Post Your Opinions About Doom (Whether Controversial or Not)

[I Drink Lava]

41 minutes ago, Arrowhead said:

Bobby Prince's best work was NOT  on Doom or Doom 2, but instead, DemonStar.

 

I agree, except I think his best work is in Rise of the Triad and Duke Nukem 3D. There are a lot of choices in Doom II that outright baffle me and make me hate playing episodes or megawads that don't have custom music. I can only assume he was under a strict deadline for Doom II's OST or something.

 

Doom: The Lost Episode has some DemonStar tracks in it.

[Arrowhead]

13 minutes ago, I Drink Lava said:

"...and make me hate playing episodes or megawads that don't have custom music. I can only assume he was under a strict deadline for Doom II's OST or something."

Have you ever heard of the mod 'Jimmy's Jukebox'? Lets you make a customized playlist of MIDIs for any megaWAD you want.

 

The original download link is long dead, but you can still get it via this 'wayback machine' link:

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20160507103513/http://jimmy.the-powerhouse.net/WAD/j-jukebox-v9.zip

 

Should help you not have to hear D_RUNNIN all the time! :)

 

I can see where you're coming from w/ the comment about ROTT and Duke3D being his best work. I can see that argument, I was just considering DemonStar his best work, because I think its his best work composed entirely by Bobby. ROTT and Duke3D also had Lee Jackson alongside if I remember correctly. Both are amazing MIDI works in their own regards, I was just trying to pick something solely by Bobby Prince. :)

[MajorRawne]

Oops, I didn't realise Bobby Prince worked on the ROTT soundtrack. It's unimaginably better than his work on Doom and for the first time ever I can count myself a fan! What a weird day.

 

That said, the Ultimate Doom soundtrack is miles better than Doom 2. I have a lot of affection for the episode 1 music in particular. The problem is when you put it in a wider context, it doesn't sound as good as other games from that time period eg Duke Nukem, Alien Trilogy etc. Quake 2 blows it totally out of the water.

[ReaperAA]

10 hours ago, Arrowhead said:

Bobby Prince's best work was NOT  on Doom or Doom 2, but instead, DemonStar.

 

It's nice to see someone remember this (almost forgotten) SHMUP game.

 

And also I agree that Bobby Prince did a better job there than in Doom.

[Kyka]

Sandy Petersen is a creative genius. To have come up with such interesting concepts and set pieces throughout Doom 2's development requires a remarkable mind. He wasn't just copying and rehashing everything that had gone before, because nothing like Doom had gone before. Really quite a visionary.

 

Fight me.

[out_of_service]

21 hours ago, TheMightyHeracross said:

I don't understand the Unholy Cathedral hate. Once you figure out that the glowing teleporter stands out from the other three, it's not hard at all to figure the map out. And it has one of the coolest aesthetics in the original Doom.

Another fan of Unholy Cathedral?! 

 

*High fives!*

[MajorRawne]

Sandy Petersen levels IMO (everyone feel free to list your own opinions):

 

E1M8: Phobos Anomaly - good

E2M1: Deimos Anomaly - not bad

E2M2: Containment Area - good but a bit long

E2M3: Refinery - boring

E2M4: Deimos Lab - good but a bit long

E2M5: Command Center - good but a bit long

E2M6: Halls of the Damned - ok

E2M7: Spawning Vats (**) - really like this one

E2M8: Tower of Babel - legendary status but not exactly much replay value

E2M9: Fortress of Mystery - pointlessly crap

E3M1: Hell Keep (**) - PSX exclusive map is 1000x better

E3M2: Slough of Despair (*) - crap

E3M3: Pandemonium - surprisingly good exploration map

E3M4: House of Pain - boring

E3M5: Unholy Cathedral - atrocious, too long and confusing to navigate, boring gameplay

E3M6: Mt. Erebus - again, too long and boring

E3M7: Limbo - confusing progression and boring, but terrific atmosphere

E3M8: Dis (*) - rubbish

E3M9: Warrens (*) - meh

MAP01: Entryway - really good

MAP07: Dead Simple - really good, legendary

MAP08: Tricks and Traps - excellent concept

MAP09: The Pit - too long and boring

MAP10: Refueling Base - absolutely superlative on co-op if both players take different routes

MAP12: The Factory - too long and boring but a really nice concept with good atmosphere

MAP13: Downtown (*) - don't know it well/find it overrated

MAP16: Suburbs - superb

MAP18: The Courtyard - superb

MAP19: The Citadel - an absolute shocker, too long, too boring, too convoluted

MAP21: Nirvana - always loved this one, view it with affection for its weirdness

MAP23: Barrels o' Fun - ok but a bit long

MAP24: The Chasm (*) - makes The Citadel look like Mishri Halek, the worst map in all of classic Doom?

MAP27: Monster Condo - too long and boring

MAP28: The Spirit World (*) - loo long and boring, progression is convoluted/confusing

MAP30: Icon of Sin (*) - rubbish but "Iconic"

MAP31: Wolfenstein § (*) - rubbish, what a waste

MAP32: Grosse § (*) - rubbish, even more of a waste

 

Summary: He made some absolutely legendary maps, some absolutely terrible maps, but "too long and boring" or "too long and convoluted" crop up quite a bit. Far from a terrible designer but not really a patch on Romero, he can best be described as "the workhorse with big ideas that didn't all pan out". Very surprised he didn't make Industrial Zone which is definitely his style. It's interesting that many of his maps were either cut out or replaced for PSX Doom, and I would definitely say PSX Doom 2 is superior to the original. Nearly a third of Sandy's maps didn't make it.

 

(*) - cut from PSX port; (**) - map replaced on PSX port

Edited June 18, 2021 by MajorRawne

[out_of_service]

56 minutes ago, MajorRawne said:

Sandy Petersen levels IMO (everyone feel free to list your own opinions):

The only Sandy Petsersen levels I dislike are Refinery/House of Pain/Dis/Tricks and Traps/Factory/Downtown/Suburbs/Nirvana. They're not bad in of themselves, they're just lacking. Taking into consideration the amount of work and the time window, he really had to make a mad scramble to meet those deadlines.

[DisgruntledPorcupine]

More of a habit which I'm curious as to how common it is, but despite pretty much always running in Doom, I do not turn always run (ie. caps lock) on. I find it more satisfying to be holding down the shift key as I'm moving.

[out_of_service]

5 minutes ago, DisgruntledPorcupine said:

More of a habit which I'm curious as to how common it is, but despite pretty much always running in Doom, I do not turn always run (ie. caps lock) on. I find it more satisfying to be holding down the shift key as I'm moving.

Same here! 

[MajorRawne]

1 hour ago, PSXDoomer said:

Same here! 

Probably cos on the PSX you have to hold the run button down all the time =D

 

Been so long since I played Doom on an actual PSX that I forgot about it until now.

 

We should make an "Upgraded Sandy Petersen maps" megawad. DTWSD, except we make them not so long and not very boring!

[Scypek2]

2 hours ago, DisgruntledPorcupine said:

More of a habit which I'm curious as to how common it is, but despite pretty much always running in Doom, I do not turn always run (ie. caps lock) on. I find it more satisfying to be holding down the shift key as I'm moving.

 

THAT'S WHAT I DO WITH TYPING. IF YOU'RE NOT PASSIONATE ENOUGH TO HOLD SHIFT THE WHOLE TIME, YOU HAVEN'T TRULY EARNED YOUR RIGHT TO USE ALL CAPS.

[out_of_service]

14 minutes ago, Scypek2 said:

 

THAT'S WHAT I DO WITH TYPING. IF YOU'RE NOT PASSIONATE ENOUGH TO HOLD SHIFT THE WHOLE TIME, YOU HAVEN'T TRULY EARNED YOUR RIGHT TO USE ALL CAPS.

WOW! That's passionate.

[Cruduxy Pegg]

Newer games should revert to the classic tracer BFG instead of the boring instawin tendril BFGs.

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

8 hours ago, MajorRawne said:

Sandy Petersen levels IMO (everyone feel free to list your own opinions)

I actually like all of sandy's levels (but the chasm)

[Wavy]

16 hours ago, bLOCKbOYgAMES said:

Sandy Petersen is a creative genius. To have come up with such interesting concepts and set pieces throughout Doom 2's development requires a remarkable mind. He wasn't just copying and rehashing everything that had gone before, because nothing like Doom had gone before. Really quite a visionary.

 

Fight me.

Though I wasn't really a big fan of Doom 2's maps I can say that Sandy's maps were certainly very creative.

 

Can't fight facts! ;)

 

On 6/18/2021 at 3:33 AM, TheMightyHeracross said:

I don't understand the Unholy Cathedral hate. Once you figure out that the glowing teleporter stands out from the other three, it's not hard at all to figure the map out. And it has one of the coolest aesthetics in the original Doom.

Agreed. I thought Unholy Cathedral was alright and was one of the better maps from episode 3. I find it better than E3M6 TBH (is that controversial?)

[Gez]

16 hours ago, MajorRawne said:

Far from a terrible designer but not really a patch on Romero, he can best be described as "the workhorse with big ideas that didn't all pan out". Very surprised he didn't make Industrial Zone which is definitely his style.

Yeah, that's the thing. He's been very creative and experimental, exploring various aspects and potentialities of Doom's gameplay. So, not every single of these experiments were successful (take Fortress of Mystery which you find crap, it was the first map designed around the concept of inciting infighting), but many of them were, and he's been incredibly influential because he blazed all these new trails that other people have followed later, as you note with Industrial Zone being made by Romero applying a formula created by Petersen.

 

When you remember the time crunch he was on (which probably explains the lack of polish, remember he wasn't using Doom Builder 2 back then), his work is pretty impressive, even if many of his maps were first started by Tom Hall (E1M8, E2M1 to E2M4, E2M7, E3M3, E3M7, MAP10).

 

And to be honest, on the whole, I think Doom is better off having some creative maps that didn't entirely pan out than just being a cookie-cutter collection of levels all following the same rote formula, even if they were all good. It's kind of like the Plutonia vs. TNT debate. Plutonia is qualitatively better, but it's kind of like 30 times the same round brown symmetrical map with chaingunners and revenant. They all kinda fade into a blur to me, Hunted and Go 2 It excepted. TNT has a lot of stinkers but the levels are so much more distinctive and varied.

[Megarop]

A lot of the levels in Doom 1 and 2 barely give you any ammo.

Edited June 24, 2021 by Megarop

[roadworx]

1 hour ago, Megarop said:

A lot of the levels in Doom 1 and 2 barely give you any ammo.

?

 

i remember having plenty of ammo, you sure it's not you having bad aim?

[Megarop]

29 minutes ago, roadworx said:

?

 

i remember having plenty of ammo, you sure it's not you having bad aim?

I don't know if it's a secret I'm missing or I keep doing the rooms in the wrong order or what but I just don't know how people can go through Tricks and Traps or The Pit without thinking they aren't getting much ammo. It feels like i'm taking crazy pills because nobody i've seen talking about those levels even mentions it.

 

Also, if you don't find the secrets that give you more shells in The Focus you only get, like, the exact minimum amount of ammo you could theoretically use to kill all the enemies. I tried intentionally not getting the secrets on it once and I finished with a single shell left or something like that.

Edited June 24, 2021 by Megarop

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

1 hour ago, Megarop said:

A lot of the levels in Doom 1 and 2 barely give you any ammo.

That's why the fists and chainsaw are there

[roadworx]

9 minutes ago, Megarop said:

I don't know if it's a secret I'm missing or I keep doing the rooms in the wrong order or what but I just don't know how people can go through Tricks and Traps or The Pit without thinking they aren't getting much ammo. It feels like i'm taking crazy pills because nobody i've seen talking about those levels even mentions it.

 

Also, if you don't find the secrets that give you more shells in The Focus you only get, like, the exact minimum amount of ammo you could theoretically use to kill all the enemies. I tried intentionally not getting the secrets on it once and I seriously finished with a single shot left or something like that.

i'm assuming you're pistol-starting then

 

i just played through the focus without secrets and yeah, it has barely enough ammo to deal with everything. however, the secrets are fairly obvious, with the most obvious one giving you 20 shells and an ssg, so it really isn't all that bad. they should've put more ammo outside secrets, yeah, but again, they're obvious enough that you won't have much of a problem finding those secrets in the first place.

 

however, i just played through both tricks and traps and the pit and i found myself having more than enough ammo, so idk what your problem is with those. do you not use the berserk pack or utilize infighting whatsoever?

[Shepardus]

2 hours ago, Megarop said:

A lot of the levels in Doom 1 and 2 barely give you any ammo.

I remember the first time I played through Ultimate Doom, I had some major ammo issues in Episode 2, and even took to running mostly pacifist through E2M4 to conserve ammo. I didn't know at the time that berserk lasts the whole level, so I'm sure I wasted a lot of ammo in E2M2 and others. A lot of the resources are placed in secrets that I bet I missed, too. If you take advantage of everything the map offers, you should have plenty of ammo, but if not you can definitely get into some tight situations.

 

Tricks and Traps and The Pit are both fairly dependent on the order in which you approach them, if you're pistol-starting. Obtaining and efficiently using power weapons (namely the rocket launcher and BFG) goes a long way. It's easy to get tempted into wasting shotgun shells on the mid and high tier monsters near the beginning of The Pit when it's better to let them infight and work your way toward the BFG and rocket launcher.

 

Edit: Also, for The Pit, I'd recommend playing on a source port that supports the vanilla lost soul limit if you aren't already doing so. There's enough lost souls in the level that the pain elementals are harmless until you've gone through a bunch of them, which saves a lot of ammo (and annoyance).

Edited June 24, 2021 by Shepardus

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

1 hour ago, Megarop said:

I keep doing the rooms in the wrong order

I generally use the route that BigMacdavis shows on his walkthrough, even when I pistol start, and, even though I run out of ammo, I can use the fist since the map gives you two berserk packs if you know where to look. (I'm talking about The Pit, played on Hurt Me Plenty) I generally finish the map with a decent amount of ammunition. Here it is if you're interested.

 

Edited June 24, 2021 by Lol 6

[Li'l devil]

Doom is controversial.

[out_of_service]

19 minutes ago, Li'l devil said:

Doom is controversial.

Hey simmer down!

[BeefGee]

classic singleplayer doomguy is a canonically different person to the 2016/eternal singleplayer doomguy.

 

the classic doomguy you play as in single player wears indigo armour. In Doom2016/eternal your armour is green. Therefore, in 2016/eternal you play as multiplayer classic doomguy AKA one of singleplayer classic doomguy's buddies.

[Gez]

24 minutes ago, BeefGee said:

the classic doomguy you play as in single player wears indigo armour.

No.

 

Player 1 is green. Indigo (actually gray) is player 2, player 3 is brown, and player 4 is red. In single-player, you are player 1.

 

And yes, indigo is gray. It's only called indigo because multiplayer chat allows to talk to a specific player by using their color initial, GIBR, and obviously since G is taken by player 1, player 2 had to have a color name other than gray. Or other than Black, because there's Brown.

Edited June 24, 2021 by Gez

[BeefGee]

10 hours ago, Gez said:

No.

 

Player 1 is green. Indigo (actually gray) is player 2, player 3 is brown, and player 4 is red. In single-player, you are player 1.

 

And yes, indigo is gray. It's only called indigo because multiplayer chat allows to talk to a specific player by using their color initial, GIBR, and obviously since G is taken by player 1, player 2 had to have a color name other than gray. Or other than Black, because there's Brown.

 

I agree with everything you've said regarding multiplayer.

 

However, what I'm saying is that in singleplayer, from a purely story perspective - not a technical perspective, you're the same marine as 'player 2' in multiplayer modes.

 

The colour behind doomguy's face corresponds to their armour colour. Guess what colour is behind you in singleplayer? The same colour that player 2 gets in multiplayer (called indigo, but sure it is gray looking. idc what you call it. It's not green).

 

You never get a third person perspective of yourself in singleplayer (in vanilla anyway, which is where canon derives from) so there's no other indication of armour colour except on the status bar.

 

Now, I know you could say 'oh, thats just a graphic design choice, that mechanic doesn't apply to singleplayer because the green background stood out too much' but then why not use a softer green? or just make player 1 the gray marine?

 

Even if they didn't mean it they accidentally made it canon.

[jazzmaster9]

1 hour ago, BeefGee said:

Even if they didn't mean it they accidentally made it canon.

This is not even a "controversial opinion" this is just outright wrong.

All the Promotional Art that came with Doom had the his Armor green, the Title Screen has him in Green Armor, all official merch had him in green armor. It's Green.

the color system in the HUD is for multiplayer ONLY and thats it. same with how FRAGS is for multiplayer.

the fact that you had to go through multiple mental gymnastics to make it "Indigo" just means its not the answer.

 

ofcourse you can ask John Romero, but everyone already knows the answer.

Edited June 25, 2021 by jazzmaster9