Post Your Opinions About Doom (Whether Controversial or Not)

[kuchitsu]

Meh, the whole concept of cheating doesn't really make sense when it comes to single non-competitive play imo (excluding slot machines, etc). When you're alone you're not deceiving anyone so there is no point in using such words.

[VGA]

kuchitsu said:

Meh, the whole concept of cheating doesn't really make sense when it comes to single non-competitive play imo (excluding slot machines, etc). When you're alone you're not deceiving anyone so there is no point in using such words.

Well, yeah but if he is posting his experience with a wad and the others had trouble on UV ... and he posts "nah it was easy as hell, you just throw some rockets at those cells high up and the splash kills the chaingunners. Then? :D

[VGamingJunkie]

About the most it does is it allows you to directly hit things instead of relying on the randomness factor of the gun maybe doing it itself. By that same token, you could argue that making the actors not infinitely high is also cheating because it means that certain obstacles can be circumvented like the explosive barrels lining in rows on Map 17 on Plutonia and other scenarios like Perfect Hatred as the Ultimate Doom demo demonstrates.

[Arctangent]

I'd definitely argue that giving non-projectiles proper z-collisions is more cheating than freelook, because it can literally cause walls to be walk-throughable. In some maps, it can practically turn into a lesser version of no-clipping that only works on certain walls.

[Spectre01]

TheMightyHeracross said:

Unless you use freelook AND autoaim- now that's cheating.

I use both and don't consider it cheating, come at me bro! I can't imagine not playing with freelook these days. It's not like monsters have trouble attacking you vertically, they don't. If anything it puts you on even footing when there's crap shooting you from above or below that you can't see. And don't get me started on the popular platforming sections or secrets/items placed below you. If I have to jump into poison shit I'd rather know if there's a radsuit there or not before I do so.

[Fonze]

Just to clarify, are we talking free-look or free-aim here? Free-look isn't a big deal to me, but free-aim can allow the player to not only shoot otherwise unshootable monsters, but also switches that should be shot from another position. In that sense, free-aim is very much cheating, whereas free-look is about on-par with the chasecam, which is to say that it only helps in certain special situations. Also, on a somewhat related side-note, PrBoom+ 2.1.4 allows for free-look now even while recording demos; there is no way aside from activating your own free-aim while watching a demo to know if the author used it or not, as it doesn't break demo compatibility.

[scifista42]

MetroidJunkie said:

About the most it does is it allows you to directly hit things instead of relying on the randomness factor of the gun maybe doing it itself.

Freelook / free-aim / disabled autoaim doesn't cancel or anyhow influence the randomness factor of the gun itself, although your statement is correct in the case of using SSG's vertical spread for hitting switches above/below you, but only that one.

Fonze said:

In that sense, free-aim is very much cheating, whereas free-look is about on-par with the chasecam, which is to say that it only helps in certain special situations.

So does pretty much every cheat / feature / gameplay modification, that it only helps in certain special situations. :)

[june gloom]

Can't be bothered with lack of free aim. Wolfenstein 3D maybe but I'm not playing that am I? If there's an enemy above me I expect to be able to aim at it. I'll skip jumping and crouching though, that's fine.

[Doomkid]

On the topic of grnrock/marble being unfitting for the HUD when it clearly should have been stone, I agree.

I don't view freelook as cheating. It can give minor advantages here and there, but.. Hardly. Higher resolutions than 320x200 also give an advantage, but that doesn't make it cheating. I just see them as the result of source port devs not wanting the game to stagnate. There's a big gap between iddqd and aiming a little higher than usual ;)

[TheMightyHeracross]

Fonze said:

Just to clarify, are we talking free-look or free-aim here? Free-look isn't a big deal to me, but free-aim can allow the player to not only shoot otherwise unshootable monsters, but also switches that should be shot from another position. In that sense, free-aim is very much cheating, whereas free-look is about on-par with the chasecam, which is to say that it only helps in certain special situations. Also, on a somewhat related side-note, PrBoom+ 2.1.4 allows for free-look now even while recording demos; there is no way aside from activating your own free-aim while watching a demo to know if the author used it or not, as it doesn't break demo compatibility.

Huh, I totally forgot about shootable switches, actually. Fair enough point.

[VGamingJunkie]

scifista42 said:

Freelook / free-aim / disabled autoaim doesn't cancel or anyhow influence the randomness factor of the gun itself, although your statement is correct in the case of using SSG's vertical spread for hitting switches above/below you, but only that one.

How many cases of shootable switches that would be made easier with free aim? I would assume that most switches that are out of your way are almost exclusively push switches for the simple fact that you can't just use the SSG or something. The only exception I can think of off the top of my head is the switch in Tenements for that secret that you have to use a lift to activate but it's not like you're skipping over some perilous journey, it saves you maybe 3 seconds at most.

[scifista42]

MetroidJunkie said:

How many cases of shootable switches that would be made easier with free aim?

They are rare indeed - which is in compliance with the point of my post, which was that your point applies in only one possible scenario which also happens to be rare - but some mappers use them relatively frequently (Eternal and Nicolas Monti come to mind) and sometimes in such a way that could be exploited by free aim.

[Cruduxy Pegg]

There is also the icon of sin. Oh we are playing coop and you freelooked to kill it at start because timing is way too hard? In that map it is definitely cheating.

[Gez]

MetroidJunkie said:

How many cases of shootable switches that would be made easier with free aim?

There are a couple of shootable lines in Suburb that normally require you to step on stuff to shoot, which you can skip with free aim. Pretty minor overall.

scifista42 said:

They are rare indeed - which is in compliance with the point of my post, which was that your point applies in only one possible scenario which also happens to be rare - but some mappers use them relatively frequently (Eternal and Nicolas Monti come to mind) and sometimes in such a way that could be exploited by free aim.

From my playthrough of Erkattanne, it seems Monti likes to have shootable switches at the end of a long and narrow tunnel, so free aim doesn't really help: you still need to go where he wants you to go if you want to be able to get a direct line of fire with the switch, you can't "cheat" by aiming up or down.

Spoiler

At least not in ZDoom. I know in vanilla, hitscans that aren't purely horizontal will not collide with a floor or ceiling and will instead only ever be stopped by a wall, so it's possible to get to shoot a switch that you don't see this way with a super shotgun thanks to its vertical spread, but it's quite tricky to set up a contrivance demonstrating this.

Personally I have used the long tunnel approach to create a shootable switch that can only be hit with free aiming, because the tunnel is sloped. ;)

[Joshua Schäferhund]

I'd say mouse look works better with OpenGL mode than it does in software. Trying to play GZDoom without mouse look doesn't feel right. I usually have crouching and jumping disabled unless the map requires them.

[TheMightyHeracross]

Pegg said:

There is also the icon of sin. Oh we are playing coop and you freelooked to kill it at start because timing is way too hard? In that map it is definitely cheating.

I acknowledged this from the start. I turn it off for this, of course. Takes the challenge away.

[VGamingJunkie]

That's true, the Icon of Sin is one of the few cases where it's undoubtedly cheating.

[Koko Ricky]

I recall there being a shootable switch in one of Doom 64's secret maps (it grants access to one of the pentagram keys I believe). You have to get to higher ground to line up the shot, so it would definitely be cheating to do it early and bypass a chunk of the map.

[Lila Feuer]

The 20% damaging floor that randomly eats through a radsuit, fun times.

[Doomkid]

I totally forgot about shootable switches as well, actually - If freelook can allow you to 'cheat' in the current era though, the author of the WAD should probably clearly specify that freelook is not to be used. That's what I do regarding jumping and crouching in my maps, for example - Unless you tell people, what with all the choices and ways to play there are these days, they really won't have any way to know that they're cheating by using freelook.

Also yeah I always thought that radsuit getting eaten through 20% damaging floors was a bug, as a kid. Damn annoying!

[Varis Alpha]

re: freelook, since it isn't a feature in the base-game, using it for some kind of advantage like aiming far away would definitely count as cheating. however, i don't really care if it is that, nor over the jumping and crouching being disabled since i can just remove that anyway. i'm playing the game to have fun, so i use whatever i think is fun, and being able to aim better and whatnot definitely makes the game a more pleasant experience for me.

i'm fond of CC2, but i really don't care much for CC3, 4 and 1 (though that last one is a given...) CC3 is way too uneven and has lots of questionable maps in it (all of Doom2day's maps, map28 which doesn't even seem to have any music, etc), and CC4, i dunno, it just doesn't feel very memorable to me. the first few maps are pretty boring, though admittedly it gets more exciting later on. and 1, well, it has map 6 in it. plus it's kind of dated. CC2 feels really fresh though.

[40oz]

There's some really amazing art in the Creative Works section of Doomworld, but I don't see many of these guys designing TITLEPICs or INTERPICs or other backgrounds for Doom wads.

This is a crime.

Too many wads have a titlepic where its just some photo someone found on the internet or some textured background with the title of their wad printed in a cool font splashed over top. Even a black and white pencil sketch can be pretty quickly and easily digitally colored with photoshop to look like Adrian Carmack's background art in Doom. You guys need to help out.

[DoomzRules]

The lack of monster varieties and monster deaths is kinda killing me.

While I'm aware that there are countless monster variation mods and monster death mods....

I wish there was a way the two could somehow seemingly be combined, in a seamless way that would integrate monster variations with death variations.

And I don't just mean 1 or 2 monster variants no...

I mean at least 5 or 10.

But that's kinda bit of a tall order isn't it?

Meh, that's just my controversial opinion about Doom... not enough monster varieties, not enough death varieties, and not enough gore in my humble opinion.... I'm not even asking for Brutal level, but more akin to the unused sprites that John Romero posted on his Twitter feed.

Something a bit realistic would have been nice....

[Chezza]

DoomzRules said:

not enough monster varieties, not enough death varieties, and not enough gore in my humble opinion.

I'm all for lots of death animations, some more varieties and gore just like you however I think it wasn't possible back then.

Having a large number of death variety on multiple or all monsters would have been that much more work that could of put them off the idea on its own however I do believe they were pushing for room as well. They couldn't add unlimited sprites and sounds without consequence.

[DoomzRules]

Chezza said:

I'm all for lots of death animations, some more varieties and gore just like you however I think it wasn't possible back then.

Having a large number of death variety on multiple or all monsters would have been that much more work that could of put them off the idea on its own however I do believe they were pushing for room as well. They couldn't add unlimited sprites and sounds without consequence.

Yeah I mean it is '93 we were talking about.... I guess they couldn't really fit all of that on a floppy disk back in the day.

Oh and in terms of gore, I really loved the gore that they had in mind.

[Koko Ricky]

Cyanosis said:

The 20% damaging floor that randomly eats through a radsuit, fun times.

Whoa, I don't think I've encountered this, how often does it happen?

[june gloom]

As far as IOS, while I use free-look I try to at least stay true to the spirit of the map by getting on the platform before chucking rockets. It's ultimately down to the player to play the game the way it's supposed to be played -- why spoil your own fun?

[Varis Alpha]

GoatLord said:

Whoa, I don't think I've encountered this, how often does it happen?

at least enough to be annoying in certain levels (scroll down for "leaky radiation suits.) http://doomwiki.org/wiki/Damaging_floor

it doesn't happen all that often since most PWAD authors don't seem to use the highest possible damage floor in conjunction with putting radsuits to run across it. the only time i remember it being a major issue was in Town Infection's map 02, where you have to swim through an entire level with the super hellslime property. that... was not a very good design-choice at all.

[VGamingJunkie]

So it never really happens in the Vanilla levels, explains why I never experienced it.

[Li'l devil]

Oh, yeah, I remember playing Doom E3M6, where the area is surrounded by 20% damaging lava. I was in radsuit and running across the lava, looking for secrets and wondering why the hell am I occasionally receiving damage.