The DWmegawad Club plays: Bloodstain

[Aquanet]

MAP25: Disciples of Babel

This is like Bloodstain Deluxe Edition. So many memorable spaces and small touches. Both of the BFG rooms are great, and the theme-ing from fortress to hellish to flesh and whatever is seamless. I love those drop shafts. Only in a couple spots did the overstuffing problems present themselves, and that's in a very large level. The sewers are filled with some rather obstructionist spectres, but that's small potatoes. The sense of scale and architecture is great and tickles the awe bone. I made a mistake in vowing to kill most of the cybers, and so they seemed repetitive, even in HMP (not sure though if UV has more). The final showdown is about right on the difficulty scale, judging by me getting through it without a tremendous amount of difficulty. The stairs were a bit narrow leading up and around the outermost ring of walkways and platforms, maybe 32 texels or less, not sure, and I kept getting hung up and dying in a blaze of afrit fire.

Pipicz says in bstainfo.txt, "I wanted this map to be hellish but completely without the traditional use of ROCKRED texture. It had worked out really well in my opinion."

[Linguica]

+++ the Brutal Doom megawad. Why are you avoiding it??

[joe-ilya]

MAP23
Funnest map so far, the monster usage here is more purposeful than many other maps here and the claustrophobic layout makes sense here.
The secrets can dare you to go through a horde of monsters without having to stand from afar, especially the BFG secret.
I didn't mind the symmetricity this time, here it serves as an escape route rather than some boring camping site, I liked the speedrunning likeability in this map too.
All in all, a solid map.
5/5

[Spectre01]

Map 26: The Corrupted Mill Casual UV-Max (~31 min)

After the magnum opus that was Map 25 comes the most dickish map yet. "Where the hell do I go?" while getting lit up by an Archvile seconds after loading the map start? Check. Forced Berserk play in the sewers against annoyingly positioned enemies? Yep. Swift death hitscanner ambushes Straight Outta Plutonia™? Uhuh. Four Cyberdemons instapopping in your face at the end? That's what you get for going for the BFG before the Invul dumbass! Speaking of Plutonia, the latter half seems to draw quite a bit of inspiration from map04, Caged.

Having said that, I still like this map. You can actually grab some weapons early on instead of fisting through the sewers, with a secret Plasma Gun and Rocket Launcher in the shitscan ambush near the SSG. Also, the starting area with all the tree sprites against the blackened sky looks pretty damn cool and telefragging those Viles is satisfying too. The caged area that you can access after quickly grabbing the 3 keys is a bit annoying, I admit. Now I haven't tried anything crazy, like speedrunning to the BFG and waking everything up, but the regular approach requires carefully paying attention to the surroundings and making sure you don't get caught in Chaingunner, Revenant or Mancubus crossfire, which can be tricky since they are everywhere man! Taking refuge from the cage snipers in one of the side rooms causes a mass Revenant warp-in as well with no blocking lines to protect you.

There are some cleverly positioned Archviles that will keep reviving the Z-Sec overlooking the exit switch unless you take 'em out topside after cheesing the Mastermind. Like in the previous map, the Cyber Surprise™ with a sparkle of Afrits is mitigated by the Invulnerability Sphere and plenty of nearby cells, so you can feel like a big man as you hold fire and mow down some bosses.

Edit: Demo wasn't as bad to record as I was expecting, aside from the initial sewer part because I can't punch in not-ZDoom ports. Ended up pretty long though.

[Nine Inch Heels]

MAP25: Disciples of Babel

UV:100% - 4/5

One of the rare occasions I will actually post in this thread. This level is gorgeous to look at, it presents a nice mix of themes, but aside of few situations it is to easy for its spot in the set, and leans more towards tedious than it should have. It was a map I highly appreciated, but looking at it once again, I have a couple things to moan about.

Monsterblocklines are being used aplenty in this level, and, at times, unfortunately in a way that is just beyond my comprehension. The Blue key ambush serves as a prime example. You know somehting will teleport in once you grab the BK, because that's how DOOM works, so you have an exit route in mind. I snatched the key, ran out, nothing followed me. On my way out I seem to have instigated some decent infighting, and the whole BK ambush could be finished with a few SSG blasts. A major blunder in my book. If you're gonna lock monsters in, lock the player in as well, especially if the monster-composition is so prone to infighting (I still had the mastermind there as well, though).

Other things to mention are the usual meat doors (at times smaller packs, at times bigger game), as well as the to'n'fro hitscanners <-> Revenants. A bit annoying during the opening, but less of a concern later on. Some Afrits seem oddly placed, but that might just be my personal preference.

The ammo distribution is well suited, though I would have liked some more rockets early on. But I always like more rockets, so maybe that's just me again.

Sticking to Joe's convenient rating system I'd say:
3.5 / 5

MAP26: Haunted Mill

UV: 68% (I just did not bother) 3/I forgot how many there were in total

An unfriendly opening coupled with the possibility to AV-jump-snatch the BK, but with little reason to do so, unless you want to run the map pacifist mode, and even then it's probably pointless to try. So, off we go for some Tyson/SSG/Chaingun clean-up-detail in the lower areas. Not my cup of tea, especially when thinking about the flesh walls (this time demons). Throw in some corridor rocket pumping, the usual hitscanner-lockdowns, and some Cybies which are just wasted because of the invul nearby, and you have a fairly average map with an annoying MIDI-tune.

2.5 / 5

As far as voting goes:

+++ Speed of DOOM
+++ Swift death

[joe-ilya]

MAP24
Feels like a scythe map, considering it's length, it's enemy placement and it's interpretation of hell.
The only time you need to shoot is in those narrow caves and at the end with the revenant reveal and the BFG makes it way too easy, you'll spend a couple of seconds there before you exit the map.
This map's not too cluttered and isn't repetitive, most likely because it's the shortest map in this wad, I still like it, it's even better than the last map.

5/5

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP26 The Corrupted Mill

These are the Nintendo Hard type of pistol start that I can't understand. Run from the enemies, get a berserk which has it's marginal uses until you get the rest of the weapons. I do like the room they are in though, as it's in some sort of Industrial Zone-like room where things are revealed as you go. I also get two keys, and later telefrag the arch-viles while getting the blue key. Big fucking deal. It's a luckfest just to AVOID damage when running from them in an open field, and that's what I always try to do whenever I have that kind of situation, regardless of the possibilities. On the other hand, whoa I got all three keys and didn't even realize it.

Lots of traps in the area that follows, and most of it sniper-related. I get the rest of the weapons soon enough, with a BFG helping against two cybers, a spiderdemon, a couple of afrits, and the rest of the idiots. A really rough level.

[dobu gabu maru]

When you add the "+++" before your vote, please don't add another one after it. Also, looks like Alien Vendetta is going to be the winner, so I might have to get off my ass and play that one :P

Or we could always go for the Brutal Doom megawad. Just sayin'.

[Voros]

Or Chezza's +++Operation UAC BD megawad. Or maybe some other day.

[baja blast rd.]

Casual playthough of the silly Dead Simple map I made inspired by DotW's running distaste for them. Strategies are not optimal obv. The last pinky has too much HP to actually be killed, but I fought it a bit just for the video.

Hmm, for some reason the music (Erkatane map02) isn't playing.

[Aquanet]

Jumping on the bandwagon

+++Alien Vendetta

It would put a dent in Classics I Have Not Played

[Spectre01]

rdwpa said:

Casual playthough of the silly Dead Simple map I made inspired by DotW's running distaste for them.

Where's the DL link for this masterpiece? I'm mostly interested in seeing how the monster edits were done.

[baja blast rd.]

:D

http://www.mediafire.com/download/tuwxfs4g6mxdafj/deadstupid.wad

Dehacked lump is in the wad.

[Linguica]

dobu gabu maru said:

Or we could always go for the Brutal Doom megawad. Just sayin'.

I'm actually quite serious BTW. It's almost certainly the most-played megawad of the last X years and deserves a critical eye.

[baja blast rd.]

If that gets some traction and Estranged doesn't, I'll hop on the bandwagon.

[Spectre01]

The BD Hell on Earth wad is pretty damn good. There's really nothing quite like it. I believe Mark said he wasn't happy with the last 10 maps though, so there may be a new version some time in the future. If people want to play it, I'll +++ it though.

[Aquanet]

MAP26: The Corrupted Mill

I like how this feels like two different concepts mated into a weird Frankenstein level. The blue door looks so unassuming, and holy Plutonia flashback. What I don't like about the second half is how it exists to be skipped over. You'd think with the Caged corridors and weapons and health kits and everything it would be worth hunkering down, but a couple switches, an invul, some BFG spam and you can skate right to the exit. This is a legitimate way to design a level, but it seemed like the wrong note after the opening. All kinds of chaingunners near and far, auto-refreshing z-sec turrents, etc., make exploration just not worth it. What I thought to be a tiny level all of a sudden explodes ... but nah nevermind I'll just hop over the mastermind and save those cells for another day.

[Magnusblitz]

MAP26: The Corrupted Mill
88% kills, 2/4 secrets

And right after a great map comes one which quickly squanders my good will. Die at least once to the AV turrets while I'm figuring out what's what, then drop into the sewers and oy vey. I must've died 20-30 times here trying to punch stuff... I love berserking things but I absolutely detest trying to punch revenants, as they've got a very quick melee attack and those goddamn rockets can do up to 80 damage. Things get better when you finally get your weapons back, and I liked the sequence up to grabbing the blue key (though I did wish I had known about the telefrags for the Viles before wasting my rockets on them). The blue door ambush is a dud since it's easy to retreat back behind the blue door. The final area wore me down, just didn't seem like enough health or ammo, so I eventually ended up doing what Aquanet did and just made a mad rush for the BFG/invuln and blasted my way outta there.

[Spectre01]

Map 27: Slaughterworks Inc.® Demo

Heh heh, a map 27 in a modern megawad called Slaughterworks? What is this, some kind of 2k monster BFG spam fest or something? Well, no actually. The starting monster count doesn't break 400 so it's not a slaughtermap. Then why the name? Because it's the hardest map so far and you're not the one doing the slaughtering, quite the other way around.

I'm gonna say it right away, this map is hard on UV-Pistol Start. Especially the final encounter, which is why I'm not even gonna bother recording a demo. Both the traps and enemy placement is brutal at every step and it certainly drives the atmosphere Pipicz was going for with this map. The aesthetic is quite original, and follows the metallic second half of the previous map. This is a dark, demonic factory with a strong industrial theme along with gore-filled chambers that give the map its name. It's all very grim, especially the final area.

Pipicz doesn't mess around with the gameplay either. The only safe-space you get is the Industrial Zone-like starting tower, but even then, standing too close to the window puts you in range of rocket splash damage. There are 2 well-placed caged Cybers that threaten the opposite sides of the outdoor area. You can kill them, but the plasma necessary to do that is found later. If that wasn't enough, there are two Barons in cages on each side that can hit you where the Cyber cannot, as well as a variety of nasty hitscanners. You get the Plasma Rifle as your first real weapon, which springs a nice Rev+Vile trap to practice on. The following section is quite amusing, as you get access to a teleporter leading to the Cyber cage nearby. You can run in there, flip the switch and get out, although my success rate was below 20% and the potential infighting possibilities aren't huge. It's better to run back out, pump him with the 200 or so cells I had left and then access his room, which refunds you 2 cell packs. Good idea to use that point to snipe some Shitgunners in the building across.

The map has a really tight balance of supplies so your shots really need to count. I ended up running out of shells in the 2nd half and used mostly rockets and the BFG. Oh, and you better not miss that sunovabitch because Lawd have mercy if you do. I also spent around half the map with no armour after taking some hits. And some of the sections are not reasonably doable with under 100HP and no armour. There's a very hectic fight in the lava flow underground past the yellow door, which I luckily saved an Invul Sphere for. Anyways, pain and suffering follows until you're able to enter the final arena.

Now at this point you see that there are 20 or so monsters left, so what's the worst that could happen? But wait, there are monster corpses all over the ground. There's no way Pipicz is gonna warp in 20 Archviles at a rapid fire pace in different sectors of the room is he? I mean, that would be quite dickish right? Well yes, and it's a pretty damn hard encounter. Having played this map twice before, I knew what to expect and luckily cleared it after a few attempts, but the first time I played I must've been stuck on that section for a good half-hour or so. It's definitely one of those "How the hell am I supposed to beat this?" parts that I rarely see outside of Ribbiks' wads. I remember reading before that you need to make each BFG blast count, and that's absolutely correct. Failing to efficiently kill the Archviles as they spawn in at any point in the fight will lead to getting mauled by revived demons or roasted from enough directions that no cover will protect you. Now that I think about it, that last part was quite the Slaughterworks. Har har, I'm done.

Good map though.

[gaspe]

The Hell on Earth starter pack is somewhow notable only becuase it's the brutal Doom megawad, apart from that it's a rather mediocre wad overall.

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP27 Slaughterworks

Would it say so right on the tin? Yes I'd say so. Enough meat to last yet have fun slaughtering. Let's just say the map got pretty easy the time I found the BFG secret. You'd think those invulnerabilities would be more useful apart from cyberdemon killing in cages as well. Both sides of the map are pretty cool, the right one was quite interconnected well. The ending segment is one of those "archvile awakening" ones where the enemies have been vapored by barrels and resurrected. Done well in how the archies don't all come at once (that would piss me off greatly) but then again a bit of memorization was needed for a perfect play here, and even then those guys manage to resurrect at least one mid-tier monster no matter what. A lot of barons for this map, I forgot to mention.

[joe-ilya]

MAP25
Lame map, and the extreme length doesn't do it much justice.
I don't have much else to say except that the ending is the worst thing ever, there's not enough time to kill most of the arch-viles before your invulnerability wears off.
There's no way I'm going to replay this map just to win it in one sitting.

0/5

[Spectre01]

gaspe said:

The Hell on Earth starter pack is somewhow notable only becuase it's the brutal Doom megawad, apart from that it's a rather mediocre wad overall.

Them fightin' words m8. Why is it mediocre, aside from maybe maps 21-30 not living up to the previous chapters? And even then, they're still better than a lot of other PWAD E3's.

joe-ilya said:

Lame map, and the extreme length doesn't do it much justice.
I don't have much else to say except that the ending is the worst thing ever, there's not enough time to kill most of the arch-viles before your invulnerability wears off.
There's no way I'm going to replay this map just to win it in one sitting.

0/5

Sounds like you just don't like long maps. Also, you can kill most/all of the Archviles before the Invul runs out by shooting more from the central part instead of hugging the walls and killing other demons. You're gonna love the ending of map 27 too. :P

[Aquanet]

MAP27: Slaughterworks

Probably the only map so far I've strongly disliked. The middle 2/3 is essentially a big long narrow corridor with hardmode encounter after hardmode encounter and not much ammo. On HMP, there was a notably scarce amount of rockets. Visually there's still some cool stuff, including out in the more spacious buildings area that starts the level. I was only able to beat the final slaughter piece by first figuring out the switch sequence in god mode. I like the atmosphere, but too much of figuring out the level felt like trial and error in spaces that left scarce room to do much of anything. Also, somewhat humorously, somewhat annoyingly, the ghost of Plutonia seems to be rising with MAP26's architecture and the general use of long-distance chaingunners and above-average-intensity chaingun traps. Also the z-sec guys sure can snipe.

[Magnusblitz]

MAP27: Slaughterworks
99% kills, 2/4 secrets

Yeah, this map is a real murderous asshole of a level. This is one of those maps where the odds are stacked against you from the get-go, and you'll have to scratch and claw for every little piece of real estate. Sorta like Scythe MAP30 except without the 500-large revenant swarms. I wasn't prepared for this from the get-go, which put me in a bit of a bad mood, honestly... but even accepting it for what it is, there's still some problematic parts. I'd be really surprised if anyone can actually finish this without dying on a blind first attempt. The first bullshit part is the blind teleporter to the first cyberdemon (which can get you instantly splattered if he's facing it), the next is the ambush right after the yellow door (yes, please squeeze me in with all these chaingunners!), and the next one is the spider fight, which happily instapops some monsters right in front of you in a tiny corridor and instalocks the doorway behind you. I went into this with about 50 health and no armor, and it was not fun trying to get through that while hoping the spider would just decide to not shoot me over the ledge from below. There's quite a few spots in this map that can only really be dealt with by having the plasma gun out and making a mad dash.

On top of it all, resources are very scarce... I actually ran completely out of ammo and still had four barons sitting on top of the red key to kill (and they're stuck there, so good luck). After wall-humping around I was lucky enough to find some rockets and a blue armor... others have discussed how needing to find secrets is acceptable gameplay, and while I can sorta see this argument when the secret is fairly obvious, but this one wasn't pretty subtly hidden (not to mention I was playing continuous, so I actually already had more ammo than I should've started with... not much given the nature of last level, but still).

At least the level ends on a positive note, I'm a big fan of the corpse pile/AV fight at the end. It's tough, yeah, and required quite a bit of reloading/brute forcing for me to get through it, but I still had fun. I'm just a sucker for Viles as resurrecters I guess.

EDIT: Two other quick things I forgot to mention. One, I love the music track, great remix of the original tune. Two, having the first door have the same red light trim as the actual red door is an uncharacteristic misstep.

[joe-ilya]

MAP26
Punching here is awkward, the revenants and the small enemies work fine here, but punching the hell knights in the little cages while the mancubus pumps lead at you isn't the best of decision in mapping I've seen.
It all gets back to normal when you get the weaponary and then the BFG. You can easily exit the map before the invulnerability runs out.

1/5

[Spectre01]

Map 28: Descent into Madness Demo

Yeah, recording a UV-Max for this would indeed be the map title. If you thought Slaughterworks was hard than this is keyboard smashing levels of difficulty on Pistol Start. I remember in the original thread, Pipicz was worried the wad's too easy after Sunlust's release, but this final stretch is proving otherwise. Took me 50 minutes to full clear/get all the secrets and countless deaths. And I loved every minute of it!

I think someone mentioned ammo starvation, but I found it more lenient than Map 27 in that regard. There are 8 secrets here and I managed to find them all while playing, which definitely helped. Even still, this map is absolutely punishing when it comes to health and armour. If you happen to drop from 200/200 to 66/66 or something after a bad fight, you might as well hit that F9 key. Now, as far as mandatory secrets go, the red key, and subsequently the BFG it unlocks is probably the only one required for progression. You still grab it at the very end though, and now that I think about it, the last two fights could probably be done without it although I sure as hell ain't trying it. Getting that red key is quite obscure though and I probably didn't even use the intended way to grab it. I fell through the edge of the 3D floor up top at the perfect angle to land on the ledge below.

Now let's rewind back to the start, because it's worth mentioning. The first weapon you grab, and your core weapon with plenty of ammo for it is actually the Plasma Rifle. This means the map doesn't have to start with you fighting weak shit with a Shotgun or speedrunning past monsters to arm yourself. Giving the PR right away allows Pipicz to kick off with the big boy encounters, which works really well in my opinion. Right away you're faced with a Mastermind, Cacoswarm and some really well placed Revenants that you don't want to waste ammo on, but make your life difficult if you ignore them. There is no Archvile shortage here from the get-go, with pairs following monster groups being frequent. Assuming you know how aggro works and you don't over-aggro you can probably wake them up in singles though. There is no aggro reset if you pull two of them though. I love the hardmode trap during the first lift switch with two Barons blocking you and Chaingunners/Mastermind through the wall hole in front of you. You die in one second if you don't plasma the hell out of one of the Barons and manage to break through. This type of punishing gameplay scattered throughout the map works perfectly with the atmosphere that's going on. The Descent into Madness doesn't only affect the Doomguy here. It's one of those cases like in the Souls games where difficulty is used to create atmosphere. You can make the the most hellish designs imaginable, but if the game itself is piss easy like Diablo or something, there's no intimidation factor or fear for the player.

The visual direction is excellent once again and transitions downward from a grotesque fleshy techno-hell to a surreal void setting with caves, rooms and bridges floating in the sky. Fitting midi as well. I really liked the trollish blue key that would keep ascending every time you went to grab it. Very cheeky. The exit area isn't as brutal as the one in Slaughterworks, but still contains toothy encounters with a Revenant horde + Archvile backup and dual Cyberdemons on the blood stairs behind you. Obligatory *PCorf exit Afrits too. *(I've never played a PCorf map before so I'm just parroting here.) The difficulty of the first fight can be mitigated by grabbing the secret Invul Sphere, killing the Cyber and then rushing down to faceroll the Revenants.

Great map, and one of the reasons I enjoy Bloodstain as much as I do. Hopefully Pipicz does another release with some bug fixes and gameplay adjustments based on feedback.

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP28 Descent Into Madness

Apart from a spiderdemon bumrush at the start, most of the level feels rather unmemorable. It's a lot smaller than I expected, and overall the combat is pretty hard. I guess the blue key segment is memorable, even if a mockery on players. And let's not forget the room where zombies are being resurrected by "unknown means", but then again a secret switch gets rid of those things for good. The Hellbound-like walkways look very impressive.

Because I usually never attempt to hurt myself intentionally, I can never realize rocket-jump secrets like the red key one. It's cleverly used enough here but man I hate that stuff. Loving the afrit's cauldron that came after it though. The red key is worth three secrets, one of which is an invulnerability, which might have some help in one final battle against a load of revenants, plus a cyber and some afrits. Pipicz is excellent when it came to tying things together, and a level in which I had an unmemorable impression with unleashes it's memorableness, or something. Let's just say I enjoy these late-game levels here.

[gaspe]

rileymartin said:

Why is it mediocre, aside from maybe maps 21-30 not living up to the previous chapters? And even then, they're still better than a lot of other PWAD E3's.

It has it's share of good moments and I must say that I liked how it feels to be a continuous trip, but the broad impression is that it was rushed quickly just to have something done. Many levels are recycled from older stuff and others are simple rip-offs. Combat wasn't very interesting, I also recall lots of shooting galleries. The city episode is the best part of the wad for sure but also the shortest, and some of the new stuff done is lacking compared to the older maps. The hell episode doesn't have anything particular that makes it to standout compared to other other wads E3. Same for E1, (that In the end it's a surrogate of KDiTD), and while the first map was rather good it seemed that the quality was decreasing as you progressed. I don't think is a bad wad, but it's very far from being something impressive.



+++ voting for Estranged, if it can help :P

[KBlaney]

Map 21: So, after dying, our heroic marine apparently goes to hell with his pistol... because why not? This map starts off pretty slow but picks up really quickly. There are a bunch of interesting combat experiences where you don't have the rocket launcher (which I don't usually get because I don't really play pistol start maps). This is otherwise a pretty small map in comparison to the last few much larger maps.

There's a small texture alignment mistake (which plenty of people noticed) on the far side of the temple near the exit on one of the switch looking plaques with the faces.
Map 22: Ugh... This map became something of a slog. Lots of traps that outright murder you if you don't have enough health. I suppose, of course, that this fits the name of the map pretty well and I believe this is the closest depiction of the biblical hell that I've ever seen in the hell levels of a Doom WAD. The attention to detail and the inspiration here make up for the difficulty to make a pretty great feeling level.

Well, I'm starting to feel like a jerk pointing out bugs like these because I feel like I'm being overly critical. The issue I found here was in the final room with the archviles. On my second attempt I managed to get double AV jumped out of bounds into the void.

Map 23: Just when you think this map is ending it keeps pulling you back in. Lots of Archviles in devious places at the end for the red key. Before that I wish there was an easier way to get some of the monsters to fight the Cyberdemon after the Yellow Key. However, there is a really fun line of imps between the Yellow and Rey key areas which is all sorts of fun.

Map 24: Starts with a lot of cross fire and then only gets more and more slaughtery. I had quite a difficult time with the two cyberdemons until I decided to widdle through the monsters one step at a time. Eventually I think the second cyberdemon was taken out by the mass of revenants while I handled some of the other monster and the archviles. Eventually I just decided that the Afrits weren't worth the ammo so I slipped past them into the exit.

Map 25: Largely a gigantic slaughter but significantly more spaced out than the slaughter of the previous map. The various battle grounds are all separated by impassible boundaries for monsters. Except for the last battle, all of them benefit significantly from being tactical instead of aggressive. The final fight, however, is a giant mess. It probably took me a dozen or so tries to get enough BFG plasma out there to thin out the heard enough to survive the slow elevator ride to the death exit.

Map 26: Quite appropriate backing music here because this level certainly was a nightmare for me. The opening involves running through a short gauntlet of imps and archviles with no well signposted escape. Expect a few deaths here until you figure it out. The next bit is slugging it out with some imps until you eventually find your arsenal minus the BFG. The last major part involves hitting a switch that is defended by 4 cyberdemons. I used the invulnerability to run behind them and flick the switch that way, but my hat is off to you 100%ers out there who will try to kill those things. There is some BFG ammo nearby, but I imagine it will be close. Needless to say from my above description this level really taxed me.

Map 27: This is the map that almost killed the WAD for me. Basically the map is a giant squiggly line that intersects with itself but prevents you from cutting any corners by gating you off. This is fine in principle but it is a bit frustrating when you leave behind a medkit for later only to find you can't get back there anymore. That said, the difficulty here seems to have been turned up to 11 along that path. This is especially true from approximately the yellow key door to the red key door after which the difficulty is turned up to 12. I've heard the term “RNG-Jesus” and that is definitely how I got through a whole bunch of sections of this map over the course of 3 or 4 days. It was frustrating and exhausing and the over use of the archviles in the last area just made me glad that the level is over. (Not that I think it is going to get easier from here.)

This might be it for me. These levels just take so much time I don't think I'll have the time to power through the last few by the end of the month. We'll see.