The DWmegawad Club plays: Echelon & Mutiny

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP27: Fire and Brimstone

Mostly feels like a conventional boss map in an unconventional slot. There's a cyberdemon ruling over this fiery crater, a gaggle of arch-vile servants or supplicants or maybe prisoners given their location on short pillars half submerged in lava, and retinue of imps tucked away in burning alcoves that might be either torture chambers or spawning vats, it's hard to tell. Definitely the action is much more of a focus here than some high concept of an unusual place to represent; this is Doom's Hell in its most classic form.

MAP28: The High Places of Baal

From an enclosed crater to an open field dominated by a ziggurat bristling with chaingun-toting defenders, from a burning red environment to a dreary green one... I think the contrast enhances this one, which balances a spacious battlefield with mild puzzle elements I'd agree with rdwpa that the rectangular boundary to the playing space feels a bit perfunctory after the evident effort spent on other parts of the map - the central ziggurat, the landscape itself - as though the map author ran out of time or ideas and had to define that border in a hurry.

[Demtor]

MAP27 - “Fire and Brimstone”
gzDoom - UV – Continuous


A good old fashioned cyberdemon fight map.

Come get some! All up in your face. Thankfully the AVs were only a minor nuisance because I was not pistol starting. I didn't even bother with the fiery Imp rooms with rocket ammo. I actually prefer a double barrel shotgun over a rocket launcher when it comes to a 1 v 1 Cybe fight. Of course, plasma (in any form) beats all. Fire and brimstone, ya say? If you saved the 200%/200% and the cell ammo from last map... this was a cool breeze on a warm summer day.


MAP28 - “The High Places of Baal”
gzDoom - UV – Continuous




Kind of a puzzle map (find the hidden keys!) with an Aztec pyramid full of hitscanners and behind it a giant spider who I killed immediately. SUCK... IT... DOWN!

Eh, this style of play ain't my bag. Heart podium switch. Hidden teleports. Buried revs and mancubi. Invisible teleport borders to an endless looking flat area. Meh.

I liked the view of the winding river though. The few unique looking trees are also interesting and the pyramid itself is well done with vines and decorative detail.

[bioshockfan90]

I think I'll join in for Mutiny. Would've done Echelon, but it's not my cup of tea.

But it's a good set, actually. I really enjoyed some of the later levels, ESP. Map 24.

[Spectre01]

MAP29 - “The Elder”
Sweet, a medium-sized map that took me over 30 minutes to finish! I enjoyed this level quite a bit, although the map is very symmetrical, which I'm sure someone will take issue with. There is also a bit of an awkward "Huh?" moment when you hit the eye switch in the fleshy basement and have to backtrack. I did like that 3D floor AV trap and it's too bad the megawad hasn't used the ZDoom format to it's full potential. Feels like it could've been a boom set with a few minor alterations. Also, why is there grass and dirt (and a gnarly texture misalignment) on top of the large wall? I did not like the Pinky drop one bit, as it resulted in a quick reload while I was at 100/50 and had the RL out. Yeah, the slow weapon switching sucks. Otherwise it was cool how the Cybers could follow you up from the dark hall of pillars and I ended up fighting them out on the wall since they couldn't leave the building. Missed one item and a Zombieman. Heh.

MAP30 - “A Chance in Hell”
Uhhh... is that it? I mean, I realize which wad I'm playing but that was still short and underwhelming for a final map. I wasn't expecting a Fire and Ice epic like in Scythe, but a single room with 3 Cyberdemons to trivially circle while spamming plasma is not what I'd call a strong finisher. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I was hoping there would be an Icon of Sin after flipping those 7(lol) switches to open the exit room. Yeah well, I guess it ended just like it began, or something.

Final Thoughts
My continuous run actually clocked at 3:30h, which is around what Scythe took me when I first played. And while this wad has been compared to Scythe, it really lacks the kind of gameplay that made Scythe fun and memorable. The maps weren't large enough for any adventuring and aside from some artsy stuff and cool new textures, the visuals don't impress like they do in other wads. Which doesn't leave much considering the gameplay was not particularly strong. The good news is that the new enemies were quite neat, the music was good and the maps were short enough where you can quickly move on if there's something you don't like. Overall, this is a 2/5 wad for me and I would describe the experience as "neat but underwhelming". I also find people throwing 5's left and right at recent wads slightly bizarre. Maybe /idgames needs a switch to the Like/Dislike system of YouTube since that's how people rate anyways.

[Demon of the Well]

Map 27 -- Fire and Brimstone - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
"Fire and Brimstone" is a straightforward boss map featuring a turret-type cyberdemon (though interestingly he's not actually locked into said role), a quartet of arch-viles, and few other inconsequential hangers-on. Visually it proposes a sort of brief "aha!" moment, introducing the traditional redstone/lava Hellscape theme to E3 proper, though this same theme's brief appearances in maps 07 and 08 perhaps blunts the impact just a touch. I reckon lots of folks will be immediately reminded of "Circle of Death" by the layout of the little arena, though to me this reads more like honest/coincidental kinship than anything resembling active homagery or the like.

This is another of the mapset's scant handful of levels that plays significantly differently between the pistol-start/continuous paradigms-- if you come in fully armed the level is nigh on insultingly trivial, but if you materialize packing only a handgun and 50 rounds, you have to take a few risks and poke your head into the fiery alcoves around the ring's outer perimeter in order to amass enough ammo and weaponry to take down your foes, which gives Chuckles a few opportunities to lob rockets at your blindside. Brave marines can snatch the plasma rifle from under the cyberdemon's metal-plated hooves with a daring chicken-dash, but doing so still requires obliterating the four viles on downset pillars in the central lava pool first. A touch of sloppiness is readily evident in the design here--assuming you're firing rockets at them, the viles will often be knocked off of their pillars into the brimstone pit below, which depending on one's priorities either prematurely removes them from the fight or makes finishing them off something of an undignified little chore--block-lines around the edges of the pillars probably would've been appropriate here.

The most interesting wrinkle to the proceedings is that, with a little coaxing or simply a bit of extra sass in his 'tude, the cyberdemon can actually walk out onto the outer ring--intuitively framed as "your" turf in the basic setup--which I suppose can be somewhat surprising, even mildly alarming if he pulls the stunt while you're not paying him full attention. Doesn't change the fight much, really, though it does of course allow stick-in-the-mud players to easily leave without fighting him. On the flipside, though, it also creates the opportunity for a cheeky telefrag kill-- +1000 style points if you opt to go that route. Other than these minor diversions, though, on the whole this is another rather underachieving showdown map, again seeming something like a relic from a very different time in its almost exaggeratedly modest/reserved framing of the action.

Map 28 -- The High Places of Baal - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
Places? Palaces?

This is an odd one, lots of quirky personality here. Given the author, I was initially reminded of "Mephisto's Mausoleum" from the Cabal series/Master Levels, though this map's really nothing like that one in substance. The action is again wholly milquetoast, a few monsters plopped down on the stylish marble ziggurat at the center of the map, with a few more (including a lavishly 90s spiderdemon) roaming around the grassy field to be summarily dispatched by whatever means you deem fit--from pistol-start you've got to run around a bit more in order to collect weapons, which gives the chaingunners on the south and east faces some opportunity to significantly chip-damage you from afar, but in the end the differences here are essentially superficial. Again, there's some issue with technical neatness and staging: a number of monsters are initially situated in holes below the surface of the ground, intended to rise to the surface as the player draws near, though in most of these cases it's very easy to unintentionally miss or skip the triggers. There appear to be failsafes in place--if you were to walk to the edge of an untriggered pit you'd find another tight perimeter of triggers to ensure the monster rises (perhaps with the player standing on its head, in the case of default/casual ZDoom simulation settings)--but the lack of polish is still hard not to see. There also appears to be some system of phasing lines in place on parts of the ziggurat--on one occasion I saw a pinky blink from the top level down through the others to the first level in an heartbeat--which is a neat concept, though in practice I've found it hardly ever comes into play, even if you just run laps around the structure and do nothing.

The 'mandatory' secrets aspect of level progression is the most interesting feature by far. One that many will probably balk at, but I'd say it was my favorite thing about the level....the right kind of playfulness, if you will, and there's even some neat 'hide in plain sight' visual clues as you survey the surroundings from atop the ziggurat--it all looks like diorama, but there's a little more than initially meets the eye at play.

[baja blast rd.]

"The Elder" (29)

Yes! Quite a good map. Felt like an adventure, which isn't something I expected from any single map in this set. The indoor areas are somewhat bland visually, but the outdoors are a treat, circular architecture set in a well designed (read: not lazily monotextured) rocky setting, all set in a sea of blood. Apart from the yellow key trap, the action wasn't really the best the mapset has to offer on a moment-to-moment level, but it's the presentation that makes this map a good experience. The silent teleporter is somewhat obvious, and I noticed a misalignment here and there, but slight errors like that don't really feel so jarring given the mapset's oldschool approach.

"A Chance in Hell" (30)

This kind of blows on the other hand. Feels really lazy. It's honestly the only map that feels like a total dud -- early on the maps were stubs, too, but there wasn't much of anything else so I didn't have any expectations. The typical megawad trope of an impressive and large penultimate map followed by an underwhelming final map is almost comically exaggerated here. If there is anything positive to be said about the map, it's that the lighting pattern looks cool from the overhead (IDDT it).

Overall

This set definitely picks up once it gets past the introductory stages of e1. In the first third or so, the main problem was there was more reading of intertext than actual playing. The levels were just too small. The custom enemies were a welcome addition, but I would have liked to see a few more of them gradually introduced in late e2 and in e3. A custom boss would have been a great addition to map30. The unconventional projectile attacks of the custom monsters showed that Soundblock was capable of creating a custom boss that would be challenging to fight even without oppressive use of map geometry and fleets of henchmen (which is generally not the case with custom bosses that are limited to Vanilla behaviors). In the smaller maps I would have liked more hectic action here and there, giving the set something like a modern-but-not-modern Scythe II flavor to it, but of course those are just my preferences.

Admittedly I wasn't paying so much attention to the story. What happened to the puppy?!

Highlights:

"The Elder" (29)
"Lunar Arrivals" (9)
"The Lodge" (14)
"Fumes of Alchemy" (24)

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP29: The Elder

A fittingly large and impressive map for the penultimate slot in the WAD, juxtaposing a castle exterior to which the player is asked to lay siege, with a gloomy cathedral-like interior section patrolled by cyberdemons and a quick diversion into the literal bowels of the map to retrieve the red key. Combat consists extensively, though not exclusively, of large spaces with similarly large numbers of enemies launching their attacks from multiple directions, and there are a few entertaining single-enemy releases (cacodemons in the exterior blood lake, demons on the north side of the cathedral, revenants on the south side) where you can happily punch or blast your way through the onrushing wall of meat with gleeful abandon.

MAP30: A Chance in Hell

Well, that was short and decisive! The visuals are certainly dramatic enough, a trio of cyberdemons appearing and disappearing as they stomp in and out of the pools of light that spill across the arena, disorienting moments when you're not quite sure where the next rocket is coming from, but it's largely a matter of strafing in a circle and hoping that your ammo holds out. Once they're done, the ending itself is relatively low-key, a hidden exit chamber that resembles the lodge from much earlier in the WAD.

[Demtor]

MAP29 - “The Elder”
gzDoom - UV – Continuous


I think this is the closest Echelon gets to being an adventure map.

Quite the journey for an Echelon map. With climbing up and down rock cliffs, exploring underground passageways and far reaching dark halls. From crawling through blood and guts to find the red key, to scaling the walls and running through the ramparts. Finally you end up in a huge shadowed corridor with many pillars and two cyberdemons running around surrounded by hidden enemies in the shadows above. Great stuff all round. Fuck the two Rev snipers in the corner though. Right in the face.

The trail of health potions to the blue armor was funny. Was that supposed to be a trap?

I loved the look of the interior courtyard area with the towers and the walkway above. Depending on how you approach clearing this area out, there will be tons of stuff flying through the air too. Just a great setting for crossfire.

I thought it was weird to have that much health laying around even if you did have to fight a Cacodemon horde to get any of it. The trade off was a no brainer to me. Here, take most of my shotgun ammo and I'll now have a safety net of health to fall back on any time I run in to trouble or make a mistake. Deal? Deal.

That was a dirty, dirty trap. Fall away floors in Doom? Woof! Haunted Hood and Factory had there's but they were less deadly. I bit the dust hard the first time around.

I ended up fighting the Cybes on the stairs before one got tired of eating rockets and wondered away while his friend exploded in to meaty bits. I had to track him down and put an end to his stomping around with a good plasma whippin'.

MAP30 - “A Chance in Hell”
gzDoom - UV – Continuous




Well that ending fell flat on it's face. The best part is the opening shot with the lighting. Other than that...what the hell? We have all this story and all of these narrative building maps that felt like they had a purpose only to finally discover that the story ends with... three cyberdemons in one large dark square room. That's it. We don't ever see home again. No wife. No Kids. (Or remains of... which would have been dark and interesting.) There is no deeper ending beyond a yawn inducing cyberdemon battle. I literally strafed circles around all three of them with the trigger held down. The exit room was almost an exact copy/paste of The Lodge's.

Disappointing to say the least but I'm willing to admit that maybe I'm looking at this wrong and my interpretation is off. But here I was hoping for an ending map akin to the first handful of maps that told a story. Something unique to really bring things back around and give some sort of closure. Instead, just like Map 1, we end up in one room with very little to it. We trade three beds and computers for three sets of switches and cyberdemons. What does it mean? Maybe the story scrawl between maps was all a red herring? Could it all have been a dream? Perhaps our trippy journey through hell didn't take us as far as we thought it did and we are still dreaming in bed? I dunno.

I think trying to get a more involved story in Doom is a noble effort but in the end it can really be a failure that leaves the playing trying to squeeze water out of a rock.

Echelon: An fun and interesting experiment, just don't get your hopes up too high.

Here is my complete story text album if anyone is interested in reading them all in one go. http://imgur.com/a/VYCIN

Favorites? Hard to pick some of the super small maps as they barely even count so among the more meatier maps, here they are along with the worst. All in order.

Hits
MAP29 - “The Elder”
MAP23 - “The Stone Web”
MAP11 - “Lunar Escape”
MAP18 - “Possessed Plaza”
MAP16 - “Haunted Hood”

Misses
MAP30 - “A Chance in Hell”
MAP22 - “Sinuous”
MAP20 - “Mammon”
MAP25 - “Bastille”
MAP17 - “Neon”

[rehelekretep]

im guessing we can start Mutiny now? :D
--------

fda here

surprisingly large for a first map. found 1 of 2 secrets. fun punching everything. a little too many cacos to sg for my liking (least favourite to sg because its so dull and unthreatening) but not disgraceful. the music is cool and i feel like ive heard it before from somewhere...
good start to the wad!

[Capellan]

I was planning to play Mutiny but I think I will skip it. Time is at a premium this month.

[Salt-Man Z]

So...Mutiny. I've already played the first four maps ahead of time (and if I want to finish this by year's end, I should probably try to stay ahead of schedule.)

As usual, GZDoom/keyboard-only/saving. I started on UV, but, uh, that will be changing shortly...


MAP01: Surface
14:54 | 100% everything

Very cool level. Love the look of the new textures, very gritty and STRAIN-ish. Gives the game a lot of character. I like that the level is like a big loop where you can decide which way to go initially. I got lost like a doofus, though, totally overlooking the door to the exit area a number of times. Apparently I had too much fun just going up around those stairs and breezing right past the door? After a couple of fruitless loops the automap finally set me straight. I really liked the outdoor vistas, and the "underwater" section was pretty cool, too.

[Spectre01]

Map 01: Surface The usual, QZDoom 1.1 + army of cosmetic mods, UV and Pistol Starts.

Back to some more familiar territory, we start off in a ruined techbase in the middle of an equally ruined city (nice bridge). Gameplay is quite standard for a map01 and mostly involves Shotgun/Chaingun action without much ball-busting by the opposition. The enemies here are your standard dudes, Imps and Demons with the occasional Cacos and Hell Knight here and there. I seem to have picked up 5 rockets too despite there not being a Rocket Launcher. I also ended up missing the SSG that was on top of some crates and grabbing it after clearing the map. The locations seems to be some sort of dock, judging by the doors blocking the ocean in the starting room and the underwater section as you descend down into the base. Pretty good opener and midi.

[Demon of the Well]

Map 29 -- The Elder - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
In traditional m29 form, "The Elder" makes a bid for being the crown jewel of the whole mapset, which it wins easily in this case. In one sense, it's not exactly up against the toughest competition--it's a real MAP, in contrast to the collection of 29 fragments/nibblets it's up against--but I reckon it's capable of standing on its own merits regardless.

The setting is an ancient temple or forum squatting on a small island in the center of a great sea of blood (shades of "Bloodsea Keep" indeed!), sheltering a gaping pit leading to the heart of Hell in its inner sanctum. In terms of expanse, this is easily the set's largest map, and as a result there's much more room for both the architecture and the terrain to spread out and really breathe; the temple facade features a tall, baroque split stairway before an imposing crescent-shaped semi-covered porch presaging a broad, windowed cylindrical casement, itself merely an antechamber to an airy, many-pillared grand hall, bathed in shadows and a few dim rays of light from the alien, golden skyscape. The island itself is on the surface a fairly anonymous chunk of striated rock, though for the first time the level allows for a bit of light exploration amidst its crannies and crevices. More of its macabre nature becomes apparent as Echelonguy plumbs the temple's lower levels, passing beyond the bounds of the building's cut-marble foundation and into the island's inner reaches, finding not the cold stone that one might expect, but rather caverns and tunnels of foul, glistening flesh, akin to the bowels of some massive living creature. While the strongest impression the presentation left on me was of its relative scale and scope, as aforesaid, there's also attention paid to smaller details where appropriate, ala the various sector lighting effects in the temple interiors, the trickling sacral font of unholy blood at the end of the grand hall, or the suggestive grooves carved into the stairway just before the entryway's strange flaming arch. The end result is an ephemeral sense of realism or believability to what is, of course, a basically fantastical setting, making the map feel more like an extension of the representational design slant which was prominent in many of the earthbound settings from the first two episodes, in contrast to the more purely abstract or game-y vignettes which comprise much of E3.

It also plays better than any of the other maps. Again, to some considerable extent this is simply a function of the playspace itself having far more depth and character to it than anything the earlier procession of micromaps could've realistically offered; generally speaking, both monster density and general placement style here present just the same light incidental fare as all of the previous levels, but the greater variety and nuance in terrain and layout as well as the level's limited aspects of non-linearity allow for much richer moment-to-moment play vs. the loose assortment of foes. The greater scale of construction also allows for larger encounters which wouldn't have been possible (or at least, wouldn't have worked very well) in most of the earlier maps, ranging from simple matters of available floorspace ala the crowd of revenants keyed to the megasphere near the blue skull key, to more scenario-based fights, ala the optional task of defending the outer wall from a cacoswarm which boils up from the sea of blood (which can be fought in any number of ways and from any number of different positions). There are also a couple of encounters, both involving arch-viles, which finally show some teeth in what has otherwise been a histrionically gentle mapset; the red key is guarded by a dangerous blindside ambush intended to flush you forward (though it's telling that the thrust here purely relies on panic, as there are no actual monsters to be flushed forwards to), but my favorite was the sudden deadfall into a bloody cistern, to be beset by a sorcerous houndmaster and his baying pack. In line with the deceptive mobility of the cyberdemon from map 27, I also thought it was cool that the two cybs in the grand hall are given a lot of license to wander if you don't engage them directly/immediately, one of them sauntered up to the upper level to meet me just as I was emerging from the aforementioned deadfall trap, gave me a bit of a start to say the least.

This is a cool level, and I'm glad I played it, though in truth there's a touch of the bittersweet to it since it's so vastly more fleshed out and developed than anything else in the set (also seems much more recent in make, I thought, leaving aside "The Stone Web" and maybe a couple of others). "What might have been", and all that.

Map 30 -- A Chance in Hell - 100% Kills / No secrets
This, on the other hand.....well, suffice to say, my sole reaction upon seeing/clearing it on my first playthrough was "Really?"

This reads like a copout or placeholder, to be frank, and there's not much to comment on or dissect--very little strategy is involved beyond having enough common sense to not pick up one of the blurspheres, and there's even very little distinction between pistol-start and continuous play. Being charitable, I kinda suspect that what's happening here is a case of an ancient setpiece simply failing categorically to cross the gulf of years, so to speak--time was, fighting three cyberdemons in a simple arena at once might well have sufficed as a 'for emphasis' finale (though I reckon you'd do the 90s a disservice to assume that this was widely thought of as truly challenging, even back then), but here in late 2016 this simply doesn't translate anymore, especially not when the venue for combat is nothing but a big, bare dark room. Being less charitable, one might also fairly feel disappointed with how starkly underachieving this level is as a game finale, in light of some of the set's other assets--no custom boss? No custom assets? The effect is very nearly as pronounced as what those who played the original release of Scythe II might've felt upon reaching map 28, if you catch my drift.

******************

To be honest, I've kind of felt like I've been pissing in the pool this whole time (moreso than usual, I mean, if you like)--a lot of players seem to be quite fond of this mapset, and I can certainly appreciate the elation in seeing a very old and rather storied hand wade back into the scene, but taken in a vacuum I feel that Echelon as a whole is rather underwhelming, and surprisingly unworked/unpolished in many ways, feeling sort of like a remaster/dressing up of a body of creative work from a period in the author's career which predates most of the stuff which he (rightfully!) became known/admired for. I mean this in a very literal sense, to be clear--I don't know for sure, of course, but I more than half suspect that the lion's share of these layouts/maps are, at root, actually quite old, as old as the PAR project, at least; the stylistic contrast between a lot of the content here and some of Soundblock's other more recent work (Plasmaplant, etc.), as well as his more famous past work, is really quite pronounced. Apart from the issue of the set's core action being chained to leisure standards of a long bygone age, said project's concept has left an indelible stamp on the proceedings here, and presumably accounts for the design slant that sees so many of the maps being little more than crumb-sized stubs, fragments of fragments. In this sense, again, charity: how much wiggle room do you really have when you set out to make maps finishable at a 'normal' playing pace keyed to the IWAD's par times? A tall task for any mapper, to be sure. As such, Echelon doubles down on its graphical and diegetic assets by way of compensation for its heavily restricted gamespace (and evidently abandoned the PAR concept entirely at some point), with a sprinkling of new monsters and additional narrative textplates for extra flavor; these all have lots of personality, and are worth seeing at least once, but the story's not exactly literature (it's still Doom, after all), and the new assets only receive a very limited window of opportunity to establish themselves given the persistently tiny/short nature of the maps and the histrionically slowballing pacing of the action, which means the new monsters in particular almost never get to realize much of their real potential. The whole set's a very short engagement, and viewed as a bit of light entertainment it's certainly "cute" and pleasant enough, but as a gameplay piece it's also very, very shallow, something I found myself unable to look past in favor of its colorful art/narrative assets in this case, again largely owing to how little space/time they are given to shine.

My top 5 maps from Echelon were:
Map 29 -- The Elder
Map 16 -- Haunted Hood
Map 25 -- Bastille
Map 23 -- The Stone Web
Map 14 -- The Lodge

Apart from "The Elder", which is pretty clearly something of a case of "a man amongst boys", heavy slant towards maps I felt to be more gameplay-focused, here, and towards those which made the richest use of the game's custom assets to create the most complete/poignant atmosphere.

[TheOrganGrinder]

And moving on to Mutiny now...

MAP01: Surface

I'll echo the sentiment that this is surprisingly substantial for a MAP01, lots of exploration to do and plenty of shotgun/chaingun action to be had against mostly grunt-tier opposition - the joy of gunning down swarms of imps will well-placed pumps of buckshot is timeless. The water sections, especially the underwater 'pod' in the north-east of the map, and the framing of the level as a submarine launch facility entertaingly dresses up what's otherwise a fairly standard techbase map, but the multiple, meaningfully different routes through the base are very engaging.

[Demtor]

Salt-Man Z said:

I started on UV, but, uh, that will be changing shortly...

Glad I'm not the only one! 5 maps in and Jeeeeezus. I am determined to tough it out but there's only so much save/loading I can do before I get frustrated enough to not want to play anymore. But... getting ahead of myself.


I applaud the Eddie usage. Up the irons!

MAP01 - “Surface” by Fonze, Jimmy, 40oz
gzDoom - UV – pistol start


I usually don't play with the status bar, but I do appreciate a good modification of it. Looks great!


So yeah, having played a few maps of Mutiny so far, I think it's safe to say this opener is deceivingly easy. That's not saying that this is an easy map as far a map 1's go. Just in comparison to what's to come.

The optional start at the beginning was nice but if you turn around and go up the cool looking stairs with a view you'll eventually find out you went the wrong way. This area is a lot harder to clear from this direction too. Double back and go the right way!

The underwater view was really cool. Never seen that done before. The surprise Mancubi and his exploding barrels of fun really caught me off guard. I did not see that coming at all.

That's one thing about Mutiny I noticed... BARRELS! Everywhere, lol. It's both hilarious and frustrating at times.

Also, it feels like the brains behind these levels love throwing things at you in an unusual ways with varying angles. From above. From the sides. Below and behind. You're going to get tagged one way or another and eventually get drained. Much quicker if you rush through areas wildly. This map only hints at what's to come. You can see how things will flow once the design difficulty is turned up. (Hint: It's going to hurt on UV.)

Really like the look of the city buildings along with the sky texture used. It all has a sufficiently sci-fi feel. A lot of rooms vary in design quite a bit. Each have having a differing look from the last before it but still manages to work together with the overall feel of the map.

Great peppy opening soundtrack too. Your "new WAD start" optimism isn't smashed in the face and left bloody... yet.

[baja blast rd.]

As far as Mutiny's difficulty goes, 03 is probably the trickiest on a per-encounter basis (but short); 31 might give people without slaughter experience trouble (but is easy otherwise); and 05 has probably the most lethal single encounter in the mapset, which is more a function of it ignoring that flying monsters are infinitely tall in some ports. I think there is one map I haven't played yet, however.

But overall it's not really that hard of a set compared to hard sets, and the difficulty curve (particularly on a per-encounter basis, which is relevant to playing with saves) reaches an early peak -- it's not like "wow, if 03 is like this, I can't imagine what the later maps must be like".

[dobu gabu maru]

Jumping on for a playthrough since I’ve been looking forward to playing Mutiny from day one. UV, pistol, saves.

MAP01: Ha, the Contra midi at the titlescreen made me giggle; shame the usual Doom text isn’t green to match our new nifty status bar!

Anyway, we get a little bit more of a peppy MAP01 than normal, not only thanks to the midi but the fact that the berserk is given right at the start! If I had to hazard a guess of who did what in this map, I’d say the left section is Fonze, middle is 40oz, and right is Jimmy, solely based on the ambitious western cityscape and the clean, angled architecture on the eastern side of the map (the underwater illusion is pretty rad too). There’s three paths through the map but since this is the opener you don’t have to stress too much about taking a wrong turn somewhere, especially since there’s plenty of barrels around to incinerate your foes. Some nice, albeit generally unmemorable stuff here—the chaingunner finale is pretty neat.

[Killer5]

I never completed MUTINY however I enjoyed the maps I played so I wanted to join in on the fun and complete the wad for this month!

Here is a reality demo of Map 01:
https://www.doomworld.com/vb/post/1697359

Map 01 is a lot of fun. I enjoyed the multiple paths, but the thing I enjoyed most about the map was the barrel usage. The barrel usage made fighting cacos with only the shotgun a lot of fun.

Also take note of the berserk placement. Having the berserk appear right at the start makes this map H-Doom certified for prime pillow fight action ;).

[Magnusblitz]

More Echelon catch-up...

MAP09: Lunar Arrivals

Hey, something that feels like a real map! I'm not a fan of all that STARTAN for some reason, feels amateurish, though it might just be the fact that years of DB2 has imparted to me that STARTAN + brown floor = default untexturing. I actually started really digging the computers and the accompanying lowering columns after awhile, kinda a cool and unique design bit.

The level itself is still short and very blocky and corridorific, but at least there's some good monster density. Killing hordes of imps with barrels or the RL will never get old.

MAP10: Exodus

Four hell knights, one baron and a shotgun. Probably the worst way to use hell nobles IMO, in a setting where they're not dangerous (it's really easy for them to get stuck on the surroundings and only wander at you one at a time) but can only plink away at them with the single shotty. Yeah there's a RL but no ammo and limited space, so instead just slowly grind the meat down.

MAP11: Lunar Escape

I wonder why he didn't use the see-through window texture on the large windows at the start... oh well. The blue floating guys are kinda cool, with their bouncing attack and exploding into health potions, but they deserved a much better intro than being stuck behind a window and being on a ledge in a big room. Really needed something that showed off their bouncing attack more I think.

MAP12: Crash Landing

As a retelling of Doom II, using the original intermissions, this one doesn't feel right... I just went from the moon back to Earth, as the only person left on the planet? Weird way to phrase it.

Anyways, this one left me a bit confused as to the point of the red key, but looking at it I guess there's supposed to be a red barrier before the blue key. I think a monster opened it for me. I kinda like the mental image of the captain of the ship getting caught on fire on the burning bridge and turned into a skeleton.

[Spectre01]

Map 02: Shipyard

Hey, nice boat! Ships made out of sectors have certainly come a long way since the AV days. Quite a hectic map with plenty of traps and action mostly taking place outside and around the central building where you spawn. Really liking that sky texture, which looks like a nighttime edit of the city sky from Doom 2. It really gives the map that sense of place of being in a dark, urban environment which the first map did a good job of with various buildings and bridges outside the playing space. There are several close range encounters that test your punching chops with the Berserk, as you're not given (I didn't find at least) an SSG to comfortably shoot Revenants and Demons in close quarters. The final trap after taking the red key elevator got me once, since I decided to stand my ground, not knowing of the approaching Cacoswarm and other bad boys appearing below. Works much better to grab the rockets and quickly jump off and run to one of the side buildings to funnel the Cacos/Mancs/Revenats to you and give them a rocket sandwich. Fun map with a good level of challenge. Never did get that Soulsphere though.

[rehelekretep]

fda here

the opening section is great. teleporters just confusing, a gimmick. the exit, even though it was signposted, caught me off guard; i always prefer switches/void spaces to avoid any misinterpretation. great midi, fits well.

edit: ha! interesting you mentioned AV rileymartin, was trying to remember what map that ship was on :D

[rehelekretep]

Killer5 said:

I never completed MUTINY however I enjoyed the maps I played so I wanted to join in on the fun and complete the wad for this month!

Here is a reality demo of Map 01:
https://www.doomworld.com/vb/post/1697359

Map 01 is a lot of fun. I enjoyed the multiple paths, but the thing I enjoyed most about the map was the barrel usage. The barrel usage made fighting cacos with only the shotgun a lot of fun.

Also take note of the berserk placement. Having the berserk appear right at the start makes this map H-Doom certified for prime pillow fight action ;).

glad youre joining the party killer5 :D
and dont tell me youve tried H-Doom... :o

[rehelekretep]

rdwpa said:

As far as Mutiny's difficulty goes, 03 is probably the trickiest on a per-encounter basis (but short);

oh boy youre right. the opening shot reminds me of one of the 2X maps from Sunlust (cant remember the title...) and some of the encounters did the same!

[Killer5]

Here is a demo for Map 02 (obviously not my first time playing this map):
https://www.doomworld.com/vb/post/1697462

Map 02 is very action packed right from the get go. Exit the starting area and chaingunners, shotgunners, and revs are happy to greet you. The action experienced at the start is basically what you can expect for the entirety of the map. Grabbing the rl and the yk starts teleporting in more hitscan/imps/revs and later on your way to the rk even more monsters appear.. oh and not to mention the cluster after hitting the switch revealed after the rk switch. Everything is up front and visceral and there is hardly ever time to breathe in this map. Makes for a very fun experience.

There are some nifty teleport lines present in this map which are required for progression. These teleport lines are quite intuitive even when split into the two that lead to the yk and to the blue armor. Very cool.

Def one of my favorites out of the maps I have played.

[Demon of the Well]

Alright then, on to Mutiny. This will be the first WAD since Estranged some months ago that I've not actually played before, so I've been looking forward to it more than a little bit. Coming right out of the gate, I'll say that I quite like the paragraph or so of backstory to the WAD found in the textfile--dystopic themes, a jaded antihero, something like a quadruple-decker doublecross, random mutants, a mysterious EMP event, and....Bourbon Street? Wild and woolly.

Map 01 -- Surface - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets - FDA (skill 4).
A strong opener, this. It's identifiably 'map 01' in terms of its thing balance and general pace, but rather than being typically tiny and trite it's nicely fleshed out and evinces a number of concepts immediately woven into the design to offer something that asserts its own substantive character, rather than futzing about with trivialities as though we're all in dire need of yet another Baby's First Doom intro course. It's also a credit to the overall design that the level's three-way authorship has resulted in something that feels quite cohesive--different areas seem to have different sensibilities about shapes and angles (pretty uniform sense of scale though, interestingly), hinting at the work of different hands, and the automap view suggests the divide may be as cut and dry as west-central-east zones, but in practice the styles mesh naturally enough, with transition points (lifts, drop-offs, etc.) reading like natural techbase features, and the impression is of a set location with a credible spread of different features rather than feeling like different maps duct-taped together, as with many of the rougher collabs I've seen.

The action is, at heart, founded on straightforward shotgun-pumping combat versus a smattering of entry-level foes with the odd mid-tier here and there, though the presence of a free berserk pack at the level's outset and the liberal usage of barrels in many of the map's areas adds a lot of joie de vivre to the proceedings--it's loose and simple, as map 01 fare often tends to be, but there's enough attention paid to thing placement within individual little vignettes to allow you to fight through it with a lot of flair if you've got the imagination to do so. I got the impression that a really stylish run of the map might see almost every cacodemon killed with the expenditure of a single shotgun shell apiece, courtesy of the many conspicuously placed barrel-clusters which tend to appear in the same areas (my favorite is the group on top of the tall light-post rising high out of the western pool). I didn't pull off anything nearly so cool in the FDA, mind, but the opportunities were generally plainly visible and intuitive at first glance, which is about what you'd want in an early map, I reckon. On the flipside, while it's generally pretty basic stuff as far as threat and traps and such go, it's not without little wrinkles to keep you on your toes, ala the hell knight tied to the chaingun secret. The placement of the SSG in the crate room near the exit also struck me as interesting--I only fired it 3-4 times or something like that, and I think that final trick with the descending chaingunner ledges is a rare example of a case where almost any other weapon in the game (excluding the pistol and melee, of course) would've served me better than the sawn-off--how often can you say that?

On that note, there's also a pretty solid aspect of non-linearity on offer for an early map, meaning that you could obtain the SSG pretty early if you really wanted to (although I must say that route would be rather bizarre). Fights are on small enough a scale at this early stage that approaching them from different entry/vantage points doesn't really change most of them much, and there's also not much actual exchange between the different areas, but having the ability to choose totally different paths to the goal, with so much of the content being effectively optional, is a rare and welcome trait in a more or less conventional map 01, certainly.

Aesthetically, the influence from older dystopian/cyberpunk mapsets ala STRAIN or Dystopia or the like is certainly apparent, though in terms of asset selection the presentation is actually quite a bit more understated than I was expecting it to be--the level is primarily dressed in familiar stock Doom II textures with new assets used only sparingly, rather than piling them on from the get-go ala Stomper (our previous Club foray into this general theme). Nevertheless, the kinship with the set's stated influences still comes through quite clearly, perhaps a function of the broad collage of textures and assets used in close proximity--it's actually quite colorful; it's just that the color is caked in soot and grime from the pollutants of future industry. The main structure of the level is couched in largely abstract/game-functional techbase trappings, but touches of more representational design are also smoothly integrated to help cement the setting, from expected fare such as crates and the like to more unusual trimmings, ala the surprisingly credible 'underwater' view at one point, using special textures just for that effect. Favorite bits were the little touches of diorama detailing in the western area and on the rooftop housing the exit chamber, clearly indicating that New Orleans is in a state of disaster (what else is new, eh?) and that you should expect a rough ride from here on out.

[40oz]

Thanks for the kind words everyone :)

I look forward very much to reading your reviews!

Just so everyone knows, Mutiny does have some pretty sharp difficulty curves, but it's rarely any more extreme than known tough wads like Plutonia 2 or Sunlust or Valiant. However I was very cognizant of what makes hard and easier gameplay and modified all the maps to include skill levels in such a way that softened the harder parts with a little extra health/armor and accessible weapons without dampening the experience, so don't be ashamed if you're not interested in dying a lot and would prefer to play on an easier skill level. The fun is pretty well preserved in all the skill levels and you are not denying yourself a more true experience by playing on medium or easy.

Also, Mutiny scored pretty well with fans of Thursday Night Survival with Mutiny's multiplayer support, so if you want to do a coop run with people -- by all means, go for it! If you like killing hordes of monsters, you can also try playing on -solo-net if you want to hang around in the maps more :)

The team worked really hard on it and I think you guys will really like it :)

[dobu gabu maru]

MAP02: What’s funny is that going into this map I was thinking “I wonder if I’ve played enough of Tarnsman’s maps to recognize his style” and then as soon as I jumped outside and was assaulted from all angles, his contribution became fairly evident. Whereas Pinchy usually gives you at least some space to feel safe and regroup, Tarns is all about pressure and pain (Bingo Pool anyone?), ensuring that Doomguy’s absurd speed is put to the test in order to keep him alive. It’s definitely a far more firery level than MAP01, especially when you take the (nearly unfair) berserk and blue key traps in mind. I didn’t really expect to be challenged so seriously this early into the mapset—had to punch out a few cacos when I ran out of ammo—but chalk that up to me underestimating this dangerous mapping duo. Only thing I’m a bit miffed about is that the "gate" on the path to the BK probably should’ve just had a YK switch next to it. Other than that, I’m floored by how much danger these two were able to pull out of a relatively small area—cool cool cool.

[rehelekretep]

eugh - after doing a few cl9 wads i forgot how often i get ghost-bugs with longer fdas on cl2... :(

[rehelekretep]

fda here

thought this was a Ribbiks-like map, found out after playing it was a Ribbik's map. opening texturing actually reminded me of Sunlust 27. always enjoyable, dont mind playing again and again as i die because there's always a new tactic/approach to try. love the different heights/platforming elements. the end fight is bloody hard if you have proper shadows on and a low-ish gamma. great map.

[Killer5]

Map 03 Reality/UV Max demo:
https://www.doomworld.com/vb/post/1697493

This map is very interesting and definitely a switch compared to Map 02 with its endless hordes of monsters teleporting in. Map 03 is more along the lines of a setpiece map. The fight for the ssg, the fight just prior to the red key, the yk fight, bk secret fight, and the exit room fight. Everything is very manageable however and it definitely feels like an early map (I mean early map within a mapset, not a map made by inexperienced people ;p).

The exit room fight stands out to me the most. I really like dark rooms with high contrast lighting. Also the stairs leading out of the room after completion of the fight remind me of some Empire ship from Star Wars O:.

Texture scheme works really well. Everything looks worn down and industrial (the textures with worn paint leading to bk switch, and orange beams comes to mind). Definitely defines the look of Mutiny quite well I feel.

Great map.