What's the most evil megawad?

[ASD]

Do there exist any brutally difficult "serious" megawads that exist to torture the player in most diabolical ways as possible? Something that would've made of unpredictable death traps scattered all over the maps, ridiculous reasons for monster closets, hitscanners hiding behind fake walls, forced damaging floors, tough platforming -and thin ledge segments, low resources and powerups shown behind unreachable areas or secrets. The wad shouldn't have unbeatable situations in the main progression such as teleporting in middle of 30 cybers without invulnerability or seemingly endless sloghterfest.

[Not Jabba]

Swift Death is designed to be extremely mean to the player, though it has few if any of the specific things you mentioned. Every level is small, and the difficulty comes from extremely challenging initial combat setups. There's also Italo-Doom, though opinions vary on whether that's a "serious" megawad that's intended to be beatable.

[Pure Hellspawn]

Dark Tartarus is another that comes to mind.

[joe-ilya]

The latter half of my lost maps megawad (MAP01, MAP04, and any map after MAP09 except MAP31)
1024abc
Hell revealed 2
Heroes series

[hex11]

La Puta de Tonia!

[Doomkid]

The 5 CHORD wads are pretty nasty in the minimalist way, stuff like ammo shortage and peculiar but fun super-hard ambushes. I wanted thedevilzwork to be cruel especially from pistol start, but CHORD is definitely harder overall. I wouldn't mind a whole megawad built with this approach but I can't think of one at the moment.

[Phade102]

Most of the hardest maps are the slaughterfest maps, but I wouldn't call them legit. I'd call them artificially hard since they aren't made with balance in mind in most cases.

Alien Vendetta is pretty hard, but the last few maps do go slaughterfest. Hell revealed also goes slaughterfest. I'd recommend unloved, its a very hard wad.

[Marcaek]

People still believe that slaughtermaps are made without balance in mind after all this time, unreal.

"I can't beat this" isn't the same thing as "this is badly made and untested"

[Grazza]

Not a megawad, but the wad that sprung to mind was Jon Landis's Eye of the Beholder II. Actually, Landis's other early maps could fit into this category too.

[Voros]

Nothing beats Swift Death. It was made with difficulty in mind, made to be beatable, made to fast, all legit.
It truly is mean to players. But then again, the megawad was made for speedrunners in mind.

[Steve D]

Marcaek said:

People still believe that slaughtermaps are made without balance in mind after all this time, unreal.

"I can't beat this" isn't the same thing as "this is badly made and untested"

Well said.

A good slaughtermap is always "legit" and was likely playtested intensively, complete with successful FDAs to prove it isn't unfair as long as you're a good enough player to beat, say, an E3 Sunlust map on the first try on UV. People have done that. For people like myself, who cannot do that, there are lower difficulty settings. It is no dishonor to use them. They exist for a reason.

[40oz]

I'm also not convinced there are many "not serious" maps with tons of monsters outside nuts.wad.

That said, I believe Eternal Slumber Party (ESP.wad) is the spawn of Satan in the form of a doom wad. Also try Italo Doom.

Also okuplok's untitled 2 fits the bill except that its a single huge map and not a megawad. I can barely get past the first part

[T-Rex]

I have thought up a difficulty scale which determines which wads are easy and which ones are brutal.

Level 1 - Simple, not-so-difficult wads that are on the same level of difficulty as Doom and Doom 2.
Examples: Icarus, Demonfear, Doom the Way Id Did 1/2

Level 2 - Moderately difficult wads, slightly tougher than Doom and Doom 2 but still doable for casual Doomers.
Examples: Evilution, Memento Mori 1/2, Requiem, Strain

Level 3 - Hard wads, featuring nasty monster placement and/or malevolent level design.
Examples: Plutonia, Hell Revealed, Chord series, Eternal Doom, Scythe

Level 4 - Very hard wads that will push your skills to the limit.
Examples: Alien Vendetta, Kama Sutra, Scythe 2, Speed of Doom, Hellbound

Level 5 - Extreme wads, only for Doom gods or masochists.
Examples: Hell Revealed 2, Deus Vult 1/2

Level 6 - Horrendously evil and mean wads. The pinnacle of hard and brutal.
Examples: Sunder, Sunlust, Slaughterfest series

[Phade102]

Marcaek said:

People still believe that slaughtermaps are made without balance in mind after all this time, unreal.

"I can't beat this" isn't the same thing as "this is badly made and untested"

I probably should have worded my comment differently. It isn't so much that they aren't balanced, but they aren't balanced for the standard doom player. I personally find them boring and very repetitive, but there is a challenge there. However, I feel maps with a normal amount of monsters can be just as challenging.

However, I am not opposed to all slaughter maps. for example, the later half of Alien vendetta isn't terrible, I enjoy that. Map 32 of AV is the type of slaughterfest I hate though.

[scifista42]

Phade102 said:

[slaughtermaps] aren't balanced for the standard doom player.

Disregarding the term "standard doom player", I agree that they are (often) balanced for players with above-average skill and/or patience, yes.

Phade102 said:

I wouldn't call [slaughtermaps] legit.

You apparently consider "standard doom players" to be some privileged group that all maps should be balanced for in order to be called legit maps. I don't see it that way. Firstly, I don't think that it's even possible to define a "standard doom player" or clearly determine who is one and who isn't, same for a "map balanced for the standard doom player". Secondly, even if there was a way to do so, I don't think other players should be considered any less important at all.

It's obvious that different players enjoy different kinds of maps. Satisfying just a certain group of players justifies a map's quality in the view of that group of players, no matter what others think or say about the map. I believe it's all great that there are various kinds of maps that satisfy players with various preferences, even if none of the maps satisfies all players, or even the majority of players. Preferences are subjective, not objective.

Slaughter gameplay in particular is obviously being enjoyed by many players (and mind you, there are different kinds of slaughter gameplay/maps as well). Therefore I think it's unjustified to call them non-legit.

[Steve D]

T-Rex said:

I have thought up a difficulty scale which determines which wads are easy and which ones are brutal.

Your methodology and your list are pretty damned righteous. Well done!

[Cynical]

T-Rex said:

I have thought up a difficulty scale which determines which wads are easy and which ones are brutal.

Level 1 - Simple, not-so-difficult wads that are on the same level of difficulty as Doom and Doom 2.
Examples: Icarus, Demonfear, Doom the Way Id Did 1/2

Level 2 - Moderately difficult wads, slightly tougher than Doom and Doom 2 but still doable for casual Doomers.
Examples: Evilution, Memento Mori 1/2, Requiem, Strain

Level 3 - Hard wads, featuring nasty monster placement and/or malevolent level design.
Examples: Plutonia, Hell Revealed, Chord series, Eternal Doom, Scythe

Level 4 - Very hard wads that will push your skills to the limit.
Examples: Alien Vendetta, Kama Sutra, Scythe 2, Speed of Doom, Hellbound

Level 5 - Extreme wads, only for Doom gods or masochists.
Examples: Hell Revealed 2, Deus Vult 1/2

Level 6 - Horrendously evil and mean wads. The pinnacle of hard and brutal.
Examples: Sunder, Sunlust, Slaughterfest series

IMO, Level 4 on this list shouldn't be there. AV and KSutra aren't any harder than HR or Scythe ep 3; Scythe 2 and SoD's meaner maps are just as cruel as the meaner ones in DV2 (SoD's later stuff is actually harder, IMO).

[riderr3]

Urania is megawad of mental massacre. Probably the author is crazy!

[Grain of Salt]

I was gonna say ESP but 40oz got there first. Definitely check it out, though. TimeOfDeath maps are superhard but they're also really grounded in the sense that you can tell they're the work of a mapper just making things they enjoy.

https://www.doomworld.com/vb/wads-mods/69846-esp-33-hard-maps/

[Memfis]

I wouldn't call evil carefully tested difficult maps where the author ensured that they are balanced, unbuggy and mostly skill-based when the player knows the right strategy and everything. They are more like highly demanding. I think an evil wad should be a lot more unfair and chaotic. Like, "here is a bunch of crazy random untested shit that doesn't make any sense, now YOU figure it out". Or it can be carefully tested but annoying in ways that you can't overcome with skill. Like blinking lights everywhere, horrendous music, 5 minute lifts... Kinda like MOCK2 lol.

[Xyzzу]

Chillax. It can get quite creative with its torturous level design sometimes.

[Marcaek]

Xyzzy01 said:

Chillax. It can get quite creative with its torturous level design sometimes.

Chillax is almost entirely composed of stolen maps.

[Firedust]

Urania. Absolutely brutal monster placement. Died a lot more times there than in Sunlust or Combat Shock.

[Paul977]

ESP I guess (and Sunlust maybe). Watch Escaping the Spiral Labyrinth demo from ToD to get an idea^

[Kyka]

Previously mentioned, but whatever that okpulok (?) opklok (?) okuplok (?) map is. The one where you start on a raised ledge surrounded by about a brazilion mancs, and every imp ever, and you have to run along all these pillars to get anything, and you just die. A lot.

My idea of hell would be having to play that map for eternity. Which is about how long it would take me to complete it.

[Albertoni]

ASD said:

exist to torture the player in most diabolical ways as possible?

10,000 Levels. Good luck finishing it!
On a more serious note, Stardate 20X6 has some very creative battles. This one in particular comes to mind: https://youtu.be/hCuCa5YiX_M?t=31s

------------

Also, may John Romero be my witness, I have absolutely NO idea why people say Sunlust is hard. Maybe it just clicked with me, maybe it was almost perfectly made to suit how I tackle battles, but to me it's a good 6/10 in the difficulty scale, just over average. Any of the maps in the 3rd and 4th category on that list are harder than it to my eyes.

[Rathori]

Albertoni said:

Also, may John Romero be my witness, I have absolutely NO idea why people say Sunlust is hard. Maybe it just clicked with me, maybe it was almost perfectly made to suit how I tackle battles, but to me it's a good 6/10 in the difficulty scale, just over average. Any of the maps in the 3rd and 4th category on that list are harder than it to my eyes.

Sunlust just 6/10? Now I feel like I know nothing about difficulty in Doom. Knowing (theoretically) about things such as Italo doom and (maybe) SWtW, I assumed Sunlust should be about 8/10. I'm curious, which ones do you think are harder, and what would be the logical next step, difficulty-wise, after Sunlust?

To me many of Sunlust fights seemed more like intricately crafted puzzles that had to be figured out in order to beat them. I do think it's hard, but I wouldn't say that it's sadistic, unbalanced or "evil".

[Moe]

Try playing Tarakannik. Its a very difficult wad.
https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/Ports/megawads/tarakans

[Xyzzу]

Marcaek said:

Chillax is almost entirely composed of stolen maps.

Really? I only knew about the Doom 64 ones.

[Archi]

Nochance.