Death Bear

I was born 30 years ago today.

I've been away too long. Cracks knuckles. Let's go play some WADs. >:^)

Have a little time free now, so I went back to Doom for a bit and wrote some articles for the blog:
WAD Review: Decades of Doom Why E4M1 is the Best Doom Level The article was previously published on Wadaazine #21.
 
So, Doom 30th anniversary is coming soon, and I had a lot of plans ahead to celebrate three glorious decades of demonic bonanza. Sadly, this year has been a little rough and quite difficult for me, particularly regarding time management, so I wasn't able to do much of it in time. I was (still am) creating a E4 inspired Doom episode to release by December, but I only got as far as E4M3. Also wanted to finish my Doom WAD history book by this point, but only got to 30% more or less. Still, such projects will be finished at some point, but probably later than sooner.
 
On the other hand, I'm currently writing an article about the best 50 WADs from 1994, as a little celebration of the good ol' days of Doom early mapping. I should have this one ready for December 10th, if all goes well.

1 week...

WOOO!
22nd July baby!!! Leeet's goooo! :D

Here's what's new on my blog, including an article on why I love playing 90s WADs:
WAD Review: Arrokoth WAD Review: TMP Why Play 90s WADs? Part 1 First part, next part, I'll be adding some commentary from fellow old-school appreciators :) Hope you guys enjoy the reads.

I hope you'll join me in celebrating my son Doomcat's birthday in this surprise project! From now through the 29th!

I hope you'll join me in celebrating my son Doomcat's birthday in this surprise project! From now through the 29th!

HUZZAH! You know the drill

ENDQUEST has finally, FINALLY been completed! I just uploaded it to Gamers.org to be added to the idgames archive. I will update the EQ thread with the link once it has been accepted!

EQ personal update v115 complete! Most levels had less than 3 tweaks to them, but there were a few that got some significant balance changes. There was a level that had NO changes needed. This project is feeling very close to being completed now!

Even though I'd like to be mapping and play-testing right now my personal life has gotten exceptionally busy for the next few weeks (in a good way), but still, I've realized that I probably won't have ANY sizeable amount of extra Doom time until November 7th at the earliest. I'm still hopeful I can finish Endquest by December though.

EQ update:
 
After seeing HOW play-testers play through maps, I am emulating them better so I can better play-test my own maps. I am now running my maps over and over, making fine game-play adjustments each time. I have decided I will continue running the maps until there are no more adjustments I'd like to make. The unproductive part here is that I might removed some items, only to add them back later, but finding that balance is what making the map's game-play feel solid requires. I have decided that ammo balance must be resolved first before final health adjustments can be made as playing an area with too tight of ammo will throw off the health's balance.
 
I am currently over half-way through my latest pass of EQ. It's going quick(ish) now that everything is feeling polished. I am finding that as areas become balanced I am now see room for small combat improvements. My goal is to release my next, and likely final update before November.

About damn time! Go love the alien!

Mapping at Warpspeed - RC1 is out!

About damn time! Go love the alien!

Mapping at Warpspeed - RC1 is out!

Full Moon 2 (32 BOOM Community Speedmaps) (RC1) is out now!

Full Moon 2 (32 BOOM Community Speedmaps) (RC1) is out now!

Full Moon 2 (32 BOOM Community Speedmaps) (RC1) is out now!

I just realized it's been 5 years (Sept 1, 2017) since I joined the community. Nice. The early years, I remember I still couldn't speak English quite well and was just getting started into the world of Doom. It actually took me a while to get the gears finally moving and I became quite addicted during my 2019-2020 season. I've been playing on and off since 2013, according to Steam, and well, since then, a lot of shit has happened, some bad, some good, some great, some terrible. Doom has being quite the companion to me. The early years were full of awe and amazement. Discovering new WADs to play, source ports to try, mods to boot up and so many other things to try out from the massive galleries of custom content that the community produced, it was, well, pretty damn addictive.
 
While I now feel a little bit off of steam (tired), I still play at least once a week. Perhaps it's the nature of things, to get burnout of the our favorite hobbies, or perhaps it's just a dent in the road, anyway, I'm pretty sure I'm not going anywhere for a long, long while. Doom is a great game, my favorite game, yet, the community is what really made it for me. The creation of the Wadazine has been one of my greatest achievements. A niche internet magazine, for a game that's almost 30 years old. I like to think that my efforts will leave a good mark in the history of this community. While I felt tired and disappointed at times, I'm always coming back for more. I actually had planned to celebrate my 5 years of Dooming with a megawad community project some months ago. Something Alien Vendetta and/or Eviternity inspired, limit-removing, perhaps. Sadly, I believe I'm not a good mapper, and I still struggle with anything that has to do with SLADE, but who knows? Maybe next year. For now, I just want to play, and perhaps write for Doom. Writing is my little corner of peace, the place I can be, and the place that lets me be. I'm happy to know that people read what I write, at least for Doom, even if only a few. I started like that, reading the reviews of many from the /newstuff Chronicles, and then reading the Cacowards features, and the awesome articles/essays created for the 25 years anniversary. Now that was really fucking awesome. I hope I can create something similar someday. I hope.
 
Anyway, happy 5 years of Doom to me! And thanks to all the people that have helped me around anything, and made me some company in the solitude of the shores of hell!
 

WOO! RC1 of 30 Monsters Challenge is here!

WOO! RC1 of 30 Monsters Challenge is here!