#doom mod

G3: Putrefier

Main author(s): Edward Cripps (Ed)

Release date: October 25th, 2012 (database)

Version(s) played: ???

Required port compatibility: GZDoom

Levels: 1 (MAP01 replacement)

Once again, we are playing a map made by Ed Cripps. I played his previous maps AKA Sin City 1 and Valhalla, and, from what I can remember, I liked them in spite of being flawed.

While this map doesn’t have a plot, I think it takes place in the same timeline as Valhalla since there are at least two computer panels name-dropping that map.

Let’s see if it’s less polarizing than Ed’s previous maps.

Putrefier looks great. The visuals might be the best part of the map. While it mostly tends to get samey indoors, it gets jaw-dropping when you look at the buildings from windows and while outdoors.

That and also some 3D models here and there, usually involving demonic growth.

I’m not fond of the music here. It’s Zombi 2’s theme cover that, while not bad, feels overly dramatic for a Doom map. I feel like a MIDIfied ending music in Blade Runner would fit better, now that I think about it. Or maybe if the track was just MIDIfied.

The map also has new sound effects; these were fine. Some stuff typical for a (G)ZDoom WAD like from Quake 2, and some other stuff that didn’t bother me. I have nothing else to add.

Putrefier is kind of annoying to play, since you have to guess which switch does what where while also forcing you to travel from one end of an available part of the map to another. It gets repetitive and mind-numbing after a while, and the aforementioned similar locations don’t help.

The map wasn’t really that hard. I don’t remember how hard Valhalla was, but I do know that this map has more random mosh pits attacking you. At least you don’t have to wait for half a map for armor this time.

I liked the moment where a swarm of Pinkies was coming from the boss area; it was still easy, though (not that I’m complaining).

Also, there was only one stealth shitling. I thought there would be more of this crap, but thankfully, it didn’t happen (at least on HMP).

There are two new enemies. One is called Pustule, which is a red Spawn from Quake I but made out of demonic biomass and much easier; this one at least doesn’t act like a jumping jelly bean on crack.

The other one is called Valhalla (yes, the same name as the 2010 map), a corrupted power core (I guess) that shoots barrages of powerful projectiles and periodically summons more Pustules for distraction.

Also, I might add that the map slightly chokes up when loading.

I think I would put Putrefier on the same level as Valhalla, AKA good but flawed. It’s not overwhelmed with GZDoom features, it looks great, and it could’ve had better gameplay. So, yeah, you can give it a chance.

G1: Doom the Way id Did

Main author(s): various (project led by Jason Root (Hellbent))

Release date: December 11th,2011 (original release)/February 24th, 2012 (1.1a)

Version(s) played: 1.1a

Required port compatibility: vanilla

Levels: 27 maps (three episodes; all in standard format)

Well, would you look at that? Another WAD that replicates the original game while adding its own spin. That’s an interesting choice for the first Cacoward winner.

But anyway, what is Doom the Way id Did? Well, it’s the first installment of The Way id Did series, made out of four main WADs, three spin-offs, and a MIDI pack. Its development cycle lasted around 42 months (16 if you only count the final incarnation) and was finally released in December 2011, with version 1.1a released in February, 2012.

The concept of this community project was to replicate the style of the original game’s map makers, AKA John Romero and Sandy Petersen (and probably Tom Hall as well).

Did this CP succeed? I don’t know. I’m checking it on its own cords, but I might throw a line or two about the similarity between it and the original Doom here and there.

And, just like with every WAD with episodes, I’m splitting the review into three parts (don’t expect me to do all episodes in a row).

EPISODE 1

The first episode looks like KDitD, AKA bizarre and simple tech base, which isn’t really surprising since the maps try to replicate the vibes of the original game, not to mention being made with vanilla restrictions.

But, yeah, I guess this WAD does its job well here. I wish I could say more, but this post would turn into a school essay. Besides, I feel like it will be the same thing with the other two episodes.

Music-wise, while there are stocks (which is probably one of the rare occasions that these are tolerated in WADs), you can also play the WAD with the custom music made by Mr. Freeze. And it’s good to listen to, although I’m not sure which track is the best in E1 (maybe the one in Military Bunker).

Fun fact: the optional soundtrack would later be used in Base Ganymede (specifically when its final episode was released in 2012).

DtWiD’s first episode was rather easy to play through. I don’t remember getting stuck, but I wasn’t fond of Reactor Complex forcing you to backtrack a long distance after grabbing the blue and yellow keys.

Bizarro KDitD is rather easy, although it has some bullshit encounters sprinkled here and there. I think it’s tougher than the original episode but, frankly, I think even the easiest WAD out there is harder than Knee-Deep in the Dead.

There are some bugs here and there, described on the Doomwiki. From my personal experience, I think I found one of the slime pools not damaging me.

That’s all I have to say for the first episode of Doom the Way id Did. For another E1 homage, it does a good job. It’s even more impressive that it is a community project that didn’t completely feel boring.

Now with the runners-up out of the way, it’s time to promote some of them for the main ceremony event.

Let’s start with choosing who will appear in the Sole Survivor category (1 map) – Frozen Time or Planisphere 2.

…

Okay, the answer couldn’t be any more obvious; it’s Frozen Time. Let’s ignore the fact I’m biased towards Eternal’s maps. While Planisphere 2 looks impressive since it is basically a recreation of the USA’s rotten apple, its scale is both a pro and a con, dragging itself to a halt if you are not rushing for keys. Meanwhile, Frozen Time, while still a slog to go through, is not as painful as in the other map, and it has a much more interesting theme.

As for the default winners, we have Coffee Break for the Platinum Revenant category (10-19 maps) and Beyond Reality for the Ruby Cyberdemon category (20-29 maps).

Masters of Chaos doesn’t get promoted because I only managed to finish its first episode, and even then, I threw in the towel after reaching its second half during the second playthrough.

With that out of the way, thank you all for reading, and I’ll see you with the reviews of the ten best WADs of 2012.

Looks like we have another WAD for the unfinished full MegaWAD pile.

S5: Coffee Break

Main author(s): Matt Tropiano (MTrop)

Release date: July 22nd, 2012

Version(s) played: ???

Required port compatibility: Boom

Levels: 11

To finally conclude the runners-up of 2012, we have Coffee Break, made by Matt Tropiano, who contributed a couple of maps for Community Chest 3 and Plutonia: Revisited, and would later become project manager for The Adventures of Square.

The development started in 2009, and, like with other full megaWADs, stuff happened in the author’s life; so, we will be only dealing with 11 maps.

This WAD looks good, but nothing really special if you ask me. It gives me Plutonia vibes, especially when you reach Deadly, where you go from the human base to some old ruins.

I liked most of the music. The most interesting one is from Channel, which uses the MIDIfied main track from ZDCMP1 (better than the original IMO). There is also Dulce Base from Jimmy Paddock, which is some old MIDI he made; I don’t know if it was planned for something.

Coffee Break was rather easy to understand. The only moments where I got stuck were in the later maps, and even then, these were short and happened once per map.

The aforementioned Deadly is your typical Dead Simple clone, although it has different stuff to do for its first half.

Fort has one of the switch areas covered in mud that severely slows you down; it also has a portal to hell where you have to grab the yellow key.

At the end of Stalker, you enter the coffin that kills you. My guess is that the WAD was originally split into three episodes where you would be forced to pistol-start MAP12 and MAP21.

The WAD gets challenging, especially during the final maps, but I wouldn’t call it hard. If you don’t pistol-run through Coffee Break, you can make some of the fights incredibly easy, especially with BFG and some of the secrets.

One of the cheesable moments is with the cyberdemon who plays the role of the titular Stalker; you encounter him a bunch of times, and he is a big nuisance every time he appears, but you can easily kill him during your first meeting if you have enough plasma, BFG, and the secret invun in one of the corners of the area.

Also, it might be me, but I’ve noticed that you can’t go inside pain elementals once they start dying to stop lost souls from appearing anymore.

That’s all I have to say. Coffee Break is a good WAD, but I wouldn’t call it great, especially when compared to other runners-up that I managed to finish in terms of… probably everything when combined together. Worth checking out if you are curious.

Disclaimer: The review is based only on my blind playthrough.

S4: Planisphere 2

Main author(s): Perro Seco

Release date: Around the last quarter of 2012 (possibly October 6th)

Version(s) played: Original

Required port compatibility: limit-removing (GZDoom recommended)

Levels: 1 (MAP01 replacement)

After my unsuccessful attempt to explore Bytom but Doom, also known as Dawn of Reality, it’s time for another attempt at exploring a real-life city ported into a Doom WAD (featuring over 550 demons on HMP).

Unlike that WAD, Planisphere 2 takes place in the rotten American apple itself – New York, and you can play on more source ports than just GZDoom (although, as I mentioned above, it’s still recommended).

There might be some plot to explain what’s going on, but you need to know Spanish to understand it. All I got was that it takes place in 2040, and the rebuilt Twin Towers look like 9/11 never happened.

There is no denying that this map looks incredible. I might know less of the landmarks than I have fingers on one hand, but it definitely feels like a typical metropolis – a jungle made of concrete and steel, with some patches of green here and there, sprinkled with demons in this case.

The music fits really well; it gives me the vibes of a desolate and abandoned city. I have nothing to add further here.

Despite being a gigantic map, Planisphere 2 is actually much easier to play through than you might think at first. When it comes to the key hunting, these were usually at one of the ends of the boroughs (for me, this word feels like a mix between a county and a district with some extra steps). The part of the not-Alcatraz was the most annoying part, since you kind of have to precisely place yourself to shoot the switch that will open the cell you end up in.

When it comes to fighting enemies, it’s rather easy, even when there is a moment when you fight four cyberdemons at the same time. The real challenge comes from the slough you will be going through; it might take you around 2 hours to finish this map if you don’t rush for the keys; that’s how long it took me.

And by the way, those siege cows that I mentioned? They will be attacking you from one of the twins for around 75% of the playthrough until you… lower it; literally, you lower the tower to the ground, antenna and all.

Doomwiki mentions how the map doesn’t have any of the lumps created by a node builder, and would therefore only work in source ports which featured an internal [one] (it was fixed in the updated version from 2018). It also has glitching collisions and hitscan traces due to its size.

From my personal experience, I think I might have seen some small stuttering in some areas when looking at some angles. Thanks, GZDoom.

And I guess that’s all I have to say about Planisphere 2. It wasn’t a bad experience, but definitely another one that tested my patience. I do realize that New York is a ginormous city, but I feel like the WAD should’ve some parts of it trimmed down; I think I’m one of the WAD fans who’s not into maps based on real cities, let alone that big.

I think you might have a better experience if you turn the monsters off (if your source port allows it) and just walk around the map.

Thankfully, the final runner-up of 2012 is not like this one, so I’ll probably have more fun with that one.

Hello. It has been a while, huh?

One of you might wonder what happened to me?

To put it simply, another burnout from Doom WADs happened; not to mention finally being employed since the last full week of March. Tried some games and idled the other ones to get some Steam cards in the meantime.

Now I think it’s time to come back.

S3: Frozen Time

Main author(s): Alexander S. (Eternal)

Release date: November 30, 2012

Version(s) played: ???

Required port compatibility: GLBoom+/GZDoom

Levels: 1 (MAP01 replacement)

Last time I was properly checking WADs, I took a look at Beyond Reality, and I remember having a great time with it.

Today, we are checking yet another WAD made by Eternal – Frozen Time.

Ironic, considering what season we are about to have in a moment, but I’m going off track here.

This map might be the best-looking one Eternal has made to this point. It looks great. The main area of the map, AKA the citadel stranded in the middle of the ice valley, looks jaw-dropping. Some of the other areas (especially the ice caves) are not too far either.

The map uses Mark Klem’s Junkie Smack from Memento Mori II; it’s a good track, but I’ve heard better tracks made by him (STRAIN had at least three absolute bangers).

The map has new sound effects, and these are a mixed bag for me. I was not a fan of most of the weapon ones, where the peashooter sounds more like a peashooter, shotgun sounds louder than anything else (it sounds good, but it is at least as loud as a plasma gun), and the rocket launcher now does a thump sound when firing. The remaining sound effects get a thumbs up. I especially liked Quake’s ogre’s death sound replacing the hell knight’s one.

Frozen Time is split into three parts: The first being calm before the storm, exploring caves, some buildings, and (probably) ancient structures. The second part is the aforementioned citadel, where you will spend most of your time, and most of the enemies are. The final part is in another ice mountain with a power generator, a clock cube, and the pentagram that you have to shoot into.

The more indoor parts of the map were rather easy to understand, even when they have a moment or two where you have to think slightly outside of the box. The citadel itself was kind of annoying to move around, since it felt mangled, not to mention switches that make you wonder what they do and where.

I liked how the demonic pentagram was revealed. It seems to me that 12 spiderdemons are getting killed one by one, with their death sound changed into a clock bell getting hit, revealing the fake wall with Romero’s head after the final ding.

I also kind of liked how the yellow switch doesn’t indicate that you require a key for it.

Now, changing the subject, the map doesn’t feel that hard. Sometimes you get attacked by a platoon of revenants or two, and the final fight with two siege cows in a clock area is tough (I like how these are foreshadowed, for lack of better words), but aside from these, it’s manageable; even the final encounter can be made easier by pressing the clock to receive BFG. My only problem is how the map (the citadel to be exact) is so vast that you might get sprayed by hitscanners from kilometers away.

While the map doesn’t have bugs (or at least I didn’t notice them), it has problems with stability on GZDoom UZDoom; to be more precise, I had to wait around 1,5-2 seconds when loading the map. I tested it on PrBoom+ as well since it can render OpenGL stuff in its final version, and, lo and behold, it loads the map smoothly.

GZDoom (and, by extension, UZDoom at the moment of writing this) tends to have these problems when the map tends to get gigantic. You would think that, by now, people behind this source port would take care of stability issues, but I guess le no chicken himself smelt too many of his farts to believe that his magnum opus requires it. I can only hope that the UZDoom developers take care of this problem (if they can).

Anyway, I kind of went off the rails here.

Frozen Time, despite my rough starts with it, is still another great map from Eternal. I still think Hell Ground is his best WAD, but this map has very high quality as well. Just mind some of the problems I mentioned with the main part of it.

Next WAD on the list is… another bloated and realistic city map…

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