The following sentences are tortuous and long-winded
Since editing the Armadosia review to include its new /idgames url this morning (following the /newstuff thread it appeared in) and the subsequent bumping of the database file's timestamp which was reflected on snafu, I thought I had better actually write a post!
So let's look at three WADs with this in common: in each, the gameplay is restricted to a square of, in Doom engine terms, relatively small size.
Tiny square maps
The following is a not-very-complete review of Congestion: 1024. 32 maps, the playing area of each of which does not exceed a 1024x1024 square, although scenery and control sectors e.g. for monster teleporters are allowed outside of it. This is another project in which mappers are asked to make maps with some arbitrary predefined restriction, to make it more interesting (see also the 10 Sectors contest, the in-progress "1 monster" megawad, etc.)
There's no denying it's a technical marvel. In such a small map you can go to town on the amount of detail you put in, since you don't have to maintain that level of detail over a more normal-sized map. But, this is as much a curse as it is a blessing, for gameplay-wise the maps are extremely cramped. Also, they tend to be unnaturally hard and by that I mean they contrive difficulty by not having enough ammunition or dropping large monsters on you in tiny rooms. More than one map drops an archvile on the exit that you can't hide from easily, which is no fun when you're down to your last 3 shells and 14% health. Some maps, instead of being inside a 1024x1024 square, are on top of a 1024x1024 plateau, and set up that if you fall over the edge you die, instantly.
Unfortunately some bugs exist in the final version, teleporters that don't go off properly, texture misalignments created by dodgy nodebuilders, the usual. At least they bothered to make a fixed version in which there weren't any maps which p/rboom flat out refused to run.
Some notable maps:
- 2 is very different-looking from your typical Doom map and also tries to make up in height what it loses from being restricted in width. Look for all the grass and rocks and so on. See also: 8.
- 4 takes the height difference thing a stage further - over half the map is a 3d bridge! This is fake floor-over-floor taken to new extremes. See also: 15
- 7 is called "Dead Small" and is, guess what, a Dead Simple clone. It is all in one (relatively speaking) "big", very attractively made, room. Indeed I liked this one so much as to waste an hour making demos for it (I really need to do a demos update soon)
- 11 is the one with the broken teleporters and is unremarkable save for the surrounding building scenery which silently collapses as you progress round the map. I remembered this because it seemed very creepy.
- 32 is the One Everyone Talks About. Whenever a community project is released, one or two maps get all the attention. This is usually because some well-known and respected mapper says "mapXX is really innovative and amazing and you should play this wad just for it blah blah blah" Before you know it sheep effect kicks in and everyone's saying the same damn thing.
Anyway that's not to take anything away from this which is nevertheless rather beautiful. You're on this weird stone structure floating in the middle of an apparently endless black void. Don't fall off the sides. Monsters keep teleporting in; the most striking moment at which this happens is when an army of cacodemons appear miles off in space, and slowly float in...
- 27 sees you stuck on top of a mountain waiting for a load of pillars to take a month of sundays to descend. Naturally monsters teleport in while you wait. It's notable mainly because I like the four spiderdemons on far off mountains that you can kill by finding the slightly-concealed switches (just don't fall off the sides, again)
- 30 finally starts off enclosed but eventually opens up to reveal the baleful glare of an Icon of Sin. After that it makes you wait and survive three long platform descents while monsters appear all around you until you can press the self-destruct.
So in summary, like I said, this wad is very well made and so forth, but I found it annoying to play very much.
Parody of tiny square maps
Okay after that some joker made Congestion: 64. You'll either find this funny or you won't - personally, I thought it was hilarious. Spoiler warning: skip to the next heading if you don't want to know what happens. It might be funnier to see for yourself.
So anyway. Last chance about that spoiler warning! ... Okay then.
You have 32 maps which are literally the size of a teleporter each. The first map is "press the exit switch which is right in front of you". The second is "press the exit switch which is behind you". Then it starts to get really complicated. The switch is behind a (very thin) door, or at the top of a lift, or requires a staircase to be built before it becomes accessible.
Then - horror of horrors - there's a monster in here with you! Later maps do the obvious things. Map15 has two switches, a smaller, less obvious-looking one next to the main one. Map32 requires you to kill Keen.
So it goes on. Lifts, drops, invisible walls, more monsters, and even keys, barrels and teleporters come into play. And finally: a baron and a BFG, then an Icon of Sin and a rocket launcher.
The whole thing takes about two minutes to play through - except for Map14, which is only the second 5-minute door I've seen in a released level, and is quite boring to wait for...
Tiny square maps with crazy colours!
Whether or not the timing of this release was just coincidence with C:1024 is not known, but "The Army of Black & The Forces of White in Room 666" is basically a nastily hard, tech-styled map entirely within a 666x666 square. With one twist - the palette has been reduced to one bit per pixel.
The colours don't help. You pretty much can't see anything of what's going on and I never managed to get far. You're stumbling around this cramped area shooting at a crowd of large monsters with no cover and not much ammo and you can't see shit.
However if you do as I did and delete the PLAYPAL and COLORMAP lumps from the wad, you end up with a small, nasty, 666x666 map that is in all fairness quite entertaining! At least once you've worked out some tactics and that. It can be very frustrating if you don't.
Anyway if you do decide to play this slice of monochromatic mayhem, you'll have to remember it replaces MAP31, not MAP01.
THE WICKED SERIES
It's been ages since I wrote a too-long, didn't-read article about a bunch of Doom maps. So let's look at the Wicked series, by Rex Claussen, a talented and prolific mapper who has done everything from plain vanilla maps to Star Wars conversions.
So far there have been 7 wads in the series which are all for vanilla Doom 2, no source port required (although obviously I used p/rboom like I always do now) The first five all came out in 2002, but since the last one came out only a year ago I'm assuming the series is still ongoing...
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Wicked_1 replaces MAP10. All of these wads replace non-obvious map numbers. I don't know why but suspect the reason is just that the author feels the MAP10 music fits better. I wouldn't know, I never play with music.
Anyway this map is excellent. You are in a nonlinear techbase. The architecture is solid and believable but not overdetailed. There are height differences and outdoor areas. The theme varies though is mostly brown and bronze, there's some nukage tunnels and brick, but it never looks out of place. The gameplay is a little on the tight side, there's not a great deal of resources available so be sure to use the chainsaw when you can. But I guess a map shouldn't be too easy on a first attempt else it has less replay value.
In many ways the first one is the best one. It's not too big or complicated or easy to get lost in, or too symmetrical, or too easy, or too hard, or have any daft gimmicks that make it feel weird. Certainly it made it initially easy to instantly download and play each map of the series as soon as it came out.
Wickedly Simple
Wicked_2 replaces MAP07. It's the only one that actually needs to be that particular map number - as you might gather from the name it is a map07 clone. Actually that's not fair, it looks completely different to the original map07. You start in a cross-shaped room, the four points of it being the start, the exit and two teleporters. They both lead to circular-ish arenas. The first has a bunch of arachnotrons and a cyberdemon; when all the former die, you can get up the sides and find a big crowd of demons. The second arena features a bunch of mancubi and a spiderdemon. It's more cramped here so it's harder, and there are imps outside it.
I'm ambivalent towards this map. It has the high quality, solid, not-overdetailed architecture common to all maps in this series, but its gameplay isn't much more than a map07 clone, and I don't think those work well as standalone maps.
No Rest for the Wicked
Wicked_3 replaces MAP27 with a red brick castle that is so like a Doom level that the first time I played it I ran into a hellknight and I couldn't believe my eyes! What was a hellknight doing in Doom... oh wait, it's actually a Doom 2 level.
Its gameplay is quite interesting in that you basically can't do it the conventional way of killing each monster as you come to it. If you do that you'll run out of ammo pretty soon. You have to run through about half the level until you have the blue key at least before making any serious attempt to remove the monsters which simply can't be avoided. And even then it's still pretty tight with the ammunition.
For the Wicked Shall Perish
Wicked_4 replaces MAP05. The series returns to its roots with a tech/industrial map. This naturally subdivides into a number of different sections. Starting outside at the south of the map you work your way to the centre, where the exit is, then off to the remaining three major compass directions. Each of these "wings", as it were, gets you a key. The minor compass point wings are just bonus sections.
Each wing is itself large and full of traps. The biggest is probably the one that leads to the red key. Hint: If you clear it out in the obvious way you won't find the switch you need, those bars only open from the inside. You have to notice that one of the four pools of slime in the room with the crossing walkways has a gap in its wall, and follow that round to a lift.
The blue and yellow key wings are much more straightforward, although the blue wing is quite dark and you have to keep your wits about you. In summary this one would probably be the best of the series, but I think it's a bit large, takes a while to get into, and that bit of nonobvious progression.
Death Comes Not Gently to the Wicked
Wicked_5 replaces MAP18. By the time it came out I was in the middle of the awkward DIY->Prboom transition and it sort of got lost. I had this thing where a wad was either a DIY wad or a Prboom wad and it didn't feel right to play the wad in the wrong engine, I don't know why. Anyway since I'd played the previous 4 in DIY, I felt this one had to be as well. So this was the first wad I'd played in DIY for a fair amount of time and it got put off for ages too. Oh well. None of this makes any difference, I just like writing this shit down for some reason.
The map itself is in the Doom 2 city theme, by and large, and especially with the city sky texture, really feels like it. It is most similar to Map13: Downtown, although there are fewer buildings and they are bigger. Like many of the others it is low on health, although there's quite a lot of ammunition available early on. One problem is that the first objective of finding the red key, is quite hard; just like Wicked_4 you have to be very observant. Hint: the biggest building, the only one you can get right inside to begin with, surrounds a walled courtyard with some cacodemons. Search that, there's a button you have to shoot.
The second building is accessed by teleporter, although you might have run through its central passageway already, the building itself is just the top floor. Then there are three more buildings to get through once you have the yellow key, the first gets you access to the second two, each of which teleports you back to the start, and allows you to open the two sets of bars to one last area where there's a switch that opens the exit. That sounds more complicated than it is.
This is definitely one of my favourites not least because of its relatively unique position in my own history with the game, but also because it's a nicely made, large open level with plenty to see and do. It is quite hard and the lack of health can be frustrating, but once you've cleared outside and the first building and have the red key, you're probably okay...
The Wicked and the Damned
Wicked_6 replaces MAP17. By the time mid-2003 came around and this map was released, I'd pretty given up bothering to switch computers to run DIY. So at the time I never bothered to download this map, because I figured I'd never get round to playing it in DIY. So despite being nearly three years old I only got round to playing it this week.
It turned out to be another base/industrial-themed map similar to 4. However, it's a lot smaller. What there is, is dark, and appears to be completely devoid of life. You have to basically explore most of this map looking for, well, anything. It's a complex layout and at this initial stage none of the doors work. It's quite easy to get lost.
Eventually you find a room on the far side of the map with a switch. You press it and shit comes to life! Now you have to get back to the other end of the map, running through a slime river through a now-demolished wall and trying not to die. There is as usual a lack of health and ammo and the longer you can go without firing a weapon after you re-energise the base, the better. Having said that the population of this map is nowhere near as numerous as some prior of the series, and I managed to beat this map on my first attempt.
Once activated the interior of the base is still quite confusing, especially as many of the doors only open from one side. Once you get them all open it's a little easier but still be prepared to be lost. This was a good idea but was quite short and felt slightly gimmicky. Oh and don't fall in the machinery.
Wicked Be The Ways of Men
Wicked_7 replaces MAP10, just like Wicked_1 (so precludes you from loading all seven maps at the same time, I suppose) On entry you have nowhere but a teleporter to walk into. Where you end up... depends on your skill level.
This map is made not on conventional standards. Each skill level is of roughly similar difficulty, and they all have the same objective - find the blue key, find the red key, and use them both to open the exit in the centre of the map. However, the location of the keys and your start position varies, and indeed there are three areas each of which is only accessible on one skill level.
The theme varies. It's mostly a dark techbase in the same style as 4 and 6, the interior of which being typically complex and easy to get lost in as before. There are also peripheral areas: caves, an old brick building, some rocky canyons, and rivers of slime and sewage.
As for gameplay well I already mentioned the changes with skill level. This makes for some interesting quirks, traps going off in not-so-obvious places, etc. Otherwise it's relatively straightforward. Apart from the usual resource deficit the only other thing I'd have to say about the gameplay is that there are a number of monster teleporters which don't go off fast enough (this always bugs me)
On the whole it's a great idea but somehow feels unsatisfying. I don't know if it's because it feels wrong that there are entire areas of maps you can't get into, or maybe I'm just rigid and narrow-minded. But it's nonetheless a very good map, and you should play it on all three skill levels.
Metamorphosis 11
Yeah it's becoming a tradition that I go to this thing. On Friday Stik came down from whatever godforsaken village he lives in now, picked me up, and drove to campus. Despite my best efforts we didn't get lost, and only had to change lanes rapidly at the last moment twice.
We got to oliford's flat and sat it in for about an hour having drinks and talking shit about people and jobs and universities and blah blah blah. His flat seemed quite small probably because the ceilings were quite low (at least compared to my memory of Whitefields) but the rooms were pretty big.
We set off for the union and to my huge surprise managed to get in without a fuss. See I'd bought my ticket online not two hours before the event was due to open, and that, coupled with the notice on their site that ID would be required and only a photo driving licence, passport or current university ID would be accepted, had served to convince me that I would get turned away. But no. The guy took a few seconds looking my name up on his computer till thing and having showed him my old university card (dated 1998, expired 2001) I was waved in.
Highlights of the next few hours included:
- Bumping into various people I knew and also shouting at a distance at people I didn't, like that stupid bitch who was I swear was wearing a belt instead of a skirt, and a number of other, similarly underclothed women. Ladies: I don't see how you can be that aloof and supercilious while parading around with your tits hanging out.
- Music: Unlike last year there was actually some drum and bass. It wasn't quite as musical as I like but still. Also there was some punk thing upstairs. What, guitars at metamorphosis? I surprised myself by actually enjoying it, because it was fast and bouncy, not the usual dirge I associate with guitar music. Oh and of course there was masses of trance and hard house but you know what I think about that.
- Fat Bitch Incident: There was a coven of identically-apparelled makeup-encrusted stage dancers, their skimpy tops adorned with the event's logo, obviously having been made especially for it. However one of them was the size and shape of a baby elephant. I elbowed my way to the front of the stage and tried my level best to heckle her. A girl nearby turned to me and tried to tell me off for this gross behaviour; I asserted that having big tits was no excuse for looking 8 months pregnant. While not quite on the hilarity scale of last year's writing "WIDE LOAD" on the screaming, bloated backside hanging out of a piggyback-riding pair of trousers in front of me, this year's fat bitch incident was nonetheless entertaining.
- Glowstick Incident: I made up for this later when someone threw a glowstick at me and I picked it up, waved it around for a while, got bored, and gave it to a different girl nearby, who only had one. I got a hug for my trouble; and as I always say, it's physical contact, what more can you hope for.
The event went on until 3am, an hour longer than I was expecting. I suppose this is due to the recent changes in licensing laws, although I didn't think the boring twats at Coventry City Council were in favour of extending the hours places could open. By this time both my companions had retired as they both had to get up the following day. I walked home; usually an easy task, but for some reason my legs and back hurt a lot more than how they usually do after an event like this, so it was quite difficult. Arriving home, I had some buttered bread, breakfast cereal, a glass of milk, a glass of orange juice, and one and a half large tumblers of squash. Then, collapsed into bed.
They couldn't have picked a better date for this!!
Oh my god
my version of the "protect yourself against ssh dictionary attacks" post
So a few weeks ago I finally got fed up of my modem lights flashing uselessly for anything up to an hour at a time and my log files filling up with sshd errors, so I did this. Yeah I know about 50 million sites have already written their own posts on this topic but I don't care!
sshd_config stuff
In your /etc/ssh/sshd_config you can do this
- PasswordAuthentication no
Attacks generally use plain password authentication, that is, where a username/password combination is sent over an encrypted channel. Most proper ssh clients support something better, so you can turn it off. Please note password authentication is different from keyboard-interactive; you can still log in with your unix password if PAM or whatever allows it. I didn't realise this for a while and was very puzzled when I found I could still log in using I think keyboard-interactive is harder to fake for a remote worm.
- PermitRootLogin no
I think it's probably safer to disallow root access completely. Log in via a regular user and use sudo or something. However if like me you're lazy and have set it up so you can sudo anything and someone else has your password you're still just as screwed. However a remote attacker knows there's a root account on your system, but won't necessarily know the name of your normal user login. I don't know, just be vigilant and don't use stupid passwords I guess.
iptables recent match
Combined with a decent user password, the above is probably enough to protect you against random ssh attacks. But you'll still see log file activity and modem lights and whatever. How about cutting them off completely at the firewall? Various people have come up with ways to use the iptables recent match to drop packets from hosts that spam you with ssh connections. This is mine. It is very simple.
Before you just had what amounts to this:
- iptables -t filter -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 22 -m state NEW -j ACCEPT
Now you do this (new stuff in bold, obviously)
- iptables -t filter -A INPUT -m recent --update --hitcount 5 --seconds 30 -j DROP
- iptables -t filter -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 22 -m state --state NEW -m recent --set -j ACCEPT
Vague explanation: instead of blindly accepting the connection, you tell the recent matcher to make a note of it. Then, before that, you tell the recent matcher to drop the connection if it's had 5 similar connections in the previous 30 seconds. We use --update so that the outsider has to go fully 30 seconds with no connection attempts before the matcher starts letting him in again.
It's not ideal yet, I mean, I would like to be able to drop people who spam 5 times in 30 seconds for a full hour, but I haven't worked out how to do that yet. Anyway this seems to work as the current breed of worm seems to stop scanning you if it detects that you are no longer accepting connections, I guess so that it doesn't get stuck in tarpits or whatever.
UNLEASHED UPON AN UNSUSPECTING WORLD
I spent a couple of days last week firstly writing a README for the overdetailed map cheat, then pissing about with "svn merge" to eventually form a patch to apply it to prboom (both the 2.2.6 release and whatever is current in upstream's repository) Finally I took a bunch of screenshots, and posted the whole lot on Doomworld.
I don't think anybody cares though. Well, it's their loss. You might expect me to be more negative about an apparent failure, but the way I see it, it's no skin off my nose if nobody else likes it. Although I suppose if extending the map cheat were a good idea someone else would have come up with it and probably implemented a better version already.
I could also post it in the patches tracker on sourceforge, but I'll have to wait until I can work out how to convince sourceforge I'm actually logged into the site.
DEUS VULT REVISITED
So I played map 5 of Deus Vult the other day. Okay that won't seem significant unless I link back to the previous article on it. To recap it is an extremely large map which has, in particular, over 32768 sidedefs, so I had to fix RBoom to accept maps of this size* (as well as a couple of other stupid little hacks, but that's another story)
I think I like it better all in one piece, if only because there are all these interconnections between the major areas of the map that you don't get in the smaller ones, and so you can revisit earlier areas. However, it still feels like a bunch of independent scenarios joined together. A lot of maps feel like this. Earlier parts are completely separate from later parts and they have no influence on each other. You just pass through them and move on. They might as well be in separate maps. It's almost as if the author has started making the map and hasn't really known when to stop, and has just kept adding more sections.
*Okay I admit I stole the fix from Prboom+. I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to, Prboom is GPL which as far as I'm aware means any derivative project also has to be. It's hard to tell if I did it properly since every single changed line in Prboom+'s source is marked with "//e6y" but there are no other additional comments so you don't know which changed lines are part of this patch and which are part of another, if you see what I mean. Oh well, it seems to work. I suppose I should try to construct a map with an even greater number of sidedefs to check it further.
