play from scratch or carry ammunition forward?
It's not obvious whether or not a map is meant to be played from scratch or played with ammunition, health and weapons carried forward from the previous level. However there are some signs you can look for.
Note: "is meant to be" is different from is possible. The only way you can tell if a map is possible to be done from scratch is to actually go and attempt it.
certainties
the text file says what to do
Probably the most obvious case. If the text file says how to play a map then that's how the author intended you to play it.
(Of course you are free to ignore him...)
it's an ExM1/MAP01
So naturally you're forced to play it from scratch.
previous level deliberately killed you at the end, but exited anyway
In this case the game respawns you with 100% health and 50 bullets. Usually achieved by killing both you and a Romero head, or killing you but knocking a voodoo doll over an exit line. Scythe does this, for example.
Not the same as dying in an exit damage sector (in which you don't actually die, and start the next level with <10% health but all your weapons and ammunition)
near certainties
there's a weapon right there at the start to pick up
This is usually a shotgun. Indication that author has likely playtested it from scratch. However in rare cases despite the presence of this weapon you could find yourself out of ammo. Or it might be contradicted by one of the reasons below.
it's a single-map wad that for some reason doesn't replace map01
The usual reason a map is not numbered 1 is it depends on some level-specific effect (map07, ExM8) or the author prefers the original music for that map but doesn't want to rip it out the iwad.
However, it's still a single-map wad. I've never seen a map where the author intends you to bring all the weapons and leftover ammunition from Doom 2 maps 1-6 into the start of his map07 replacement.
reasonable doubt
more than one consecutive wad in the map
There's always the possibility that when you're in a multi-map wad you're supposed to play through all of them at once. However, the simple case of having more than one map in a wad is, by itself, not enough information to go on.
Some obvious cases where maps are meant to be played from scratch include:
- Community megawads are more like collections of single maps, designed by authors working entirely separately, and should be played as such. These will usually say so in the text file.
- Wads by speedrunners and demorecorders, even otherwise with obvious flow between maps, are primarily meant for each map to be played from scratch, as it is much easier to record demos of single maps.
- More generally if you find that after one or two maps you seem to have full ammunition, health, and all the weapons, you're probably not meant to be carrying it forward. On the other hand it might just mean the maps are really easy and, arguably, overbalanced.
A much clearer indication of carrying-forward intention is where the maps themselves follow on; that is, where the start of the next map is identical to the end of the previous. However I've seen wads where the maps follow on, but also have a shotgun easily available at the start. UAC.WAD was a great example of this. It turned out you could do all the maps from scratch but some were... tricky.
Experience tells me that for most wads the author thinks that while you can play the maps one after the other it's easier to balance each one individually.
probably not
weaponless ammo
The best indication a map is not meant to be done from scratch is that it has large amounts of ammunition you can't use, but could if you had played through a previous level and picked up the right type of gun there.
pile of resources at end of previous map
If there's something like a weapon, megasphere, or large amount of ammunition at the end of the previous map, and it was pretty much unavailable until there were so few monsters left to use it on (or even none) then it's likely you're meant to carry the stuff onto the next map.
At least, if the map was made by the same author, it's not part of a community wad or something, or it's not just the case that the author always puts a soulsphere by the map exit as some kind of signature.
nowhere enough ammunition to beat the map
Bit dubious though, there are lots of reasons why a map might not have enough ammunition. Perhaps infighting is intended. Perhaps the author is too good a player (although this usually means the monster count is higher rather than there being a lack of ammunition)
The reason I started writing this was because I was replaying Wonderful Doom and from pistol starts several of the maps seem to have excessively low ammunition. However others have weapons at the start, although not just right there stuck under your nose.
A selection of maps by Eternal
Eternal (remain1, epic, freak4) continues to release a large number of excellent wads. Here are some more:
Replacing map31*, this is a giant slaughter map, part gothic castle, part lava cavern. It's extremely large and cannot really avoid dividing itself up into separate sections, but that kind of disjointness can't be avoided in maps over a certain size. Architecturally it's pretty much flawless.
It has over 2000 monsters on UV and was far too hard for me that way. However I found it really fun to run through with my various "beef up the player" dehacked patches, and I would say it was probably my favourite map of 2008.
Cybersky feels somewhat like a refined version of bbb.wad (see below) but then it's often the case that maps by the same author have a similar feel to them.
* It also has both normal and secret exits, despite being only a single-map wad. I am told this is because it was originally intended to be the first secret level in the upcoming sequel to Kama Sutra, but had to be taken out because it got so big it broke the sidedef limit (I suppose the ksutra authors want to make another vanilla-compatible megawad)
Two rather unique maps, based around the idea of playing with upper textures and sky ceilings. We are mostly outside, on grass, under a bright blue sky - it's positively spring-like, an effect enhanced by all the structure casting believable shadows.
The first map is kind of like a small town, the second, the remains of a fortress. Weirdness comes into play with many apparently unsupported floating structures hanging in the sky.
Gameplay is light. There's hardly any monsters and difficulty is low. While sometimes it throws quite a lot of monsters at you, the amount of space you have to run away removes nearly all threat.
Despite the high-density modern architecture the maps as a whole feel rather oldschool. Not sure why this is. Modern maps are often highly sanitised and you don't often see physically impossible architecture. Or maybe it's the sky texture, there's something inexplicably nostalgic about the light blue sky texture.
Seven maps, mostly what I'd call survival horror (low monster count but with a tendency to surprise the hell out of the player) The gimmick here is like that of Grid32, that is everything is made with a coarse grid setting. Also a deliberate restriction to the IWAD textures.
Now I'm not much of a fan of low-ammo horror maps. I can appreciate the architecture and layout, but I would really like a lot more ammunition and to stop having invisible monsters teleported in right next to me. It's worth even cheating your way through the maps though, as there's some really impressive Dehacked work going on here.
In contrast however, map05 is another enormous slaughterfest. It actually doesn't really fit in with the rest of the wad, but it's by far my favourite map of the set. Set mostly in a huge cavern, it's unrestricted - you can run pretty much anywhere - but you will die quickly. There's a lot of jumping between pillars to do as well. It was a huge triumph when I found the quick way back up to the start (teleport from cavern floor, jump to cyberdemon tower, jump to hidden alcove in wall, teleport again)
Eternal showing his range, he can do survival horror maps just as well as huge slaughterfests.
Another huge slaughter map. This is instantly recognisable as a remake of the final map in the One Week Megawad although there are also parts obviously inspired by Deus Vult. It also has a lot in common with Cybersky, notably the "jump to key on descending pillar" motif (this is hard to describe, just play them both, you'll know) and the same disjointness which makes it feel like a number of smaller levels joined together (but which as I said is hard to avoid in very large maps)
Interestingly it has a strange bug on ITYTD. Consider the Boom conveyor belt trick to activate more than one linedef at once. BBB tries to do the vanilla version - knocking a voodoo doll over linedefs with a barrel explosion, and giving the player health to compensate. However in ITYTD you only take half damage, which means half impulse, which means the voodoo doll doesn't get knocked far enough for the linedefs to be activated!
Also the sequence in which you get the keys, and press the switches the keys unlock, seems out of order.
- Get the blue key, come back to the start, find the blue switch has revealed itself.
- Press that, go back to where the key was and through the bars, do the area beyond, teleport back to the centre, and find the red switch has revealed itself.
- Then you can go and get the red key, and return to find the fourth corner with the secret armour has revealed itself.
- Finally go through the red door, grab the yellow key off its pedestal and do the (excessively long) yellow key section, eventually returning to the start to find the yellow switch has revealed itself, and this opens the exit.
You have to do the bit after the blue bars before you can do the bit that leads to the red key, so I think getting the red key should reveal the red switch, and doing the previous bit after the blue bars should reveal the corner that doesn't have a key switch in it.
Might as well be dead (again) (redux) (*yawn*)
As of today I'm a socially retarded cripplingly shy overgrown manchild whose age starts with a 3 so if the hole in my CV isn't enough to make me unemployable, that surely will.
Not doing these birthday updates any more
I know updating today is supposedly a tradition but I'm sick of the past being a millstone round my neck (not to mention, given the previous section, how depressing it obviously is, nobody wants to read that) so in future years I won't bother unless something actually happens (which it won't)
Can't be bothered to post at all really
I have a few site updates in my head but am as usual thoroughly bored of writing. However the difference this time is, now, the site is all static files. This means there's none of the usual pressure to write something before the page empties itself automatically. Thus I expect posts to become even more sporadic.
Bye.
