[Boom] Escape from Hell (New Episode)

The screenshots  look awesome! I will try this one!

Before this episode, I had 4 serious maps, as well as several maps that now look very terrible. By the way, e1m6 is a remake of my very first map. To be honest, I didn't play blood, except for a few levels from the first episode. I just googled "Blood Midi music" and downloaded the first archive I came across. I'm doing e2m4 now and there will be a second episode soon. I will also change the music in the first episode so that there are clear credits

Ok I see.




Finished the first episode, I'll start with what I liked first. These maps have good atmosphere, there are some areas with nice detailing, doomcute, and lighting. You have a good handle on progression as well, and even though many of the maps were very long and maze-like, you did a very good job of delivering me where I needed to go with minimal back-tracking and I actually never really got lost in any of the maps (except for where to go with the red key card in e1m3). To me this is a very important skill, so well done in this regard.

Now to the combat...the plodding corridor-crawler action which dominates almost every map in this set is not my cup of tea, so keep that in mind for this part of the feedback. The few set-piece fights that were to be found in e1m3 and e1m4 were a welcome change of pace but they turned out to be either too easy to turn into a giant circle-strafe party as was the case with e1m3, or poorly executed in the case of e1m4 (platforms of hitscanners way out of the players view that take forever to lower was not super fun). The maps leaned too heavy on the regular shotgun as the main player weapon for my tastes, especially in maps which were stuffed to the brim with hitscanners. When I did get the chaingun which I would have rather mained for most of the maps, it never felt like there was enough ammo for it. Combat moved a little quicker once you started handing out rockets like candy at the mid-point of e1m3, but in general the gameplay experience of open a door, fight random enemies in the next room from the doorway got stale for me after a couple maps.

The last couple of levels seemed real tight on health and it seemed like more often than not, I was going long stretches without any armor at all. My biggest gripe is probably the huge wide open areas filled with hitscanners in e1m4. The player definitely needs armor at the start of this map and some some cover in the huge outdoor area would do wonders for survivability.

Again, this is just my personal preference, but the combat here feels decidedly 90's, so if that is your jam, then this episode is probably right up your alley. I prefer more of the modern combat aesthetic with ambushes, and combat set-pieces stitched together by the incidental combat which dominated this episode. Without those elements the combat felt a little hollow to me, however the atmosphere, environmental story-telling, and clear progression were enough to push me through to the end of this short episode and keep me from getting bored or frustrated. There is for sure an audience for these nostalgic throw-back style maps, but it ain't me.

Hopefully you can find some useful feedback here, and good luck with the rest of the megawad.



p.s. e1m5 has a softlock if the player jumps off the lift to get on top of the factory.

Thanks for playing, I will correct some points in the cards by type of health and ammo. The action with each episode will be more dynamic, that is, the player will receive a rocket launcher earlier. I'm trying to do something interesting within the framework of the first doom