Doom community happenings

fucking hell, Lüt has risen. Next thing you'll tell me that someone pulled deadnail's head out of cryo.

Tho I kinda hope deadnail is perma-gone, tbh. He'd shit magma if he had lived to see how they massacred our boy.

A snip of ZDoom.org forums notifying wereknight that they're permanently banned.

Agreed about base content, but I think the first THREE episodes are gold, and bosses of each episode are much cooler than in Doom I or even the penultimate in Doom II. You have not truly experienced it unless you played it on the fifth difficulty, "Black Plague..." which is like Nightmare! without the respawn (and -respawn parameter can be added in console for kicks, that might be brutal tho). That's because D'Sparil kicks your fucking ass on that difficulty, especially when played without fucking mouselook. I don't even remember if I managed to bit him on that.
The last couple episodes can be ignored even moreso than Plutonia. I am not a big fan of Plutonia, actually, because not every level is memorable but there are memorable levels. By comparison, the expansion episodes of Heretic are meh.

Also the gameplay in Heretic is not boring. The problem with the game is that is taxing on level designer - too many monsters with overlapping roles, not enough purely distinct monsters, nothing like the Arch-Vile and the Revenant. At least we got a flying manc-wannabe, and he is not slow (Disciples of D'sparil) and also can ghost in/out, especially on Black Plague they are really good at dodging your projectiles by ghosting and letting them through without damage.

If you wish for a finely-crafted Heretic experience that is not a modern cliche slaughterfest-lite, there is this gem: www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/heretic/m-o/mdomain1 I managed to complete it on Black Plague, selecting that difficulty also helped me beat it without cheating because I wanted to bailed out, but cheats are disabled like in Nightmare!, so I toughed it out, and it was cool! You'll find a lot of interesting setups there. Although if you choose Black Plague, you'll have to play with saves, because there are ghost undead warrors in a lot of closets and other types of close quarters xD but the fire gargoyle setup over a lite damaging liquid with a wind and the megaarmor provided, or circlestrafing non-stop blasting the phoenix rod powered into flamethrower to make roast meat out of hellish pack of monsters surrounding you from every side, using tomed gauntlets in melee against the Maulotaur after you killed the other one with tomed serpent's staff and invulnerability in a scenario with two of them, ... well, there is simply a lot of cool stuff there. And while it plays on "Maulotaur and Iron Lich" in every level trope like the last two episodes of Heretic with an Expansion, it does it much better so it actually works. In fact, the end of most level pits Maulotaurs and Iron Liches in all different height combinations so either side is given a premediated victory, it's like a setup with Cyberdemon infighting Spiderdemon and tons of variations in which one side consistently wins over the other, but Maulotaur is much cooler than Cyberdemon, and Iron Lich is cooler than Spider or the Baron.

Fuck, some monsters from Heretic I would like to see in Doom: Iron Lich, Disciples of D'Sparil, D'Sparil himself (both forms), both gargoyles and Weredragon (like a mobile earthbound cacodemon, or an overgrown pinkie-like with a missile attack). Hell, Weredragon could replace pinkie for fuck's sake (melee-only sucks in Doom), since he is big and blocky and fast, Spectres could also be based of it, would be really creepy. Iron Lich is better than Baron. Disciples of D'Sparil are Mancubi-like but not a replacement, but really like a monster unparalled in Doom totally.

I feel like it's not very fair or even logical to compare Heretic to Doom like that, the whole "Heretic is just Doom but fantasy" should be nothing more than a bad absurd joke.

Heretic clearly has various elements that Doom doesn't like the whole inventory system, the tome of power (and how the game is balanced around it), flight, fully projectile based enemies, different damage types (physical and magical), and others that even if tried to adapt into Doom would prove to be as much effort as just making a whole new game at that point, and wouldn't even be recognizable as Doom anymore.

Heretic has the potential to be an extremely fun bullet hellish FPS with proper bosses, more nuanced and complex progression, would probably benefit a lot more from advanced formats with increased verticality, and all of it is even adaptable to a hub format given you iron out the bad things about Heretic to make that a more enjoyable long term experience (just look at Faithless, it's just what i'm describing, and it's one of the best things i've played in recent years in general). Doom has barely ever been put in a (at least continuous) hub format because it's exactly just about the short term progression, since it doesn't allow for long term progression unlike Heretic.

As for the theme: even if it just remained the same without any projects to turn the whole serpent riders and dark fantasy setting on its head, there's nothing wrong about that. I mean, look at Quake: most Quake mappers seem to be very serious about keeping the same setting and general look of the original game to this very day (with very few exceptions), yet you can still see a lot of visual variety in them. This is of course, assuming that it has to stay the same, and it obviously doesn't!

tl;dr: Heretic isn't just a fantasy Doom clone ya nerd

you should be careful what you wish for.

i'm still around, dwvets is still a thing. typically i make a new account/email every time i contribute something, i think i have 3 or 4 by now on the zdoom forums.

something you wanna know?

Witness. I speak, and terrible demons of the ancient netherworld rise from their slumber, and answer my call.

Nothing I need to know, other than you are well and in health my man. Tell the vets I was asking for them.

heh. deadnail finds his Zen, the physical world implodes into literal wet shit. The ironists grin and the buddhists weep.

Also use needs to fucking man up and send me some pm love.

Just like everyone here. Although life is not that generous in terms of positive things...

It's something I do every few years.


You should feel ecstatic! Full of glee, overflowing with delight! Abounding in exuberance and jumping for joy! Cheerful, merry, and jubilant! On top of the world, over the moon, and thrilled to be alive in such a tremendously fabulous and wonderfully blessed time!


Pffft, I'll have you know I've started more maps than he's ever finished.


Russia ain't in the west, you hockenplatz.

they ban everyone who posts in the Kiwi Farms threads iirc.

Wooooah. Who would've expected a DW admin here. Hope you don't delete your account.



Kinda weird they don't ban anybody who posts here, lol