The /newstuff Chronicles #129

Okay folks, due to some personal matters, Hyena was unable to preform his reviewing duties this week, so this week we have guest reviewer who you may have heard of, Tormentor667. So, onto the reviews:

Well, some might ask "Why does someone like Tormentor667 do the /newstuff chronicles this week!?", well the answer is pretty simple: I have never been pleased with the reviews from some of Doomworld's staff reviewers and some might also know that long and resultless discussions between reviewers and wad creators ended up in flame wars and else because nobody was able to find out if the review-job can be done more objective and nobody was able to find out if it is really that hard to avoid subjective opinions on wads. This week I got the chance to see, if the reviewers have been right or wrong. So, here we go...

• Death Revealed by Mattias Johansson
  doom2.exe | SP | 141kb |
  This set of 5 maps is indeed very nice. The ammo and monster balance is very good although the ultra-violence skill level is almost not beatable without cheating. The texturing and layout of the maps vary and so you can find everything from metal rusty areas to gray verdigris parts. The level of detail is also very good but sometimes flats and walls don't fit together and look ugly, also the fact that you have to load 5 wads has a negative effect on the rating but overall it's fun and playable.
  
  
• Congestion Control 2 by Karthik Abhiram
  enhanced port | SP | 903kb |
  It was really a pleasure for me to plax this second part of the Congestion Control series - twice. The map design is absolutely amazing and took my breath away and the Final Doom midis fit this outstanding environment perfectly. Although the textures seem to be chosen randomly for a newbie doom eye at the screenshots on Karthik's page, the complete setting of this map looks great if you are really into it and play the masterpiece of work. The ammo balance is great and the monsters have been placed very well and... heh, I don't have to say much more, just play the wad if you don't want to miss a great Doom achievement.
  
  
• Chiptune Doom2 by Bill "Bloodshedder" Koch
  sourceport with tracker capability | n/a | 1,46mb | n/a
  This wad is a straight music replacement file which replaces all the 32 Doom2 midis with tracker-format files. The special thing about this is the fact, that the music sounds now like those old NES and Commodore music formats, also called "chiptunes" and if you are really into something like that, you will like it and I have to admit, most of them sound very well. Btw, I prefer the mp3 versions...
  
  
• E1Style by Job
  doom2.exe | SP | 48kb |
  If you don't read the txt file, you might think about a Chris Hansen type-of retro map but: "This is probably best described as a cross between e1 style and Doom2 midgame levels". The map is pretty decent but it doesn't fit today's standards in detail. Unfortunately it's also a bit short. It took me about 3 minutes to finish it all up but the ammo and monster balance is very good.
  
  
• MA_Desolite by Ed C.
  doom | DM | 177kb |
  The map takes advantage of some of the latest ZDoom features like skyboxes, slopes and 3d-bridges. The map itself is designed very well built without any faults of eye-killers and looks damn pretty good. Texturing consists mostly out of episode 1 textures and that's why it acts very retro. It's mid-sized and therefor a very good fragging arena for 2 to 4 players, it might also work very well with bots because of the easy map layout.
  
  
• Shadowcaster by Stephen Clark
  doom | SP | 1,5mb |
  This one is a new adventure in the world of heretic, a 1 episode replacement for 9 maps for ZDoom Heretic. As far as I am not into Heretic map editing that much, I can only say that the maps look awesome and are fun to play neither they are detailed or not. Ammo and monster balance is very good throughout the complete episode. The only points which striked my eyes have been some special large areas without any changing colors or textures and without a small bit of detail (check screenshot 3 so you know what I mean). But overall a very good achievement for today's newstuff.
  
  
• Zar by Jeremy Statz
  doom2.exe| DM | 60kb |
  A very nice and decent Doom2 style map which reminded me at first a bit on the "'O' of Destruction". The map is designed very well without any misalignments or textures/flats which doesn't fit together and that's the reason why it looks so good without being heavily overdetailed. The monster and ammo balance is great and the map itself is very fun. I recommend this one to all of our Doom2 old schoolers because it would fit the doom2.wad perfectly.