The /newstuff Chronicles #232

Bloodshedder says: Hey look! It's Saturday! /newstuff on...Saturday? Well, this never happened before except for that one time it was early. Anyways, I'd like to thank deathz0r for promising to do this /newstuff on Wednesday, and then taking his sweet time to get it to me. Also, you can thank him for not reviewing the old WADs from 94/95 that were uploaded. Anyways, here's that jerk we all know and love:

I like to congratulate NMN for delaying this week's /newstuff by willing to participate in reviewing this week's WADs, then backing out a few days later. That makes my job unbearably harder since every stupid jerk is going "OH NO WHERE'S NEWSTUFF" and so on. But never fear, deathz0r's here again to save you all from certain doom!

• Broom - Luiz Eduardo (a.k.a DuduCrazy)
  Enhanced Heretic Port - N/A - 16kb -
  To start things off, here's a graphic wad that replaces the Heretic staff with a broom. Perfect for sweeping away the competition!
  
  
• Custom Glock18 - Luiz Eduardo (a.k.a DuduCrazy)
  ZDoom Custom Weapons Patch - N/A - 46kb -
  A custom weapon that uses the Glock 18 model from Counter-Strike. It shoots somewhat faster than the pistol. A demostration level is included in this zip, but I didn't bother checking it.
  
  
• DoomonstrationGame - Michael "Optimus" Kargas
  ZDoom - SP - 649kb -
  There is two versions of the wad inside the zip; one with monsters and one without. This review is based on the version with monsters.
  
  According to the text file, this wad was created for a demoscene party and was completed quickly in order to display the wad at said party. Because of that, there are some areas where the detail is minimal and very dull, and the layout is a complete mess and sometimes painfully annoying to move around, or even know where you're going. The difficulty level is somewhat tough, as there are multiple Cyberdemons and a Spider Mastermind, and not enough ammo or health to survive through the entire level. Having said that, there are some nice texture effects like funky scrolling laserbeams, although the starfield at the very start is only textured on one side. It's also interesting to note that even though this WAD was created for ZDoom, there is no scripting whatsoever. Another problem with the WAD is that it's a mess to examine with programs like Wintex and XWE, as there's a lot of useless lumps inside the wad.
  
  
• EGA Doom and CGA Doom - Dean "deathz0r" Joseph
  doom2.exe - N/A - 2kb and 1kb -
  Review by SargeBaldy:
  At long last! Wildly anticipated by the community for a number of years, these two deathz0r gems have finally been realized. But how well do they meet the hype? In such a case of these, perhaps such an aim was beyond any realistic scope of the imagination. And indeed this is the case, in part. Where CGA Doom leaves a bold statement, in bold colors, a homage to its obvious predecessors -- indeed who would argue against the impact of Pirates! on the development of Doom? -- which both leaves the player submissive in its relation to a certain indescribable nostalgia, the impact of EGA Doom perhaps does not have any such effect on the player. Perhaps its largest weakness is that, being itself an intermediator between CGA and the VGA system utilized by Doom, EGA's contrast does not exhibit upon the player enough to force any strong reaction. In addition, EGA, having had a much shorter lifespan than that of CGA, is less recognizable to most players and therefore itself lacks the dynamic nostalgic response present in the much more formidable CGA presentation of Doom. However, that is far from saying that it too is not required playing; certainly these stand as pinnacles, totems, it might be said, to the religious fervor of the Doom community at large.
  
  
• Extra 0verpowered Weapons - Finalizer
  ZDoom - N/A - 393kb -
  A weapons mod that is largely based on 0verp0wer Weap0ns by Xaser. Not only that, but it includes new monsters as well! The weapons don't really feel that overpowered though, except for the kickin rad BFG replacement that is a must see.
  
  
• InuBot 1 - Inu-Hanyou1776
  Skulltag - N/A - 14kb -
  This is a Skulltag bot that utilizes the Inuyasha skin created by Inuyasha_989. It seems to be a tough bot, but the skin is too small when it is compared to the base skin.
  
  
• (My First Wad.) - (Anonymous-my name on Multi-DOOM is "I love my head" (you'll see why))
  Skulltag - SP - 2kb -
  Out of all of the possibilities of doing /newstuff again, I had to choose this week. I was always known to have poor timing.
  
  
• Ponte - Renato Pinheiro
  doom2.exe - SP - 23kb -
  Upon playing this WAD, you will instantly recognize the characteristics of a typcial 1996 WAD: Incredibly huge areas and pits, minimum detail, health and ammo, too many monsters and no fun whatsoever. Of course, if you had read the text file, you will realise that the author had made some WAD back in 1997 with his friend (who had uploaded this WAD), and if I had to guess correctly, Renato hasn't made a WAD (other than this) since then.
  
  
• ragnarok - Audun Remøy
  doom2.exe - SP - 1kb -
  This map is greatly detailed and a blast to play, with fabulous gameplay and unexpected twists. THIS WAD WINS THIS WEEK'S RECOMMENDATION BY DEATHZ0R TOTAL CRAP MEDAL
  
  
• Submerge Deathmatch Pack 1 - Joel R. Poston aka Submerge
  Skulltag - DM - 867kb -
  The only deathmatch WAD this week, and it is by far the best WAD when compared to the other WADs that are reviewed, mostly due to the fact that this is the only multi-level WAD that was uploaded this week. These maps utilise Skulltag features efficiently while providing an incredibly smooth gameplay that is perfect for 1-on-1 or free-for-all action. To top things off, these maps are beautifully detailed, with obvious hints that these levels were inspired greatly by UDM3 () and other WADs of similar calibre. The themes vary from each level, meaning that you won't face a succession of boring E1-themed maps or gay tech-themed maps. It doesn't end there, as Submerge included three awesome Capture the Flag maps (that I wasn't aware of until I actually read the text file) that appear to be incredibly fun and are all detailed as beautifully as the deathmatch levels. I have to end this review off with a negative however, and the thing that bugs me the most is that there's no custom music for the DM levels, and no music at all for the CTF maps. Oh well, it's good enough anyway.
  
  
• Temple of Chaos 2 - Warped Reality - Agent Spork
  ZDoom - SP - 1,692kb -
  Agent Spork delivers another quality ZDoom map, this time featuring an extremely linear battle to the exit! Even though the map layout is somewhat basic, the detail and gameplay of this map is simply incredible. It's not overdetailed (which is good), the difficulty is somewhat challenging, and the best aspect of this WAD is the scripting that makes the blandly typical "shoot stuff and survive" a lot more interesting. This WAD features a pallete modification (similar to RTC3057 and UDM3) and some new baddies that you must really check out for yourself. The only annoyance I have with this is that the music does not loop properly, and to be honest it sounds like crap when it goes through the repeat transition. Other than that, this is clearly the best single player WAD this week.
  
  
• The Cursed Generation - Samuel 'Kaiser' Villarreal
  Enhanced Port - SP - 689kb -
  This is the first Kaiser map reviewed by yours truly (even though the other one is earlier in the kaiser_* series, I sort my reviews by alphabetical order) and the overall feeling towards this map is mixed to say the least. Although these two kaiser_* WADs were originally meant for the ill-fated Plutonia II project, this map does not play well by itself due to its extremely stressful difficulty. There is a minimum amount of ammo and health at the start, and the amount of chaingunners that snipe you down from high places makes this map a pain in the ass to play for lower-skilled players, and it certainly frustrated me (I'm not much of a SP person anyway) while I was trying to play the level and I kept constantly dying. It would be nice if the starting room had more ammo or even a shotgun when you spawn (instead of having to kill the initial group of monsters), but I guess it does a good job at making the player not aggressively run out with guns blazing. Even with the gameplay quirks, the detail and texturing is rather pleasant to look at, although it is somewhat basic.
  
  
• ToxicHole - Samuel 'Kaiser' Villarreal
  Enhanced Port - SP - 790kb -
  This is the second Kaiser map reviewed this week, and this map is a lot less strenous than The Cursed Generation at the start. The difficulty level is similar to The Cursed Generation overall, but you have a higher chance of surviving the first few rooms and being able to enjoy the rest of the map. The texture theme is extremely similar to The Cursed Generation, but the amount of ammo and health is a lot more generous than in the other map released by Kaiser, and you don't have to face Hell Knights and Barons early in the map. Other than that, the two maps share similiar characteristics, so it'd be pointless repeating the same things again. Between these two maps, this one is a lot more entertaining to play than The Cursed Generation.