The DWmegawad Club plays: TNT: Evilution

MAP17: The last contribution of Tom Mustaine really feels like an extended version of his previous maps, most notable the unchanged aesthetics and the large use of outer courtyards. Combat is rather light except for the red key ambush and the initial usage of chaingunners. I really enjoyed the mood of the level, and in particular that the lighting comes from the outside through the windows instead that from the actual light sources.

Map16 - Deepest Reaches - Andre Arsenault

This map is a lot distinct than the other regular Tech-Base maps,it takes you to a crypt cavren map with a really cool visuals and nice level design,the black sky once again helps creating a good mood,also great music as well,it's called blood jungle.

In this map,you have two ways to proceed the other way to proceed is by the second secret in the second area you enter,where you get to the area with the imp in it,then you open the door which leads you to the way that you come from it,pretty neat trick that saves you time so you don't backtrack the same path over and over again,also nice Red Key puzzle as well, the only issue is that the elevators hight is too high which may bore you sometimes, otherwise cool map.

antares031 said:

If you're looking for my reviews about secret levels, there you go.

doh, sorry!

map15 - demo
cool map. its small and packed with secrets so searching around doesnt get annoying. good mix of incidental combat ( :p) , with flyers following you into the base, revenant rockets through windows, and small set pieces like the AV warp-in. some odd textures/shapes but adds to the charm. i like how you can see where youre going/where youve been from different angles. perfect example of how to create an engaging 'space' in video games - not a linear freaking corridor. one bad thing was a door seemed to get stuck, endlessly repeating its open/close sound which really confused the hell out of me.

map31 - demo
not a fan of using the intermission music within the wad - sounds weird as hell when you finish the map.
this is pretty cool for the time made. i like that a simple SR40 skips most of the map, and the YK bug is ridiculous but this was pretty fun in a stereotypical TNT way; i.e. never really knew what to expect, case in point: surprise! floating cyber.
not a fan of some of the progression points, lots of backtracking to teleporters that id long forgotten were a thing. ok.

map32 - demo
despite being the dullest texturing possible this map has some charm. surprisingly agressive revenant use, CG traps par for the course at this point. end is pretty cool little set-piece. BA after everything's dead reinforcing the continuous slant of the wad. better to play than 31 imo.

map16 - demo
didnt have found memories of TNT's 'cave' maps, and replaying hasnt really changed that. caves/tight corridors go against dooms core strength, i.e. movement ease and speed. not to mention bouncing off corners of corridors/decorations is strangely irritating. some infinite-height shenanigans round off map-awkward here.

map17 - demo
nice little breather map. could not for the life of me get the SSG perched at the start. would have made the playthrough even quicker. nice surprising demon-spam use caught me off guard. liked the secrets on this map such as the console.

map18 - demo
that goddamn archvile tower man, :x - i must admit it's very effective at making the AV scary again though. i really liked the revenant/baron room (let's not mention the fake-wall CGs tho...) and played it like an infight-puzzle. the arachnotron cavern is just - what? the wooden lift section is just tedious. the journey back from it with the surprise CGs and barrels is ok, if a little bit badly implemented, encourages corner-peaking.

MAP18 - Mill
ZDoom, UV-PS, KIS(%): 100/87/80

I have a mixed feeling about this one. You start the level from the hub area with a couple of spectres around the outer circle. Doors of the hub seem a little awkward, but it's not a big problem. The first part is a large pit with totally harmless lava floor. The enemy placement seems not bad... until you enter the room with teleporters on each corner. Yeah, I know the trick about this encounter, but I still don't like it. The metallic room with captured revenants also has an issue that I don't like; a chaingunner behind the fake wall above the floor, damn. You see, I didn't like several monster placements of this level, but at least I liked those sections with their own theme, a giant lava pit, rusty metallic chambers, a computer room with blue carpet... ah, yes. That room. I still have no idea how I figure out that shootable wall. Was it sixth-sense? I dunno, but it was definitely not a good thing for the progression, almost equivalent to those cryptic setups from Eternal Doom. I admit that some parts are cool. But in the end, I didn't enjoy this one too much.

MAP18 Mill

To the metal ground we go. Big level here, some sections take longer than others. Definitely don't like the blue key section though. The pain elementals and arachnotrons make an unhealthy combination here (I came to this area from a secret so the shotgun guys weren't a problem. And the indoor cut-in with the arch-vile is way worse, unless you find expertise in telefragging this bastard or something. Not to mention, waiting for fucking too long for the one teleporter that takes you out, thankfully onto the blue key so I can avoid this nightmare.

Moving west, the red key was easy enough to get, but both blue and red are necessary. Plenty of revs behind the blue door, but then again, I'm being shot at from a chaingunner behind another fake wall. The room with the cages I fared a bit better, but that switch is so poorly located that it's one of the easiest to miss. The revenants were quite nasty too. The big blue area has a switch puzzle for the yellow key, and is the memorable thing for this map. The clues are in those silver bars around several switches. Three are easy enough to figure out, even though they are slow-goers because barons are in the way for them. The other one involves shooting marble lion faces to get to one switch. Finally, just go into the center room to hit the four switches to get the yellow key. Splendid little puzzle.

Final area looks like a barren battlefield. It'd be nice if I had a switch to press, instead I had to shoot a terminal to get the other door to open up. Hitting both switches opens up the exit where a cyberdemon guards it, but I've got a ton of other enemies to deal with too. There just HAD to be hitscanners here among the variety. The hellknights usually teleport to the middle walkway where the cyberdemon is, so I let him take care of those while running around. Quite a hectic one this last battle is, and a fun level overall apart from some dubious design decisions.

MAP17 - “Processing Station” by Tom Mustaine
gzDoom - UV – continuous/no saves



Deaths this map: 0
Deaths so far: 1


Short square base design with not a whole lot going for it. I liked the front entrance. Come on in fella! Not sure why all three of the outside areas have to be closed off and secretive. That's like half the level, and this thing is tiny.

The uppper computer area can be dicey for the uncautious player. I did like the creepy texture usage in one of those little side passages to get outside.

The toxic barrel room with the BK was dangerous fun.

Missed the secret outside to the SSG my first go around but I dig the idea of it.

The trap at the end did not, in my mind, justify an invulnerability sphere but that's probably just me. I actually skipped picking it up, thinking there might be a time when I should use it later. That time, never came. Bleh. I suppose for a pistol starter that would have been necessary but thankful I am once again up and running strong on my continuous with no saves. (Remind yourself that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.)

MAP18 - “Mill” by Dario Casali, Ty Halderman
gzDoom - UV – continuous/no saves



Deaths this map: 0
Deaths so far: 1

Parts of it I liked but the some of the design pissed me off. Especially these doors. I know, I know. Nit picky B.S. but they are annoying for no reason. Taking an extra second to open when nothing is going on, makes me grumble like an old man. Considering you teleport to the begining a few times, reopening these doors really grinds on my nerves. Get on with it!

Alright, anyways... couple of good looking areas (hallways and barrel room), couple of bad (lava area and final battle). I did like being able to sneak up on the shotgun guys via a secret. The AV trap was wicked mean with no where to run. I suppose you could get lucky with a telefrag but I doubt it. Thankfull a face full of plasma made quick work.

The caged in Revs were kind of tricky but not nearly as bad as an invisible sniper spot filled with a hitscanners. Lame.

Interesting central puzzle piece. A unique kind of thing that was enjoyable for the most part with the corresponding YK. I expected way more enemies to pop in there, but ah well.

Never figured out how to get either of these secrets. *shrug*

The end confrontation with the Cyberdemon meat grinder was different. Not sure why I had to shoot a computer panel to open up this switch. What was the point of that? Hated the look of the walls. I don't make maps but I know I wouldn't have made that texture choice, yeck. Uglyness aside, it was certainly a memorable fight. Even if you just retreated to the windowed viewing area to wait for all the infighting to start up.

This map, eh. Lots of different things going on in various areas. Each with their own distinctive look and feel. Mostly good stuff just a little oddly paced IMO. I see a few of you didn't like it and I couldn't really argue for or against it. This one had it's moments, for sure.

MAP18: This is one of my favourites maps of Evilution. It's a cool and rather atmospheric trek through this subterranean complex. I like the contrast between the rusted metal halls and the clean area with silver and blue textures, where there's somekind of a mechanism to solve to get the yellow key. It seems the every area tries to have its own tricky moment (arachnotrons in open space, the room with the barons and the revenants, the barrel area) but without going for gimmicks, maybe except for the archvile you are supposed to telefrag at the blue key. At the start we are granted of a chaingun, and later on of the plasmarifle, through a little trick. The big fight after the yellow door is one of the most memorable things in all the iwads imo.

Apparently that shootable panel is a switch texture, you just don't get to see the button because it's buried in the ground. I wonder if this was a simple mistake of the author?

Map 15
This is my favorite map in Evilution, it's an open layout which surrounds a large central structure where most of the action takes place. There are many different paths that you can take to enter the building. I decided to enter from the side closest to the normal exit & then work my way through. I like all of the secrets in this map & I still don't know how to access all of them, there are a bunch of plainly visible switches that do stuff, but I have no idea what. Combat is kinda light, but with all the exploring that you can do I'm fine with that. Visually I will admit that this map is pretty hideous, I do like the MODWALL section in the middle, but that's about it. Unfortunately from here on out TNT goes from being nothing but good maps with the occasional dud, to nothing but bad maps with the occasional good. It's one of the most striking drops of quality in any megawad that I know of.

Map 31
I fucking hate this map. Evilution is the reason I always play the secret maps after I play all the normal maps. Though since I've played Evilution before I'll just get these maps out of the way now. This map is by Dario Casali the worse of the two Casali brothers, & it has an Egyptian theme to it. The Egyptian setting has mixed results of quality, the stock Doom 2 textures do surprisingly well to evoke a sandy setting & it's the Egyptian Hieroglyphs that are of questionable quality. Here's a bit of trivia, Paul Turnbull the author of Map 23 was the one who provided these Egyptian textures. He had used them in his own map prior to the start of Evilution in a deathmatch map called Mayan Temple. Architecture is decent, you get the typical Egyptian structures, a Pyramid, tombs, pillars, temple rooms, & really big chairs. The map starts off with you outside a large pyramid, there are a few cargo boxes full of ammo nearby for you to resupply with as you play the map. After hitting a switch hanging from the ceiling you enter the pyramid which is a large open room with some arachnotrons visible behind some invisible walls. This is were progression starts to get weird, and pretty annoying. There is a ton of back & forth backtracking throughout the entirety of the map, & being one of the biggest maps in Evilution it gets pretty old really fast. The worst backtracking offense comes when trying to obtain the blue key. From a ledge you see a platform slowly lowering, the first time I played this map I jumped right down not knowing that I needed to hit a switch right next to me to get to the top of that platform. So I had to backtrack through the entire previous area to get all the way back to that switch. Once you are on the top of the platform you can then jump to the blue key, but that's only if the 2 arch-viles didn't block you, if they did then you have to backtrack all the way back to the switch again, what a pain in the ass. Once the blue key the map starts to get okay. L like that when you grab the red key the rock canyon walls collapse to reveal...a lone Zombieman :D shooting him causes a cacoswarm to show up. Then there's the part where yo grab the megasphere which reveals a giant horde of shotgun guys, they were fun to mow down using the chaingun. After that it's a quick run to the left for the normal exit or right for the secret exit. I suppose I should mention the yellow key bug, even though everyone knows about it. In the room at the end of the dark caves there is a tomb. This room is supposed to contain the yellow key, but it was somehow tagged as multiplayer only, even stranger is that the key isn't even inside of the crusher, but instead sits right next to it. Anyhow this isn't really a big deal as I play on GZDoom, so I just gave myself the yellow key when I got here. So there are some interesting ideas in this map & it has a decent setting, but the horrible obtuse progression, like the missaligned switches in the teleporting arch-vile room, & constant backtracking makes this map easily the worst in Evilution for me.

Map 32
Oh boy another map from Dario Casali, this one is called Caribbean & has a sort of watery bungalow setting. This is probably the best of the Casali map in Evilution, but I still don't like it. This map is much more reminiscent of there work in Plutonia, lots of chaingunners & revenants to fight here. Visually the map is actually pretty nice, with only the brown sludge areas being ugly. On HMP the first boss monster shows up, the Cyberdemon, he helps clean up the horde unleashed at the exit. The arch-vile behind the wall & the gimmicky exit door were not enjoyable though.

Map 16
Oh good lord, after those 2 secret maps all I wanted was a nice reprieve from bad maps, but instead we get Deepest Reaches. Sometime in 2012 was the first time I played through Evilution, but after playing these 3 maps in a row it would take me a full year before I would sit down & play through maps 17-30. This map is Andre Arsenault sole contribution to the Doom community, he showed up, made this map, & then never made another map again. This is the first map in Evilution, aside from the secret maps, that really changes up the style, every single map before this one has been some kind of a techbase, whereas this one is an underground cave. The design of this map is all over the place & progression is quite bizarre & it has a lot of backtracking. The start room of the map is kinda ugly & doesn't leave much of an impression. The wood room is strange, I don't get why it's angled weirdly, but it's fun nonetheless. The water caves are simple, but don't have anything wrong with them. The red key room is memorable & it has that weird stalagmite hanging from the ceiling right before the entrance. Right after the red key room is by far the most interesting part of the map, it's another cave section, but this one has huge differences in heights between the various levels & it is very nonlinear, connecting to many parts of the map. The marble arena near the end of the map is alright, the way to access the exit is pretty strange though. That's really the only way to describe this map, it's just very strange, there's no real central concept & none of the various areas mesh that well together. It's like Andre Arsenault had a bunch of small map concepts & then just smashed them all together here after he decided Doom mapping wasn't for him, or something along those lines.

Map 17
Ah finally the good breather map that I've needed, this is the last map is the wad from Tom Mustaine & it's easily his best work here. It's somewhat similar in design to map 10, but really you could say any two Tom Mustaine maps look somewhat alike. This map is much more spacious than map 10 & it doesn't have those annoying hallway details for the player to get caught on. Interestingly an older version of this map can be found in Maximum Doom in one of the various Dwango wads. It's much simpler there & doesn't have monsters, but it's clearly the same map.

Map 18
Mill is the last map from Dario Casali in Evilution, thank god! Ty Halderman also made significant contributions to this map as well. This is the second map in Evilution that uses primarily metal textures & like the previous metal map this one isn't very good. This has to be one of Dario's first maps, instead of the the Plutonia style difficulty of Revies/Chaingunners this maps "difficulty" steams from is usage of lots of Barons & Hell Knights. The only real challenge in this map is the exit room due to the high number of hitscanners. There are a few annoying elements to this map, the chaingunner behind a wall in the red key room ranks at the top of the annoying list, then there's the shoot switch in the exit room. I forgot about this so I actually had to look in the editor to see what I was supposed to do to leave the map. I also forgot what to do in the blue room, so I just used the speed run strats to access the yellow key. Overall this is just another one of these late game maps that suffers from some obtuse progression & just weird design decisions.


After getting over halfway through Evilution now, I've come to notice on thing that I didn't do in Revilution that is very prevalent here in Evilution. Which is not having enough gimmicky sectors or weird invisible walls. Off the top of my head I can think of only three maps with weird sector trickery in Revilution, Maps 13, 16 & 20. Whereas in Evilution sector gimmicks have appeared on at least half of the maps so far & I know that there's more yet to come.

Memfis said:

Apparently that shootable panel is a switch texture, you just don't get to see the button because it's buried in the ground. I wonder if this was a simple mistake of the author?

Okay that's interesting. It almost seems as if Dario didn't know how to align the switches vertically, as the switches are hidden on map 31 as well. It would also explain why Dario occasionally puts switches hanging from the ceiling rather than on the floor, because when it's on the ceiling he doesn't have the align the texture up or down, he just needs to lower the sector height down a bit.

Jaws In Space said:

After getting over halfway through Evilution now, I've come to notice on thing that I didn't do in Revilution that is very prevalent here in Evilution. Which is not having enough gimmicky sectors or weird invisible walls. Off the top of my head I can think of only three maps with weird sector trickery in Revilution, Maps 13, 16 & 20. Whereas in Evilution sector gimmicks have appeared on at least half of the maps so far & I know that there's more yet to come.

Those kind of stuff was more popular back then (a trend that's pretty much gone now I guess), probably it looked more impressive and more generally the mappers liked more to mess with that kind of stuff.

MAP31 - “Pharaoh” by Dario Casali
A flawed masterpiece comes to mind playing this one. A map full of oddities including the ammo distribution, a mandatory part of the map being marked secret, the weirdly placed switches and some rather dodgy looking vanilla trickery. That said this is fun to play for the most part with some fun fights as well as some funny moments including the mass sergeant warp in at the end.
Hopefully I will catch up with the rest later.

Map17 - Processing Station - Tom Mustaine

Mustaine's last map in TNT,like map 1, and map 10,it looks the same mapping style,it looks better than the two maps,due to being a little bigger and you can approach it in two ways,it's an easy map and the secrets can be found easily,the hardest part of the map was the red key ambush,other than that it's a breather map for a harder map.

MAP32 - “Caribbean” by Dario Casali

Same kind of feelings as map31 really, there is a lot of fun to be had here with tonnes of rockets, there are some questionable design choices present here too but overall like the last map I like it a lot, the final fight is more engaging than the cyber fight in map31.

Map18 - Mill - Dario Cassali and Ty Halderman

This map seems aged rapidly as a level design, I remember this map that it was the best thing ever,a dark techbase,it's a nice hard map with a lot of powerful monsters like arachnatrons,revevants,barons and hell knight, the blue computer station looked liek a part that was mady by Halderman (propably,I'm not sure) It's a really a good level design in it's time,it also has the music that made the map look creepy,the only not good part is the wooden lift part which is tedius,other than that a very good map.

Map19 - Shipping/Respawning - Jimmy Seiben and Ty Halderman

In this map,I'll go to review it,and go on a Rant in the middle of it.

This map has an excellent architecture,it's one of the most detailed maps in the game,alongside map05 and map09 ,map09 was made by Seiben and Halderman,which they excell in it,so I liked the office design with the yellow key in it,I also liked that there are some easter eggs in this map,the map contains four official secrets,but overall, it's 8 or 9 secrets, this is also the second time I see Romero's name on a wall, the first time I see the name was in map11 on a crater box "Thanks to BigMacDavis for showing me it" ,also the map has a Truck at the outside area, and a gate, really creative,there are also some questionable parts including the teleports in the computer room at the start, and the one beside the crate boxes.

Now,let's get to the Rant part,and this is not a rant about the map.

This map has a box lift as an easter egg,and I heard people bashing this part saying that this is the worst part ever, they were acting like the mappers were the first ones who created this part, let me tell you all something,First, I don't mind the box lift,Second, they DID NOT invent the box lift, the box lifts first created in Doom2,remember Map04, there was one, Memento Mori map06, I saw two box lifts, Memento Mori Map28, I saw one, Plutoina map01, there was two of them at the only box crate in the game,so stop bashing them like they invented it Okay,that's not their fault.

Overall, Solid Map, I'm taking a small break preparing for the next two maps,because ,phew .....this is gonna be a long ride....

MAP16 - “Deepest Reaches” by Andre Arsenault
A rather mediocre map with some nice touches, I like the optional red key puzzle and the alter area, there is however too much backtracking in this one and at times the map can become quite dull. A nice thematic change of pace even if it is for one map.

MAP17 - “Processing Station” by Tom Mustaine
Another rather short offering here from Mustaine, another decent map which plenty of action, the difficulty is fairly easy with SSG perfectly capable of chewing down all the enemies without it feeling grindy. Overall another good map.

Playing catch up once again...

Map 11 - Storage Facility

Part of me wants to say that I dislike this map for being a crate maze, but i've played a lot of maps called such that I really enjoy. This one.. I think my problem is that when you get inside, there's like three spawn points and it just plops all the monsters out of them when you grab the keys or get to a certain point instead of just letting them spawn in more evenly. Very clumpy, annoying combat, and while Evilution has moments where it does that well, this map doesn't.

Map 12 - Crater

Very average map that feels like a mishmash of several concepts jammed together and presented in a somewhat spartan fashion. Despite that the progression is smooth and the combat is mostly decent. So it's not a huge slog.

Map 13 - Nukage Processing

One of the better maps of the game, I think. While the bulk of the map is kinda centered on a hub-like arrangement, the combat in this map is really fucking visceral & bloody; if you're not dilligent it's the kind of map that presents constant pressure on you, and while it's relatively linear, it's a very cleanly laid out map and the progression is very intuitive, something TNT struggled with in some of their other projects over the years. I wish the Cyber fight would've been more challenging, but overall this is a pretty successful map with some nasty, mean spirited encounters and a fun layout to romp through.

Map 14 - Steel Works

Pretty average & linear, though it leaves an impression because the combat - mostly involving hitscanners, with some surprisingly nasty appearances by Pain Elementals - is bloody & vicious. On the other hand, there's some really stupid design decisions, like the lost soul room with the pillars & poison floor a little before the red key - that's just dumb stuff. It's not challenging and it isn't fun to play.

Map 15 - Dead Zone

It's true that this isn't a very good looking map; that much I agree with. However, it's one of my favourite maps on a purely gameplay level from the WAD - in a departure, this one is mostly nonlinear, and lets you tackle it at any angle you want to choose on continuous. It's bloody & visceral on a combat level, with some smart useage of both Cacodemons & Revenants as snipers and otherwise rovers throughout the map that keeps you on your toes. In addition to the usual retinue of hitscanners & hell nobles here. It doesn't look like much, but it's a lot of fun to play.

Map 31 -Pharaoh

Another one of my favourites, this by one of the masterminds of The Plutonia Experiment in Dario Casali. This is quite different from that WAD though, being much more of a linear map through the bowels of a Pyramid. Very influential on stuff like Alien Vendetta Map 20. There's one bit that's really unintuitive because the switches weren't marked correctly, but for the most part this is a map that runs the gamut from diving into the bowels of the pyramid/tomb, to exploring adjacent courtyards to it; as such the fighting ranges from vicious close quarters stuff to much more open area, classic Doom styled combat where agility is your best defense against swarms of Cacos & Revenant missles.

Yes, the yellow key bug is a major faux pas, but I still genuinely enjoy the map. And the intermission music midi is great here; it gives the map an identity unlike the others in the map.

As for the person who thought it was lame that Casali barely hid the secret exit.. I suppose I get it. But do keep in mind that if you hit both of the secret levels in Plutonia, it was mandatory to play both, period. So in that respect, I don't mind that he barely hid it in the first place because he wanted folks to play Map 32. Speaking of which...

Map 32 - Carribean

MUCH more classical Plutonia in execution, albeit in a map layout much bigger than most of that map. The basic principle of applying very sudden, instant pressure to the play with nasty traps, as well as more passive stuff like sniping chaingunners & roving Revenants is pure Plutonia. Even the texture scheme, with its heavy juxtaposition of greens & browns, is pretty in-line with that WAD.

This one took me a long time to like, but nowadays I count it as one of the best maps of the WAD. It's full of vicious, mean spirited encounters, and it plays pretty intuitively - it doesn't hand-hold you, but it isn't opaque about it either. And for how relative spartan the colour scheme of the Casali bros' maps tended to be, they knew how to make it look very clean & presentable anyway. Exceptional map.

Map 16 - Deepest Reaches

Basically a precursor to a lot of the mediocre hell cavern maps that dominate episode 3 of this WAD. Again, the combat here is solid - one thing i've noticed going back through Evilution is that the actual encounters & traps with monsters are usually very solid - but it's a really fuckin' ugly map, laid out in a manner that takes a few playthroughs to get a full handle on, and even then the lifts that dominate the map take too fucking long. I'd really like to say more good stuff about it, because it has atmosphere going well, but overall it's just a blah map.

Map 17 - Processing Area

Tom Mustaine's final contribution to the mapset is very much an extension of his usual work: small, compact tech-base type levels. This one is definitely more developed than his usual fair, with a nasty, wide-open nature that leaves you being picked at by hitscanners from afar unless you act quickly and take 'em out. Another solid map on the combat front; as irritating as some of the monster placement is, one can't deny that at least it makes some attempt to pressure & rattle you, even if it's tame by today's standards. Very clean & well laid out, with some nicely placed secrets and a good sense of progression that's intuitive & never opaque, yet it's never too obvious. I've always like this one.

Map 18 - Mill

I'm a stan for the Casalis, I can't lie. I love The Plutonia Experiment and I think their contributions to Memento Mori 1 and Requiem were fantastic. That being said, I don't really like this map very much. The progression is kind of clunky & unintuitive here, with a weird layout that tries layering on itself and it just doesn't quite work. The texture work is really mish-mashy on top of it, and the encounters range from being really cool to being really tedious.
'
Part of me wants to say this is the worst Casali map i've played, but there's a couple i'm not quite sure on how i'd place 'em. Regardless: i've always wanted to like this map and I can never bring myself to fully do it.

Time to play for TNT, and we're on schedule with the normal maps.

Map16: Deepest Reaches (Andre Arsenault)
100% kills, 100% items, 100% secrets
Time: 10:59

For some people, this is where TNT starts to decline in quality and fun factor, but I beg to differ, I think it's not too bad. One thing, though, is that at this point in the wad, it does seem to stick out due to it not having much of a techbase theme and it mainly cavernous with some hellish sections. Given the storyline of TNT, I find it that you're exploring the caves and cliffs of Io, and it seems as if Hell has set up an outpost of its own here. Kinda like what Memento Mori 2 would do with some of its maps whereyou got a mixture of hellish and tech maps. There's detail here, like the stalactite hanging above the canal in the passage from the east door past the large circular area is a nice touch. There's also the tomb being overlooked by a blood cross where you see the red key after going the elevator. I kinda agree that despite some of its strong points, thematically, it's mish-mashed, noticeable with the caverns that connect to the cliffs. Another complaint is the amount of backtracking you have to do, particularly when you obtain the blue key (bypassed by going on the teleporter you came out from), and when after you collect the yellow key and have to locate the yellow door. The exit is revealed when you step on the teleporter behind the door in the large marble area. Monster combat is nothing too memorable, though you have to be careful in a couple of areas, like the library area where after you hit the switch, the walls open revealing some nasties, and there's the large marble area fight. The red key is optional, but it's worth collecting the goodies behind the red door. A rather tepid map, but I've seen even worse.

Map17: Processing Area (Tom Mustaine)
100% kills, 100% items, 100% secrets
Time: 06:14

Short, easy nonlinear map by Tom Mustaine that is in the same style as his other two maps for TNT. This one is a lot of fun, and right off the bat, you can open the door behind you for an invisibility which will come in handy for taking down the hitscanners while you won't get perforated that much. The exploding barrels in the nukage room (accessed via the yellow key doors) come in handy for blowing up the shotgunners and weaken the arch-vile. Watch out for the demon ambush when you raise the bridge to the blue key and obtain it. The invulnerability in the red key room makes the final monster ambush trivial. Overall, it's a nice breather. The outdoor areas with the trees including the water canals and the pool makes the map look like a garden terminal. It's interesting to note that this is Tom Mustaine's second contribution to the Master Levels that was rejected. There's a nice easter egg if you use the clipping cheat and go in where the demons teleport from, you'll see Mustaine's first name and the Nine Inch Nails logo in the walls.

Map18: Mill (Dario Casali/Ty Halderman)
100% kills, 100% items, 100% secrets
Time: 12:59

Oh, boy, Stronghold may have been a pretty tough map, but this is definitely far tougher! Anyone who hasn't played through the secret levels will be in for a shock when they play this map. It's the first non-secret TNT map where you will be introduced to such extraordinary monster placement that is like nothing to be found in any official Doom map. To start, this a pretty large map at this point, and it is packed with some really nasty monsters, mostly chaingunners, barons, arachnotrons, and even revenants. The large red area with the blue key houses an unusual amount of arachnotrons coupled with two pain elementals and a bunch of shotgunners that snipe at you from the ledge they stand on. Then when you hit the switch that open the doors to the tower and you go in, they close on you, and you must hit a switch and wait for the lowering sector while you fight an arch-vile in a constrained space. Very tough, but not much if you have a BFG9000. Then to the west of the map is a big room with barons and revenants behind the blue door, including the dreaded chaingunner that shoots at you from behind a fake wall. You have another arch-vile to contend with before you hit the switches to open the way to the red key. You then have another door opened holding a baron and a switch which opens the door behind the blue door, where you'll find inside a large room with shotgunners, barrels, and an arachnotron. Watch out when you hit the switch further up, cause that raises some caged revenants, and there's a lot of them. The yellow key switch puzzle in the blue room can be aggravating, but once you figured it out, it presents no problem. Finally, behind the yellow door, is the toughest part yet. You must fire a computer panel in the huge room to open a door holding a switch, but act fast cause a bunch of cacodemons and lost souls come pouring in, followed by hell knights and hitscanners while a cyberdemon guarding the exit teleporter is revealed. This is by far a very tough map, not surprising as this is a Dario Casali map, and it (along with the two secret levels) foreshadows Plutonia and Hell Revealed's hectic gameplay. Fortunately, this map isn't as difficult as Plutonia and HR, but it certainly establishes the Casali Brothers as "visionaries" in that sense. From what I gathered from certain sources, the blue area with the yellow key puzzle is Ty Halderman's part of the map, which explains why it sticks out so much in the architecture department.

Map19: Shipping/Respawning (Ty Halderman/Jimmy Sieben)
100% kills, 100% items, 100% secrets
Time: 11:04

Personally, I have nothing against this map, but I will acknowledge that it has some rather annoying elements and ideas. The computer room not far from the start has a very bizarre teleporter setup where once you grab the cell pack, you teleport around until after a few. There's an odd wall at the hallway where you hump it, you have to race through the lowered platform to reach the passage with the teleporter (requiring to open the door beforehand). When you reach the office and obtain the yellow key, don't enter the teleporter if you hit the switch you see, because that takes you back to the start. Finally, behind any of the blue doors is a huge warehouse, which has some crates with monsters and goodies on top. This is without a doubt the most annoying part of the map because first it's not obvious to which of the crates are elevators and you have to make a couple more rounds to grab all the items. Second is the barrel on teleporters trap where the monsters teleport on once they're ignited. However, rather than home in on you, they stay in that spot, and only one monster can teleport in once they're killed, which is very infuriating for people trying for 100% kills. I will give it the benefit of a doubt, though, I like how it looks like a real location as it's basically a factory of sorts. The truck is a nice touch, and I find it neat how when you hit the switch near where the monsters teleport, the crates move, giving the illusion that you started up the factory. Considering this is mostly done by Ty Halderman, this map could probably have been from E1M4 of his Sacrifice wad. Definitely not the worst map, that is yet to come much later.

With that, I'm gonna stop here. Next one's gonna be a marathon map. See you then.

MAP19 Shipping/Respawning

Well no idea what the respawning part of the title is supposed to mean. I also assume this is a shipping facility of some sort. It's a typical level actually, apart from a slightly annoying start with a revenant, I'm fighting nothing BUT hitscanners until the big area to the south side of the map. A ton of optional content for this level, switches and things that do things that lead me backwards on the map sometimes. When it comes to where I need to go, the yellow key is in a cupboard and the blue key is obtained shortly afterwards.

On to the storage area! Well this place is the crate maze with hitscanners around, a ton of optional things too. The one area with barrels has enemies teleporting in, but they seem useless since they can't leave the pads they teleport onto. The outdoor area with the red key has some cacos guarding the key, a trio of mancubi near a secret, and some imps and a pain elemental. Er, actually this level didn't have a whole lot of interest to it in the crate section either. Probably would be a fun level to speedrun given how easy it was.

MAP19 - Shipping/Respawning
ZDoom, UV-PS, KIS(%): 99/100/75

One of the memorable levels from Evilution, designed by none other than Ty Halderman. After greeted by an agitating skeleton, we enter the shipping facility with various areas. I really liked the architectural details of this level; a control center with those TNT monitors, a chairman's office with wooden decorations, a giant containment area with lots of crates and conveyor belts, and a loading deck with that iconic TNT truck. The combat was nothing too special, but just good enough to enjoy moving around. Although it could be better if it had some intense combat scenes since we're nearly done with the second episode. But then again, at least there was a moment that fit to the title of this level; Respawning. In overall, the combat doesn't stand out that much, but I still like the layout, environmental design of this one. And don't forget, there's one level that homaged this level pretty good architecturally on THT:Threnody called "Wormhell" (It's actually the combination of MAP04 and this one with more challenging gameplay).

MAP19 - “Shipping/Respawning” by Ty Halderman
gzDoom - UV – continuous/no saves



Deaths this map: 0
Deaths so far: 1


I got flashbacks of THT:Threnody's MAP12 - “WormHell” ... *shudders*

This was probably something pretty cool back then but for me now it has one of my least favorite things in Doom. Lots of box puzzles that go up and down like lifts. It's just not fun. At all. I disliked it then and hate it now. Thankfully that stuff is optional.

Hard start with a sneaky Rev right away. I can picture a pistol start being troublesome.

Lots of good looking spaces with special detailing given to each area. The hallway to the lobby looks great. Lots of computers and console rooms. One with lights even. The teleports were a bit silly. So was the truck and road to outer space. It was also kind of goofy to find enemies climbing up on the office furniture.

I missed the megasphere secret on my playthrough but found it when I went back afterwards for more screenshots and I really liked the visual of it. Great secret! Would've been nice to have found that if I had looked harder. Ah well.

The barrel explosion teleport ambush here was unexpected. Not sure what point it served. Just a cute trap I guess. I didn't grasp what was happening fast enough to react and the first barrel explosion with the red key pillar caught me good. Whoops. Never seen that one before. Huh. At least you could take your frustrations out on stationary targets, hahaha.

The exit AV gave me a start only because I rushed the wrong way and was greeted by two chaingun sargents with him running around behind me. Ahhhh! That was a close call.

All in all, not bad but I'm glad to be done with all of the kookiness and stupid boxes.

MAP19: I didn't remember much about this map, apart the outdoor area with the truck. It does a good job on creating a rather surreal mood with the detail and architecture that are geared towards realism (and I guess this is the first successful attempt at doing this) and all the weird stuff that happens. I think that the room with the teleportes near the start suggest that there were some experiments going on there, and then you go to the main part of the map with the offices and the warehouse. In this map there's also the best usage that could be done with this particular track.

MAP18 - “Mill” by Dario Casali, Ty Halderman

Like Dario's other maps this one is mixed with some weird ideas and some genuinely fun set pieces. The wooden area is a tad ridiculous and a big time sink though at least it is optional. The following puzzle section would be fun if the monsters were more than just a few barons. The archvile is a real dick move though I survived it first time here. The ending is fun to play though and the exit room looks kind of neat.

map19 - demo

as others have said, cute little box factory here with all the various areas laid out :p
unfortunately, the beginning office area is the best one, and its downhill from there. the various cubicles and windows, with the silent hitscanners is a really exciting dangerous combo where you can get broad-sided and youre constantly checking angles and being startled by wakeups and noises of doors. the midi complements the mood.
the actual loading area and the shipping warehouse aren't as fun, but still nicely put together.

Now we're at the last level of the nighttime episode, and this one, oh boy, this one is an absolute behemoth. It's now or never.

Map20: Central Processing (Drake O'Brien)
100% kills, 100% items, 100% secrets
Time: 22:28

The first of the three maps designed by the infamous Drake O'Brien (and apparently the only Doom maps he has ever designed). You'll either love them or hate them, as they are mammoth-sized and they show no mercy. This one is absolutely no exception. It's a gigantic techbase-like map that has an assortment of themes, including catacombs, sewers, and a huge outdoor area. It's so huge and confusing that you can easily get lost. This map almost qualifies for Eternal Doom standards in that sense. You don't even get the first key until very later on in the map. It won't be easy either. Every bit of this map is dangerous from start to finish that you have to plan ahead how you're going to tackle each are and what weapons you will use, because so many of these enemies are hitscanners, particularly chaingunners, and they're positioned in far distances and in such a way that they can take potshots at you with no problem. Revenants, lost souls and pain elementals will cause a lot of trouble here too. On top of that, once you get to the outdoor area, well, there's barely much room for cover, and you'll trying your best not to die as you have a barrage of projectiles and chaingunners firing away at you, and they have the advantage since their shots can hit you almost perfectly while yours don't hit them as much. When you teleport for the soul sphere on the big island, stay frosty, as you'll have an arch-vile, some chaingunners, a pain elemental, and a spider mastermind teleporting on the water. Monster infighting might help sometimes, but not always. Despite all that, it's a nicely done map. The computer room looks pretty good, I like the big round circular tank in the centre of the nukage pool, the exit from the base looked very impressive, including the outdoor area with the cliffs and the soul sphere island. I have to admit, though, first time playing, I was very lost because I didn't know that humping the exit sign is the way to exit the level since I was used to switches, teleporters, and such as the way to end a level. With that said and done, it's not a bad map, but damn is it so massive. It just goes on and on and on. I mean, TNT's lengthier maps took me about 12 to 13 minutes so far, but this one took me 22 freaking minutes! and there's a couple more like this one coming up soon. What a way to end the nighttime episode with a huge and difficult map. It really throws everything at you.

Right, time I leave it here for now. The nighttime episode is done, and all that's left is the hell episode. Until then, take care, and have fun. Looks like the next one's yet another Drake O'Brien behemoth. Whoop-de-doo.

Map20 - Central Processing - Drake O'Brien

The First of the three Maps that were designed by the infamous Drake O'Brien , he's the reason behind people making longer maps,those Gigantic maps that has to be hard,and has to be long that they amazes you for how long it is,his maps starts with indoor areas,you inside a base,and then it ends with a gigantic outdoor area where an epic finale happens and then you get straight to the exit.

This map is the second longest map in the game,and it's a techbase theme with a really cool music and cool atmosphere,the outdoor area is really cool too,it's massive,and it's easy for you to miss a kill during the map,so make sure you search for every crook and cranny to kill everyone in there,the final segment in the outdoor is hard,and if you don't know your way around you'll be killed, especially with the Spider Mastermind fight,a massive map that took me 21 minutes to finish, there are a lot of maps that you finish in 30 or 40 minutes, or AN HOUR like "City Of The Unavenged" from Memento Mori,but this one is UNFORGIVENGLY LONG AND BORING , thankfully map20 is not as confusing as map28 from Memento Mori, and it's a cool map, one of my favorite maps in the game.

The Next one is the Hell episode, and guess what's next,it's a Drake O'Brien Map....Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyy....

City Of The Unavenged rules nothing to do with the long TNT maps