Doom 1 & Doom 2 maps that tripped you up on your first playthrough

I first played Doom I and II as an adult. For the most part they were a cinch because I was forged in the fiery crucible of Final Doom...however, I did have a few stumbling blocks in both. From Doom I, Halls of the Damned was a genuine challenge, and it was quite intimidating compared to the other maps (fumbling around in the dark section took forever and made me anxious). E3M7 turned me around for nearly half an hour, and proved more frustrating than anything that came before it. Naturally I had some issues conquering E4M1 and 2 keyboard only, and I sure as hell never got 100% kills in the former on keyboard. Even today I don't usually bother with that. 

Doom II's The Pit was an ordeal to finish because I had a hard time figuring out how to escape the dark room with the skull switch console that opens walls in different directions (I think you just press on the wall that let you in...) and I think I was scraping by on ammo by the end. I also got a harsh reception from Refueling Base; I ran out of ammo in continuous play, had no idea where I was going, and felt constantly overrun by the pain elementals and zombos. That map gave me the Plutonia treatment and I did not appreciate it back then. Barrels o' Fun and Monster Condo also kicked my ass, but not as badly for their map slots as MAP 10. 

I had many, many stumbling blocks in TNT and Plutonia but I'll save those stories for another thread.

I remember Doom95 being my first experience with doom 1 and Central Processing being a challenge for me when I was a kid.

E1M3. Completing it was easy, finding the secrets was the hard part. I had to look it up and even after reading how to do it I still had trouble.

5 hours ago, Pechudin said:

MAP15, the Industrial Zone, where you have to back into the teleporter you just went into to grab the Red Key. I had to look up a walkthrough for that one.

I used to never get the red key playing that map. You can just jump in the damage floor and teleport to the BFG and yellow key. I always sensed this was a bit hacky, but it was before I played with any in-game secret tracker or even really understood what constituted a secret, so that’s what I always figured I was missing.

For me it was back-to-back levels. I don’t remember what happened in Map 27 Monster Condo, but I somehow got stuck in the room that is duplicated. I was stuck for a long time because this was before I knew what IDSPISPOPD had been updated to.

Then Map 28 The Spirit World has those shoot switches. I don’t think I knew that was actually a thing from Doom 1. I don’t think I ever realized what I had actually done; I just thought I got lucky or something. (They're all for secrets in Doom 1, right?) I must have done it in Map 18, but it still took me a long time to figure it out in 28. I also got softlocked in the Zimmer room a lot more recently with an SR-50 line skip and a W1 door close situation.

Oh, and as an honorable mention, I still did not learn my lesson for TNT's Mill, which is also Map 18. By then I knew how to IDCLIP, but I did not figure out the shoot switch for a long time. 

I got really lost in MAP15 and stumbled into the secret exit without knowing where the normal exit was

Also yeah the shootable switches in The Spirit World and The Mill had me wandering like an idiot for hours

Next time we’ll do “Hexen maps that tripped you up on your first playthrough” when I will describe every part of Hexen from beginning to end 

I've had experiences with a multitude of maps in Doom 2 where you get stumped on where to go and how to get there until you finally find it after all that time and realize how simple it actually was. They were most if not always the maps with Message for the Arch-vile and Dave T. Taylor Blues as their accompanying music.

Wolfenstein 3D, notably the prequel missions, has the same thing with some of its music, and it's as if the ID guys knew what levels were boring and mazey as hell and chose accordingly.

First time playing map02, I just couldn't navigate it for some reason. Kept getting back to the starting area, trying to press [use] on all the bars again and again... and of course I couldn't do the red key jump. My pal laughed and took the controls eventually to show me how to do it.

edit: Oh, and when I accidentally found out there were secret levels in Doom (1) and decided to replay all the episodes for 100% secrets to make sure I found them all... doing E1M3 without a guide, not knowing any cheats, and no soundcard (no audio clue to the lifts in the yellow key area). Took me a while!

you've never seen true fear until you where forced to go through this area in E2M6 on PS4 at the age of 12.

I grew up on PlayStation Doom and the levels that confused me then were Command Control and The Citadel. 

E2m4 when I was really young, for some reason I could get stuck there for ages, now I just speed run to the end when ever I play it, but it still gives me the creeps. like my own memory of it is haunting its halls.

E3M9 - Warrens

I realized I hadn't tried any of the secret maps outside of E1M9, so I was using the console commands in GZDoom to skip to each of them to try them out. When I got to E3M9, I thought I had made a mistake or something and quickly checked if I inputted the right info or not. Probably one of my favorite secret maps now.

For me...

E3M5 I got lost easily the first time. Still kinda do.

I remember feeling overwhelmed in Map 08 of Doom II the first time, until I realized that in-fighting would make a room full of Barons and a Cybie not that big of a deal.

Map 24 The Chasm. I first placed this in 1994 and hated it so much I just skipped to the next level. Didn't actually finish it for years. "Why is Doom requiring me to tightrope walk??" were my thoughts at the time.

In Plutonia, map 32 was INSANE the first time playing it in the 90s.

7 hours ago, Grain of Salt said:

MAP28 - I never figured out that you have to shoot that stupid spine texture. In my defense.... why would I. 

I think I remember getting confused by that, too. That was one of my favorite maps, though!

Halls Of The Damned took me like forever to figure out somehow, hated that map for a loooooooong time

My first experience with Doom was with bootleg GBA cartridge that didn't allow me to save.
Several of my playthroughs ended on Mt Erebus, with me defeating everything and not being able to find the exit. Eventually I died to damaging floors while looking for it, or just switched off the console out of frustration, and returned to the game several days/weeks/months later. One time I actually managed to find the exit... only to face the same problem in Limbo. And when I died or ragequit (I don't exactly remember) on Limbo, my next playthrough finished with me realising I can't remember where I found the exit on Mt Erebus that one time I actually found it. And I ragequit the GBA vesrion forever after it.

I never got farther until I first played PC version through ZDoom many years later.

I like Downtown, but I STILL forget how to get around in it. Definitely tripped me up the first time.

Doom 1: E3M7 was always hell for obvious reasons (still is).

Doom 2: My older sister had made it to Map 30 and made a save, but we could never figure out just exactly how to kill the icon of sin. It wasn't until years later (after I'd learned about cheats and used them to kill Romero's head several times) that by random chance I discovered the damn pipe tower in the middle of the room was an elevator.

Mt. Erebus. You know how easy it is to miss the last switch which grants you access to the exit that also unleashes a little Cacocloud? Well, I literally spent upwards of 50 minutes in there at times.

I don't quite remember my first time playing the retail version of Doom, and Doom 2. I do remember getting lost for quite a while in E2M5 "Command Center", at the time this map's layout felt gnarly and counterintuitive to navigate unlike every other map in the IWAD. 

About the shareware version of Doom, the earliest memory i have is that of getting my mind blown when i first saw the huge secret optional area in Nuclear Plant, even more so when i stumbled on the secret passageway to the donut platform with the Chainsaw.

I'm still a bit salty about the time i tripped off into the nukage pit near the exit room in Trick and Traps.

E3M7 did and still does trip me up. Well not anymore since I made my own fixed version with progression clues.

Unholy cathedral for doom 1, entering the teleporters at the correct angles was something that I did not catch up on at all, I did manage to find some of the secrets no problem. As for doom 2 its the citadel, I've gotten lost a bunch of times, even when I revisit it a few times, I still get tripped up once in a while. Of course now I know where to go and all that. But the citadel still goes down as probably my least favorite map in doom 2

I played through doom 1 and doom II a couple of years ago, (aged 13) and nothing really tripped me up, however there are some maps that came close. might as well include TNT and Plutonia because why not?

Doom 1: E3M7 - Gate to Limbo. This one confused the hell out of me and it took me a solid 100 minutes to complete. Frustrating mess.
Doom II: MAP11 - Circle of Death/O' of Destruction. Couldn't figure out how to open the door to the exit room. That just sucked.
TNT: MAP20 - Central Processing. This was so incoherent and confusing. I had no idea that half of these rocks in the final area lowered and it took me roughly 4 hours to finally figure so.
Plutonia: MAP24 - The Final Frontier. This one with the two Arch-Viles at the beginning and that Cyberdemon in that one room just completely tripped me up. There's actually video footage of me struggling on it. (said video in question: 

)
anyways, that's all I've got to say.

E2M6, Halls of the Damned.

Unavoidable slime damage? Check.

Maze that you take one look at and then thankfully notice you can avoid it? Check.

False exit? Check.

Fuck, gotta go through the maze anyway? Check...

I'm not a fan of Sandy's maps usually, but this one I can't help but like.

Outside of Doom and Doom II, I have a laundry list of levels from Doom 64:

Map08 (Final Outpost): The Yellow Key, which I'm sure tripped up everybody that's ever played this game. I played through this game when there was absolutely no information anywhere on this planet for this game (no FAQs existed on GameFAQs, no YouTube, I highly doubt this game was covered in Nintendo Power or through a strategy guide), and after a super long time being stuck on this map, I ended up figuring out the solution by a dumb luck wild guess.

Map 18 (Spawned Fear): This was one of those levels that would be a complete impediment to your progress if you didn't know about switches triggered by gunfire, more specifically, the Blue Key, I think my brother ended up figuring this one out before I id.

Map 20 (Breakdown): For the longest time I never got past the opening room, the Blue Key is on a pillar in the middle of the room, and you lower it by shooting a switch next to the pillar that's up in the air, and you have to be standing in a certain spot to see the switch, it's not too visible. Again, if you didn't know you could shoot some switches in this game, this level would practically softlock you.

for the first doom...e3m6: mt. erebus. i still fucking  H A T E  that map for that goddamn stupid-ass candle wall that leads to the blue skull, it pissed me off when i first played it and it pisses me off now. it's needlessly confusing, and anyone who likes it is a terrible person

as for doom 2, map13 is and always will be a map that makes me wanna cry

The teleports in E3M5, which I used to "hate" and childishly bash until someone pointed out the blinking light hint. Now I approve of the map's quirks a lot more than before, and encourage myself to take notes about ways to hint towards stuff in maps. 

The biggest bottleneck though was E4M2, because oh so doomguy can sonic-the-hedgehog over platforms farther than usual?!?! that's cool, thank you youtube videos and tutorials!!! ... yeah I didn't know running was a thing, nor anything about the utility behind strafing.

Map 11 - I hate to admit it, but it took me pretty long to realize that you have to run over the gap to make it to the ramp leading to the final area.

Map 28 - I do remember being confused by this map initially. Most likely due to the random shootable suff, a fake wall and the entire yellow key area.

Level 28. This shit...

In hindsight it's really obvious but I remember spending a while on this room the very first time :p

The Citadel lives in infamy to me, the whole "teleport into a random room which can only be escaped by shooting a wall" had me actually stumped for uncomfortably long time.

E2M2. This map was really scare me.

E3M7. I remember, how long i couldn't find the exit.

Factory. Big and empty map, i didn't like it at first sight.

Mount Pain (from TNT: Evilution). Atmospheric and difficult map, my favorite from official Doom IWADs!

E3M7 is still my worst nightmare, even if I understand it completely now.