Plerbtonia, a 32-map vanilla Plutonia megawad (Now on idgames!)

[Plerb]

Plerbtonia is a Plutonia megawad featuring 32 relatively short, difficult maps intended to be played pistol-start. Most of the maps are by me, with a couple guest maps from @RiviTheWarlock and @OverflowingMocha. It's vanilla compatible (-complevel 4) and the IWAD is PLUTONIA.WAD.

 

This WAD was made over the course of around 3.5 months (it was more like 2 months when excluding some lengthy breaks during that time), starting on July 3rd. Throughout development I released periodic demos for every 4-6 maps made.

 

IMPORTANT NOTE: Plerbtonia makes use of vanilla specific quirks that probably won't work in various ZDoom derived ports. This could cause gameplay discrepancies at best and major sequence breaks at worst. Sticking to ports that explicitly support complevel 4 behavior is highly recommended, although there is some rudimentary support for newer GZDoom versions.

 

===Notes===

 

-All maps were designed around pistol-start and continuous isn't recommended. If you insist on playing continuous anyways, please at least pistol-start MAP21 and *especially* MAP31.
-This WAD was primarily tested in DSDA-Doom and CRL. As of RC3 it runs in doom2.exe (specifically the Final Doom version).
-HNTR and UV are fully implemented. HMP is almost entirely the same as UV, so if you want something noticably easier, play HNTR. I'm not good at describing the difficulty of my own maps, but I think Plerbtonia on HMP/UV is somewhere in-between Plutonia on UV and Sunlust on HMP. Maybe leaning towards the latter.
-Multiplayer is not supported.
-I got a softlock on MAP07 once, but I haven't been able to reproduce it and I assume it's rare enough to not be a big deal.
-There's a DeHackEd lump in the wad file, and an external DeHackEd file for use with vanilla.
-If you played all the maps from the final pre-release demo, the new maps are MAP31, MAP23, and MAP26-29.
-In the pre-release demos, in MAP06 there was an evil double arch-vile ambush on UV in one part. Upon reflection, I decided said encounter was too much of a difficulty spike for such an early map, and I think it was too obnoxious and too RNG-dependent, so I removed one of the arch-viles. It's still there if you use solonet + UV.

 

===Screenshots===

 

Spoiler

 

 

===Maps===

 

Spoiler

MAP01: Harbor
MAP02: Swamp
MAP03: Ruins
MAP04: Scrapyard
MAP05: Old Shack
MAP06: Evil Zoo
MAP07: Living Complex
MAP08: Jungle
MAP09: Nuke 'Em
MAP10: Lightheaded
MAP11: Spider's Game
MAP12: The Bay
MAP13: Dreamzone
MAP14: Cobra (by RiviTheWarlock)
MAP15: Steel Furnace
MAP16: Grotto
MAP17: Temple
MAP18: Chlorophyll
MAP19: Geyser
MAP20: Hell's Finest
MAP21: Tite Balance
MAP22: Under The Stars
MAP23: Mud Mines
MAP24: Tek Support
MAP25: Fortress
MAP26: Snowscape
MAP27: Glacier
MAP28: Frozen Pipes
MAP29: Mothballs (by OverflowingMocha)
MAP30: Nukage Winter
MAP31: Vile Dreams
MAP32: Hide From It

 

===Music===
 

Spoiler

MAP01: Enter Plerbtonia by me
MAP02: Dark Swamp from Atroxian Realm (a Commander Keen mod), by Gamebird
MAP03: NWarkanoid#17.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP04: Down the Line by me
MAP05: Contempt from TNT: Revilution, by Varis Alpha
MAP06: Warkanoid#57.mid from Warkanoid, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP07: NWarkanoid#28.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP08: Krilewood Forest from Atroxian Realm, by Gamebird
MAP09: The Anthrax Solution from AVMidi, by Varis Alpha
MAP10: DRIVE.MID from Gubble, by Seppo Hurme
MAP11: NWarkanoid#18.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP12: 8 Gallons of Fuel from Demonstar, by Bobby Prince
MAP13: The Caco's Best from AVMidi, by Megasphere
MAP14: DLA from Cringe, by Mark Klem
MAP15: Gamen't by me
MAP16: Tim 3 from Lemmings, by Tim Wright
MAP17: Reaching Deeper from TNT: Revilution, by Tristan Clark
MAP18: Flipped by me
MAP19: Murky Marsh from Atroxian Realm, by Gamebird
MAP20: Blood Rush from PlutMidi, by Tristan Clark
MAP21: WASTE1.MID from Gubble 2, by Seppo Hurme
MAP22: Observing by me
MAP23: NWarkanoid#11.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP24: At the Place by me
MAP25: NWarkanoid#16.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP26: NWarkanoid#03.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP27: NWarkanoid#24.mid from Warkanoid 2, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP28: Night Cloud by me
MAP29: Neon Glitter by Dial-up for Murder
MAP30: Refraction by me
MAP31: Warkanoid#48.mid from Warkanoid, by Vakhtang Adamiya
MAP32: Stage 5 music from Super Mario PC, by unknown
Title screen: Title by me
Intermission: Intermission from PLERBTONIA by me
Text screen: War3#02.mid from Warkanoid 3, by Vakhtang Adamiya

 

===Credits===

-Graphic resource credits: me, Doom 1, TNT Evilution, 32in24-15 Tex, Valiant, Plutonia 2, Greenwar 2 Tex, lostres, Grove (I was gonna use more resources from Grove, but ultimately I only used one of the leafy flats on like 2 floors in MAP25 :P)
-People who played the demos while this was under development, and recorded themselves doing so: @SleepyVelvet, @THEBaratusII, @Austinado, @Zahid, @Maribo, @paymentplan, @-BLEEDTEA. Shout-outs to paymentplan especially, who played every map I released during development and generally showed a lot of enthusiasm for the project, which was super motivating!
-Tech support: @Melodic Spaceship

-ENDOOM: @Peccatum Mihzamiz
-Tools used: SLADE 3, WhackEd4, Doom Text Generator, 3D Studio Max 2.5, KolourPaint, GIMP, OpenMPT, Rosegarden

 

===Download===

 

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/megawads/plerbtonia

 

Old versions:

Spoiler

plerbtonia_rc4.zip (same as idgames version, just missing the .txt file)

plerbtonia_rc3.zip

plerbtonia_rc2.zip

plerbtonia_rc1.zip

 

 

Edited Monday at 08:28 AM by Plerb : idgames

[elf-alchemist]

NICE! Congrats on the release, Plerb!

[Ludi]

[paymentplan]

Well done on getting to RC1! Very much enjoyed watching your progress and can't wait to blast through everything again. 

[OverflowingMocha]

Yippie!! Glad to have made a pretty alright map 4 this thingy :3 Congrats on the release!!!

[Claire]

Hell yeah, nice to see this one out!

[paymentplan]

Played maps 1-6 again and they were as fun as I remembered! Well, except map 06... Which was even more fun now, after the change you made with the arch vile! Had the good sense to go ahead and export my Twitch footage to YouTube in case anyone wants to check it out. 

 

Spoiler

 

 

[Plerb]

Thanks everyone! Crazy to finally have this out, even though I only started it a few months ago. Really, the most surreal part is that I made a whopping 30 maps in that time!

 

3 hours ago, Ludi said:

Heh, what's this image from? :D

 

2 hours ago, OverflowingMocha said:

Yippie!! Glad to have made a pretty alright map 4 this thingy :3 Congrats on the release!!!

Thanks so much for contributing a map to this, it's one of my favorites in the set and I have a blast every time I play it!!

 

56 minutes ago, paymentplan said:

Played maps 1-6 again and they were as fun as I remembered! Well, except map 06... Which was even more fun now, after the change you made with the arch vile! Had the good sense to go ahead and export my Twitch footage to YouTube in case anyone wants to check it out.  

I always enjoy watching your playthroughs of plerbtonia, glad this one won't be auto-deleted in a week! Also good that you think the MAP06 change was positive. Looking forward to the next videos, especially the maps I haven't seen you play yet!

[97th Century Fox]

Played a couple of maps, love this

[bioshockfan90]

1-8, HNTR blind pistol start VOD

 

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2279267827

 

i don't usually record but i figured what the hey! you might find some things of interest here. will probably stream some more on Sunday or something. good stuff so far!

[Plerb]

12 hours ago, 97th Century Fox said:

Played a couple of maps, love this

Glad you like it so far, and thanks for mentionating this in the cacoward mentionation thread!!

 

57 minutes ago, bioshockfan90 said:

1-8, HNTR blind pistol start VOD

 

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2279267827

 

i don't usually record but i figured what the hey! you might find some things of interest here. will probably stream some more on Sunday or something. good stuff so far!

Thank you for recording your playthrough, that was very fun to watch! Looks like you've managed ok without saving for these shorter early maps, but for later maps I would recommend saving occasionally :P Excited to see you get further into this!

[Logamuffin]

Ok that pun is awesome. Congrats on the release!

[Aceituns14]

To be honest here, all of them are absolutely amazing, and they work really well with many of the mods I use, such as Brutal Doom, Project Brutality, Call of Doom, Halo Doom Evolved, and many other mods, all of the maps are amazing, both artistically and physically.

 

[Plerb]

1 minute ago, Aceituns14 said:

To be honest here, all of them are absolutely amazing, and they work really well with many of the mods I use, such as Brutal Doom, Project Brutality, Call of Doom, Halo Doom Evolved, and many other mods, all of the maps are amazing, both artistically and physically.

I mean, I can't stop you, but I really don't recommend using gameplay mods or GZDoom when playing this :P

[Kroc]

[Aceituns14]

51 minutes ago, Plerb said:

I mean, I can't stop you, but I really don't recommend using gameplay mods or GZDoom when playing this :P

yeah... it does say that its a vanilla mapset.

[Jayextee]

I'm totally going to play through this continuous.

...when I've done with Into Sandy's Cities, of course. <3 

[Plerb]

10 minutes ago, Jayextee said:

I'm totally going to play through this continuous.

...when I've done with Into Sandy's Cities, of course. <3 

Hope you'll enjoy it! Maybe you'll also appreciate the fact that I didn't tag half the secrets in this wad ;) (tbh I didn't even add that many to begin with)

[Jayextee]

7 minutes ago, Plerb said:

Maybe you'll also appreciate the fact that I didn't tag half the secrets in this wad

Plutonia.

Vanilla compat.

Untagged secrets.

This was fuckin' made for me! I'd better hurry up with Into Sandy's Cities, then. ;)

[Plerb]

Here's my commentary on all the maps, with a lot of development trivia!
 

Spoiler

 

MAP01:
The map that kicked off this whole WAD. I downloaded 1000 Lines 3 and played a couple maps, and then suddenly got the inspiration to try making my own map with this restriction. Plutonia was chosen as the IWAD because I was already planning to eventually start a Plutonia mapset. The line restriction changed a bit over the course of the map's development, but I eventually settled on 200. I pretty quickly dropped any pretense of line limitations for this wad, but it was essential for me to get into the mindset of making short, visually rough maps that are nonetheless fun to play (many of the later maps have much nicer visuals though!).

 

MAP02:
Originally there weren't switches which lowered the skull keys, they just lowered when you walked over the ledges. Pretty much every person who played and recorded this map struggled to figure this out, so I was going to add switches for this instead... but then I remembered there wasn't a switchable linedef action for lowering floor and changing texture. And THEN, a month later, I stumbled upon a vanilla quirk which allowed me to do just that! So in RC1 I implemented it.

 

MAP03:
The opening arena was directly taken from a random 5 minute speedmap I made March 27th (I was trying to make an entire megawad of 5-minute speedmaps, most of them are utter shit but this one had potential).

 

MAP04:
This was a remake of a random speedmap I made in 15 minutes in April. The general flow is the same as well as the central crusher, but the original version was a LOT rougher.

 

MAP05:
VERY loose remake of a speedmap I made in July 2023.

 

MAP06:
The color-changing key signs were supposed to be a single sector with a single texture, but I wasn't able to get that working. The solution I ended up using is less elegant but it does the job.

As mentioned in the OP, I removed an arch-vile before releasing RC1.

 

MAP07:
Early in Plerbtonia's development, I was thinking of remaking a MAP07 speedmap I made in 2023, but ultimately the only concept I retained from that was having both a floor and ceiling action be applied to the 666-tagged sector. I changed the arachnotrons to use A_KeenDie for this map, which I also took advantage of for MAP32.

 

MAP08:
This has a very experimental and weird layout. It flows almost entirely differently based on your choices near the start. Probably the most difficult layout to design but it was very satisfying when it all worked out. However, ultimately one of the paths you can go down is just WAY more easy and intuitive than the other, so bleh.

 

MAP09:
This was vaguely inspired by MAP14 from Valiant, taking the concept even further. When I made this, I planned on making more of these types of barrel-centric maps (at least one per episode), but ultimately I didn't have enough ideas for them to make any more.

 

MAP10:
Probably one of the least visually appealing maps in this set... but it's still fun. Also one of the most compact. The part with the 2 lowering arch viles was vaguely inspired by a trap in MAP23 of Ancient Aliens.

 

MAP11:
You're supposed to keep the spiderdemon alive until you telefrag it, but with a bit of patience you can completely cheese that towards the start. It's not that big of a deal.

 

MAP12:
I started this map before even the second demo was released. It was just the maze-like area shortly after the starting area at that point, but it was much more claustrophobic and really frustrating to play.

 

MAP13:
This was designed around a couple areas that appeared in a dream I had in early 2024 (which I only remember because I hastily jotted down sketches of it right after I woke up from that dream), hence the map name.

 

These were the specific bits that were based on the dream:
-The mancubus facing you at the start, and the baron on the ledge behind it (my hasty sketch also mentioned something else on the ledge, but it's completely unlegible xd. "2 dmlss"???????)
-The room with the vine walls and spiral staircase over a pit of nukage.

 

MAP14:
The first guest map in Plerbtonia. I added a couple power-up spheres but otherwise didn't make any changes.

 

MAP15:
I had the concept for the secret exit early in Plerbtonia's development, but it took a while to actually execute it. I had a couple false starts. When I finally made this map in September, I set up the exit first and worked backwards from there.

 

MAP31:
Another map which I had the idea of early on but took a while to actually end up making. It's a Cyberdreams homage, which I got the idea of doing because of the cyberdemon theme of Plutonia MAP31, although it uses arch-viles instead as they worked better for the puzzles I made. The blue key puzzle is self-plagarized from another (currently unreleased as of writing) Cyberdreams homage I did, E2M1 of Extragalaxial.

 

MAP32:
Didn't start this as a secret map at first, but it was so gimmicky and hard that of course it had to be. My initial idea for MAP32 was a Go 2 It take on Chex Quest E1M1, but I didn't have any good ideas for that beyond the initial concept, so that was scrapped.

 

MAP16:
I took a break from working on Plerbtonia (and mapping in general) between July 20th and August 15th, and this was the first map I made when resuming development on it.

 

MAP17:
The expanding pyramids at the end use a bunch of donut sectors, taking advantage of a vanilla trick where you can control the speed the floor moves up. It's a uniquely vanilla trick, I don't even think you can pull this off properly in MBF21 because you only have 4 distinct speeds for moving platforms that are exponentially faster than one another, rather than linear.

 

MAP18:
This was originally started in April 2024 for Knee Deep in the Dictionary. When it was still in MBF21 format, there was an interesting puzzle for a secret area, involving a Boom conveyor. This obviously had to be cut when it was switched to vanilla. This map's development moved incredibly slowly until I decided to drop out of that project and retool it for Plerbtonia, and shortly after I finished it. A significant portion was cut, including the first few rooms I made for this map. I might repurpose those parts for another map down the line, but they weren't very interesting.

 

MAP19:
The revenants teleporting in in the rising arena don't really work as intended, they get stuck in the spot they teleport in from because of reasons, but I couldn't find a good solution for this without tearing apart the map entirely.
It's also very easy to lock yourself out from getting 100% kills in this map.

 

MAP20:
This map began life as a potential StarZone map, which I originally worked on for a day and then scrapped it. The MIDI is maybe a cliche choice for a Plutonia WAD but it fits well enough. Despite the relatively late slot, it was only the 7th map I finished, which is why it's as unpolished visually as the average E1 map. It's still really fun though, which is the most important thing. Between the 4th and 5th pre-release demos I added an REDWALL1 inverted cross near the starting area.

 

MAP21:
If you're playing continuous and have only a tiny amount of health and armor going into this map, good luck.

 

MAP22:
This map is partially the reason Plerbtonia exists. I originally started it for StarZone sometime in January 2024, as a random plutonia themed map in there. After working on it for a bit I decided I wanted to make a mapset for the plutonia IWAD and use this map in there instead, so I set it aside. So the idea of making a plutonia mapset had been sitting in my head for a while, and then eventually I started one.

 

MAP23:
This was the last map I made before going on my second hiatus from Plerbtonia, which lasted from September 22nd to October 11th.

 

MAP24:
Another StarZone reject turned Plerbtonia map, originally started in November 2023. It contains the oldest linedefs in the wad. When I initially started it back then, it was an experiment in drawing a layout on paper and then recreating it in the map editor. Pretty quickly realized that method wasn't for me. The piece of the map that I ended up using here was only a fragment of what I designed then, as that was the most developed section and the rest was just an incoherent maze.

 

MAP25:
This started life as a speedmap I made in December 2023. At one point it was put in StarZone, where I did a bit more work on it (which this version is based on) but ultimately I scrapped it from that. It used the Nuts 2 music then. I only changed the music to what it currently is shortly before finishing it. As much of a banger the Nuts 2 music is, it gets a bit too repetitive after a while. There was a LOT of moving linedefs around and breaking down walls involved in reworking this.

 

MAP26:
Based on a scrapped snow map from StarZone, and it was the first of 3 maps I made after resuming from the aformentioned second hiatus that started after I made MAP23.

 

MAP27:
This was the last map created for Plerbtonia. Originally OverflowingMocha was gonna do a second guest map, but that didn't end up happening so I had to throw this together at the last minute. Initially it was shaping up to be a burnout map, but on Oct 17 my inspiration came back and I finished this up with a fun final fight, and thus, Plerbtonia was done!

 

MAP28:
I really like this map but I can't think of any interesting commentary, other than it was the second-to-last map I finished, and most of the pink lava uses 5% damage but one of them uses 10%. It's not a huge deal and I'm not sure I'll change it.

 

MAP29:
Second guest map made for Plerbtonia. It was also the second snow-themed map that was made, and the visual style influenced the other snow maps I made. I implemented HNTR support, which was one of the last things I did before releasing RC1.

 

MAP30:
This map was based on parts of an extremely unwieldy abandoned map I started for the Snow Wave community project. I was initially gonna use said map in StarZone, where I split it into 2 maps to alleviate some of the unwieldiness. But ultimately I gave up on those maps and removed them from that project.

This is a HEAVILY reworked version of one of those 2 maps, still keeping the best ideas and executing them better, such as the slaughter-esque arena with the glowing REDWALL1 towers, spiderdemon, and a ton of other enemies. In the original version of that room, I just plopped a bunch of different enemies in a room (including 2 spiderdemons) with no thought behind it. I've really improved a lot at mapping since 2023.

 

Misc. notes:
In total, 10 maps were based on unfinished maps originally started for other projects of mine, mostly dating from November 2023 to April 2024. 6 of them were at one point considered for StarZone. At some point I want to release a wad showcasing some of these early iterations of Plerbtonia maps, for the folks who find this stuff as interesting as I do. It'd have to use Doom 2 + 32in24-15_tex.

 

Side note about StarZone: I don't know when I'll finish it, and I plan on releasing a beta of all 7 maps in their current unfinished state sometime soon. I still want to finish it eventually, but not for a while. Detailing the remaining maps to the standards of the 2 maps I finished in January is really time consuming.

 

I have a megawad's worth of scrapped, unfinished maps from Plerbtonia. Several of them are simply test maps, others were failed attempts at real maps. Most of these were scrapped for a reason, but nevertheless, hopefully I'll find a new home for some of them later down the line.

 

 

[Bri0che]

Delightful design as far as I can tell. And I'm not even a Plutonia fan :)

By the way, untagged secrets are a choice that I get it, but I though at first that there was, in fact, no secret hidden at all... :S

[Plerb]

10 minutes ago, Bri0che said:

Delightful design as far as I can tell. And I'm not even a Plutonia fan :)

By the way, untagged secrets are a choice that I get it, but I though at first that there was, in fact, no secret hidden at all... :S

Thanks. To be fair, about half of the maps don't have any secrets whatsoever.

[Bri0che]

3 minutes ago, Plerb said:

Thanks. To be fair, about half of the maps don't have any secrets whatsoever.

 

Ohhh, so I'm half right then :')

That's good enough anyway, I'm not a great Indiana Jones when it come to secret hunt haha

[Claire]

I've managed to get to map 8 and i'm loving it so far! The map layouts are surprisingly competent despite being really short and there are some really cool tricks. Map 1 for example, i don't know how you make the monster closets only after you go back to take the yellow key, or in map 6 where i didn't notice that i was pressing the same switch but with a different key color 3 times. It's a really cool showcase of vanilla trickery, and maybe i could learn a thing or two from these maps.

 

I like how the music contrasts with the gameplay, i love how they are whimsical and quirky, which doesn't represent the excrutiating difficulty of some of the maps.

 

Also, i found something in map 2:

Spoiler

If you manage to skip the last platform, you end up revealing a HOM:

I assume that this is the case with the other platforms that lower

 

I feel bad for not playing this when it was still in development, but better late than ever.

[SpaceCat_2001]

Gajenga Bobber

[NIBAX]

Plerbtonia is such a delightful name, will have to play this soon!

[NIBAX]

On 10/17/2024 at 9:14 PM, Ludi said:

Very beautiful

[NIBAX]

played a few maps so far, good ol' plutonia feeling to it.

 

Works great on Crispy Doom btw

[Helm]

Some of the best doomin' I've done all year for sure. This is guaranteed to entertain if you like it hard and fast.

[Plerb]

14 hours ago, Claire said:

I've managed to get to map 8 and i'm loving it so far! The map layouts are surprisingly competent despite being really short and there are some really cool tricks. Map 1 for example, i don't know how you make the monster closets only after you go back to take the yellow key, or in map 6 where i didn't notice that i was pressing the same switch but with a different key color 3 times. It's a really cool showcase of vanilla trickery, and maybe i could learn a thing or two from these maps.

 

I like how the music contrasts with the gameplay, i love how they are whimsical and quirky, which doesn't represent the excrutiating difficulty of some of the maps.

 

Also, i found something in map 2:

  Reveal hidden contents

If you manage to skip the last platform, you end up revealing a HOM:

I assume that this is the case with the other platforms that lower

 

I feel bad for not playing this when it was still in development, but better late than ever.

Thanks! Yeah I love whimsical and quirky midis :) I'm gonna have to start the wad file for RC2 and fix the HOM in MAP02 soon. It won't be released for another week or two unless something gamebreaking shows up.

 

9 hours ago, Helm said:

Some of the best doomin' I've done all year for sure. This is guaranteed to entertain if you like it hard and fast.

Thank you, that means a lot! :D How far did you get so far?