My latest Doom mod

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RobbyPants
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My latest Doom mod

Post by RobbyPants »

I've been working on a Doom mod for a while now. I finished it a couple of weeks ago and after a bit of tinkering, I've put it up at ModDB for download!

Hubris of UAC download at ModDB

The general plot starts out similar to the 2016 Doom game. You start on Mars, then go to Hell for a while. I made a few levels set on Earth and then you go back to Hell to wipe out the rest of the threat.

Screen shots:
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Title pic


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Credits


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Office on Mars


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Power core on Mars


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Streets on Earth overrun with demons


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Hell level: Iron and Blood


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Hell level: Bane Mires
For those interested in playing this:
  • Go to the above link and click the red Download Now button.
  • Unzip the download file. Hubris.WAD is the game file that you play with GZDoom.
  • You will need GZDoom (at least 4.3.3) installed. You can find it at zdoom.org. Click the left-most download.
  • I set this up to make UltraViolence pretty hard. I have beat every level from a pistol start, but I know where all the secrets are. If you haven't played Doom in a while, you might want to try an easier difficulty.
  • Let me know if you have any questions.
Last edited by RobbyPants on Thu May 28, 2020 4:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Dogbert »

Looks awesome, kudos.
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Post by Blade »

Oh looks nice! Does it require mouse look or is it playable with classic doom controls?
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Post by RobbyPants »

Dogbert wrote:Looks awesome, kudos.
Thanks!

Blade wrote:Oh looks nice! Does it require mouse look or is it playable with classic doom controls?
It needs to run in GZDoom because I put in 3D floors and swimmable water. So, it won't run in Vanilla Doom.

That being said, you can rebind the controls in GZDoom and you might be able to get something comparable to the old controls. I've never bound any keys to turning, but I think you can turn old Doom style aiming on (where it does the vertical aiming for you if you're horizontally centered on a target). Some levels to require jumping, climbing, or swimming to win, all which would need you to bind a <jump> key.
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Post by Thaluikhain »

Ok, tried this out (on lowest difficulty), got killed by a Hell Knight (or Baron of Hell, get those mixed up) in the second level, but I'm not a hardcore gamer.

I dpn't seem to be able to pick up shotgun shells, either with the shotgun, the 4 by themselves or the box, it says I have, but it doesn't add any. Does when I get the backpack. Also, barrels don't explode, they just crumple and disappear and things next to them take damage.

Total noob at this, is it possible to run Brutal Doom with this? Was playing that the other day.

Level design (of the entire 2 I've seen) looks a bit odd, big space with nothing much in them, not grabbing me TBH.

EDIT:, Ok, running it with Brutal Doom (sorta), got to I think lvl4 before getting killed by a Hell Knight (or Baron of Hell, still get those mixed up) on easiest difficulty.

The zero oxygen thing was a nice idea, though I don't like running round damaging places when I don't know what I'm supposed to do. Likewise, the next bit with swimming in toxic waste and the conveyor belt. Nice idea, but not been able to dodge imp fire on the belt isn't much fun.

EDIT EDIT: Lvl 5 and this time it was a Hell Knight for sure. Though, that's my idclev -ing to that level and then -summon shotgun and stuff, rather than getting their legitimately.

EDIT Again:

Ok, played this all the way through...kinda. Got frustrated and idclip -ed through doors to the exit a few times and idclev -ed past levels that I'd almost done but got killed near the exit.

A lot of idkfa -ing and summon backpack -ing and summon megasphere -ing. Often, several megasphere per level. The difficulty seems way too hard, you don't need a cyberdemon appear every second level. I noped and iddqd -ed for the final level, more than one cyberdemon in the same room is getting silly.

Wasn't able to pick up shotgun ammo, and other ammo seemed a bit scarce.

Generally not a fan of the levels. I did like the cathedral (the bit with the statues and some are monsters but it's not obvious which was nice), and the idea of deadline (not so much the execution, got frustrating). A number of levels had a definite feel to them, and the hell portions were obviously different to the Earth portions, something the original games sometimes struggled with. That's a plus.

The levels had a lot of big open spaces where you are being shot at by something at long range you can't effectively fire back at, which was annoying, especially when it's coming from multiple angles, the original game tended to avoid this. Fast moving flying monsters with rapid fire weapons at long range are very annoying. Not fussed on any of that.

Also wasn't fussed on swimming through radioactive waste while exploring places, again, only 1 level of the original DOOM2 had a section like that off the top of my head (bout lvl 15, the one with the exit to the Wolfenstein lvl).

Oh, and I also wasn't fussed about the story, but that's really never been a priority for Doom, played Ultimate Doom and Doom2 a bunch of times and only vaguely aware what the backstory is.

EDIT: Aaaand went and idclev -ed to lvl31 and did that one and 32. Ok, swaped the original cyberdemon for grosse and stuck medipacks around. I liked the original, because it fires rockets you can dodge and there's stuff to dodge behind, bit more just shooting grosse and hoping it runs out of health before I run out of health and plasma.

Oh, and there's the chaingun and minigun, but I only can seem to select one (the one with separate ammo to the pistol and assault rifle). The other selects automatically when I get it, but once I change, I can't get it back.
Last edited by Thaluikhain on Sun Aug 02, 2020 2:32 pm, edited 4 times in total.
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Post by RobbyPants »

First of all, thanks for the feedback.
Thaluikhain wrote:Ok, tried this out (on lowest difficulty), got killed by a Hell Knight (or Baron of Hell, get those mixed up) in the second level, but I'm not a hardcore gamer.
Did you do all of your playing on this difficulty? I'm curious based on some of the comments. I played a lot of Doom for a while, so I know my skill level isn't necessarily the best barometer. Also, the way enemies and power ups are placed, it's possible I accidentally put some ammo down that was Ultra Violence, only. I did very little playtesting on the easy levels, so it's possible that's in there as a bug. I might have to run the whole thing like that to see.

Thaluikhain wrote: I dpn't seem to be able to pick up shotgun shells, either with the shotgun, the 4 by themselves or the box, it says I have, but it doesn't add any. Does when I get the backpack. Also, barrels don't explode, they just crumple and disappear and things next to them take damage.
I'm not sure how that's happening. Do you have the Doom2 WAD file set up in GZDoom? I'm wondering if you're missing core game resources, or something. My WAD file is only the map data, the enemies and guns I modified, and the texture files that I created.

Also, were you running this in GZDoom, or something else like Skulltag or Zandronum?

Thaluikhain wrote: Total noob at this, is it possible to run Brutal Doom with this? Was playing that the other day.
The regular WAD file, I'd think not. There'd be a lot of collisions between the two mods, and I have no idea how the emulator would handle that.

Thaluikhain wrote: Ok, played this all the way through...kinda. Got frustrated and idclip -ed through doors to the exit a few times and idclev -ed past levels that I'd almost done but got killed near the exit.

A lot of idkfa -ing and summon backpack -ing and summon megasphere -ing. Often, several megasphere per level. The difficulty seems way too hard, you don't need a cyberdemon appear every second level. I noped and iddqd -ed for the final level, more than one cyberdemon in the same room is getting silly.
I know it's hard for me to know how others will handle a level. When I create it, I know where all the secrets are. On the earlier levels, I had a friend testing them who is pretty enthusiastic about Doom and probably similarly skilled as me. He thought UV was tough, but doable. After around level 5, I was pumping out levels fast enough he wasn't testing them, so the vast majority of the levels were only play-tested by me.

Thaluikhain wrote: Wasn't able to pick up shotgun ammo, and other ammo seemed a bit scarce.
In UV, I'm usually exiting levels with pretty high amounts of ammo, and apart from guns dropped by monsters, I'd be shooting more monsters with the same amount of ammo. This could be:
  • A potential bug that I mentioned earlier. Maybe some of the ammo is UV-only, which shouldn't be the case.
  • I know where the secrets are, so I can find caches you'd likely not find.
  • I might miss less shots since I'm used to the game.
Thaluikhain wrote: The levels had a lot of big open spaces where you are being shot at by something at long range you can't effectively fire back at, which was annoying, especially when it's coming from multiple angles, the original game tended to avoid this. Fast moving flying monsters with rapid fire weapons at long range are very annoying. Not fussed on any of that.
I can think of one level that is a big offender in this (the city one). There are a few other open ones (the Pit and Blood and Iron), but at least those don't involve hit scans.

I tended to make it through those areas by aggressively clearing an area out with walls where I could hunker down and deal with the threats at an easier pace. If you're not spending a lot of time in the alleys at the beginning of the city street level, you get perforated fast.

Thaluikhain wrote: Oh, and there's the chaingun and minigun, but I only can seem to select one (the one with separate ammo to the pistol and assault rifle). The other selects automatically when I get it, but once I change, I can't get it back.
I'm not sure where you'd get a chaingun from. Maybe some issue with running it with Brutal?



Anyway, thanks again for all the feedback.
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Post by Thaluikhain »

Ok, was playing it with Brutal Doom (in retrospect maybe shouldn't have, but I started it so I finished it that way) using GZDoom, easiest setting. I should try it again without Brutal.
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Post by RobbyPants »

Thaluikhain wrote:Ok, was playing it with Brutal Doom (in retrospect maybe shouldn't have, but I started it so I finished it that way) using GZDoom, easiest setting. I should try it again without Brutal.
Yeah. That'd eliminate any bugs that I wouldn't be able to account for. Hopefully the shotgun works. Part of the issue is none of my weapons use the default ammo types because I changed the sprites for them. It will hopefully also get rid of the chaingun/minigun issue.
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Post by Thaluikhain »

Yeah, trying without Brutal Doom lets the shotgun work (though, shame, I look the Brutal Doom stuff).

First 2 levels again, I guess the outside bit is outside on Mars where there is no air? If so, not a bad idea, but it needs to be more obvious, perhaps a warning sign saying you are going through an airlock or something. Also, ended up going out there twice, and used up the O2 canister the first time.

It wasn't immediately obvious that I was supposed to go out there, I just guessed, maybe a sign that said you were pulling the level for something outside? Personally, I like to be clear on where I should be going, walking past a big red door on the way to the place where the red key is, for example, there was a lot of that in the original Doom2, and it worked.

Is there any reason to use the pistol once you've got the rifle?

EDIT: Oh, so the chaingun starts off with a slow rate of fire and it gets faster until it reaches normal? That's pretty cool.
Last edited by Thaluikhain on Sat Aug 15, 2020 12:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by RobbyPants »

Thaluikhain wrote:Yeah, trying without Brutal Doom lets the shotgun work (though, shame, I look the Brutal Doom stuff).
I did beef up both shotguns. The pump shotgun does about 50% more damage and has a noticeably tighter spread pattern. It makes it a much more useful medium-range weapon. The double barrel shotgun gets around a 20% boost to damage, but has the ability to fire one barrel at a time if you right-click it. That helps a bit with versatility.

Almost all the other weapons have an alt-fire method if you right click.
  • Rifle - bayonet. Deals triple damage of a punch, and it gets the damage boost from a berserk pack, as well.
  • Double barrel shotgun - shoot with one barrel.
  • Chain gun - get the barrels spinning without using ammo. If you plan on using it a lot in a short period of time, you can alternate between right and left clicking to keep it at the max rate of fire. Without this, the barrels have to accelerate, meaning you shoot slower when you first start.
  • Rocket launcher - shoots three rockets in rapid succession. I'm not sure if you noticed, but the rockets are a bit safer in this game. They won't explode until they've traveled a certain distance. So, if you're standing still and shooting, you shouldn't ever suffer splash damage. That being said, if you're running toward something and shoot, you might end up in the blast radius.
  • Plasma rifle - rail gun. Uses 5(?) cells but makes an instantaneous blast that penetrates monsters and hits everything on a line until it hits a wall.
  • BFG - shoots a tiny, fast-moving projectile that acts sort of like a rocket. It hits pretty hard and has a large blast radius. It won't hurt you, but everything in the radius (including you) get propelled back. So, you could knock yourself off a ledge if you shoot a close monster. Uses 10 cells instead of 40 in this mode.
I beefed up the BFG in it's normal mode. It creates far more hitscans than the vanilla version, the hitscans originate from from orb itself rather than the gun, and the ball continually fires them as it flies. So, shooting it into a crowded room from a distance will affect a lot of monsters. Also, I think it fires these hitscans three times when it explodes rather than once.

Thaluikhain wrote:First 2 levels again, I guess the outside bit is outside on Mars where there is no air? If so, not a bad idea, but it needs to be more obvious, perhaps a warning sign saying you are going through an airlock or something. Also, ended up going out there twice, and used up the O2 canister the first time.

It wasn't immediately obvious that I was supposed to go out there, I just guessed, maybe a sign that said you were pulling the level for something outside? Personally, I like to be clear on where I should be going, walking past a big red door on the way to the place where the red key is, for example, there was a lot of that in the original Doom2, and it worked.
Yeah, I added an exclamation point in yellow triangle as my general "danger!" warning, but it's not really obvious. I could make a "zero O2 environment" label, or something, too. I did try to be consistent with having identical air locks in all of the levels where you go outside.

There is one level where the outside wall is damaged and you have to deal with zero O2 for a short period, and I did post a warning outside that room in the form of the TVs flashing "zero O2" warnings.

In the first level, you're forced to go outside when that door at the end of the hall doesn't open. I could probably mess around with scripting to make it say something like "this door is opened elsewhere" or something when you try to open it.

Thaluikhain wrote:Is there any reason to use the pistol once you've got the rifle?
Not hugely. I have it in there sort of for legacy reasons, and since the zombiemen carry those rifles, I thought "why shouldn't you be able to get one, too?". The pistol is really like a tutorial weapon for the first 1/3 of level 1, I guess.
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Post by Thaluikhain »

RobbyPants wrote:Almost all the other weapons have an alt-fire method if you right click.
  • Rifle - bayonet. Deals triple damage of a punch, and it gets the damage boost from a berserk pack, as well.
  • Double barrel shotgun - shoot with one barrel.
  • Chain gun - get the barrels spinning without using ammo. If you plan on using it a lot in a short period of time, you can alternate between right and left clicking to keep it at the max rate of fire. Without this, the barrels have to accelerate, meaning you shoot slower when you first start.
  • Rocket launcher - shoots three rockets in rapid succession. I'm not sure if you noticed, but the rockets are a bit safer in this game. They won't explode until they've traveled a certain distance. So, if you're standing still and shooting, you shouldn't ever suffer splash damage. That being said, if you're running toward something and shoot, you might end up in the blast radius.
  • Plasma rifle - rail gun. Uses 5(?) cells but makes an instantaneous blast that penetrates monsters and hits everything on a line until it hits a wall.
  • BFG - shoots a tiny, fast-moving projectile that acts sort of like a rocket. It hits pretty hard and has a large blast radius. It won't hurt you, but everything in the radius (including you) get propelled back. So, you could knock yourself off a ledge if you shoot a close monster. Uses 10 cells instead of 40 in this mode.
That explains a few things, tried alt-fire a few times without knowing what I was doing.
RobbyPants wrote:Yeah, I added an exclamation point in yellow triangle as my general "danger!" warning, but it's not really obvious. I could make a "zero O2 environment" label, or something, too. I did try to be consistent with having identical air locks in all of the levels where you go outside.

There is one level where the outside wall is damaged and you have to deal with zero O2 for a short period, and I did post a warning outside that room in the form of the TVs flashing "zero O2" warnings.
Yeah, just played level 3, didn't quite grasp that the whole in the wall was the reason for no air, but seems obvious in hindsight. Random idea, some posters or something around saying that you're on Mars might help the feel of thing ("UAC, developing mankind's New Mars" or something). Doesn't feel that you are on an alien world. The AVP (2010) game had Weyland Yutani corporate propaganda around the place and I think that worked.

Also, and these are really minor points, when you've got a radiation suit in a passageway I think it's better if you don't have to walk into it, if you want to go round and do something else and then pick it up. Also, if no monsters can see you when you start the level, the original games usually had a small room or corridor, possibly so you can save the game once you've finished a level before getting into another gunfight. But those are quibbles.
Last edited by Thaluikhain on Sat Aug 15, 2020 1:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by RobbyPants »

Thaluikhain wrote:Also, if no monsters can see you when you start the level, the original games usually had a small room or corridor, possibly so you can save the game once you've finished a level before getting into another gunfight. But those are quibbles.
Some of the levels start you right in a firefight. Episodes 2 and 3 of Doom would do that on occasion. Granted, most of the Mars levels are switched by elevator, so I could just make an elevator in the entrance and start you in it...
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Post by Thaluikhain »

Ok, just played it through again (and then IDCLEV-ed to the secret levels).

Think it worked better the second time around, when I had some idea of what I was going, and only occasionally had to cheat (though had to reload a few times).

Still think there's too many Cyberdemons, and it's not obvious sometimes if I'm supposed to be fighting them or running away.

Notable where you have that level where you have to kill the Cyberdemon to get to hell, and it's one monster by itself in a big arena set up. Fair enough. Two levels later, you're fighting a bunch of monsters while pressing switches, and taking fire from monsters on a distant wall too far away to effectively engage, and then a Cyberdemon jumps out, and after you kill it a Spider Mastermind jumps out. That's a lot.

Fighting the zillion Barons of Hell and Hell Knights in the last level was fun, once I realised I could stay at a distance and circle them.

The shotguns proved to be a bit useless once I'd got other weapons, which is a shame. Not such a problem with the pistol or rifle, as the ammo works for the chaingun and that's still useful, but I'd end up with 100 shotgun shells I'd not use, and run out of useful stuff.

Also, is it just me or is it fiddly getting the angle of the rockets right? Keep aiming just a tad above or below the target by mistake at long range.
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Post by RobbyPants »

Thaluikhain wrote: Still think there's too many Cyberdemons, and it's not obvious sometimes if I'm supposed to be fighting them or running away.
"Supposed to" is kind of subjective. You do what you want. If you want a 100% kill count, then you kill them.

I tend to kill everything.

Thaluikhain wrote: Notable where you have that level where you have to kill the Cyberdemon to get to hell, and it's one monster by itself in a big arena set up. Fair enough. Two levels later, you're fighting a bunch of monsters while pressing switches, and taking fire from monsters on a distant wall too far away to effectively engage, and then a Cyberdemon jumps out, and after you kill it a Spider Mastermind jumps out. That's a lot.
I was definitely aiming for something that would be a challenge on UV. I wanted it harder than vanilla Doom, but I wanted to avoid the absurdity stuff like the later levels of Scythe.

I've got a couple "boss" levels that are deliberately hard. 15 (The Pit) is probably the first hard one (IMO), and in the 20s, you run into a few more hard ones.

Thaluikhain wrote: Fighting the zillion Barons of Hell and Hell Knights in the last level was fun, once I realised I could stay at a distance and circle them.
Yeah, they're pretty easy if you circle them. There's a whole room near them (with the two grey cyber demons) that is entirely optional. I have an invulnerability nearby, and I'd be hard pressed to beat that room without it. Level 30 is meant to be a beast. Several slogs of tough rooms/areas.

Thaluikhain wrote: The shotguns proved to be a bit useless once I'd got other weapons, which is a shame. Not such a problem with the pistol or rifle, as the ammo works for the chaingun and that's still useful, but I'd end up with 100 shotgun shells I'd not use, and run out of useful stuff.
This might be a playstyle thing. I use them both heavily. I also prefer hitscans to projectiles because they're instantaneous. The chaingun is the one I don't use too often, unless I'm in a packed room. I tend to snipe with the rifle, use the shotgun on the zombies/imps, and the double barrel on all the big demons.

Thaluikhain wrote: Also, is it just me or is it fiddly getting the angle of the rockets right? Keep aiming just a tad above or below the target by mistake at long range.
I use the rocket launcher as a medium-ranged weapon. It's obviously risky at close range. I added a safety to limit blowing yourself up, but that tends to limit the effectiveness if the rocket just hits, but doesn't blow up. At long range, it just takes too long to get there. I even sped it up a bit from the original game. The rocket launcher's real benefit in this mod is that I doubled the explosive damage and radius. It clears small mobs quite nicely.
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Post by JonSetanta »

Congrats RobbyPants!

I'm a huge DOOM fan since age 12, grew up on it, I'll give this a try when I have time.
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Re: My latest Doom mod

Post by Thaluikhain »

Ok, played this one a bunch of time (on easiest difficulty). Working out what I was supposed to do wasn't that fun, IMHO but now I know what to do it has a lot of replay value.

Still not keen on the shotgun, it doesn't seem to have a useful niche, at least not for me. The plasma gun has a high rate of fire, enough to stun lock enemies, and does good damage, the machine guns aren't as powerful but the bullets don't take as long to travel so better at range, the assault rifle is more accurate than the minigun. The bfg is good for single, big monsters, and firing a volley of rockets is good for that as well, or for a target at long range to increase the odds of a hit. Single rockets are good for distant enemies in confined space, imps on small ledges, say, that will move but not usually far enough before the rocket reaches them. The shotgun doesn't have a great rate of fire or do that much damage, so neither fish nor foul, again, IMHO.

Some of the levels feel a bit flat, they don't have the same character as similar doom levels, even if the layout is good. Not sure why that is. I do like that all the levels have their own gimmick. The only level I really don't like is the one that's really dark (Catacombs?), that'd really annoying, IMHO. OTOH, Gloom is dark enough to be atmospheric but light enough to see what I'm doing, so that works, likewise the swamp one. And there's some nice flat out weird stuff, swimming up a waterfall of blood (in the Halls of Madness?) and so on, and the second last level with all the places you have to escape before the room fills with lava or the ceiling crushes you are nice. The Streets on I wasn't so fussed on, it's main appeal to me is looking like the 2nd level of the zombie mod (one wonders if they are canonically the same city), I spend ages trying to remember where I'm supposed to be going, as it's got lots of buildings and it takes a while to find the right one.

Came across the odd bug, in the cathedral level a statue of a hell knight at the end was invincible, and I was able to determine that rockets and plasma were going through it without damaging it. That only happened once, though. In The Void, at that part where you are on a ziggurat near lots of hell knights and barons, more than one time the walls didn't go away and I was trapped there. And, well not technically a bug, I'm able to swim up the walls on the edge of the world in the last part of Blood and Iron and see off the edge of the map.

I do like the difference between locations (Mars, Hell, Earth), though I think this could be more pronounced, though this was something that the original Doom also had issues with.
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