What I found by watching a twenty-year-old Doom II deathmatch

Video was really well done! 

I also love those .lmp file deathmatch demos. I never really knew about them until now, so thank you!

It's a pretty interesting time capsule. There are some obviously skilled moves on display, but the game is also extremely rushed and carefree. The commentary reveals it was one of the late night games during the LAN party, so it makes sense to assume fun triumphed over business. All those aggressive jousts into the enemy position would lead to harsh punishment from a spammy opponent prioritizing defense. Translation, I'm saying they don't camp enough for a serious challenge, heh. It makes for a more entertaining video though!

I'm not too familiar with Galiu demos, because I'm a newfangled late 00's map01 kid, so I can't claim this stuff with confidence, but I think there are some fairly interesting anachronisms regarding "common map01 strategies" in that video. Both players seem insistent on using the pistol in double respawn situations where nowadays you'd immediately rush for the SSG if you found yourself in a more advantageous position. Basically it seems like causing at least some (any) damage was almost preferable to securing more weapons and assuming the dominant central position on the map. Sometimes Galiu is seen taking a pistol potshot at BahdKo as she goes for the SSG... damn, nowadays you'd silently sneak past and go for the BFG. Leaving your opponent even slightly unsure where you are is worth more than potential -15%, heh.

Take those insights with a grain of salt though, I'm just guesstimating.

I just watched this video today, what a coincidence you (the uploader) posted it here.

9 hours ago, dew said:

Take those insights with a grain of salt though, I'm just guesstimating.

 

That was great, thanks! Your point about the pistol makes a lot of sense. Got any demos of stand-out deathmatches you could link me to?

BahdKo said when she played Anders in Norway, she was astonished at how much better he was than anyone she played. So I think I'll try to find a good one of his to watch next.

Honestly, 26 minutes of 1v1 all on the same map was probably a bit too much for me. Is that a typical format?

3 minutes ago, atroche said:

BahdKo said when she played Anders in Norway, she was astonished at how much better he was than anyone she played. So I think I'll try to find a good one of his to watch next.

 

Wow, check out this quote from that Anders profile:

“While in game, he feels very distracted by any ambient sounds in the room, such as chairs squeaking, people walking around, and other innocent, normal sounds that people or machines make. He evidently can have a temper when distracted from his dooming, and it was interesting to watch all of the Norwegiens go entirely silent whenever he began a game. They would whisper to one another in the most quiet of voices, literally stalk around the room if they had to move, and when he finished the game, the noise level would rise as people began to talk and get up to do things such as use the bathroom and get drinks. If any sound had  become a distraction during the game, he would usually mention it to the offender, or require the offending machine to be silenced before his next game.”

I'm going to watch this one now:

“Anders' 11th game with Ocelot at the December, 2000 netparty in Stavanger, Norway can be downloaded here. Watch 2 of the best players in the world go at it!”

Andy Johnsen vs Ocelot is among the very best pairings you may find still recording on vanilla in 2000. You can fish for some other demos here for example, but the multiplayer community migrated to client/server source ports such as Zdaemon and Skulltag quickly after they appeared. Most of the greatest games were recorded on Zdaemon after that.

1 hour ago, atroche said:

Honestly, 26 minutes of 1v1 all on the same map was probably a bit too much for me. Is that a typical format?

26 minutes for 100 frags would be considered blazing fast, heh. A 50 frag game lasting 20 minutes would still be considered well paced, map01 can get very campy.

11 hours ago, dew said:

Sometimes Galiu is seen taking a pistol potshot at BahdKo as she goes for the SSG... damn, nowadays you'd silently sneak past and go for the BFG. Leaving your opponent even slightly unsure where you are is worth more than potential -15%, heh.

Then again the psychological aspect of continuous harassment and "leaking" health must not be underestimated. So you're under fire from a pistol...do you keep taking it and just head for the SSG and then react, or turn around/react immediately? Are you absolutely certain that either option will be optimal? Are you 100% certain that once you pick the weapon up, you'll have the time to aim precisely and finish the harassment in just one shot?

Even in a FFA (not 1-on-1) situation, your opponent may choose to just give you a couple of whacks from relative safety and then vanish, only to leave you weakened to other players' attacks as he also picks a better weapon.

17 minutes ago, dew said:

26 minutes for 100 frags would be considered blazing fast, heh. A 50 frag game lasting 20 minutes would still be considered well paced, map01 can get very campy.

 

How about shorter matches? Or ones that had a time limit rather than a frag limit?

I like your video, all the comments you make throughout seem on point. I enjoy map01 duels, but I'm not great at them so I probably can't add much regarding strategies that hasn't already been discussed, but I will say there are some very popular, far superior duel maps in my opinion. Stuff that's been around since 1994/1995 like Dwango5 Map01 & Map02, SSL2, Judas23, Pobla8 and much much more, far too many to list all the good ones, that's not to mention all the excellent duel/dm turf made in the various eras since. The most commonly played popular duel maps tend to encourage consistently fast movement and well rounded use of each weapon, contrasting against Entryway's "camp a lot" / generally convoluted strategic approach. Map01 is the exception rather than the rule when it comes to duels, put simply.

Regarding item respawn, it's generally accepted that in a competitive oldschool duel, you'll have "weapons stay" and "item respawn off" since that's what Deathmatch 1.0 started as. Deathmatch 2.0 (altdeath) had item respawn, but the weapons didn't stay so you also had to wait for them respawn which just sucked, so everyone has pretty much always played with the 1.0 rules in a duel.

In a free for all deathmatch server, it's most common to see "weapons stay" alongside item respawn, but it's not often people duel using these rules as respawning health and ammo can make what would have been a 5-10 minute round drag on seemingly eternally. This is also probably why Newschool Duel (jumping and freelook in addition to item respawn and weapons stay) never gained a lot of traction, but even then there are some excellent map packs out there designed around NS Duel.

Good thread and good video!

Hey sonny, I object to your history telling at 1.00! That picture is from a cold, dark Norwegian winters day, and that frozen pizza in the oven is mine! The bananas in the transparant bag are bought on ICA, and this is Andy's sordid little kitchen during the lan party in Desember 2000. I know, cause I was there! Bahdko had to travel all over the Atlantic to join us.

 

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If any sound had  become a distraction during the game, he would usually mention it to the offender, or require the offending machine to be silenced before his next game

Yeah, Andy has always been a grumpy guy

15 years between forum posts, incredible.

Nope! Some posts got deleted during a DW server problem in 2002...

OK, so it was maybe merely... 14 years between forum posts, incredible.

15 minutes ago, Martin said:

Nope! Some posts got deleted during a DW server problem in 2002...

Wow so did you fall into a wintery lake, get frozen and only now get thawed?

Anyway, only 15 minutes between number 2 and 3... and there mighty be some more in the future, when the right occasion is there...

On 06/07/2017 at 4:51 AM, Martin said:

Hey sonny, I object to your history telling at 1.00! That picture is from a cold, dark Norwegian winters day, and that frozen pizza in the oven is mine! The bananas in the transparant bag are bought on ICA, and this is Andy's sordid little kitchen during the lan party in Desember 2000. I know, cause I was there! Bahdko had to travel all over the Atlantic to join us.

 

Yeah, Andy has always been a grumpy guy

4

Well, drat, you caught me out. I thought I could get away with using extra shots from other lan parties to establish the mood. Little did I suspect there'd be someone from that scene paying close attention!

Any chance I could interview you about your experiences from back then, for a video? You'd get final say on what gets published, and I promise not to talk any shortcuts with history this time ;)

(Also, I worked as a games journo for two years, so I'm not super awkward to talk to, and will ask good questions.)

On 7/5/2017 at 2:11 PM, atroche said:

How about shorter matches? Or ones that had a time limit rather than a frag limit?

Well, map01 has always been considered the vestige of oldschoolers who like to take it slow, so it's rarely played shorter than 50, maybe 40 frags. Time limit is out of the question for this particular map, because there are many ways to camp and kill off the timer, heh. There have been attempts to fix the map against such abuse, but those were always... controversial, since they screw with the iconic pace and introduce new, "artificial" strats.

You could, however, find some very fast-paced games. A few of them can be found in the DSDA link I gave. Beside that I'm afraid you'll need to move into the source port territory. You'd need to install Zdaemon and watch demos through the client app in the local mode. Also a lot of the sites that used to store demos and stats seem to be down, but I could pull some strings hopefully if you're interested.

The easiest way to get your hands on some ultimate-tier map01 matches right now is this thread. I ran a high-caliber tourney back in 2010 and though the links to individual demos are dead (oops, I let the hosting expire years ago), the mediafire link to the entire pack is still valid. The link to the tourney brackets is also dead (oops, the guy in charge also let his hosting expire), but here's the excel sheet I used to process the results. You can easily spot the fast games by filesize, though I also provided short commentary for every game.

haha aw, ppl watching the old videos :) . I should port the link over to my windows machine and watch/listen.

Galiu stated to me that his personal preference was not to camp super hard, as he didn't enjoy that style of play. He could do it, and did in games with Sslasher, but with a player like me he didn't care to bother with it.

The reason I perceive that we focused on pistol shots in respawn situations on map 1 was because in hard games, a little damage could translate into a possible completed frag later, and a completed frag on map1 has extra value than something like D5-1 because it puts you in a position to be the one controlling the map for the other person's respawn. Frags can be hard to come by in Map1 in particular. These games had no respawning health powerups, of course. Skilled pistol on someone who was already partway gone could certainly yield a frag, too.

btw there are some amazing map1 demos of ocelot at one of his last LANs in Finland that I don't believe were released. I think those would be worthwhile to get and propagate. The files may still exist. hmmmm.

3 hours ago, dew said:

Well, map01 has always been considered the vestige of oldschoolers who like to take it slow, so it's rarely played shorter than 50, maybe 40 frags.

...

You could, however, find some very fast-paced games.

Map1 to 100 frags is sorta fatiguing.. 40 or 50 is all one really wants to do.

Anders is a terror when it comes to fast map1. If he can rape you without camping, he becomes like a whirlwind and does exactly that.

I always wondered...if in a map the best strategy is to camp, and all players follow a rigid, "robotic" logic, wouldn't DM games stall, sooner or later, as nobody would take initiative/risks?

To make it even more graphic, imagine a prison shower where everybody keeps his back to the wall, for obvious reasons, and the only working shower + only bar of soap is at the middle of the chamber. Who'd dare make the first move here, either showering or moving on somebody else? ;-)

It was a good party. I remember starting my college xmas break a bit early to be there. I might even have that sweater lying around somewhere. The computer, mouse, keyboard, I still got lying around. The monitor, a Sony Trinitron 17" died on the way to The Gathering in 2002 or 2003 I think.

We had a lot of lovely deathmatches. I remember Ocelot being so concentrated and tense that while he was playing you could have removed the chair he was sitting in, and he wouldn't have noticed...

On the topic of food, I think I had Bahdko sample some of my mom's homemade potato pancakes, a traditional norwegian thing. I also have vague memories about Bahdko talking about cooking a very tasty chicken dish. Not sure if it actually got made. On the topic of chickens, I once woke up on a different party in the same location with a chicken walking on my sleeping bag. I remember _df finding that one hilarious. I remember being confused about there being chickens in the room when I woke up.

30 minutes ago, BahdKo said:

The reason I perceive that we focused on pistol shots in respawn situations on map 1 was because in hard games, a little damage could translate into a possible completed frag later, and a completed frag on map1 has extra value than something like D5-1 because it puts you in a position to be the one controlling the map for the other person's respawn. Frags can be hard to come by in Map1 in particular.

Right, I thought that was the case. However the game still found ways to evolve and this strategy got quite dangerous and... not all that cost-effective. If you double spawn and chase after the guy racing toward the SSG, you risk they'll actually go for the CG, or that they'll quickgrab the SSG (pick it up in the middle of a weapon switch) and fire at you at almost the same moment they touch it. You can still fire the pistol, but you'd better also run backward towards another weapon while doing so, heh. Or get that one pistol shot in before peforming the south spawn plasma grab. Basically never linger, heh.

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Well, drat, you caught me out. I thought I could get away with using extra shots from other lan parties to establish the mood. Little did I suspect there'd be someone from that scene paying close attention!

 

Any chance I could interview you about your experiences from back then, for a video? You'd get final say on what gets published, and I promise not to talk any shortcuts with history this time ;)

Your sins are forgiven!

I don't know if an interview with me is the best format or the most natural pick of an interview candidate, but sure, we can talk, or we could also hang out... - why don't you come over to Stavanger for a summer LAN? We will arrange it just like we did back in the days, which also means: If you by the ticket, we'll pick you up at the airport, and accommodation is on us!

If your plans for this summer are already set, the easiest way to talk to most of us in this thread is to go here: http://webchat.quakenet.org/ #Nightmare, or just send us individual messages.

It's perhaps also possible to find more recordings from the old days, since Andy insisted on recording every deathmatch.

 

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I once woke up on a different party in the same location with a chicken walking on my sleeping bag. I remember _df finding that one hilarious. I remember being confused about there being chickens in the room when I woke up.

Oh, boy, you are giving out all the compromising details about Andy's dirty apartment.

haha wow, commentary is really neat, I can see that some points are understood about map1 but some things are being missed. I'll PM you (atroche).

[Edit: Comments are up now, thanks!]

Welcome atroche. :) I had originally posted the comment below on your video page, but it might've been routed to the spam folder (youtube.com/comments -> Likely spam tab) because of the links. If it was removed for some other reason, I apologize. O:)  Anyway:

Interesting, thanks for uploading this. For anyone looking for the actual demo file, it's still available on BahdKo's site. It's part of a .zip file containing 3 Deathmatch sessions between Galiu and BahdKo, recorded in summer 1997 according to the accompanying text.
The details: http://www.doom2.net/doom2/textfiles/galiu341.txt
The zip file: http://www.doom2.net/doom2/lmps/Galiu341.zip
The demo shown in this video is gal02.lmp. It should work with original old DOS Doom II version 1.9, and with any fully compatible ('Vanilla' compatible) modern source port when using the v1.9 doom2.wad file. I usually use PrBoom+ when not playing the game in a DOS environment.
A nice thing about old-school multiplayer demo files like these is that they record all players simultaneously. As such, you can change the playback perspective from player to player if you wish. Tap F12 to do this in original PC Doom II, PrBoom+ and some other ports.

11 minutes ago, Ledmeister said:

.. you can change the playback perspective from player to player if you wish. Tap F12 to do this in original PC Doom II, PrBoom+ and some other ports.
 

There is also colmp.exe which performs an edit to the .lmp file that causes it to wholly swap perspective. You can see the scores and hear the sounds, etc, of the newly-selected player. It's a complete swap of pov. Linked on http://www.doom2.net/doom2/utils.html as colmp1a.zip ( http://www.doom2.net/doom2/colmp10a.zip ).

Ahhhh oh btw. Not something that anyone could have realized but, I just checked the notes in the .lmp documentation text file, and I can see that with this particular LAN at Adoctors, it was the one where Duke was there. This means that I must have drove up from the Boston area with him riding shotgun, not from Maryland. Many of the other Doom-related trips started from Maryland/DC though, so that was a fair assumption. There were several LANs up there in Montreal and I think Duke came for just one of them, and we would have definitely came from the Boston area in that case.

Adoctor had something like, 3 LANs that I went to over the years or something like that. The LAN that produced this demo was held at his "old" apartment, it was kinda in an older building. The last one I went to was in his "new" apartment, literally a new construction. The pictures of me, galiu etc. at Adoctors are from that last LAN.

9 hours ago, BahdKo said:

There is also colmp.exe which performs an edit to the .lmp file that causes it to wholly swap perspective. You can see the scores and hear the sounds, etc, of the newly-selected player. It's a complete swap of pov. Linked on http://www.doom2.net/doom2/utils.html as colmp1a.zip ( http://www.doom2.net/doom2/colmp10a.zip ).

 

Very cool, thank you. :)