ICID

Aboocean (1996) by Bob Reganess Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence, continuous Bob Reganess was one of the very first stewards of Doom's avant-garde wing, whose works were only really discovered after he stopped mapping. He's known for partial conversions that pushed both Doom's visuals and its gameplay to strange new places. In this case, what starts as a tropical Doom vacation a la Cyriak's Overboard begins to have strange flashes of odd textures that seem to imply - as far as I can tell - that you're in a bizarre facility being watched from the outside. Somehow a non-existent DOS game called "Shoreleave" is involved and as you can see in the screenshot above (and the many more I posted on Discord, because this wad is gorgeous) a few of the rooms drop the tropical theme entirely in favor of the truly surreal. Given the quirkiness of the mapset and its author it can be hard to tell what's intentional and what's not. Certain monsters being unable to hear or see you until you shoot them presumably has to be intentional given the programming involved, but what about the shotgunner in MAP02 who spawns halfway in a wall, or the door in MAP03 that can only be opened from one side - is the latter an intentional softlock to cleverly force the player into "hit and run" gameplay, or a broken tag? It's hard to say. I will say that to love Aboocean, you'll need a great deal of patience for 90s mapping quirks. Progression is often extremely opaque (especially given the aforementioned softlocks) and you'll spend a lot of time wandering through Wolfenstein mazes. Puzzles are put ahead of combat. The start of MAP04 with its tight corridors, incredibly precise mandatory platforming, and linedef triggers will wear on your patience most strongly. But push through and you'll find a mapset that's consistently surprising, entertaining, and worth celebrating. Flash1 (1996) by Dave "Flashlight" Clark Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence A cute little DM map with lots of goofy architecture. The default starting room looks like an art museum, but you can also see what looks like a construction zone and this weird Pepsi-themed version of the entryway from Entryway. My favorite detail is the Doomguy-shaped holes you can run through as seen in the second screenshot. Not sure this would be much fun for DM since literally all of the weapons are in one room, making it very easy to camp, but I had a lot of fun looking at it! The Gingerbread Knight (2015) by Omegalore Play Settings Source Port: GZDoom I swear to you all I pulled this at random and didn't do it on purpose for the holiday weekend. Anyway, this is a simple theme pack by mapper and spriter Omegalore which turns the Hell Knight into a gingerbread man, with sprites, death animations, and a ZDoom death message to match ("[Player] got baked by the gingerbread man.") Okay! Sprite (2022) by Timothy "MArt1And00m3r11339" Brown Play Settings Source Port: GZDoom Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Martiandoomer is...a weird guy. He's a prolific member of the community who's active on both /idgames and YouTube, probably best known for his MAP31 contribution to SlaughterMAX. He's actually interacted with the ER/iWA community a few times, including reaching out on the very first adventure thread. Recently his WADs have turned away from slaughter in favor of mostly making maps where you kill various figures from center-left politics in the United States - Biden and Schumer and Pelosi, of course, but also more obscure folks like former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, philanthropist Alex Soros, or FBI Director Christopher Wray. For these he was banned from Doomworld, which he responded to by going on Facebook to express his wish for the rape of all Doomworld mods and "their family members under 18 years old." Charming. I didn't know any of this when I started playing Sprite - a 5000+ monster map named for its yellow and green color scheme - but I was curious to look up more info about this guy after playing because this is, in fact, the single least enjoyable WAD I have ever experienced. Each room is just a brick of identical monsters that you have to clear so that you can open the door to the next room. There is no infighting or combat puzzles. I was already completely infuriated by the second room, where you have to hide behind a corner and kill 40 or so mancubi using a horrific bastardization of the super shotgun, which has a clip of four shots that you slowly reload (eww), and which does so little damage (ewww) that it takes six shots to kill a single mancubus. I realized quickly that playing this room fairly would take over 20 minutes even with perfect execution, so I cheated. But even with cheats I quit about 1000 monsters into the map, because it's ALL like this. It's not hard, it's not challenging, it's just tedious. Grueling. There is admittedly some nice-looking architecture as seen in the first screenshot. It's not always there (the first room is just a single repeated fullbright zimmer texture) but it shows that maybe if Martiandoomer settled down and worked on ONE map for a year or so instead of constantly pumping them out, he probably has the talent to make something fun. Heck, that SlaughterMAX map isn't too bad. This is, though. This is the worst thing.

Haha, always fun on those rare occasions when someone pulls a really well-known map out of the abyss. And it's true, No Chance is a lot of fun when you don't play the deliberately unfun version for clout.

Beta Labs 2 (2017) by Serious_MOod, Chaingunner, Brain Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 9 I discovered Chaingunner through a previous ER/iWA selection two years ago and quickly devoured a bunch of his other work, including my now-beloved A.L.T. He's one of my favorite mappers and I was so excited to pull a work that he (and many other names of note, like the great RDC) contributed to. Sadly, I really did not care for this. Maybe it's because I've never played any of the Doom alphas, which this was apparently inspired by. In practice, what we've got here are variations on Knee Deep in the Dead maps (nothing outright copied, but rooms clearly designed as homage) - but flatter and more Wolfenstein-y. You can collect treasure items which don't actually seem to do anything (score isn't even tabulated at the end of a level) and monsters have different sprites but essentially identical gameplay. So for example, you get the famous alpha Lost Soul sprites, but they still just charge you like regular Lost Souls instead of having the silent hitscan attack the iD guys apparently thought was a good idea back in the day. But the thing I REALLY hate is the pistol. Technically it's an "assault rifle" here, but mechanically it's just a slightly faster pistol akin to Eviternity, and the three levels I played (out of six) REALLY make you lean on it, slowly taking half a dozen shots to take out even your basic imp. Combined with the health starvation on UV, it makes the levels pretty brutal, but not in an interesting way - just in a slow, plodding, "please give me the fucking chaingun" way. By the time I made it through MAP03 I decided I was done; I simply didn't have fun with any part of this. But I could see how someone could. Willy_Wad (2001) by Johnny Magnum Play Settings Difficulty: N/A Source Port: GZDoom True story: I was going to play the next WAD from the description, but then I accidentally bumped the Random File button out of habit, saw that the sole review for this thing called it "an INSULT", "AN ABOMINATION", and "UACMN.WAD GRADE SHIT", and went "oh man, I gotta try whatever this is." Turns out it's just a pack of sound replacements the uploader recorded himself, so that the monsters say "ouchiieee" when they die and stuff. It's stupid and definitely kinda pointless, but far from the worst thing on /idgames - hell, it's not even in the top 5 worst sound packs I personally have played. Grade: 3/10 aloha4u2 (2011) by Alamain Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 This is actually the fourth version of this map, following "aloha2u", "aloha4u", and "aloha2u2". The name seems to have really struck a chord with Alamain, because prior to this he made the different maps aloha911, aloha 999, aloha 2x, aloha778, aloha808, and aloha_oe. Mele Kalikimaka, I guess. Anyway, this map may have needed one more revision, because it's not very fun. It looks pretty cool, wringing a lot of foreboding scale out of some default brown textures. But you have to do a lot of running between those textures and a lot of waiting for elevators to take you up the scale. The gameplay uses interesting weapon progression - giving you an immediate berserk before anything else, then jumping you straight to the rocket launcher in a room full of arachnotrons - but doesn't build combat around said progression in a particularly interesting way, forcing you to punch room after room of pinkies. Also, despite all the iteration, it still has glitches - specifically a significant number of monsters who spawn unable to move. I like the ambition here but execution matters too. Grade: 3/10

Corrupted Techbase (2014) by Omegalore Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: GZDoom My three-word review here is "ambitious, but unpolished". You kinda know what you're in for when you see that your UI now has two rows for keys - an extremely long, backtrack-y GZDoom adventure map (that's actually even longer than you might think, because there's skull keys as well.) These kinds of super long maps can be enjoyable - in fact, when done right they're my personal favorite genre of Doom. But to do them right, you need to make each area of the larger map feel special, either by having an escalating series of memorable linear encounters (as in Foursite or UAC Supply Depot) or by making the map non-linear and letting the player choose from several large setpieces (Anagnorisis.) Combat in Corrupted Techbase doesn't do this - it's all over the place in terms of difficulty and scale, like when you have to battle a room full of cyberdemons and revenants to open up a chamber that has three imps. Most of the combat is more like the latter - fighting small numbers of low-tier monsters in absolutely enormous rooms. It's a huge waste of potential and it keeps any of the beautifully-designed areas from actually being memorable or fun to play, turning them instead into empty scenery you run back and forth across as you try to get to the fun part. Don't get me wrong, though - these areas are beautiful. Where CorTech really excels is in atmosphere - the creepy ambient music and borrowed Doom 3 SFX are well-deployed to make your skin crawl as you watch the base get more and more hellish and broken, piece by piece. It's not exactly a new idea in Doom but it's effectively done - I especially like the use of wall textures on the floor to simulate broken doors, computer panels, etc. Even the architecture's not perfect, though - there's a couple misaligned textures and I got stuck in a wall once. So like I said: ambitious, but unpolished. It's worth a download but I wouldn't necessarily take the whole hour+ required to complete it - just play until you get bored, and then stop. Grade: 6/10 Enemy Stalkers Part 1 (1999) by Michael Bogert Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 Your classic beginner map where square legions of demons line up at the ends of flat mazes waiting for you to BFG them. Notable for being a map designed primarily for co-op, which is why there's duplicates of every weapon. But otherwise utterly forgettable. Grade: 2/10

I don't track anything but I generally have a pretty good memory, if I start playing something that seems familiar I just search Doomworld for "ICID [wad name]" and see if an old review comes up. Tracking everyone else's scores is enough work for me, thanks!

Thanks for playing, everyone! Here's the new thread:

(logo by @4MaTC)  ICID, what the hell is this now? Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures is a small project of exploration, interaction, entertainment and reviews where we meet once every two weeks to select random WADs in search of hidden treasures, lost promises, or our worst nightmares! We use the /idgames archive’s special feature that lets us search for random files. Of course, sometimes the results are resources or unplayable stuff, so we focus on looking for WADs.  So, what do we do here? Play at least one random WAD in a two-week period of time. WADs are selected using the Random File feature on /idgames or from the list below. Post a review of whatever you play. Always provide the name of the WAD, the name of the author, and a link to the file. Play however you want, on any skill level, and with any source port, as long as you play the WAD as intended/in working shape. Be respectful. It's okay to criticize a map, but remember that many mappers read these review threads and behave accordingly. Also, please don't tag mappers into a negative review of their work. What kind of WADs are we looking for? Any file on /idgames is fair game, but most of us choose to stick to singleplayer Doom or Heretic WADs that work in our sourceport(s) of choice. If you're worried about finding Terrywads or broken files, I also pull at least five random WADs for the event. Feel free to play them with me if you wish, or look for your own! The point of the event is to encourage you to explore this vast, random world.  Recommendations for reviewing: Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures of this event: Corrupted Techbase Enemy Stalkers Part 1 Beta Labs 2 Aloha 4u 2 Aboocean Join the Doom Master Wadazine community for more events like this! » https://discord.gg/Q2RKn4J And check the Doom wiki for the full list of past adventures.

I didn't get on the Internet all day yesterday, what did I miss? (looks around) Oh. Well instead of playing any of that cool shit, let's slog through some random crap, shall we? Fred (1994) by Jeff Blank Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 3 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence E2M1 is my favorite intro to any episode or game in the IWADs. The way it starts as the techbase you're used to, albeit darker, before quickly showing you the big flaming hurtcross and forcing you to run over platforms that melt into lava, doors opening within doors as hell itself starts to spill into our world...it's awesome. Frankly the subtle hints of madness you get in E2 are much cooler than the actual hell levels themselves, which are ugly and full of teleporter puzzles. But I'll never forget how cool that first taste of post-shareware Doom was. Anyway, I thought about this because Fred here is ALSO in the E2M1 slot and has none of that. It's full of ideas and even full room concepts ripped straight from Knee-Deep in the Dead - note Hangar's famous zigzag floor in the screenshot above. The one sorta-interesting idea here is that the exit room is available to you pretty early on, but so packed with monsters that you'll have to run around finding all the secrets to collect enough weaponry and health to survive it. Other than that, the definition of "nothing you haven't seen before." I do also like that way back in 1994, in the 38th file ever uploaded to /idgames, Jeff was still bragging about how UV was the only difficulty worth playing on. Wherever you are now, Jeff, you would have loved YouTube. Grade: 2/10 Shrike (1995) by Carlos Dwa Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Good lord this thing is jank. Monsters stuck in walls or each other, missing textures both intentional and not, jagged corridors that make Doom's spotty collision detection go sicko mode, random lines on the automap, mistagged blue key doors and secrets, doors that are smaller than their texture - you name it, we got it. There were also several areas I couldn't walk through, that I seemingly should have been able to, due to high or low props or monsters and a misunderstanding of how infinite height actors behave in Doom. If you can put up with all that, there's plenty of questionable gameplay decisions to make you scratch your head too. Teleporter puzzles, ammo mostly all hidden in the initial room, random monster placement that seems to think arachnotrons are a bigger, scarier threat than arch-viles...I actually kinda had fun with this just from a "seeing is believing" perspective; you want to get to the next room just to see what's gonna happen next. I appreciate the unbridled creativity (and the one teleporting arch-vile fight, which cleverly forces you to use chaingunner infighting and resurrection to get a shot in) but even just a little bit of QA testing would have really made this sing. Grade: 2/10 CROSST (1994) by Terry Henning Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 3 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Turing 3 looked like a pain to get running so I've opted to just skip it. Instead I found this very early magnum opus-y work by University of Wisconsin student Terry Henning. For only being the 244th file ever uploaded to /idgames, this thing honestly rules. As the name implies the map is broadly shaped like a large cross (the "T" was added to avoid confusion with Alistair Brown's c-coded CROSS.WAD, which was either the first or second PWAD ever made depending on who you asked at the time) and progression is often confusing and requires a lot of backtracking and switch hunting, as was the style at the time. But combat is fresh and fun with lots of nifty traps to catch you off guard. More importantly, this thing looks great. Early rooms of simple grey and green give way to highly saturated, hellish pillars of red and blue. The main aesthetic idea here seems to be making the player feel small - stairways are absolutely gigantic, sniper imps are placed a million miles away and even simple ledges with health often require you to jump down on them from above. Whether this was an intentional choice or an accidental effect of an early mapper not fully understanding scale yet, the effects are often breathtaking. So as long as you have a lot of patience for getting lost, I definitely recommend CROSST. Grade: 6/10 Night of the Living Dead part ? (1996) by Robert Oberlander Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence An ugly brown deathmatch map containing the chainsaw, chaingun, SG, and SSG as well as a few monsters. By "a few" I actually mean 160 monsters, all of whom are hitscanners. Based on the title I'm guessing the idea was to imitate the film Night of the Living Dead by trapping you in a house surrounded by a true horde of zombies but good lord the actual implementation is unhinged. Grade: 2/10 Stuck in Hell (2013) by "R.Belly" Play Settings Source Port: GZDoom Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Yep, it's a terry trap. Starts you off in a cute little spaceship (with a mandatory jump to make sure you're playing a Zdoom derivative) and then as soon as you hit the first switch you start hearing fart noises in a room full of the usual swill. As terry traps go it's honestly not that bad - it's over with quickly and doesn't blow out your headphones, though it did attempt to run some console commands that I'm very glad GZDoom blocked. Grade: 1/10 C'mon bro, I got tigerblood! (2013) by Chris Hansen Play Settings Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2 Difficulty: Ultra-Violence I think I'll end the day's wadventures on this supremely enjoyable one-off by the one and only Christian Hansen (whose unfinished 2023 release, Hell's Bane, is well worth your time by the way.) The gimmick here is that the level constantly changes with walls and floors moving and vast new areas opening almost every time you cross a linedef or hit a switch - an old trick at this point, but one I never get tired of. Most of the early bestiary is a bit too tough to deal with without the SSG (which is visible early on) so I kept hitting switches and letting out monsters until I was able to grab it, leaving me in a slaughtermap of my own making - perfect. According to the textfile, Chris' sole ambition here was "to create a no-bullshit map that is fun to play." I feel strongly that all Doom mappers should aspire to exactly this, and no more. Grade: 8/10

Silver Edge (2022) by Paul977 Play Settings Difficulty: UV, pistol starts Source Port: dsda-doom A pair of slaughtermaps very obviously inspired by Ribbiks' work, but scaled back a bit in both aesthetics and monster count. I say that not as a criticism - in fact, I really enjoyed these little bite-sized morsels of slaughter. The low monster counts mean you can't rely as much on infighting in most combats and make the ambushes challenging without ever getting to the point of being frustrating or sloggy, a common complaint of Ribbiks imitators. Ammo is always plentiful but never so abundant that you can just mindlessly plasma through all encounters, and most fights let you see the monsters you're about to encounter before you wake up, so to my taste this stayed firmly on the fair side of "tough but fair", although as comrade brick's review above shows your mileage may vary. Both maps are pleasantly non-linear but I thought the first had better combat, it felt more fine-tuned and tested and I had more fun opening up too many doors at once and getting myself into hot water. The Arch-Vile fights were especially nasty and the final setpieces, while not too tough to cheese with infighting, were a great way to send out the map. The second map's still good but some of the fights seemed fairly trivial (like the first arch-vile who's just standing in a hallway waiting to get plasma'd) and others seemed like much more of a difficulty spike (the pillar room that opens up a cyberdemon). MAP02 also has the better atmosphere imo - the MIDI and background make you feel like you're on a beautiful silver spaceship of some kind, a very pleasant counterpoint to the battle at hand. In short, while Silver Edge provides nothing you haven't seen before, it's all polished to near-perfection and a hell of a lot of fun for us slaughter enjoyers. Bravo @Paul977, can't wait to see what you cook up next. :) Grade: 8/10 Porn (of which your mainstream idea is laughable) (2016) by RaphaelMode Play Settings Difficulty: UV Source Port: GZDoom In case it wasn't already obvious from my full-throated defense of B.P.R.D.'s work, I love experimental Doom WADs. Preferably stuff that actually engages with the Doom structure and gameplay loop rather than just being an unrelated point-and-click adventure game with delusions of grandeur but hey, I'll take what I can get. So I was very excited by this map as soon as I saw the text file, which states "this is not mine or any other specific person's fetish, it's Doom's." Raphael's tumblr (whose theme is, fair warning, basically unreadable on desktop) calls it "a doom mod that caters to a fetish that doesn’t exist, or maybe does but I haven’t seen it" and states "I still knew what I was doing because the accommodation of themes could be abstracted." Based on said tumblr Raphael clearly enjoys avant-garde stuff and deliberately ugly aesthetics, which are certainly visible in "Porn", a map structured around providing binary solutions to complex ethical problems written in a language that doesn't exist. Stated bluntly, this means you walk up to what look like MS Paint drawings providing two options, one of which will kill you and one of which allows for progression. If played correctly, the map will never require you to fire a single shot, and will take you up and across slow elevators and conveyer belts with nothing much to look at. It ends either with you sitting down in a chair to play Doom, or finding the "secret ending" where you get locked in a wall to watch monsters infight with no input from yourself, a helpless spectator. Is this "fun" in the traditional sense? Not remotely. Did I find it moving or otherwise emotionally engaging as a piece of art? ...not particularly, but that doesn't make it a failure in my opinion. When I read something like "this map contains all that pornographical work would, besides sex", that's not a statement that makes sense to me, but it's one I enjoy thinking about. Okay: what does define porn besides sex? And how would you make those elements into a Doom WAD? These are interesting questions and the kind of thing I like encountering. I also enjoyed being introduced to Raphael. I read several pages of their tumblr and I think we have similar worldviews. A lot of their writing - including the lengthy textfile included with this WAD - strikes me as rather tongue-in-cheek, feigning a higher level of pretentiousness. I really enjoyed this post about WAD quality being measured by by "Intense Relevance, Comprehensive Relevance, Ethical Quotient, and Artistic Quotient." I intend to seek out their other WADs and Doomworld Mega Project contributions. So to me, it's a successful ER/iWA experience - because what I want most here is to be exposed to work in the realm of Doom that I never would have seen otherwise, be it good, bad, or in this case, perplexing. I'll leave us with this final thought from Raph:

Thanks for playing, everyone! A smaller adventure, presumably due to the holiday weekend, but a good one all the same. Here is the new thread:

(logo by @4MaTC)  ICID, what the hell is this now? Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures is a small project of exploration, interaction, entertainment and reviews where we meet once every two weeks to select random WADs in search of hidden treasures, lost promises, or our worst nightmares! We use the /idgames archive’s special feature that lets us search for random files. Of course, sometimes the results are resources or unplayable stuff, so we focus on looking for WADs.  So, what do we do here? Play at least one random WAD in a two-week period of time. WADs are selected using the Random File feature on /idgames or from the list below. Post a review of whatever you play. Always provide the name of the WAD, the name of the author, and a link to the file. Play however you want, on any skill level, and with any source port, as long as you play the WAD as intended/in working shape. Be respectful. It's okay to criticize a map, but remember that many mappers read these review threads and behave accordingly. Also, please don't tag mappers into a negative review of their work. What kind of WADs are we looking for? Any file on /idgames is fair game, but most of us choose to stick to singleplayer Doom or Heretic WADs that work in our sourceport(s) of choice. If you're worried about finding Terrywads or broken files, I also pull at least five random WADs for the event. Feel free to play them with me if you wish, or look for your own! The point of the event is to encourage you to explore this vast, random world.  Recommendations for reviewing: Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures of this event: Silver Edge Porn (of which your mainstream idea is laughable) fred Shrike Tuning Contest #3 Join the Doom Master Wadazine community for more events like this! » https://discord.gg/Q2RKn4J And check the Doom wiki for the full list of past adventures.

Thanks for playing, everybody! Always great to see a newcomer. Shoutout to everyone who survived the stupid Elvis WAD, either in this adventure or (in Roofi's case) a previous one. Here's the new thread:

(logo by @4MaTC)  ICID, what the hell is this now? Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures is a small project of exploration, interaction, entertainment and reviews where we meet once every two weeks to select random WADs in search of hidden treasures, lost promises, or our worst nightmares! We use the /idgames archive’s special feature that lets us search for random files. Of course, sometimes the results are resources or unplayable stuff, so we focus on looking for WADs.  So, what do we do here? Play at least one random WAD in a two-week period of time. WADs are selected using the Random File feature on /idgames or from the list below. Post a review of whatever you play. Always provide the name of the WAD, the name of the author, and a link to the file. Play however you want, on any skill level, and with any source port, as long as you play the WAD as intended/in working shape. Be respectful. It's okay to criticize a map, but remember that many mappers read these review threads and behave accordingly. Also, please don't tag mappers into a negative review of their work. What kind of WADs are we looking for? Any file on /idgames is fair game, but most of us choose to stick to singleplayer Doom or Heretic WADs that work in our sourceport(s) of choice. If you're worried about finding Terrywads or broken files, I also pull at least five random WADs for the event. Feel free to play them with me if you wish, or look for your own! The point of the event is to encourage you to explore this vast, random world.  Recommendations for reviewing: Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures of this event: Area 53 SomethingWrong?.WAD Unfinished Horror Scorched Hell (this is a HeXen WAD) UnNecessary: 30 Days, 32 Maps, Zero Texture Alignment; or, UnAligned 2: A WAD No One Asked For Join the Doom Master Wadazine community for more events like this! » https://discord.gg/Q2RKn4J And check the Doom wiki for the full list of past adventures.

Lava (1996) by Denis Tetreault Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: Crispy Doom An extremely impressive and ambitious technical achievement for 1996 which takes place inside of a facility to turn lava into energy. It looks terrific and there's lots of great details - I particularly loved the "flammable crate room" shown above, where every "crate" is stuffed with explosive barrels causing them to "explode" when hit. Aesthetically I find the map mostly unimpeachable. Sadly the map was clearly built with gameplay as an afterthought, so you're mostly just picking off imps and zombies in really tight corridors. You're often forced to walk directly on lava and health is surprisingly sparse. Backtracking is difficult because the majority of the hallways connecting rooms look the same, or so similar as to be indistinguishable. And then, just like brick, I got trapped in a room with a one-sided yellow key door and never figured out how to escape. I really respect the ambition and would love to see the sequel promised in the text file somehow surface all these years later. But it's not very fun to play. Grade: 5/10 Of Demons And Men (2004) by ravage Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: Crispy Doom Now HERE'S a great-looking map that actually plays great too. I really like the vine maze that partially obscures enemies without outright using false walls. Had some trouble finding the yellow key (I think I may have accidentally skipped a line the first time) and some areas are SO detailed that either I or the demons got stuck on em thanks to Doom's infamously wacky collision physics, but other than that I don't really have any complaints. Just a solid, creepy little base - I even like the use of green marble, for once. Grade: 7/10 DOOM IN GRACELAND - Hunka, Hunka Burnin' Love (2004 / 1994) by Robert "Aaron" Bukoski Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: Crispy Doom This map was uploaded in 1994 in a format that required you to manually edit the IWAD, but was given new life in 2004 as a series of PWADs. Truly awful. The one map in question is an eyesore of a thing where you shoot zombiemen (Elvis) and shotgunners (uh, also Elvis) through a series of huge identical hallways that spell out "ELVIS LIVES", each of which you have to walk through twice. After that you can play the rest of The Ultimate Doom with the sprite replacements, if for some reason you hate yourself. Unpleasant and half-assed even by the standards of 90s sprite conversions - and how the fuck do you not replace "At Doom's Gate" with a horrible grating MIDI version of an Elvis song, at the very least. I mean, come on. What are we doing here. Grade: 2/10 Dwarf Town (2006) by Pawel Zarczynski Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: GZDoom Cute! A 1024x1024 map taking place in a tiny town complete with tiny computers, tiny kitchens, tiny couches etc. Gameplay is a joke - you get the SSG early on and then hold down M1 as a handful of lethargic imps and hell knights wander into view, but the Final Fantasy XI music makes it all feel very cozy and pleasant rather than dull. You're just here to hang out for a couple minutes, see the sights, then move onto something else. It's nice. Grade: 6/10 Go off with a BOOM. (1999) by Rolf Nantoft Jensen Play Settings Difficulty: Ultra-Violence Source Port: dsda-doom A map very obviously inspired by, of all things, Sandy Peterson's Downtown, from Doom II. Now I like "Downtown", probably more than most people reading this - but c'mon. You and I both know why making another map like it is a bad idea. Confusing, ugly, and horribly paced, you know you're in trouble right away when you start to notice that every room looks like nothing. Some of them are just bland monotextured nothing, some of them are way-too-dark nothing, some of them are these weird chasms, but all of them look like nothing. Still you might even put up with this until you get to the infamous lifts, noted by both brick and the sole Anonymous idgames reviewer - incredibly tall, slow-moving lifts that are designed to let you take out the apartment snipers (who are chaingunners here rather than imps) but which more accurately serve to try your patience. The best thing I can say about this one is that it's at least bad in an unusual way. Grade: 2/10

Thanks for a great adventure, everyone! Wish I personally could have participated a bit more, but it's always great to see Sena come back. We also had some interesting movement: DrRock is now only three spots from the top 10 and brick has now surpassed Endless in number of WADs played (201 to 197 - brick had more points previously because of the massive bonus points won in ER/iWA #50). Anyway, here's the new thread!