VoanHead

I like Akeldama, but it is certainly not a pwad I would binge all in one go. Lots of people said before that its map’s are pretty damn lengthy and I had my moments where I would play 1-3 maps in a couple days and break off from it for a while before I picked it up and played it again and repeat until I finished it off. No one map particularly ruined the wad, it’s more like after spending a lot of time playing you feel like you need a break.

secrets and kills yes idgaf about items

looks like “Everything Else” section is leaking on here

Thank u for the small update for Sigil II fixes. I don't necessarily have any plans to play it soon, but it's nice to have this for Woof! set out rn. Happy Holidays everybody :)

About as totally real as Bigfoot in Grand Theft Auto San Andreas.

MAP 19: PORT FURY (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) This map starts off inoffensive at first, some rather meh fights that you have to deal with w/o any armor whatsoever, and it starts off feeding you lots of rocket ammo but no launcher in sight first. By this point, you know that's a rather peculiar sign of things to come. From then you're tasked with dealing w/ a bunch of other enemies in a narrow, cramped passage, but once you're out of that place you finally get to see it... the big flooded city. Ripe with lots of monster infighting, and two of each boss monsters raining rockets and bullets on your ass. Don't be like me and waste any plasma ammo on the cybershakers, they later get crushed to death, but you'll have plenty of ammunition still left over if you decide to do it anyways, so it's entirely up to you. I took em out b/c they got annoying. What really elevated this area for me was once again the good old cacodemon swarm that surrounds you after going through a rather awkward area in the map to progress things further by hitting switches and letting them come out. Call me Samus again, b/c I wound culling all of them w/ plasma from the BFG and rockets too. Once I was done, I gawked at the big sector ship for like 30 seconds then decided to make my way through the exit after getting past a cyberdemon and a pair of archviles that the BFG made quick work of them. The last remaining fights felt like filler after such a bombastic fight out in the liquid filled city/port. It's the moment that is the crown jewel of the map. I'm having plenty of fun playing throughout this megawad. Some highs, some lows, but overall not a bad pwad. This is coming from somebody who has never touched the OG at all. Cammy has no doubt done a great job overall doing this by himself w/ revamped maps and original midis made for these respective maps. No wonder it took a long time to push out, he was taking his time making sure this got out in good quality. However, I think I'm going to pull out of this month's DWMC now. I do feel bad for cutting this short with 21/32 maps played so far, but my impressions of it have been pretty damn good. Unfortunately, it's down to two main reasons why I'm pulling out: 1) IRL stuff that's going to keep me busy, since we're also nearing the holidays. 2) I'm reaching a bit of burn out on DOOM once again, and feel like I just need a break. I'll finish this pwad some other time, waiting on a final release to idgames. Perhaps for another DWMC in the future I will fully complete the month. See ya fellas! Happy 30th for DOOM & Happy Holidays!

MAP 18: DEAD RADIO (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) The fuck is the title of this map implying? I say turn up the radio or pass me the aux b/c this midi is a fucking banger. Those first notes sound reminiscent to that one DWANGO midi (I think it's called hitfloor.mid?) and the whole rest of the song feels like a mix of that midi w/ Fear Factory from David Wise once again. Onto the map itself: wow, I love the step up in difficulty here. Way more boss monsters are present, and the main highlights of this map is the 2 green slime fights of slaughter. The one thing I didn't like is that the plasma rifle was kept behind a secret and I was mostly well stocked on ammunition for it, and my monke brain was too stupid this time around to figure out how to get it. Oh well, looks like I didn't really need it since I was well stocked even after finding 3/5 secrets. I like the comparison some people made between Go 2 It and this map, as it does rip a page out of Plutonia via having tough fights but giving you lots of supplies to deal with the enemies. I shit you not, I exited the level w/ 200% Health and 200% Armor. If this was more jungle/brown themed then it would've certainly fit right in with Plutonia.

MAP 17: NO ESCAPE (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) Love, love this midi. Shit gets me really pumped up. Too bad it was used on this map, which I thought was not so good imo. The only part that I liked was the archvile run for your life dark area behind the blue key door. The 3 cybershakers in the last fight wasn't really hard but moreso annoying, spent all my plasma ammo on the BFG that I had to super shotgun the trio. I don't know what else to say about this map.

MAP 32: NOWHERE TO HIDE (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) What a banger of a level. As the name implies you’re going to be doing a lot of running around to avoid enemies and have monster infighting be your source to whittle down the numbers. At first I didn’t understand what I had to do in the outside area but as I looked closely I saw some hanging keens. Using my big monke brain, I did the logical thing and fired at them and went on a mad dash to get the rest. Once I got that done, I finally had access to the exit room w/ goodies and used the invul to get back at the cybershakers roaming around giving me all that trouble during my keen hunt. I was lucky enough to kill 3 of them grouped together w/ the BFG, while the rest were taken out by monster infighting. This map is a killer good time. I never played DK64 so I don’t really know the resemblance of this midi being inspired of the bonus themes of DK64. Maybe I’ll give em a listen some other time. MAP 16: THE WOLF’S HOUR (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) Aight and we’re back to the regular levels. This time this was a more lowkey map. I’m ashamed to admit I died way more times than I should’ve when I collected the red key and fought 3 archviles for it. It’s a bit tight on bullet and shotgun ammo this time around, and you’re given way more rockets than you’ll ever be using right at the end. The end fight is what stood out to me as it’s a big fight w/ a fuckload of imps and 1 mastermind. If you’re like me, you can bully the mastermind by making it infight with the imps and watch as those same imps surround it and claw it to death. Once that’s over, sneak behind the imps and blow them all away w/ the two BFGs stored in the back. Not a bad map.

Some excellent stuff this pwad has. Played the 1st 3 maps and I like it already. I hope there will be a widescreen version for the status bar, looks killer. I wait for the release on idgames to play completely.

Got done w/ my finals now. Now back to this. MAP 15: INFESTATION (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart) Holy shit look at the amount of monsters in this map. This took me roughly 37 minutes to complete. There’s just a lot to say. For starters, I cheated when getting the BFG secret and just IDCLIP-ed my way in, I fucking suck at hitting the switches fast on time, sorry! If there’s one thing that I want to say about this map is that it’s really symmetrical, on top of already being lengthy. The main attraction is the gigantic lava pit where the massive fights take place in. Everybody here should be calling me Samus the way I’m supplied with so many damn rockets for me launch at my enemies, especially the giant swarm of cacodemons reminding me of another certain alien eventually comes in after getting the red key. One issue in this “not all the way to RC2” is that I think I found the first softlock: if you’re not careful in the small room where the pain elementals and cacodemons fly in, in front of the cage that’s the platform where the cacodemons rise up, you can easily get stuck in there w/ no way to get out besides IDCLIP. The only 2 fights I didn’t like where the giant lava room where you essentially kill arachnos/knights, flip a switch, then wait for a wall to lower and blow up barrels to kill hitscanners. That shit felt redundant when it was repeated like 3 more times. The fight where you get to the tower can be entirely skipped if you have an eye for secrets and get out w/ the secret exit, but it felt like it went out on a fart with the 2 cyberdemons and clusterfuck of revenants by the normal exit. Overall, solid map, symmetrical in some areas, but disappointing ending. MAP 31: THE MANSION (Woof!, -complevel 2) Aight, I’m sorry but I broke my pistol start streak and did this map w/ the weapons carried earlier from before b/c I’m a little tired at the time of typing this up and wanted to go to bed ASAP. I know, but I’m just exhausted from all of today. Doomcute galore! This map is a break from all the action that has occurred and let’s you just soak in the relaxing vibes this mansion provides. Let's not forget how chill this midi is, it reminds me of Eruyt Village if Cammy has ever listened to that before. As stated before, you get to admire all the doomcute like the library room w/ the desk & book, to the dining table in a different room, the bedroom, and the bathrooms where it seems like the Pinkies are all shidding together (or they could just be surrounded in a circle hitting the vape/dab pens like how college students did it in bathrooms when it was the rage in 2019-2020). Only two archviles you get to fight in this map. Majority is mostly just hitscanners. Don’t forget to grab the yellow key to get to the secret exit. Side note; I know the pwad is yet to be finalized, and idk if sounds crazy to ask if this wad will ever get a spritefix? Like yk how there’s that thread that shows the clean up on the sprites of DOOM (ie the broken super shotgun frame sprite for example)? Or does the pwad already come w/ fixes like that already?

There's really nothing wrong if you're using saves when playing a wad casually. I practically save every time I clear out a big fight, before I collect a key right in front of me, after collecting the goodies in a secret, etc. Basically what everybody in this thread has already said. Unless you're going to be recording and submitting demos for speedruns or something then nah I don't think saving and loading is allowed for that.

MAP 12: HOME SWEET HOME (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) Yo this was a major tonal whiplash of a map. After going from 11 back to back maps w/ funky music and absolute slaughter of cannon fodder enemies, this map suddenly comes out of nowhere to fucking spook the player. This goes to show how much power music has in creating tone and how the sudden atmosphere turned into something much more chilling. The one fight w/ the blue chaos key w/ the 4 archviles came as a jolt to me. I’m so damn lucky, and none of you will probably believe me when I say this, but when I encountered them I ran back to the room I came from and just dealt w/ the en mass of monsters teleporting in, while the archviles just hanged back and didn’t even set foot into the room itself. Again, either I am just really lucky or the way the monster behavior worked saved me in this instance. Cammy was not lying that the difficulty is ramping up. MAP 13: BLOODLANDS (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) Already I’m starting to love how the difficulty is picking up here in this new chapter of RoC25, felt like that what was lacking in the beginning maps. The thing is, what’s being traded off for higher difficulty is things going from upbeat to more sinister and like shit has hit the fan here back on earth. This map has some notable design choices, from the winding angular passageways when you get the super shotgun, and the setting that looks like a canyon w/ a demon outpost set up in there. The exit made me say “what the fuck” when I first gazed my eyes on it. It’s a bunch of voodoo dolls surrounding the area w/ two chaingunners there just so they could be able to open fire on you and make you hurt yourself. This area should be no problem if you are stocked to 100% on health here. The archvile felt like it was just there for padding, just hug him ASAP when you open the door and plasma em down till they die and you’re free to exit. I missed out on like roughly 28% of the kills here tho b/c of the monsters being hidden behind a secret. Wish I had Doom wiki to consult on this, but sadly no page up yet. Regardless, some good stuff this map has. Enjoy this image of the death message that displays in Woof should you blow up a voodoo doll or the cause was b/c of a voodoo doll. I found it funny. MAP 14:DIE HARD (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) Here we have another canyon outpost in this map, this time with what seems to be one w/ a storage room the demons have set up. Loved the lil doomcute meeting table room that the demons almost looked like they were in the middle of one before I rudely came in to interrupt. The standout fight here for this map was the big fucking water fall room where you gotta hit switches to later stage dive into the big fucking mosh pit of demons while 2 masterminds open fired on you from afar. Luckily, if you have an eye for secrets you should find a big fucking gun somewhere and a megasphere to patch yourself up ready for the big fight. The midi this time I felt like was reminiscent of Castlevania, and I mean post NES-era Castlevania music. Off topic, but I’m going to admit something: I have never seen Die Hard and I don’t know why I haven’t bothered to go ahead and watch it for so damn long. Since we’re nearing the holidays, might as well watch it now since I heard it’s considered a Christmas movie.

Ik I'm getting a little bit ahead of myself here posting about my thots on maps a bit too early to the matching days, however I'm going to speed things up a bit since I have final exams due very soon and kinda wanna reserve time to practice & study. If not I'll just put this on hold and just later make a big post for the following maps if that's cool. MAP 11: MARS STARPORT (Woof!, -complevel 2, -pistolstart, UV w/ saves) Another hitscan heavy map, this time set in a building. Super shotgun is once again your best friend here in this map, easily mowing down the zombiemen and other cannon fodder enemies. The outside street area secret w/ the cacos and the soulsphere was practically the highlight of this map. Ik I'm going to sound repetitive but man what another banger of a funky midi track this one has, and kinda has a slight 90s influence if that makes any sense. So far my thoughts on the Roc25 pwad as a whole has been it's pretty ok but has some rocking tunes, like it's a bit more ezpz than I thought it would be. I just hope things begin to ramp up in difficulty here after we're done covering this chapter and past the following intermission text screen.