Cyberpunk/Horror Fantasy, story driven TC-ish map pack for GZDoom
"That was... strange" - Suitepee
Greetings, Doom community. I'm currently working on a .pk3 featuring 6 maps for GZdoom. "Doom Happens" is a project I'd started a few years ago and, unfortunately, lost every single map in a failed backup. The idea was to make a Megawad, but now that I've started over I'm taking a different approach.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GZDoom only
Doom Happens - Alpha demo 0.41
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The idea is to make a map pack consisting of a few large, themed maps with a strong narrative element throughout the whole thing. I'm making cutscenes, ingame dialogs, characters, etc. The game is divided into chapters. Each map will have 2-3 chapters aprox. The maps will have abundant minibosses fights, as well as a final boss for each map. I have a whole cosmology tought over for this universe. Each map after the first one and before the final one will take place in different realms of purgatory. Each of this realms is a sort of eternal plane of existence where an aspect of reality lies in its pure form (Darkness, Flesh, Conflict, Machine, Mind, Lust, Light, those last 3 won't be playable though), but they have been taken over by powerful people that managed to enter purgatory in body and soul, hence enabling them to draw power from this realms and creating vast armies. This will lead to bizarre clashes, each of this powerful villains being famous people in history that somehow were related to the occult. For example, the second map will be in the Darkness realm, and there you will find the castle of Drácula (Vlad Tepes in his human life), which was built in purgatory to serve as a mirror to the material castle still standing in transylvania, object of popular lore. Said map will be a tribute to Castlevania, and will mimic many of the NES classic's mechanichs in FPS form. Each map will have unique traits and mechanichs to it. To give another example, the flesh themed map will constantly change architecture, as the whole map will be the titanic body of the boss itself, who will shift forms to create traps and decieve you, twisting your notion of space to stop you from reaching his heart. The first map, which is the longest and is still in development (there is a demo of chapter 1), has a urban warfare/survival concept. You will be fighting human soldiers, assassins and robots in this one, but later in the map there will also be zombies (still not released). It's a huge map, consists of the first 3 chapters. I estimate each chapter has about 40 min gameplay, though for some people it takes over an hour to beat the first one in the demo.
Everything in the demo map will be improved in some way in the future, so bear in mind that the finished thing will attempt to look different. I will try to implement features like a PDA with monster logs and weapon descriptions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You are Sgt. Woods, an ireful soldier from an 80's styled futuristic cyberpunk world divided by a civil war between two factions: People's army, a group of rebel soldiers and ex-members of the dismantled US army, and Monochrome, a dark corporation that is taking over the world and have formed an alliance with the EDF (who are, at the same time, smuggling state of the art weapons from the UAC). His team was ambushed during a very important mission and, having sworn vengeance, Woods continues alone, and eventually ends up in purgatory (dem teleporters). He then travels across five realms of otherwordly landscapes in which he will face his own destiny.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[spoiler]
[/spoiler]---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- 6 maps with different themes (urban, medieval, titanic, tech, flesh and Inferno)
- Textures, monsters, weapons and items taken from different sources such as realm667, as well as original Doom stuff.
- A silenced pistol can be used if you like playing stealthy.
- Narrative. Cutscenes. Ingame dialogs -no voice, just text- and a combination of run n' gun action with ingame storytelling
- 16-bit music from Arcade classics and popular game tracks in general. 80's movies soundtracks here and there.
- Mini-bosses and Bosses, some will have to be killed in unique ways
- Loads of references to games -old and new-, movies and popular culture in general
- It will feature a button to skip cutscenes, but it is not yet available in the demo. However, cutscenes are very short and usually there is autosave after them, just in case. Currently you can still skip the opening cutscene which is the longest.
The story is not going to take itself too seriously, it will have tragic and comedic moments, introduced by the many pop culture references.
I'm currently nearing completion of the first map, which is the most extensive and complicated one, for it takes place in a city and is the less conventional map (the others will be much, much more doomish, with more classical monsters). Nevertheless, the rest of the maps and the story are already planned and thought over.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
EDIT [03/16/16]: Major remastering of the map. This will be the last Alpha before the Beta. I've done countless things to it: nearly total retexturing of most of the map areas, enhanced stealth system (enemies will have a hard time shooting at you when you stand in dark places) as well as gameplay changes to the Alpha zone to take advantage of this feature, more architectural detail pretty much everywhere, swinging and sliding doors, flickable light switches, resized textures for duke nukem and kingpin patches that looked gigantic (specially doors), new decal effects for blood and bullet puffs, loads of new props, new visual effects for explosions, slightly rebalanced difficulty, new sounds, improved weapon animation for the rifle, new fonts... I've done everything I could, but it's still the same length, all the new parts for chapter 2 are still in development, though I included a piece of it as "MAP01F" if anyone wants to have sneak peak at what I'm doing. Simply enter "map map01f" in the console. The reason why I did this is that I want this mod to look tight and polished and let you know that i'm taking this serious. I plan to add even more features in time. This goes to show that I do not intend this to be an amateur map pack, I'll do my best with it. I will keep improving this as I learn more about editing myself, since this is my first project and started it without even knowing how to script.
Older news
[spoiler]EDIT [12/23/15]: UPDATE: There is still a lot to polish, but I think there are major improvements in gameplay and a lot of new visual details. Cutscenes are way better now, with more cuts and better shots. there are new dialog lines all over the place that explain a little more of what's going on and what you are doing. This version ends with the Gamma section of the EDF building complete, the previous one was cut in half, so now there is a sense of closure, like a chapter ending, insted of a sudden black screen. The city areas are still in need of some detail, but now it's getting closer to what I want to do in the end.
EDIT [7/13/15]:10:15 am - Alpha 0.21 released. Just some second thoughts on ammo ammounts, no big deal. They have been reduced to make it so that you have to scavenge some more to survive. There's still more than enough, you just won't be sitting on countless ammo you have no use for.
6:45 am - Alpha 0.2 released. After what seemed to be a very hard first version, I have just released this second rebalanced one. The main change here is the difficulty, which has been dropped down a notch. You will also find some minor bug fixes as well as a reworked sound propagation which now allows the player to play stealthy with the silenced pistol more easily at the beginning. Almost every enemy now has less hp and lousier accuracy, and there are a few more bullets around the place. The story is also included in the .txt file along with the enemy list, that provides more background as to who you are slaughtering.
EDIT [7/11/15]: DEMO RELEASED: This is a first take at what i'm trying to accomplish in the long term. I have uploaded this manily to recieve feedback. I take all kind of advices into account, please share your thoughts. This first version is far from the finished project, It's just the first half of the first map, which happens to be a long map. This first map is not very "doomish", since you only fight human soldiers and robots, which behave differently from the demons of the original DOOM. This is why I want to know if the direction i'm taking for this introduction level is working out for now. I promise the other 5 maps will be much, much more DOOM-oriented.
In the future, I might add an introductory cutscene in the menu that explains a bit of what's going on with the story. All there is in the .txt I included is a list of enemies so as to be introduced a little bit in the universe of the game. I have not finished the .txt that goes with every wad submission, mainly because the credits are too many. I do not claim to have done any of the resources here, most of them are taken from elsewhere. I asked permission when permission wasn't already given in the page I took it from. I did redo some decorates from scratch and edited every other one in a way or another, but mostly my work is on the map and the scripts.[/spoiler]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
. Invisible polyobject doors? Try a non-dev version of GZDoom builder
. Zandronum version has been discontinued, it has major bugs and makes some of the parts of the map I have made since the last version unplayable.
. If you experience fps drop when steping outside, try switching fog mode from "radial" to "standard" in the options menu.
. Keep the fonts unresized, otherwise dialogs and text in general wil be extremely buggy
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[spoiler]v0.41
. Some aesthetical changes recommended by Ozymandias81
. Corrected typos in dialogs
v0.4
Major remastering
. Enhanced stealth system: enemies won't be able to aim very well at you in the dark
. Flickable light switchs (so as to put the stealth system to use)
. Retextured most of the map
. Resized gigantic textures
. Loads of new props
. More detailed geometry and extensive use of 3D floors implemented
. Enhanced weapon animation for rifle
. Decal blood and bullet puff effects
. New explotion effects
. Changed fire sound for the machinegun
. Rebalanced difficulty
. Reduced file size (even though there are lots of new textures, sprites and sounds, I deleted lots of unused textures from previous releases. I mean A LOT)
. Decorate and script overhaul: no more yellow or red error messages should appear when running GZDoom. Much cleaner decorates all around.
. Falling damage implemented
. Type "map map01f" in the console if you want to take a sneak peak at an in development section of chapter 2. Nothing's nearly final there.
v0.32
.Fixed bug that made you star in a box after the initial sequence if you don't skip the cutscene
v0.31
. Fixed bug that stopped Beatrix Kiddo from coming back after she teleports in the middle of the fight
. Minor dialogs added and revised cutscenes
v0.3
. Difficulty rebalance
. Realistic stealth mechanichs
. Improved and new cutscenes as well as more expository ingame dialogs that explain some of what you see
. 2 new mini-boss battles (the end to the Gamma section of the EDF building)
. Lots of minor visual improvements around the place
. New sprites (player specific sprites and black skinned marines)
. Minor bugfixes
. Polished some scripting and decorates
v0.22
. The short lived v0.21 had more ammo, but it was way too much. Rebalanced ammo ammounts in general.
. Fixed sound bug with Captain Lance's fireballs
v0.21
. You can now jump over the table at the director's office
v0.2
. Difficulty rebalance. Grenadiers, Assault troopers, Paladins, Black Ops and Heaven Guards all have less health. Hitscan enemies have less accuracy and lower fire rate. Minibosses don't shoot so often and a bit less rapidly.
. You can now skip the introductory scene, which is the longest one. I still haven't done a button to skip cutscenes, but they really are very short and there's usually an autosave after them when you are not in danger of being autosaved in a harsh situation.
. Rework of the sound propagation in the city area. It is now easier to play with the silenced pistol in the first parts before you confront the main building opening its gates.
. Minor fixes: sound bug with the fire effect, "to be continued..." message when the map is over, relocation of certain enemies[/spoiler]
Let me know what you think!
