Communications have gone dark and there’s been no response from the outpost, you’re heading there to find out what the situation is. Emerging from the cavern you can see the base up ahead, some of the lights are still on but it’s quiet. Too quiet. Snowmobiles have been abandoned a short distance away from the outpost as flares fizzle in the snow. Nearby, a motionless body. What happened here?
DOOM remakes for E1M1 or MAP01 are a dime a dozen over the years and recreated for various engines, while other classic levels are often left behind without receiving similar homages. Step into E1M2 through the eyes of Duke Nukem, taking on that familiar layout from the original painting a fresh layer reimagining how Nuclear Plant might look in the year 2024.
Third entry that concludes the Escape series. Before taking the portal to Natas, Snake watches a video recording Carmack left behind who goes on to explain everything leading up to this point, the UAC sticking their nose where it doesn’t belong as per usual. The portal to Natas has been set to arrive one hour before the invasion started, Snake must delve into the demon home world to defeat the Spider Mastermind and shut off the monster making machine.
Sequel to Escape from Phobos, Snake arrives on Deimos with a call from Carmack. With the Red Skull power reserves down to 20% all hope in escaping is now lost. It’s over. Unless a miracle happens to stop the invasion. With nothing else left to lose, Snake should head to Carmack’s office, reactivate the portals, grab the Yellow Skull from the Deimos reactor and take the fight back to Natas, the demon’s home world.
First entry for the Escape series that merges the continuity of both DOOM and the conclusion to Escape from LA, introducing us to Snake after he awakens from a fifteen year cryosleep having been imprisoned by UAC. His past actions helped them gain power which has now lead them to tampering with things they shouldn’t have. CEO of the Deimos Moonbase, Carmack, gets in touch over a monitor feed demanding Snake to help. He must seek out a Blue, Yellow and Red Skull to power up the shuttle on Phobos and take it to Deimos to save him before the demons come knocking at his door.
Having not seen Boom’s friction sectors used to any large extent in other releases, Eater29 designed a swamp themed level that takes full advantage them. Trudging around the mud slows movement down to a crawl while having no effect on monsters, leaving players no choice but to adapt and pay attention to their surroundings.
CALDERA is a single level demonstration WAD exclusive to the author’s own PsyDoom port that brings over the PlayStation version of DOOM to PC. It was built to showcase various modding features from a backported and extended PSX DOOM engine, a hellish themed level blending together open and tight quarter environments utilising new textures pulled from OTEX and an extensive use of coloured sector lighting.
It’s been 10 years since the events of Duke Nukem Forever and things have changed, Duke is no longer seen as the heroic figure he once was, his name has been dragged through the mud because of fans digging too deeply and is now forced to lay low from the public eye. Turns out the whole ordeal was an elaborate smear campaign by the aliens no longer satisfied with just his death. Having tracked down a warehouse containing the beta materials for Duke3D and DNF, this becomes a city wide journey to reclaim those files and clear his name.
Over the years I’ve always typically associated ck3d’s levels to have similarities to Roch in style, going for these richly decorated urban playgrounds like Poison Heart, otherwise leaning more toward dark moodier pieces like Rural Nightmare and End of the World. Then to my surprise a speedmap made in three days is suddenly pushed out the door that shared nothing in common with prior bodies of work up until that point, perhaps one of those occasional experimental excursions before returning to familiar ground, but this mapping style eventually sticks around going forward as development on his Blast Radius episode went into full swing.