Revisiting the Cacowards (1995)

It's time to revisit the second year of the Cacowards! For an explanation of this series, please see the first entry.

Fava Beans

This is, in my opinion, a thoroughly mediocre episode 1 replacement. The level design is competent, but lacks a spark of creativity. There is an overabundance of ammo. Vaguely familiar environments recall areas from the original levels, but it feels more like rehash than reinvention.

Infinity (Serenity 3)

This is episode 3 in the Serenity/Eternity trilogy. I think these level sets improved from one to the next, but I'm still having a lot of the same complaints I had from the first two. Not very intuitive level design. Overabundance of nukage barrels. Way too much ammo and not nearly enough health. Is there a bug with the secret sectors? Because normal rooms that are necessary passage to complete the level are triggering as secret areas. To end on a semi-positive note, there's a glimmer of a good idea in the final level, with enemies seemingly constrained by lighting sectors. Demons that are afraid of the light is a fantastic idea. But the execution here is minimal, and clunky in a way that makes it feel more like a glitch than a stylistic approach.

Boothill

This is a set of four Western-themed deathmatch levels for Doom II (although there is some repetition between the levels - the first one is the largest, but the third one has cool lighting effects to simulate night). As an exclusively single player, I might not be the best person to review these levels, but I can say that they are excellently crafted. Great manipulation of architecture to create the illusion of buildings with upper and lower floors (the Doom engine is limited in that you can't stack floors). There is a real sense of place in these levels, making them fun to explore even alone and without combat. I would have liked to have seen this design approach applied to a single player level.

Fistful of Doom

Two levels, billed as the "ultimate Western Wad" and "UK's answer to Boothill". The best part is that it's actually playable for a single player! The conversion details are very immersive - it really feels like you're in a Western. I don't like that the buildings don't show up on the map in the first level, but it looks like that was fixed for the second level, which has a stronger Mexican flavor. I love the nude paintings, the idea of raiding a bank in the first level, and how cool the church looks in the second level. I also love the idea of the rocket launcher being dynamite, and repurposing energy cell pickups (for a weapon that's not used in this wad) as bags of gold. Even though the gold is functionally useless, you're a bandit, you're collecting gold, it's fun! The creativity in a wad like this really fires the imagination - it makes me wish I'd completed my own total conversion all those years ago.

H2H-Xmas

This is our first full 32 level set for Doom II, and yet it never really feels like it drags. I remember playing this wad before; even partial conversions, as this is, tend to stand out in your mind, because they often look and sound so unique. This one is Christmas-themed - and by total coincidence, I ended up playing it (again) in December; it was even snowing outside the day I loaded up the first level!

Graphical replacements include Santa taking the place of Doomguy, ammo wrapped up like presents, and health pickups represented by things like cookies and eggnog and candy canes. There are even wintry textures, including falling snow, and Christmas trees scattered about the levels. Plus, popular Christmas songs have been rendered in glorious instrumental midi format to play in the background.

Level design is pretty creative - some of the more memorable locations include an airport terminal, a tree farm, and a hockey rink - and although this wad is a hodgepodge of levels by different designers, there are subsets with recognizable themes that have a sense of logical progression from one level to the next, which is something that I really appreciate. A number of levels (especially later on) seem to be optimized for deathmatch, but are still fun to play through on single player.

This wad really makes use of Doom II's larger roster of enemies, with heavy placement on Ultraviolent - and a notable focus on Revenants; you'll be adept at side-stepping their deadly homing rockets by the time you're through. At a point, the combat does get ridiculous. For consistency, I should complain about the overabundance of ammo and the literal swarms of enemies, but the reality is, there's a fair amount of health to keep you going, and it just turns into a giddy free-for-all. This kind of mindless melee, with little to no strategy involved, is not my favorite form of combat in Doom, but I can't deny that it has a certain entertainment value.

All in all, this is not the best levelset you'll ever play, but it's certainly a memorable one, and one that I think is a lot of fun. Although the novelty might be less effective if I were playing it any other time of the year.

Gather2 (a.k.a. The Final Gathering II)

I have mixed feelings about this 5 level set for Doom II. It starts out weak, with a level so short I was actually surprised when it ended. The design aesthetic is middling, with lots of bright sectors and dark sectors (that are prohibitively dark), and little complicated shading between. Rows of identical trees show off the limitations of the graphics.

The set improves as you go through the levels. I like the idea of the elevator in the second level, but the implementation is rudimentary, and I feel like it's been done better elsewhere. I appreciate the continuity between the second and third levels, although the lift takes entirely too long, and the strobe lights are annoying. The third level is big, but not especially complex.

The fourth level is where this wad really shines, as it is a sprawling, labyrinthine fortress. I still have mixed feelings about the design aesthetic, but it's a fun level to play, and it must have been a bear to put together. The fifth level is also big, if not as complex, and makes me wonder how some of these levels would work in deathmatch (even though I don't play deathmatch).

I'm not sure if this was a bug or a feature, but I encountered four "ghost" imps after unleashing an Archvile at the end of the last level. They were faded out like the spectres, but couldn't be hit by my weapons. They would sometimes (though not always) phase through walls. I eventually discovered that they could be killed by indirect splash damage from rockets exploding nearby (e.g., on walls).

Artifact

I feel like this wad is a good example of what happens when your ambition exceeds your talent (something I know a little about). It sounds great on paper - a wad with a little bit of story (I always appreciate a creative flourish), so big that it had to be split into three levels (I also love wads that harbor a spirit of adventure/exploration, instead of just creating disjointed arenas in which to slaughter demons). But the execution, in my opinion, is lacking, with somewhat amateurish design and questionable gameplay balance, that reads more as frustration than challenge (I say after smashing an army of imps one at a time into giblets with my bare hands at 6% health). The levels provide healing spaces with extra power-ups, but the vague threat of being punished for using them makes their very presence more cruel than forgiving.

This wad has also ruined me on strobe lighting. I've been more aware of its problematic nature living with somebody who is photosensitive, but even aside from that, I found their overuse here to be annoying. Coupled with that is the inclusion of extremely dark tunnels, with walk-through walls, sometimes over radioactive floors, such that you're navigating blind and being decimated even by low level enemies because you can't see for shit where the room even is, let alone what's in it. And then in the final level there are invisible floors which contribute to your disorientation, that seem tossed in just because "they're cool" and not because their presence makes any kind of logical or aesthetic sense. It got to a point in the climax where I'm being tossed around by unintuitive teleportation triggers in no readily apparent pattern, with arrows drawn only on the map screen that seem to be trying to tell me something but I'm not sure what it is...and I couldn't even finish it.

Nostromo's Run

Though only a single level for Doom II, it's a pretty big one. There doesn't appear to be any direct connection to Alien in spite of the title, but I still enjoyed it. There's an overabundance of ammo and health pickups, but I suspect that's a symptom of the level being designed with co-op play in mind (which is pretty uncommon in my experience, as opposed to deathmatch - not that I ever play this game with anyone else). If I don't have much else to say about it, that's because I don't have any serious complaints. As far as big, single levels go, I think this one was executed a lot better than Artifact.

Obituary

This is a half(ish) level set for Doom II (just enough to cover the secret level, which is accessed from MAP15). I was very excited when I found out that this wad was created by "The Innocent Crew", which did two of my favorite levelsets from 1994 - Slaughter Until Death, and The Evil Unleashed. Sure enough, the quality is just what you would expect, with a solid set of levels that are a lot of fun to play. They start out pretty compact - rather than "sprawling", they are packed tight with efficient use of space - but get bigger as you go along (including one level with the most tricked out exit section ever). I noticed some misaligned switch textures, but it didn't ruin functionality, and was the only problem I encountered.

Introduced in this wad are some light mods, including some tweaked weapons and enemies. For example, you get dual pistols, a kick instead of a punch, and updated graphics for the plasma weapons. Additionally, the imp has been given faster green fireballs, some troopers carry rocket launchers (unbalanced perhaps, but lots of fun), and the Nazi has been upgraded with erratic movements, partial stealth camo, and more powerful guns. Don't be intimidated by the complicated instructions to get the game running; you can use a patched wad (search "obticfix") to plug and play in GZDoom. It's totally worth it.

Enigma

A nine level set for Doom II (and some of these levels are huge, taking me well over an hour to complete). The graphical style may be slightly rudimentary by today's standards, but the level design is very creative, with a good use of height (you'll be climbing the walls of tall buildings and descending into shadowy canyons), and a mastery of stair sectors. Levels tend to be non-linear, at times even tricky to figure out the path to the exit. The difficulty is more due to puzzles than combat, which is a change of pace for Doom. At its worst, there are passages and solutions the finding of which is downright unintuitive. I don't recall ever needing to consult a walkthrough for a Doom level before. Bottom line, this is not a perfect wad. It has flaws. But it also displays a real artistic vision. I was impressed with it. It is frequently fun, occasionally frustrating, but above all, worth playing.

Dwango5

It's hard to find a lot of background information about this wad, other than that it's a compilation of 24 random levels for Doom II, all designed by different authors specifically for deathmatch play. Oh, and that it was apparently super popular back in the day. I wouldn't know, as deathmatch was never my scene - I've always been more of a solitary player. The levels all display typical deathmatch characteristics - small levels with ample ammo, usually designed around a central arena but with intertwining passages and vantage points for sniping. Quality ranges from the downright boring to the pretty creative, with a couple original Doom II levels lightly modified for deathmatch play. But if you're a single player like me, you're not gonna find much to do here.

JUDGMENT: Keeping in mind that for any wad to win a Cacoward, it must have distinguished itself in some way, I'm making the assumption that you don't have time to play them all, and that you value my opinion (otherwise, you wouldn't be reading my reviews), so here are my recommendations for which wads are most worthy of your time.

Must Play: H2H-Xmas, Obituary, Enigma
Time Killers: Boothill/Fistful of Doom, The Final Gathering II, Nostromo's Run
Skip: Fava Beans, Infinity, Artifact, Dwango5

See you in 1996!