[WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

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Ed the Bat
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ed the Bat »

My mission in this patch is to retain the original gameplay, which is why any adjustments by Evil Space Tomato are made optional.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ozymandias81 »

Ok. Just needed an answer. :-D
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by KMetalMind »

Ed the Bat wrote:I would recommend just loading batman.wad and batman.deh in ZDoom to test for vanilla. But, if you're so inclined to run DOSbox or some sourceport recognized as more faithful to vanilla, you'd be more than welcome to.
Buuuut... Wasn´t vanilla not working properly on zdoom? :oops:
Ed the Bat wrote:Thanks for the reports. As soon as a version of GZDoom that doesn't crash becomes available from DRDTeam, I'll get to thorough testing and troubleshooting. Incidentally, a version of ZDoom that doesn't crash should now be available, so you can play unhindered now.
Don´t worry, I´ll keep playing the game and reporting until I have a complete list. I´ll recheck them properly later to make it easier to fix. So far, until map14:
* MAP03: I can´t seem to trigger Killer Croc on this map. I couldn´t with previous patches though,
* MAP05: On the blastgun room, once I picked it no enemy came out from the left small room like it should.
* MAP08: Gamebreaking: There´s no blue key. It´s supposed to fall from an enemy, but he doesn´t have it...
* MAP08: Some enemies somehow fell through the floor. One of them even got inside a non-walkable area (into a building, watchable from outside, like he was noclipping).
* MAP10: Gamebreaking: Another blue key from another common enemy that doesn´t appear.
* MAP15: Some stalagmites appear on the ground rather than the ceiling.
* MAP15: On the poltergeist room, you can hear the elevators coming up and down, when you shouldn´t here them. They also kinda break the sounds (too many sounds at the same time).
* MAP19: Gamebreaking: Yet another missing blue key from another common enemy.
* MAP19: Broken wall at the end on the map (wall without texture).

These ones I´m not sure:
* MAP05: Once you open the blue door, you have some petrol cans. You have to blast them to continue, but that doesn´t open the hole in the wall. It triggers later, if you keep advancing. Was that the case in the original? I can´t remember clearly...
* MAP11: Was there a functional countdown in the original? I mean: Did the hospital really got poisoned after 04:30? I think I pushed the switch later than that, but I´ll retry it to be sure.
* MAP14: Sometimes being on the red buttons activate the mechanism but the bomb associated doesn´t seem to blow up...
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Ed the Bat
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ed the Bat »

Just uploaded a quick revision that I believe may fix the issue with key-bearing terrorists not dropping their prize.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by KMetalMind »

I can fully confirm it works on all maps including map01 (which worked before too). Good job! :D

Played up to map21:
* MAP03: I can´t seem to trigger Killer Croc on this map. I couldn´t with previous patches though,
* MAP05: On the blastgun room, once I picked it no enemy came out from the left small room like it should.
* MAP08: Some enemies somehow fell through the floor. One of them even got inside a non-walkable area (into a building, watchable from outside, like he was noclipping).
* MAP15: Some stalagmites appear on the ground rather than the ceiling.
* MAP15: On the poltergeist room, you can hear the elevators coming up and down, when you shouldn´t here them. They also kinda break the sounds (too many sounds at the same time).
* MAP19: Broken wall at the end on the map (wall without texture).

These ones I´m not sure:
* MAP05: Once you open the blue door, you have some petrol cans. You have to blast them to continue, but that doesn´t open the hole in the wall. It triggers later, if you keep advancing. Was that the case in the original? I can´t remember clearly...
* MAP11: Was there a functional countdown in the original? I mean: Did the hospital really got poisoned after 04:30? I think I pushed the switch later than that, but I´ll retry it to be sure.
* MAP14: Sometimes being on the red buttons activate the mechanism but the bomb associated doesn´t seem to blow up...
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ed the Bat »

Real quick, while I have a minute... regarding MAP05, I see nothing on the map about an enemy or a 'left small room', or a blue door.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by KMetalMind »

Mmmmm... Just start the level an keep forward until you have the fish shop on the left. If you keep advancing a little more, there will a building where you can enter, with some shotgun guys on the sides. Just opening the main door, you will see the blastgun. If you pick it up, a small room will open on the left, with a chair on it. An enemy is supposed to appear there ;)
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ed the Bat »

Fish shop...? MAP05 takes place entirely within the Batcave.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by KMetalMind »

Ooops!! Sorry!! I always mistake map levels because I always forget that everytime you go to the batcave it´s a new map. It´s really map06, the first Tally Man map, in Chinatown.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ed the Bat »

Ah, thank you. Also, a quick question... you've been mentioning how things should be, compared to how they are now. When you say 'should', shall I assume you mean that's how it was in vanilla Doom (doom2.exe) with Batman Doom? I've actually never played it that way, so if you have, your insight is appreciated.

Now, if a bug that appears in my patch has always existed, even in vanilla, then I would give that a somewhat lower priority. Not that I think it shouldn't be fixed (especially now that we have more powerful tools than ACE Team did so long ago), but my first objective will be to fix any new problems that my patch has created. Its primary purpose, after all, is to be a replacement for the batman.deh file. Any new features on top of that are icing on the cake.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by KMetalMind »

Yeah, I agree with you. The goal of this patch is basically playing Batman Doom as faithful as posible to the original in modern ZDoom.

My reports currently depend on the map. I played some maps on previous patches, for some others I´ve watched YouTube videos after seeing something strange, and lastly, some of them are from what I remember. That´s the reason I put two lists, one with the "I´m 99% sure this isn´t working right" and the "This seems strange but could be wrong in the original. I´ll sooner or later retry all pending things on the vanilla, so you could always wait for that. Anyway, there´s no gamebreaking bug, so congratulations!

I´ve completed the game with the new patch, and there´s no gamebreaking bugs. This is my final list:
In general: Enemies are weak to fire. I wasn´t sure if this worked like that in the original, but on MAP29, Scarecrow died without actually coming out of the hole, just by touching fire. There are other many enemies that died before reaching them on levels with fire, so I think it shouldn´t damage them.
* MAP03: I can´t seem to trigger Killer Croc on this map. I couldn´t with previous patches though,
* MAP05: On the blastgun room, once I picked it no enemy came out from the left small room like it should.

* MAP08: Some enemies somehow fell through the floor. One of them even got inside a non-walkable area (into a building, watchable from outside, like he was noclipping).
* MAP15: Some stalagmites appear on the ground rather than the ceiling.
* MAP15: On the poltergeist room, you can hear the elevators coming up and down, when you shouldn´t here them. They also kinda break the sounds (too many sounds at the same time).
* MAP19: Broken wall at the end on the map (wall without texture).
* MAP29: This isn´t exactly a bug, but something that could be fixed. With the added height, you can actually see Joker before confronting him unlike the original, and what´s worse: It makes hiding behind the police cars a lot harder, because you are actually taller than them and Joker can shoot you through them. I don´t see an easy fix anyway.

* Some of the later maps: On some of the later levels (I´ve to actually note down which ones and on which spots), you can see the sky divided in two. Watching original videos, I´m not sure if it´s another glitch related to the higher height (maybe in the original you couldn´t see down enough the sky), or if it´s another kind of bug.


These ones I´m not sure:
* MAP05: Once you open the blue door, you have some petrol cans. You have to blast them to continue, but that doesn´t open the hole in the wall. It triggers later, if you keep advancing. Was that the case in the original? I can´t remember clearly...
* MAP11: Was there a functional countdown in the original? I mean: Did the hospital really got poisoned after 04:30? I think I pushed the switch later than that, but I´ll retry it to be sure.
* MAP14: Sometimes being on the red buttons activate the mechanism but the bomb associated doesn´t seem to blow up...

I´ll reconfirm if these bugs are really bugs or not, or if they were on the original or not. The red ones are confirmed to be bugs.
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Re: [WIP] Batman Doom Patch for ZDoom/Skulltag (0.4)

Post by Ed the Bat »

Thank you very much for all of your efforts in cataloging issues. It will really come in handy for when I get the chance to fix the things I can. I'm quite relieved to hear there was nothing game-breaking, at least!

I can remark on a couple of these right now. For one, the fire... the way fire damages the player is coded differently than it was in vanilla. It's a somewhat more sensible approach, on the whole, but it does cause some things to happen differently. The boring specifics: the fires in vanilla used a melee attack to hurt the player, which would never target a bad guy. The new patch (when the relevant option is on in the menu) has fire continuously create small explosions to produce steady radial damage. But this now hurts bad guys too, and the fight with Scarecrow in the burning asylum illustrates how this can have unintended consequences. I'll need to think of a good workaround for this. Perhaps I could give the fires a unique damagetype and make bosses immune to it. Meanwhile, you may restore the vanilla behavior by toggling the option in the menu.

As for Batman's height in this patch, it's entirely cosmetic. The issue of the camera being set in Batman's utility belt was something ACE Team always wanted to be able to fix, but were unable to with the vanilla Doom engine. ZDoom allows us to fix it, though. Seeing Joker too early is a bit unfortunate, but I'm not entirely sure what I could do about it without editing the map itself; something I'd prefer not to do... as for hiding behind cars, Batman's actor height is unchanged from vanilla, so he shouldn't be any more visible to attacks than before. But do keep in mind that, with ZDoom, you may crouch if you wish. ;)

Thanks again for all your reporting!
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