[Done] Master Levels Menu Interface

For Total Conversions and projects that don't otherwise fall under the other categories.
Forum rules
The Projects forums are only for projects. If you are asking questions about a project, either find that project's thread, or start a thread in the General section instead.

Got a cool project idea but nothing else? Put it in the project ideas thread instead!

Projects for any Doom-based engine (especially 3DGE) are perfectly acceptable here too.

Please read the full rules for more details.
User avatar
Zippy
Posts: 3302
Joined: Wed Mar 23, 2005 5:31 pm
Location: New Jersey

[Done] Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by Zippy »

NEW DOWNLOAD (Dropbox)

OLD VERSION DOWNLOAD (idgames, to be updated)

The new download is a zip file with ipk3, instructions, and credits inside.

UPDATE - 9/13/2018
Added IWADINFO for support as a custom IWAD.
Custom IWAD support requires GZDoom 3.2.0 or later. The menu will technically still work with GZDoom as far back as 1.5.0, or classic ZDoom 2.5.0 or later, but the custom IWAD feature will not work.

Contains no playable levels, but is intended to be used with The Master Levels for Doom II. If you don't have The Master Levels you can get them from Steam. A few simple steps need to be followed in order to get The Master Levels to correctly work with the menu. The instructions are included in this post and also in the INSTRUCTIONS.TXT in the zip file.


DESCRIPTION
The Master Levels Menu Interface is just a simplistic menu interface for GZDoom, driven by the [wiki]GetPlayerInput[/wiki] feature. The Master Levels For Doom II is a classic collection of levels made by various community authors that was released by id Software in 1995. Because it was a collection of separate wad files instead of levels collected together into a single wad, the Master Levels was released with a separate program that would let you choose the wad you wanted to play and start Doom II with the correct level loaded for you. This project provides an in-game menu to replace that behavior, allowing the Master Levels to be played without having to restart GZDoom for each level (and at the same time provides a few bonuses: for example the option to keep inventory between levels).

The latest version is an ipk3; a custom IWAD. It will show up in your IWAD selection menu.

The ipk3 file contains little more than the menu level itself. Players who wish to use it in conjunction with the Master Levels For Doom II must already own that product and will have to either load the wad files alongside the zip or pack them into it; see the instructions below or included in the zip file. The ipk3 can still be used without the Master Levels and the menu will work, but you will naturally be unable to play any of the levels.

It can hopefully serve as a fairly simple demo of one way to use GetPlayerInput to make an in-game menu. So I hope it will help some people who wish to work on their own GetPlayerInput-based contraptions.


INSTRUCTIONS
Within the spoilers are the copy-pasted instructions from the INSTRUCTIONS.TXT included in the latest download.
Spoiler: Instructions
Last edited by Zippy on Wed Sep 12, 2018 11:10 pm, edited 7 times in total.
User avatar
Siggi
Posts: 3288
Joined: Sun Oct 03, 2004 8:57 am
Preferred Pronouns: They/Them
Location: South Africa

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by Siggi »

That's pretty cool. I approve.
User avatar
SoulCrow
Posts: 842
Joined: Wed Dec 12, 2007 10:45 am
Location: UK

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by SoulCrow »

Awesome, this will definetly be handy for playing the Master Levels. Hated having to quit the game every time, check what the .wad was called, check what level is replaced...
User avatar
Enjay
 
 
Posts: 26517
Joined: Tue Jul 15, 2003 4:58 pm
Location: Scotland
Contact:

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by Enjay »

I love how it looks like the old DOS launchers of days gone by.
User avatar
randi
Site Admin
Posts: 7746
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2003 10:30 pm
Contact:

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by randi »

Though that dark gray text on a dark blue background hurts my eyes.
User avatar
Graf Zahl
Lead GZDoom+Raze Developer
Lead GZDoom+Raze Developer
Posts: 49056
Joined: Sat Jul 19, 2003 10:19 am
Location: Germany

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by Graf Zahl »

Indeed- A horrible clash of colors...
User avatar
Zippy
Posts: 3302
Joined: Wed Mar 23, 2005 5:31 pm
Location: New Jersey

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by Zippy »

Enjay wrote:I love how it looks like the old DOS launchers of days gone by.
I love how I can use that as an excuse, when in reality it was just far less work intensive to do it like that.
randy wrote:Though that dark gray text on a dark blue background hurts my eyes.
CR_BLACK actually. It turns the font a dark gray for whatever reason. The text that is actually black is only so because it's part of the background image.

Always some time to play around with the colors I guess. Or maybe I can leave all the text white and highlight the selection background, or move an arrow or asterisk in front of it, etc...
User avatar
Zippy
Posts: 3302
Joined: Wed Mar 23, 2005 5:31 pm
Location: New Jersey

Re: Master Levels Menu Interface

Post by Zippy »

Finally set aside some time to clean this up. It's basically done now; I'm just missing par times for the maps as they never had any to begin with. That's no reason to keep me from releasing it, so I'm just going to take some time tonight or tomorrow to look over everything to make sure it's right and then I'll put it up for download.

The first post has been updated with newer screenshots.
User avatar
Zippy
Posts: 3302
Joined: Wed Mar 23, 2005 5:31 pm
Location: New Jersey

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Zippy »

And done.

You can download the version without par times from the first post or RIGHT HERE. Remember that this is intended to be used with The Master Levels for Doom II. Because some of The Master Levels have conflicting map lump names I've included some simple instructions for how to get them to work in the first post. Anybody who doesn't have The Master Levels can still run the file and try out the menu, but ZDoom will drop you to the console if you try to play one of the maps.

Requires ZDoom 2.3.0 or GZDoom equivalent.



I'll put together some par times at another point and upload it to the archives after that. Though another thing I've thought about is having the menu take some sort of action after you beat all the levels. Currently it does nothing and you can replay the levels infinitely, but I could have it throw up the end game cast call or something.
Crashbanito
Posts: 6
Joined: Thu Apr 16, 2009 10:03 pm

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Crashbanito »

Im new to this but could you explain a bit more on how you do this renaming map lump thing. Nothing I do seems to work.
User avatar
Tormentor667
Posts: 13530
Joined: Wed Jul 16, 2003 3:52 am
Contact:

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Tormentor667 »

Out of curiosity, does the "Best Play Results" get saved during different play sessions?
User avatar
Zippy
Posts: 3302
Joined: Wed Mar 23, 2005 5:31 pm
Location: New Jersey

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Zippy »

Crashbanito wrote:Im new to this but could you explain a bit more on how you do this renaming map lump thing. Nothing I do seems to work.
Open the wad file (e.g. ATTACK.WAD) in XWE or SLumpEd. Select the MAPxx lump (e.g. MAP01). Rename that lump to match the file name without the extension (e.g. in ATTACK.WAD, rename MAP01 to ATTACK). Do that for all the wads. Except in TEETH.WAD there are two maps. MAP31 should be TEETH, MAP32 should be TEETH2.
Tormentor667 wrote:Out of curiosity, does the "Best Play Results" get saved during different play sessions?
No. Generally speaking that would require features ZDoom does not support. Alternatively it could be done by compressing the user's play results into a "password" and letting them input the password when playing it, but that's out of the scope of the project as far as I'm concerned.

Instead, just save your game when you feel like stopping and load the game when you feel like playing again.
User avatar
Tormentor667
Posts: 13530
Joined: Wed Jul 16, 2003 3:52 am
Contact:

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Tormentor667 »

Ok, nevermind then, this is just awesome Zippy, great job :)
Crashbanito
Posts: 6
Joined: Thu Apr 16, 2009 10:03 pm

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Crashbanito »

Thanks for the help with renaming the maps. I have to say that you did a very good job with this. The only thing that I could see to be improved would be keeping the par times saved. Other than that good work.

Note:I decided to change around the nextlevl options in the mapinfo to give the game more flow.
Gez
 
 
Posts: 17833
Joined: Fri Jul 06, 2007 3:22 pm

Re: [Done-ish] Master Levels Menu Interface (Download available)

Post by Gez »

Rather than renaming each lump in each file, it's possible to put all levels in a "maps" folder in the zip. Then the only thing to do is to duplicate TEETH.wad (to have TEETH.wad and TEETH2.wad) and then delete MAP32 from TEETH and MAP31 from TEETH2.

Personally, I also made some other changes as well, because several of those levels (MANOR and all those from "Dr Sleep's Cantos series") are meant to use a star sky texture while the others are not. So I copied the STARS patch into a patches folder, added a "starsky" entry in the textures lump (I nearly named it "hutch" :P), and altered the mapinfo lump accordingly. And finally, I took the liberty of correcting Sverre Kvernmo's spelling and changed "Maosoleum" to "Mausoleum".
Post Reply

Return to “TCs, Full Games, and Other Projects”