Is the community out of ideas and motivation?

[twinkieman93]

Mhmm, you got your point across fairly well. And on a phone. Neat. And you're correct, we're still just a minority, and yes, I am part of it. While I still show interest in the "traditional" projects, the ones that excite me do something interesting with the engine. Thankfully, unlike minorities in other situations, some of us here actually can do things pertaining to the problem and make stuff. I can't, but I do have ideas.

One thing people should try is finding a weapon mod(not hard to do, they're everywhere) and make a mapset with that weapon mod in mind. I'm not saying they should make that mapset unbeatable without that particular mod loaded, but make it so that the themes match. People do it all the time for Brutal Doom, so why not for mods which are actually good rather than popularly mediocre? A few examples follow:

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Xaser's Psychic: A dystopian city of the future, with enemies ranging from gangbanger types with baseball bats and cheap dinky pistols, to megacorp security guards armed with deadlier hardware, and even the occasional enemy psychic for boss encounters. And of course, billboards and advertisements containing many Xaserisms™ is a must. Humorous cyberpunk, is what I'm getting at.

WildWeasel's Nazis!: While it was already designed to go with Epic 2, and it does so admirably, a mapset with a more traditional Nazi type theme would be nice. While there are a few Wolfenstein 3D style mapsets flying around, one made up to modern standards instead of the standards set for Wolf3D would be amazing. Actual Nazi castles and bunkers, you know. And a short jaunt through Hell or some other alternate dimension wouldn't hurt either, if it's filled with those ghosties.

Xaser's NecroDoom: Mad Max. I probably don't need to expand upon this, seeing as how the resources are ripped from a car combat game in such a universe, I think it's obvious. Running down a destroyed highway fighting off bandits, all of them mutated by constant exposure to demonic energy(This is NecroDOOM after all), and all the tropes pertaining to such a setting, would be a laugh and a half, for sure. Culminate in a giant arena that has a name which is an obvious reference to the Thunderdome, and you're golden. Of course, additional Xaserisms™ are required.

PillowBlaster's Russian Overkill: While this already goes well with every slaughtermap ever created, one specifically made with Russian Overkill in mind would be the best thing on this planet since Russian Overkill itself. Imagine tearing across Siberia fighting off demonic armies with the greatest arsenal the Motherland can give you, all to save Robo-Stalin in his palace in Moscow. And yes, it would be Robo-Stalin, who else?

TerminusEst13's Samsara: People ask for this all the time, but a mapset containing either DM levels inspired by the design of the maps from each hero's game, co-op levels inspired by the same, or both would be pretty awesome. Then the heroes who aren't from the Doom engine could get a little taste of home. Bonus points if there's a hub map that also serves as an "HQ" styled map, with a barracks for the heroes, and a kitchen, and all the amenities the multiverse's greatest heroes would want.

There's plenty more ideas floating around in my head. That's just a start.

[wildweasel]

I am in full support of all of these ideas, especially the one for Psychic.

[TheBadHustlex]

Hmm... Grezzo2 is a little bit different, I think.

Sure, it ripped out everything that ever came out for ZDoom/GZDoom, and the quality is probably not the best, but at least the creator managed to patch all that together into a completely crazy storyline, which I haven't seen in any mod before.

[cortlong50]

One of the main problems I'm having is that I see a lot of stuff people are working on that is different. But it's really just...lame. I hate to say it but it's cheesy and weird like "look it's ironically cool". I want legitimate bad assery when I play doom. I want interactivity and purpose. Not weird ass stuff that kind of undermines the whole experience and everyone likes it because it's different.
Golden souls is a good example. Fun. Really interesting. The idea is great. But why Mario based? Why not doom with the whole Mario painting deal? It just seems weird to me. I think the best ideas are the ones that tackle the doom universe with an iron fist and a new perspective. Something enhances doom while maintaining the game.
There's a lot of cartoony poorly sprited stuff that I think gets so much credit wen it's really just obtuse as weird.
I enjoy doom. Most things about it. I'm looking to make my game better not different. If you're feeling like doom is boring now it's probably because you've been playing it for twenty years and may actually be a human being who gets bored of the same stimuli. Nothing wrong with that.

[SigFloyd]

PillowBlaster's Russian Overkill: While this already goes well with every slaughtermap ever created, one specifically made with Russian Overkill in mind would be the best thing on this planet since Russian Overkill itself. Imagine tearing across Siberia fighting off demonic armies with the greatest arsenal the Motherland can give you, all to save Robo-Stalin in his palace in Moscow. And yes, it would be Robo-Stalin, who else?

I'm throwing Rubles at my monitor but nothing's happening.

[twinkieman93]

PillowBlaster's Russian Overkill: While this already goes well with every slaughtermap ever created, one specifically made with Russian Overkill in mind would be the best thing on this planet since Russian Overkill itself. Imagine tearing across Siberia fighting off demonic armies with the greatest arsenal the Motherland can give you, all to save Robo-Stalin in his palace in Moscow. And yes, it would be Robo-Stalin, who else?

I'm throwing Rubles at my monitor but nothing's happening.

That's because Russians get paid in vodka, silly capitalist pigdog. What, did you actually think rubles were WORTH something? Hahaha!

[Nightfall]

So you're saying that Robo-Stalin wouldn't be able to wipe out the demonic armies all by himself? Considering what the player already is given.. I think he'd do just fine all by himself.

[TheBadHustlex]

There's a lot of cartoony poorly sprited stuff that I think gets so much credit wen it's really just obtuse as weird.

So damn right...

[Blox]

So you're saying that Robo-Stalin wouldn't be able to wipe out the demonic armies all by himself? Considering what the player already is given.. I think he'd do just fine all by himself.

Robo-Stalin is too busy neglecting his people to deal with such minor manners as "wiping out demonic armies".

[twinkieman93]

So you're saying that Robo-Stalin wouldn't be able to wipe out the demonic armies all by himself? Considering what the player already is given.. I think he'd do just fine all by himself.

Robo-Stalin is too busy neglecting his people to deal with such minor manners as "wiping out demonic armies".

Exactly! It is his job to delegate such tasks to others, not do them himself.

[TheBadHustlex]

I guess Alosha, Marty and Yuri are his personald buttlers and they just do whatever he says. It doesn't seem to be a big deal for them anyway.

[JPL]

As a mostly-outsider to the Doom community, my perspective is that new blood would bring both a wider range of interesting things and re-invigorate the work of (possibly jaded) long-timers. Doom predates the modern "indie games" movement by more than a decade, but in many ways they are now carrying the torch in terms of both originality and execution. See the FreeIndieGam.es blog: every day multiple new games are posted; some are just building on old ideas, others are daringly experimental. This is what keeps a scene exciting.

I think with a few improvements Doom could fill an important niche for indie game creators. With 2.5D level design and sprite-based objects and characters, it's extremely easy to make content for. Unity3D is a great tool for many things but I've found its ability to quickly build interesting level designs is lacking compared to Doom's.

Unity3D's advantage over Doom is that it's extremely easy to define complex object behaviors in a level-agnostic way. ACS scripting is powerful but only within the domain of level scripting (ie instantial, special-case), while DECORATE is more about specifying behaviors via data which has obvious limitations.

That's why I'm so keen to see the ZDoom scripting branch progress; I think being able to define Thing behaviors in a general scripting sort of way cracks the possibilities of game creation wide open. The current difficulty of doing comparable things is one reason I think Doom engine projects take a long time. Unity3D by contrast is regularly used for game jams, it's ridiculously fast to get an idea up and running in a 3D space using easily reusable components.

Please undersatnd my comparison, I'm not saying that ZDoom et al need to become like Unity - their differences are in fact the reason I'm making this argument. I'm just realizing that the connections between these two very different technologies suggest that Doom could become much more than what it is today.

There might be some traditionalists who are ambivalent or even threatened by the possibility of lots of new people making things with Doom, but this is unfounded. New blood almost always revitalizes a scene without doing away with what made older eras great.