Metroid: Dreadnought v1 - The Galaxy is Doomed

[Captain J]

a crossover, i see. let's see how 8 bit graphic works for 16 bit properly.

[TerminusEst13]

Hey, guys, some neat stuff going on. I've got a few artists interested in making custom sprites for an enemy set more appropriate for Metroid, I've got a few mappers interested in making maps for trekking through, and I've been experimenting with a few new systems as well. If these continue going on without a hitch, then these next few months are going to be looking pretty promising.

Since people have mostly been asking for proper Metroid-style monsters, I'll be pushing for that--I've been working on their behavior with silly placeholder sprites, so I don't have much to show, but in combat they're definitely a big pain to go up against! There's a lot of quick movements and rapid-firing going on here, and it's easy to get yourself locked in a bullet hell. They'll be slightly more difficult than the typical Doom bestiary, but (if I can get this working right) they'll be toggleable via a cvar so that you can decide on the go whether you want more difficult Metroid enemies or just the typical Doom enemies for lounging through slaughterwads with.

[Scripten]

That level looks fantastic. Feels very interconnected and full of secrets, just like something Metroid-y should!

[Valherran]

This is looking promising, can't wait to play!

[Captain J]

what a losta retrospective secrets, and hope for artistic volunteers' magnificent works will shine your mod as well!

[LuSan]

It looks outstanding, really amazing!

[Chris]

Looks neat. The only complaint I have (which isn't much of a complaint, but more of a concern) is that the secrets seemed to rely a lot using the morph ball to fit through hard-to-spot small tunnel. While Metroid certainly did have such secrets, it also had plenty of other ways to hide items, like shoot-away walls and floors/ceilings, illusionary walls, etc. In some cases, the items weren't even 'hidden' so much as they required an item to reach that you didn't have yet, and when you did get the item, you aren't lead back there for it (i.e. it required the player to notice and remember something that's out of reach, either an item or a pathway, and actively go back there once they get the item to reach it).

Also, will there be doors or other objects that require being shot with a specific weapon to activate, rather than just having the right key (not forgetting that any weapon will work for doors that only need the basic beam weapon)?

One final thing, if I could make an aesthetic suggestion, have the doors open by splitting from the middle (upper half goes up, and bottom half goes down; kinda like some of the doors in Doom64). I think that would fit the "Metroid style" better than doors that just raise up. Also having the door lit an appropriate color based on the weapon type it opens with (blue/cyan for beam, white for ice, purple for wave, etc).

Just my ideas and suggestions, anyway. Still looking forward to what you come up with.

[Xim]

Metroid does seem to blend well with the Doom environment. Although it would be nice to get some Metroid enemies too. But I'm not a HUGE fan of the series, but I enjoyed the little bit I played.

[Tapwave]

Just a few things that bother me:
• The beam seems to fire as fast as you pull the trigger, didn't it have a firerate limit in the original games?
• I kinda expected the doors to have color-coded shields, for different projectiles. Is it going to be included eventually or are all doors only beamable?

[XutaWoo]

• The beam seems to fire as fast as you pull the trigger, didn't it have a firerate limit in the original games?

They do. Non-power beams had a non-0 fire delay, while the power beam had a 0 or near 0 fire delay.

The beam system is more based off of Metroid Prime than the 2D games, you see.

[tsukiyomaru0]

• The beam seems to fire as fast as you pull the trigger, didn't it have a firerate limit in the original games?

They do. Non-power beams had a non-0 fire delay, while the power beam had a 0 or near 0 fire delay.

The beam system is more based off of Metroid Prime than the 2D games, you see.

Even the 2D ones have minimal delay if you use Turbofire

[Chris]

The main thing that really bothers me about the weapons is the Wave Beam. The charge shots specifically... the amount it bounces around basically makes it a "Kill Everything" weapon, particularly in smaller rooms. Its charge+missile combo is probably the most devastating thing ever (it kills so much, even my framerate dies). I'd think the Plasma and Chrome weapons should actually be the most devastating.

I'm actually kinda disappointed in the Plasma Beam, too. In Prime 1, it was pretty much the top-tier weapon to anything vulnerable to it. It's charge shot would disintegrate many creatures in one hit. With this mod, though, I almost never think about using it because it's range is too poor and doesn't do much damage compared to a rapid-fire Power Beam or charged Wave Beam.

The Long Beam I find useless, as well. Though it has range, it's too slow and weak. I'm better off with a rapid-fire Power Beam or charged Wave Beam. To me, it feels like you could just get rid of the Long Beam, give the Plasma Beam some more range and damage, and replace it with the Phazer or something (from Super Metroid; makes your other beam weapons rip through most enemies, though it does slow the fire rate a bit IIRC).

Also, I feel the charging to be a little.. off. Using the audio cues (which I'm familiar with as an ardent Prime 1 player), and the visual cues of the energy ball, the weapons feel like they take longer to actually reach "charged" status than they should. I often end up releasing early, expecting the shot to go off and it not.

[Valherran]

The weapons were balanced to the Doom monsters and map layouts. The new monsters will most likely be added in and balanced towards the weapon's current settings. It will be Metroid Prime on crack, it's gonna be great!

[twinkieman93]

Oh no, the beams each have their own purpose and none of them are the best at everything, what are we ever going to do?

The Wave Missile is kinda ridiculous, but the beam itself isn't great at longer ranges(due to the spread and unpredictable movement of the energy bolts) unless you charge it, and even charged only the immediate target takes the brunt of the damage. Most other things usually just get lightly damaged unless they're all packed into a rather tiny room. It's best either just spammed en masse or used to fire around corners to wipe out pesky hitscanners without giving them a chance to shoot you.

The Plasma Beam is fantastic for groups of enemies where you can get close to them and still have room to dodge. A few charged shots aimed properly to hit as many enemies as possible can make short work of most crowds. Sure, its range is kind of lackluster, but that's when you pull out...

The Long Beam, which is just a tad bit less damaging than the Plasma Beam but hits things instantly and has, as far as I've seen, unlimited range. Even the power beam has a limit to its range, I think. It's fairly slow, but hey, it's a sniper weapon, it's not supposed to be fast.

As a side note, there has never been a "Phaser" beam. You may be thinking of the Spazer Beam, which is already in the mod but with somewhat different behavior, but that's not what ripped through enemies. The Plasma Beam did.

[TerminusEst13]

Just a few things that bother me:
• The beam seems to fire as fast as you pull the trigger, didn't it have a firerate limit in the original games?
• I kinda expected the doors to have color-coded shields, for different projectiles. Is it going to be included eventually or are all doors only beamable?

Also, will there be doors or other objects that require being shot with a specific weapon to activate, rather than just having the right key (not forgetting that any weapon will work for doors that only need the basic beam weapon)?

One final thing, if I could make an aesthetic suggestion, have the doors open by splitting from the middle (upper half goes up, and bottom half goes down; kinda like some of the doors in Doom64). I think that would fit the "Metroid style" better than doors that just raise up. Also having the door lit an appropriate color based on the weapon type it opens with (blue/cyan for beam, white for ice, purple for wave, etc).

At the moment, only the Power Beam is "fire as fast as you pull the trigger". While the Wave Beam is fast, it still can only fire every three/four tics--while the Power Beam is basically the "pistol" equivalent and there's very little reason to use it after you pick up other weapons, if you have a fast trigger finger (or cheat and use an alias I guess) then the Power Beam can be a very viable weapon and have the absolute top DPS.
And the doors are currently in a bit of an experimental phase--ijon made a system that works in typical Metroid style and recognizes Spazer or Missiles, and later on I'd like to expand this to work with other weapons, though bombs are going to be an interesting quandry. And yes, if this system goes well, the doors will be appropriately color-coded.

(Opening from the middle is a bit of a different matter that I can't entirely 100% say yes or no to, but it's being attempted at least)

The charge shots specifically... the amount it bounces around basically makes it a "Kill Everything" weapon, particularly in smaller rooms. Its charge+missile combo is probably the most devastating thing ever (it kills so much, even my framerate dies).

The Wave Missile is kinda ridiculous, but the beam itself isn't great at longer ranges(due to the spread and unpredictable movement of the energy bolts) unless you charge it, and even charged only the immediate target takes the brunt of the damage.

The Wave Missile is extremely ridiculous at the moment and is definitely on the nerfing block. While it loses out to Spazer, Long, and Plasma in sheer damage numbers, half the time it does more than enough anyway to get the job done--it's going to get its metaphorical bollocks sawed off next update.
The Charged Wave is also a little OP, but in a way that isn't immediately apparent--I have several friends who (I assume through the use of ancient and eldritch magnets) are able to not only hit one single target with all three wave spirals, but also every single spatter. As you can imagine, the resulting damage is extremely ridiculous.
What I'm looking at for the moment is making the spatters have a few momentary tics of -SOLID/+NOCLIP so that they pass harmlessly through the immediate enemy, then go into the rest of the room. This should reduce the amount of damage on a single target, but increase the chance of other enemies being hit with it, allowing it to better suit the crowd control purpose it was designed for.

Also, I feel the charging to be a little.. off. Using the audio cues (which I'm familiar with as an ardent Prime 1 player), and the visual cues of the energy ball, the weapons feel like they take longer to actually reach "charged" status than they should. I often end up releasing early, expecting the shot to go off and it not.

I agree, I'm not too happy with the charging system at the moment. In the future, I hope to give a proper indicator as to when the beam is fully charged, so that people know exactly when the ball is charged instead of firing off something half-done.
I'm not sure whether to have it be some sort of flash of the gun, particles coming off the beam, or simply a microwave "ding!", but either way I'll definitely try to address this in the future.