RUST: The Infernal Machine [UV] - E1M8: Killswitch

Port Used: dsda-doom 0.27.5 (complevel 1, pistol start)
Skill: Ultra Violence
WAD: RUST1.WAD
Download Link: www.doomworld.com/forum/topic...
That's a whole lot of reading!
Chapters:
00:00:00 E1M8: Killswitch
00:19:37 Ending Text
00:20:50 E1M8: One Final Secret…
00:23:36 Password Hunting
01:04:57 Codex
01:05:30 Codex: Database
01:27:27 Codex: Missions
01:31:37 Codex: Bestiary
01:41:53 Codex: Weapons
01:45:13 Codex: Items
01:50:51 Outro

[@Arsinikk]

Thanks for playing through RUST! And I'm glad you enjoyed it. It's still funny to me that the project's whole point was to be inspired by D!ZONE and 90s WADs. Especially since many players consider those kind of WADs to be not very good. Although the combat and layouts probably do help elevate RUST a bit.
Also it was pretty fun to see you figure out the CODEX. I tend to really enjoy solving puzzles, so it's a bit rare and fun to see someone else also have fun trying to solve them. Especially when it comes to Doom. Many players just wanna shoot things. :P
"E1M8: Killswitch"
So with this map, I had alot to live up to. My playtesters really liked E1M7 alot, and so I suddenly felt this pressure to end the episode in bang. It's interesting how while playing, you were saying it felt very "cinematic". I think that my mapping style does tend to rely on set pieces a bit of the time... And I'd say E1M8 is very set piece driven.
The intro to E1M8 is a little strange, but I feel like it was needed to sorta have a transition from the more atmospheric E1M7 to get to the action-packed rush that E1M8 ends on. Starting with a straight rush, I think would be a bit jarring. The whole health bonus sequence is meant to be a bit disorienting with the heart of the infernal machine almost shifting as if an organic being itself.
The original idea for this map was actually to create a "The Mancubian Candidate" situation, where you had to protect the mastermind from dying or else the Cyberdemons would teleport in. Unfortunately, I found that the other monster's attacks and projectiles never ended up hitting the mastermind. And so, as goofy as it is, the crusher basically sets up most of the timer.
Regarding complevel shenanigans, this map relies on old "bossdeath" behaviour when all kinds of a certain monster dies, it lowers a tagged 666 floor. In the Ultimate Doom (Complevel 3), it was hardcoded specifically to only apply to certain monsters per level, Barons for E1M8, Cyberdemon for E2M8, etc. But for Complevel 2 and below for Doom 1, it was possible to trigger multiple "bossdeaths" to make tagged 666 floors lower more than once. In this map, The Mastermind and Cyberdemon both have "bossdeaths", with it being removed from the barons. Essentially to open the exit, both the mastermind and cyberdemons need to die to open it. However this functionality also applies to the Cyberdemon invasion. So the Cyberdemons teleport in whenever the Mastermind was killed, but the exit wouldn't open up unless all the cyberdemons were also killed. However, reaching the killswitch (which I used an Invulnerability to hide the damage of around 60 voodoo dolls telefragging all the Cyberdemons) meant that you could kill both monsters to open the exit. Interestingly enough, I actually did have to add a safeguard near the killswitch to ensure that the exit would open if both monsters died... It seems that it was possible if you killed both the mastermind and the Cyberdemons at a specific time, it could result in a softlock...
Now interestingly you may be thinking... so why is this complevel 1? Well tbf when I started the project I thought this functionality was exclusive to complevel 1 at first. Technically there is a minor difference with complevel 1 having 2 HELP screens, but unfortunately most modern ports don't emulate this behaviour correctly. Regarding actual gameplay and demo recording, complevel 1 and 2 are exactly the same. I will say that I did test and play the entirety of RUST in DOS Doom v1.666 to ensure it works as intended. Speaking of that... it's extremely cursed that E1M8 in DOS makes all sounds in the level full volume (this is hardcoded behaviour).
Fun fact, I actually ended up making the map harder and more tight timing wise, to add to the tension and difficulty. It's almost recommended to not kill all the enemies and rush the to the killswitch and then go back to deal with the rest. I actually had to completely redesign the Cacodemon fight, as originally it was too similar to the next pinky fight. If you're wondering, a one-time "conveyor" thing was required there to allow for the floor and multiple sectors with teleport destinations for the Cacodemons to all raise at the same time. Yes, I do realise that part is much more of a modern Vanilla mapping technique. One minor thing to mention is that I actually ended up adding barrels to the pinky fight which I think made it much more fun and fast to play.
Regarding the final arena, it was very challenging getting that huge open area to work in Vanilla. I can definitely see people saying it looks under detailed, but honestly it's quite impressive how detailed I was able to get it while still staying Vanilla. I think the overall map concept almost overshadows the lack of detail there. A fun little detail is that the entire circle arena uses an animated texture of rain all around the arena instead of the rain sprites. This is to adhere to the Vanilla sprite limit, which is surprisingly playable in that area. I think it really helps that the walls hide the sprites from flickering since they are out of view.
Regarding the final explosion switch, the idea is that building was the entire infernal machine you were in this whole time... and so you blew it up to kingdom come :) . Interesting fact about the forever looping icon of sin explosions, they are actually forever looping in Doom 2, it's just that you don't see it loop since it usually ends the map right after.
The NIN logo probably makes alot less sense if you play with the other soundtrack ofc, but I still think it's cool. I'm not sure how it slipped my mind not to include a Spectere easter egg anywhere, but I'll be sure to remedy that in episode 2 :)
CODEX:
There's prob not as much to say about this. I will say that I did end up adding the "7F" sign just to make is crystal clear what the seventh floor was. It is still a bit tricky to use the "demonstration thrine", since I wanted the clue to not be too obvious, but still make sense. It's a shame that Googling "thrine" doesn't go straight to 3 for whatever reason. Still I think putting the hint in the internal demos is such a cool and interesting idea. That's not something you see done very often.
I thoroughly enjoyed listening to you read the CODEX. Maybe it's just cuz I put so much effort into writing all the entries that seeing someone experience it, is just so cool and makes all the work worth it :)
EPISODE 2:
Regarding episode 2, I'd just like to give a little bit of an idea of what I'm thinking for it. So for episode 1, the main goal was to introduce all the Doom 1 monsters, and not include the plasma or BFG. The theme for episode 1 was technology, which is very reminiscent of "Knee Deep in the Dead".
For episode 2, I'm thinking of tapping into the more wide open areas aspect of D!ZONE and 90s WADs. I think having a nature / cathedral setting would help distinguish it from episode 1, while still tapping into that D!ZONE feel. The codename I have for the episode is currently "The Nu Breed", in which I plan to introduce all new bestiary similar to the Toximp. Keep in mind that I don't plan on reusing Doom 2 monsters, but instead create new and unique monsters instead (similar to Rekkr). For difficulty I plan on ramping it up, similarly to the second episode of Scythe. I considered RUST episode to be on the easy :P .
Just wanted to thank you again for playing through RUST and showing off the CODEX. Now excuse me while I ingest a Soul Sphere in preparation for a very special night ;) .

[@Spectere]

Thanks for making RUST! :D
Even aside from the combat and layouts, I think the knowledge of more advanced editing tricks really helped as well. One of the biggest issues a lot of older maps suffered from is that the mapper clearly had some good ideas but didn't know exactly how to execute them. The fact that modern day editors are simply better (both in terms of stability and user experience, as well as being optimized for the advanced tricks of the modern day) probably helps a lot as well.
I love puzzles as well. The Talos Principle is one of my favorite games, for example, and the only games I really play on my phone are puzzle games (Kakuro and Sudoku are my two favorites, with Picross being a fun diversion as well). The biggest issue with Doom puzzles is that it tends to flip back and forth between action and puzzle solving, so it's hard to settle on one thing. That's why I love maps like Nova's Iron Exuviae (if you haven't played it yet, DO IT! :D), and why I like how the CODEX is a bit more meta. In hindsight I wish I would have paused the recording, thought about things a bit more, then came back to it later, but alas. I do appreciate you sending over the hints! It really helped move things along.
E1M8
I think "cinematic" is a great way to describe this, especially with how you're forced to keep on the move when the action begins.
I had a feeling the reason you targetted the lower complevels is due to the boss death behavior, but it's interesting to see why you wanted to use cl1! It's a shame that modern ports neglect to emulate things like that. It would be kind of nice to see things like rendering limits and other subtle behaviors carry over, but even Chocolate draws the line in the sand when it comes to certain things (notably emulating versions below 1.666).
The sound behavior is even more cursed than you might think. In your Doom 1.666 install, go to E1M8 and wake up the pinkies in the starting area. Use idspispopd and go far outside of the boundaries of the map, and you'll still be able to hear the demons, as "expected." Now, lower the SFX volume to the minimum. You'll still be able to hear them. Walk towards them again and you'll find that the sounds will get quieter as you get closer. The only thing I can think of is that they only tested the map 8 behavior using the default sound volume.
I don't remember where I've seen it, but I have seen 90s maps that use barrels to shove things over lines, so I'd say you're in the clear. :) I agree that adding barrels to the pinky fight was a good idea. Giving the player more tools to do the job is always a win, and barrels tend to be a lot easier to use as weapons when you have a rocket launcher, teehee.
CODEX
I have a feeling "demonstration thrine" is the thing that really would have made sense to me if I walked away for a couple hours, especially after I worked out the "demon stration" part of the clue. That sort of thing is fridge brilliance.
(Apologies if I just initiated a day-long TV Tropes diversion.)
That was a fantastic way of hiding the clue, especially since most people-myself included-tend to just see the first few seconds of DEMO1 and start playing. I also love the way you were able to use the "SSG" in Doom! I had no idea the engine would behave like that.
EPISODE 2/3
That's a pretty cool direction, methinks. It's kind of an interesting reversal from the original Doom levels, too, since you basically covered techhell already. If you're planning to give it a Scythe-like difficulty curve, I shudder to think about what episode 3 is going to eventually look like. ;)
One little thing I did notice while taking a quick glance through the source code is that Doom doesn't seem to internally cap the episode or level number, so you miiiiight be able to get away with adding an "E4M1" lump with a corresponding demo. While I can't accurately say what DOS 1.666 will do, based on the released source it'll probably use the sky from the last loaded level (since it doesn't explicitly set skytexture OR throw an error if gameepisode is out of bounds). If you wanted to give the map unique music, E4M6 and beyond would be your best bet. Due to how the music table is set up, that would cause the engine to pick D_RUNNIN and other Doom 2 music lumps. I'm not sure what sort of implications that would have to the automap name, though…that would probably be the biggest wildcard.
Let me preface this by saying that this is all theoretical, though at this point I'm seriously itching to give it a shot…

[@DoctorNuriel]

babe wake up, new Spectere just dropped

[@BeheadedKamikaze]

Wow, this was amazing - thanks for taking the time to create this!

[@TheLetterJ0]

What a WAD!
I'm proud to say I noticed the 7F and your first time back through the map, way before you did. But I don't think I ever would have figured out the "demon stration trine" part.
And I think the figures in the outskirts were probably supposed to be a hint to finding the numbers on the outskirts of the automap.

[@Spectere]

Yep, that's exactly what Arsinikk meant by "figures in the outskirts." :)

[@hebonky]

Haha, Helldivers joke! That.. sure did age!

[@Spectere]

At least the had the good sense to roll back that stupid little plan of theirs. You know the backlash was severe when _Sony_ rolls something like that back.

[@DrWho-vc2go]

I don't think it's Demon Stration, but Demonstration, S.

[@Spectere]

Yeah, I picked up on that a bit later on.

[@Arsinikk]

I was very evil and separated the word after "demon"... Seems my evil plan worked

[@DrWho-vc2go]

@@Spectere

[@DrWho-vc2go]

@@Arsinikk It coitanly did...