we're back with what is by far the hardest wad i've taken on. speed of doom was released in 2010 and won one of the cacowards that year. it's by joshy and darkwave0000, and largely joshy worked on the odd-numbered maps, and darkwave worked on the even-numbered ones. the only exception to this are maps 31 (darkwave) and 32 (joshy). originally this was going to be a semi-speedmapping project producing one map per week, but the maps became more elaborate over time and the project eventually took about a year to finish. thematically the creators do tend to have pretty different approaches, with darkwave tending to include more exploration, open spaces, and secrets, and joshy tending to include a lot of close-quarters slugfests, nasty traps, and tight resource management.
overall... i actually really like this wad. there are lots of super memorable maps and high intensity combat. overall i had an easier time with this wad than i did with alien vendetta, but it's not actually easier, i've just gotten better. in particular having skills like killing two archviles with one BFG shot (one with the ball and one with the tracers), and killing cyberdemons in two BFG shots really helps. i even did an archvile jump to reach the much-needed invincibility in map32. maybe the best part of all this is that no map really outstays its welcome, even if some of the harder maps took me some time to work through. maybe i just felt this way after playinmg eviternity.
i'm not totally sure what i'll tackle next. been thinking about recording some demos (not of wads this hard to start). but i'll probably try and broaden my experiences a bit before continuing my way up the difficulty ladder.
(warning: the read more is very long)
GOLD MEDALS:
- MAP10: Vile Pain
- MAP14: Sledge
- MAP32: The Pyramid of Death
- MAP20: The Path to Hell
- MAP28: Twilight Massacre
SILVER MEDALS:
- MAP06: Dreamscape
- MAP31: 101011010
- MAP26: Blessed Hellscape
- MAP29: The Ruins of Kalnik
BRONZE MEDALS:
- MAP05: Cliffside Siege
- MAP16: The Core
- MAP27: Hais Temple
THE DEAD SIMPLE AWARD FOR BEST GIMMICKRY:
- MAP30: Darkness Without End
THE PLUTONIA AWARD FOR UNUSUAL CRUELTY:
- MAP23: Poison Ivy II
THE LEE JACKSON AWARD FOR BEST NON-DOOM MIDI:
- "The Midnight Carnival" from Guilty Gear X2 by Daisuke Ishiwatari, sequenced by Solis (MAP14)
FLAGS: -complevel 9 -pistolstart
STATS:
- Time Played: 21 hours, 11 minutes
- Kills: 14331/14345
- Secrets: 67/93
- Items: 1585/1784
MAP01 (First Blood): a humble start to what is generally considered a pretty challenging WAD. my first impression is that the hud is comically unreadable. the map is pretty brown and linear to start off, with some zombiemen that need to get pistoled before getting the first shotgun. berserk is also available early and can be used to taste (my taste: not at all). the courtyard that the pathway leads to has several chaingunners at considerable distance and dealing with them is pretty annoying - too far for autoaim to kick in without crossing a lot of ground without cover. there are a bunch of barrels up there that presumably could cause them all to die at once... but between autoaim and shotgun spread it wasn't working out for me. one short jaunt into a cave for the blue key leads to the final area which has a bunch of specters - thankfully perfectly visible in the even lighting here. from there it's just a quick trip to the exit.
MAP02 (Mysterious Cove): this WAD has two authors that alternate every map, and that difference couldn't be more stark in the first two levels. the first one would feel right at home in any number of vanilla-friendly WADs, but this map works on suspensful atmosphere, jump scares, and surprisingly non-damaging slime. there's a lot of instant-lift popup monsters and close-range closets, although generally i had enough space and time to react to them. a lot of the level centers on the somewhat-magical multifloor elevator with both an up and down button. there's a lot of very in-your-face spawns here... and one very sad pain elemental, doomed to be chainsawed to death from behind without ever getting a chance to do anything. getting to the top floor will lead to the next building, which requires a somewhat artful jump to reach. the blue key is guarded by some beefier monsters, and there's no super shotgun yet... but there is a rocket launcher hidden in a secret, which helps a lot. taking that key to the exit sprung an ambush even though i'd already checked out that area, which definitely caught me off guard, but the map is generous with health and armor so it wasn't too bad.
MAP03 (Constrained Base): another pretty small map. as the title suggests, there's very little room to maneuver here. unfortunately a lot of this level boiled down to getting monsters to file through a choke point while slowly whittling them down with an underpowered weapon - pistol against imps to start, and eventually shotgun against cacodemons and hell knights. i found both berserk and a chainsaw which were helpful for cutting through the pinkies and specters (a couple of which i couldn't see at all) - both ammo and health are pretty tight in this level. there's some nice moments when the level gives itself a little room to breathe, like the stairs that wind around a slime pit, and there's one nice trap on a location where the mapper anticipated a chaingun would drop, but otherwise it felt pretty procedural.
MAP04 (Sedgemire): a sewer level covered in slime from front to back. fortunately most of it is not damaging. the overwhelming impression i got from this level was how tight the ammo was - there were multiple points where i was down to just fists. fortunately i had found a berserk in an easy-to-find secret early on, which helped a great deal. there's finally a super shotgun on this map which is guarded by a pretty significant teleport ambush... but i just walked out and forced the enemies to funnel out of the room and down the hallway at me. in the sewer hallways there's also a lot of popup ambushes, some of which involve chaingunners that were awake and facing me which seemed a little unfair. the area behind the yellow key door is a little unfortunate; there's a room with a switch, barrels along the side, and imps behind those barrels... but there's an invisible wall in place preventing the imps from taking damage until the switch is hit and a couple hell knights spawn in. there's no easy way to tell that the barrels won't do the obvious thing here and it would have probably been just as effective if they were opaque. getting 100% kills also required some tricky movement along the edge of a ledge, which contains a rocket launcher and what's probably the toughest ambush in the map. but with some trial and error i found the right position and was able to deal with it pretty cleanly.
MAP05 (Cliffside Siege): a pretty spicy map that i kind of like. the intro is a little weird as it a visual continuation of the sewer theme from the last map... but the slime in the center is damaging now. i had my hands full right off the bat fending off the immediate welcoming party. it doesn't get any friendlier from there as a lot of the map is spent tiptoeing around a giant slime pit, and for the first half a spider mastermind was able to harrass me with only limited cover, and i needed to snatch a super shotgun from between a revenant's feet to make any progress. there's berserk, which helps, but i'd rather not punch out revenants while being shot in the back if i don't have to. every step of the way spawns more resistance as well - flipping the switch on the right side caused cacodemons to flood in on the return trip. thankfully the spider mastermind can be killed shortly thereafter, which helps a lot. i only found the telefrag path after it was already dead, but it was an easy kill without it anyway. the rockets it was guarding helped cut a path to the yellow key, althogh the chaingunners that surround that point when i picked it up were pretty vicious. from there it's a relatively straightforward path to the exit, although getting a radsuit for the area with the specters was very helpful. also the first popup enemy that ground my gears showed up - a hell knight in tight quarters, too close for rockets and with no space to retreat.
MAP06 (Dreamscape): another really good map. like the first two of darkwave's maps, this one definitely brings the atmosphere, but it's much more of a challenge than any map so far, starting right from the intro elevator that gave me a partial invisibility and leads directly into a hall full of chaingunners. infighting helped, but it's still not exactly a friendly start, and that's before the archvile came around the corner to start resurrecting them. i didn't even have a super shotgun at this point; the proper way to deal with this was probably punching out the archvile, actually, but that's hard. grabbing the super shotgun in the next room over triggered a pretty substantial ambush, but i was able to walk right out of it. then i realized i needed the ammo on the other side and had to run back in. the following cave area is beautiful and i was able to take my time exploring it before picking up the plasma and triggering the next onslaught. again, it's relatively easy to walk out and force enemies to funnel to the front of the room, and then pick off the ones that are left. of particular note is the secret fight, granting a much-needed BFG, but then forcing its use to fend off a total encirclement by hell's beefiest nobles. it was very useful for the exit though and its cyberdemon tag team, although the second one i was able to largely dispatch via infighting - the linedef revealing the adds is a little weird and required me to actually step into the room.
MAP07 (Simple Prison-Yard): it's like dead simple (doom 2) and prison (TNT) and caught-yard (plutonia) rolled into one! that's pretty cute. what's less cute is the level itself which starts out with enough chaingunners to make plutonia blush, and tucks the super shotgun away in a little hut guarded by two revenants. each of the following two sections also immediately locks when entered. the subsequent prison area is tough, as the hell knights are positioned such that it's very difficult to dodge their attacks. there's also a cyberdemon outside that is probably best dispatched with the super shotgun - in retrospect it's possible to reroute this, but i think it's better to save plasma. after dealing with the two mirror identical wings of the courtyard, the real dead simple starts, with twenty or so mancubi teleporting into the very tiny courtyard area, and then a dozen or so arachnotrons. and then, before exiting, there's three archviles - not very dead simple, but pretty spicy. the final room has a full 100 rockets and i needed all of those plus all the cells i'd manage to scrouge.
MAP08 (Frenetic): hmm. this is one of those maps that i think doesn't work so well on a first playthrough. there's a huge crowd of imps in a fixed area near the start, and making progress involves carefully ducking and weaving past those imps, mancubi, more imps, and the odd hitscanner or two. a little bit in to the level i got a rocket launcher, which i immediately used to thin the herd of imps a bit. this is a mistake, as making progress in the level requires triggering the red key trap, which released a couple archviles into an corpse-rich area. somehow i managed to make this work, but ammo was incredibly tight through this whole section, with every shell pickup having value. annoyingly there's no reachable chaingun, either. but hitting the switch behind the red door revealed boxes upon boxes of rockets behind the imps - way more than i'd need for the whole rest of the level. there is a spider mastermind that shortly spawns in that i didn't really have the shells to deal with, but fortunately i was able to get it infighting and it even wound up stuck on an arachnontron, completely unable to attack as the smaller spider quickly dismantled the larger one.
MAP09 (Depredation): another map with a lot of action packed into an incredibly small package. living through the beginning takes a bit of luck with berserk and infighting to fight off the initial attackers. then before i even had the super shotgun i was chased by revenants and barons into a very small corner. fortunately i was able to get them to infight; the other strategy probably involves giving the revenants the slip somehow and grabbing the super shotgun behind them but that seemed hazardous (and i didn't know it was back there, anyway). after a kind of odd encounter with an archvile and a ton of zombiemen, the level introduces one of my personal pet peeves - doors that can only be opened remotely and are on a timer. plus there are a bunch of enemies on the other side, which meant a lot of repeat trips. it also locks when passed through, ensuring that i had to take an archvile ambush in the face rather than circling around for a better angle. a couple extra barons after that and the level is over. there are actually a lot of rockets and plasma after the initial section, so those wound up being a good bit easier to handle.
MAP10 (Vile Pain): i knew this map meant business from the opening room, which has 28 archviles, 13 pain elementals, and a switch that needed to be shot to wake them all up. fortunately they are dispatched across various parts of the level instead of attacking all at once. the level is suspiciously empty to start, but as i progressed further the level unfolded with additional traps and lowered walls to both make it more open and reveal many additional monsters, including the monsters from the opening. i had way more trouble with the pain elementals as there was limited chaingun ammo, no plasma until late in the level, and i didn't find the secret berserk at the start until the level was almost over. the archviles are generally placed in dangerous locations, but often aren't in a position to revive a lot of monsters. given how limited the ammo was through most of the level without berserk, this was pretty fortunate. there's a huge and memorable trap featuring waves after waves of pinkies and specters at the red key; fortunately i was able to find a good spot to make a stand down a staircase they couldn't cross. the finale is a little silly featuring a room with invincibility, lots of rockets, and probably a dozen archviles, but it's still the sort of thing that's fun on occasion.
MAP11 (Transcension): starting a level off with an archvile directly across from the spawn is certainly the choice this level made. there's a shootable switch behind it that can open up a couple other rooms; i chose to stand my ground rather than get chipped down by the zombiemen, but it took a few tries. pushing down the narrow staircases leads out to a big courtyard populated with plenty of monsters covering most of the area. making progress required exploring the narrower caves and hallways around the courtyard, and these definitely push the limits of what is acceptable in terms of popup monsters with at least two cases of monsters showing up already in melee range. in the caves is also one of my least favorite things that repeatedly annoyed me - a door on a timer with a remote switch. there's also a hallway full of pinkies that's a mess, but easier with the secret berserk. and the finale is rough needing to get out through a narrow ledge absolutely packed with imps while multiple waves of enemies refill the courtyard below. in each case i found it better to bail off the walkway and deal with the additional spawns, even if that meant walking all the way back around again.
MAP12 (The Meat Grinder): this level really tests super shotgun skills in the first half, requiring good positioning and efficiency with shots. the initial area especially requires figuring out a good place to stand before kicking off the big battle. this is another map that's big on the popup hell knights and they're even more egregious this time around. but there's a lot of high quality action too - the fight around the top of the stairs and the secret fight around the berserk are great and tough with the still-limited rockets available. the room with the arachnotrons on the side that limit movement while the room floods with enemies is also great even if it was a little tough to get a handle on. but the highlight was definitely the titular meat grinder, a giant cylindrical room with a massive crusher in the ceter and a narrow hallway surrounding it. it was a pretty chaotic mess to get started, but once i found the switch to get it going it was great fun, and pretty necessary to kill all the barons. i just wished it killed them faster. the ending is a little underwhelming - a huge drop into a pit, a dramatic raising of wall, and... a handful of pinkies and a couple arachnotrons came out. there were a couple archviles at the end, but they weren't near any corpses and i had plenty of rockets to wrap things up tidily.
MAP13 (Lucifer's Tears): these maps aren't getting any friendlier. despite the impression the drab texturing and stock MIDI might give, the combat is decidedly not vanilla and enemies immediately rush the spawn area to prove that point. fortunately there's a nearby berserk, which i saved for a bit to benefit from its healing. getting the red key requires contending with a horde of shotgunners with only the hitscan weapons, and after dealing with them the map reveals the other nasty trick up its sleeve - it's incredibly short on health. and the next section is particularly challenging - a spiral staircase leads up to a hallway with windows leading out to a courtyard, exposing the player to fire from a full 180 degree arc from a variety of monsters at numerous different ranges. it helped to grab the plasma above and behind the staircase, although that did involve tiptoeing past a couple of mancubi. but that area has likely the best cover in this whole section. from there it's generally downhill in terms of difficulty, although the popup specters in the canal are a pretty cheap trick. the exit was guarded by a couple of archviles that were generally easy to deal with, although i didn't even have shells for the second one and had to scour the level, eventually finding a rocket launcher in a secret.
MAP14 (Sledge): so far darkwave has made a set of maps that are reasonably restrained, with a deliberate atmospheric pace. this map sets that aside very deliberately and goes all in on speed metal excess, starting right from the MIDI, a port of midnight carnival from guilty gear x2. it has by far the highest monster count so far at 700. right out of the gate there are a whole cauldron of monsters raring to go with only a super shotgun and chaingun to fend them off. the pain elementals are out in force right from the start as well and really make this maps not-too-generous ammo economy even tighter. after getting the yellow key and carving through the map's first cyberdemon with the super shotgun, the map splits into two paths to hand out the rocket launcher and plasma rifle, but neither of these is easy with each step of the process spawning significant waves of monsters that can easily get out of hand. fortunately the arena opens up a bit here, allowing for several different approaches and helping with arranging for infighting. going across the final bridge leads to a pretty over-the-top finale with tons of revenants, two cyberdemons, and 30 seconds of invincibility to try and get it under control. but before that, swing by the very cool secret fight with 160 specters in a backlit, dark room to grab the BFG. wonderful map.
MAP15 (Descent to Core): this map is a tiny postage stamp of cruelty that i tripped over myself a lot getting through. right from the outset i was dancing through arachnotron and chaingunner fire while trying to grab the meager supplies at the start of the level. from there things calm down a bit, and the outside area is relatively easy to clear out. but then i was stuck between two uphill battles - one through a hallway of crushers filled with shotgunners and an archvile, and another where the top of the staircase was covered by mancubi, hell knights and a spider mastermind. and also an archvile. that side had a plasma rifle, which made dealing with the coverless archvile in the other area much easier. the finale is especially frustrating with a cyberdemon in a small room, nowhere to attack it from without catching splash damage, and very limited ammo that meant i had to finish it off with rockets. the secret exit... requires an archvile jump. i just applied idclip judiciously and moved on.
MAP31 (1010011010): part of the 2018 list of the 100 most memorable maps, and with good reason. it immediately makes an impression with its stark blue-heavy color scheme and all-mechanical monster cast. with the artificially limited monster cast each one gets significant time to shine - especially the arachnotrons, who often have excellent sightlines and were difficult to retaliate against. additionally the arsenal provided is limited to just the rocket launcher, plasma rifle, and BFG, although plenty of ammo is provided for each. although there are a lot of popup encounters, most of the fights are pretty reasonable, with plenty of room to maneuver and lots of cover - perhaps too much, in some cases. of course that only helps so much against the maps numerous spider masterminds, and a significant part of success is finding ways to keep them distracted while fending off charging revenants or the suppressive fire of arachnotrons or mancubi. the exit to the super secret level is cute but incredibly annoying, requiring killing 7 commander keens to open the gate. i found 1 of those on my own and had to look the rest up on doomwiki
MAP32 (The Pyramid of Death): with listed influences of go 2 it and no guts no glory, it's pretty clear what i was getting myself into with this map. like no guts no glory the opening might be the hardest part. just running around and trying to BFG everything didn't work, as there isn't enough ammo to really do this. instead it was better to carve through one of the cyberdemons and grab the ammo they guard, which also granted some safe space to work from. the second part is insanely cramped, and is full of so many barons that it took significant effort to clear out. jumping in the water was pretty hazardous until they had been cleared out, as they were able to rapidly block any escape. the third part is maybe the most obnoxious with a dozen archviles limiting movement; the easiest way to deal with this was to grab the invincibility in the middle of the arena to deal with said archviles, but this required an archvile jump - pretty hard to do consistently when there are so many of them. this also unleashed a huge wave of cacodemons and pain elementals but with careful cell management the BFG cut through them easily enough. there's probably another twenty archviles between here and the exit but the worst of it is done. really the thing that kept tripping me up was the cell supply - there is very much not an unlimited amount and proper supplemental rocket launcher usage was required through large sections of the level.
MAP16 (The Core): this is a bit of a silly map, but i kind of like it. most of the combat is centered around the titular core, a large, donut-shaped arena. because of the way doom's monster "AI" works, monsters on the opposite side of the donut from the player will walk towards the inner radius, causing them to be neatly packed and giving doomguy plenty of room to maneuver. the result? the easiest way to deal with this map is to run in circles as fast as possible and blindly fire away at the monsters flying by. this is somewhat complicated by the spider mastermind in the last wave, but it's easily distracted by infighting and died before i even really engaged it. the coda is absurdly nasty though, with eight archviles pouring out of a closet, a very close-quarter popup hell knight trap, and a final ride on a tiny elevator with two more archviles. i had to really scrouge to find enough plasma to handle this, especially since the pads with the ammo were completely covered with corpses at this point.
MAP17 (The Shrine): a relatively breezy map with a lightweight monster roster and a welcome change of pace from the out-and-out slugfests of the last few maps. annoyingly most of the map is covered in damaging floor, although plenty of radsuits are provided. it was still worth moving quickly as i wound up going through most of them. the intro was probably the hardest part with a lot of enemies with an angle on the small starting corridor. get past there and there's more room to breathe, although the popup revenants blocking progress aren't exactly fun. after collecting a ton of rockets and chewing up some pain elementals with the chaingun, i largely botched going up the bleachers with all the chaingunners and lost a bunch of health. could have used taking some cover. there are a couple of obnoxious traps in the rest of the level, including a bunch of hitscanners at close range around the red key, and an archvile appearing directly behind the player in the open when going for the exit, but other than that it was smooth sailing.
MAP18 (Silent Hour): oof. this one is super rough, and made me question if i really understood what i had signed up for. the start is encircled by a large number of imps, two hell knights, two revenants, and a chaingunner that's already awake. it's possible to get out of here without waking up anything, but going anywhere else makes things worse. the whole front is covered by a cyberdemon and ten mancubi. both the rocket launcher and megaarmor have an attendant archvile along with the numerous already-visible monsters, and the switch to proceed with the level pops up half a dozen chaingunners. once past all this, the level calms down somewhat and offers a quieter moment of exploration in a warehouse, although ammo was still tight at this point. the plasma rifle at the end of this area is trapped with a cyberdemon and spider mastermind with only thin cover on offer, but shortly thereafter things broke open with a BFG and a ton of rockets and cells. sure, there were a ton of monsters around here, but they were coming from fewer angles and there were better tools to deal with them. from there, the only tough encounter was in the canal for one of the secrets, featuring half a dozen archviles and very little cover. the exit had another dozen archviles or so but also had an invincibility and i was just glad to get out of there.
MAP19 (Impure Serenity): this is a pretty short map - surprisingly short for this point in the wad - but it's still pretty spicy. after clearing out the initial area i went up the stairs and immediately got ripped to shreds by chaingunners tucked behind a window. there isn't even a super shotgun yet in the level! this whole area is guarded by revenants that are prohibitively difficult to deal with at this point as well. some of the traps in this level are surprisingly tame - two of the keys are guarded by just a few cacodemons. but getting to the blue key is tough with numerous arachnotrons limiting movement and requiring careful chaingun work to eradicate. the last stretch is a little better as there are finally a plasma rifle and rocket launcher offered. i tried to save cells as best as i could which turned out to be worth it - the final encounter had a whole swarm of lost souls, chaingunners, and a cyberdemon.
MAP20 (The Path to Hell): this map is another high-caliber slugfest, and i had to really stretch my resources to make it through. the initial area has a berserk in addition to both shotguns, and trying to rely on the shotgun alone probably won't be enough - i wound up having to punch out an archvile to get to the next room. there are some more shells in the next room as well as some shotgunners, but again it's a tight scrape. getting out of there reveals the rocket launcher and a dawning realization that there's no chaingun in this level. at all. what gives darkwave? this is the second such map. maybe it's not such a huge deal but i definitely found myself reaching for it at a few points. anyway the map offered two forks at this point, and a key is needed from each. the slime tunnel to the left is probably the easier one to start with, even with the oppressive mancubi and arachnotron fire over hell knights and pinkies, as it's somewhat easier to grab the plasma rifle and additional rockets here, and every rocket and cell matters. it also has a nasty trap where two archviles spawn at the entrance after hitting the switch at the far end, and they managed to raise numerous monsters before i could get there. the right side is somewhat easier except for the start which drops in a couple of barons at close range. there's a plasma rifle behind them but i found it was definitely easier to get it from the other branch. once that's done the finale offers up a canyon of carnage, with the BFG and a small mountain of cells available against an army of hell knights, barons, and cyberdemons. and the finale? doomguy blows his brains out on a one-way trip to hell. brutal.
MAP21 (Resurrection): the map starts with climbing out of a shallow grave... and somewhat thematically appropriate, it's largely a tyson map. perhaps most surprising to me was that i didn't totally hate it, although i don't know that i'd really call it fun either. starting out with a two-on-one archvile duel and a health pack helpfully placed next to a chainsaw isn't exactly the friendliest of intro. but then the level breaks into a rendition of e1m1, which is pretty cute. although the level inherits e1m1's geometry, it certainly doesn't inherit its gentle monster allotment, and everything up to and including two barons are here. the fight by the blue key is especially taxing and required some creative monster funnelling and infighting to make progress; there's a room nearby with some explosive barrels, which can help. the finale... well, there's an archvile behind a door, and the door needs two switches to open, both on timers, and the whole arrangement was just miserable. eventually i coaxed it out, and even though it revived a nearby baron this wound up being the easier way to do it.
MAP22 (Dead Echo): this map definitely feels a little methodical and not really in a good way. i found navigating around the level kind of confusing, and the secrets are surprisingly straightforward for darkwave. one - a shootable switch way outside the level - is kind of finicky as well and requires some guesswork with the chaingun to open. the initial part of the level loads in a ton of enemies into the central courtyard, and it's mostly going to be super shotgun work. or alternatively, just run away and let infighting do most of the heavy lifting. there's a kind of odd interior section that's mandatory but placed behind an easy to miss switch, with two of the least useful archviles i've seen in the whole wad. that led back out into the initial courtyard, although now it had three additional cyberdemons (and BFG access). fortunately i had enough cells for the finale, which was another corridor filled with hell knights, barons, and one cyberdemon. maybe it's the stock midi, but there wasn't a lot to latch on to here.
MAP23 (Poison Ivy II): one of the most absolutely brutal maps i've played. the original poison ivy was made for a 1024x1024 community project and that carries through here with some very overwhelming monster density. all the weapons are to the right at the start of the level, but trying to pick them up guaranteed getting splattered by the cyberdemon that starts directly behind the spawn, or the arachnotrons sitting on top of them. so i was stuck with the super shotgun and a small allotment of ammo; also trying to go right from the spawn is immediately greeted by a dozen popup revenants at close range.. i spent that ammo and got a little stuck for a while, but was able to make progress by clearing out a small hallway behind the revenant shelf and creative berserk usage. oh and there's an archvile that has a bead on this whole area and no way to deal with it with the weapons available. however at this point i was able to run out, provoke infighting, and then run back, and eventually the arachnotrons disappeared, the cyberdemon was distracted and i grabbed most of the rest of the weapons. this makes the rest of the level somewhat easier, although it's still by no means easy, starting with an awkwardly positioned spider mastermind guarding further progress. the yellow key fight is pretty rough, sends revenants in after it's done, and then repopulates the whole outside area with a crowd of archviles and a ton of other monsters. i got there eventually, but i can't say i felt particularly good about the process.
MAP24 (Hell's Honeycomb): i'm really conflicted about this level. it looks really cool, especially on the minimap, and there's some good fights, especially the huge crowd of imps around the blue key. but overall i can't say i really enjoyed it. first off, the level is suffering from a serious archvile infestation, with 23 of them generally stuffed into random corners or placed in a popup ambush. secondly the level suffers from major navigability problems. the unified hexagonal design that gives this level its unique appearance also makes it very challeging to tell where to go. and with very few recognizable landmarks i found myself constantly needing to check the minimap especially since a lot of backtracking and key finding is required to make progress. and the cyberdemon placement is super rough, especially the triple team at the end and the (needless) secret with a BFG (available earlier in the level) and a very narrow hallway to fight in. i'm getting better at the two tap strategy but it was still a struggle. also there's no chaingun. again.
MAP25 (Death's Nocturne): a relatively pleasant map for this point in the wad. kind of. the opening is a little out of control as it's completely encircled by hitscanners with hell knight reinforcement and a revenant pillbox. the next area is tricky as well as there's a huge number of monsters spread out and at this point there's only a super shotgun and chaingun to deal with them, and the safest area is covered in damaging floor forcing fighting on the run and chewing through a lot of the free megasphere. but after that the rocket launcher and plasma are given out and the level becomes a lot more straightforward. the fight in the library is a cool setpiece, with enemies tucked between the stacks and multiple additional waves of reinforcements as further progress was made. the finale was a little confusing (the area with the BFG is a lift, not a closet...) and hitting the switch up there fills a big valley that was already cleared with archviles. but there's plenty of ammo at this point to deal with this. there's a popup cyberdemon with comedically advantageous placement. but with appropriate application of the "street sweeper" technique i was able to deal with it a lot more easily than i would have thought. oh and there's one more room at the end that has a teleporting archvile... thing... that was kind of weird. i just sat outside and shot rockets until everything died.
MAP26 (Blessed Hellscape): this map is starting to feel like the beginning of the end. resources at the start of the level are very tight and the whole outside area is flooded with revenants - and each trip further afield brings additional opposition with it. the right-hand side bridge has even more rockets and revenants and one of the keys, and coming out from the pillar it's behind reveals the bridge has repopulated with a couple cyberdemons and a broad range of escorts. at this point it was possible to get the bfg, although it required battling four cyberdemons and four spider masterminds in a big featureless black void to escape. the other side and the other two keys have a number of very close quarter encounters where the BFG was very useful. i ran out of cells pretty quickly though and had to do some artful rocketing. it also has a kind of janky elevator between the two areas that got stuck whenever a monster was between the two sectors. once all the keys are obtained it's on to the final area for a big BFG rumble. there's tons of health and armor... but they're directly where the monsters spawn so it can still be a little risky. there are also a whole heck of a lot of archviles at the exit, but fortunately they can be picked off from range with the rocket launcher. sadly, once again, there is no chaingun.
MAP27 (Hais Temple): despite not having the ranks of other maps in the final leg, this one is no less challenging for it. the initial linear and very cramped area could go sideways quickly, as there were a lot of revenants pursuing from close quarters and very little territory to retreat to. the central room beyond that is worse - a large open area with archviles and revenants given superior positioning and cover. it's impossible to clear this out as none of these enemies are reachable, so i had to sprint to the wings and collect the keys from there. the right side has a close quarters castle encounter with lots of small interior rooms and outer corridors that have long-range cyberdemon sentinels posted. the other side has a longer range battle with a bunch of mancubi and revenants challenging advance. with both keys in hand it's now possible to deal with the center room, although it's still not easy as all the enemies have line of sight to all the other enemies. take on one last four cyberdemon tag team along with a bundle of additional archviles and the level ends without too much further resistance.
MAP28 (Twilight Massacre): this map is #8 on the 2018 list of the 100 most memorable doom maps. and you know what? i think it deserves it. over 2800 enemies of slaughter, and yet somehow the whole thing manages to not feel completely overwhelming, and it's somewhat nonlinear but still completely understandable, even with six keys to collect. i'm not even sure it cracks the top 5 hardest maps in this wad. part of that is the enemy selection, especially the relatively low number of archviles (13) - they're also placed in a way so that they're not so threatening. there's actually no hitscanners at all, which prevents getting slowly chipped down over time. there are also "not too many" revenants (306) and cyberdemons (43), and the latter are frequently tied up with infighting and can be taken out relatively easily. by far the biggest hassle are the pain elementals (88), who will rapidly start infighting and firing lost souls everywhere no matter how quickly they're prioritized. of particular note is the main arena, which is of significantly more complex design than other similar maps. in addition to the large pillars and walls that gradually open up to reveal additional monsters, the arena is split into numerous different levels, and a key part of survival is knowing how to move around through these levels smoothly - it's often not possible to blindly circle strafe. really the only complaint is that all the other weapons besides the BFG are in a secret, and i didn't find it until the very end of the level, which would have been useful for cleanup. it's not like i was going to run out of cells though - there's absolutely tons of them in the map.
MAP29 (The Ruins of Kalnik): this map, entrusted to speed of doom's other mapper, represents the opposite side of the slaughter spectrum from the previous map, and as a result is far, far harder. after getting swarmed by pinkies from the very start, the first thing to notice is that large chunks of the level is covered in damaging floor and it will require some degree of rad suit management to make it through the level. this is definitely not the worst part of the level. after several failed attempts to clear out the nearby area i came to the revelation that there was no ammo anywhere to be found. this wasn't a mistake - there really isn't any. most of the ammo is in the central area, which can only be reached by climbing a lavafall, getting around a mancubus, killing some imps on the other side, and then making a tricky strafe jump while cyberdemons are trying to blow up the whole general area. fortunately once completed, bridges extend to make future access easier. from there there are a ton of tough encounters between here and the end of the level - the worst is probably the blue key trap, which spawns two archviles at point blank range, four cyberdemons from behind, and a whole catwalk full of revenants to ensure nowhere is truly safe. being able to kill both archviles with one BFG shot helps, but it's still really hard. oh and some more archviles are busy resurrecting stuff in the central building while this happens. it's also worth noting that the ammo situation here is incredibly tight - by the end of the level i was down to trying to kill a cyberdemon with a chaingun. possible, but definitely the last choice before punching. and yet, despite all the brutality, i had a lot of fun with this map, somehow.
MAP30 (Darkness Without End): kind of a gimmicky finale, but probably better than most attempts to get creative with the final level. there's a central pillar that gradually lowers surrounded by a massive pile of health and ammo. around that is an infinite inky black void with tons of monsters, and lots of monster spawners reinforcing their ranks. but it's not necessary to kill everything - after three minutes, romero's head gets revealed and blowing it up ends the level. in those three minutes, it's mostly a matter of running in circles, getting stuff to infight, waving the BFG around wildly, and trying not to die. i felt like most stuff died without ever even getting shot but it's still a fun way to send out the wad, which is more than i can say about most maps in this slot.
MAP33 (Descent to Nowhere): but wait, there's more!!!! i almost forgot to play this one - it's warp-only. it is... pretty unpleasant, actually - an intensely cramped and gray techbase. after the initial elevator, there's two shotgunners, a pinky - and two archviles. also there's only a pistol so far. the super shotgun is in the next room over, but getting it floods the room with hell knights and a couple chaingunners. i found it easier to run out than actually deal with it. there are a couple other traps that are pretty mean, including a room that locks and spawns two revenants and is basically just big enough for the player and those two revenants. but the worst part is the titular descent to nowhere, a long elevator ride that starts with a cyberdemon and floods with more enemies shortly thereafter. i couldn't get the cell supply to last the whole ride and had to be bold with rockets - the space to do this safely is really quite limited and it only gets worse once the pain elementals arrive. there are a few opportunities to resupply on the way down but without foreknowledge the elevator will likely pass them by too quickly. there's also an archvile waiting at the bottom to resurrect stuff in case the ride down wasn't already painful enough.