#game mods
Hey it’s me that guy that draws memes. Oh yeah, I also make games too.
I’m working on a top-down fast-paced shooter where you draw your character and fight against others players drawings.
Let’s call it: ARTillery
This is in its veryearly stages but I hope it interests any artist or gamers out there.
I’ll be posting any progress I make on the game and I might even ask for some suggestions time to time.
Thank you for reading my pitch, announcement, Ted Talk, thing?
Oh and get stickbugged lol
My sister-in-law told me that, when playing Dragon Age Origins, she no longer saves Connor with the circle mages, since that feels cheap (and it doesn’t seem likely that you’d have enough time to go get them and come back).
So I was inspired to plan out a tweak to each of the main quests so that the dilemmas are actually dilemmas. As is, there’s a right answer to just about everything, and that’s among my biggest complaints for that particular game.
I don’t actually know how to create game mods, so this is all theoretical for now. It would be the #1 mod I’d want to make, though, and I would certainly like to learn sometime! In any case, I’m trying to think of conservative solutions - making the dilemmas harder with relatively minor changes.
My ideas so far:
* Only Jowan can perform the ritual to save Connor (i.e. Isolde or Teagan will die if Connor doesn’t)
Partly because I agree with my sister-in-law, partly because Jowan is an underrated gem and I want him to shine. All hail Jowan, dabbler in excellence.
* Just as siding with Branka forces you to kill Shale, siding withCaridin forces you to kill Oghren, since you’re killing his wife
Granted, this is frankly yet another reason to side with Caridin for a lot of people. There is dialogue for Oghren turning hostile (albeit it takes some doing!), so this one actually shouldn’t be much trouble.
*Remove the option to just kill Zathrien and the Lady of the Forest
For similar reasons as with Connor - why pick anything else? It also feels a bit pat that you can just resolve an ancient grudge and settle the whole war in everyone’s favour with a decent speech check.
* Andraste’s ashes, mixed with High Dragon blood, are needed to conduct the Dark Ritual.
There’s currently no reason to take Kolgrim’s deal (Reaver is a bad subclass for a bad class!). Even if you don’t want to kill the cultists, you have to kill them by the dozen beforehand. Conversely, there’s no negativeconsequence to the Dark Ritual. This would fix both. The big problem is lack of Morrigan voice lines. I’m thinking maybe you’d get a discreet letter from Morrigan to inform you of this out of earshot of the Andrastians in the party.
I’d also considered making the deal give you the High Dragon, or the cultists, as an army (like how the Anvil gives you golems). This would make sense, but isn’t elegant and the (more interesting) former would be either busted or rather disappointing. If it didn’t just crash the game.
I don’t currently have a clear idea for the Broken Circle. As-is, there’s no upside to telling the templars the tower isn’t safe, which leads to the bad ending for the Circle and is only even a choice if Irving is alive (in which case the tower is safe). Unlike the Brecilian Forest and Redcliffe, there’s no better third option to just cut - only the mage outcome is good.
My best idea is something like a Tower Safety track, like the points-based Landsmeet debate, where you have to get your hands dirty to make the tower safe. This seems like the least elegant and most intensive solution of the ideas here, though.
If anyone has any suggestions, or just wants to vent about the dilemmas, please let me know in the notes!
Epic Custom Magic Cards
Six players, forty-five custom Magic cards each, three-pack draft and one epic tournament of total chaos. This is the scenario that was presented to me when I signed up to be part of my friend Gordie’s “Make Your Own Magic Draft” night, hosted at the illustrious Raygun Lounge, our local game cafe. In my previous Magic re-theme article I talked about changing out the art, names and flavor text to pre-existing Magic cards- ones that were designed by a group of highly trained professionals on a closed course. This time we took off the kid gloves, the training wheels and other make-you-sound-grown-up metaphorical equipment.
Post link
Space: the Convergence
As I wrote last week, I consider theme to be a very important element of any game. Theme is just as important to a game becoming well loved as mechanics and art, and it can change the way you feel about the game while playing it. Recently I’ve been involved with drastically changing the theme, and only the theme, to a very popular game and I’d like to show you what I’ve learned.
Post link
The Hell Factory Hub One
Game: Doom II
Year:2000
Port:ZDoom
Specs:MAP01-MAP04
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Tomi Rajala
idgames|onemandoomTomi Rajala builds on the promise of ZDoom with this Doom II hub pack with a strong Quake II feel. The design is a little too back-and-forth due to the small size of the levels, but Tomi does a good hand at showing us one of Doom’s potential futures.
Post link
Doom: The Mars Missions
Game: Doom II
Year:2000
Port:Any
Specs:MAP01-MAP09
Gameplay Mods: DeHackEd monsters, some incomplete
Author: Berthold Beckschäfer and Thomas Lokum
idgames|onemandoomYet another Mars base goes to shit, this time with survivors - well, mostly just Eileen, the daughter of the scientific coordinator. Your job is to mop up the mess and rescue any souls left in the chaos.
This is an unfinished TC with some interesting features that drives Doom closer to Duke 3D purely through the use of DEH, which is commendable. When I say incomplete, I mean that one of the enemies is an anime succubus who only has attack and death frames so while she flies around all you see are shotgun shell sprites. It also has an actually functional escort with Eileen who must be guided to the teleport controls in some levels so that you can exit. The run of MAP05-07 is very cool; I highly recommend taking a look. MAP08 is pure agony, though, with its super marines, and the final level is a Heretic non-sequitor that I think was slated as a secret map. Still, lots of cool things; it’s too bad they never got around to finishing it.
Post link
Zone 300
Game: Doom II
Year:2013
Port:Any
Specs:MAP01-MAP32
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Paul Corfiatis aka “pcorf”
idgames|onemandoomDoom’s most prolific author used the 100 Lines concept as an excuse to make a bunch of bite-sized Doomlevels.Zone 300 isn’t ugly, is packed with action, and never lasts long enough to wear you down. If you find epic-length Doom levels daunting, try this popcorn-styled mapset out.
Post link
20 Years of Doom
Game:Doom
Year:2014
Port:Boom-compatible
Specs:E1M1-E1M9
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: William Huber aka “[WH]-Wilou84″, Sid Zetmeck, Nils Vandamme aka “Nils the Red”, Jean Bon aka “jambon”, Arnaud Florian aka “Oxyde”, and JC Dorne aka “JCD”
idgames|onemandoomThe French Doom Community whipped up this little tribute to the original Doom where each map in a single episode was supposed to be a mixture of three. They’re not just stitched together homages, though; every level has its own character, even if E1M7 is “Mt. Erebus” as fuck. The run from E1M4-E1M8 is brilliant and E1M1 is a great little pastiche of E1M1-3. E1M2 is really boring, though. Skip it.
Post link
Base Ganymede
Game:Doom
Year:2012
Port:any
Specs: E1M1-E1M9, E2M1-E2M9, E3M1-E3M9
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Adam Woodmansey aka “Khorus”
idgames|doomwiki|onemandoomKhorus made Base Ganymede over the course of a few years, releasing all three episodes together. From the title, it’s supposed to take place on Jupiter’s moon of the same name, but pretty much all of the plot is inference.
Base Ganymede is a “modern” (but still vanilla-comp) Doom megaWAD. It’s got lots of wide-open spaces, tons of neat architecture in Khorus’s particular style, and plenty of monsters to chew through. The author uses the limited bestiary to the best of his ability, with the most lethal foe being the cacodemon, which is great at crowding you out and soaking up ammo.
Post link
Berserk
Game:Doom
Year:1994
Port:Any
Specs:E2M1
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Jon Landis
idgames|doomwiki|onemandoomBerserk is Jon Landis’s first level, of Eye of the Beholder/STRAIN fame. Appropriately enough, it’s also the most basic level in his oeuvre, though it’s still got some enjoyable gameplay moments, mostly related to combat. 1994 haters beware.
Post link
October
Game: Doom II
Year:2010
Port:Limit-removing
Specs:MAP01-MAP06
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Chris Bourke aka “purist”, Michael Jan Krizik aka “valkiriforce”, and Norbert Dávid aka “Noneellama”
idgames|onemandoomA collection of six birthday maps for October babies from three different authors. I believe that they’re all speedmaps in the longer sense (several days instead of a few hundred minutes) so they’re actually pretty solid little outings. MAP03 is impossible to finish if your port of choice won’t handle east/west wallrunning (aka ZDoom).
Post link
Into the Code
Game: Doom II
Year:2014
Port:Any
Specs:MAP01-MAP06
Gameplay Mods:None
Author:“Obsidian”
idgames|onemandoomObsidian gives us a cheeky little adventure where you battle a computer virus that’s decided to hide in your favorite game… Doom II! Prepare to fight your way through digital strangeness and a couple of really nasty traps. It’s a nice collection of short, computer-based levels. “Proxy” is a surreal experience with all the teleporting corpses and whatnot. “Prototypical” has the best action.
Post link
Chaos, Uprising
Game:Heretic
Year:2014
Port:ZDoom
Specs: This mod mixes some gunpowder into Heretic but also adds more magic and different starting character kits.
Gameplay Mods: New characters, new weapons, new monsters, new items
Author: “Richard S. Long”
idgames|onemandoomThis ZDoom mod for Heretic is set long after Corvus’s adventure. Technology has advanced slightly and a mysterious wanderer has settled down on Parthoris only to find the cult of the serpent returning a few years into his retirement. Wield revolvers, shotguns, and various magical implements and pry the secrets of spellcasting from the cult pontiffs as you battle through Corvus’s old stomping grounds. Play as the stranger, the melee-oriented mercenary, agile seer, or mana-leeching warlock. All in all, I thought it was pretty cool, and if you want something a bit more “advanced” from Heretic, you ought to give this a shot.
Post link
KZDOOM1
Game:Doom II
Year:1999
Port:ZDoom
Specs:MAP01
Gameplay Mods: None
Author:Kurt Kesler
idgames|doomwiki|onemandoomOnce Kesler finished his forays into vanilla, limit-removing, and Boom Doom, he tried his hand at ZDoom. This first map has some even more experimental tweaks, like making zombies faster and giving them more health, a trend I think discontinued after this entry. It’s still a very cool level, a showcase of how to enhance Doom II stuff with ZDoom features.
Post link
Wonderland
Game: Doom II
Year:2011
Port:Limit-removing
Specs:MAP01-MAP06
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Paul Stasiuk aka “fiend-o-hell”
idgames|onemandoomStasiuk draws from the popular theme of “space marine stuck in a nightmare”. He actually does manage to pull off a surreal sense, but most players will have trouble making it through the very first map, which is loaded with death traps. Wonderland is interesting, but non-traditional in many aspects.
Post link
Micro Plutonia
Game: Doom II (PLUTONIA.WAD)
Year:2011
Port:Any
Specs:MAP04-MAP06
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Mattias Johansson aka “Waverider”
idgames|onemandoomAs if you couldn’t get enough Plutonia, Waverider took his Plutonia Revisited reject map and added two new minimaps for a tiny trilogy. These levels don’t quite match the standards of PRCP, but they’re great if you’re dying to fight through more Plutonic ruins.
Post link
Khorus’s Speedy Shit
Game: Doom II
Year:2011
Port: Any
Specs:MAP01-MAP32
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Adam Woodmansey aka “Khorus”
idgames|onemandoomSome people might wrinkle their nose at the scatological title but this megaWAD is The Shit. Excreted in little more than a month, these polished shards will dung the crap out of you until you’re flush with excritement. Don’t let this go to waste.
Click here if you’d like to read my full review. (warning: shitty puns ahead)
Post link
Alkylation Episode 1:
Handle With CareGame: Doom II
Year:2011
Port:ZDoom
Specs:MAP01-MAP05
Gameplay Mods: New monsters, new weapons
Author: Lorenzo Davia aka “UltimateLorenzo”
idgames|onemandoomThe latest UAC fuckup comes with a new breed of upgraded Hellspawn and it’s up to you to stop them. Lorenzo takes Doom in a bit of a different direction through extensive use of monster replacements, all of which should be familiar to Realm667 regulars. The stakes are higher and while I miss the normal SSG, getting close to any of the new creatures is a very risky proposition. I dig his particular techbase aesthetic.
Post link
Esselmap I:
Testing FacilityGame: Doom II
Year:2006
Port:Limit-removing
Specs:MAP01
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Sarah Mancuso aka “Esselfortium”
idgames|onemandoomBefore Esselfortium laid her iron grip on the Doom mapping community, she made cool, amateurish levels, too. This plays in Doom II but it’s a big level with an OG Doom look and one of those stream-of-conscious layouts.
Post link
Spawn
Game: Doom II
Year:2011
Port:GZDoom
Specs:MAP01-MAP05
Gameplay Mods: Two new zombies, one new weapon, achievement system
Author: Dave Billing
idgames|onemandoomThe UAC further reveals the depths of its incompetency when its xenobiological research facility on Epsilon Eridani III gets overrun by Hellspawn. Your mission is to put an end to the situation before it has a chance to reach home, preferably by destroying the power core.
Spawn is a modern-day take on the PWADs that cropped up in ZDoom’s infancy, like Tei TengaorHell Factory. The construction is about as smooth as Doom has ever looked, but it shares many of the problems its progenitors have in pacing. Quake II - which these authors undoubtedly attempted to emulate - was (at least in my memory) not nearly as bad with hub-hunting, and Spawn is no different with its blocked-off doors and multiple expeditions into target areas. It’s also really dark, and the custom railgun zombies are super-annoying. Still, it boasts wonders like an achievement system and stands as an example of where Doom can be taken in an advanced source port.
Post link
Quadruple Threat
Game: Doom II
Year:2010
Port:Boom-compatible
Specs:MAP01
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Eric Baker aka “TheGreenHerring”, Jon Vail aka “40oz”, Jamie Bainbridge aka “Super Jamie”, and Joonas Ailjala aka “Jodwin”
idgames|onemandoomThis single map has four contributing authors, each one a fairly recognizable name in the Doom community. It’s a speedmap of sorts, but good luck speeding through it. TheGreenHerring’s section is demons and zombies in the dark while Jodwin posits a superhard slaughter. SuperJamie and 40oz are pretty tame in comparison.
Post link
Fava Beans
Game:Doom
Year:1995
Port:Any
Specs:E1M1-E1M9
Gameplay Mods:None
Author: Sean Birkel and Ben Gates
idgames|doomwiki|onemandoomFava Beans remains one of the premiere Doom episodes, but it’s not because of crazy, memorable fights. Sean Birkel was a wizard at channeling the look and feel of Doom into memorable level layouts complete with architecture, in spite of its many recognizable homages. The only downside is that the combat is basically unmemorable apart from the perfunctory consistency with which the monster closets are staffed.
Post link
