skePLand (SKEPLAND.WAD)

Monakhov Vladimir, aka "Skepticist", published the first iteration of skePLand back in late 2011, adding another level to it in 2012. Currently, it's three maps for the Plutonia IWAD, though not really borrowing the style. skePLand has a nasty brand of gameplay, highlighted in the .TXT. Doomers looking for a less demanding experience are directed to play the maps on HMP, which is sound advice. Your Doom gods can try to tango on UV, but HMP is still more than the average player will be comfortable with. For an idea of just how much harsher Skepticist has set things up, compare the opening of MAP03 on both difficulties.

New PWAD layout

Long-time readers may have noticed a shift in the format of multiple-level PWAD reviews toward something resembling Andy Olivera's review page. This design migrated from the series articles in Serial Killing, where it was prototyped. I'm still working out some kinks but I'm backporting all of the archived articles to the current standard. Any and all opinions are welcome on possible improvements. You might notice some incongruities with backported articles as I am using a few reformats as the template for others; report these for a swift fix!

Winter's Fury (WINTER'S FURY.WAD)

Every so often a super-ambitious GZDoom project manages to climb over the sea of bodies left by its fallen brethren and grab the brass ring. 2012 had Ed Cripps's Putrefier, but it also had Pyroscourge's Winter's Fury, a twelve-map episode for Doom II packed with tons of goodies. Winter's Fury, like many PWADs, begins some time after the events of Hell on Earth. The demons lost the war on Terra, but rebuilding has been a long and costly process. The UAC kept the corpse of the uber-demon - Baphomet - interred deep in the mountains of Siberia while tactical units traveled across the globe, wiping out the remaining bastions of infestation. Of course, when scanning Earth for demonic activity, recent results revealed a presence in the top-secret facility where Baphomet's body resides. When the exploratory team failed to report back, well...

Beyond Reality (BRFINAL.WAD)

Darsycho, aka Jack101 (aka the_afrit) wants to take you on a wild ride to a dimension of pure insanity. Beyond Reality chronicles a bizarro world on the fringes of Doomspace, filled with unusual monsters that bring their own dynamic to tried and true gameplay. There's no stated reason for your intrusion to this mixed-up place; it simply is, an amusement park concocted to test your conceptions of what should be. There are seventeen levels for Doom II in Beyond Reality; fifteen normal maps, a "credits" level that has some decent gameplay, and a hidden foray in the MAP31 slot. The features of the mapset require one of the ZDoom family of ports.

The Eye (EYE.WAD)

THE EYE
by Cyriak "mouldy" Harris

The Eye is an unassuming single map for Doom II, meant to be played in Boom (or Boom-compatible) engines. It isn't the first thing Doomworld forum superstar mouldy's made, but it's the first solo release that found its way onto the archives. There's no pomp and circumstance in the .TXT, just a terse description that gives you a vague idea of what you're in for. The Eye isn't exactly an enormous level. It's certainly smaller than other maps I've played featuring more than 500 monsters. But, yeah, there are a bunch of enemies to fight, found in what are essentially two different areas of the level.

Strife: Absolute Order (SABORD.WAD)

I love Strife, so it's cool to see that a few crazy people make WADs for it. Absolute Order was originally going to be a much larger project, but it's clear that Adam "Khorus" Woodmansey decided to finish the project as it was rather than languish due to disinterest. So, here's a short episode for the most neglected child of the Doom family (unless you count HACX). The plot is pretty simple. Even with the death of the entity at the end of the original game (uh, spoilers I guess), outposts of the Order remain. You're not the Strifeguy, apparently, just an agent of the front who's been sent to loosen tyranny's dying grasp on the world.

Putrefier (MA_PUT.PK3)

PUTREFIER
by Ed Cripps

Ed Cripps, known as the brains behind the famous Sin City series, released Putrefier in late 2012. Originally meant to be part of a much larger release (think legit TC), he saw fit to make one single level for Doom II in GZDoom. It's more or less a sequel to 2010's Valhalla, another single map for ZDoom. There's no given story, but with the context of the mission profile that pops up right before the level's finale, the character is ostensibly the Doom marine, sent to another charming military base that has since been corrupted and overrun by Hellspawn. And that's pretty much all there is to it, so grab the gear laid out for you at the front door and get to shooting!

Back to Saturn X E1: Get Out of My Stations (BTSX_E1.WAD)

I hear whispers every month, people bemoaning a lack of output in the Doom community. It's like all the mappers have had their output drastically cut off, leaving only eager newbies to make the megaWADs of the future. Or, you know, some dastardly villain had many of the authors we know and love working in secret. But no longer! Now, we get Back to Saturn X. I thought it was going to be a slammin' Doom II megaWAD of stuff to blast through, but there's more. There's so much more. Back to Saturn X went from megaWAD to triple megaWAD, seeing release in three "episodes" filled by eager authors. This review concerns the first episode, Get Out of My Stations.