Complex 867 (COMP867.WAD)

COMPLEX 867

by Simon "Volte-Face" Broadhead

Simon was a minor fixture in the Doom community from 2001-2004. He didn't make any maps and he was also in his early to mid teens for all of his authorial work. He had an entry in the DoomCenter E1 Mapping Contest, submissions in the first Community Chest as well as its sequel, and even participated in Exquisite Corpse. Broadhead only had a couple of solo releases, Hell's Arena in 2001 and Complex 867 in 2002. The latter, COMP867, is a MAP01 replacement for Doom II. Volte-Face suggests that the level itself is vanilla-compatible but recommends using a limit-removing source port.

The author doesn't mention anything approximating a plot but he goes out of his way to talk up how many secrets there are. Seventeen sounds like a lot until you realize that nine of them are tied up in a compact, indulgent secret chain. Simon didn't go out of his way to hide anything so the automap will help you out. Once you find the computer powerup it should all fall into place. I would hate to go through without having the hidden weapons, too. One off the first room grants the chaingun and super shotgun and you won't find the SSG any other way. Diligence will also award you with a megasphere during the big outdoor brawl.

HELLARNA occupied the sweet spot concerning form and function. Its simple architecture serviced the pacing of Broadhead's encounters. Complex 867 has a larger, more traditional layout and can basically be divided into two segments, the east portion and the west. The former has a green marble temple aesthetic while the latter resembles a techbase. The two are linked by a single teleporter so Simon worked to make sure that the transition between texture themes wasn't completely random. The overall architecture is more something that you might expect from a 1994-1995 room and corridor level, though. It has a few neat setpieces but is mostly composed of boxy / orthogonal shapes.

The marble section isn't very large but it contains many of the plain secret chambers and the most DoomCute bit, a painstaking sector cable hooked up to a teleporter pad. There's one large encounter - essentially the finale - that features a clutch of cacodemons. They are visible but motionless behind a transparent wall, the devils of Damocles. The starting area looks okay and gave me a sort of Black Tower vibe. There's a warehouse / bunker just outside of the atrium. It's the scene of one of the standout encounters, a brawl where you're trapped in a cage in the corner while waves of imps and zombies teleport into the room. It's a pretty good setup and easily survivable with the chaingun.

The other side of the level is larger and more typically techbase. Some of the visuals are banal but the crate maze that emerges from the water is pure, '94-era acid trip. The big attraction is an outdoor area whose appearance and combat are eerily similar to Hell's Arena. It's a big outer yard and medium-size packs of heavy monsters are delivered through large pockets / holding pens at the periphery. It feels less dynamic, though, since the ground floor is so large and the monsters are unleashed from a limited variety of angles. It's sort of fun as a slaughter-lite since you can lean hard on the rocket launcher. I also like these sorts of fights where areas are expansively revealed a la Memento Mori's "Showdown" (MAP23).

Simon's architecture may not blow me away but he shows a knack for nonrestrictive detailing. Power supply to teleporter aside, he put decent work into lightcasting in some of the interior spaces. It sticks out like a sore thumb when secret side-areas get more attention poured into them but lighting - especially dynamic - is a great way to give plain levels some much-needed character. My favorite element is something that I didn't even realize until taking screenshots. It's a marine corpse next to a doorway and the bottom lip of the frame has a bloody metal texture aligned with the body for a smart bit of environmental design.

It's too bad that Broadhead's Complex 867 didn't live up to the promise of HELLARNA, which was a fun little banger of a level. I still found it to be more fun than his DoomCenter E1 Mapping Contest submission. It'll be interesting to see what Simon brings to the plate in 2003 and 2004 with the Community Chest series.

AREA 5309