Requiem (REQUIEM.WAD)

Most of these authors should look familiar to you. Requiem gathered some of the greatest "star" power when it came to megaWAD authors of the time. Some of the names you may recognize from Memento Mori / MM2, and others from STRAIN and Dystopia 3. And, of course, there are a few new faces, as always seems to be the case with these community projects. The show-stealers for this particular project appear to be Iikka Keranen and Anthony "Adelusion" Czerwonka who together might as well have released Dystopia 4 in disguise. Adam Windsor contributes a fair number of maps as well, but all but one of them are short but sweet affairs, singled out by some as filler speedmaps made to push Requiem to release (given an apparently troubled development, not unlike STRAIN and The Talosian Incident).

Mordeth (Episode 1) (MORDETH.WAD)

Mordeth's first episode was released in 1997. The rest of the project has been in development ever since. It's been so notorious for its delays (all understandable) that the Cacowards have a category named in its honor, dedicated to the released project with the longest development time. Duke Nukem Forever, the butt of gamer jokes everywhere, was announced and released during Mordeth's development. At the very least, Gaston Lahaut can take solace in the fact that Mordeth (now being developed for the Eternity Engine) will be far more enjoyable than Duke Nukem Forever, not that that's saying much.

STRAIN (STRAIN.WAD)

STRAIN is a 32-map partial conversion created by the Alpha Dog Alliance, a loose confederation of Doom enthusiasts, many of them fairly prolific in the community at the time. While some I recognize from their individual works, others are familiar contributors to the community WADs of the past (MM and MMII) and then present (Requiem). STRAIN was in production for quite some time; Patterson (the project director) spoke of work stalling while a number of 1996 high-profile WADs were released (some of their authors also contributing to STRAIN!). Fortunately, STRAIN saw a release, and though it has a few very short levels and some donations (from the cancelled Serenity IV project and Dystopia 3), it would still be worth your attention if half the WAD went missing.

CHORD_NG (CHORD_NG.WAD)

CHORD_NG
by Malcolm Sailor

CHORD_NG (previously referred to as CHORD: The Next Generation) is one of a few levels in Malcolm Sailor's CHORD series, the maps of which he claims are the only good ones he's ever made. If that's the case, then I gather that Sailor prizes very hard and very fast gameplay, because that's what CHORD_NG (replacing MAP28 of Doom II) is all about, playing something like a Hell Revealed map on a much smaller scale. There's no story, just you and some Hellish battlements isolated in a sea of lava. Alignment, lighting and all that jazz is impeccable. Sailor emphasizes his tower theme by surrounding the main island with four smaller structures in the distance to place the map outside of a void. Enough about the visuals, though.

The Talosian Incident (TALOSIAN.WAD)

The Talosian Incident is a 20-map megaWAD for Doom II by Black Star Coven, an organization consisting of a number of Doom authors who intended this to be their farewell to the Doom community, in search of browner pastures. From what I can tell, it was supposed to be longer (probably the full 32 maps) but, well, here we are! Most of the maps are courtesy of John "Gestalt666" Bye and Malcolm Sailor (eight and nine, respectively) with a few other authors contributing one map each (including a collaboration with Ola Bjorling), and almost all of the new, atmospheric music by Bye. As an interesting sidenote, few of these authors would actually end their Doom mapping careers with this release.

Hell's Eventide (EVENTIDE.WAD)

HELL'S EVENTIDE
by Marty Ihlen, Travers Dunne and Rick Clark

Hell's Eventide is a product of tag-team mapping between Marty Ihlen, Travers Dunne and Rick Clark. The tremendous trio passed the WAD from member to member after modifying it, creating a medium-size map for Doom II with its own particular Hellish style. The story is a little muddled but the protagonist appears to have witnessed the downfall of his father's kingdom to the forces of evil, brought on by a jealous subject, an adviser named Hilsgarde. The result rended time and space in such a way that future, past and present commingled, resulting in a twisted, broken world. The narrator thus resolves to fulfill his father's dying wish, now that he's older, and slay the source of evil, thus returning things to their proper place.

Eternal Doom (ETERNAL.WAD)

Eternal Doom began life as a 12-map episode for Doom II, produced by Team Eternal and under the direction of Paul Schmitz, the author of Artifact and Welcome to Hell. A number of WAD authors cleaved unto him, including Sverre Kvernmo, who is responsible for many of the new graphics (that is, the stuff not ripped from Heretic and Hexen). Eternal Doom was updated two more times, adding fifteen and six levels, respectively, to turn it into a mega-megaWAD. I know this project eventually came under the purview of Team TNT, but I have no idea when that happened. I'm guessing some time during the development of Eternal Doom II, but I have no basis for that assumption. For sure, Eternal Doom III was headed by TNT, given Ty Halderman's involvement.

Dawn of the Dead (DODEAD.WAD)

Dawn of the Dead is an episode replacement for Doom's Knee Deep in the Dead. Well, almost an episode replacement. Jan Van der Veken never finished E1M5 (at least, for this episode), so it's more like 8 maps. The story takes place on Jupiter's moon, Europa, where simple lifeforms were discovered, leading to attempts to terraform the planet (I mean, that would probably kill all the native species, but whatever). The end goal was to colonize the moon, and at the "current" time, there's a burgeoning population complete with a contingent of space marines. Of course, they managed to discover relics from a past civilization that mastered teleportation technology (sploops!) and, later, some manuscripts containing vague warnings (double sploops!). And, now, the moon's colonies have (mostly) overrun by an unknown hostile force. Owing to your expertise, you're sent in to deal with the situation.

Hell Revealed (HR.WAD)

Hell Revealed was designed to be hard. Let's just get this out of the way. Donner and Niv, the WAD's architects (I believe hailing from Israel), used skill level 4 to create a difficulty level for those who found Ultra-Violence in other PWADs to be easy, using skill level 3 to provide a setting more in line with the previous UV standard. However, to quote Donner:

"...some people never bother to use skill level selections, and always play on Ultra-Violence. These people see that Hell Revealed is too hard for them on Ultra-Violence but instead of playing on skill 3 or even lower, they just say 'Hell Revealed is too hard' and switch to godmode or don't play at all. To me it seems really stupid - after all, that's what difficulty levels are for!"