Nebula 95: Drown Stone Cassette B (NEB04.WAD)

NEBULA 95:
DROWN STONE CASSETTE B
by Chris "lupinx-Kassman" Kassap

This ended up being the first of the Nebula 95 levels to appear on the archive, but Drown Stone began life as part of the Doomworld Secret Santa project. There are a few big differences between this edition and the previous, but if you've played the original level, the gameplay is basically identical to my eyes, excepting the Nebula 95 intro map on the saucer. It's got an amusing background story. Since Kassman used a stewboy track for the first version (part of his stewboy imitation), Cassette B is offered as an alternative more in spirit with the gives-no-fucks attitude of Nebula 95. The choice is left to you, as beads of sweat pour down Doomguy's forehead since he can't make the decision himself.

color scheme

dickin' around with the blog color scheme after reading some pointed feedback given to raymoohawk about his sprite edits re: the color of perfect pitch black. it was an easy pick when i started this up, back when it was One Man's Journey Through Doom, but I think its time for a change. your feedback is appreciated. after all, its your eyes that have to put up with the damn thing!

Valiant (VALIANT.WAD)

Skillsaw owned 2011's mapper of the year with two releases; Vanguard, an episode inspired by Speed of Doom that elicited cries of "make it a megaWAD!", and Lunatic, a minisode full of projectile-dodging that takes place on Earth's moon. In 2015, everyone who prayed for a megaWAD got their wish... and then some. Valiant is another full replacement for Doom II, and it's got all the bells and whistles, including five distinct episodes, extensive DeHackEd work that adds a handful of new monsters to the roster, and changes to Doom's most overlooked weapons, the pistol and chaingun. When all is said and done, the megaWAD hopefuls may have got more than they'd bargained for, or at the very least, something completely unexpected.

Nebula 95: Human Earrings (NEB03.WAD)

NEBULA 95:
HUMAN EARRINGS
by Chris "lupinx-Kassman" Kassap

This time we take a bit of a detour in Nebula 95, acknowledging that the series itself is a detour from typical Doom fare with its unusual blend of jazz and funk tracks, demons, and jarring SFX, a deliberate callback to the anything goes days of Doom mods. Human Earrings is the first (and at the time of this writing the only) original entry in Nebula 95, which has you traveling through the mysterious forbidden quadrant in a corner of the galaxy inundated with the eponymous hallucinogenic gas. After spending some time in your ship, which might reward you with some armor, you can touch down and put these particular demons to task for their gruesome mockery of human life.

UAC Ultra (UACULTRA.WAD)

We know that horrible shit wound up happening to the UAC bases on Phobos and Deimos. Mars was never officially touched on, though, until id remade the series with Doom 3. Different PWAD authors have told their own stories about the Mars facility. In 2010, Jon Vail aka 40oz and Super Jamie Bainbridge put their heads together for UAC Ultra, an eleven-ish map episode for Doom II to be played in Boom-compatible ports. There's no clear delineation as to who did what work; like 2011's Double Impact, I assume that the authors picked over each others' maps until the levels felt complete.

Urotsuki: Radical Way (UROTSUK3.WAD)

UROTSUKI
RADICAL WAY
by "Lainos"

Lainos started releasing his Urotsuki trilogy in December of 2014. It was an experiment in aesthetics, trying to pioneer a brand new theme for Doom II that borrowed from the works of H.R. Giger and the infamous anime movie series, Urotsukidoji. The end result is a post-apocalyptic cityscape whose war-torn ruins are being slowly overtaken by some kind of bio-technical creep. Part of the influence is marked by sinister step pyramids standing far and near. After finding a way through the insidious machinery of Dead End, the player slowly picks through a scene of urban desolation, with one sole structure standing ominously in the distance. The true nature of the evil you oppose is never made clear, but its thrust is unmistakable.

Swim With the Whales (SWTW.WAD)

Ribbiks loaded up two barrels of ultrahard slaughter goodness and blasted them into Doomworld in 2013. Stardate 20X6 felt like a more conventional if claustrophobic take on the genre, showering everything with the color purple. Swim With the Whales, which came out toward the tail end of the year, is a smaller outing that tackles a different shade on the color wheel - blue. This time, you're stalking through ancient, forgotten fortresses at the bottom of the ocean. The final total comes out to four levels (one "bonus") for Boom-compatible ports, the likes of which you've never seen... until now.

Urotsuki: Dead End (UROTSUK2.WAD)

UROTSUKI
DEAD END
by "Lainos"

Dead End follows hot on the heels of Lainos's Urotsuki: Inferno Road. Having played the former, I can't say I'm any wiser, but I digress. UROTSUK2 is a single MAP01 replacement for Doom II to be played in any limit-removing port that also supports .OGG playback. As usual, this basically means PrBoom-Plus and on up. The action of Inferno Road was bizarre; you emerged from a crate into a world undergoing a dark metamorphosis and fought your way to a skyscraper which appeared to have been surrounded by military vehicles. After a climactic battle brought on by draining an ominous contraption of its precious fluids, you drove the vehicle until reaching a dead end at a chasm, after which this level picks up.