For the past, oh, probably 3 weeks or so, I’ve been working on a test map for some Dehacked work that is going to be in Supplice. It was mostly just supposed to be some quick speedmapped areas for various specifics bits to be tested in. Figure out what’s sounds off here? Yea, it shouldn’t take 3 weeks to build a simple test map 
. The map in question has been a lot of fun to work on…in fact it’s probably the most fun I’ve had working on a map in a long time. I’ve been expanding and detailing and polishing more than I should be for a test map, thus the long build period. So yesterday, I made a decision.
I haven’t made a serious attempt at full-scale single-player mapping [outside of speedmapping] since Salamadastron back in 2006, which was one of my first real maps. I’m don’t necessarily count my contributions in Claustrophobia 1024 since they were relatively easy to build, although I did learn quite a bit about Boom mapping and some things about singple player mapping. What I’d really like is some practice on a full-scale, unlimited single player mapping. And this test-map-turned-beast is going to be my platform for a short 5-episode map set, which I’m calling “Vela Pax“.
The goals of this project are going to be short and sweet; I’ll be creating 5 full-length singleplayer maps, for PRBoom+, using stock Doom II resources. I will be using some new sky textures and new module music, but outside of that everything will be using stock Doom II stuff. Once done, I’ll take all of the feedback and whatnot and apply it to my mapping for Supplice; basically, this is a practice session. The reason why it’s going to be limited to PRBoom+ is because I want to use some cool .it/.s3m musics…sort of a dumb reason I guess but that’s what I want 
. I may even eventually add-on to this project at later dates. I hope to finished this little project up in a timely manner, although I currently do not have a definite schedule.
As you should already know, I’ve already got one map in production. I’ve also got the beginnings of another map I started on about a month ago which I will also be using for this. Aaaand, for those of you who saw and played my speedmap Dominion of Madness, I plan on detailing, polishing, and adding-to it for one of the later maps in the episode. Some of you who lurk the Doomworld forums have probably already seen some of the screenshots I’ve posted on the map I’ve been working on for the past few weeks. Well I’ve been working pretty hard on it for the past few days, so here are some new shots! I’d hate for my 5 readers to leave this post empty handed 
So will this delay Supplice or any of the other projects I’m working on in any way? Supplice will definitely not be delayed since, due to it’s infinite schedule of lazy, it is un-delayable (also it’s nowhere near ready for map production). I could probably be working on TSoZD or Vaporware in the mean time instead of doing this…but actually, I think it’s going to be more beneficial for me to do this little mini-episode for practice. It will benefit Supplice as well as those other two projects in terms of my experience with single player mapping, and I don’t plan on taking forever to finished this up as it’s 99% mapping.
Anyways, expect to hear and see more about Vela Pax in the near future! I’ll be starting project threads and a Wads In Progress page shortly.
Super Jamie
11 Mar 2010Delicious, I love some of the little detailing tricks you’ve done here. Also totally stoked you’ll be expanding on mek-dom, I really enjoy that map already!
So glad you’re having fun dude
[WH]-Wilou84
11 Mar 2010Nice screenies Mechadon, it’s impressive how you manage to keep a high level of detailing while restricting yourself with the Doom II stock textures !
I think new textures ( like your Quake-like ones ) would be even greater though.
I’ll be following this and Supplice as well. Good luck
Mechadon
11 Mar 2010I always appreciate the comments guys, thanks alot!
About the textures, my main concern at this point is to just keep it simple and focus mostly on mapping, so just using stock Doom II stuff seemed like a good idea. I’d certainly think about using some new texture, quite possibly those Quake ones, if I ever add-to this project though
Super Jamie
11 Mar 2010Actually, I love to see just the IWAD textures used in creative ways. Some people like to challenge themselves by sticking to Vanilla limits, or making a map within a certain amount of time. I have to say my favorite challenge is putting those 16-yearold resources to uses which make people say wow!
Mechadon
11 Mar 2010And I really do enjoy working with stock textures too. The only thing that sorta bugs me at times are the lack of certain textures that you’d think would be there…like the water/lava falls. Hopefully my stuff will be wow worthy though…we’ll see how it turns out