Aliens-TC guns
Aliens-TC guns | Alignment tests | The Catacombs | Demon Base | Dreamland | Fish! | I Am Very Weird | Infested Factory | King's Palace | The Light | Martin's Subway | Medieval Castle | Sewage Works | Sewer Control | Space Base | Texture Showoff
These Doom WADs have been tested with RISC OS Doom v2.03, although they ought to work with versions of Doom for other platforms. Some WADs are designed for Doom (or Ultimate Doom); most are for Doom II.
In my opinion the best level available here is 'Sewage Works' although as one of the co-authors I am arguably biased! I like extravagant scenery, attention to detail (e.g. texture alignment) and lighting effects - all of which it features in spades. Some of the older WADs were designed by my younger brother Martin when he was only eight years old, so don't be too harsh on them. His latest and best efforts are 'Dreamland', 'Sewer Control' and ' Space Base', which are all his own work.
The title of each WAD is linked to the relevant ZIP archive for download. On RISC OS computers ZIP archives may be opened using SparkPlug, SparkFS (commercial) or Infozip. Each archive contains the WAD file, and an accompanying text file in the standard format.
The thumbnail pictures are linked either to a full-size version of that screen shot or in some cases a whole page of screen shots from that WAD.
Aliens-TC guns
This WAD provides the 10mm assault rifle, grenade launcher and smart gun from Justin Fisher's amazing ' Aliens' Total Conversion - the point being so that you can use these weapons in normal games of Doom.
The new weapons replace the chain gun, rocket launcher and plasma rifle respectively. They behave the same as their Doom equivalents - so grenades don't bounce or do anything outside the normal physics of the game. However the new graphics and sounds make a welcome change. In particular the assault rifle from 'Aliens' looks and sounds much more powerful than the chain gun.
Justin Fisher (compiled by Chris Bazley)
25-Apr-2003, release 1
Alignment tests (for Doom)
This small WAD illustrates some of the principles explained in Martin's texture alignment tutorial - mostly about unpegging textures, but with some stairs and sloping ceilings as well. The wall texture of choice is 'GRAY4' because it resembles the diagrams in the tutorial. Everything is plotted squarely on a 64-unit grid.
There are no weapons, although an exit is available in the vine room. There are 4 player positions and 4 deathmatch starts, for convention's sake if nothing else. You could possibly try it with deathmatch if you add weapons and ammunition or don't mind punching each other to death!
03-Jun-2007, release 1
The Catacombs (for Doom)
Centred around a tiny, winding, ever- changing system of tunnels. The difficulty levels are intentionally easy; in the future this WAD will form the first level of a replacement episode for Doom. However, there are lots of puzzles to make up for it.
25-Nov-2006, release 2
Demon Base (for Doom)
According to your watch, it's the 12th of June. Which is odd, because it was definitely the 5th of June about five seconds ago, and you were at your friend's birthday party, not here...
Frantically, you cast your mind back to the time which was presumably a week ago. There was that girl; a real shocker. That was your most recent memory - the girl. Cascading chestnut-brown hair and bright blue eyes; shame about the complexion. Actually, hang on, how many people have you seen with grey skin hanging off them...? And was that really her cheap perfume that smelt of rotting flesh...?
More memories come back to you, fleeting glimpses of something almost like those movies you weren't allowed to stay up to watch as a kid. Rooms full of zombies... evil experiments in dark laboratories... more and cheaper ways to efficiently zombify lots of people at once. The worst thing was, you seemed to be helping them!
Something fishy's up on the Martian colony. You jump up from where you are sitting, and decide there and then to go and do something about it.
08-Apr-2008
Dreamland (for Doom)
A medium-sized level featuring a few nice ideas, including two mazes. There is a secret exit to mission 9 of episode 1. This WAD is called 'Dreamland' because most of the design work came to Martin in a dream. Scary, eh!?
Martin thinks this is easily the best WAD he has ever produced and I am inclined to agree. I had a lot of fun playing it and died in all the right places.
07-Oct-2006, release 2
Quite a lot, mostly affecting secret areas and map features. Nothing that affects gameplay.
Fish! (for Doom II)
This was an experiment in finding out whether I could take a simple map based on the gimmick of its resemblance to a word (in this case 'Fish'), and rework it into something imaginative and unique. I believe that I have succeeded; hopefully you will agree.
Having relied upon new textures in all my previous WADs, I also wanted to what I could do when restricted to using only original Doom II textures.
It is still a relatively small level, but takes a reasonable amount of time to play through and has some neat design elements. You'll need to keep your wits about you in order to survive.
"Fish" is the despised pet name by which my little brother was known, by the way.
"The room with the bars is rather annoying IMHO; apart from that it's a classic, fun level."
(Comment by Dr. Andreas Dehmel.)
09-May-2003, release 2
Fixed a problem inside the door of the room across the courtyard (the ceiling was far too high, though this was barely visible). Also, improved the alignment of the texture on the inside wall.
I Am Very Weird (for Doom)
I believe this the best of the early levels that Martin designed, although not as good as his later efforts (such as 'Dreamland'). Because the scenery is relatively simple it isn't very taxing on computing power. It features a number of traps and secrets. I implemented the level layout for him in DETH and in the process was also allowed some creative input.
Martin says that he named this one 'IWEIRD/WAD' because he sought to emulate strangely-named levels such as 'COMBINE/WAD' and 'FISTULA/WAD', the meaning of which was not apparent to him. He only inserted 'Am Very' upon realising he had to think up a title for the help file!
17-Aug-1999, release 1
Infested Factory (for Ultimate
Doom)
A secret research facility beneath the surface of Phobos has been frantically beaming out distress signals for the past three hours, but obviously nobody noticed until tea break was over. Now it's probably too late.
Nobody is known to have survived, but it's a valuable place and you and a friend have been sent in to clean up. The entrance lobby doesn't look too dangerous. 'This is easy,' snorts your friend, reaching out to open the door, just as it bursts into flames... Easy it ain't.
Two slightly different versions of this WAD are available. The preferred version requires Ultimate Doom (because it uses the SKY4 texture from the fourth episode), whereas the other version is designed to work with plain old Doom I.
07-Dec-2006, release 1
King's Palace (for Doom II)
Another one of Martin's early levels, and a very strange one! The 'palace' in which you start is deserted but in the 'space port' across the courtyard "You are in for a nasty surprise", as he puts it.
Actually, describing it as a 'palace' is an overstatement (even given the inherent limitations of Doom) but then he was only seven years old when he designed it.
18-Dec-1999, release 1
The Light (for Doom II)
A bijou level involving a room with a lamp, a dark maze with green torches (pictured) and a miniature end-of-level boss. This was the very first level which Martin designed. From the point of view of implementation it gave me a chance to experiment on a small scale with gradated lighting effects (i.e. multiple adjacent sectors with successively lower light levels).
15-Nov-1999, release 1
Martin's Subway (for Doom)
This level is based on the map for the first mission of Doom, with the addition of some subway-like tunnels and stations. Of course there aren't actually any trains because that would be impossible to implement.
It is the first WAD that Martin created completely independent of me, and after a lot of work it's finally looking quite polished. Having play tested it on 'ultra-violence' I can also say it is very taxing if you unexpectedly unleash a big monster in a confined space.
14-Apr-2005, release 1
Medieval Castle (for Doom II)
Yet another level based on the concept of a medieval-style castle, although hopefully it is unique enough to provide a bit of entertainment. You must infiltrate the castle, which naturally is infested with monsters, and somehow reach the boat house at the rear to make your escape.
This WAD started as an experiment to demonstrate my new flaming torch graphics and gradually increased in size (a little) and detail (a lot). In particular the towers with the spiral staircase took longer to get right than I care to think about!
12-Jun-2003, release 4
Sewage Works (for Doom II)
This sewage works is populated by monsters who are trying to kill you. Your objective is simple - get out alive. You may find that obvious exits are blocked but you must persevere in your quest, which will eventually take you underground into the sewers themselves.
In my opinion the difficulty levels are harder than an average Doom level and 'ultra-violence' is very tough. Because this level is large and complex it may sometimes run jerkily on slow computers.
Due to problems with patching of Sprites/Flats in the original DOS version of Doom (not the RISC OS version), there is also an alternative version with fewer new graphics. Or you could use Olivier Montanuy's DeuSF utility to merge the graphics.
Chris Bazley & John Tardrew
13th Feb 2005, release 8
Sewer Control (for Doom)
It seems a bunch of demons has invaded the sewer control system, and have plans to flood the city with raw sewage! After a bit of straw-drawing, you have been sent in to get rid of them. Unfortunately, they could only find a pistol to arm you with. You think it'll be easy. You wish.
25th November 2006, release 3
Space Base (for Doom)
Martin describes this as a pretty average (not to mention small) WAD, except for the starting area. He thinks the start is astoundingly original because you can already see the exit (but can't reach it). Fortunately, that is not the only thing this WAD has to recommend it.
This is a well designed level incorporating some good ideas. He has obviously taken time over the texturing and other details. Ideal if you fancy a quick blast.
21 Oct 2005
Texture Showoff (for Doom)
Designed many moons ago by Martin around the concept of a series of rooms with alternately red or silver decor. Apparently this was inspired by my experimention with coloured lighting effects in his WAD 'I Am Very Weird' (through judicious use of similar textures in different hues).
This level will forever be unofficially known as the Showoff-Waah, due to the 10 character limit on file names imposed by most old RISC OS filing systems.
13-Sep-1999, release 1
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