Favorite D2 Single-Player Campaigns

[Xfing]

Yeah, "Against Thee Wickedly" is a sweet level, probably the best Romero-made official level. And hard as hell too, but I think I've managed it several times. I only play Doom on UV, quite unlike Descent

[Sirius]

Umm. If you have access to the breakdown, does the difficulty of AF vary by author in your opinion?

[Alter-Fox]

This is irrelevant, but I think I once named a track in Trackmania Canyon after a level from AF and a level from Obsidian...

[Naphtha]

Umm. If you have access to the breakdown, does the difficulty of AF vary by author in your opinion?

Well, assuming every level had just one author and there was individual item placement, then I remember your levels (the ones without ownage depots ) being a great deal easier. Then again, that might not be completely fair since Darkhorse handled most of the boss levels, but overall there seemed to be larger clusters of robots in his levels, along with more psych-out traps (the side area with the mercenary and the locked matcens in Level 7, for example). Plus there was the ridiculously short countdowns for Level 5 and Level 7... In the coop run I did on Ace, I think only Whoskyd made it out of Level 7 alive!


Another one I've been playing lately is Project H.Y.D.R.O., a 23-level pack (18 obligatory, 5 secret) from around 2000 with surprisingly good robot mods for back then. It has a lot of the same feel of Descent 1 and 2, but the handful of new robots do set it apart and add an extra dimension of challenge to certain areas. I've only gotten through Level 7 as of writing this, but I really like it so far with one of the only complaints being slight imbalances in weapon handouts. Definitely want to breeze through the rest of this in the next few days if I can, since even with me getting deeper into multiplayer now, D2 single-player is still very enjoyable.

[Xfing]

Levels 2, 3 and 5 struck me as the hardest, but other than that I'd say the difficulty was pretty evened out.

[Alter-Fox]

Project HYDRO is a good one, definitely. You just need to get past the first couple of levels. Pretty obvious they were all built in order .

[Xfing]

Guys, how to open the yellow key X-grate on level 7? I'm completely stuck and have no idea how to proceed.

EDIT: Nvm, figured it out. I wouldn't call the puzzle intuitive, though.

[Alter-Fox]

I don't think it's possible to make puzzles in Descent intuitive.

[Top Gun]

Yeah, most of them seem to be of the variety, "Hey, shoot this switch, and magically guess what door opens three rooms over!"

[Naphtha]

Nah, I honestly don't think those control panels blocking the keys were hard to figure out aside from finding them. Project HYDRO definitely set a pattern with panels mostly used to unveil keys and not for much else, so by a certain point it became a pretty clear pattern. But if that doesn't work out that way, usually the best a level designer can do is give little clues using the scenery. For example, if I thought players were going to have a hard time figuring out what panel reveals a key, I'd probably use one of the three "RBot" wall textures that matches the color of the key it lets you grab.


Anyway, HYDRO was pretty interesting with the sudden "plot" in the last few levels. The robots certainly got harder, but they were still manageable until I got to the Level 16 boss (think Ice Boss with less room to dodge or camp) with two Shakers but no Megas to spam it with after that. Definitely liked how Level 15 was done, although it makes it impossible to complete the mission in coop. I think my only real complaints are that certain parts (such the reactor defenses) stayed on the easy side for far too long and Levels 17 and 18 felt way too short and might've easily served as a nice conceptual end to Level 16. The story idea wasn't bad, but both felt a little tacked-on as individual levels.

[LightWolf]

The best one is The Enemy Within. It's a fact. Admit it. Don't be ashamed.

[Alter-Fox]

As well as the visual clues, the best way I've found to do panels is to put the panel and the thing it does in the same room, or at least reasonably close and not separated by a door. That way you can hear, say, a door or a wall open -- and if it's a door you might even be able to tell what door it is by the sound. Adding the clues and not spreading the sequence (let's not even call it a puzzle because it's not one ) over the whole map are the best ways to go.
And also never check the "no message" box XD. When you don't even know what the panel did and it's seven rooms in the distance that gets very frustrating very fast and causes ragequits. :cough: Obsidian :cough: You don't want to cause ragequits.

This thread reminds me that I was going to add some compression & volume to the TEW songs for re-release. I should do that.

[Xfing]

To be honest, I'm not sure if I can even unlock all the secrets in Tycho Brahe on a single run, let alone some custom level sets that are even harder and more creative.

[Avder]

Is there a version of AF that doesn't require D2X XL?

[Sirius]

Yes, the original didn't since it was older... looking it up...
http://enspiar.com/dmdb/viewMission.php?id=418 I think that's it... screenshot still seems to be from XL, but that doesn't matter.

[Avder]

Yes, the original didn't since it was older... looking it up...
http://enspiar.com/dmdb/viewMission.php?id=418 I think that's it... screenshot still seems to be from XL, but that doesn't matter.

Hm, I see level 1 doesn't ★■◆● around. This is gonna be fun on the bun!

[Sirius]

Well... yeah, I guess not. Compared to levels 2/3 it does, though.

The remainder of the set has its moments, but the opening is just brutal - largely thanks to limited weapons (and, honestly, space) at that stage.

[Avder]

Quad laser 4 is plenty, but oh my god spiders spiders lou guards and WTF is that zippity bot that fires a a technicolor arsenal at me? Good lord. Getting my ass kicked on ace here.

[Xfing]

I had no idea this was primarily meant for D2X-XL. I downloaded the first version I saw and it worked fine in Rebirth.

And yeah, this set is masochistically hard.

[Duper]

Yeah, most of them seem to be of the variety, "Hey, shoot this switch, and magically guess what door opens three rooms over!"

The Vertigo series was especially guilty of this. i loved the architecture, but a lot of the switches and stuff were ... a bit silly.

Xfling, what set are you playing? I couldn't follow.

[Sirius]

It isn't - it was released before D2X-XL came out. There was a subsequent revision that added XL stuff to it... I'm not exactly sure what kind of stuff, I presume effects though.

[Naphtha]

WTF is that zippity bot that fires a a technicolor arsenal at me? Good lord. Getting my ass kicked on ace here.

According to the wall-of-texty story, there's a mercenary ship from an enemy organization in almost every level. Very fast, very likely to pursue, as durable as two Fusion Hulks and their weapons get upgraded along the way (all the way up to Phoenix or Fusion Cannons and Smart Missiles by the end of the mission). Not to mention the insane bosses in half the levels... To be honest, it was so bad that I kind of cheated by looking at the .HXM files beforehand to see what I was getting myself into.

[Xfing]

The worst robots have to be the green versions of the Class 1 Heavy Driller. Firing all those homers at you and whatever.

[Sirius]

...and those aren't even custom.

[Avder]

The worst robots have to be the green versions of the Class 1 Heavy Driller. Firing all those homers at you and whatever.

God I hate those things. Glad parallax never used em anywhere.

[Xfing]

The worst robots have to be the green versions of the Class 1 Heavy Driller. Firing all those homers at you and whatever.

God I hate those things. Glad parallax never used em anywhere.

It's probably because they're mostly redundant with the Super Hulk. And owerpowered as f'k.

[Alter-Fox]

The worst robots have to be the green versions of the Class 1 Heavy Driller. Firing all those homers at you and whatever.

God I hate those things. Glad parallax never used em anywhere.

It's probably because they're mostly redundant with the Super Hulk. And owerpowered as f'k.

Redundant with the Lou Guard actually, since the were D2. XD Also I think they were the first bots to drop powerups completely unrelated to themselves (concussion missiles). That trend was boldly continued in Descent 3! Because it was definitely a good idea for most robot drops to not make sense at all!

[Avder]

The worst robots have to be the green versions of the Class 1 Heavy Driller. Firing all those homers at you and whatever.

God I hate those things. Glad parallax never used em anywhere.

It's probably because they're mostly redundant with the Super Hulk. And owerpowered as f'k.

They seem more like a lou guard turned up to 12. The agressive pursuing nature of the plasma driller, combined with the trigger happy nature of the lou guard/red hulk.

[Avder]

You disguised 3 energy powerups as a 1-up, a gauss cannon, and an earthshaker.

This mission just lost a star.

[Alter-Fox]

Yeah I do not get what that was about.

[Avder]

I would be one thing to stick them behind grates, permanently inaccessible. Thats a author to player taunt, which can add atmosphere. But disguising normal crap as super goodies is just a real dick move if you ask me.

[Avder]

Also the boss room in level 2 is the most frustrating thing I have run into since I was attempting to speed run D1 level 8.

This level has already made me compromise my "exhaust every matcen and get all the points" rule, I'm not compromising my "no deaths" rule, ever.

52 shields or not, I'm gonna kill that damn boss.

And its not the boss thats the issue, its all those damned cloaked drillers. FFS.

[Alter-Fox]

Where's that damn cloaked driller XD

[Avder]

Where's that damn cloaked driller XD

I dont get it.

[Alter-Fox]

Yeah, there aren't many fans of the 3D Sonic games here. Especially the ones that came out between 2001 and 2006.
It has to do with a game that's (sort of) one of those.

[Avder]

So I'm guessing you had extreme difficulty getting the cube lighting right in level 3? The rooms are plenty lit but all the robots are black until I start firing on them.