DBP30: The Magnificent Five

DBP30: The Magnificent Five | DBP30.WAD

Doomer Boards

 This review was originally posted in parts to Medium and tumblr.

Going back as far as 1994 with the release of the Doom Editing Utilities, people have been modding Doom in various ways, some of them quite extensive (and intrusive, such as directly replacing existing assets in the game’s data files.) Sometimes new weapons and enemies are just reskins, sometimes — thanks to the use of DEHACKED then, DECORATE and similar scripting languages now — entirely new behavior is coded in. And almost since the beginning, there have been a few recurring themes. 1994's Aliens TC, the first “total conversion” (a complete overhaul of the game’s assets and behavior to create a whole new game) would set the standard for the future, and modders have been going back to that well for years. (It’s only logical, given how much Doom draws from the Alien franchise.) Another, less common theme that still sees the occasional revival, however, is the western.

Western-themed video games are nothing new, of course. The genre has seen a few light gun games over the years, but the first commercial first person shooter game is probably LucasArts’ iconic Outlaws from 1997. (Still no support for that in The Force Engine, dammit!) But as far as cowboy shooters go, Outlaws was beaten to the punch in 1995 by a pair of mods: Boot Hill and A Fistful of Doom. Boot Hill came first; it’s as straightforward as can be: a pure deathmatch experience spread across four separate maps, all permutations of the same idea of a little western town consisting of a small collection of buildings in an otherwise open arena. What sets Boot Hill apart from more mundane map sets is the use of textures and sounds to give it a western theme, though you will quickly get sick of that yowling from Ennio Morricone’s famous tune every time you pick up a weapon. A Fistful of Doom was developed explicitly as a British response to the US-made Boot Hill, lifting some of Boot Hill’s assets, while adding several of its own, including a new HUD that changes armor to “luck” and cell ammo to otherwise useless “gold.” It’s a more complete conversion than Boot Hill in that it features a new title screen, but it’s still a very small piece of work with a mere two maps. There’s no real story involved, but we can make inferences based on the enemies we fight that some kind of violent possession has taken over the town and it’s up to the Doomguy With No Name to do something about it. With only two levels, it feels kind of truncated, but fear not pardners.

Say what you will about the Doomer Boards and its culture vis-a-vis that of Doomworld or the ZDoom forums, they know how to make maps, and the popular Doomer Boards Projects have been a showcase of some real talent, like 40oz and joe-ilya. DBP30: The Magnificent Five, as its name suggests, is the 30th such project, released in late 2020, and it’s got a simple premise: Five levels (not counting the credits map,) five weapons, five mappers, all with a western theme.

In terms of overall aesthetic, this proves itself to be another iterative take on the assets made for Boot Hill and A Fistful of Doom; however, whereas Fistful mostly relied on hitscanners (which made for rather more dangerous play,) Magnificent Five brings out the rest of the monster roster (with some notable absences,) with a few changed significantly to fit the theme (for example, demons and spectres remain as possessed guys who run up on you and throw a punch, and Hell Knights are now monstrous demon cows.) Even the ones that haven’t been changed significantly now all sport various period-appropriate hats. Even the power-ups have hats. It’s gleefully silly and makes me smile.

As a map set this is generally not a difficult ride. The maps are generally quite short, and even the finale, as hectic as it is, feels less epic than you’d expect. So The Magnificent Five is rather like its predecessors in that it’s high on aesthetic but relatively low on content; it can be frustrating in that a cowboy Doom is a solid idea — after all, like Doom, the western is a very influential gun-themed genre, with intense violence and a sense of the supernatural being frequent features — but the community simply hasn’t done much with it. I would certainly like to see more western-themed content, but I suppose we’ll have to content ourselves, for now, with this family of wads.

 

 

MAP01: Sunrise

Ilya "joe-ilya" Lazarev

Joe-ilya starts us off light with “Sunrise” — a tiny little two-room inn and a saloon across the way, near a small network of mine tunnels, which pose the most danger as they’re pretty dark. I never did work out how to get the armor out of the well.

MAP02: Tempio el Diablo

Walter "daimon" Confalonieri

If the low-level skirmishing of the previous map didn’t wake you up, Walter “daimon” Confalonieri gives you a swift kick in the pants as a sprawling canyon full of enemies blocks your path to some kind of corrupted monastery. And if that’s not bad enough, on UV at least you’ll face off against a Cyberdemon, though given the theme he’s less of a cyborg and more of a really big demonic cowboy who throws cannonballs at you.

MAP03: Chaco Canyon

Micah "Jaws in Space" Petersen

"Chaco Canyon" is probably my favorite of the set, a cute little adobe village set into the walls of a canyon. You start off near a small lake and must fight your way up, tier by tier, to reach the exit. The biggest roadblock is the line of mancubi across the canyon providing artillery support, making clearing out the penultimate room a dangerous proposition.

MAP04: Assault on Rio Lobo

Jaws in Space, Morpheus Kitami

Jaws in Space and Morpheus Kitami collaborate to throw everything they’ve got at you in “Assault on Rio Lobo,” an absolute clusterfuck of an invasion map that gives you an opportunity to load up before kicking things off. After the initial massacre you’ll need to find your way up on the cliff to get the key, at which point not one but two Archviles appear to start undoing your hard work. As the shitshow reaches its climax, it’s almost safer to just make a run for the exit.

 

MAP05: Corbucci

LunchLunch

After the chaos of the previous map, LunchLunch’s “Corbucci” (nice) makes for a more sedate finale, despite its relatively high monster count. It’s a straightforward adventure map that has you working your way through an infested canyon-and-tunnel complex. The invisibility sphere is tempting, but it might be better saved for before you open the blue door to give yourself an edge over the ambush waiting behind.

 

 

 

 

 

-June <3

Once you loved her, whoa, oh
Now you've lost her, whoa, oh
But you've lost her forever, Django

 

 

The Doomer Boards Projects

DBP01	DBP02	DBP03	DBP04
DBP05	DBP06	DBP07	DBP08
DBP09	DBP10	DBP11	DBP12
DBP13	DBP14	DBP15	DBP16
DBP17	DBP18	DBP19	DBP20
DBP21	DBP22	DBP23	DBP24
DBP25	DBP26	DBP27	DBP28
DBP29	DBP30	DBP31	DBP32
DBP33	DBP34	DBP35	DBP36
DBP37	DBP38	DBP39	DBP40
DBP41	DBP42	DBP43	DBP44
DBP45	DBP46	DBP47	DBP48
DBP49	DBP50	DBP51	DBP52
DBP53	DBP54	DBP55	DBP56
DBP57	DBP58	DBP59	DBP60
DBP61	DBP62	DBP63	DBP64
DBP65	DBP66	DBP67	DBP68
DBP69	DBP70	DBP71	DBP72