Blasphemous Experiments | BEXPER.WAD
Cacowad
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| This episode was played in Blasphemer v 0.1.9-fork 2. |
For a time, Doomworld member Cacowad was a devoted contributor to, and maintainer of, Blasphemer, a years-long project to build a freeware replacement for beloved(?) fantasy shooter Heretic. You don’t take a job like project maintainer for something like this without having some passion for the game you’re attempting to clone; as such, Cacowad has spent their decade-plus in the community making maps for both Heretic and Doom, contributing to projects like HYMN and the DWANGO anniversary project. It seems much of their output thus far has been Heretic-focused, and in 2021, they released Blasphemous Experiments, a collection of nine of their Heretic maps, greatly expanded on and retextured in the Blasphemer style, and released as an episode with the intent of donating it to the Blasphemer project.
As a map pack, Blasphemous Experiments is pretty solid. It’s representative of nine years of growth, and Cacowad’s extensive editing of their older work for the pack has more or less hidden whatever more amateurish or underdeveloped aspects there might have been. The end result is a well-designed gauntlet of extra-hard Heretic maps that make extensive use of golems and gargoyles (perhaps more than any other monster) for an occasionally slaughtery experience, especially on higher difficulties. From the very first shot drawing a horde of golems out of hiding to the crush of Disciples while you’re trying to put down a Maulotaur and his Iron Lich pets in a narrow arena, Cacowad knows how to keep the pressure on. An especially common feature is the veritable clouds of gargoyles, whole flocks that establish air superiority early on and have an annoying tendency to find a way into whatever shelter you’ve found for yourself. Lesser used are the Disciples, usually trotted out either to add a little extra oomph to a monster fleet or in large groups to punish the player. The majority of monsters are golems and undead warriors and their variants; they fill the mouldy tombs, patrol the dusty corridors and snipe at you from cragged perches along stone ridges.
The constituent parts of Blasphemous Experiments might not have been built with Blasphemer in mind, but they generally suit the gothic atmosphere pretty well, ranging from forsaken churches with sinister earthworks in back, to long-abandoned, dusty tomb complexes, to sprawling haunted medieval fortress towns. While sometimes the sheer amount of monsters — especially in some of the later maps — can be overwhelming, sometimes it’s as much about the journey as it is about the goal, and other than a few tough spots (mostly to do with a lack of ammo and/or weapons) I found the difficulty curve to be fairly gentle, albeit starting off high.
If you like Heretic, or you’re looking for a proper episode to play Blasphemer with, you could do worse than Cacowad’s heretical experiments.
get it on Doomworld
E1M1: Death
Cacowad gets us started with a very golem-heavy map set in a corrupted church and the cursed digging project beneath. Fire a single shot in the sanctuary and watch the golems come out of the woodwork. It doesn't get any easier as you work your way into the tunnels below; you're pretty much forced to make use of the (thankfully abundant) timebombs to help soften up the resistance. It wouldn't be so bad if you had more than just the wand and crossbow to work with, but ammo is tight and a lot of those golems are phantoms. At least there's not too many undead warriors.
E1M2: Grim Awakening
A gloomy, sprawling catacomb complex (that's actually in the current version of Blasphemer in the same slot.) Like "Death," this one is rife with golems, most of which thankfully aren't phantoms. While you're still working with just the wand and crossbow, ammo for the former is abundant; plugging away at golems with it is a bit tedious, but it at least allows you to save your crossbow ammo for the undead warriors also lurking in the dark. There's a couple of spots where the way is blocked; while you'll never be unable to just get around the closed passages some other way, it's hard to find the switches nearby that operate the stone doors in the dark.
E1M3: Evil Ruins
Ay-yi-yi. Nothing about this map -- a collab with Samian -- is straightforward. From the cloud of gargoyles that swarm the opening area to the point of no-return that drops you in a rather intense gauntlet of undead warriors, sabreclaws, golems, gargoyles and Disciples, and this is before you've even gotten any secrets -- it's a tough one. Of course, you may be tempted to say "fuck it" and bail once you find the exit, but hold up! There's a map at the exit room and a whole bunch of secrets to hunt, offering up some more combat scenarios, plus the gauntlets, the Phoenix Rod, and the Hellstaff, as well as two silver shields and some other stuff. Well worth the detour -- and these fights are a lot less punishing than the ones you've just been through.
E1M4: Ordeal
Truly an appropriate name for this map at 359 monsters on difficulty 4. Generally it's split into water and lava themes with semi-identical (minus parts that are in active disrepair or whathaveyou) temple complexes. It's not the most difficult map, but it's very long. Your job is to find the two keys that open up the exit, but unfortunately once you've done so the map fills up again with multiple Iron Liches leading the charge.
E1M5: Fiery Domus
With a fairly hot start for a Heretic map, "Fiery Domus" -- an expanded version of Cacowad's contribution to HYMN -- has you exploring a tall fortress surrounded by a deep chasm of lava. Beyond the lava is an entire army of baddies who will throw shit at you en masse the moment you pop your head out while on the wall. Your mission is to find all three keys, two of which lurk down in the darkness of the caves beneath the castle, and the third requires some Hexen-style switch puzzling to find. The finale teleports you to the ridge and you get to fight your way through that entire army that's been harassing you the whole map to reach the exit.
E1M6: Into the Darkness
It's not a Chris Lutz map, but you could be forgiven for thinking it was, given the attention to semi-realistic detail, the somewhat idiosyncratic layout, and of course the theme of a sprawling underground temple complex, complete with a very large chamber that makes up the back half of your time with this map, full of enemies. There's a lot of golems and undead warriors, to be sure, but the single greatest threat in the main cave is yet more god damned gargoyles -- there's an entire swarm of them roosting in these caves. The secret exit is heavily guarded, but you're gifted a Tome to deal with the threat in short order. (I didn't use it 'cuz the untomed Phoenix Rod is my go-to for Iron Lich deletion.)
E1M9: Chaos
Aptly named. From the first shot you'll be conquering, section by section, a massive gothic fortress, with lots of open spaces and lots of open windows. With nearly 600 monsters on difficulty 4 the map quickly descends into slaughter, mostly hordes of golems, warriors, sabreclaws and the most annoying-ass flocks of gargoyles you'll ever have to deal with. The entire outer rim of the fortress has lots of fire coming at you from multiple heights, with several tall columns with phantom warrior snipers that are difficult to pick off thanks to their freedom to move around a bit and their height advantage. The southeast tunnels are notable for being one big slaughterfest, one you might want to save your Tomes for between the hordes of warriors, phantom nitrogolems, GARGOYLES, and the odd Iron Lich or two. If you're wondering where all the Disciples are, they come out of the goddamn walls when you grab the blue key, and it's almost safer to just book it for the exit... almost. Crazy stuff.
E1M7: Obsidian Fort
With over 500 monsters on difficulty 4 you could be forgiven for assuming that "Obsidian Fort" is a slaughterfest like "Chaos," but in actuality it's rather measured, a sprawling medieval city -- think Doom II's "Downtown" or perhaps more accurately Plutonia's "Odyssey of Noises" set in the context of Heretic -- and three switches that need three keys, scattered around the city. Cacowad is generous enough to use key statues to indicate where you should look, though each key has its own series of encounters to reach. The big one would be the gold key, requiring an assault on the titular fortress itself, infiltrating through a cavern that connects the outer wall with the nearby village, and each room is its own massive fight. Big brawls aside combat is mostly incidental; if you can find a way into a building early on, you can pretty much wait for the gargoyles to show up and pick them off.
E1M8: The Crypt
The final level, but I half-wonder if this might not be one of Cacowad's earlier maps, given the relatively simple aesthetics, the linear progression, and the fact that they use teleporters to fake multiple floors but I don't think they knew that vanilla Heretic allowed for silent teleporters. It's pretty straightforward, with a much smaller enemy count than the last few maps, most encounters making for bite-sized slaughter as you move from one section to the next. The only really tough part would be the big fight at the bottom of the complex, in which on difficulty 4 you'll have to deal with two Iron Liches and a Maulotar as well as multiple Disciples in a relatively confined space. Once they're dead you'll have a little more fighting to do as you work to unlock the exit, and with your ammo reserves likely exhausted you may want to just end-run around them.
-june❤
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