Re: More Doom... that's a good thing, right?

On 2024-08-15, Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

On Thu, 15 Aug 2024 12:27:55 -0000 (UTC), Borax Man
<rotflol2@hotmail.com> wrote:
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On 2024-08-14, Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

On Fri, 09 Aug 2024 11:49:03 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
<spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:
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Bethesda has just dropped an upgrade for the original "Doom" and "Doom
II" (yes, the classic games from the 90s). Bethesda really knows how
to milk their existing IPs; adding a few tiny upgrades, and then
repackaging it under a slightly different name and reselling it to
fans.

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Oh, Bethesda...
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So, this new "Doom + Doom II" release has, as mentioned, support for
mods. To use/play these mods, you need a Bethesda account before you
can access the 'workshop'. However, the mods themselves are just the
same mods as have been playable on Doom since time immemorial, just
made more accessible and easier to install/run. But how did those mods
get there?
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Why, end-users uploaded them, of course. The problem is that the
people who uploaded them - and are given credit for developing the
mods- aren't necessarily the same people who actually CREATED the darn
things. There's very little (or quite possibly) no moderation going on
in the unsorted mods list.
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Oops.
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There is a curated 'Featured mods' page which Bethesda has populated
with better known mods. But this selection is tiny compared to the
unsorted selection. That selection also has some very... erm, varied
material, including hentai-flavored material, stuff celebrating school
shootings, and stuff that blatantly violates copyright (such as MODS
that rip off Nintendo's IP. But I'm sure the notoriously litigious
Nintendo is fine with that).
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It's been described by some as a 'chum bucket of random shit'.
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So like the shovelware Doom Add-on CD's of the 90s, where they scraped
cdrom.com and threw everything on a disk?  I do admit I purchased a
couple of these, because it was easier to get WADs that way instead of
downloading over slow dial up.

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At least the shovelware disks included the text files attributing the
WADs to the creator. It doesn't seem like Bethesda.net does even that
much. They just accept that if John Doe uploads
ThisWADWasMadeByBobPeterson.zip, they give John Doe credit for the
work.
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Or so it's been reported. I've never bothered to make a Bethesda.net
account, so I can't check for myself. Honestly, I uninstalled the
"Doom + Doom II" pack after less than an hour of playing it; it just
doesn't feel "Doom" to me. If I need another Doom-fix, I'll just fire
up GZDoom (a Doom sourceport) and play that instead.
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And if I want to add a mod, I'll just browse ModDB.com and download it
manually.

Giving the right attribution is just the decent thing to do.  Actually,
just a few days ago I found a post on a BSD forum where someone claimed
to write a script, but what he described, and showed in the screenshot
was one I had written.  It would have been a remarkable coincidence if
he chose to write the same script, using the same language, to produce
the same form, using the *same title* just one month after I wrote it
(he claimed t have written it a year prior, but the post was after I
wrote mine).  Sheesh, I don't care if you plaster it around, just give
credit.

There are two reasons I'm interested in this new Doom release.  The
first is the new expansion, which really, I shouldn't be all that
excited about, because there are many, many good WAD's out there already
and new ones coming out.

The second is that it seems it comes with a lot of historical game
assets.  Sounds, midis and graphics that were used during development
which didn't make it into the final game, or even the early alphas.
Stuff that wasn't even in Romero's Doom Dump.  I saw a YouTube video
where someone skimmed through it, and there were lots of graphics,
alternative sprites for guns, for the DoomGuy face, skies and such that
I've never seen before.  That alone makes me want to get it.

But I'm not sure what other advantage this release offers that GzDoom or
Prboom+ (my source port of choice) doesn't offer already, except for
perhaps making it easier to load mods, which I don't need at all.