• I loved the first Eviternity, let’s see how this holds up
• nice palette
• map01
  • crazy intro teleporter thing, let’s check this in doombuilder
  • also revisiting levels from the first megawad but altered due to doomguy’s efforts
  • jump pads still kind of wild, although a little glitchy
• map02
  • first button you hit, you see exactly what it activates in LOS
  • cool rain effect
• map03
  • leaves falling effect, cool…
• making the pistol fire faster is a classic great way of fixing the pistol feeling awful to use
• each map’s exit allow you to see the start of the next map is brilliant
  • a lot of “high budget” choices like this bring this wad above and beyond others
  • the detailing in every room is just insane
• having a switch bring up some stairs with a switch on them allowing the player to “unlock” being able to activate these stairs up and down to access new areas seems key (not something new but something I was having trouble coming up with on my own during my most recent mapping session)
  • also, having really big stairs have a dedicated button next to them instead of on them
• map05 track is cool but doesn’t fit…
• breadcrumb rocket ammo, encourages keeping your eyes peeled and makes the movement funner than it would be otherwise (like coins in Mario)
• map07: big open space with monsters all around, open this one up in UDB and take a look at how this works.
  • two SSG spawns on both ends of the map to increases the chances of the player picking it up sooner rather than later. Especially once the pinkies are start showing up.
  • every enemy set to ambush probably. Ample use of cacos that can fly over obstacles and threaten the player. A lot of weak monsters out of reach that the player can ping with the chaingun, big bads are very rarely out of reach. Arachnotron used as a turret though
  • hit a switch and different monster comps teleported into the arena you just fought in
  • switches / combined with walk over linedef actions to force player to walk back and forth while fighting enemies
  • masterful use of colours to guide the player towards buttons they can press or should press based on the keys they have (map06 does this too)
  • grey arachnos are deadly but their shots can be avoided with movement so they encourage you to keep moving
  • giving an extra rocket launcher as well, just in case…
  • a lot of sector manipulation to create arenas where fights happen then eventually the arena opens back up again. Check how this is done in UDB…
• map09: nice
• map11: constantly expanding arena with new monsters
• map12: another map with an expanding arena, a bunch of imps teleporting in, seems like the imp is the go to spammable enemy
• map14: wild puzzles
• map16: callback to eviternity map01?
• map17: cool shifting stage and teleporting probably
• map20: another map ending on a locked in arena fight
• map21: skidding on ice? ya… not sure I like this gimmick
• map22: a “gauntlet” style map where you run through all of it, triggering a bunch of enemies and picking up weapons along the way
• map23: another “gauntlet”
  • where are the keys?
• map24: another gauntlet, is this very skillsaw-inspired?
  • wild arena fight after you get all the keys, tight room
  • oh ok, we’re doing 3 big arena fight for each of the skull keys
  • coolest map combat-wise
  • god-tier doomcute battleship at the end
• map25: epic boss fight
  • fantastic track
• map26: like map01, more of an atmospheric level, something like ALT
  • spooky AF track
  • map acts like a transition from one setting to another, emphasing the transition
  • shivers inducing
  • BIG reveal
  • OK this map is not what I’m into, I need to play more slaughter maps and understand what make them tick for something like this to hit for me.
  • The laggyness despite playing on the best performance source port (DSDA-Doom) is rough
  • OOHHHHHHH OK I get it now, beating puzzley sub-maps to make the main big fight easier wasn’t foreshadowed much and so I bulldozed my way into an actually absurd fight. Probably beatable but not fun playing the map that way. But this is a really cool premise
  • but that’s a really cool concept now that I know WTF is going on here
  • haunting…
• cringe compilation

closing thoughts:

• pretty good
• great textures
• some great tracks
• some great levels
• the intermission texts are awful and detract from the experience
• I don’t know if there’s a reason for it to be a sequel, some callbacks to the Eviternity 1 is cool and all the new enemies are interesting (although I’d argue some are more annoying than fun to fight)
• still, it’s probably an easy wad to recommend for people because the appeal is pretty universal, the production value on this whole thing is undeniably high.