After some playtesting I realized that after room 1 there's basically nothing stopping the player from just running past the mobs in the remaining ones. Putting lines of pinkies in the tiny corridors connecting the letters feels fucking cheap so I thought about doing the classic 2016/Eteternal thing of "you can only leave when everything in the room is dead", problem is the only solutions I found say "oh this can only be done in Hexen/Heretic". Surely there's a pretty straightforward way to deal with this?
That's normal, especially if you know the map. Being the creator, you know the map better than anyone.
But if you want to slow the player, there are two and a half methods I know of.
Put a switch or a key out of plain sight. It doesn't have to hidden or a secret, just not in your view as soon as you enter the room. People will clear the room so they can look around in peace.
Baron or hell knights slow the player down. As long as it's not a huge open area, most people will slow down instead of trying to kite around them. Again, speedrunners can get around monsters, but that's normal. Normal players, not so much.
A half measure is a door or lift. It doesn't have to be slow (and shouldn't be) but it will be enough that most normie players won't bum rush for risk of getting hit in the back.
I'd be happy to offer some texture set suggestions or even put something with a tighter focus together to lend to the project
Sure, any advice or suggestions is great. I'm not neck deep in the Doom community, so any texture packs that arn't OTEX, aa_tex, or cc4 are welcome.
As for OTEX, my main problem with it is that it doesn't mesh with the stock Doom textures, so it has to be all OTEX or nothing imo, but that's just me.
And no, I don't think textures would confuse new people. The problem is even experienced Doom modders can't leave things alone and as a result, either by accident or maliciousness, fuck everything up. And I'm lazy, I don't want to have to deal with that problem.
As for creating a texture pack, I can give it a shot. I think I can do it on a technical level. As an indie dev, there's a few CC0 packs I use a bunch that can easily be resized and given the PlayPal palette. However, I'd like requests of what people want. Other than a computer monitor with a KF logo, I don't know what else to include. I don't want just a bunch of photos of lolcows slathered on every surface.
Especially this being a KF derived project if we want anyone in the wider world to take notice and through gritted teeth make admission of its merits then we would need to put our best foot forward and you know, actually put some effort into the thing.
If you want that, do it.
The problem with that is Doom has some amazing projects. Ancient Aliens, Evilution, Scythe 1 and 2, My House. Those projects took years to develop. Even if you put the time in, those projects are a high bar to clear. And it would all be pointless anyway because the Doom communities would just deny our mods existence. No matter how good it was, they'd claim it wasn't that good.
If the goal is to simply to troll the Doom community, you'd be better off simply mentioning Brutal Doom, Terry wads, or Moonman for the millionth time and watch them have yet another meltdown.
It's kind of like Null's approach to t-shirt designs. They should reference the farms, but be something you can wear. Something where those who are in on the joke will get it. As has been discussed, we could easily make a low effort troll wad, but that wouldn't hold interest. Same with something that puts lolcow heads and voice lines on stock enemies. "Haha, Patrick as a Mancubus. Get it! Because he's fat!" works once, but again, fails to make a meaningful impact. If people want that, they're welcome to it.
The way I see it. This mod is for us. For Kiwi Farms, and it should be something people actually want to play. And even if it sucks, we had fun making it.