After a lengthy conversation, I somehow was forced into writing about a Doom mod. Thanks, Laura. Welcome back to THE SITH ARCHIVES OF DARTH FANDOM, where I have been tasked with writing about one out of the… many Doom mods available on the internet. Seeing as though I’ve been in a bit of a Mega Man mood recently, I thought I’d take this opportunity to talk about Mega Man 8-bit Deathmatch, a total conversion mod for Zandronum (a source port based on id Software’s classic Doom/Doom II engine that mostly enhances the multiplayer) that converts the world of Doom into one centred on the Blue Bomber in his iconic, 8-bit NES days. That was a long sentence. Anyways, I guess it’s time to… Rock on!Duel of the Mega Mans... Mega Men?
Image Credit: Destructoid
Let’s get the easiest thing out of the way: the story. The classic Mega Man games have never had massive story arcs, but MM8BDM does still have a nice alternate take on the Mega Man universe as its story: 1 year after Capcom’s Mega Man 6, rather than Wily going to jail and breaking out six months later (Mega Man 7), the real Mr X has been found and has organised a second annual robot tournament. Dr Light has entered his various robots, including a new one (spoiler: the player character), into the tournament. However, Dr Wily has decided that he can never be absent from a classic Mega Man plotline and enters his many creations into the competition too. The story of the mod is expanded through short dialogue segments with the cute 8-bit NPCs and letters received in the mail at the beginning of each chapter. On the topic of chapters, let’s move on to the gameplay.I wonder who the mastermind behind the evil could be...
Image Credit: MegaQuint / YouTube
MM8BDM… actually, I’ll just start calling it 8BDM from now on. 8BDM has two main gameplay modes: multiplayer (the main attraction) and single player. The multiplayer is essentially classic Zandronum: various modes, such as deathmatch, team deathmatch, and capture the flag, with support for bots or player vs player matches. The single player is made up of the various chapters; each chapter contains some multiplayer maps filled with bots, as well as a few boss battles against characters that aren’t fought in the main maps. There is also a small hub world where you, the player, can interact with Dr Wily’s Robot Masters, select your missions, and change your costume. Hey, if that means I can be Bad Box Art Mega Man, I’ll always be happy. The music for each map is also based on each map’s respective original level. Yes, that does indeed mean you can listen to Dr Wily Stage 1 on loop while murdering fellow Robot Masters for hours on end. As Bad Box Art Mega Man. Brilliant.
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| My man! Image Credit: Nintendo Life |
Finally, you can’t have a Doom mod without having Doom mod mods. Cutstuff’s wiki has a page dedicated to mods 8BDM here, and there’s also this nice page from the forum which shows off quite a few interesting mods. My favourite of these mods is the Class Based Modification, which you can find here. What this mod does is balance out the various characters of 8BDM into their own classes, with weaknesses to certain weapons (based on Capcom’s official games), as well as other new features. Another interesting mod is this one, MM8BDM DOS Reborn, which incorporates new enemies based on the not very good DOS Mega Man games, but rather than their strange original designs, the mod uses hansungkee’s redesigns which look much better.
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| I just hope that damned dog isn't chasing me as soon as I start. Image Credit: MagnetDood / Cutstuff |
I’m not a Doom mod reviewer and I don’t plan on doing this again, but here I’ll gather my final thoughts: 8BDM is a great, fun mod, not just for Mega Man fans but just for anyone who is looking for a fun little Quake 3-/UT-type story in a more cutesy style or a new multiplayer game to experience with friends/random strangers online. The maps are open and allow for unique battles depending on your elevation and which weapons you’re using. The awesome 8-bit music also adds that extra icing to the already tasty cake. For me, I’d give this mod a 5/5. Yep, there is some Mega Fan bias in there, but I genuinely find this mod fun and would put it up there with my other favourite, QCDE. Well, that’s a wrap on this blog post against my free wi—sorry, that’s a wrap on THE SITH ARCHIVES OF DARTH FANDOM!
