Wad:           Nostalgia Zero
Map:           Episode 2 "Gates to Hell"
Skill:         4
Category:      UV-Max
Sourceport:    DSDA Doom v0.29.4 (xHUD)
Complevel:     3
Time:          24:12

Author:	       Alvis        	          
Date:	       13 September 2026

YouTube video link: https://youtu.be/424UNMp0GXo

Comments:

This map set is super fun; Ultimate Doom's gameplay allows for increased creativity with weapon usage and myolden takes full advantage of it in this set. I really wanted the sub-24, and it's very achievable.  There were several attempts where I my time was ahead of where this demo ended up, but I got sloppy and would finish with 98% on a map and have to start over. The standard set by Revved was very high, and this took...quite a bit of time to do. Much credit goes to the sunk cost fallacy. I also took a few cues from Revved's run, and tried to route faster when I could.

Stolen table from Revved's text file:

   Map      Name                            Time    Kills Secrets
----------------------------------------------------------------

  E2M1   -  Wake Up Dead                  | 2:17 |  100%   100%
  E2M2   -  Creeping Death                | 2:15 |  100%   100%
  E2M3   -  Harvester of Sorrow           | 2:42 |  100%   100%
  E2M4   -  Legions of the Dead           | 3:50 |  100%   100%
  E2M5   -  Sweating Bullets              | 2:45 |  100%   100%
  E2M9   -  Treachery                     | 2:58 |  100%   100%
  E2M6   -  Heresy                        | 2:35 |  100%   100%
  E2M7   -  Covenant of Death             | 3:17 |  100%   100%
  E2M8   -  Gates to Hell                 | 1:33 |  100%   100%

-----------------------------------------------------------------
  Episode 2                                24:12

E2M1:
Myolden loves his lost souls, and I don't think I share his sentiments. By the 10-second mark you either have 22% health or 90% and there's not much you can do about it if you're playing it for a speedrun. 

E2M2:
Having weapons to start helps with faster routing than can be done with a pistol start. Rocket play could probably be more efficient, but I felt like being theatrical at certain points. Far be it from me to be turn down a chance to blow up six monsters at once with a rocket.

E2M3:
Lost soul RNG once again pretty much decides your pace of play. It's more efficient to grab the berserk to start, but I preferred to keep it for contingency during the middle rocket fight.

E2M4:
At this point, it's a good idea to bank cells for the claustrophobic battles of E2M9, so rockets and chaingunning are the gameplan when possible. Somehow I had more rockets than usual to start with so I took advantage. Instead of putting in any strategic thought, I just arbitrarily decided "plasma for Cacos and above." I was lucky to leave with some health, because hitscanners and lost souls stand ready to siphon it off in the next map.

E2M5:
Time to hoard cells. Thankfully there are plenty. The sergeants at the secret exit are almost always super aggressive. The wooden maze slowed me down many times with monsters' wandering.

--INTERMISSION--
My cat demands my attention. My cat gets my attention. For about a minute.

E2M9:
Oh, did I dread this map. So many attempts ended here. Luckily, I had more cells than I typically did at this point and that helped mow the cacos down quickly. I have no understanding of monster behavior, so I relied on luck to make sure I had some space to move during the second half. Getting stuck between monsters with only rockets is too easy, and it's not fun six maps in. It's essential to have enough rockets to avoid flipping the yellow key switch for ammo, because having that extra baron behind you makes an already tough battle way harder. Matched the previous episode run time. It does't help that for some reason, in the latter half the monsters seem to require more rockets to go down than usual.

E2M6:
Having weapons make for faster routing on this map as well. It's easy to miss monsters, so I had to pay close attention to the count after each battle.

E2M7:
At this point, I kind of lost the plot. Lost souls, man. They drove me to play so inefficiently at the end, which isn't the sole reason I lost so much time, but it was a big factor. At this point, I had rockets so I got pretty liberal with them. If I'd kept the time of Revved's episode run, this would have been a sub-24, but 26 seconds of my gains were wiped out.

E2M8:
Another 12 seconds lost. I forgot to save some imps to infight one cyberdemon while I fought the other. 240 cells is more than enough to take two cyberdemons down, but I was jittery due to this being my third viable attempt of the day. Also I drank a lot of iced coffee between maps.



