E2M9: Nebulous Origins (Doom the Way id Did)

E2M9: Nebulous Origins is the secret map of The Shores of Hell in Doom the Way id Did. It was designed by Trevor Primmett (iori) in the style of Sandy Petersen and uses the music track "The End of DOOM". It can be accessed from E2M5: Deimos Command. Finishing this map takes the player to E2M6: Foundry. The par time defined in the DEHACKED lump is 3:30.

Essentials
Open the door. In the next room take a sharp right heading southwest into a curvy hall. You will find a switch at the very end, press it. Now go back to the room and you will find a few extra passages to take. Now enter the door to the north. You will see a blue door to the north, and a hall slightly east of that. Take this hall and when you can go right, do so. You will see two switches, press the one that is not lit to lower the other platform as a lift. Take this down to the water and find the switch at the end here. Now go back to the room and there should be a third path open. Follow this path to the blue keycard. Go back to the hallway east of the blue door leading north and go all the way to the end of the hall to find a second blue door.

Take this one and follow the linear path to a switch. Now backtrack and you will see a new area with a structure containing an inverted cross. Behind this structure is the yellow skull key. Enter the northern door here, and you will find a place with nukage. Head east through the nukage and behind the wall to find a radiation suit. Now look to the southeast wall in the nukage and you will see a slightly opened wall. Open this wall up, and proceed through the nukage tunnel. When you reach the room with the column get out of the nukage and follow the path to a switch. When you press it, a shack with a baron of Hell opens, but also a passageway south of where he is at will also open. Now backtrack to where you saw the first radiation suit (you may need to grab another one along the way), and take the tunnel to the north to a yellow door. Enter this door, and climb up the stairs here to a room with a switch on the wall. Press it, then head south. The shack with the baron will be open along with a passage to the south.

Go through this passage and you will see the exit door across the blood. You cannot reach it yet because you do not have the red key. Do not fall in the blood here as you cannot escape if you do. Instead, head southwest and press the switch to reveal the cargo area. Here, if you pressed the switch in the northeastern part of the map, the southern portion of this place will be revealed. Go all the way south here, and turn west and go up the stairs to a teleporter. Then take the lift up to a switch. Go back in the teleporter to appear in the middle of a star-shaped floor, with the red skull key directly in front of you. Grab it and return to the red door. Open and follow the path to the exit, making sure not to fall in the blood.

Other points of interest
After pressing the switch at the end of the curvy hall near the beginning, a room opens up revealing an armor.

Secrets

 * 1) Press the switch to reach the blue key, but go back to the room that had the gargoyle switches, and you will see a path open near the rightmost switch. Take this path all the way down, and open the wall at the dead end to reveal another passageway. You will grab a few health bonuses and a blur artifact. (sector 105)
 * 2) Drop down from the where the blue key is into the nukage, then head for the brown ledge with the red pillar to obtain some shotgun shells, two medikits, and a box of bullets. (sector 34)
 * 3) In the northeastern part of the map, head south into the next room that has the shack with the baron of Hell inside. If it is not open, it will just be a column with a UAC logo on it. When you enter from the north, look to your left to see a large faceted wall. To open it, look to the windows to the west and spot the gargoyle switch. Shoot this switch to open the wall to get some armor bonuses. (sector 320)
 * 4) Climb the stairs in the southernmost part of the map where the red keycard is. Take the teleporter here, but do not move off of it. Instead, look behind you to find a gray wall that is greener than the rest. Use it to lower another teleporter which takes you to a ledge with several health bonuses and a soul sphere. (sector 282)

Current records
The records for the map at the Doom Speed Demo Archive are:

The data was last verified in its entirety on December 20, 2021.

Player spawns
This level contains twelve spawn points:
 * 1) facing east. (thing 538)
 * 2) facing east. (thing 542)
 * 3) facing west. (thing 543)
 * 4) facing south-east. (thing 544)
 * 5) facing east. (thing 545)
 * 6) facing south. (thing 546)
 * 7) facing west. (thing 550)
 * 8) facing north-west. (thing 559)
 * 9) facing north. (thing 560)
 * 10) facing east. (thing 561)
 * 11) facing south-west. (thing 562)
 * 12) facing north. (thing 563)

Things
This level contains the following numbers of things per skill level: