Codename: DEMOLITIONIST

Codename: DEMOLITIONIST
Author	Marisa Kirisame
Port	GZDoom
IWAD	Doom, Doom II, Heretic, Hexen
Year	2020
Link	ZDoom forums thread
	This mod received one of the 2020 Cacowards on Doomworld in the Gameplay mod category!

Codename: DEMOLITIONIST (formerly known as SWWM GZ) is an ambitious gameplay mod for GZDoom by Marisa Kirisame, serving as a reboot of her Unreal Tournament mods. From the very beginning, the project's aim was to build upon the work done in both Doom Tournament and Doomreal to create a fully original work containing a selection of redesigned weapons and items from SWWM, Zanaveth Ultra Suite and various other unreleased UT mods. It also features a fully voiced player character, as well as its own take on the story and worlds of the various games it supports.

The mod is fully compatible with Doom, Doom II, Heretic, Hexen and also boasts some "special compatibility" with No Rest for the Living, SIGIL, Eviternity and Deathkings of the Dark Citadel.

Development

The project was first teased around August of 2019, with Marisa announcing that it would be an add-on for Doom Tournament. However, this idea was quickly discarded as the mod evolved and it became standalone instead.

Public development began in November 20th of 2019, with the very first "fully functional" beta release (0.9b) coming out in September 15th of the next year. By this point, further updates would serve mainly to fix various bugs and rebalance the weaponry, as well as occasionally implementing more features. On October 5th, the final 0.9.10b beta was released (with the mod earning a gameplay award in the 2020 Cacowards around the same time).

After that, it took almost one full year for the 1.0 release to finally happen, in August 12th of 2021. This period of development proved to be considerably stressful for the author, and the release was in fact rushed, having opted to cut out a large chunk of content. A part of it was salvaged for the later 1.1 release in the next month.

Following this was another year of work in major code refactoring and further improvements, culminating in the 1.2 release on March 26th 2022, also featuring all-original voice acting. At this point the mod was also rebranded under its current name, as the author cited the need for "something pronounceable".

Further updates are still planned, implementing additional weapons to expand the arsenal, as well as other features such as minigames or a photo mode.

Story

It is the year 2148. Shortly after the incident on the UAC bases of Phobos and Deimos, a full-scale demonic invasion of Earth began. The situation is grim, and many believe this to be the end, but there is still hope. Hope that the Doom Marine, lone survivor of the attacks on the moon bases, will defeat the invaders.

In response to this, Saya Miyamoto, head of Akari Labs stated: "That's totally not going to happen. I mean, he's just one guy, and they're hundreds, thousands, maybe more. Is ONE guy seriously going to fix everything? Ha! As if."

That's where you come in, Demolitionist. You are the crowning achievement of Akari Labs, the culmination of weeks of hasty planning and thorough training, but you're still good. You can do this, you can kick demon ass like there's no tomorrow, and send those bastards back to Hell where they belong.

So go, Demolitionist, show them all what you're capable of.

Weapons

The mod features a total of 11 weapons. Many of these reference the weapons of the Unreal series in both design and functionality, albeit being far more powerful.

Deep-Impact

One of the two starter weapons, a rechargeable air gun that serves to push away enemies and projectiles. Its alternate fire shoots a blast that rips through multiple targets.

Explodium Gun

The main starter weapon, a high-explosive pistol whose magazines can be employed as grenades through its alternate fire. Has infinite ammunition, and can be dual-wielded.

Pusher

A potent rotary hammer that replaces the chainsaw. Can be charged with its alt-fire for a potent thrust, but has the risk of slipping off your hands if it doesn't hit a target.

Spreadgun

A single-shot shotgun based on the Rhino Stopper from the Weapons Resource WAD. Features multiple selectable ammunition types.

Wallbuster

A 25-barrel revolver shotgun, capable of firing either one, five or all twenty-five barrels at once. It supports less ammunition types compared to the Spreadgun.

Eviscerator

A flak cannon with a self-loading magazine. Virtually identical to its counterpart from Unreal, but also featuring a spread toggle for long range shooting.

Hellblazer

A mini-missile launcher with four ammunition types. Can shoot both flying projectiles and grenades, and supports target locking.

Biospark Carbine

An energy weapon with heat-seeking capabilities. Like the ASMD, its projectiles can be ignited by its beam shot, resulting in a combo explosion.

Silver Bullet JET

A massive 30mm anti-materiel rifle that requires jets to compensate its own recoil when hip-fired. Its primary ammunition can pierce through walls.

Candy Gun

An overpowered version of the started pistol dealing as much damage as the BFG9000 with each shot. The gun itself can be thrown as a grenade through a combined fire mode.

Ynykron Artifact

A superweapon that instantly kills anything it hits, each target further spreading death in a chain reaction to others nearby. Its alternate fire allows to shoot a pocket singularity instead, sucking in nearby enemies.

Items

As a sort of hybrid of Doom and the Raven games, most items will be held in the inventory when picked up, but health and armor (of which each type is independent) will be automatically used as needed. In addition, certain powerups are also automatically activated under specific conditions.

Health Nugget

Heals for 1 point up to a cap of 200.

Health Tetrahedron

Heals for 10 points.

Health Cube

Heals for 20 points.

Refresher

Heals for 100 points immediately, plus an additional 100 point auto-heal at 10 points per 5 seconds, both up to a cap of 500. In addition, it automatically activates should the player take mortal damage. Healing above 200 points gradually fades.

Armor Nugget

Provides 1 point of its own armor type up to a cap of 200. Its damage absorption percentage is relative to the amount used. Above 100%, damage is turned into additional health.

Blast Suit

Provides 150 points of armor to absorb 30% of damage and an additional 50% for any splash damage.

War Armor

Provides 250 points of armor to absorb 50% of damage, plus an additional 70% reduction of splash damage and 80% reduction to any elemental damage (such as Fire, Ice, Slime, etc.)

Grilled Cheese Sandwich

1000 points of health along with the full amount of each armor type. Guaranteed to prevent death entirely when automatically used.

Ghost Artifact

An invisibility powerup that causes enemies to attack the last spot where they heard you, rather than simply having difficulty aiming, for 60 seconds.

Ragekit

A powerup that, for 30 seconds, strengthens your melee damage by 8x, doubles movement speed, and reduces all damage taken by 25%. Causes the player character to scream angrily at regular intervals.

Elemental coating

Protects completely from all damaging sectors as well as blocking out elemental damage entirely for 60 seconds.

Gravity suppressor

Appearing on the Raven games, it serves as a drop-in replacement for the Wings of Wrath, allowing the player to float freely for 60 seconds at twice their walking speed.

Fucking Invinciball

Actually named that, provides 20 seconds of full invulnerability to everything save for the effects of the Ynykron Artifact.

Hammerspace Embiggener

Functions similarly to a backpack, but its ammo expansion can be performed up to eight times.

Universal Ammo Fabricator

These serve to replace the Mana pickups in Hexen and function fairly similarly to the Ammo Cubes in Doom Tournament.

Lamp

A toggleable floating lamp that lights the way and additionally attracts moth, which can be coaxed to attack nearby enemies.

Omnisight

Reveals the full automap and shows the locations of keys and level exits in the screen, along with making all enemies and items visible in the minimap.

Safety Tether

Serves as a drop-in replacement for the Chaos Device, with an added shockwave effect to push away nearby enemies at both source and destination of the teleport.

Mykradvo Artifact

Spawns homing energy beams that damage all visible enemies up to 3200 map units.

Divine Sprite

Rapidly boosts the player health up to 10000 points and maintains it for 50 seconds.

Devastation Sigil

Boosts all outgoing damage by 25x for 50 seconds. Can be combined with the Ragekit.

Lucky Chance Box

Appears randomly in secret areas, sometimes dropping resources when used, and other times dropping unique collectible items that give extra score points.

Trivia

• The mod features an extensive amount of lore, most of it available for perusal through articles in a dedicated library menu (which unlock based on items found and other articles being read). The author claims that it would take up to six hours to read all of it.
• Like the character, the Demolitionist's voice actor is also non-binary.

External Links

• ZDoom forums thread
• GitHub repository