The following describes some action from a recent co-op modem game I played with my fellow marine, Jason. Since we both already knew the original Doom II WAD, we used the 11-level ALTD2 PWAD (described in this month's WAD reviews section). After playing for four hours the first night and three hours the next, I decided to write down some of our experiences, to the best of my ability. Which is not the easiest thing; since so much happens so fast, it's hard to remember anything in much detail. Some of the facts may be wrong here, but the only way to get the truth would be to play a co-op game yourself. And believe me, there is nothing finer.
We start out in a semicircular courtyard abutting a large building due north of us with a big black door in the middle. Hmmm, no weapons, no monsters -- it's almost peaceful. My buddy and I glance at each other as we move towards the door, not knowing how bad things will be inside. We stand next to each other, me on the right and him on the left -- standard operating procedure -- to avoid accidentally hitting one another when the fighting begins.
I open the door to find three or four former humans inside: not bad, considering the possibilities. We take them out quickly with our pistols, then cautiously move forward inside the big hallway. A shot rings out from the left wall, and I take my first hit. There's a small opening halfway up the wall; could someone be inside? Another shot reveals a former human sergeant inside, so Jason pumps a few bullets into the hole until the death scream is heard -- music to my ears. We move ahead to the north wall and eagerly pick up the shotguns on the floor, but as expected, we're not alone. A few Imps and former humans appear through the hallways to the left and right. Slightly surprised, we put our new shotguns to work immediately. Jason takes the ones on the left, I take the ones on the right -- that's co-op play for sure!
We scout out the two side hallways. They each turn towards the top of the map, then end in a door. The one on the right requires a blue key, but the one on the left's unlocked. We open the door to find a few more former humans. I miss the guys on the right, but Jason helps out once he frags the guy on the left. There's the blue key -- on a pillar near the left wall of the room. The pillar won't lower when we shoot it or press down on it -- hmmm. I check out the rest of the room and find a switch tucked away in one of the corners. I press it, and a stairway rises next to a pillar near the right wall. I climb onto the pillar and -POOF- I teleport across the room onto the pillar with the blue key. I jump off and Jason gets the key as well; from experience we know never to teleport onto each other ("instant death"). Then we head out of the room for the blue door.
Along the hallway I notice an unusual texture, so I press against it. Then something unusual happens. The panel on the wall slides down, making a sound like an elevator -- weird. I turn to leave when BLAM, I'm hit by a shotgun blast point-blank. Jason realizes what's happened and shoots the wall a few times, which is followed by the sound of a body hitting the floor. Before I piece it all together, Jason walks INTO the wall and disappears, then the panel on the wall slides back up. He calls out, telling me it's an elevator with a fake wall in front of it, and he's now in the hallway up along the wall with the hole in it:
 
Jason steps over the former human he killed earlier to find the chainsaw and a switch (I know, because I switched my screen to his point of view, by pressing Command-2). I decide to come up and get the chainsaw, then Jason hits the switch and the lights go out. A dark hallway with a sniper hole -- what kind of building is this?
We head back down to the main level and move on to the blue door. The door opens and we find ourselves face to face with six or seven Imps. I back up, as usual, to give myself room to dodge the fireballs. Jason, however, just starts firing away, apparently unconcerned for his bodily health. He takes a few hits, but manages to kill nearly every Imp. I aim straight ahead -- careful, I don't want to hit Jason -- and blast the remaining Imp on the right. I immediately ask how Jason's doing -- only 37% health. I've got 84%, so it looks like I'm going to be the lead fighter (i.e., guinea pig) for awhile until he regains his strength.
Inside this new area, the walls are all brown and angled; it looks to be a cave. There's a switch on the northeast corner wall, with an exit door next to it. I hit the switch, and we hear a door open in the distance. After a bit of exploring we find that a secret door has opened in the left hallway, and after some discussion on relative needs, Jason is now the beneficiary of a brand-spanking-new green armor vest, as well as a medikit (I take the backpack).
We then return to the cave and find that the northwest corner wall has lifted to reveal another switch. This one makes the sound of a platform raising or lowering, seemingly behind the north wall of the cave. We try to open the wall by pressing on it and firing a pistol at it, but nothing budges. We scout out the rest of the level for any other changes, but everything looks the same, so we return to the cave and poke around again. Jason tries shooting the southwest corner wall, and luckily the wall raises to reveal another switch. He hits the switch, but nothing appears to happen. He heads outside the cave to check for changes while I shoot the remaining corner wall. It opens, and when I hit the switch behind the wall, it lowers a small platform in the cave. When I walk onto the platform, a secret door in the north wall of the cave opens to reveal the rocket launcher!
Jason comes back and gladly grabs the launcher, and we start some more poking around (i.e., random wall checking for secrets). After a bit of exploring, we find no more options. There's a couple of things that look promising, but they're just beyond our reach: a stage in the room with the pillars, with both stage-right and stage-left exits (the left one shows up yellow on the map, the right one doesn't deflect bullets), and a moveable panel in the middle of the north wall of the main hallway, where we found the shotguns. Stumped, we head back for the exit door. Whoa -- medikits and rockets for each of us! When we leave, we're told that we got 100% of the secrets, though it appeared there were some areas we didn't reach. (When I e-mailed the author, he told me that those areas were reachable only in deathmatch).
Level 2
The second level starts out with both of us in a circular pit in a round cave-like room. Immediately we find ourselves beseiged by former humans but WATCH OUT -- there are explosive barrels in the pit with us! Realizing that a poorly-aimed shot could kill us both, we take up defensive positions against the pit wall (at least I do, anyway, since Jason continues to show no concern for his well-being) and start taking out the enemy one by one. By the end we both have about 50% health -- not bad, but not good. For our troubles, however, we find the super shotgun in the middle of the pit. Thank God, I think. Then our attention is fixed on another source of concern: how to get the hell out of this pit. We randomly grope the walls when all of a sudden I notice that Jason is out of the pit! I ask him how he got there, but he says he did nothing. I go to the spot where he was, and after moving forward into the wall, I'm on top as well, standing next to Jason. There must have been a staircase of some sort, perhaps an incredibly steep one? Walls that are really staircases? What else is different about this place? Feeling a sudden sense of nervousness, we move out to explore the rest of the level...
In the middle of Level 3, we find ourselves looking out of a window at a square cement plaza below. We head down some stairs and then to the door that opens up onto the plaza. Carefully, we peer around the columns that form an inner square, finding a soul sphere and a Mancubus in the center of the plaza:
 
Before we can start on the Mancubus, monsters start teleporting into the plaza like crazy. It's a trap! Within moments, monsters are everywhere!! I fire a couple of shotgun blasts at an Imp and a Demon in front of me when I see a Baron of Hell and a few more Demons and Imps racing for me. Realizing that I've got to find a better defensive position or else I'm dead, I run past the brutes back to the door and scamper back inside the hallway. I switch to the rocket launcher, turn around, and wait for them to follow me inside.
However, no one comes in. All I can hear is carnage outside in the plaza, both from the efforts of Jason and from monsters tearing each other apart. Realizing that I've got to go help my buddy, I switch to the plasma gun and head back outside. As I turn into the doorway, the Baron is waiting with his handful of green goo poised. I'm hit point-blank, and stagger backwards. I start to give him a constant stream of plasma cells, but then realize that he's tough enough to survive the cells long enough to give me another blast to the face. Before I turn and run, I see Jason over the Baron's shoulder, surrounded by monsters and slugging it out bravely. I manage to get away from the Baron's shot, then switch to the rocket launcher and give him five or six rockets in the gut. He screams and falls, thankfully, allowing me to get back outside to help Jason. But I'm too late. Jason's death scream tells me that he can be helped no longer.
There's still plenty of monsters outside, however, and I know (the reincarnated) Jason will find his way back here to continue the battle. I head back to the door and turn outside to fire shotgun blasts at the foul beasts (my quarters are too cramped for rockets, dammit). I get off one or two shots into the mass of monsters when yellow flames start tickling my feet. No!! An Arch-Vile here would be horrible news! All of the monsters that Jason and I have managed to kill will be resurrected! I dodge to the side of the doorway to escape the Arch-Vile's blast, and soon hear the sounds of the monsters being resurrected. I contemplate my options for a moment, and then Jason appears from upstairs. He whispers "Arch-Vile" and I reply "I know". Before I can devise a strategy, however, Jason is at the door, trying to shoot the Arch-Vile with his super shotgun. [Bad idea.--Ed.] The yellow flames dance around him, but he dodges to the left to avoid the blast. He then moves back into the doorway and fires another round. The yellow flames dance around him again, but this time he doesn't move fast enough. BOOM! Jason goes flying up into the air. He screams, and I know he's dead once again. [See what I mean?--Ed.]
Angrily, I run into the doorway (actually, I laugh out loud when I see Jason fly up into the air; it's a funny thing to see. But THEN I get angry). The Arch-Vile is standing there, filling the doorway, towering over me. He's busy resurrecting a nearby imp, however, and I start flinging plasma cells into his gut. He notices and moves forward towards me. I back up against the wall, continuing to fire, as he puts his hands together and the yellow flames appear. I turn and run, knowing the blast will finish me. As I'm running, red death fills my screen, and I die.
When I rematerialize on the other side of the building, Jason is waiting for me. I tell him that I pumped alot of plasma cells into the Arch-Vile, so he should be weakened. We head back to the plaza, but as soon as we start moving through the building, we hear the Arch-Vile's awful hiss. He's coming after us! He descends the stairs into the hallway where we wait, and, seeing us, puts his hands together once again. The yellow flames dance in front of me, and I turn a nearby corner to escape. Jason uses the momentary distraction well and hits the Arch-Vile with a couple of rockets. Revenge is sweet, and I hear the odd sound that tells me that the arch-vile is now just some bloody limbs on the ground.
Now that the hard part is over, we head back to the plaza to take on the horde of Imps and Demons again. We do it the smart way, standing in the doorway and emptying the super shotgun into whatever appears in front of us. Soon the doorway is littered with corpses and we cautiously walk out into the courtyard. The Mancubus is still there, too fat to move in between the columns, and we pump him full of lead until his skull flies off and he melts down in a gurgle. The soul sphere is still there, waiting for us, and I insist that Jason takes it.
He'll need it for our next hoedown.
 
Rob Berkowitz is a frequent contributor of WAD reviews for MacDoom Review. Do you want to write the next DoomPlay? Send in a note to reeltime@voicenet.com.
