Legions of Hell 2

Score - 2.72 / 6
- If "Scythe" had a younger brother that was kept in the basement for obvious reasons, this would be it.


Alien Vendetta co-author Brad Spencer pointed us towards this little known episode. Apparently it was uploaded without much fanfare back in 2004, and soon forgotten.

"Legions of Hell 2" is an updated version of the original "Leigons of Hell", from what one can tell. It occupies Doom II map01 through 11, and was put together by one John Gaughan in the aforementioned year. According to the txt it needs a limit removing port to run proper.

To quote the author himself, he set out to do the following:

"My focus is great gameplay, not awesome detail. While they are not bland, they should be halfway pretty to look at. I know the maps are heavy on ammunition, I balanced them that way on purpose. I like lots of ammo."

So, with that out of the way - lets have a closer look at this cookie. 

MAP01 - Entrance to pain 
[Hunsager]
This is not a very promising start. The L-shaped hallway with the 17 marble faces is probably the entryway to pain. You then progress into a dull and grey little yard, and yes, this is painful to look at, just like the other few dark and sordidly decorated rooms in this level. Altogether, this is a small and forgettable starter. The only clever thing done here is the secret yellow key you can reach when you run over the shotgun and jump through the window.

Aesthetics: 2/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  8/18

[Johnsen]
A small anonymous start-map that does not leave much to complain about, nor much to remember. Theme-wise I would categorize this as an earth / tech-base that does not follow any strict direction. Take a left from the start, and you get the only slightly interesting area architecturally - with the balcony overlooking a garden you can jump into in order to collect an optional yellow key. Said key does not hold much point on multiplayer since you already get the super shotgun elsewhere. The garden / outdoor area before the exit, is at best amateurishly simplistic. Several bland secret enclosures can be tracked, five in all, each delivering excess weapons and ammo. Difficulty leans towards the trivial because of the ammo and health overload, which seems randomly distributed and excessive.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

The secret garden...and its obvious sky-where-walls-should-be.

Map02 - Death from above  
[Hunsager]
This map starts out with a nice and decent view of blue water, torches and brown stone. When you approach the marble face downstairs you are surprisingly teleported into a completely different looking room with a blue key. This was probably done to make some sort of diabolic touch but it feels just odd and strange. The invisibility is handy and useful in this level and there is a cool secret with a supercharge behind a waterfall.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 2/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  8/18

[Johnsen] 

One of the nicer looking maps in the set, which is not saying much. A small brown and grey water-filled subterranean brick map with a few decently smooth lighting touches to its upper hallways. Not much more to say really, you'll quickly blaze through this with your excess ammo and health. Leaves little to remember, but might still be one of the more tolerable offerings in the set. It's too short and cheap to get much of a score however. The low point architecturally would be the out of place marble-garden that you cheaply teleport into in order to collect the blue key.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

Map03 - Insanity  
[Hunsager]
This is a very small level, with a total of two keys in just three rooms! If a map consists of a beginning, a middle and an end, this one at least lacks the middle. It's a shame, because the first room starts out so promising with its nice contrasts, delicious colors and decent details. There should have been more of this. Did this map end so abruptly because of a sudden lack of ideas?

Aesthetics: 4/6 - Layout: 2/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

[Johnsen]
My partner in crime managed to get himself locked in the closet with the backpack, because someone forgot to proper playtest said secret. That might be the most memorable part of this one. It's another "fast-food" type of map with not much substance but just enough sugar to keep you going. I'll give due credit to the first hall you enter which also make up the central part of the map. This bit looks nice. It's a decent setup with the height differences, the little moat before the BFG and the ceiling beams. This might just be the prettiest section in the episode overall. Gameplay-wise this was another quick run-through, you are pretty much wading around in corpses, health and ammo. The garden area which leads to the exit pulls the aesthetic rating down a peg, I just cant stand the illogical ceiling height compared to the connecting hallway which obviously makes no sense - that's just lazy, and stands out in a map this small.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

Behold. One of the finest views of the episode.

Map04 - Cacofire  
[Hunsager]
This map is all about cacos. Two times in cages and one time around a key on a lowering pillar. There is nothing more, really. If you run around, it's easy to make them infight, so there is not that much of a challenge.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

[Johnsen]
This marble, brick and stone base gives a slight vibe of Ultimate Dooms episode 4, but I would be disgracing that masterpiece if I compared it further. There's not much to be said about the indoor area which mainly consist of caged hallways, and the red key garden is best left forgotten as it's one ugly sunnuva - it does however bring a decent fight with the sizable ambush it unleashes. Again, we found ourselves leaving tons of ammo and health behind.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

I'm sure that key is safe to grab.

Map05 - Lost hallways  
[Hunsager]
These hallways were lost for a reason. They are dark and inhabited with some lost souls and poor caged imps. You don't wanna be here too long, so get the red and yellow key and try to hurry away from here. There is a dark room with an ambush of demons and cacos where it's easy to die, so beware. The last room before the exit has some odd looking shapes and decoration.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 4/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  10/18

[Johnsen]
I would say this is one of the more successful maps in the set compared to what the author set out to do - create small fast-paced simplistic levels. It's another tiny one alright, with plenty of monsters. Ammo and health is liberally and somewhat lazily distributed throughout. There's a decently pleasant center hall which connects some water-filled and identical looking hallways together. That's pretty much what the map has to offer, beyond a really ugly section involving wood, barrels and a plasma-gun. It draws obvious inspiration from Doom II's 2nd map, but fails to recreate the simplistic beauty of that one.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

Map06 - Painkiller  
[Hunsager]
This maps steps up the challenge a bit as it contains the first revenants and pain elementals. There is a room stacked with enemies and the main threat being a Cyberdemon in a cage. After the battle we discovered it was not that difficult after all, since there is both an invulnerability and a crusher to kill the cybie with. In the second room there are some tempting windows to explore. You can slip through to have a look at the outside, but don't try it! There is no reward waiting for you outside this time, only the slow death in hurting lava. Power-ups are abundant  in this level if you find the secrets, but getting the light-amp goggles when there is just one monster left is not much use.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 4/6 - Score:  10/18

[Johnsen]
For some reason I'm gonna be nice and peg this one a notch higher than the rest as far as gameplay goes. This was the map that I enjoyed the most outta the 11 pieces in the set, and that's more due to a healthy combination of monsters and available ammo rather than a masterful execution. It's a really simple creation, consisting of a few decently lit hallways and a Cyberdemon showdown inside a rather bland metal hall. Said cybie was rather easy to deal with because of its caged status, but I'm not gonna complain about that fact. It's a fun, quick thing to blaze through, but I'll forget it just as quick.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 4/6 - Score:  10/18

No reward for you this time, this is where you die!

Map07 - Dead again  
[Hunsager]
This is a pale shadow of the original Dead simple, with the only invention over the old concept being the barrels between the monsters, and that isn't interesting enough. Apart from that, the two rooms are decorated with as much as 86 marble faces. Congratulations on that proud achievement!

Aesthetics: 1/6 - Layout: 1/6 - Gameplay: 1/6 - Score:  3/18

[Johnsen]
Yes, I get that this is supposed to be a gimmicky Map07 kind of thing, but it just takes an overused concept and does nothing with it. This is too cheap, even for an episode that sets out to pride itself on simplicity. Two large, ugly garden areas with no creativity involved. It probably takes about as long to make a map like this as it takes to blast through it, or say, blow your nose.

Aesthetics: 2/6 - Layout: 2/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  7/18

Map08 - Fury  
[Hunsager]
This might be the best level so far. The action and monster-placement is good, and there are ambushes and surprises around every corner and in every room, and new monsters appear and pop up as you backtrack. You can access a secret garden by running over a berserk and jumping through the window, just like the secret in Map01, but this time the reward is a supercharge.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 4/6 - Gameplay: 4/6 - Score: 11/18

[Johnsen]

I suppose I'll say that the wooden hallway with the berserk and the rocket-launcher, which allows for a jump into the garden area below and thus granting an outside view, is half decent if you are out of creativity and in a hurry. The rest, well, it's just a few connecting hallways and some smallish bland rooms that make up another standard fare for this set of maps. It's a good thing it's as short as this, because if this dragged on, the points would go down.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

Map09 - Hell's vanguard  
[Hunsager]
This starts out with a mean ambush which had me shot dead. The pain elementals around the BFG also had me another time. I can't decide which of the two embarrassing areas I despise the most, the outdoor cyber mountain arena with the hopeless looking pillars and horrible texture combination, or the green and brown main basement with imps in small cages. Since you keep coming back to the underground core room and because of it's asymmetrical shapes and lines I guess that is the most annoying part. In the room with the yellow key there is a secret in a corner with a supercharge where you can get stuck if you don't move away from the lift. Second time I get stuck in a secret, ouch, not good!

Aesthetics: 2/6 - Layout: 4/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

[Johnsen]
A much more crowded map than the previous ones, and more of a challenge. This is the first one that killed me off repeatedly, since I managed to fall into the lava-pit in front of the exit like a drunk tard. We both got our asses firmly kicked by the nasty ambush that unleash in the large outdoor area towards the north of the map. The BFG certainly helped some, as did the cybie, but the arch-viles were mean bitches to deal with after losing our ammo stacks. I suppose one could say the raise in challenge was needed, so I wont complain too much about that, and the map feels more complex than the previous ones. It cloaks the fact that it is tiny by adding a lot of lifts and doors and high end monsters. Quality wise it's pretty much on par with the rest of the maps, not much to write home about. There is an annoying lack of symmetry and care for proper detailing, but at the same time some minor effort has been put into smooth lighting. It's loaded with secrets, but none of them memorable, nor tempting to hunt down because of their random nature.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18

A huge arrow pointing towards the BFG. In case I didn't see it.

Map10 - Toxicity  
[Hunsager]
Five square rooms and three trenches of toxic waste hardly justifies this levels name. This is too small and barely a start of a map. Too many barons in the smallest of the five rooms make this no fun.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 2/6 - Gameplay: 2/6 - Score:  7/18

[Johnsen]
Slightly better visuals than the previous map, and less of a drag. Nothing grand here, but it's tolerable and mundane in equal amounts. Standard tiny tech/brick/slime base thing. Short map, short review.

Aesthetics: 3/6 - Layout: 3/6 - Gameplay: 3/6 - Score:  9/18




Map11 - Demonfear  
[Hunsager]
It would be better if this parody of a grand finale was just left out of the episode, since it's a total failure. I noticed later on single-player that if you don't fire a shot, you won't release the demon ambush and you can grab all the keys with only the 15 demons chasing you, rendering this not much of a challenge.

Aesthetics: 1/6 - Layout: 1/6 - Gameplay: 1/6 - Score:  3/18

[Johnsen]
Once upon a time it was enough to put up a few pillars in a big, open, dark space and load it with monsters, health and ammo. That time had passed long ago, even in 2004.

Aesthetics: 1/6 - Layout: 1/6 - Gameplay: 2/6 - Score:  4/18




Hunsagers' Summary and total score:
These maps are small, short, simplistic and not very pretentious. The monsters are mostly appearing in an ok mixture, and there is an alright use of traps and monster-closets keeping the action going. Powerups and secrets are abundant, and the difficulty is rising in the later maps. The aesthetics are not very impressive, and it doesn't seem like there was much point in making them sourceport dependent when so few of the opportunities were used. After all, the time and thought the author invested in making these maps can't be that much. It's probably a good thing he stopped after making 11 maps if he didn't have enough ideas for more.

My score: 2.63
Aesthetics: 2.54 - Layout: 2.63 - Gameplay: 2.72
(Awarded points: 28 / 29 / 30 = 87)


Johnsens' Summary and total score:
It's hard to justify this as needing a limit removing port, when it's solidifying in the txt that the gameplay is the driving force, not the visuals. With a few less lazy copy/paste details I'm fairly sure it would not require much tampering to make this 100% 1.9 compatible - it certainly does not look more detailed than the original i-wads. I'm not gonna slander a guy for wanting to put together a quick snack meal with loads of ammo and monsters to slay - that IS pretty much what this thing offers, but there's just little justification for its existence considering other offerings that were already out and well established by 2004.

This set didn't add anything new, nor improved on anything old, and it failed to fine-tune the gameplay into something extraordinary. Excess power-ups and ammo scattered around is not "well planned" nor fine-tuned gameplay. It is my opinion such needs to build gradually and achieve a flow through variation and clever design. The most redeeming quality of these maps would be the very limited size, they are quickly completed and quickly forgotten, and the main issue is mostly the plain, mundane and rushed approach the author applied. This is not unplayable, and it's not horrible, but it's pretty lame. If "Scythe" had a younger brother that was kept in the basement for obvious reasons, this would be it.

My score: 2.81

Aesthetics: 2.63 - Layout: 2.81 - Gameplay: 3.00
(Awarded points: 29 / 31 / 33 = 93)



COMBINED SCORE: 2.72

Aesthetics: 2.59 - Layout: 2.72 - Gameplay: 2.86