Gotten tired of Doom's endless stream of hellspawn? Perhaps Rampancy may do the trick for you. A monsterpack by Yholl and Cherno, Rampancy is designed for maximum compatiblity with various gameplay mods. What this does is bring a whole lot of robot models to your GZDoom weapons mod or mapset, but with some additional twists:

• There are no hitscan attacks, all bullets from robots are projectiles.
• There is no infighting at all, but all enemies can injure each other no matter their type.
• Damage is semi-static. All damage varies by 2, giving values like 13-17 damage.
• Projectiles are faster than vanilla Doom, but do far less damage due to low values and minimal randomization.
• Robots that fire physical projectiles have limited ammo, exhausting that ammo will force them to either rely on other attacks or power down.
• Enemies set to Ambush in maps will have different behaviour, usually lying in wait ready to attack.
• Many menu options to customize things like item drops or cosmetic options.
• A difficulty option in addition to normal Doom skill levels, which gives robots more dangerous behaviour or abilities.

All in all, Rampancy is the kind of mod you would want to throw in sci-fi related maps and weapon sets. Be a different kind of Terminator with Rampancy!

This is news that came as surprising as the many deaths in 2016: Randi Heit stops the development of the ZDoom sourceport. I was actually very shocked when reading this. Personally, for me the ZDoom sourceport was always the most advanced one and also the one that kept me modding for Doom. I can still remember the good old Phorums times when I first posted feature requests and asking for support when ZDoom was at 1.22 in the year 2000... that's around 17 years now. Anyway, as shocking as this is, there are also good news to tell - and with good news come also benefits. But one thing after another.

I want to thank Randi Heit on his fantastic work in the past two decades. He has done an amazing job and even though it got calmer lately around him and others were doing the dirty work, he is the reason why many of us still stick to this old game and still continue mapping and modding, as he always listened to the community demands. Thanks for all your dedictaion Randi, don't get a stranger!

Now onto the other side of the medal that we should not miss: Eruanna, dpjudas and Graf Zahl - with both of them we have important and amazing pillars in the community, that ensure to keep the legacy alive. QZDoom and GZDoom are engines that already go hand in hand for shorter or longer times now and with both of them we have someone who keep the forums, the compatibility and the future going. Beyond, Graf Zahl can now decide many things that wouldn't have been possible as long as compatibility to ZDoom had to be granted.

All in all, this is not the most happy day in the history of Doom - but promises are being made: it's not the worst either. I am looking forward to 2017!

From time to time, Doomer extraordinaire Jimmy plays his magic when it comes to new midi music, in the form of Community Midi Packs. With Plutonia, Revolution! and Rebirth behind his belt,  He and his team of fellow composers now turn to Heretic, with the Raven Midi Pack: An ode to Kevin Schilder.

The full game shipped with five episodes - six if you count the three hidden ''E6'' levels - for a total of 48 levels. Amazingly, the number of pieces in its original soundtrack amounted to less than half that, with a total of 19 unique level themes and 3 more tracks for the title, intermission and story themes. The pack is already well under way, but nevertheless, it never hurts to take a shot at this.

To consider writing new music, please do so only for Episodes 2-6.

How to join:

• Observe the Completion Report below.
• Claim a slot, or up to three at once - your slot(s) will be listed as "claimed/track unfinished".
• Claiming does not mean you are inextricably bound to that slot - you may drop out or move your claim at any time!
• Start writing!
• Once your piece is finished and submitted I will offer you any critical feedback needed.
• Once your piece is finalised, your slot will be listed as "completed".
• Completed tracks may still move around to form the final order.

Guidelines:

• Imitate Kevin Schilder's style as best you can! Closely study it and expose your ears to his compositional tricks and motives.
• Tracks must fit the map you're writing for, and integrate into Heretic's existing soundtrack.
• Track length must fall within 1:00-3:00. Heretic's pieces are NOT epic in length! Heck, the longest ones are still only just above 2:00. Crazy, right?
• Name your tracks. Untitled tracks will not be accepted!
• Collaboration with other composers is encouraged!
• Remixes of the existing tracks are permitted, but not encouraged. Originality is what we're after here.
• Brand-new tracks only this time around! I won't be accepting tracks that have been resting on your hard drive for months beforehand, unused. Let's all be on an even footing going into this project!

The final product:

• An "album" of MIDI files in a zipped, instant download.
• A WAD file compilation that will allow the tracks to play in-game.
• A new resource for the community! All tracks will be reusable per the permissions in the text file!

From the likes of DoomKid comes Ray Mohawk's Manic Monday!, a tropical minisode of 6 levels that is 100% vanilla-compatible and should run in any port. Away from the gloom and doom of the Shores of Hell, Manic Monday sees our protagonist Ray Mohawk take a nice holiday to the tropics, to the beachside neighborhood he knows and loves. But in 2027, the UAC developed Nukage™. A revolutionary fuel alternative for then current oil and petroleum. It was ''the savior humanity was waiting for.'' But not for Ray Mohawk. Whether it was because of Nukage™ or not, the ecosystem and coincidentially Ray's neighborhood polluted - including his former neighbors. Only one option is left - to travel to the UAC heart of operations, and reassure that Mohawk's future holiday's to the beachside are saved. Check it out!

Re-Blood is a expanded version of original Blood - and it really is! After much thought and the project developing for a long time, the author MaxiClouds decided to release it with a huge amount of features already:

• Reworked weapons! Most weapons have reload, improved sound and effects.
• Now you can carry 2 weapons anytime(full time akimbo).
• More BLOOD, More Gibs!
• Working Delirium mode.
• Beast mode!
• Few reworked maps
• Improved swimming system
• All weapons and enemies from original Blood included.
• Armor system like original.
• Headshot system.

For screenshots, more information and a download link, check the ZDoom development thread and hope the author will continue working on it!

MaxEd, the famous creator of GZDoomBuilder seems to be a mapper and modder as well, as he has just released another public test version of his Re-Exhumed. It is his attempt at recreating a 1996 FPS PC game known as Powerslave in America, Exhumed in Europe and Seireki 1999: Pharaoh no Fukkatsu in Japan. It includes several enhancements like better enemy behavious, new music, widescreen-friendlieness and more nifty stuff that hasn't been in the PC version before. A playable demo can be downloaded in the official thread, other than that I totally encourage you to test it and give MaxEd some feedback, it's definitely worth playing!