i love stumbling on reviews of my old doom maps, great video. I had a lot of fun making this zany megawad. UV with pistol starts was intended for players who are already quite familiar with the maps, hence they can get a little frustrating in this mode. People shouldn't be ashamed to drop to lower difficulties, as well. I don't think of them as difficulties, more like modes to play the maps faster and looser, because sometimes I just want to charge around like a lunatic and get away with it. I think fun is about getting away with mistakes and challenge is being punished for them, so balancing the two involves somehow tricking the player into thinking you are trying to kill them when really you are trying to keep them alive.

The telephone conversations taught me that the true reason as to why the Doomslayer doesn't speak is because he's British. Which to be fair, is a valid reason.

Wait Cyriak?! THAT CYRIAK?! I never knew he made DOOM levels let alone an entire WAD. Definitely gotta check this one out.

I am a long-standing fan of Cyriak's music and videos, and never imagined that he is a Doom level designer as well. And turns out, a pretty good one. Really a talented man.

In MAP32 I like the idea of the hitscanner corpses moulding together into the spider mastermind because that sounds like what Harris was going for

Decino just started playing this and while watching this video I am giggling on how he he will react to certain levels. Great video man! So awesome!

You know it's good when the lowest rated map is C+. Also, the monster names at the end are a great British reference!

Going Down remains one of the ZANIEST megawads I've ever played

Definitely one of the most impressive megawads in recent history, both for its overall quality and for how well it realizes its conceit using simple Boom tricks. The TeamTNT Boom episode of Evolution of the WAD explains it better, but so many of Going Down's special effects and encounters exist thanks to prodigious use of voodoo doll belts. That elevator going down at the start and end of maps? Operated by a voodoo belt. Any of the particularly mind-bending maps and puzzles? Quite easy to do in a modern mapping format like UDMF, but just as doable in the earlier Boom standard. It's a master class in demonstrating the various creative uses of a more limited but still potent limit-removing platform from 1998. I started mapping with Boom knowing it would get me as close to the classic Doom mapping experience as I'd like, but with potential to scale ambitions with belts for timed encounters or environmental changes normally impossible in vanilla (limit-removing). On top of all that, Cyriak's just a damn good mapper who rightly used this gimmick focus to make the rare megawad that doesn't overstay its welcome through its structure. The bite-sized flow of each major region in Going Down means you can jump in and out of the WAD without ever having to play catch-up, unlike some others (looking at you BTSX...much as I love ya) where you're going from small to enormous maps a lot of the time. And the relative lack of new assets means Cyriak has to coax new and inventive situations out of the standard bestiary and Doom II resources, making it doubly impressive when you fall into hell and then back into the elevator for who knows what's coming next! It's no wonder this megawad's so often recommended to new Doom players, whether they're just scanning the Cacowards for canonical greats or looking to deep dive into the classic modding community. This megawad serves a lot of players' wants and needs early on, and yet it's very replayable and ripe for study if you're a mapper. Excellent video as always, and a helluva Halloween to all of y'all!

Im glad papa Decino pointed me in your direction. Glad to see Going Down, one of my favorite wads of all time. Love the videos. Keep up the good work man, looking forward to seeing your channel grow.

14:45 in Decino's let's play of Going Down, he didn't want to kill the imp because peeing before you die is embarrassing in his opinion.

I've started playing through this wad myself and I can't get over how good it is. I've never played a wad that so effectively communicates the personality of its author.

7:27 I believe the correct term is "an Agitation of Revenants"

Thanks to you, professor, I have finished my first run of Going Down today. And as usual, I have a few things to say: First off, Cyriak is a genius of minimalism. The man made an entire megawad's worth of ultra-compact maps with often tiny monster counts feel so much freaking bigger than it is. BUT!, simultaneously, not a single level is long enough to cause fatigue, not even one where you have a lot of crap to do and platforming to get places such as Forbidden Fruit. Like Valiant, Going Down has a _very_ refined tempo. And I should also mention how some of the secrets work: sometimes the treasure in a secret is not the items within, but the extra space you can duck into. Trip Switch and Demonology get extra marks. In accordance to Mouldy's sense of detail, Going Down is almost like Eviternity in how it refers to previous maps. You noticed Stair Crazy's vistas of UAC office building floors, but what about the final descent into Necropolis? You can always take a peek into the cavernous infernal city starting in Demonology, and you can see the Bridge of Blood from the open vista in Forbidden Fruit! And when you finally reach the bottom, the architecture beyond the playing field actually matches what we kept seeing. Is that hecka neat or what?! 😈 Finally, one more thing to commend is the conservative mood with which you're given gear per level, which certainly has a sting with all-pistol-start play but really comes unto itself in continuous play. There was only one level where I can say carryover stuff made it considerably easier, and that was Demonology - it's way easier if you've hoarded a stash of cells for the plasma. Oh, and the BFG's placement makes the pickups shine all the more, they're there strictly when needed and never for cheese. Final note: Insanity is, indeed, *evil.* Going Down has harder maps, almost equally disturbing maps, and maps with even more grandeur... but Insanity is basically uncontrollable. Not even the torrential outflow of monsters trapping the blue skull key in Necropolis was as stressful as map 26.

Oh wow, wasn't expecting cyriak. Cool!

"paranoia about doing anything will serve you well"

Dude, I had a bad day at job, and the first thing I see in youtube when I came back home is your video. I made my dinner and watched the whole thing. You made my day. ty god bless.

I never knew Cyriak made a Doom WAD, but that kinda makes it more impressive. It looks very fun and painful at the same time. And about the music, it's kinda understandable that people don't really like it, even though I love it. His music works the finest with his animations, since it's a mixture of joy and insanity packed into around 3 minutes of a track. The music still fits pretty well though. Thanks for reviewing this WAD, it was very interesting.

Of all the WADs this channel has encouraged me to play, this is in my top 3. I simply couldn't put it down, ending up binging the entire WAD in a single day through Brutal Doom - outstanding stuff. I'm glad you highlighted the music because it really is a "sum is greater than the parts" scenario, the game would feel incomplete without the music and visa versa. Great video as always Mr Dean!

People may not like cyriak's music and that's fine, but as a professional composer working for 20+ years, saying that his music is bad is ludicrous. He knows a lot about polyrithmics, disonance and his percussion work is amazing. His music is incredible and presents a really unique sound.

To skip to the reviews: 2:04 Link to the wad is in the description!

This is the first custom wad i've ever ended, I love it

Hey, I remember suggesting this wad in the comments. Glad to see you were willing to suffer its dickishness for our entertainment. And yeah, "chaotic evil" seems an apt description. It's not only hard as balls in UV, it sometimes feels like an acid trip in Doom format.

2:37 this implies the dean was an office drone before becoming the dean of doom academy, from humble beginnings i guess

This is one of my new favorite channels. Great work so far, and you chose an excellent, delightfully demented megawad for Halloween. And you picked my favorite map for Valedictorian too! I almost want to suggest some megawads, but I'm sure you've already received a bunch of requests and I don't want to impose. All I can say for now is to keep up the quality videos!

"Insanity" is the most memorable Doom map I have ever played. so cool! this WAD is an excellent show in creativity and fun.

I agree with nearly all of what you said in this video, with Map 15:Gladiator, Map 19:200 Mega Hurts, Map 20: The Mouth of Madness, and Map 29:Necropolis being my personal favorites. also, the music has more of an "Elevator Music from Hell" vibe for me, so there's that. Regardless, this Wad is still well deserving of its A. Here's to season 3!

"Caesar gets easily distracted by the demonic crowd throwing their demonic beer and demonic nachos." History. Not how I remember it.

Just finished. The combat here is normally much more claustrophobic than I prefer, but Cyriak's twisted presentation force me to bow. Unfortunately, the title now seems like a prophecy of the likelihood of Dean of Doom returning. Be safe and we'll accept whatever you decide.

Cyriak is a guy that earned my respect, even before I knew of this wad. His stuff is surreal and kinda creepy if you're new to it, but if you bother to look at the production value of any of his releases, you'll see he is dedicated to them in a way that makes most professionals look incompetent. Lad's a legend. Shame his KZfaq channel took so long to reach 1M subs, he's an OG. I like to joke that Gladiator is less a coliseum event and more a regular session at the Bolivian Parliament. My friends from Bolivia can confirm 😂 I wonder to myself how Going Down compares to Sunlust, both in quality and difficulty. Seriously, Sunlust is my baby wad. (On that note, sorry but I find it hard to believe that none of the levels in Going Down is harder than Eviternity's Anagnorisis. You'd have to convince me, but if you don't it's fine, we can agree to disagree 😌) Happy Halloween, Pain, and thanks for another great Dean of Doom episode!

glad you had a fun time with this one! the visual storytelling in it is just a delight. adore the "stream of consciousness" level progression.

This channel is pretty much exactly what I've been looking for - well structured analysis of custom wads with solid editing and humour. Keep it up man.

Nice work bringing more attention to this absolute masterpiece! I hope to see some of the classic 90's megawads like Requiem or Memento Mori covered on this channel eventually.

I'm glad I suggested this wad for you to review it, it is one my favourites of all time and the music is just amazing.

Loved the editing in this episode! So happy to see you are trying out new stuff!

Going Down's music has such an impact that you can easily distinguish cyriak's work by music alone, ala Map28 from NOVA ( Man, that was an amazing map❤️)

Spooky day got even better as soon as I saw the notification!!! Also, I love cyriak animations with my soul, but I had no idea that he made wads too! Definitely looking forward to playing this! And also, the show is awesome. Getting better and better uwu

The names of some of the monsters in the credits are from an old UK kids TV show, think it's called Rainbow. The imp was called Bungle, Google that to see why its hilarious

This has quickly become one of my favorites. Short, sweet and ball crushingly hard when it wants to be.

Started playing this based on the review, and it's wonderful. Thanks for bringing this gem to light!

This wad is a masterpiece. It feels like one fool adventure. I especially like those connections between maps - sneak peaks to previous maps during map31, and connections between 'buried alive' and '200 mega hurts'.

I really appreciate the editing on this one. I hope you do more creative editing/editing gags, they add a lot to the videos. Keep up the good work!!

I'm glad I stumbled upon your channel after I ran out of Decino videos to watch. This is great content, and I'm glad you like this megawad as much as I do! You put out some AMAZING content, keep it up dude!

Loving your videos man. I hope you get more recognition, you really deserve it. Great stuff.

Found your channel because of decino and have been loving the dean of Doom videos

God this wad looks awesome. I'm definitely going to give it a try. Once again an amazing video. Up to par with decino I just cant wait to see the next video.

Love it. This is your best episode yet. Keep up the good work!

Happy Halloween back at you! Another awesome video! :D

How did I not find this channel earlier? This videos are awesome can't wait for the next. Keep it up dude :D

It’s so creatively twisted and crazy, as to what is done in a DOOM wad! I never did finish this, (checked some out here and there) so I missed out on a lot. Like seeing the storytelling, very clever. Needing the red key, but coming back to it later after the UFO - the yellow key in time warp that you showed - the mouth of madness - and then Insanity just being… wow. It’s all so creatively TWISTED! Wild wad

I didn't even know there was a portion of the Doom community that hated this WAD's soundtrack lmao. Personally, I love it. I don't think this WAD's sense of sheer derangement and sick amusement at your expense would be nearly as memorable without Cyriak's psychotic compositions to compliment it. You really can't do without it as it gives the WAD its voice. A voice that is spouting Harlan Ellison level insults while throwing angry-looking candy at you

I remembered really enjoying this when I first played it, and watching Dwars' playthrough of it really reminded me how well designed everything is. I'm really happy Insanity got Valedictorian, since that's my favorite map of this WAD, and probably one of my top 5 maps of all time. That level blew my mind when I first played it, from the lift changing its look, to the floors falling out, to that ending. Also, Game Over may be my favorite IoS map. I remember thinking that it was just fun little end level with nothing in it, and then panicking when the Icon's Eyes appeared when I picked up that key. Good stuff.

Thank you for recommending this megawad! I've been having a lot of fun playing this on UV with no saves in MBF 2.03 on my DOS PC. I'm really excited to play MAP19 because I'm kinda weird and I love the funny Pain Elementals very much :D

My favorite wad. It's fun, crazy bordering on insane sometimes, hectic music fits with the theme very well imo, map designs are awesome, and challenging in a good way. Had plenty of WTF?! moments on my first playthrough but rather than get frustrated I was motivated to try again. Extremely well made and enjoyable.

Its most interesting, fun and hard wad that I have played, also felt in love with music, replayed whole wad with different mods, Going Down truly is great

My first playthrough of this wad was with Trailblazer, and it still managed to be a challenge and a chaotic slaughter while never not being fun.

I had no idea Cyriak had made a mega wad and it's certainly a testament to his warped mind. Some of the music I recognised as coming from his many animation videos. Going to have to play this now

I watched Cyriak and played Doom for ages but never knew those things were so deeply connected!

I like the Chernobyl reference! Loved that show!

Note, Map 19 also plays different depending on the difficulty. If you play the easier ones only spooky skeletons will show up.

I watched Dwars play this on his channel, but yeah, this is a fantastic megawad that gets my appreciation for its creativity in how it uses default Doom graphics to create some wildly detailed areas.

i havent even watched the review yet but i know itll be high quality content. keep up the good work!

I would like to thank DoD for highlighting this mod. I have not played many Doom mods but this ranks as my favorite Doom mod so far, it's not just a lift gimmick the game play on every level is engaging, unique and fun. Love the music as it adds to the overall feel of the mod. I would love to see a follow up this.

I had no idea this wad was made by the same guy who made those surreal animations on KZfaq I used to love so much, makes me really wanna play it. And Doomguy talking to his mom on the phone between missions is a nice touch.

This is my favorite WAD specially when you add brutal to it holy smokes the action.

That's an amazing soundtrack. Very jazz-y and prog-rockish. Honestly, it seems harder than Alien Vendetta in spots. Almost like that path through the middle of lava in Cybersky where you're dodging what I think is the rockets of half a dozen Cyberdemons and realizing there's not enough invulnerability spheres to survive. I got past it after 100 times, but that was probably the hardest part of the entire map, including the last section.

I greatly recommend you to play the wad DTS-T if you never played it. It has a kind of plot and the maps are well made. Also keep up the good work, it's always good to see channels of quality grow. All my support from France !

Thank you!, I have been watching your channel ever since the first time Decino mentioned you, and when I saw this I thought, I just gotta play this some day. I did and it was an amazing experience, I also for the first time did pistol starts and no saving during the levels on UV- I play on gzdoom but I like having the punching not feeling as jank, and I also enjoy jumping on demons heads as when I was a child I never imagined the monsters having infinite height. by Far my favorite map was stair crazy it seemed like the funniest concept of all to me in a wad all about going down an elevator, to have one level where you just go up stairs for the entire level. Second in line is mouth of madness and 3rd indigestion ( I didn't find the rad suit till after the level was done) visually and playing those levels was a complete joy I can only describe it as watching a cyriak video it's strange but absolutely captivating. Secrets and lies was hard, but I don't think it was as evil as this video made it seem, Vivisection, Necropolis, Gladiator I personally found it was better to rush all the monsters out gladiator specifically get the crowd to join and rush to the toilet then finish the fight ;). As a lover of TNT when I saw time warp I knew this wad was going to be for me. There was moments where I wanted to use saves again these maps made me turn the music off I overall thought the music fit the maps but man being stuck on an level for more than 40 minutes the music was slowly sending me insane, Insanity ( till I figured out you could do a one way circle it was giving me a lot of pain) Necropolis was a personal achievement for me, but the music did have to come off. Demonology is evil, I made myself a custom path but the chemistry room fight was always painful, and the map chips away both your hp and your sanity, And by far the hardest map personally was "rest in pieces" 3-4 hours of my life was complete pain, the map itself is great but man the ambushes, and doing the whole level just to have the last fight where you get scammed by an archville, catch a single cyberdemon rocket, find a cluster of revenant missiles ( or one max damage one). Dying on the berserk pack on a near complete run will probably give me nightmares for me entire life. footnote, Constipation station was kinda painful around 15 deaths- but the archville surprise at the end got me to 3% health, then I found the secrets after I had beaten the level... I honestly can't tell if I liked everternity more than this they are both god teir in terms of mega wads to me!

This set's a modern classic. It really pushes the Boom engine to its limits.

Loved this WAD. So creative.

I think this is one of best wads ever made for doom. I bet Carmack would approve. Cannot WAIT!!! for decino to get into next levels. He is gona be amazed

Your rating of "haunted robo-clown massacre" means I definitely must try it 😁

I never knew Cyriak made a doom wad. I kinda want to stop everything and play it now.

I mentioned that I tackled and completed JPCP earlier, and that you inspired me to play it. Your reply was "Here's to many more," and here we are! Going down is my next megawad! Here goes nothing!

Bruh. Map 03 was my first time using a chainsaw in my entire career and i died a lot bc of that lmaooo. This wad is sick! The whole episode 3 was banger after banger

This wad got me good. Certainly one of the best I've played. Necropolis is my favorite map. That genocide of revenants got me good the first time.

This is one of my favorite Doom wads. Necropolis is insane.

After finishing Lost Civilization based on your video, I decided to tackle this one. I have to say that, so far (200 Mega Hurts), I'm actually much more pleased with Going Down than LC for several reasons: 1) Instead of playing on large expanses of terrain where the action gets lost, Going Down features mostly small, cramped spaces that keep the action going. The combat is also more intense, courtesy of maps like Roof Rage that really make you use that BFG like few other maps. Dead End is also a great example, with bigger arena and it forces you to really be careful and clean up bit by bit or the arena will become deadly whether infigthing occurs or not. Ah yeah, and Gladiator. I actually did that Russel Crowe imitation, even without your advice. It just came naturally, what a great feeling. 2) There's a real dark, unhinged aspect to this wad, and the horror and unhinged aspect of the maps surpass basically anything I've seen in commercial Doom so far, except maybe Halls of the Damned. Vivisection is so claustrophobic and gory that I actually couldn't help but shudder at some point, Time Warp made me think of Silent Hill with its theme, which reinforced the atmosphere that oozed from those humid, decrepit walls and broken machinery (and holy shit, actual puzzles in Doom that don't require you to hit switches randomly and look at what happens?!), and Hide and Seek really plays with jump scares (too bad the map is completely scripted though). 3) The use of the Arch-viles. Although I've always considered Arch-viles as the strongest enemies in the game, this is the first time of me playing Doom where their use is actually very clever: the level really unleashes them at moments during which they can do a lot of damage with their ability to bring back monsters. Hide and Seek takes their attack style and makes a whole map around it, but other maps have them run around rather stealthily, resurrecting monsters galore and you can truly feel the pain of having to fight those monsters twice. Vivisection is another great example that had me say "oh shit, not you!" as one of the secrets unleashed the Arch-vile in a room full of corpses. The tight, cramped aspect of the levels also plays a huge role in Arch-viles being so strong. That being said, Buried Alive really had me on the ropes, what an exhaustingly difficult map.

Great Video! I hope you can cover overboard, a spiritual sequel to going down

I had no idea this was made by the same guy who made those crazy animations, he's got multiple talents as it seems!

this is my fav doom wad,i love this and i adore it

I always liked the map to map continuity with this one like when you get off an elevator and end the map in a different way like jumping down a hole, you start the next map like that. Bonus points to going back up in map 32 and the detour to grab the red key you needed in 200 Mega Hurts.

this was a wonderful vid! thanks

I know I am very late for noticing but as for this being suggested by many people. My guess they were suggested by Dwars fans judging from how close this was released at the time nearing his playthrough of Going Down (at the time of release.) As for that ending in Map 26 Insanity. That always gives me goosebumps just seeing the freakishness of it all.

I love the music in this. I almost think it fits the wad better than the default music fits Doom and Doom 2. As sacrilegious as that may be to say.

Absolutely love these videos, and watching the old ones helps me sleep. The only thing I wish is that they were longer... Here are two suggestions with more to come later: Valiant Unloved

I only just noticed this is the 13th episode, and is the Halloween special. Very good.

I heard about this WAD from one of Barley's videos. Good thing because this WAD looks amazing.

5:00: It sounds like Cyriak got the jump on "Sweaty Mancubus Armpits" from Hell Revealed 1! Thanks for uploading!

That ending was brilliant.

This looks good! I'll be playing this soon

I just got all caught up and had to give this megawad a try. Necropolis is so much fun. It has a lot of the strengths of Scythe's Fear, but with a bit more challenge; it doesn't overstay it's welcome either - short and sweet.

time to give this wad a try for this years spooky month

I really like this megawad because for whatever reason, I'm fascinated by the idea of going lower into the earth and facing increasing amounts of danger.

Going Down is a masterpiece

He is the best KZfaqr! I have played many wads This wad is a bit unique This is so fu**in hard already

I love this megawad so much

Oh yes, Going Down is known to be extremely sadistic, I define it as cramped slaughterfests. Only one of my subscriptions has completed it continuously, Larzuk06!

My theory of the first level is that all of the UAC employees in the first level all came in to cause some... changes and ended up sitting around awkwardly while all heavily armed.

I beat Going Down, I did it! You'll love how I beat the Mastermind in map 29: after it molted, an archvile started infighting it right around the time that I died. I happened to have view of this in my death state, so I sat back and let the Archie take care of it for me. A win is a win! The glory of this WAD was in its difficulty for me. I am a relatively new member of the Doom Community, and every time I busted through and completed a map from this collection, it was universally met with either a triumphant "FUCK YEAH!!" or an exhausted "Holy shit, that map was fun. My nuts hurt." The ball-busting but fair difficulty made this WAD a treat to play, and I genuinely think I am leagues better at Doom because of it.