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The Renovation

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The Renovation is a map set for registered Wolfenstein, made by BJ Rowan. Its latest release dates to September 1994, though the set had been featured in the Wolfmaster map pack in May that year, as set C.

Genesis[]

Originally begun as a Spear of Destiny map set, Rowan made the switch to registered Wolfenstein due to certain editors not reading Spear of Destiny properly. Rowan later stated:

Back in 1993, when I was first exposed to Wolfenstein, I was pulled deep into the gameworld that id Software created. The atmosphere, the suspense, the action, the secrets, everything came together perfectly to create the kind of incredible gaming experience that each of us, if we’re lucky, gets to be a part of only once in a long while. Nearly from the start, I wished for a way to create my own dungeons, prisons and secret strongholds — and that wish came true in January of 1994, when I discovered SODedit. I was fourteen years old at the time.

Back then, CompuServe — my ISP — did not allow Mapedit on its forums because that tool was capable of editing the shareware version of Wolfenstein. Then SODedit came along, an editor designed to work only with the commercial-release Spear of Destiny, Wolfenstein’s sequel, and CompuServe accepted it. Excitedly, I set to work. I started like any other Wolfenstein designer probably started back in the nineties: Creating “test” levels, trying out everything, recreating parts of the original game that were especially memorable. Huge treasure rooms; gigantic halls filled with Nazis of every shape and size; secret doors concealing everything from keys to chainguns to the elevator itself. I was like a kid in a candy store.

It was during those initial efforts that The Renovation was born. When Mapedit was adjusted to only edit the registered version of Wolfenstein 3-D, I seized upon it and converted my level set to work with Wolf3D instead. By this time I had created a significant number of levels, and began to shoot for the magic 60 — a total replacement of all levels in the game.

Description[]

The set features 60 levels that are all quite challenging yet very realistically designed for its time. As for the design, Rowan stated:

Commitment to Quality: That probably sounds like a scam these days, but it's true: I wanted to make these Wolf3D levels so impressive that you would want to keep playing them, or just remember that one room and that feeling of "being there" that it gave you, as did id Software's original levels (well, they did for me). Some levels I've seen are just a collection of floors hurriedly whipped together by just another guy. The Renovation took time, effort, and a lot of debugging and reworking to perfect. Approximately 6 months of work went into this project. This is realism at its best, people! If you can't take it, tuck your tail between your legs and run, but otherwise, stay for the fight - you've got 60 big ones comin'!

However, the story behind the set indicates that nearing the end, some of the maps were rushed; in particular E6M5, which Rowan originally had not featured in its initial running order. The map was not without historical value, however, as it was the first map Rowan ever made.

Ports and availability[]

Fluctuating outside the Wolfenstein 3D modding circles for some time, the set was uploaded on an outside link cluster hosted by the Dome in June 1999, shortly after the release of Conflict in the Fatherland. The set was also converted to ECWolf by AstroCreep in 2016.

External links[]

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