I really enjoyed this WAD, speaking as someone who usually sticks to vanilla maps. The compact level design was great, with some really tight fights packed into them. The bizarre (yet distinct) soundtrack, and the way it creates an unforgettable aesthetic out of Doom II makes it feel full of character. Overall, I just found it to be really creative and funny, with no truly dull moments. Conceptually genius.

In particular, I enjoyed maps 5, 9, 15, 20, 25, 26 and 28. I won't spoil them, but they're all unforgettable.

Genuinely the most creative set of fps levels I've got to experience <3

The full characteristics of cyriak videos + old-doom level design philosophy congealed into a rocking-rollercoaster of an Office Experience. Smile on my face from start to finish, from just, incredible use of space and wonderful level gimmicks. Big shoutout to the one messing with past/future, titanfall 2 could never /s /s

If anything, my only 'real' issue is that there's a lot of jumps in terms of difficulty (although a lot of the later breathing room makes sense,, some of these maps hold nothing back), as it does always make me giggle when the Hardest challenge was Well Before the halfway point for me. Then again I do feel like just experiencing this pack front-to-back helped me buff out a lot of my amateur-ness with running these maps. I feel more equipped than ever to tackle stuff like Sunlust again.

If you have even the remote interest in trying out a Doom WAD, I think this is the best place to start, just so you can experience the true 9-5 workerman perspective.

Easily the best time I had playing Classic Doom yet, Going Down both as a Doom Wad and as a one person creative endeavor is about as close to being ideal as it can get.

A remarkably cohesive piece of work, described as chaotic evil by the wad author Cyriak Harris himself, the wad carries a mischievous spirit , but at points he can turn it into malice.

The two main characteristics of this wad is the combat, Cyriak loves using a small compact area as his playground, where any action you take can and will cause enemies to ambush you or appear in an area you have to go back to, keeping the player consistently paranoid about doing anything in this map as any interaction could mean lurking death for the unwary. This feeling is enhanced by Cyriak's music which sounds like someone organizing a circus in my head where you should be really careful if you want to check behind the stages or you might not come back alive. As more and more enemies get released the game seems just gets more chaotic and increase my heart rate. And sometimes he just lets open the floodgates, hundreds of monsters at a time when he seems to get tired of playing with the player. There are 2 fights in this set that I would say straight made me break through my Doom skill ceiling and because of how fun the design is I enjoyed the failures as well.

The other characteristic is the weird humour mixed with his eye for detail, easily the best looking Vanilla Doom wad I have played, Cyriak creates believable environments with stock Doom 2 textures, the whole idea of this wad is funny in a way, Doom guy going down floor to floor clearing demons. One floor might be an office building where a Baron of Hell jumpscares you from behind the boss's chair or Doom guy might decide to take the emergency exit to the roof to call his mom. It's just this weirdness that makes the whole thing so charming.

There's endless creativity here, while similar no two levels are truly the same and while not every level hits the same peak, their sheer uniqueness ought to win you over. One level you might be crawling through the vents of a building to get around the monsters, another one where there might be a elaborate key hunt through an area. Dont worry none of these are boring, Cyriak always does more with his concepts than it seems he can on first glance.

Then there is the last third of the map, there are sections here that are genuinely jaw dropping not only for Doom but for any FPS campaign I have played, I wont spoil what happens but fair to say, if you made it that far things will only get better, more insane and definitely harder.

I was tweaking when I had this at 3 stars. Unironically a kafkaesque comedy of errors, wholesomely committed to painting Doomguy as the "aw, shucks :(" down-on-his-luck Everyman who is able to sustain this weird, hostile world through determination and ingenuity. Encounter design is A-1, a return to the frantic, claustrophobic combat design of retro WAD culture over modern WAD's slaughter-tendencies--even Barons became threatening when you have no room to run. Thoroughly meticulous in environmental design too--there's a skeleton in the closet joke that I didn't even realize until I was watching a YT playthrough. So goofy, yet so earnest! One of my favorites that will probably become an annual revisit.

Quite simply going down is easily one of the best Doom Megawads (a 32 map replacement set for doom 2) ever made. With a really tense maps that have just the right balance of ball busting enemy spawns and generous powerup usage to feel intense but managable (I did beat it on HnTR). Plus there's a fun balance of levels that are remakes of doom 1, 2 and final doom levels and entirely original concepts.

Of course as good as Going down's substance is the real charm is the style. Going down was made entirely by doom modder mouldy better known as youtuber Cyriak Harris, and every song in the game comes from one of his videos. Going down also has some of the best atmosphere and progression in doom, as the games levels wonderfully shift from light hearted gags to pretty effective horror

This stupendous megawad has very rightly been hailed as some of the best that Doom modding has to offer. Attention
is often drawn to its brisk pacing, snappy combat, witty humor, phenomenal use of Doom 2's stock textures, palpable atmosphere, and its singular vision as a one-man creative project. But I want to point out something else that Going Down does very well, which is its difficulty. Doom aficionados who play exclusively on ultra-violence will often point to this as one of Doom's most difficult offerings, but those who cower at that warning (such as myself), fear not. While ultra-violent is the bread and butter of most seasoned Doom players, the lower difficulty settings in Going Down are just as well-balanced. What has the reputation of being notoriously difficult is, in fact, more accessible than you might think. Either way, Doom casuals shouldn't let Going Down's difficult reputation and penchant for "slaughter maps" (somewhat debatable) put them off. This is a brilliant work of horror comedy fun that no FPS fan should miss.