An Evening with Nirvana

The 40th episode of An Evening with Nirvana will be the last episode of the show due to an increased workload making it challenge to keep up with. However, I have another announcement that will hopefully interest people who enjoyed the show: a new podcast with SoBad! All Patreon subscribers will just have their bonuses apply to the new show instead, so not much change there. Hoping to create some fun content in the future.

Today on the podcast I'm talking to Dubzzz (or you might know him as Bdubzzz), a Doom speedrunner and mapper who is known for his numerous contributions to community projects like Slaughtermax, Mayhem Orange, the Hellforge Speedmapping sessions, NoYe, and more, as well as for his speedruns. He currently has over 2600 demos recorded on DSDA with a mix of UV Max, Pacifist and D2all runs. He is also notoriously mute. We discuss Dubz' early introduction to slaughter wads, the reason he mutes his microphone when he streams, and his year of 1,000 demos.

Today on the podcast I am talking to American McGee. Level designer for  Ultimate Doom and Doom 2, level and sound designer for Quake and Quake  2, creator of the extremely popular Alice series of games and now the  designer of a unique range of plushies that we'll get into later.   We discuss American's time at Id Software, the inspiration for American  McGee's Alice, his move to China and the founding of Spicy Horse, new  information about Alice: Asylum, and we touch on some political topics  that are sure to rile up a few people.

Today I'm talking to Matt Tropiano, also known as Mtrop. A long-time  community member, you'll likely know him for wads like Coffee Break and  Forsaken Overlook, as well as a major contributor to the Adventures of  Square 1 and 2. He's also created a number of useful tools for the  community over the years including Doom Struct, WadTools and Wadmerge.   We discuss Mtrop's early TNT-influenced years, his move from big maps to  small maps and back to big maps again, and the creation of his various  Doom utilities.

Today on the podcast I'm talking to Ukiro, perhaps best known for  creating the OTEX texture pack as well as map 32 of Eviternity, but he's  also a long-time community member with solo mapping projects like  Tantrum and Venom and texture packs for GothicDM and The Darkening  series.   We take a journey through Ukiro's early 1995 mapping years, his early  love of texture work, and his eventual release of OTEX.

Today on the podcast I'm talking to Doomkid. A font of knowledge for all  things Doom, a Youtube content creator , and creator of the Rowdy Rudy  and Ray Mowhawk series, you may know him for any one of these things, or  all of them.    We discuss Doomkid's love of shovelware, creating characters to inspire  level design, and building content for YouTube.

Today I'm talking to Tango, most well known for his popular weapon mod  Supercharge and accompanying mapset Paradise. You may know him as a  contributor to BTSX 1 and 2, Plutonia 2 or a number of other community  projects over the years.   We discuss balancing Supercharge, how Doom multiplayer could be  improved, and the merits of changing up your mapping process.

On today's episode of the podcast I'll be talking to Armoured Blood, one  of the OGs of slaughter mapping, creator of New Gothic Movement 1 and  2, Shai'tan's Luck and a contributor to Slaughterfest 2012.   We talk about building loose slaughter maps, the beginnings of New Gothic 1 and 2, and the old school slaughter scene.

On this episode of the podcast I'm talking to Esselfortium, also known  as Sarah Mancuso. She's the lead developer of the BTSX series, a  contributor to Doom the Way id Did 1 and 2, as well as working on solo  projects like Vaporwave for the Eternity engine, and the recently  released Knee Deep in Knee-Deep in ZDoom.  She's a midi composer, a creator of texture assets, and an all around  staple of the Doom community.  She has also composed music for a visual  novel that recently came out called Please Be Happy, is working on  Supplice, and has an album out that I highly recommend called Future  Human.

Today on the podcast I'm talking to Joshy, co-creator of Speed of Doom  with Darkwave, project lead for Plutonia Revisited, and creator of  Resurgence. He's also had a hand in a number of big ticket projects like  Ancient Aliens and BTSX, as well as contributing a map to one of my  personal favourite community projects: 50 Shades of Graytall.   We talk about GzDoom versus Boom mapping, working with Darkwave on Speed  of Doom, the importance of community projects, and Joshy weighs in on  the conspiracy theory that Darkwave and Death Destiny are the same  person.   Due to Joshy being profoundly deaf, we used an interpreter for this  episode, so special thanks to Kerrie for helping us out!

In this episode I talk to NoReason, who you will probably know for his  challenging slaughter maps, starting with his early releases Disparate  Realities and Death in Excess as well as his 3 NoSp speedmapping  projects and the gargantuan Cosmogenesis.   We talk about the benefits and pitfalls of speedmapping, the making of a  giant slaughter map, and the benefits of MBF21.

Today on the podcast I talk to DraQu, perhaps best known by the Doom  community for his Doom Eternal and Wolfenstein speedruns, as well as his  occasional casual playthroughs of custom classic pwads on his Twitch  channel.   We discuss what drives DraQu to run games, competitiveness in  speedrunning, and DraQu drops some spicy takes about Doom 64.

In this episode I talk to Cyriak Harris, known in the Doom community as  Mouldy. He's the creator of Going Down, The Eye, and the recently  released Overboard, as well as being a prominent animator for music  videos and his own personal Youtube channel.   We discuss Cyriak's penchant for micro detailing, how to make dynamic  encounter design, and we touch on his surreal animation style.