E3M2: Slough of Despair (Doom)

E3M2: Slough of Despair is the second map of Inferno in Doom. As can be seen from the map, its plan is based on a skeletal human hand - whether a left hand's upper side or a right hand's palm. The name may be a reference to "the Slough of Despond", from Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. It uses the music track "Donna to the Rescue" and has a par time of 0:45.

Overview
Unlike most of the other levels, which take place in buildings, this level takes place outdoors (like Mt. Erebus). The Slough is a depression in the ground, somewhat like a crater or gulch; the "fingers" are a series of caves.



Walkthrough
At the start, keep to the left hand wall and just keep firing at any monster that comes your way. If you get outnumbered, simply backtrack to the start and let the monster(s) follow you. Begin firing at the monster(s) until you've defeated them. Keep moving along until you get to the blue skull key (at the end of the "pinky finger"). Then turn around, go straight, and when you're out of the alcove, take 2 lefts into another one (this is the "ring finger" on the map). Walk up to the wall in front of you. Kill (or avoid) the Lost Souls that were behind the wall and go into the room they were in. Open the Blue Door in here, hit the switch, turn around, go right, grab the health and ammo, and get to the exit teleporter.

Other things of interest: Just south-east of the start of the "pinky finger" you'll find a blue shield (and on the two highest difficulty levels, a Cacodemon).

Also playing on the two highest difficulties, the real problem is ammo, so if you need it you can get plasma rounds and a bunch of shotgun shells at the start of the "index finger" where there is a bunch easy to kill Sergeants. To get in to them afterwards you have to shoot the back wall in one the cubes with the dead Sergeants to lower the pillar which will reveal a red triangle on the floor; walk across it and the low wall in front of the Sergeants' cubes comes down.

Secrets

 * 1) In the "thumb" is a small lava pit. Walk over it to lower a nearby wall, revealing a chaingun.
 * 2) Below the "pinky" and "ring fingers" is a rock shaped like an arrow if you look at the automap. Open the wall this arrow is pointing to; inside is a plasma rifle and a medikit.
 * 3) At the end of the "middle finger" is an arrow on the floor pointing to a switch; flip it to get a soul sphere.

Bugs

 * Two "hanging leg" decorations (Things 184 and 185) and a "pool of blood and flesh" decoration (Thing 187) have no flags set for any of the difficulty classes, so they do not actually appear in the level.
 * Near the second "joint" of the "little finger" (just after the Cacodemon trap), a severed leg is hanging from the open sky.
 * The skull switch at the end of the "index finger" not only opens the blue wall it is on, but also the wall at the "finger"'s entrance that starts closing as you progress. But if you flip the switch too early, the wall might not have finished closing and you will be trapped.
 * The fiery grotto next to the "thumb" is an unclosed sector. Sector 22 is missing linedef 156, which is the sole linedef of sector 21. Interestingly, sectors 21 and 22 have differing ceiling and floor heights, creating a gap near the ceiling of the proper sector. This is not noticeable during normal gameplay as the grotto is too small to fit the player.

Records
The Compet-N records for the map are:

Trivia

 * The music for this level is inspired by the track "Body Count's in the House" by Body Count.
 * "Slough" here is pronounced like "slew", and can refer either to a marshy pit or bog, or a large amount.
 * Of all the home ports of Doom only the SNES port has this map. This map was removed in the Jaguar, 3DO, GBA, PlayStation and Sega_Saturn editions.
 * Despite having the appearance of a giant skeletal hand, the intermission screen shows two large tombstone-like structures in its place.
 * According to John Romero in a Devs Play video, the round room at the end of the middle finger is supposed to be a booger.