Thy Flesh Consumed

Thy Flesh Consumed is the fourth and final episode of The Ultimate Doom.

All of the level names, as well as the episode title, are phrases taken directly from the Bible (with the exception of the secret level "Fear"). The list was compiled by Kevin Cloud, and John Romero assigned names to the individual levels. This episode was also Tim Willits' first contribution to the Doom series, as he joined id Software after the release of the original Doom (version 1.666) and Doom II.

Plot
The final campaign of Doom takes place after the Marine teleported to Earth at the end of Inferno. The final message screen confirms that in previous battle with Spider Mastermind in Inferno that the creature had already sent forces through to Earth before the hero arrived there and that hero discovered his pet Rabbit had died. It also confirms that the hero beat the Mastermind's invasion force, but didn't prevent the demons from invading other cities around the world. The final cutscene shows the marine leaving the twisted cityscape seen at the end of Inferno (in which he had been fighting in) carrying the head of his deceased pet. Then it foreshadows Doom II.

Story-wise, the episode is both a sequel to Doom and a prequel to Doom II. It chronicles the Doomguy's battles against the legions of demons that the Spider Mastermind had sent through the doorway between Hell and Earth, the very same gateway that the player had earlier used to return to his home planet. He fights through corrupted cityscape held by hellish forces. Ultimately, though the player is victorious, inflicting heavy losses on the invaders and avenging the death of his pet rabbit Daisy, it turns out to be an empty victory as the demons eventually overrun the major cities and the stage is set for Hell on Earth.

Since the expansion was produced while id Software was involved in other projects, not much thought was put into making it consistent with the previously developed plot of the game (which included Doom II, a portion that occurs after the added episode), and the designers simply concentrated on straightforward action (which was already the general focus of the games, in any case).

Design
It is set on Earth, with the background sky being a sullen, hazy orange, similar to the sky in the ending cutscene of Inferno, the end of this episode, and the starport levels in Doom II. The graphical style is generally hellish, though there are a handful of techbase themes used. The fortresses resemble those in Inferno, generally made of somber greenish-gray stone or wood, with a large number of lava pits. While there are a few features carried over from Doom II, such as switches that require keys (and the intermission screen), all of the music, textures, monsters, and weapons are from the original Doom. Possibly because no Doom II monsters were brought over into the episode, Barons of Hell are very common.

Description
Getting started in this episode is considered much harder than for the original three episodes in Doom, Doom II, or even Final Doom. Unlike the other episodes, the difficulty in Thy Flesh Consumed does not follow the expected learning curve as one progresses through the levels. The first two levels are extremely difficult, as the player faces a large number of enemies, including Barons of Hell, while suffering from a relative shortage of supplies. Then, at the beginnings of the secret and third levels, the player is immediately exposed to hostile fire from all directions and is forced to scramble for cover. By contrast, the later levels are tricky but relatively straightforward, as the monsters are more dispersed and can be dealt with piecemeal.

Unlike for the three earlier episodes, but like Doom II, the designers didn't create a map of the locations of the episode to display in the intermission screen. The intermission screen simply uses a black-and-white version of Doom II 's intermission screen. However, the Doom95 source port suffers a major bug where the intermission screens from the first episode are used.

Levels

 * E4M1: Hell Beneath
 * E4M2: Perfect Hatred (Exit to secret level)
 * E4M3: Sever the Wicked
 * E4M4: Unruly Evil
 * E4M5: They Will Repent
 * E4M6: Against Thee Wickedly
 * E4M7: And Hell Followed
 * E4M8: Unto the Cruel (Spiderdemon is the boss)
 * E4M9: Fear (Secret level)

End of Episode Message
The Spider Mastermind must have sent forth its legions of hellspawn before your final confrontation with that terrible beast from Hell. But you stepped forward and brought forth eternal damnation and suffering upon the horde as a true hero would in the face of something so evil.

Besides, someone was gonna pay for what happened to Daisy, your pet rabbit.

But now, you see spread before you more potential pain and gibbitude as a nation of demons run amok in our cities.

Next stop, Hell on Earth!

Current records
The Compet-N records for the episode are: