Review by Colin Phipps

CHORD3 starts in the style of the level it replaces, Monster Condo (Doom 2 MAP27), with wood panelled halls, and these are nicely mixed with a number of lava tunnels and caves which create a good hell feel to the level. The level is nicely detailed, in particular the use of lighting to emphasise features in the halls and tunnels, and the sinister atmosphere in the tunnels.

At ultra-violent, CHORD3 is, to quote the text file, not for the average player. You can expect to face barons, chaingunners, and revenants before getting anything better than a shotgun, archvilles commanding the main areas, and very limited ammo forcing the player to make use of the beserk packs. Playing at hurt-me-plenty, the level begins more sedately, but there are still a number of imps and a revenant overlooking parts of the start area, and some wandering monsters to deal with.

As you get further in, the difficulty increases, with plenty of well executed traps - these vary quite a bit in style, from dropping the player in a limited space with a couple of barons, through to teleporting in demons behind the player. Provided you are alert to the more nasty traps there is a good supply of health and ammo, and a beserk pack helps with all the demons around. The level is pretty deadly at the end - here's a hint, just because that chaingunner trap is murder, doesn't mean you can afford to waste your cells on it, worse follows...

Overall, a nice tough level, although I didn't enjoy it as much as some of this author's previous offerings as UV was too tough for me this time. So that may have soured my view of the level a bit. A good fight nonetheless.