Jamal Jones Episode 1: In Judgement of Evil
By Doomkid et al. - 22 Maps
Format: Vanilla
[Download]
Started: October 8th 2026
Finished: October 9th 2026
Status: Completed
Born from a contest for Doomkid's 20th anniversary as a mapper, Jamal Jones went from a planned single megawad to a structure more like BTSX, 3 not-quite full length megawads split into the intended episode themes for the original singular project. Like many other Doomkid community projects your guns and the enemy roster have gotten a bit of a tune-up which is nice, and the first 10 maps make for an absolutely fantastic introduction. Explosive non-stop action with zero filler makes for a great testing ground of your slightly modified arsenal. E1M5 "Shopping Spree" is the highlight of the entire episode, a Doomcute shooting gallery in a high rise mall complex with a perfectly energizing midi. Doomkid's late appearance with E1M10 "Base of Consequences" closes out the first half of the episode quite nicely, but admittedly after the midpoint, JJE1 starts to lose me a bit. The explosive action of the first 10 maps gives way to slower paced longer maps, which aren't necessarily bad, but it is a little disappointing considering how absolutely fantastic those first 10 maps were. The secret maps aren't especially noteworthy either, E1M31 "Forlorn Fantasy" is pretty significantly worse than everything else here, an ugly mishmash of various random texture themes with a needlessly stupid secret exit hunt, and despite sharing second place in the contest alongside E1M1, E1M32 "UAC Muffin Research Kitchen" feels a bit lacking for the super secret slot. Apparently E1M20 "Warhevil" was the overall contest winner, which admittedly doesn't bode well for the remaining two episodes considering I felt like it was only kinda meh and a bit overly long despite the very detailed architecture. Overall Jamal Jones E1 is a decently fun (if mostly unremarkable) set of maps, but not enough to immediately make me want to commit to playing the other two episodes right away.
Rating - ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Favorite Map - E1M5: "Shopping Spree"
Least Favorite Map - E1M31: "Forlorn Fantasy"