The best Doom tribute ever made is also one of its best mods

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Sep 3, 2018 · 4 min read

When the Doom reboot came out, classic Doom modders made some attempts at recreating some of its gameplay mechanics and elements into classic Doom, with some results being amazing, but this idea also happened with Doom 3, despite the limitations at the time.

So, the modder behind Reelism, Kinsie thought “ why restrict yourself to mashing just two games together…?”

MetaDoom is the ultimate attempt at mashing up Doom history, by taking elements from classic Doom, Doom 64, Doom 3, the reboot, some ports, the mobile games, prerelease content and probably a lot more.

While the idea seems crazy at first, MetaDoom actually tries to be balanced and play close enough to Doom’s core gameplay, which works most of the time.

One example is the randomization system, which is based on map progression, so for example, newer and stronger enemies show up at the time you get some cooler new weapons and items in your arsenal.

The weapons

Let’s say there are three categories: the primary arsenal, the secondary arsenal and the inventory.

  • The primary arsenal are weapons that resemble the classic Doom arsenal, which have been modified to resemble combinations of different types of weapons (The rocket launcher for example has parts from Doom 1, 64 and 3 and an alt fire from Doom’ 16) and even have alt fires, while the fist has its own key, so you can punch enemies for bits of health.
  • The secondary one is mostly weapons from later games, that function differently from Doom’s traditional weaponry, from the Gauss cannon to a chaingun to even the soul cube and unmaker to a toy pistol that shoots holy water. All of which are mostly picked up after you have the main weapons.
  • The inventory system has this ammo sharing system where if you waste one item, you’re sort of wasting others, but if you pick up one certain item, you also gain “ammo” for those other items… if you get that.
  • Naturally, these items spawn next to other pick ups and can be used without stopping you from firing your weapons in use, but they do have some short delays.
  • They consist of mostly Doom 4 items, a bit of Doom 3 and a dog collar that turns zombie dogs into melee weapons.

The enemies

Much like the weapons, enemies are also randomized by progression, while also being “mix ups” (For example, some of them have names taken from Doom RPG and new abilities, some of those possibly inspired by Doom 4)

  • These include but aren’t limited to: a nightmare Spectre from the PS1 port using Doom 64 sprites, Doom 3 trites that can walk on the ceiling, teleporting Doom 4 imps, Hellrazers, Doom 64 Pain Elementals shooting two lost souls at once, hellhounds from Doom RPG and even the summoners from Doom 4, who even have the archvile’s abilities.
  • The only enemies that don’t have variants (So far) and were instead “revamped” are the Hellknights, Barons of Hell, Cyberdemon and the Spider Mastermind, with the latter having some amazing sprites and the first two being a lot stronger than usual.

Pickable items

Next to health and armor bonuses, you may find some treasure items taken out of some of Doom’s early builds, which is why you have that score tracker in the hud.

You also have inventory items next to other items, BFG ammo next to cell ammo and even new power ups: Berserk is timed but can make you punch enemies for more health, Haste makes you run faster and Quad damage makes you obviously stronger.

Meanwhile, some items function the same, but have different visuals and sounds.

What else

MetaDoom takes its concept far enough to come up with easter eggs and some attention to detail.

  • You can replace Commander Keen and the Wolfenstein SS with references to id software and Wolfenstein’s history.
  • Besides the treasure items, other score pick ups include some UAC credits from Doom RPG and the best take on the Marineguys from Doom 4.
  • If you change the player’s gender in the mod, you get Major Morgan’s face from Doom 2 RPG in the status bar as the female option while the “other” option is that robot thing from Doom VFR.
  • Press N and you have a codex, that can show up information related to monsters, weapons and items, while also containing references to Doom related media.
  • If you play Doom 64’s maps from the Consolation Prize, some of Doom 64’s gameplay elements will spawn in their original areas.

MetaDoom is a good example of a mod that does an incredible job at executing its own idea, that i can’t think of someone handling the concept better.

The mod itself may not be perfect and has some flaws, but the more you look at it, it feels like it gets even better and more interesting.

May not be the best mod made for Doom, but it is the best tribute anyone could have done for this iconic gaming franchise.

The fact that it’s not afraid to touch obscure material means Doom as a series is a lot more interesting and fun to explore.

If you want to try it, here’s the link:

https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=53010

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