DOOM: A Review
Born from the Nightmares of Demons
Intro:
This week I’ve had the biggest smile on my face. That wouldn’t usually be an odd thing if it wasn’t for the day dreams filled with destroying demons and hellspawn with shotguns, chainsaws, and my bare hands that fueled my grin. After a few hours of being exposed to the endless spray of carnage that is DOOM, I’m convinced it could happen to anyone. Developer id Software, in cooperation with Certain Affinity for online multiplayer, dug deep into Doom’s extraterrestrial clay to rebuild, rename, and raise a truly remarkable tribute to a FPS original that spawned a kingdom.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a remake of Doom. In 2004 gamers received a terrifying Doom 3, but the atmosphere was incredibly dark and enemy models seemed a few too many branches from their roots. This DOOM looked to set the tree upside down, and sprout something new, and it has been an absolute pleasure to play. I’m getting a little ahead of myself, we only just begun. In choosing which difficulty, I immediately noticed the return of classic difficulty names and the introduction to a new difficulty: “Ultra-Nightmare”. I chickened out some, and chose “Hurt Me Plenty”, because I wanted to beat the game before reviewing. Either way, I was expecting a slow introduction about a marine punished to work on mars, but instead was thrown straight into pandemonium.
Spoiler Warning: videos, especially this first one, do give away some of the fun about experiencing the game, but I wont spoil anything important.
Gameplay:
The Union Aerospace Corporation, a multi-planetary company with military connections and a surprisingly deft hand for science, discovers a new energy source on Mars that could fix all Earth’s energy issues called Argent plasma. Argent plasma just so happens to be mined from a rupture between Hell and Mars called the Argent Fracture, but hey why would that stop the UAC? In fact that only seems to encourage the UAC as attempts to enter and retrieve artifacts from Hell are made with only one survivor, who so happens to be a robot. On one of said excursions, a remarkable sarcophagus is found and returned for study. Here lies the player, a human seemingly asleep in which no tool or weapon can harm, until the demonic invasion starts.
Players awake from possibly hundreds of years of being sealed to a living Hell on Mars. Once suited within the Praetor suit, you soon become something out of a demon’s nightmare. With LS to move, RS to aim, R2 to fire, L1 to use equipment like grenades, and a click of the right stick to interact with everything and pull off a Glory kill, any player can own the battlefield. These controls are simple and when paired with smooth transitions and quick animations, can definitely make killing any target fun.
Tired of your current weapon? Well simply tapping the R1 button will cycle through each weapon, or you can hold down R1 to bring up the weapon selection wheel to whip out a specific weapon. You actually are encouraged to switch weapons often to collect points and complete challenges. I found myself switching weapons often to discover which weapon worked best in a particular situation. This becomes even more complicated with the introduction of weapon mods: new attachments unlocked from Combat Support Drones hidden throughout the campaign. Weapons in your arsenal, except for the Pistol, Super Shotgun, and BFG9000, have two different mods that can be unlocked and easily switched between by pressing UP on the D-pad. Using L2 activates a mod, all of which are very different; the Tactical Scope mod for the Heavy Assault Rifle attaches a scope for long range head-shots, while the Micro Missiles mod launches a volley of missiles that attach to a target prior to exploding. Check some out in action with a video demonstrating the two different attachments for the Combat Shotgun:
You are given plenty of chances to get familiar with your weapons and their mods as you clear room after room of enemies in your efforts to stop the demonic invasion. Players are directed to various objectives by Dr. Samuel Hayden, the UAC bigwig in charge of the research facility. Hayden developed cancer during construction of the the facility, which resulted in his entire body being replaced with cybernetics. This ended up being a serious bonus for Hayden as he is the only other person to survive the trip to Hell and back, besides you. You on the other hand are flesh and blood, and will die if not careful. In true DOOM fashion, health and armor do not regenerate and ammo can be scarce. The developers wanted players the “fight forward” by using Glory kills to receive extra health, and eventually armor.
Deal enough damage to an enemy and a blue aura will appear around them; this indicates a Glory Kill can be performed on that enemy, but be nimble, the aura will change from blue to yellow then finally red, flashing faster along the way. If you fail to reach the enemy in time to click RS, they’ll regain their feet and seek revenge. The animation of the Glory Kill depends on the creature and the angle of attack; performing a Glory Kill from behind may result in a nasty head twist while Glory Kills from the front might rip off a leg and swing away. The absolute coolest thing about the Glory Kill is they can be performed on every single enemy no matter how big or small. Grabbing a Baron by the horn just to rip it off and stab him in the face with it, or slicing a Mancubus’s belly open to tear out it’s stomach and make him eat it is incredibly fulfilling.
Accompanying the constant massacre of demons is a surprising amount of platforming. With new mechanics like lifting up ledges and double jumping, comes a lot more exploring and a greater ability to dodge. The developers were definitely not afraid to leave you out of a limb surrounded by enemies, with run, jump, and find better ground as your only option. You move so fast this is easily accomplished, even without a dash button.
Design:
Progressing along levels in DOOM consists of finding a lot of keycards, or skulls in Hell stages, to unlock doors throughout the stages. These can be anywhere and are everywhere, the introduction of the double jump ensured more complex hiding spots for collectibles and secrets alike. DOOM has completely overhauled it’s philosophy on collectibles. In the original game searching for secret areas would rewarded the player with ammo, health packs, armor pickups, early weapons, and temporary power ups. All this is still true with modern DOOM, but with so much more. The map below shows just about everything you can obtain in a level.
First off each stage has a set of three challenges that once completed will reward players with a weapon upgrade token. Weapon upgrade tokens are spent on improving weapon mod attachments, and can only be spent on unlocked mods obtained through Combat Support Drones. Discovering secrets will actually provide points that after certain benchmarks are reached also provide weapon upgrade tokens. There are usually only two tokens per level that can be obtained through secret discovery, and in order to obtain the second token, players will have to clear all secrets in a level. Doing so is entirely worth it as weapon mod upgrades can make all the difference in a close fight. To ensure I had an easy exit to any close call, I upgraded my Explosive Shot mod for the combat shotgun first.
Purchasing the first mod upgrade for a select mod is pretty cheap at 1 to 2 tokens, but for each purchase the amount needed for the next upgrade is exponentially increased. Think your done with a mod after purchasing all available upgrades; errrr wrong, you now must complete the Mastery Challenge. Mastery Challenges are the last step in proving your efficiency with a weapon mod, and upon completion Mastery Challenges provide even bigger bonuses for using the mod like the addition of cluster bombs to my Combat Shotgun’s Explosive Shot. Meeting battle point benchmarks will also reward players with mod upgrade tokens, a total five per level.
Weapons aren’t the only category on your upgrade belt; players can go upgrade crazy with additions to your Praetor Suit using Praetor Tokens, increases to core stats using Argent cells, and overall augments set in place by Trail Runes. Praetor tokens are reaped from the bodies of Elite Guards found dead throughout the story. Once extracted, these tokens are used to level up various bonuses provided by your Praetor Suit, like equipment cool-down speed or immunity to explosive barrel damage:
As I stated earlier core stats are increased by finding and consuming Argent Cells. Deciding how to spend Argent Cells isn’t too difficult with a selection limited to increasing health, armor, or ammo. I chose to invest my cells first in health, than in armor to ensure I survived more than anything, but I felt a serious lack in my ammo threshold in later stages as the amount of enemies I faced continued to climb with every new encounter.
The last category of upgrades comes in the form of Trial Runes. Trial Runes can only be earned through completing “trials” given by hidden glowing stones. Once touched a Trial Rune will place the player into a challenge situation, many of which are design to have to player kill an enemy with a specific weapon, or reach a goal within a time limit. Trials weren’t to difficult for me overall, though some took be a few tries to complete. Runes provide extremely nice augments to gameplay; for example the first Trial grants access to the Vacuum Rune, which increases the range that you can absorbs dropped items. This bonus can be increased by completing an associated challenge while said rune is equipped. In the case of the Vacuum Rune, absorb distance was increased even further after collecting 300 items with the rune equipped.
Every level has a secret area modeled after a level from the original Doom, similar to Bethesda Softworks successful remakes of the Wolfenstein series. What stands DOOM apart, is once you’ve discovered a through-back secret area, the full version of the level is unlocked for play from the campaign main menu screen. How cool is that?! Playing through old school textures and layouts, while battling modern baddies and wielding remastered weapons is nostalgia overload. I’m still waiting for a remake to someday allow you reskin new weapons with their 8-bit originals.
Presentation:
Having played the original Doom and its many episodes as boy, I loved how much it’s monsters frightened me; they were vile and satanic. I’m now revisited by an onslaught childhood nightmares with snorting Pinkies, towering Baron’s, and floating Cacodemons chasing me down blood smeared hallways just to reach a dead end of impaled heads and strewn-out entrails. This is what please me most: the obvious attempt to recreate the original character models. Some demons like Imps and Hell Knights still don’t look like their original designs, but when it comes to the rest id Software is right on the money. Demons like the Barons of Hell and the Cacodemons have received the makeover they rightfully deserve; our demons have grown out of their Doom 3 goth trend with now vibrant colors, beastly textures, and threatening teeth.
There has been a lot of effort put into designing an environment that promotes a frenzied state of mind. Mixing together elements of heavy metal, dub-step distortion, choir vocals and synth-screech the soundtrack is horror genius. Exploring through levels I noticed the soundtrack does a great job adapting to certain situations. While searching for collectibles or extra ammo, the sounds of machinery and the screaming of nearby possessed may be all I hear, but once engaged with enemies drums, guitar, and synth spring to life. Through all the sounds of bullets and breaking bones, you can hear the progression in the video above. On the flip side, find one of many secret Doomguy dolls, and you’ll be rewarded with a quick verse of Doom’s original 8-bit soundtrack:
The fist bump in the video above is just one example of playfulness I came across in my conquest. These moments help remind the player DOOM is just a game meant to be enjoyed. There was an obvious drift away from the frightening throughout DOOM; sequences were more focused on action and suspense than outright terror. I soon became so engrossed with DOOM’s blood-lavished environments, that the reoccurring comedy standings of the UAC hologram tour guide actually made me laugh. “221 accident free days,” my ass. Scenes are more rich in style and the new back ground story the developers have created is movie-worthy, and more importantly epic enough to still be called DOOM. You wont get a peep more about it either; trust me when I say it’s more than worth experiencing.
Multiplayer:
I spent a great amount of time playing through DOOM’s brutal multiplayer. I may die left and right, but I’m having a lot more fun than I expected to have. Starting out, I spent some time customizing my character and weapons. With limited colors I went for a look that shouted muddy toad: green and brown with a 92% filth effect applied. New armor, patterns, and colors are unlocked by completing matches, winning matches, leveling up your player rank, and finishing challenges. There is a ton of different armor sets to collect, each with helmet, torso, left arm, right arm, and legs.
Show off your skills with a recently rewarded taunt, either in game after a beautiful kill or post-game in the top three screen. I personally like the way my Silverback taunt throws my character into a primal tantrum sure to intimidate. Victory taunts are well earned as multiplayer modes are fast paced and challenging. Players can select from Team Deathmatch, Soul Harvest, Domination, Warpath, and Freeze Tag.
Team Deathmatch is pretty self explanatory except for one thing: the Demon Rune. After some time has passed a Demon Rune will appear somewhere on the map for all to see. The first person to touch the rune will be transformed into the demon they chose with their loadout at the start of the match, until killed or the the rune loses effect (loadouts can be switched mid-match). There is currently only four demons to unlock and choose: transform into a Baron of Hell and trample your foes, shoot missiles from high above as a Revenant, scorch them to ash as a Mancubus, or cling to walls and pounce of unsuspecting prey as the Prowler.
Freeze Tag is a clever take on elimination mode. With no respawns, teams must work together to freeze enemies combatants. This is done simply by killing an opponent, but instead of blasted into chunks of gore, they are frozen solid. If you become frozen, there is still a chance your teammates can “thaw” you out by standing near enough to you. Once one team is completely solid a round is won; first to three wins. Soul Harvest is much like kill confirmed, killing an enemy will cause their soul to be left behind for pick up by an ally or foe. If you love playing as a demon this mode is for you, as a demon rune is almost always in play and can be picked up from a enemy demon’s corpse. Domination is similar to modes like ground war which tasks teams to gain points by controlling three fixed points on the map. Warpath is similar to Domination, but there is only a single moving territory to control. This if my new favorite mode! Holding down a mobile fort challenges players to really learn the maps, and eliminates camping.
With 5 custom loadout slots that allow two weapons and an equipment each, you can prepare for most situations, but with non-regenerating health it takes a lot of skill to stay alive. Players can be aided by Hack Modules that are acquired as game rewards. Four hack modules can be slotted and brought into battle at a time, and only last the match they are used in. In between respawns players can chose to activate a hack module to provide various support such as starting boosts to armor or to reveal the location of the player who killed them last. Modules are time based and only run out once enough in game time has passed with them active. The randomness of acquiring hack modules is something I approve of. Its nice to not have guaranteed score-streak rewards, but instead little boosts and augments that still force players to have skill.
Whether or not DOOM’s multiplayer will survive the test of time, I do not know. It is worth noting that the multiplayer allows players to use guns and equipment not found in the story mode. Guns like the Static Cannon, which charges and becomes more deadly with movement, and equipment like the Personal Teleporter can only be experience in multiplayer. The Prowler demon only makes an appearance in multiplayer as well, which supports my theory of a campaign sequel or add-on. I look forward to more exciting multiplayer exclusives that are sure to follow with the season pass promising new maps and demons types.
SnapMap:
SnapMap is a modern version of the old school Doom WADS. WADS were groundbreaking; they allowed custom mods to be created by just about anyone who wanted to make one. Thousands of Doom levels were created, including the Master Levels and even whole new games like Hacx 2.0 and even Chex Quest, a promotional FPS game that came with specially mark boxes of Chex. The memory of WADS lives strong in the heart of SnapMap. Players can create a wide variety of custom levels, post them online and receive feedback on those maps. Finishing other players custom maps as well as certain challenges rewards players with credits that can be used to buy character customization such as armor or taunts. Maps can include up to four player multiplayer if you don’t want to journey alone, but I urge players to try a few solo maps like “The Memory Game”, the “Can you count to 10?” map or possibly this whack-a-mole map:
Conclusion:
Instead of naming this current installment Doom 4, id Software decided to rebrand. The all caps’ed DOOM makes sense to me; this game is very much so the original rebuilt with modern technology. We were once given a glimpse of Hell on Mars through a view of 8-bit, now the pain and all its glory shines at 60fps. Changes have been made: the story has been spiced up, Glory kills now fly in your face, the double-jump now creates a ton more platforming, and upgrades of all kinds are everywhere! These changes put DOOM at odds with any current first person shooter out there.
For a completionist, trials and challenges are cleverly designed to teach and keep players on their feet so at no point through DOOM’s 9–12 hour campaign do things get boring. Heck, if your bored you should try the harder difficulties: Ultra Nightmare difficulty provides only 1 life to the player, forcing a full campaign restart once killed. I do wish boss battles were a little more in-depth, but neither was the original Doom’s boss battles. The idea is to go all out and feel the adrenaline pumping, and it shows in magnificent storytelling and brutal multiplayer. Throw that all together with a quirky SnapMap and you’ve got masterpiece. As of now I want to tackle Ultra-Nightmare, but I know I’ll have to practice through Nightmare first to learn arena layouts a little better as it only takes one second to fall into lava:
Thank you for reading. Nolan — Totaltoad
DOOM gets a 10/10 (Masterpiece)
Thank you to Zack Hage and Bethesda Softworks for supplying me with the code and giving me this chance to share my opinion with everyone. Check out my random video game videos on YouTube. For more reviews and features like this one, please check out The Cube on Medium.com, or our twitter account @TheCubeMedium
