Honestly, I can’t think of many games that have managed split people down the middle like DOOM has.
Some people think it’s amazing. Others absolutely hate it. Where do you sit?
I think the consensus seems to be that DOOM really nails being a modern version of a 90s run and gun. The discussion appears to be whether it’s good for a game to play and feel that way in 2016? Our very own Alex Walker has run the gamut with this game. At first he was cynical, then he ended up enjoying the game.
That was a proper, genuine surprise for him.
How are you finding it so far?
Comments
46 responses to “Community Review: DOOM”
I wasn’t in the MOOD to play it.
There are people who don’t like Doom? The only dissenting opinions I’ve seen are trolls on Metacritic who gave it a 1/10 because there were no advance review copies so it therefore must be shit, and didn’t bother to play the game themselves.
I personally haven’t managed to play it past the 4th level yet due to time constraints, but I’ve really enjoyed it so far.
I don’t really like it, and I want to. Stability aside, it’s extremely twitch-based, finding it difficult to the point of not being very enjoyable (lack of something to tell you there’s something behind you is the biggest issue), and the guns so far (admittedly just the pistol and shotgun) feel absolutely terrible, with bad sounds and inconsistent damage.
The pistol is weak (but fun to play with vs. weaker enemies) but you get the shotgun so early on that it hardly matters. I don’t know where inconsistent damage or bad sound is coming from, not having that issue on Xbox One at all. I’m only playing on Hurt Me Plenty and one shotgun blast usually finishes off an imp or at least stuns it so that I can go for a glory kill, unless my aim is off and I only wing it.
Have you unlocked any mods yet? Presumably you found the first field drone and chose either the 3-burst or explosive shot for the shotgun. Personally the shotgun became a beast vs. possessed soldiers when I unlocked the burst fire.
I had some issues when I would get pinned against an enemy and die because I couldn’t move not realising something was blocking me, so an area motion indicator like Halo has would be useful, but it’s possible something like that becomes an upgrade later, it’s hard to say really. I’ve found that after dying a couple of times I’ve just learned to be more situationally aware and modify my approaches.
The sound design is the biggest issue I think. I should be able to tell there’s an enemy behind me, but I can’t, because the sound design is awful.
I chose the explosive shot upgrade but it’s more like explosive shit. So limited and annoying to use I forget I have it most of the time.
I must be winging everything or shooting from too far away because everything seems to just get stunned by it, it takes 3-4 shots to kill a lot of enemies and you can only hold 20 shots so I’m finding I run out of ammo constantly.
Yeah, probably shooting from too far away. The idea is to duck and weave projectiles until you get right up in the enemy’s grill and either gib them with a shot, or at least wound them enough to pull off a glory kill. (Which if you’re low on health/ammo, drops more health/ammo.)
Explosive shot cool down can be upgraded with mods later. I use it a lot because it’s cheap on ammo and does pretty good damage to everything, even late game.
The shotgun is consistent. Just terrible from any distance > 10m. Sounds like you haven’t used explosive shot either – it’s fantastic.
It’s old school Doom in updated clothes. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Good old fashioned exploding demon gristle … does it for me every time.
When it lets me play it, it’s okay. Not really digging it heaps but it’s not terrible.
Trouble is it likes to hard lock my entire PC whenever I play for more than about 20 minutes.
pretty much every comment I’ve seen on the webz from players has been positive.
I think people hated the multiplayer beta but i have heard nothing but good things from the SP campaign.
Me, i absolutely love it, i am 2 thirds into my playthrough on Nightmare.
Single player: Absolute great. Super fast fun arena combat where all the weapons sound and feels awesome. Glory kills to heal keep the combat going. Most refreshing shooter I’ve played in years. If you liked Unreal Tournament or Quake this game is for you.
Multi-player: Dull, soulless. Weapons feel bad. Unlocks feel bad. Only 2 weapons. Weapon loudouts. Rockets that only do 55 damage on the full. Getting hit has no feedback so you seem to die after only a few hits. Random consumables imbalance gameplay. Worse than Halo 4. Play Quake 3 or UT99 instead
Good FPS campaigns like Doom come around rarely. Always a real treat to play them from start to finish.
I am in love with this game, even though I haven’t played as much of it as I’d like.
The snapmap feature is interesting, but unfortunately limited.
It’s like they ran out of time to flesh it out.
The campaign is good so far, haven’t tried the multi-player yet, but overall, I love this game.
I think it’s actually quite solid. They’ve made some very bold and strong design decisions with the game, especially seeing as how this is a particularly unique franchise.
No other franchise has this kind of legacy or history behind it, and they tried deviating from that essence fir Doom 3 to mixed results. Yes things need to evolve, and it’s interesting to see how id have evolved parts of the game while allowing other parts to hark back to a more archaic style of game.
The guns are the best example of this treatment in the game. They are at once really different and innovative and also kind of dumb and basic (like Doom used to be). On the dumb side, there’s no reloading, no sophisticated scopes, no silencers or any of those things that modern shooters revel in. They are just tools to dish out damage in a fairly brute force kind of way.
But they’re not static in that form – they have mods and can be enhanced. Those enhancements are customisations that the player gets to choose, essentially adding an additional layer of depth to an otherwise primitive shooter. The mods and their enhancements operate within fairly narrow constraints, so they won’t allow a single gun to become the overarching master of all situations. Each gun has it’s place, but the mod can stretch that definition just a little.
All of this, coupled with the ultra fast gameplay, leads to the game being more about situational awareness, gun selection, ammo management, tactical positioning and evasion. Those are all things that arguably were all in the core of the old Doom, but now the way that those elements combine in each combat engagement is much more sophisticated.
The enemies engage is fairly predictable, but varied, ways. And this is good, as as soon as you see which enemies you’re facing, you know what kind of situation you’re in for, and what weapons you need to use. You know your options – now it’s just a matter of skill.
For me, it sits very carefully along that knife edge of balanced nostalgia and innovation, and succeeds at both.
Hrmm.. your review makes me want to try it now.. I loved Wolfenstein Doom, Quake, Duke Nukem 3D from that era of gaming, however, every time I try to play a game based on one of those classics, I feel like there is something missing. What you’ve just described sounds like Doom Evolved.. the same core fundamentals with improvements rather than just more eye candy for the current gen.
I would say check out some of the gameplay videos for the single player campaign. Some players would be slower than others, but if you sample a few from different youtubers, you can get a sense of the pace and tension of the gun fights.
The game really incintivises you to play it hard and fast, knowing your surroundings and your enemies and your guns. if that sounds like your cup of tea then i would recommend.
Yeh I will.. I am trying to decide whether I want a crazy fast action game or whether I will take the plunge on a much slower Hitman 2016.. Can’t really justify buying both at this stage with my pre-order of No Man’s Sky just around the corner..
Search for “DOOM Vulkan Gameplay” and you’ll get a slick 1080p video running at 60FPS with a player who knows what they’re doing. It’s the video that convinced me to buy it on launch day
Multiplayer feels like a poor man’s halo..
Singleplayer campaign has been great fun and feels like it captures the spirit of the originals fast past run and gun, rewarding you for aggressive play and the level designs are interesting.
If you’re after a MP fix, don’t bother, if you want a fast and fun sing pleaser shooter where you don’t have to think too much while player, then it’s great.
I wasn’t sold to start with. The early game is a bit meh, but if you push on it seems to feel better the further you go.
Overall it’s nothing special, but it’s not terrible.
Multiplayer is fucked – I’d hazard a guess someone in a suit said make it more like cod. Fuckin worst.
Single player is amazing – no story just shit tons of demons to slaughter. Early on it is a bit slow but it’s glorious when you have a few weapons (i’d say when u get the double barrel shotty) – really rewards players who can switch weapons for situations and not stick to one or two guns. By far the best gun play in a shooter for years.
Moar pls.
Apparently the multiplayer has been handled by a third party developer who also helped work on Halo. So you can see why a lot of those mechanics have bled through.
I agree that’s not what Doom multi should be, but it does help explain it.
The general bad reviews I saw for Doom were something along the lines of “This game is about a 7/10 but too many people rated it 10/10 so I’m giving it 1/10”
Personally I love the game. The multiplayer is pretty simplistic and has some issues but the campaign is great.
The downside I saw in reviews of the campaign often had “run backwards while shooting demons, rinse, repeat”. I didn’t get this at all. I played it on the hardest level and spent all my time moving at full speed dodging fireballs, leaping from platform to platform, dropping on an enemy for a death from above glory kill to give me some desperately needed health.
The scenarios were pretty repetitive in the setup for each but the stages, different enemy combinations, powerup, and weapon upgrades always made the combat feel fresh. Absolutely loved it.
I’m loving it. Haven’t tried multi, and have no intention to, as it’s never really been a multiplayer game worthy of my attention. Singleplayer is fantastic though! So many secrets, and upgrades and challenges are fun. Can’t wait to play through the old doom levels when I’m done!
Easily my GOTY so far, on the strength of the campaign alone.
Multiplayer can be straight up ignored. Single player is fun, fast and hectic… assuming the game works. I would only recommend this to people if Bethesda can pull their finger out and fix the save corruption/Dev mode issue.
It wont stop you playing the SP campaign but it will kill off any achievement progress. Bethesda’s solution right now is delete your save and start again. All well and good until your save shits itself again due to -some- reason.
only a few hours into the single player so far but I love the shit out of it! it just feels….right. The Music, the gore, the tempo, the atmosphere, the chainsaw…..oh the chainsaw…….
Absolutely loved it. Its’ been a long time since I thoroughly enjoyed a fps single player campaign like I have with DOOM. Thank you id software.
I was sold as soon as doomguy found a collectable figurine and fistbumped the tiny version of himself. I have issues with the imp design because I wanted giant brown spike shouldered dudes damn it. The only actual problem I’ve found is the lack of force feedback for being hit. The level design is great and I’m finding myself going through normally to kill stuff and then spending an hour or so just backtracking to explore and find secrets (Need that 100% yo) the weapons feel good, the sound design is holy shit amazing, the chainsaw is great the first few times you see the individual animations … the game just feels good. I got to play some rounds of multiplayer on the weekend and to be honest, it’s not that bad. It’s fast and kind of bridges the gap between twitch shooters and more “standard” multiplayer fare … that said running into literally anyone they’re bound to have a super shotgun on them. The character customisation is kind of average, but the end game taunts are pretty cool. All in all, it’s a great game but unless you’re into doom it might be a bit weird and offputting with the rhythm of the game being explore-find big open area to fight waves of enemies – explore to find more fight arenas could get tiresome.
“I was sold as soon as doomguy found a collectable figurine and fistbumped the tiny version of himself.”
I laughed my butt off and screenshotted it. Best bit, best bit!
I love it! I haven’t had this much fun with a videogame in a long time. It doesn’t talk down to its players at all, it lets you fight the way gamers are supposed to fight. No BS aiming down the sights, no regenerative health, constantly on the move and thinking about your actions.
I will even defend the multiplayer. I know about the complaints people have for it and I agree. But what Doom does differently is that it allows players to get dirty and have a brawl. In most shooters the victor is decided by whoever gets spotted first. Killtimes are so short that someone with a shotgun can win against a sniper. In Doom you have to actually fight. You can dodge, jump around, switch weapons and collect armour. It’s based mostly on skill where you have to actually aim at the person and not rely on the autoaim from ADS to do the work for you.
and playing as a demon is fun. In Soul Harvest there’s no time limit, so I like to jump around the edges of the map to freak out the other team.
your feeling towards the MP sums it up for me too. The game is a 10/10 for SP alone but the MP not being the insta-spotted death that pisses me off with modern shooters but skill based is why I like it so much.
I really dug it. I never really got tired of the Arena style “The room has been locked down” engagements. Upgrading the weapons and then upgrading the upgrades kept pushing me forward to keep killing and changing up my play style. I only with the super shotgun had some sort of alternate fire mode beyond just the 2-shot. The Bosses were just tough enough. Replaying is worthwhile too since you can double jump your way to unreachable secrets in the early game.
You dont need jump boots to get all the early secrets, fyi. Just try to stand on handrails n stuff to get up higher 😉 Oh and to folks saying the shotty range is bad or they are running out of ammo- youre doin it wrong. Treat doomguy like a fighter jet doing strafing runs- Dive into crowd guns blazing, glory kill, run out other side of crowd. Swing back around and do same. Short on ammo? Chainsaw, shoot, glorykill again. Stand on bloody ground feeling godlike, Search area for secrets. Job done. Rune trials can be tricky at times but satisfying to complete. As to MP, no fks given. Im here to carve demons, thx.
I think it’s fantastic, I’ve finished the campaign, restarted it straight away on ultra nightmare and got to the second map… think I’ll leave it there! The MP sucks, as everyone is saying, but the Snapmap feature might have some staying power and its fun to try them out.
For me, Doom 2016 is up there with Wolfenstien: The New Order as a surprisingly excellent reboot of an old id shooter, although done via a completely different method. Whearas wolfenstien brought in a genuinely engaging story and gang of characters to complement the action, Doom has just refined and refined that combat loop to absolute perfection. I can’t think of a shooter with more satisfying combat, to be honest. Big, big fan.
I’ve gotta do a few snap map thing and all the multi-player ones and I’ll 100% it. One of the few games I’m willing to go the extra for.
Loved it. The new jump, climb & glory kill mechanics looked gimmicky initially but they really added something.
Weapons felt great, aside from the rocket launcher, which was underpowered.
Levels were pleasantly large and it felt like a lot of thought went into them. I enjoyed the concept of the locked down arena areas but think it could have been used a little more sparingly.
For me they absolutely nailed the aesthetic of Doom’s hell. Super pretty.
I enjoyed always being on the lookout for secrets. I appreciated the progression system, it worked well, though the praetor suit upgrade choices were a bit bland.
I loved that it didn’t hold your hand. Ultra-Violence was satisfyingly difficult and I think the choice to use checkpoints was the right one. The rune trials were a blast.
I think the way could have spread out each weapon find a bit more; we ended up with most of them too early on.
Oh, and it ran silky smooth for me no matter how intense things got.
Multiplayer did feel like a mess. After a couple of hours of Team DM what stood out for me was the weakness of the rocket launcher and the lack of feedback when getting pinged with bullets. I didn’t know I was being hit until it was too late. Loadouts replacing weapon pickups felt like blasphemy too (looks like Troutmonkey had the exact same thoughts above). Fortunately for me I was really only interested in singleplayer.
Great game. Good to see a studio thinking about the gameplay of what they’re making. Doom is all about situational awareness and dodging fireballs etc….this version nails that.
And the heavy metal sound track?!! Awesome!!
I think it is great. To me, a fps needs good controls and movement and Doom nails that. The weapons are excellent and I use them all. Its so refreshing to have maps/levels that are self contained and you can backtrack and go in any direction from the start (Bioshock 1&2 were also the kind of level design I like). The secrets are good and are integral to the level design. The new glory kills are a good game mechanic (maybe a great mechanic if the animations were shortened and/or skippable). In general, I like that the game mechanics are simple and well defined. Last week I also bought uncharted 4, and while I understand its a completely different beast, I am concerned by the mechanics of it. Its still a very fun game but sometimes the game systems feel convoluted and not really fine tuned – sometimes you can’t ‘trust’ them. Doom on the other hand is reliable and that leads to a feeling of being ‘in’ the moment.
I have yet to play it due to SLI not being supported yet, but! i have seen nothing but praise for its SP (the mp seems to be a missed opportunity).
I’d like to give it a go but $99 on the PSN says no…if it was $79 (like UC4) then it would be a yes…
Anyone at Sony taking notes ???
$69 @ target/big w, $79 @ gametrader. Go get some exercise!
It is fluffing brilliant game and everything it should of been and more. A return to form for FPS in a world of CoD clones.
I hope it sells a tonne to encourage developers to take note in the same way Wolfenstein the New Order showed not everyone wants scripted corridor set piece crap.
I thought it was great. Great gameplay, enjoyed the story, fights, environments and game length. Only gripes are the cheating in multiplayer and the excessive gore and blood. But that aside it’s awesome game. Wish there was even more! 🙂