Doom does not perform nearly as well on the Switch as it does on PS4, Xbox One or PC. On Nintendo’s latest console, Doom runs at a lower framerate, with big sacrifices in resolution and graphical fidelity. But really, isn’t it a miracle that Doom is on the Switch at all?
This new port, released on Friday, is the first of many big third-party games coming to the Nintendo Switch in the next few weeks, including Skyrim, Rocket League and LA Noire. The big advantages of these ports, as with all games on the hot new console, is portability. For the first time ever, you’ll be able to fight through endless waves of draugr and scream at homicide suspects on the go.
I’ve played a few minutes of Doom on Switch, testing it both on my television and on the handheld, and it feels steady, if not quite as smooth as its console and PC counterparts. It runs at 30 frames-per-second, as opposed to 60 on the other platforms, and it looks significantly worse, suffering from the oh-so-common “Vaseline on screen” blurriness that tends to plague games that are making graphical compromises just to be here. There are occasional framerate drops and a few other reported glitches, including music dropouts, and the text is so small that I assume it was designed for eagles.
But it’s Doom on the go. It looks like Doom and feels like Doom and you can play it anywhere. Given what we know about the Switch’s processor, which is based on an Android tablet chip, it’s a miracle that this even exists.
For a more in-depth look at Doom on the Switch, I recommend the GameXplain review. (They spent a lot more time with it than I did!)
Comments
11 responses to “It’s Amazing That Doom Can Even Run On The Switch”
We shouldn’t be praising these subpar ports. We should be demanding they do better.
Look at is as a stand-alone product. crap frame rate, blurred graphics, performance.
If this hadn’t already released, and this was the first time we saw it, we would be shitcanning this game.
I think that’s a bit harsh but I agree in a way. There’s nothing remarkable here – if you reduce fidelity and make enough compromises, of course it’ll run on weak hardware. That doesn’t make it a miracle or a good port.
The switch shouldn’t have got this game. It was never designed for it, there were no intentions to do it. Any port of this game was going to be subpar NO MATTER WHAT
It is a miracle this happened, because it shouldn’t have, and now we have a competent Doom game on a handheld device. This is happy days.
If this was the first time people were seeing Doom as a Switch exclusive, a great looking game running comfortably on a portable device, they would absolutely be losing their shit over how something like this happened.
Keep in mind that the comparison would be with other Switch games, and while the current big hitters – BotW, Splatoon 2, ARMS, Odyssey – all look great, none of them look like Doom.
Cannot agree with this at all. The experience simply would never have been built for the Switch in the first place. And id is one of the only software developers that spends an extraordinary amount of time optimising its games for systems on top.
It’s not like Nintendo has never had doom before.
That was when Nintendo were building full powered consoles however.
I get what you’re trying to say. And for 90% of ports you might be right.
But Doom on Switch isn’t one of those ports.
I mean if you are going to try and put any AAA FPS on switch this would the easiest, its soooooo well optimised. honestly its worse than i thought, 30fps (with drops) and very very significant graphics downgrade from even the Xbox one which itself looks a fair bit worse than the PS4 one.
The other day i was impressed by the graphics compared to xbox because i was thinking xbox ran it at 30fps so i was surprised with how “good” they were (with how little power switch has), but now that i remember its also 30fps vs 60fps plus those graphics downgrades im pretty disappointed.
I mean its still cool to get doom on the switch but holy moly its such a compromised version i hope no one plays it as there only play through, and only play as a replay of the game after playing it on something else first.
EDIT: Hey @guestwhowould I went to edit/add something to this original post as i was also replying to you but apparently editing this post killed your reply (at least when i load this article i dont see it, maybe not for you). Also i would PM but i haven’t the faintest idea how, only reason i have your name is my account still has a notification about your reply.
Anyway if you come back this is what i said:
I havent actually played it on the switch or xbox (Have a PC, all multiplatform games are on there) and the video was all sections standing still so there was no way for me to see the difference really. Plus its more about the fact that it is objectively running half as well (worse really as it drops below 30), whether or not every one sees it (they do even if they don’t admit it). All while looking significantly worse than the previous worst version.
Why does the frame rate matter if you never noticed the difference?
Of course a full blown console or PC is going to poo on the switch in terms of the performance and quality but the appeal to switch users is the flexibility of mobile and off-screen play.
I got my Switch with the whole idea in mind that I can play games while watching TV (or someone else is using the TV) or at any stage I can pull it out of my bag and play for a bit.
The only issue here I think is they are still asking the same price as the PS4/XboxOne/PC prices and expecting people to pay it which makes no sense.