Doom is rightly considered the granddaddy of the FPS genre, a claim few games can make. Let's look at each memorable entry in the Doom series from development to reception.
Ripping and Tearing: 3 Decades of Doom
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You missed out Final Doom - 2x MegaWADs (The Plutonia Experiment and TNT: Evilution developed by TeamTNT, and Dario and Milo Casali) that were good enough that id Software ended up directly publishing them more or less as an semi-official Doom 2 expansion pack in 1996.
You also missed out Sigil, essentially a belated Doom 1 Episode 5 finale that was released for free by John Romero in 2019. The GZDoom engine is here.
You also missed out Sigil, essentially a belated Doom 1 Episode 5 finale that was released for free by John Romero in 2019. The GZDoom engine is here.
QuantumPhysics
Posts: 6,306 +7,258
Of all the DOOM games, I and II were easily the best.
I was perfect in every way.
II was more challenging than I'd imagined a Doom game could be.
III was more like a survival horror VR game, and held its own, but it was too slow to really be "DOOM".
Doom 2016 and DOOM Eternal are overhyped as if they were trying to make an ultra-violent Master Chief. Doom 2016 wasn't so bad, but Doom Eternal purposefully gives you less ammo then you need to kill enemies the way you want to kill them and then adds enemies with gimmicks to force you into puzzle solving rather than just letting you blast away the way you want.
It's all about lure in order to sell DLC.
Of all the Doom games, if I could only pick one to play for ever, it would be either Doom I or Doom II. And it's hard deciding which one I like more because both were so radically different, yet perfect stand alones.
I was perfect in every way.
II was more challenging than I'd imagined a Doom game could be.
III was more like a survival horror VR game, and held its own, but it was too slow to really be "DOOM".
Doom 2016 and DOOM Eternal are overhyped as if they were trying to make an ultra-violent Master Chief. Doom 2016 wasn't so bad, but Doom Eternal purposefully gives you less ammo then you need to kill enemies the way you want to kill them and then adds enemies with gimmicks to force you into puzzle solving rather than just letting you blast away the way you want.
It's all about lure in order to sell DLC.
Of all the Doom games, if I could only pick one to play for ever, it would be either Doom I or Doom II. And it's hard deciding which one I like more because both were so radically different, yet perfect stand alones.
Avro Arrow
Posts: 3,721 +4,821
"While it's true that Doom was not the first FPS, it is rightly considered the granddaddy of the genre; a claim few games can make."
- Since it was spawned from Wolfenstein 3D, what does that make Wolfenstein 3D?
- Since it was spawned from Wolfenstein 3D, what does that make Wolfenstein 3D?
Geralt
Posts: 1,387 +2,213
They forgot Doom 95.
I stopped playing Doom Eternal because it's too intense. Repeating the same areas over and over again is not fun IMHO. Too much.
I stopped playing Doom Eternal because it's too intense. Repeating the same areas over and over again is not fun IMHO. Too much.
arrowflash
Posts: 584 +696
Original 1993 Doom is my all-time favorite video game. During the 1990s I probably played it more than any other video game, not only the PC version but also the SNES, PSX and Saturn versions (I think the article should have talked in more detail about the console ports, though that has enough content to deserve an article on its own).
Doom 2 and Final Doom are still pretty good but I found them disappointing. It's the same game running on the same engine with identical gameplay, but the level design took a nosedive. Level design just isn't as solid as OG Doom. OG Doom is unbeatable, but even in the early 2000s there already were many campaign mods with better level design than Doom 2 and Final Doom.
There's also Brutal Doom. While being a mod and not an official game, I think Brutal Doom deserves some recognition and should have been mentioned. I know it has detractors among die hard fans, but I love it and it gave a whole new life to the game.
However it's depressing to see what the Doom franchise has become. I even liked Doom 3 and Doom 2016, but Doom Eternal is not only a terrible Doom game - Doom Eternal is one of the worst FPS I ever played in my entire life.
Lastly, I don't think the 2005 movie is that bad. Not great, but not terrible either, especially considering they didn't have much to work with from the source material in first place. It's a pretty entertaining cheesy sci-fi action B-movie and one of the last of its kind, they just don't make these kinds of movies anymore and that's sad. I still think the first person sequence that imitated the game was great.
Doom 2 and Final Doom are still pretty good but I found them disappointing. It's the same game running on the same engine with identical gameplay, but the level design took a nosedive. Level design just isn't as solid as OG Doom. OG Doom is unbeatable, but even in the early 2000s there already were many campaign mods with better level design than Doom 2 and Final Doom.
There's also Brutal Doom. While being a mod and not an official game, I think Brutal Doom deserves some recognition and should have been mentioned. I know it has detractors among die hard fans, but I love it and it gave a whole new life to the game.
However it's depressing to see what the Doom franchise has become. I even liked Doom 3 and Doom 2016, but Doom Eternal is not only a terrible Doom game - Doom Eternal is one of the worst FPS I ever played in my entire life.
Lastly, I don't think the 2005 movie is that bad. Not great, but not terrible either, especially considering they didn't have much to work with from the source material in first place. It's a pretty entertaining cheesy sci-fi action B-movie and one of the last of its kind, they just don't make these kinds of movies anymore and that's sad. I still think the first person sequence that imitated the game was great.
RudyBob
Posts: 1,474 +1,566
Doom Eternal...to much acting like a monkey. Swing, jump and grab
PEnnn
Posts: 1,285 +1,853
I must say, almost all of them beat the stupid Doom Eternal.
It seems the programmers there think it's pretty cool that you cannot do anything unless it requires a series of convoluted triple or quadruple jumps!!
Pathetic.
It seems the programmers there think it's pretty cool that you cannot do anything unless it requires a series of convoluted triple or quadruple jumps!!
Pathetic.
I'm sorry but I strongly disagree, the 2016 reboot is amazing and it deserves the praise and hype it got. Saying that the original 2 were better is just looking back at the past with nostalgia tinted glasses.
Trapped Nowhere
Posts: 188 +213
Lmao in that first doom video around 3:30, how is the player shooting at monsters above with no aiming?
Early Doom (1993) didn't have vertical look or mouse-look, it merely "auto-aimed" vertically for you. Vertical look up / down in the idtech 1 Engine was something that only came from Heretic (1994), and mouselook by the mid-late 90's in Quake, etc. Playing Doom Engine games through GZDoom source-port instead of their original MS-DOS .EXE is far better as it deals with all this stuff out of the box.
Edit: The 2D -> 3D transition in the early 90's was a learning experience for everyone and it took a couple of years to get the controls right. For another example, see System Shock 1 (1994) super clunky UI & controls vs System Shock 2 (1999) where the difference in playability between them separated by just 5 years is 1000x greater than the difference between SS2 (1999) vs today in terms of "normalizing" WASD + mouselook as the base FPS control system.
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RudyBob
Posts: 1,474 +1,566
BadThad
Posts: 1,362 +1,637
Fun and great article!
Doom Eternal - I had high hopes but it turned into a platforming game resulting in hours of frustration. I don't know a single Doom player that was into hopping, jumping and swinging. Doom is all about killing hoards of monsters, not platforming! They ruined a great game!
Doom Eternal - I had high hopes but it turned into a platforming game resulting in hours of frustration. I don't know a single Doom player that was into hopping, jumping and swinging. Doom is all about killing hoards of monsters, not platforming! They ruined a great game!
Stingy McDuck
Posts: 300 +268
I think most of the hate the Ancient Gods Part 2 gets from part of the community is because it tweaked the previous expansion and base game to make them easier.
As a PC gamer that spent his high school and college years in the 90's, I lived and breathed ID games. I can still remember "downloading" Doom and installing it on every computer lab machine I touched. Ah, the good old days. Castle Wolfenstein really was the real FPS catalyst, Doom made FPS gaming the "thing to play," and Quake (in my mind) set the bar for graphics. The joy of 90's with Doom, Quake, and Wolfenstein (oh yeah the internet and the dot com bubble). Okay, enough nostalgia.
I played them all, a lot. It is not realistic to compare the old versions of Doom to the new ones. They just come from a different time in life. I must say that I really liked the reboot of Doom in 2016 (wow that long ago already). It had the perfect blend of old school action, a touch of story line, and just the right amount of "open worldness." The only draw back was getting a good graphics card to play it during the crypto boom.
For me, Doom Eternal was a dud. I still have not finished it. I do like the jumping and climbing. I think the extra complexity of all the weapon mods and new actions when combined with a nauseating level of repetitiveness just sucked the fun out of it. It became "work" and just kind of sucked the fun out of it. It would be nice to given it another try with a new graphics card, but we are in yet another crypto boom and cards are just hard to get and way too expensive. Hey, is that just a coincidence or what?
I played them all, a lot. It is not realistic to compare the old versions of Doom to the new ones. They just come from a different time in life. I must say that I really liked the reboot of Doom in 2016 (wow that long ago already). It had the perfect blend of old school action, a touch of story line, and just the right amount of "open worldness." The only draw back was getting a good graphics card to play it during the crypto boom.
For me, Doom Eternal was a dud. I still have not finished it. I do like the jumping and climbing. I think the extra complexity of all the weapon mods and new actions when combined with a nauseating level of repetitiveness just sucked the fun out of it. It became "work" and just kind of sucked the fun out of it. It would be nice to given it another try with a new graphics card, but we are in yet another crypto boom and cards are just hard to get and way too expensive. Hey, is that just a coincidence or what?
Geralt
Posts: 1,387 +2,213
Yes, I just couldn't express better than you why I disliked this game. It looks great but it is very frustrating even in the easiest difficulty. I dislike platforms too, of course.
Hey! About Virtual Reality Doom, you really forgot Doom 3 VR Edition, which is ofitially PSVR exclusive, but can be ran on Doom 3 BFG from steam (with Fully Possesed mod which VR codebase is reportedly decades old and it reportedly THE THING Carmack worked on before departure to Oculus)
https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/doom-3-vr-edition/
https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/doom-3-vr-edition/
Hurrdurr hopping and swinging in muh doom, y u do dis ID?
The pacing can be a bit offputting when simply traversing to move to the next enemy encounter, but the actual implementation of movement mechanics into the gameplay makes Eternal way better than any incarnation before it, because it starts to feel more like superior shooters that came after it. Blasting things with the rocket launcher and ballista after flinging yourself into the air at 90mph feels like good ol' Quake and Tribes fragging. The swinging is a bit goofy in both design and execution, but at least the mantling is quick and responsive.
The core of the gameplay and available mechanics are good; it's mostly the level design and pacing between action sequences that leaves some to be desired.
The pacing can be a bit offputting when simply traversing to move to the next enemy encounter, but the actual implementation of movement mechanics into the gameplay makes Eternal way better than any incarnation before it, because it starts to feel more like superior shooters that came after it. Blasting things with the rocket launcher and ballista after flinging yourself into the air at 90mph feels like good ol' Quake and Tribes fragging. The swinging is a bit goofy in both design and execution, but at least the mantling is quick and responsive.
The core of the gameplay and available mechanics are good; it's mostly the level design and pacing between action sequences that leaves some to be desired.
I loved the originals and I loved Doom Eternal. Custom keybindings and my logitech g604 were important with all the weapons and gadgets etc. I tried playing on Switch and it was a nightmare
Written by a young guy?
Wolfenstein 3D was huge before doom and kicked the whole FPS off in a big way. Doom just added superior graphics.
Lets not rewrite history because you can’t remember it. And not to say there were not ones before Wolfenstein 3D, particularly indie developers.
Wolfenstein 3D was huge before doom and kicked the whole FPS off in a big way. Doom just added superior graphics.
Lets not rewrite history because you can’t remember it. And not to say there were not ones before Wolfenstein 3D, particularly indie developers.
Neatfeatguy
Posts: 1,621 +3,052
Doom was awesome and I loved playing Doom 2 and all the levels on the Demon Gate disc (which I still have).
I was pumped about Doom 3. One of my roommates actually got his hands on a early conception demo level for Doom 3 and it was pretty sweet. I was excited to get the game when it finally came out. My younger brother and I spent the better part of a weekend taking turns playing through the game. In the end, though, I thought Doom 3 was just okay. It felt slow compared to the originals and it didn't have the intense atmosphere you felt in the original games. They tried to replicate that intense atmosphere by making the option of either having your flashlight out or your weapon out, but not both. It felt kind of cheap.
I was intrigued when Doom (2016) came out. Thought it might be fun.....it was so boring. You just run, jump, shoot, run, jump, shoot, run, jump, shoot, over again and again and again and again and again. It wasn't fun. I have more fun playing the Painkiller games and Serious Sam games. I felt that Doom had become a bad arena shooter.
Maybe the fact that I played a lot of Doom back in the day kind of turns me off of the new ones and how they were designed? For example, I can only play so much of the Assassin Creed games before they bore me and I only got through the first 4 (AC, AC2, Brotherhood and Revelations) before the series became the same old, tiring, boring crap. I struggled getting through AC3 and was so bored playing through it I haven't looked into any others since.
I was pumped about Doom 3. One of my roommates actually got his hands on a early conception demo level for Doom 3 and it was pretty sweet. I was excited to get the game when it finally came out. My younger brother and I spent the better part of a weekend taking turns playing through the game. In the end, though, I thought Doom 3 was just okay. It felt slow compared to the originals and it didn't have the intense atmosphere you felt in the original games. They tried to replicate that intense atmosphere by making the option of either having your flashlight out or your weapon out, but not both. It felt kind of cheap.
I was intrigued when Doom (2016) came out. Thought it might be fun.....it was so boring. You just run, jump, shoot, run, jump, shoot, run, jump, shoot, over again and again and again and again and again. It wasn't fun. I have more fun playing the Painkiller games and Serious Sam games. I felt that Doom had become a bad arena shooter.
Maybe the fact that I played a lot of Doom back in the day kind of turns me off of the new ones and how they were designed? For example, I can only play so much of the Assassin Creed games before they bore me and I only got through the first 4 (AC, AC2, Brotherhood and Revelations) before the series became the same old, tiring, boring crap. I struggled getting through AC3 and was so bored playing through it I haven't looked into any others since.
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