Doom (Video Game)
Developed by id Software
Published by Bethesda Softworks
Available on PC, Xbox One, and PS4
Rated M for Mature
When I first played Doom, it was in secret on a friend’s N64 that he smuggled into a sleepover. At the tender age of 10, I feasted my eyes upon all manner of blood, gore, and glorious carnage. It was an awakening, a mixture of guilt and desire I imagined the bad kids that played with skateboards and smoked “the drugs” felt. It was forbidden, and I wanted more.
Unfortunately, the searing gaze of my mother’s eyes bore straight into my sinner’s soul, and she pried out the unclean truth from me on the car ride home. I wasn’t allowed back to that friend’s house again, and the culprit was swiftly banished from our birthday party invites. It was back to Math Blaster for me, and the bears in Oregon Trail were the closest thing I’d get to intense action for a while. Hell, I had to sneak into my dad’s office just to play SkiFree because the yeti was too scary. And she was right. I still have nightmares about that.
The point of this tangent is that I didn’t grow up with the “old school” titles that older gamers revere. I don’t really connect with arguments about the terribleness of modern shooters and a wistful desire to return to the glory days. I had tried to play games like the original Doom a few years ago, and could not for the life of me get past the awful graphics, repetitive soundtrack, and bizarre mechanics. Tint your glasses as rose as you like, that game has not aged well.
I first learned of the new Doom when it was publically revealed at E3 2015, and all I knew was that it looked fucking epic. Demons were crushed, shotguns were blasted, chainsaws were brandished, and bodies were dismembered. Having played Doom 3, I was more than a little aware that this was a stark change in tone. I knew that this was a return to form of the old school shooter, but I didn’t really know what that would entail.
Spoiler Alert: Lots and lots of this.
Well, consider me well educated, and a disciple of the dark lords of Doom. This is, without any reservation, the most fun I’ve had playing a shooter since Half Life 2. It’s early to call, but this might be my game of the year. If Dark Souls didn’t exist, this would be my game of the decade.
“Ted, get those balls out of your mouth and tell us why you liked it!” Fair. What I just did, establishing my character and all that, is exactly what Doom has the balls not to do. Setting out at the onset of the Hell invasion, the game starts with you ripping chains off of your arms with the sheer power of rage and smashing every demon in sight with the massiveness of your muscles. After making sure every living organism in the room is pounded into a fine paste, you walk into the next room, don your iconic Praetor Suit, and have some gnarly flashbacks to Hell.
You attempt to scan the facility, but learn that the scanning equipment is offline. A voice comes across the computer offering assistance, but you’re just way too mad for that shit, so you punch the computer and storm off down a hallway. You then partake in Doom’s version of a tutorial, which is a bunch of demons spawning while you leap through the air and shotgun them all into oblivion. After you rip the face off of a hellportal and frag every last imp in the room, you get into an elevator that won’t move. Naturally, you punch it, and it starts moving again. Queue the opening credits.
This is a game so fucking savage that it starts with slaughter and ends with mega slaughter in just the tutorial. From start to finish, Doom is a balls-to-the-wall fuckfest of carnage. Sweet glorious Satan, is it beautiful. Limbs constantly fly to a soundtrack of heavy metal and rocket explosions. While other games have you sit behind a corner to regenerate health, Doom makes you rip it straight out of a demon’s throat. Out of ammo? Nothing a chainsaw can’t solve! Rev it up, chop off a limb, and you’ll be treated to a fountain of fresh munitions.
They seriously took a chainsaw and went, “this needs to be more badass.”
If you think this all means that the game is stupid, you would be dead wrong. I’m the kind of guy who likes to find all of the secrets in a game, and Doom provided a rewarding experience on par with most adventure games. There are no sliding tile puzzles to solve, but the amount of exploration they pack into such a tight package is incredible. There’s so much to do and see that it can easily keep you entertained for a dozen hours just looking for every nook and cranny.
There are suit upgrades, secret weapon drops, stat upgrades, challenge rooms, and collectible figurines to find. While other games *cough FarCry 3/4 cough* are afraid that my peasant brain can’t handle missing a collectible and let me unlock all of the content at the 50% point, Doom doesn’t give you all of the upgrades unless you find all of the shit it hid. It treats you like an adult. You don’t need all of the upgrades to win, but it makes you earn every single point.
Who said demonic invasions can’t have their cute side?
The secret that fans will enjoy the most are the 16 classic maps. Finding them is no easy feat, but not impossible. They show up on the map, so it’s pretty easy to figure out where the entrance probably is. The difficult part is finding the unmarked lever to open the door. There’s one in every level, so keep your eyes peeled.
And if you thought finding them was challenging, oh man, just try playing them. They are recreated in the classic 2.5 D style, straight down to the enemies always facing you. Watching the 3D models act like flat sprites is uncanny, but uniquely awesome. It’s an attention to detail that shows how much the devs really loved reviving this franchise. Also, keeping to form, the classic maps are keyboard-smashingly hard.
Although, unlike the original, you do actually have to aim at what you want to hit.
Once you are done finding everything, there are volumes of codex entries to delve through to flesh out the backstory. I’ve seen some critics call Doom “storyless,” which is funny, since the backstory they give you in the text entries is as compelling as any other sci-fi universe. I can guarantee you they did not read them, because they would have been treated to a world where a war between Hell and other realms created a patchwork dimension of floating temples populated by a mosaic of corrupted constructs. The main narrative is simple, but only for the purposes of being unintrusive. You get what you need from the little snippets of dialogue and flashbacks, and if you want more it’s all there in the codex logs. I spent several hours past my bedtime just learning about the origin of the Doom Slayer.
By the way, that’s who you are. You play as the Doom Slayer, a badass anti-demon force of nature full of so much hate and rage that even demons cannot handle your shit. You wake up to the alarm clock of fearful demons, and the only snooze button is to crush their stupid demon faces. After having been trapped for an eternity in the depths of Hell, you are freed when mankind foolishly decides to harness Hell as the next fossil fuel. Since you’ve been kept in a stone sarcophagus for millennia, you cannot possibly fathom a reality in which every limb of every demon is not on opposite ends of the room, and go about rectifying this discrepancy.
You know that when demons have illustrations of you bringing their apocalypse with just your fists, you’re doing something right.
It’s a badass enough backstory, but the gameplay sells it. Really, a game about dismembering demons with massive ordinance could be held up on concept alone. I’m not exaggerating when I say that I cannot remember the last time I played a game after I was done reviewing it for fun, but that is what I continue doing with Doom. I kept justifying it as “research” for my review, but in reality I just wanted to keep smashing demons. The intense action, genuine challenge, and gloriously sadistic deaths keep me coming back hour after hour, day after day, and will for a good time after typing this.
Also, it’s just so goddamn pretty.
I’ve seen some other criticisms regarding the multiplayer, which I can kind of understand. In terms of match types, it’s all pretty basic variants of Deathmatch and King of the Hill. Loadouts are customizable the same way they are in every modern shooter, which is going to be a let down for the fans of the old school “rush the rocket launcher spawn” type of frantic arena shooter. The weapons in the multiplayer are balanced for it, with several not crossing over into the single player. A sniper rifle just wouldn’t work in the campaign, but it fits the multiplayer fine. You level up quickly, unlocking new weapons, skins, color variants, and taunts. It’s all pretty standard, but there is a lot to see.
That’s the extent to which I can agree with the multiplayer being bland, and I’m going to have to once again say that I think most reviewers just didn’t really explore the Snap Maps. I can understand why, I almost passed on the mode myself. From what I understood, it was just a multiplayer map creator. It’s fun for some people, but not for me. Still, the people at Bethesda asked pretty please for all us reviewers to check it out, so I did.
I was shocked to find a robust map creation engine on par with anything Valve ever put out. It simplifies things into understandable tutorials, but the complexity of what you can do is really top-notch. Not only can you piece together an arena, but set enemy spawns, unique objectives, special triggers, unit pathing, and even AI behavior. It’s a level of creative freedom reminiscent of the old Halo 3 forge. I seriously loaded into a map that was just a giant keyboard, cowbell, and a drum beat. Together with four other strangers, we did our best to play “Carry on My Wayward Son.” That is the kind of random fun you can expect to find daily on the Snap Map.
Sadly, for the amount of skeletons in this game, there was no trumpet.
The only criticism I have for Doom is that the ending is lame. The betrayal we all saw coming from minute three comes to fruition, and it sets up for a sequel. Honestly though, for how lazy and unfulfilling it is, I can’t even be mad. As long as we get more Doom, I’m happy.
This is without a doubt the most pleased I’ve been with a game since I started writing for Dread Central. The only way you wouldn’t like Doom is if you just positively hate shooters and fun. It proves that “old school” doesn’t mean “dated.” It brings that classic frantic action into the modern age, expertly updating the formula without making it unrecognizable. Buy Doom, and get to fragging some hellspawn immediately.
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Categorized:Horror Gaming Reviews
