It's not just the trademark ripping and tearing -- it's the viscerality of even the quieter moments: shoving a severed head into an eye-scanner, prying a weapon from the cold dead fingers of a corpse, stomping carefully engineered relics of scientific ingenuity into dust, locking and twisting a beefy gun mod into place, brute-force heaving a hydraulic door open... These things are character development.
I missed these little touches SO BAD in Doom Eternal back when it came out, and wondered recently if it had colored my opinion of the gameplay too much. So, before revisiting it, I decided to complete my fourth playthrough of this, its predecessor, on the normal difficulty mode. (I did one Ultra-Violence clear back in 2018 and liked it, but to me the game really sings not when you feel vulnerable, but rather--more in accordance with the narrative--when you feel like a fucking unstoppable God).
I can barely think of one other game of this length that I've completed that many times. It's a little confounding even to me why I keep getting drawn back to it... the confidence of its simple story and world are a marvel to me, its buttery-smooth performance is a rapture, its design is ratcheted down so tight that even the tiniest flaws (one-too-many stupid Mancubi in a particular enemy hive, or the fact that you inevitably have to hunt down one stray imp to end every battle) couldn't be more glaring... but none of those qualities, or even their combination, is unique to DOOM.
What is unique to DOOM is its array of curious dichotomies. Its music blends metal seamlessly with hard techno; its world depicts the folkloric fires of hell against the frigid corridors of scientific and capitalist bloat and overreach; its game mechanics mix a surprising amount of platforming, of all things, in with the shooting (next to Respawn's endeavors, it's the best platforming in an FPS)...
And, it could not be more linear, yet it feels more open with gameplay possibility than many "Open World" games; each room a killing-puzzle that could be conquered countless satisfying ways with countless different dopamine-drenching weapon combos, pathway choices and tactics.
A violent reverie.
I missed these little touches SO BAD in Doom Eternal back when it came out, and wondered recently if it had colored my opinion of the gameplay too much. So, before revisiting it, I decided to complete my fourth playthrough of this, its predecessor, on the normal difficulty mode. (I did one Ultra-Violence clear back in 2018 and liked it, but to me the game really sings not when you feel vulnerable, but rather--more in accordance with the narrative--when you feel like a fucking unstoppable God).
I can barely think of one other game of this length that I've completed that many times. It's a little confounding even to me why I keep getting drawn back to it... the confidence of its simple story and world are a marvel to me, its buttery-smooth performance is a rapture, its design is ratcheted down so tight that even the tiniest flaws (one-too-many stupid Mancubi in a particular enemy hive, or the fact that you inevitably have to hunt down one stray imp to end every battle) couldn't be more glaring... but none of those qualities, or even their combination, is unique to DOOM.
What is unique to DOOM is its array of curious dichotomies. Its music blends metal seamlessly with hard techno; its world depicts the folkloric fires of hell against the frigid corridors of scientific and capitalist bloat and overreach; its game mechanics mix a surprising amount of platforming, of all things, in with the shooting (next to Respawn's endeavors, it's the best platforming in an FPS)...
And, it could not be more linear, yet it feels more open with gameplay possibility than many "Open World" games; each room a killing-puzzle that could be conquered countless satisfying ways with countless different dopamine-drenching weapon combos, pathway choices and tactics.
A violent reverie.