Game review 17 March 2020, 16:05

author: Darius Matusiak

Doom Eternal Review – Demon's is in the Details

Doom Eternal improves on and adds to the formula of the previous so intently that sometimes it feels exaggerated. Luckily, the game provides unmatched experience of murdering demons. In this competition, Slayer offers an eternal guarantee of quality.

The review is based on the PC version.

Hell on Earth, a sequel to the original Doom released in 1994, was often referred to as an additional mission pack, but both games were so sensational that no one considered it a drawback. The latest Doom Eternal draws a lot of inspiration from that game, and it's obviously very similar to the 2016 reboot, but calling it "just a set of new levels" would be a bit of an understatement. Doom Eternal improves all the mechanics of the previous game, adding several new features, as well as significantly expanding the Doom lore.

I even got the impression that there were too many new elements, and they didn't all fit the simple and proven formula of Doom. This particularly includes the slightly over-complicated plot and unmemorable storyline, some garden-variety sword-and-magic-fantasy locations, and a few platform sequences that required some serious agility. But I write this as a Doom veteran, whose taste was formed in the 90s., precisely on this franchise – a shotgun and a horde of wild demons was completely enough for me.

Fortunately, the very quintessence of Doom – massacring the hellish abominations – gives you a sense of nostalgia, and it's polished like never before. The authors managed to achieve remarkable harmony between dynamic action, spectacular, and somewhat comic, cruelty and the need to use all Doom Slayer's gadgets. This feels like a perfect symbiosis of continuous movement, shooting and hitting at point-blank, and the principles of extremely smooth combat are understood in an instant. Doom Eternal is a festival of slaying hellish monsters!

Blood chess

Developers from id Software compare the battle in their game to speed chess. They improved the mechanics that combine killing demons with acquiring specific resources: health, armor, and bullets. A chainsaw, available from the very beginning of the game, turns monsters into ammo, a flamethrower into armor, and spectacular glory kills complement health. Some of these solutions were already implemented in the previous part, but now they're much more relevant. All these actions form a continuous chain of interdependencies, and in order to survive, you have to take advantage of that.

This is a fantastic, high risk, high reward system, where acting with immediacy is tantamount to survival. Dynamic movement through the arenas is now more dynamic with trampolines and rails mounted on the walls. In practice, only the former can provide a real edge, as they require less precision and keys presses to be used. Another great addition is the hook that you can fire from the shotgun – it pierces through enemies, instantly pulling you towards them for even more damage. This way, you can combine escaping from a hot pit with restoring health points. The dash, replacing the unnecessary crouching from the previous part, is equally handy. As soon as we realize that all these elements seamlessly merge with each other, we can start going with the flow of this game, which isn't seriously disturbed even if we die.

The daemon’s in the details

This kind of minor, but very useful changes and improvements concern numerous other aspects. The ineffective pistol is no more, the two special grenades were replaced with an ice bomb, runes with perks are now available as regular collectables (i.e. without an additional arena), and all weapon mods were reconsidered. The glory kill animations are also much better. They seem more accurate, also with more humor, so they don't become boring quickly.

The authors also took care of the correct sense of power of each weapon, which means that watching the demons disintegrate is what takes most of the time in the game. Flesh is chopped off them, as are different kinds of chips – Mancubus and Ravant (two bosses; the former is super heavy, the latter is able to fly) both carry deadly turrets, which can be torn off their bodies. Combined with the excellent, synth-metal soundtrack, these elements form such a great combination of shooter, arcade, and gore, that immediately after the story ended, I started going back to random levels and playing them out again. This deadly, high-octane carnage is simply addictive!

Well... hop, and respawn

The platform sequences are easily the weakest link, and for some, perhaps the most serious blemish of Doom Eternal. In addition to the standard climbing wall, we can use a double jump and a double "dash" that sometimes needs to be boosted by catching the right "pill" mid-air to extend the flight or get into a special ring. The disappearing platforms and walls are a bigger challenge, and be a nuisance. Interestingly, reaching the hidden secrets in most cases is not too difficult. It's reaching the subsequent arenas with demons waiting for us that's the real hassle.

My past experience includes the Vault of Glass raid from Destiny – and I was prepared for the most hardcore jumping sequences imaginable in FPS, but Doom Eternal gave me two moments within the main path that really had me gnash my teeth. I understand the devs wanted to give us some diversion from the exhausting arena fights, but the thing is that jumping in first-person isn't as fun as in the third, and the sort of whizzing and bouncing around arenas that id Software are known for (vide Quake III Arena) just doesn't go well with Doom Slayer.

Slayer: an unusual journey…

With the atmosphere of this Doom also seems at odds with the storyline, continuing the reboot's story. Borrowed from the classic Doom II: Hell on Earth, the theme of the invasion of the legions of hell to Earth is just an introduction to the plot going back centuries, and the vast mythology of the entire Universe. We will learn out who is behind the invasion of hell, what its purpose is, as well as get to know a few events from the distant past of Doom Slayer. I always found the mute, mysterious protagonist, as well as the general ambivalence of the world, to be the better solution for the game, and so I kinda felt like we're learning a little too much, that Doom Slayer's world becomes too crowded.

You can generally skip most of the storyline by not reading the documents you find, but it's usually hard to resist, and you'll be constantly reminded about it with the cut-scenes full of new and old characters, also showing Slayer in full glory, but mute like a stone. All in all, I'd rather stick to the failed experiment on Mars scenario, and forget the entire story of Eternal.

...that is, to hell and back

New, more diverse locations are also closely related to the story. Some of them resemble fortresses from fantasy RPGs and mostly do the trick. I even had a few flashbacks from Quake, and the abandoning the brownish colors in favor of a much brighter palette was an excellent decision. However, one map in particular – the city of Urdak – did not fit the atmosphere of Doom at all. The decor, which looked like neither sci-fi nor fantasy, caused similar dissonance as RDR 2's chapter five, but at least the boss fight was pretty cool. Fortunately, we will spend a lot of time in the ruins of the earth's metropolis, a modern version of the old map of the Lost City, and in the hell.

Both locations are meticulously designed, with some great artistic ideas, at the same time constantly providing exploration, secrets, optional challenges, etc. The hellish city of Nekravol, especially the place where souls are squeeze out of people, is a league above anything else. Grim bloodbaths with hundreds of twitching bodies is really something, also diverting your attention away from the fact that some of the textures are pretty lame.

Generally, the graphics aren't jaw-dropping. The majority of the urban areas look rather bland; the usual set of burning cars, insides of shopping malls and offices is pretty monotonous, with ubiquitous copy-pasting. Most of the efforts of the designers seem to have been focused on the demons, and animations of combat – locations must have been far down the list. Perhaps it was a compromise to keep the animation stable and smooth, and if so, it really worked, because on my not-so-new PC, the game never dropped below 60 frames, in a combination of high and ultra detail. With such dynamic gameplay, stuttering animation would be unacceptable.

Multislayer – changes in MP

Doom revival is true in the campaign, but the rage for Doom death matches isn't a likely scenario. The last time, id Software didn't give us a compelling multi-player experience, so they decided to change approach. Doom Eternal features an asymmetrical multiplayer for three people: Slayer, and two demons. This is, on the one hand, a more interesting solution, but at the same time a little less accessible for beginners or casuals. The devs don't hide that it's hard to master. This requires perfect mastery of all Slayer's abilities and weapons, while on the demon side, you not only need to learn how to fight with much slower characters; what matters most here is cooperation.

All in all, this means that the multiplayer is not a relaxing diversion you can launch every now and then and leave. The fast pace requires complete commitment and considerable skill, and in the case of random team mates, also a desire to communicate. The authors provided weaker demons with a variety of alternative actions, such as blocking Slayer's ability to collect resources, or summoning stronger opponents, and this works best with coordinated teams. If you run into an unwanted player, games can be more frustrating than fun.

However, you must admit that the dose of emotion here is incomparably greater than in the standard TDM, especially when Slayer has only a few seconds to kill the second demon (if he doesn't, they both come back to life) and win the round. And thanks to the concentration of all the action at one point and in space for a few dozen seconds, similar thrills are also available to those watching the matches, not just the players. This is better MP than the previous part, but hardly for everyone.

Hail to the king, baby!

This may sound strange, but I'm not a huge fan of the 2016 reboot. I liked the gunplay... and that's basically it. A great shooter, but I didn't feel too much like a Doom. With Doom Eternal, it was completely different. From the first minutes with the game, I was completely sold on the idea, and when I entered the ruined Lost City, I knew that the good old Doom was back! The appearance of demons, the atmosphere of some levels or the excellent "flow" of the fights is absolutely irresistible.

I do not mind that Doom Eternal has swollen a bit, especially in the story department – I don't like it, but I understand the entire formula needed reinvention, and just getting improved combat and new maps wouldn't suffice. After completing Doom Eternal, returning to the previous game will be hard; but I'm sure I'll come back to some of this game's arenas. It's a bit like switching from a hard drive to an SDD. You can really feel the difference.