This game feels like a very poorly thought out mess

[DarkCobalt]

I loved the original, and of course this one seemed to be getting glowing reviews, so I decided to give it a shot. So far, it's a huge mess.

Firstly, the level design. Why did there need to be platforming? The levels feel very pointless since the platforming is largely linear, and the "secrets" have thus far been "turn left and you'll find a secret!" or "Jump-dash and you'll find a secret!" The old one felt like legitimate secrets, weird scaffolding you could climb up to and suddenly run across the level to a corner you didn't know existed, etc. On top of all of this, in general the levels are very arcade-y, which isn't usually bad for this type of game but it seems overly nonsensical. The previous one's keycard system felt natural, you need keycards for the humans to get around. Here, there's big floating green buttons that I need to shoot, why are they there? Where did they come from? What's with the monkeybars everywhere? How come I can't climb other rocky surfaces, but have to rely on this strange foam-like material? None of it feels natural or well-placed. All of a sudden I'm playing 3D Mario.

Secondly, the combat. It's generally fine, except there's too much fluff. It doesn't help that all of the enemy encounters have a rock-paper-scissors nature. Constantly switching grenade types, firing modes, weapons, etc. It's a huge spamfest and is incredibly messy, not at all like the clean Quake-like combat of the first game. And I never thought I'd say this, but I dislike the chainsaw mechanic in this one. The ammo pool is so small it becomes a persistent necessity to use the chainsaw. One moment you're spamming weapon swaps, the next you realize you're out of ammo and suddenly need to grind the nearest trash mob to a pulp just for a handful of shots. Rinse and repeat every 20 seconds. I don't know, personally it's just not clicking, there's no zen-like flow to the whole ordeal like the first one had.

Lastly, the load of extra crap. I'm just not a fan of all of these new features. Armor perks that seem to be so niche to the point of not existing? Perks? Weapon points? Ship upgrades? A BATTLE PASS??? What is this, Destiny 2? There's so much that didn't need to be here. I have no idea if any of these armor effects or weapon upgrades will feel impactful, again it's all fluff to me at this point.

I'm getting the sinking feeling they tried to do too much to "innovate". They seem to just be borrowing ideas from other games, and slamming them one-by-one into DOOM without much thought or care. I'll keep playing it, since there is some amount of fun to be had, but man it's just doesn't have the same raw energy as the first one did.

[UNBREAKABLE]

DarkCobalt a écrit :

Grampire a écrit :

The "original" being 2016? Sure, if you expected this to be more of that then disappointment is almost guaranteed.

This is the part that got me. I recently watched The Act Man's video on what makes a videogame sequel satisfying, and I'm realizing this game ticks the wrong boxes.

The Act Man also made a video on Eternal and he actually liked it and called it an improvement from 2016 in just about every way, which it generally is.

Anyway, there are reasons for everything, it’s not like they threw everything in without knowing what they’re doing and made a mess. Hugo is pretty open about their design choices in Eternal, he's been explaining their choices since before the game even came out. Good watch if you have time, but the most important part probably starts at 13 minutes where Hugo talks about the feedback they got from 2016 and how the sought to address it in Eternal.
https://youtu.be/qBHIalb01ew

You have to bear in mind that earlier in that interview he also talks about how when they put the pieces of Eternal together (meathook, dash, new abilities etc), the game wasn't fun. The player was too strong, nothing could keep up with them, no one at the studio wanted to play the game at first. That quakecon footage that first revealed the game was also basically a lie as a result so they could make the footage look cool, it was only after that point they started to work on the game we all know today. So, if the game was to be more like 2016, it wouldn't really have worked anyway, it would have been seen as the same thing as before and not very fun or innovative. That's not what you want as a dev, at least a quality one that isn't pumping the same stuff out every year.

[arsenicBumpnip]

Apologies in advance that I, too, will be dumping a wall of text cuz I'm bad at getting my ideas across concisely.

Sierra-117 a écrit :

I don't think the argument about games letting all the players play however they want is very valid.

If you don't play to a games rules, I don't think you have a right to complain about the game limiting creativity or dampening your fun.

I can understand that this style of gameplay isn't really for everyone, I get that. But that doesn't make it bad. Just because you can't whip out a super shotgun and destroy everything in your path with it and just it alone, doesn't make it bad game design.

I propose for a moment that we take a look at say, Overwatch.

The game makes it apparent that certain heroes are used to counter certain heroes.

For example, if Pharah is flying over your team, raining rockets upon you and you keep dying, what you're supposed to do, is pick a character that can counter her.

If you don't do this, and you get destroyed and utterly countered by Pharah, yet refusing to do anything about it, it's not the games fault. I admit, Overwatch is not perfect, and there are some op heroes and ♥♥♥♥ (Idk, haven't touched the game in like 3 years)

I think people's biggest mistake, was entering this game thinking it would be like 2016, despite all of the promos and news about the game saying the opposite.

Again, I don't blame people for not liking this style of gameplay, but that doesn't make it bad.

I agree with you here to a degree, but I still have some contentions in that regard, that boil down to Doom Eternal being part of a series, rather than a purely standalone game like Overwatch.

That is to say, once a game series has established its overall formula, it's generally expected that, regardless of what new stuff you try out with each succeeding title, the formula is still recognizable and familiar underneath. You can see this with stuff like the 3D Mario games or the Hyrule Warriors spinoffs of the Zelda games. Super Mario 64, Sunshine, and Galaxy all try out some -radically- different things, yet each game still feels like a direct sequel with gameplay that you can pretty much instantly recognize if you've played another game in the series. Hyrule Warriors likewise diverges a great deal from the main series Dynasty Warriors formula, yet is still totally recognizable as ultimately being a DW game in spite of those differences.

Meanwhile, Doom Eternal strays so far from classic "Boomer Shooter" design conventions that it basically isn't even in the same genre as the entire rest of the series anymore (discounting the very broad genre of "FPS", of course). It feels more like taking the design conventions of multiplayer-only Arena Shooters like Quake 3 or Unreal Tournament, and giving them a properly fleshed-out campaign instead of the generic "just play bot matches with cutscenes in-between" setup the genre normally gravitates towards.

Mind you I'm not saying that's a -bad- thing, but it's definitely jarring when you take an established IP and turn it so utterly on its head that the gameplay is scarcely comparable to the previous games. Simply put, if they wanted to give us a campaign with this gameplay, it'd have been better to make it as a single-player tie-in game to Quake Champions, where the gameplay would've actually been a match for the IP, or just make a new IP entirely to introduce their new gameplay style, instead of taking an IP whose fans are expecting a particular style of game and tell them "hey sorry but this one's -completely- different" and just expect everyone to be totally fine with that.

That's what I'm getting at with the whole "devs shouldn't try to force players to play a game a particular way" thing. Like, it's fine when they're doing that for a new IP that's creating its own style like Overwatch did, and in turn pushing you to play in that new style. Likewise, someone who loves Boomer Shooters would be foolish to jump over the Gears of War to complain about the cover-shooting and regenerating health just because they want to try playing it the same way they would Doom 1/2/2016.

In that regard, the big difference with 2016/Eternal's case is that the devs made a game that fit the Boomer Shooter mold while still doing something new with 2016, then seemingly got upset when fans of the genre played it like they would any other Boomer Shooter. Instead of then doing the more sensible thing and going "well, we don't really wanna make Boomer Shooters, so let's make our next game a singleplayer take on Quake Champions/A Brand New IP instead!", they went "alright, so because we don't like Boomer Shooters, we're gonna make the next Doom a -totally different genre-!", and alienated a large portion of their fanbase in doing so.

The stuff about the Marauder and weapon uses was here and I cut it for brevity's sake

One thing I do wanna point out is that, at least to me, weapon mods basically amount to each being different weapons, so from my perspective it comes across as less "I can use the Plasma Rifle to stun lock enemies, heat blast big groups of fodder, or detonate shields" and more "I can use the Microwave Ray to stun lock enemies", "I can use the Heat Vent to blast groups of fodder", and "I can use the Plasma Rifle to detonate shields". I feel like as far as that point goes we can probably just chalk it up as a different in how we each quantify that sort of thing.

Yeah, the Marauder is indeed pretty easy, but in that same regard he's pretty tedious to fight. In the entire campaign + first level of the DLC I can't even remember him ever being spawned alongside anything other than fodder besides the one time you fight two at once? And I think that's ultimately my problem with him: rather than find interesting ways to involve him in bigger fights, the devs only ever used him as a very lackluster "finale" for some areas that you fight in a completely formulaic way every time.

In that regard, I don't actually think that my lack of enjoyment of Eternal's gameplay loop is what makes it "bad" (or at least, imo, worse than all the other Doom games). Like you said, just because the loop isn't my style doesn't mean it's bad. I certainly have my contentions with it, but those are ultimately far smaller gripes than what really knocked the game down a few rungs for me: The encounter and enemy design.

AND IN THAT REGARD THERE'S A TL;DR AT THE BOTTOM BECAUSE WHOOWHEE THIS TURNED INTO A RANT, DIDN'T IT?

Boomer Shooters historically use an approach to enemy design where each different foe fits a particular niche. Doom 2 is a great example of this: Archviles are designed to restrict what rooms you can safely enter while also taking target priority due to how they revive lesser foes, Arachnotrons keep up constant pressure to force you into constant movement, Mancubi fire in a staggered pattern where you'll run into the off-angled blast if you overstep your dodge, Zombies force you to have quicker reflexes than you'd normally need to avoid taking hitscan attacks, Cacos act as long-range, erratically-positioned extra pressue, Revenants require you to pay extra attention to the map geometry to ensure their missiles get caught on something, etc.

By comparison, Doom Eternal has way more enemies than Doom 2, but so many of them fill -exactly- the same roles as one another. Realistically, what's the meaningful difference in gameplay approach between the Hell Knight, the Hell Knight With Swords™, and the Whiplash? Why are Cacos & Pains, the only two enemies that could be spawned out over open air where they could act as long-distance artillery, only ever used for that purpose during the piddly outside-of-an-arena combat moments, then when you actually enter arenas they're just spawned deadass in the middle of the room where they promptly just start biting/punching at you? Realistically, what's the difference in behaviours between Imps and Gargoyles, or Soldiers and Super Zombies?

Enemies like Revs and Hunters were supposed to have threatening homing missiles, but they just end up being a non-factor because a single dash (and you're -constantly- dashing) causes them to miss. Lost Souls basically aren't an enemy outside of a couple of Secret Challenges, because Pains are they only way they spawn, and they orbit around the Pain before being fired as a one-off missile instead of actually acting independently. Why, for the love of god, is every ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ enemy spawned around the middle of the room? Serious Sam 4 is out here spawning the enemies that fire homing shots up in castle battlements, spawning the flying guys in the distance so that they pepper you with shots from afar while you fight other enemies, slowly closing in to slam you with dive bomb attacks if you didn't strategize a means of dividing your attention between the near and far opponents, having charging enemies that actually -stay a threat- instead of taking extended breaks where they're so completely vulnerable it's laughable, and etc and so on. Meanwhile, nearly every Doom Eternal fight is the exact same, monotonous "enter 2-floor square/circular room. 10 fodders, 2 heavies, and possibly 1 superheavy spawn. When one of the heavies dies, spawn another heavy until quota is reached. Spawn fodder indefinitely because we wanted to remove ourselves from Boomer Shooter resource management as far as physically possible with our incredibly forced chainsaw mechanic".

The Slayer Gates were seemingly the -only- areas in the entire game where the devs put actual thought into wave order, spawn location, and etc. Meanwhile, all of the main level stuff felt completely cookie cutter, due in combination to the incredibly lazy spawn locations, and the samey enemies resulting in encounters that have completely different types spawning still feel like nigh-identical fights.

I learned with time & with getting full access to my arsenal that the gameplay loop has merit even though I personally don't like it and don't think it belongs in a Doom title, and was getting some solid enjoyment out of it around the late midgame, but by the endgame everything was so repetitive that it wasn't even -challenging- anymore (played on UV, as a note). I played the two Master Levels I have access to right on the heels of beating the Icon of Sin (not in the mood to drop $5 for the third) and they were downright -boring- with how formulaic the fights had grown. It was just dodge dodge dodge, fire some rockets at the big guy or a freeze/chaingun combo at the bigger guy, chainsaw an imp or two, repeat until arena over, and not even the DLC has managed to assuage that feeling of just doing the same thing repeatedly thus far.

TL;DR: it's not the combat loop that has Eternal sitting at the bottom of my theoretical "Doom Tier List". That just has it on my "Should've been another IP so as to not alienate fans expecting a proper Doom-style sequel" list. It's the sheer laziness of the enemy and arena design. Samey arenas filled with samey enemies that are spawned in samey locations simply lacks the variation of challenge provided by classic Boomer Shooter map & enemy design. Rather than put me in a massive variety of combat situations to repeatedly change things up and throw me off for additional challenge, Doom Eternal basically just goes "hey, how good at this one thing are you yet? are you better at it now? how about now? how about now? how about now? how about now?", and no matter how much I scream at my monitor "YES DOOM ETERNAL, I'M ACTUALLY PRETTY GOOD AT THIS NOW, DO YOU THINK WE COULD CHANGE IT UP A BIT SO THAT I'M ACTUALLY BEING CHALLENGED AGAIN?" it just keeps going "how about now? how about now? how about now?" like a broken record.

So anyways thanks for coming to my Ted Talk/Informally-Formatted Doom Eternal review. I give the game a flat 7. And before anyone tries to argue that that's a high score given my opinions on it, I'll note that I score on a standardized-test-esque grading scale. E.g., 7/10 is a C-, Slightly Below Average, where pretty much the entire rest of the Doom series is sitting comfy at 9 or 10/10s, which are some degree of Very Above Average or Practically No Issues, respectively.

So yeah, sorry that I'm just dumping a massive wall of text on you, I had dental work done today and the meds they used have me too loopy to actually play games right now, so I decided to burn time writing this essay instead. I hope, even if we remain in disagreement, that it was at the very least informative as to how some of us feel over here on the other side of the pond.

[DarkCobalt]

arsenicBumpnip a écrit :

Apologies in advance that I, too, will be dumping a wall of text cuz I'm bad at getting my ideas across concisely.

Nice read, it definitely illustrates many of the issues I had with the game in detail. I'm still playing the game, it's generally been "fine". It still feels incredibly tedious, and yeah now that you mention it, the arena-like levels are pretty mediocre largely due to the new dash mechanic. You can kite Hellknights around the arena, while the main threats are ironically the Cacodemons who stick to you a lot more easily and break the flow of combat by taking a couple seconds to become vulnerable after a grenade. Revenants are almost trivial, they're essentially a non-threat unless I'm really just not moving around. That's not to say the game isn't challenging, the combination of all of these at once makes some of the arenas really brutal, particularly with those shield spawning demons that block you off from a clean shot.

[FB_Destroyer_Rebecca]

DarkCobalt a écrit :

I loved the original, and of course this one seemed to be getting glowing reviews, so I decided to give it a shot. So far, it's a huge mess.

I know, it really is!
Some like the changes, some hate it. I am not a fan, nuDoom feels more like it was designed for a younger generation and console players.
This good review has been posted already a dozen of times here but since it nails it perfectly and sums up all the ups and down of nuDoom I want to post it here too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlgq6i0X6MA&t=2322s

it is a really in depth and detailed review so give it time.

[coolman552]

how do you guys write these without stopping and saying "damn maybe i should do something else"

[Grampire]

Doomguy a écrit :

DarkCobalt a écrit :

I loved the original, and of course this one seemed to be getting glowing reviews, so I decided to give it a shot. So far, it's a huge mess.

I know, it really is!
Some like the changes, some hate it. I am not a fan, nuDoom feels more like it was designed for a younger generation and console players.
This good review has been posted already a dozen of times here but since it nails it perfectly and sums up all the ups and down of nuDoom I want to post it here too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlgq6i0X6MA&t=2322s

it is a really in depth and detailed review so give it time.

That review is horrifying and actually wrong in many areas.

What's been said in this thread is a better representation of the game than that review is.

[VAL | Giogio]

Doomguy a écrit :

DarkCobalt a écrit :

I loved the original, and of course this one seemed to be getting glowing reviews, so I decided to give it a shot. So far, it's a huge mess.

I know, it really is!
Some like the changes, some hate it. I am not a fan, nuDoom feels more like it was designed for a younger generation and console players.
This good review has been posted already a dozen of times here but since it nails it perfectly and sums up all the ups and down of nuDoom I want to post it here too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlgq6i0X6MA&t=2322s

it is a really in depth and detailed review so give it time.

That video is honestly eh, the part about limiting player choice is kind of stupid imho. I mean, the classic run and gun feel is gone, but that opens up a lot of other things to explore with the weapon switching and stuff. Its like saying combos in SF2 were bad and we all should go back to SF1 were combos didnt exist. It is new, and really opens up a lot of new things to do. Weakpoints are there but really, once you get how to kill things fast you dont even use them as they should, they are there for you to hit them if you want to save ammo or priority kill the thing. How is that not players choice and freedom is beyond me. You can do so much ♥♥♥♥ here with all of the tools you have at your disposal that mastering it is were the real fun is. Again, i play fighting games and the mentality there is like that, you play to master game mechanics and stuff, it is a big part of it, so when i found an FPS with that same mentality i found my favorite FPS game of all time in doom eternal.

When i see videos like this i only think they are trying too hard to ♥♥♥♥ on something that wasnt catering or made for them. Most of these threads and doom eternal's negativity really come from people who played previous doom games and were expecting to be the snorefest that 2016 was.

[SoulXam]

.

[FB_Destroyer_Rebecca]

Grampire a écrit :

Doomguy a écrit :

I know, it really is!
Some like the changes, some hate it. I am not a fan, nuDoom feels more like it was designed for a younger generation and console players.
This good review has been posted already a dozen of times here but since it nails it perfectly and sums up all the ups and down of nuDoom I want to post it here too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlgq6i0X6MA&t=2322s

it is a really in depth and detailed review so give it time.

That review is horrifying and actually wrong in many areas.

What's been said in this thread is a better representation of the game than that review is.

What can I say, I think this review is one of the best, best-researched, most detailed and most brutally honest of all. It nails nearly every aspect and is not afraid of not being a naive review that speaks everything nicely.

[Jim Lahey]

Doomguy a écrit :

Grampire a écrit :

That review is horrifying and actually wrong in many areas.

What's been said in this thread is a better representation of the game than that review is.

What can I say, I think this review is one of the best, best-researched, most detailed and most brutally honest of all. It nails nearly every aspect and is not afraid of not being a naive review that speaks everything nicely.

And despite your claims the dislike bar is proving you wrong.

As well as the game's overwhelmingly positive reviews despite a massive review bomb.

So... We can choose to cherry pick one single review out of literal thousands upon thousands that simply justifies something or we can act like rational human beings and go on statistical numbers and facts.

[FB_Destroyer_Rebecca]

Jim Lahey a écrit :

Doomguy a écrit :

What can I say, I think this review is one of the best, best-researched, most detailed and most brutally honest of all. It nails nearly every aspect and is not afraid of not being a naive review that speaks everything nicely.

And despite your claims the dislike bar is proving you wrong.

As well as the game's overwhelmingly positive reviews despite a massive review bomb.

So... We can choose to cherry pick one single review out of literal thousands upon thousands that simply justifies something or we can act like rational human beings and go on statistical numbers and facts.

What can I say, I am not a sheep and I dont care what other's might like or dislike on youtube.
A young crowd is not known for having the best taste or the most objective opinion.
You can pick whatever you want. I still think its the best review.

[Jim Lahey]

Doomguy a écrit :

Jim Lahey a écrit :

And despite your claims the dislike bar is proving you wrong.

As well as the game's overwhelmingly positive reviews despite a massive review bomb.

So... We can choose to cherry pick one single review out of literal thousands upon thousands that simply justifies something or we can act like rational human beings and go on statistical numbers and facts.

What can I say, I am not a sheep and I dont care what other's might like or dislike on youtube.
A young crowd is not known for having the best taste or the most objective opinion.
You can pick whatever you want. I still think its the best review.

You assume that those reviewers are a young crowd despite them being of all ages from new and old doom players.

You are doing nothing but trying too hard to be a hipster who can't sit and enjoy something because it's too "main stream"

See? I can apply your extremely flawed logic to a sentence too. Maybe reading it being parroted to your self will enlighten you to just how stupid it comes off.

[FB_Destroyer_Rebecca]

Jim Lahey a écrit :

Doomguy a écrit :

What can I say, I am not a sheep and I dont care what other's might like or dislike on youtube.
A young crowd is not known for having the best taste or the most objective opinion.
You can pick whatever you want. I still think its the best review.

You assume that those reviewers are a young crowd despite them being of all ages from new and old doom players.

You are doing nothing but trying too hard to be a hipster who can't sit and enjoy something because it's too "main stream"

See? I can apply your extremely flawed logic to a sentence too. Maybe reading it being parroted to your self will enlighten you to just how stupid it comes off.

Nothing you say will change my mind that I like this review though. No matter how hard you try. ;)

[Jim Lahey]

Doomguy a écrit :

Jim Lahey a écrit :

You assume that those reviewers are a young crowd despite them being of all ages from new and old doom players.

You are doing nothing but trying too hard to be a hipster who can't sit and enjoy something because it's too "main stream"

See? I can apply your extremely flawed logic to a sentence too. Maybe reading it being parroted to your self will enlighten you to just how stupid it comes off.

Nothing you say will change my mind that I like this review though. No matter how hard you try. ;)

And again you contradict your self.

You say and I quote. "I am not a sheep and I don't care what others might like or dislike on Youtube"

Well, despite those words you sure care what that review says don't you.

If you are going to be a contrarian, the least you can do is be consistent.

[FB_Destroyer_Rebecca]

Jim Lahey a écrit :

Doomguy a écrit :

Nothing you say will change my mind that I like this review though. No matter how hard you try. ;)

And again you contradict your self.

You say and I quote. "I am not a sheep and I don't care what others might like or dislike on Youtube"

Well, despite those words you sure care what that review says don't you.

If you are going to be a contrarian, the least you can do is be consistent.

Nice strawman argument. Took you only half an hour to come up with that. Me liking a review does not equal to be a sheep. If anything, all the downvotes proof I am not one. So thanks for bringing it up before.
I am curious what other mental gymnastics you come up with just because you are sooo mad that I like something you dont.