Why people are saying doom 2016 was more fun

[gameboy7707]

This was going to be a retrospective on doom eternal as a whole, but after seeing how much there is to go into about the combat systems of doom 2016 vs doom eternal and why more people seem to prefer doom 2016 over doom eternal, I thought I'd trim it down to just this topic as it is long enough on it's own.

A lot of people seem to enjoy doom 2016 more than they do doom eternal. I've heard this opinion from everyone I have met in person, but none of them seem to be able to point out exactly why. I agree with them in that I also find doom 2016 just a more fun experience overall, but have also struggled in determining exactly why.

After playing doom 2016 and doom eternal, both across multiple platforms over the last 3 years, and contemplating and comparing both, I believe that I have finally found an understanding as to why more people tend to enjoy doom 2016 more, and why I agree with them.

Don't get me wrong, doom eternal is a great game with a lot of impressing moving parts, but sometimes a package is less than the sum of it's parts as I am going to attempt to explain.

If you like eternal more than 2016, that's perfectly fine. It's good to be passionate about stuff you like, this is just a break down of a different perspective.

Doom 2016 gave players an ever expanding tool kit full of various ways to handle any situation. Each gun had it's ups and downs that made it viable save for only the pistol, which becomes admittedly obsolete early on. But every gun felt fun and exciting to pull out and use. It was like being the star of an action movie where you get to pick out how the scene played out! Not only that, but the use of glory kills for health and chainsaws for ammo just made sure the action never came to a halt as you were constantly not only required to push on to progress, but were actively rewarded with more resources for doing so.

Then came Doom Eternal. What was different here? Well you have more movement options, more methods of gathering resources, which were also more reliable as you had better movement to reach glory kills and a recharging chainsaw that would ensure a consistent supply of ammunition. Enemies are now more diverse as weakpoints become center focus for hindering your enemies abilities, but the biggest change by far is the focus on varied gameplay, especially using the weapon combo system.

Very basically broken down, the weapon combo system is an implementation of quick switching between weapons in order to prematurely cancel the recovery of a specific weapon by switching to a another one instead. By switching from a shotgun to a rocket launcher after firing, you can skip the pump between shots, giving the player better means of dealing more damage in a smaller time frame. This mechanic was lightly touched on in doom 2016, but became much more of a focus in eternal.

On paper, this is a perfect evolution of the combat from doom 2016. More means of self sustainability, more efficient methods of dealing with enemies, and potentially limitless possibilities of player expression by allowing players to use the quick switch mechanic to chain any possible variation of weapons together.

This "combat cycle" of harvesting resources via glory, flame belch, and chainsaw kills and utilizing the resources to survive long enough to collect more to maintain a constant pace in combat is very well woven into itself and plays onto itself very well. This system is tight... perhaps a bit too tight.

In attempt to have every mechanic work with each other well, player expression is ultimately limited by the very system built to expand upon it, and as a result, players no longer fell like they're in control of the situation they're in but are rather just picking
pre-ordained solutions to problems the game gives the player. At no point does the player have true freedom to play however they want, and are instead expected to perfectly sync up to the previously mentioned "combat cycle". The player no longer feels like an action hero in their own movie, and feels more like the recipient of endless pop quizzes over game knowledge where an incorrect answer will have them punished and in many cases, killed.

But how can this be? Doesn't the weapon switch mechanic give the player endless self expression as previously stated?

Well, yes, but, actually no.

You "can" chain a combat shotgun into a super shotgun and back again and vice versa, but doing so will very quickly empty the player's supply of shotgun ammunition, which is disappointingly less available in this game than it was in Doom 2016. without this ammo, the player will be left without the use of 2 weapons out of 8. An entire quarter of the weapon wheel, gone because the player wanted to use the shotguns more often than the small ammo pool would allow.

This becomes a problem whenever there are any weapons that go "unused" for too long. As the player uses more of the different types of ammo, their tools become more and more limited, which forces them to use weapons they are either unfamiliar with, uncomfortable with, or may simply not enjoy using.

This is a problem that very rarely occurred in Doom 2016, as the larger ammo pool meant the player was free to use as many or as few weapons as they want. They decided what their arsenal was and could use the leniency of ammo availability to experiment with different play styles and various tactics to situations. Every combat encounter was a playground to try out the cool toys, instead of a math problem on using the correct ones the correct amount of times.

It is here that the player is left with a "choice". Either collect more resources now and waste currently stored chainsaw fuel (if you have it by now that is), or force yourself to use the weapons that you legitimately do not want to. I intentionally put the word "choice" in quotation marks because unless the player gets lucky and the combat encounter ends soon, or they will be forced to use the weapons they won't want to anyway, or be slain in which they would need to restart from the nearest checkpoint, which is never fun.

Weapon utility is also a big factor here. Ballista and rockets are great fast damage dealers, but use em too much and you can kiss your dedicated weakpoint busters goodbye, which'll leave you screwed if you happen upon revenants or mancubi. True, the heavy rifle scope and sticky bomb launcher can also be effective weak point destroyers, this also leaves you avoiding the other weapon mods in favor of these two, further restricting player expression. Regardless, it's safe to say that ammo management is very important due to the small ammo pool.

But why would the player have such a small ammo pool? Again, I feel like this was a choice that was intended to encourage player variation in weapon usage, however, the intention comes off more as a stringent requirement that makes the game less accessible and less enjoyable to those hindered by these restrictions.

Sprinkle in a dash of weapon swap execution difficulty for anyone not using mouse and keyboard, which becomes especially hindering when facing enemies that require good weapon swap capability to reliably deal with such as the marauder, and you have a cascade of mounting factors that lead to a gradual depreciation of the game and it's mechanics for anyone who is not entirely devoted to mastering every aspect of this game.

I don't think this game has any specific issue that is holding it back, but rather has a multitude of small hairline fractures in it's foundation that, while not enough to destabilize it, is enough to get people to wanna step off of it and onto more stable ground.

For what it's worth, I really, really, really wanna enjoy this game and I keep finding myself coming back to it to give it another chance, but it can never seem make me smile like doom 2016 did.

Hope this opens a bit of perspective, thanks for reading this far, if you did, and have a wonderful day.

[Sar]

I didn’t have the energy to read your entire post, but your entire premise is wrong. Quick switching isn’t a new mechanic introduced in Doom Eternal, it exists in Doom 2016 as well, both mindlessly swapping between your SSG and Gauss for increased DPS, and some advanced versions:

https://youtu.be/7M-VyDVDx4Q

Now, the question is: “Why did no one bother with it in Doom 2016” and the answer is very simple: Doom 2016 is a very easy game past the first two levels. You don’t need to bother with any advanced techniques to demolish the game completely when you can just spam the SSG or kill everything with 1-2 Siege Mode shots with infinite ammo.

[Hundinger]

This whole text is based on the assumption that most people like 2016 more than Eternal. Where's the evidence for that? All your friends say so? Not convincing. This is a text about why YOU like 2016 more than Eternal. And that's okay.

[gameboy7707]

Originally posted by Hundinger:

This whole text is based on the assumption that most people like 2016 more than Eternal. Where's the evidence for that? All your friends say so? Not convincing. This is a text about why YOU like 2016 more than Eternal. And that's okay.

I've yet to meet anyone in person that likes eternal more. This out of a pool of about 30 or so people.

This is further evidenced when you consider the player count of 2016 vs eternal.

Despite being the newer title, 2016 and stayed almost neck and neck for it currently. And if you look at the player base when the game launched, it's clear that a vast majority of the player base of eternal dropped it pretty quickly.

Some might say this is evidence that an equal amount enjoy 2016 and eternal rather than more enjoying 2016, but I believe 2016's age combined with most people moving on to newer titles while simultaneously not playing eternal is evidence of the latter rather than the former.

[gameboy7707]

Originally posted by Sar:

I didn’t have the energy to read your entire post, but your entire premise is wrong. Quick switching isn’t a new mechanic introduced in Doom Eternal, it exists in Doom 2016 as well, both mindlessly swapping between your SSG and Gauss for increased DPS, and some advanced versions:

https://youtu.be/7M-VyDVDx4Q

Now, the question is: “Why did no one bother with it in Doom 2016” and the answer is very simple: Doom 2016 is a very easy game past the first two levels. You don’t need to bother with any advanced techniques to demolish the game completely when you can just spam the SSG or kill everything with 1-2 Siege Mode shots with infinite ammo.

If you read it, you read the part where I mentioned that quick switching existed in 2016. And I explained why no one bothered as well.

You can't judge a premise before you've even read it.

[Sar]

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

This is further evidenced when you consider the player count of 2016 vs eternal.

By this metric Eternal wins every time, and you have no data to suggest otherwise. Eternal wins in spite of having a much maligned MP, while people praise D2016 MP and yet 2016 has worse numbers at release day, 6 months after release day, 3 years after release day than DE.

[Ace]

https://steamcharts.com/app/782330 - Doom eternal

https://steamcharts.com/app/379720 - 2016

[gameboy7707]

Originally posted by Sar:

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

This is further evidenced when you consider the player count of 2016 vs eternal.

By this metric Eternal wins every time, and you have no data to suggest otherwise. Eternal wins in spite of having a much maligned MP, while people praise D2016 MP and yet 2016 has worse numbers at release day, 6 months after release day, 3 years after release day than DE.

That's a statistical error.

Just reading the numbers for what they are is not going to get you accurate results. It's important to interpret why they are what they are.

Doom 2016 had less initial player base because it had to earn player's interest and respect. It was a game from a franchise that had it's most recent title release 12 years prior and was the weakest in terms of popularity since then. It took a while for it to reach the higher numbers, but it got there IN SPITE of that.

Doom eternal had an easy start because it was riding on Doom 2016's back. Everyone was praising the game and loving it, so of course a game that garnered so much positive attention would have it's sequel sell well. That's not indicative of the game itself. How could it be? The game hadn't come out yet. When it did, the player base dropped DESPITE it's initial release. It clearly wasn't living up to expectations.

It's like having a 12 year old race an Olympic athlete. Of course the Olympic athlete will win because you expect an experienced racer to. But if he only only won that race by a margin of seconds, then that would raise some eyebrows about their performance vs the child.

[Hundinger]

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

Originally posted by Hundinger:

This whole text is based on the assumption that most people like 2016 more than Eternal. Where's the evidence for that? All your friends say so? Not convincing. This is a text about why YOU like 2016 more than Eternal. And that's okay.

I've yet to meet anyone in person that likes eternal more. This out of a pool of about 30 or so people.

Still anecdotal evidence. I can ask people in my bubble about anything and the results would rarely match with the overall average.

[gameboy7707]

Originally posted by Hundinger:

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

I've yet to meet anyone in person that likes eternal more. This out of a pool of about 30 or so people.

Still anecdotal evidence. I can ask people in my bubble about anything and the results would rarely match with the overall average.

Fair enough. But it was the catalyst for why I started looking into this in the first place, which has lead me to what I've found so far.

[Hundinger]

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

Originally posted by Hundinger:

Still anecdotal evidence. I can ask people in my bubble about anything and the results would rarely match with the overall average.

Fair enough. But it was the catalyst for why I started looking into this in the first place, which has lead me to what I've found so far.

It's totally okay to share your thoughts on why 2016 resonates more with you than Eternal. All I'm saying... you know by now. Maybe I'll try to give my own reasons on liking Eternal more later, when I have time. There's nothing wrong with a controversial but respectful discussion. Let's just hope certain people don't show up and ruin it.

[Sar]

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

Originally posted by Sar:

By this metric Eternal wins every time, and you have no data to suggest otherwise. Eternal wins in spite of having a much maligned MP, while people praise D2016 MP and yet 2016 has worse numbers at release day, 6 months after release day, 3 years after release day than DE.

That's a statistical error.

Just reading the numbers for what they are is not going to get you accurate results. It's important to interpret why they are what they are.

Doom 2016 had less initial player base because it had to earn player's interest and respect. It was a game from a franchise that had it's most recent title release 12 years prior and was the weakest in terms of popularity since then. It took a while for it to reach the higher numbers, but it got there IN SPITE of that.

Doom eternal had an easy start because it was riding on Doom 2016's back. Everyone was praising the game and loving it, so of course a game that garnered so much positive attention would have it's sequel sell well. That's not indicative of the game itself. How could it be? The game hadn't come out yet. When it did, the player base dropped DESPITE it's initial release. It clearly wasn't living up to expectations.

It's like having a 12 year old race an Olympic athlete. Of course the Olympic athlete will win because you expect an experienced racer to. But if he only only won that race by a margin of seconds, then that would raise some eyebrows about their performance vs the child.

Ok, let’s look at both games’ numbers a year after they released, when the hype died down and 2016 was accepted to be a masterpiece and DE to be a miserable failure:

D2016 in the May of 2017: 1800+ players.

DE in the March of 2021: 3600+ players.

But maybe today the data is different… nope, almost 3 times as much people play DE even though Battlemode supposedly sucks and D2016 Deathmatch is supposedly fun.

[Hundinger]

Originally posted by Sar:

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

That's a statistical error.

Just reading the numbers for what they are is not going to get you accurate results. It's important to interpret why they are what they are.

Doom 2016 had less initial player base because it had to earn player's interest and respect. It was a game from a franchise that had it's most recent title release 12 years prior and was the weakest in terms of popularity since then. It took a while for it to reach the higher numbers, but it got there IN SPITE of that.

Doom eternal had an easy start because it was riding on Doom 2016's back. Everyone was praising the game and loving it, so of course a game that garnered so much positive attention would have it's sequel sell well. That's not indicative of the game itself. How could it be? The game hadn't come out yet. When it did, the player base dropped DESPITE it's initial release. It clearly wasn't living up to expectations.

It's like having a 12 year old race an Olympic athlete. Of course the Olympic athlete will win because you expect an experienced racer to. But if he only only won that race by a margin of seconds, then that would raise some eyebrows about their performance vs the child.

Ok, let’s look at both games’ numbers a year after they released, when the hype died down and 2016 was accepted to be a masterpiece and DE to be a miserable failure:

D2016 in the May of 2017: 1800+ players.

DE in the March of 2021: 3600+ players.

But maybe today the data is different… nope, almost 3 times as much people play DE even though Battlemode supposedly sucks and D2016 Deathmatch is supposedly fun.

OP should definitely stay away from trying to prove anything statistically and stick with discussing their personal opinion.

[gameboy7707]

Originally posted by Sar:

Originally posted by gameboy7707:

That's a statistical error.

Just reading the numbers for what they are is not going to get you accurate results. It's important to interpret why they are what they are.

Doom 2016 had less initial player base because it had to earn player's interest and respect. It was a game from a franchise that had it's most recent title release 12 years prior and was the weakest in terms of popularity since then. It took a while for it to reach the higher numbers, but it got there IN SPITE of that.

Doom eternal had an easy start because it was riding on Doom 2016's back. Everyone was praising the game and loving it, so of course a game that garnered so much positive attention would have it's sequel sell well. That's not indicative of the game itself. How could it be? The game hadn't come out yet. When it did, the player base dropped DESPITE it's initial release. It clearly wasn't living up to expectations.

It's like having a 12 year old race an Olympic athlete. Of course the Olympic athlete will win because you expect an experienced racer to. But if he only only won that race by a margin of seconds, then that would raise some eyebrows about their performance vs the child.

Ok, let’s look at both games’ numbers a year after they released, when the hype died down and 2016 was accepted to be a masterpiece and DE to be a miserable failure:

D2016 in the May of 2017: 1800+ players.

DE in the March of 2021: 3600+ players.

But maybe today the data is different… nope, almost 3 times as much people play DE even though Battlemode supposedly sucks and D2016 Deathmatch is supposedly fun.

I never said eternal was a failure. Just that it wasn't what people were expecting. I also think a big reason why eternal still has more over 2016 has less to do with the vanilla game and more to do with the modding community which has revamped the battle mode completely, even adding a new playable demon, added a functional co op mode, and even a functional invasion mode, which Id didn't get implemented for some reason.

[gameboy7707]

Maybe I did misinterpret some of the player base stats, but my initial post, as well as the reasonings behind it were more of a stance of the casual player base, which do tend to make up a larger portion of customers of a game, even if they don't play that consistently or that long.

I noticed that the player base of eternal seemed to be very stable after the initial drop off of players, which seems to imply a base of hardcore dedicated fans remaining after the casuals had left.

The number of 2016 players, while lower, are still not too far off from eternal.

Maybe we'll never understand why this title is so polarizing. At least we can still share our two cents and have a reasonable discussions about it every once in a while.

[Bob]

I wish games like Dark Souls or S.T.A.L.K.E.R. had way easier first games that did not expect anything from the players so the next titles would've been criticized for being demanding and restrictive because you have to try.

DOOM 2016 is a blessing and this game needs story mode...