Yeah, the explicit callback to Quake is interesting. It’s basically admitting that the Quake universe is not really distinctive from Doom’s in a meaningful way (OK so there’s some Cthulhu stuff instead of demon stuff, but it’s not exactly Bloodborne here), and a lot of people think back nostalgically on Doom and Quake as a unit, and Quad Damage seems like a perfectly appropriate powerup to put in a Doom game (fits right in with berserk and invincibility), so let’s just toss it in and not even change the name.
The game design of nu-Doom seems strangely wise in how it deals with questions like this – I’m increasingly wondering just who is the auteur today at id software making these decisions? Or is it a collective wisdom, is id staffed 100% by people who went to work there because they’re nostalgic for Doom and they all have a sixth sense on what’s appropriate and what’s not to include?
I finally had to take this back to redbox because it was clear I didn’t have the time I wanted to devote to it over three days unfortunately which is a Bummer Supremer but what ever I guess
I did enjoy what I experienced of the game, where I got to felt like the perfect point where the game was really committed to hitting me with the near-same wave of enemies every time
I mean say what u will about games that focus more on encounter design than level design, but doom could use a lot more of the first
This game is commiting a PC gaming cardinal sin for me right now. Just loading the title screen is telling me I don’t have the GPU RAM that it requests and the game doesn’t get far enough to initialize a config file so that I can edit it manually. It might not even have those. When did having taxing title screens become a thing?
Yeah, you get the title screen and music, then it goes into demos, with the credits screen in between demos IIRC, and it repeats once all the demos have played.
Quake is where they just omitted a title screen completely.
I played this from beginning to end this weekend (PS4, Hurt Me Plenty [normal] difficulty). Holds up very well, definitely exceeds expectations (which to be fair is a low bar, as I was convinced this was going to be trash before release). In my personal single-player FPS ranking (for gameplay-focused FPSes as opposed to adventury ones), I’d rate this as being slightly better than Destiny’s main campaign, but not as good as the best Halos (ODST and Reach). Like those, it’s consistently lively and highly mobile, and incentivizes you to stay aware of your surroundings and find the right tactics. (Comparing to Doom 2, it’s almost as mobile, but more thoughtful, less attritional, and with more “swings” and close calls, and with a lot more effective ranged options.)
I played on a relatively low difficulty level which allowed me to play rather loose and sloppy and probably not experience the full sharpness of the game design, so my opinion might still be revised upwards when I replay this on Ultraviolence (which I plan to do).
The criticism upthread about it devolving into almost pure closed arena battles with the same kinds of enemy mixes at the end are true, but it didn’t bother me that much because the arena designs themselves are varied. Imagine like 3 straight hours of Dead Simple with different configurations – I’m pretty sure that’s precisely what the designers intended in fact, and it’s pretty fun.
What’s so baffling about that statement? I played Destiny like a traditional single player FPS and ignored the multiplayer. It’s a perfectly decent game that way and clearly one of the ways it’s designed to be played.
Or if it’s that you think even then, the two games aren’t comparable at all and can’t be ranked that way… I mean they play out in pretty much the same run-around-the-arena-shooting-down-waves style, and they both have RPG gun upgrade systems – they seem like very close cousins to me.
Allow me to remove the chapeau of snark and don the cap of criticism
ahem
Destiny’s campaign falters because the game’s design ironically leads to a lack of design. Because the game has so many player-related systems in which to consider - class, skills, weapon types, weapon perks, the possible presence of other players - missions, spaces and encounters cannot be tightly designed and have to fall back on objective tropes and sheer numbers of targets to shoot at in the absence of interesting scenarios. Consider the very legitimate criticism of the campaign, that you spend a lot of time going to a point, hitting a switch and defending your Ghost from wave after wave of enemies. Consider the limited types of enemies and how neatly they slot into certain categories (weak grunt, light gunner, heavy gunner, heavy brute) and the number of bullet sponge bosses, some of which are merely stronger, larger versions of regular enemies. Since the game has to acquiescent to any number of combinations the player may be running, its mission design must be as loose as possible so as to not impede progress because the player(s) don’t have weapon X or skill Y. It ultimately ends up as a glorified shooting gallery, largely bereft of tension or unique encounters.
(Battleborn’s campaign suffers from the same issue to a somewhat greater degree, with fully half of its 8 missions involving node defense and several braindead bullet sponge boss designs).
Even though Doom has some light upgrading that can nudge the player’s skillset in certain directions (and, again, I have not played it yet), the fact that there are limits to Doomguy’s arsenal, when he gets said arsenal, his movement options and when he can acquire upgraded options, etc., allow the enemy, encounter and map design to breathe. They don’t have to consider several different Doomguys that all have different guns and one can put a bubble up and another shits fire and another can run really, really fast all existing in the same space (simultaneously or no), and that seemingly small difference cascades out.
also, Doomguy has a chainsaw and that’s pretty fuckin neato
Well, I still think Doom has a lot in common with how you just described Destiny. The weapon pickups are a little bit hidden and the game expects you might miss some (it gives them again later). The Doom upgrade system is not light by any means, a nonupgraded weapon in Doom is almost useless trash and a fully upgraded one is OP (example final upgrade for heavy rifle: higher damage when aimed, which feels like 1.5x to 2x more damage), and every weapon has two upgrade tracks. The enemy combinations are less differentiated than Destiny’s if anything, as someone said it’s always the same enemy mix in Doom after a while. Actually I’m starting to reconsider whether Destiny is worse than Doom. Anyway Doom makes you feel overpowered whereas Destiny makes you feel like you’re shooting peas, is the main difference.
The feeling of power Doom gives you is only because Doom is letting you have it. The feeling of power Destiny gives you is because it has to give it you or else it doesn’t work.
