Doom Eternal

I really liked Doom 2016, so I was excited to see where they were heading after the end of 2016. Doom 2016 ends with Samuel Hayden (with his big laser sword made of argent energy) sending you off somewhere unknown so you won’t stop his harnessing of argent energy. So it’s weird where Doom Eternal picks up. Starting some time after Doom 2016, it kinda just starts without letting you know what has happened since then. It’s just like “hey doom guy has a flying fortress now, hell is already on earth and Doom Guy already knows to stop the invasion, you all caught up?”. It just dumps you head first into the story, to the point where I thought I may have missed some DLC for Doom 2016, animated short or something that told how we got from the end of Doom 2016 to here. It is a little jarring but not enough to really take that much away from the story. Also I guess they might answer what happened between Doom 2016 and Eternal in DLC.

The tone of the story on the other hand is not as good as Doom 2016. The story is played a little more seriously than 2016 and has less wit to it. There are some clever things throughout but it feels like a lot more time was spent on expanding the lore of Doom. There is so much more lore in this game and so much to read about it. I’m one of those people that likes to read about lore in anything really but even to me this was kinda much. The lore also isn't especially good either. There are some neat ideas of heaven or hell in this world or more about the Doom Slayer but it lacks some of the cleverness 2016 had. Also the after credits thing is pretty terrible and doesn’t fit the tone of Doom. Hopefully it isn’t a sign of the direction the humor in these games is going.

On the same side, it also tosses you headfirst into the combat too. I feel like the game assumes you just came off playing 2016 and are ready for more which hurts the game early on. The early parts are pretty punishing due to a more rigid game play style and way too much mechanics introduced in the game. Doom Eternal (and 2016) wants you to play a certain way, which is to use the chainsaw to get more ammo often. But it feels more extreme here in Doom Eternal than it ever felt in 2016.They want you to learn to use the chainsaw so that is why ammo feels so scarce early on. But it just leads to you conserving your ammo more because it is still the early game so you are not used to using the chainsaw. Even in 2016 it eased you into using the chainsaw by giving you a pistol with unlimited ammo. Here there is no pistol to use. You have to use the chainsaw way more or in the worst case scenario wait for the chainsaw cool down by running around. The ammo scarcity feels too extreme because after almost every encounter you are out of ammo early on in the game. Which with the more difficult combat leads to you dying a lot early on.

The game also throws so much at you that it's hard to remember it all. Let alone press all the buttons quickly and accurately enough (on the PS4 anyway). To list off all you have to keep in mind, there are two types of grenades, catching enemies on fire with you shoulder mounted flamethrower to get armor, using the chainsaw to get more ammo, a blood punch that refills with gory kills, weapon mods and switching between the two types that each weapon has, the, enemy’s weakness that you must use or you will die very quickly plus something else I’m probably forgetting. That is a lot to keep in your head in the early hours. I didn’t really feel fully comfortable using all of this until I was near the end of the game. Even then I ended up forgetting to use the ice grenade a lot or would mistakenly have the wrong grenade chosen. I also ended up sticking to one mod for each weapon instead of switching cause it was too much to remember and stuck with the ones that work best for the enemy weak points instead of my preference. Which was a bummer since the micro missiles on the Heavy Cannon was my favorite weapon from 2016 but I stayed with the scope because they worked better for eliminating the weak points on Arachnotron. I didn’t even really use the super shotgun at all because with the difficulty the last thing I wanted to do was get close to the enemies.There is just so much in this game to keep track of. Upgrade wise there's a lot too. Runes, suit points, weapon mod points, other upgrades and lets not even mention the collectibles. There is just way too much in this game for all of it to work well.

Something for me that really doesn’t work well is the focus on platforming. For most of the game the platforming is just kinda there. It doesn’t really add anything, it is just there to break up the action. But there is some really annoying platforming in this game that the controls aren’t precise enough to make work and it leads to a lot of annoyance. I would fail them repeatedly because I was off by a hair or I wouldn’t stick to the climbable walls and then I would lose my health or armor because of the repeated failed attempts.which would then cause me to die in the next fight. This happened enough that I would start to groan when more platforming would appear. I think the little bits of platforming worked in Doom 2016 because it was optional if you wanted the collectibles. Here there is way more of it and either it is forgettable or it leads to annoying deaths.

The music on the other hand is really good and adds to the intensity of the combat. Mick Gordon does a great job making the music want you to kick some ass. When the guitars hit and music really gets going it is so good and makes some of the combat better than they actually probably are. When everything comes together though Doom Eternal still feels incredible. Too bad I felt more annoyed than exhausted during most battles. There was one slayer gate right before I lowered the difficulty that felt as exciting as Doom 2016. It was intense and nerve wracking but when it was done, it reminded me of the fun I had with Doom 2016. Which is a shame that it took me that deep in to get that feeling.

I really wanted to like this game more. Hell (ha), I really want to play it again to see if I like it more a second time,having gotten accustomed to the mechanics and playing on a harder difficulty. I am still chasing that rush I had after the slayer gate on level 9. I already have all the collectibles so the only thing would be to try and finish the last couple of levels on ultra violence before I knocked it down to hurt me plenty. The difficulty is weird too. Hurt me plenty is a little too easy but ultra violence was too hard. And I can see some of the later levels being more annoying then exhilarating on ultra violence.

I haven’t mentioned the multiplayer because.I didn’t play any of it. I wasn’t interested in it. And the way the campaign shows you the xp you gained for icon profiles and skins made me want to not play the multiplayer even more.

My hope for the next Doom (3?) is that they learn from this game and find the right balance of combat and right tone for the story. This game constantly almost manages to recreate the feeling of Doom 2016 but there is always something to get in the way that brings it just short of it. There is a note in Doom Eternal that explains how argent energy is made which involves human souls It mentions how they would remove the soul from human bodies by torturing the humans for years until their will just gives up and that kinda feels how i felt near the end of Doom Eternal. It is not a bad game so it’s no torture but the early game was so disappointing and punishing that by the last half I had kinda given up and lowered the difficulty to see it through to the end.