Civvie 11 - Retro FPS Boomer

[Smaug's Smokey Hole 2]

Doom Eternal is getting the same type of backlash Elden Ring got from challenge runners after a short while: there's just too much shit to do and the game goes from "fun" to "tiresome" very quickly on repeated playthroughs unless you're exactly the kind of autist the game is meant to cater to. It goes from a power fantasy first person shooter where you're slaughtering demons in droves, to a puzzle game where you're slaughtering demons in droves if everything goes right, but getting slapped around like a little bitch without ammo, health or armor if you don't follow the script for the combat scenario the developers set up for you.

After seeing a couple of the pre-launch gameplay demos, I knew it wasn't for me. I'll take Doom 2016's more unga-bunga-I-don't-need-skill-I-have-spare-ammo approach any day of the week.

You're right and I'm going to add something to that. My grievance was that the combat arenas very often felt like small multiplayer death match maps with specific loops to run through complete with jump pads, boosters etc. it was just too neat and clean.

 

[Brain Problems]

You're right and I'm going to add something to that. My grievance was that the combat arenas very often felt like small multiplayer death match maps with specific loops to run through complete with jump pads, boosters etc. it was just too neat and clean.

I may be in the minority here but I hated 2016 and Eternal, and Eternal just dialed up everything I hated about 2016. My main issue is that the combat felt like Halo and Painkiller had a baby. I hate arena fights and hated the goddamn loop of never having enough ammo so glory kill shit to make more of it. The whole super semi-ironic metal aesthetic also bugged me because it felt so on the nose and contrived that it bordered on forced meme territory.

It's incredible how going back to playing Doom 2 wads just feels so much more entertaining and creative and fun than anything those guys could come up with. The death of proper maze levels in favour of closed off arenas where enemies just teleport in and you have deliberately annoying enemies like Marauders is just so sad to see. It didn't help that it seemed like all the FPS nerds were losing their shit over nuDoom and blowing Mick Gordon (again, am I the only one that just found the music generic? Hulshult's stuff is way more interesting to me but I never played the DLC so it could have sucked).

 

[Coolio55]

I may be in the minority here but I hated 2016 and Eternal, and Eternal just dialed up everything I hated about 2016. My main issue is that the combat felt like Halo and Painkiller had a baby. I hate arena fights and hated the goddamn loop of never having enough ammo so glory kill shit to make more of it. The whole super semi-ironic metal aesthetic also bugged me because it felt so on the nose and contrived that it bordered on forced meme territory.

It's incredible how going back to playing Doom 2 wads just feels so much more entertaining and creative and fun than anything those guys could come up with. The death of proper maze levels in favour of closed off arenas where enemies just teleport in and you have deliberately annoying enemies like Marauders is just so sad to see. It didn't help that it seemed like all the FPS nerds were losing their shit over nuDoom and blowing Mick Gordon (again, am I the only one that just found the music generic? Hulshult's stuff is way more interesting to me but I never played the DLC so it could have sucked).

If anything, it's less a sequel to Doom and more an unofficial sequel to Serious Sam. The teleporting enemies crap is something that I never liked about those games and to see modern "old-school shooters" rip it off is pretty baffling.
Fun fact: id actually hired Croteam for some preliminary work on Doom 4 before parting ways. I wonder if they had any lingering effect on the final product...

 

[Overcast]

I may be in the minority here but I hated 2016 and Eternal, and Eternal just dialed up everything I hated about 2016. My main issue is that the combat felt like Halo and Painkiller had a baby. I hate arena fights and hated the goddamn loop of never having enough ammo so glory kill shit to make more of it. The whole super semi-ironic metal aesthetic also bugged me because it felt so on the nose and contrived that it bordered on forced meme territory.

It's incredible how going back to playing Doom 2 wads just feels so much more entertaining and creative and fun than anything those guys could come up with. The death of proper maze levels in favour of closed off arenas where enemies just teleport in and you have deliberately annoying enemies like Marauders is just so sad to see. It didn't help that it seemed like all the FPS nerds were losing their shit over nuDoom and blowing Mick Gordon (again, am I the only one that just found the music generic? Hulshult's stuff is way more interesting to me but I never played the DLC so it could have sucked).

Classic Doom has that special something that the modern Doom games lack. With the older games, it felt like you were methodically tearing down hordes of enemies at your own pace and in an organic way. You always felt like you were in control and you never knew where and when you'll face certain enemies. You were always on your toes. With the modern games, everything feels so much more scripted and artificial. I wouldn't mind the approach the new Doom games took if they were just their own thing rather than being called "Doom".

 

[The Bovinian Derivative]

I may be in the minority here but I hated 2016 and Eternal

My feelings about them are worse: I just couldn't bring myself to give too much of a shit about them. I never liked the glory/sync kill system in any game and by the time I saw the 20th Baron dying the exact same way I just zoned out. I didn't like the teleporting enemies that show up because the engine can't handle more than 20 monsters alive at once either. I think I stopped playing 1-2 levels before the end and never even bothered to pick up Eternal, and I heard that Eternal's DLCs are pure ass. Bethesda being a cunt and not releasing the idTech source code is just icing on the cake. Ironically the only one that will be eternal is Doom2 because of it's infinite modding potential.
I feel kinda worried about whatever they'll try to do with Quake.

 

[Conan]

Doom Eternal is getting the same type of backlash Elden Ring got from challenge runners after a short while: there's just too much shit to do and the game goes from "fun" to "tiresome" very quickly on repeated playthroughs unless you're exactly the kind of autist the game is meant to cater to. It goes from a power fantasy first person shooter where you're slaughtering demons in droves, to a puzzle game where you're slaughtering demons in droves if everything goes right, but getting slapped around like a little bitch without ammo, health or armor if you don't follow the script for the combat scenario the developers set up for you.

After seeing a couple of the pre-launch gameplay demos, I knew it wasn't for me. I'll take Doom 2016's more unga-bunga-I-don't-need-skill-I-have-spare-ammo approach any day of the week.

I kept pointing this out back in 2019. Having to stop and dodge enemies to chainsaw zombies really dragged the game out and the whole concept of "We want the player to utilize all the weapons" really got slapped down when you have 9 weapons and only 3 ammo types between them. Ironically the game became a blast when you unlock the unlimited ammo cheat and just go blasting.

I got a mod for eternal that increased the ammo pool and progression to something more like 2016 and surprise surprise, the entire game felt way more fun.
I still changed up my weapons but not out of a need but rather a desire to. There was still plenty of challenge and I died the same amount of times as with vanilla ammo amounts but
I never felt artificially hamstringed. Hugo got so fucking assmad that people were walking through UV in 2016 blasting the super shotgun and nothing and failed to realize that is part of what made that game so fun.

the doubling down on combos and specific weapon mods/types for specific enemies just confirms my belief that hugo got pissy people weren't playing with his toys the way he wanted them to

 

[BlackDragoons]

I got a mod for eternal that increased the ammo pool and progression to something more like 2016 and surprise surprise, the entire game felt way more fun.
I still changed up my weapons but not out of a need but rather a desire to. There was still plenty of challenge and I died the same amount of times as with vanilla ammo amounts but
I never felt artificially hamstringed. Hugo got so fucking assmad that people were walking through UV in 2016 blasting the super shotgun and nothing and failed to realize that is part of what made that game so fun.

the doubling down on combos and specific weapon mods/types for specific enemies just confirms my belief that hugo got pissy people weren't playing with his toys the way he wanted them to

The whole weapon combo system reminds me when DmC first came out and I get a lot of flashbacks to that game. Certain enemies where only beatable with certain weapons and completely ruined Devil May Cry's fluid style combat. Completely annoying and completely out of touch with the games core demographic. Doom was "Heres a bunch of weapons, get to the end of the level and move on. How you deal with your enemies is your choice" while in Doom Eternal its like "Well if you don't use specific weapons against specific enemies its going to be a lot harder, also heres the Marauder."

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole 2]

I get the idea of the new Doom games, the glory kills and ammo/health pops is to encourage you rush straight into the fray and cut through it instead of moving backwards or strafing around. It's a good idea, it's an exciting idea, but Eternal FORCED that idea by limiting the ammo capacity. The auxiliary weapons, like the fire that makes them spit armor was yet again a nice idea, encouraging the player to get closer, but it felt like it should have been an area-of-effect/explosive fireball weapon so the player could jump in, set them on fire, escape and later collect the armor drops.

In a way, a really slimmed down Eternal would be a really good arcade game if those things still existed.
I'm not complaining about Eternal being hard, it's just that sometimes I found myself in a combat arena and by missing the flow or a couple of jumps/shots I ended up with nothing left to realistically gain ammo with given my health and I couldn't stick quarters into my computer. Start again from checkpoint, the next time I hit the flow the designer/map maker intended for that arena and it was easy, I'm swimming in ammo and health. That doesn't mean I'm suddenly any better at the game.

I haven't played 2016(still not on gamepass) though, it's the game that looks more interesting to me.

 

[Kane Lives]

I get the idea of the new Doom games, the glory kills and ammo/health pops is to encourage you rush straight into the fray and cut through it instead of moving backwards or strafing around. It's a good idea, it's an exciting idea, but Eternal FORCED that idea by limiting the ammo capacity. The auxiliary weapons, like the fire that makes them spit armor was yet again a nice idea, encouraging the player to get closer, but it felt like it should have been an area-of-effect/explosive fireball weapon so the player could jump in, set them on fire, escape and later collect the armor drops.

In a way, a really slimmed down Eternal would be a really good arcade game if those things still existed.
I'm not complaining about Eternal being hard, it's just that sometimes I found myself in a combat arena and by missing the flow or a couple of jumps/shots I ended up with nothing left to realistically gain ammo with given my health and I couldn't stick quarters into my computer. Start again from checkpoint, the next time I hit the flow the designer/map maker intended for that arena and it was easy, I'm swimming in ammo and health. That doesn't mean I'm suddenly any better at the game.

I haven't played 2016(still not on gamepass) though, it's the game that looks more interesting to me.

2016 has one thing going for it: you can use the SSG (or any favourite weapon) all the way and not be forced to interact with the glory kill system at all (except maybe as a prerequisite for some runes, or in the later more ammo-starved levels).

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

The idea of ammo starving players in a FPS is one of the worst ideas that was popularized in the last decade and a half. Only few high skill high reward weapons should be limited, everything else should have plenty for a person with enough skill in the genre. Forcing the player to switch weapons means you know you fucked balancing the weapons.

 

[Corn Flakes]

In a way, a really slimmed down Eternal would be a really good arcade game if those things still existed.

That's Doom 2016. Eternal made the arenas way more arcade, but in terms of gameplay itself 2016 does straddle that line between old-school and arena shooter. Because the Arenas in 2016 usually have multiple paths you can take to circle around them, you not only hold but also pick up a lot more ammo just by going around, and while some enemies are easier to kill with some weapons it's not a mandatory thing like in Eternal.

How both games treat the chainsaw is indicative of just how overdesigned Eternal is. In Doom 2016, the Chainsaw is a special weapon with very limited ammo that you use in two specific situations: 1 - you want a specific enemy dead right the fuck now, or 2 - you fucked up and ran out of ammo (either in general or for your favorite weapon). So unless you were playing on the highest difficulty you would only use it once every few encounters. Most of your ammo would be picked up from enemies you shot to death, or from pre-placed pickups around the map. In Eternal, the chainsaw regenerates ammo insanely quickly and it's meant to be used not only every fight, but often multiple times per fight because the game keeps throwing waves and waves of demons at you, and your ammunition supply is so fucking limited. The chainsaw in Eternal is supposed to be used so often that pretty much every arena has infinitely respawning melee zombies for you to use as ammo/health pinatas. You'll notice that maps in Eternal have a lot less pre-placed ammo boxes lying around because of it. The zombies are your ammo dispensers.

Doom 2016 railroaded you into arena fights, but once the doors were locked you got to make your own fun. Want to kill the entire swarm of zombies with the Super Shotgun? Have fun! Chaingun everything to death with infinite bullets? Knock yourself out! Rocket Launcher with guided rockets? Sure! Pistol only? Good luck! Eternal on the other hand is a classic example of an overdesigned game. There's only one way to play the game, and the developers won't have you playing it any other way. And it shows, too! You could see the devs were angry when people found ways to cheese the Marauder by stunlocking him with the ballista, for example.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole 2]

The chainsaw in Eternal is supposed to be used so often that pretty much every arena has infinitely respawning melee zombies for you to use as ammo/health pinatas.

I had completely forgotten about them.

 

[Slav Power]

Fun fact: id actually hired Croteam for some preliminary work on Doom 4 before parting ways. I wonder if they had any lingering effect on the final product...

Speaking of, here's a screenshot of that cancelled Doom 4 project from Croteam.

And here are two screenshots out of another cancelled Croteam project that was supposed to be a tactical military shooter.

Both of these projects fell through, and I don't think I have to state the obvious of what Croteam did next.

 

[Lev El Shmeckle]

Hey brothers and gay uncles, remember that time when Civvie just started doing these vids back in the day? pure, unfiltered shy guy which shows us his true self... 6 years ago

https://youtu.be/HZ7kSIdXBpc

Why yes he was transphobic and a bit racist back then. He was better. He was, dare I say, BASED.

 

[Kane Lives]

Civvie seems to be slowly losing his mind playing through TNT Evilution lol. (Despite his hatred for it, it was still my favourite of the Final Doom pair. The thematic progression they had going was lovely, while Plutonia was just brown and brown and bloodpools.)

 

[Mega Black]

I think Eternal being 'too strict' is just whiny boomers not wanting to put a modicum of thought or planning into combat. Beaten the game several times and never felt like I was on rails, it's a lot of fun.

 

[Mihaly A. Shilage]

Speaking of, here's a screenshot of that cancelled Doom 4 project from Croteam.
View attachment 4987625

Funnily enough, the text be

Edit: I meant to say that the text below the picture says that it's not from a doom sequel, it's an enemy from serious sam 3.

 

[Slav Power]

Funnily enough, the text be

Edit: I meant to say that the text below the picture says that it's not from a doom sequel, it's an enemy from serious sam 3.

By looking at the DoomWiki article again, there's a link to this Reddit post where a Croteam employee says that it was published by a Croatian magazine, and here's the full version of it, showing all the similarities between Serious Sam 3 and DOOM.

Needless to say, Serious Sam 3 was a massive asset flip that Croteam made because two of the projects they were working on fell through and they needed to get something made fast.

 

[Evil Peter Griffin]

Needless to say, Serious Sam 3 was a massive asset flip that Croteam made because two of the projects they were working on fell through and they needed to get something made fast.

Ivan worked real hard on those models and by God we are going to use them.

 

[Slav Power]

Ivan worked real hard on those models and by God we are going to use them.

More like Dragan worked real hard on those models.