While I admittedly have little experience with the fast-moving 3D FPS games that began with Quake, I have at least played and loved that nexus. Quake's origins as a fantasy RPG, carrying forward much completed work on environments and character models, resulted in an artistically incongruous experience compared to id's prior work on Doom. However, this cobbled-together style, along with the polygonal models borne of its revolutionary early-3D engine, gave Quake its own unique look and feel, albeit one arising from a non-replicable confluence of intention and circumstance.
Going into Dusk, I've not seen the 20+ years of lessons and refinements to this style of game, and so the jump up here is mind-blowing. In almost every way it exceeds Quake. The style is wonderfully realised, beginning with campy cult horror and slowly descending deeper into hellish and surreal environments. New enemies are introduced (and later re-introduced) gradually, and in accordance with the changes in environment. Each enemy introduction is so expertly handled too, they manage to make such a moment of it while keeping everything in gameplay. Just looking through the enemy roster I can easily recall my first time encountering each one, a seriously impressive feat. And then once you learn what that enemy does, it gets added to the roster and the fast-paced, incredibly fun combat puzzle of Dusk gets just that little bit more complex.
The worst moments of old-school shooters, and Doom II is particularly bad for this, is that moment when the enemies are all dead and you're supposed to do... something. You're not sure exactly what, and the map is enormous, so you spend 15-20 minutes scouring an empty level until eventually you just have to look it up. Quake was occasionally guilty of this too, but Dusk? Not so much. On a couple of occasions I'd get confused for a few minutes, but this was very rare. The level-design is just so much better, each section is distinguishable from each other, and so the overall layout of a level sticks in the mind strongly. The levels build around themselves, so with smart manoeuvring you can really make them bend to your will, crouch jumping through windows and getting onto rooftops to skip sections... it's just fantastic stuff.
It's not perfect however. The weapons aren't as inspired as the things you kill with them, and a few moments in the last couple of levels rubbed me the wrong way. Overall though, Dusk has got to be one of the finest shooters I've played. Style, pace, gameplay, level-design, sound, music... Dusk just gets it.
Going into Dusk, I've not seen the 20+ years of lessons and refinements to this style of game, and so the jump up here is mind-blowing. In almost every way it exceeds Quake. The style is wonderfully realised, beginning with campy cult horror and slowly descending deeper into hellish and surreal environments. New enemies are introduced (and later re-introduced) gradually, and in accordance with the changes in environment. Each enemy introduction is so expertly handled too, they manage to make such a moment of it while keeping everything in gameplay. Just looking through the enemy roster I can easily recall my first time encountering each one, a seriously impressive feat. And then once you learn what that enemy does, it gets added to the roster and the fast-paced, incredibly fun combat puzzle of Dusk gets just that little bit more complex.
The worst moments of old-school shooters, and Doom II is particularly bad for this, is that moment when the enemies are all dead and you're supposed to do... something. You're not sure exactly what, and the map is enormous, so you spend 15-20 minutes scouring an empty level until eventually you just have to look it up. Quake was occasionally guilty of this too, but Dusk? Not so much. On a couple of occasions I'd get confused for a few minutes, but this was very rare. The level-design is just so much better, each section is distinguishable from each other, and so the overall layout of a level sticks in the mind strongly. The levels build around themselves, so with smart manoeuvring you can really make them bend to your will, crouch jumping through windows and getting onto rooftops to skip sections... it's just fantastic stuff.
It's not perfect however. The weapons aren't as inspired as the things you kill with them, and a few moments in the last couple of levels rubbed me the wrong way. Overall though, Dusk has got to be one of the finest shooters I've played. Style, pace, gameplay, level-design, sound, music... Dusk just gets it.