Doom Eternal is a fantastic shooter, and yet I find myself slightly disappointed. Despite its greatness, it compares unfavourably to its 2016 predecessor.
2016 had a much greater sense of momentum, for one, which was tied into the contextualisation of its levels. Waking up, getting your bearings, and slowly progressing into deeper and more hellish places... marvelous. By contrast, Eternal opts for a planet hopping adventure with a single main objective in each new location. Variety is valued over cohesiveness. While each has its merits, I would argue that 2016's approach is more synchronous with the core gameplay, in that you're always pushing towards something, be that the next environment or a demon who's about to lose his limbs.
Beyond structural issues, variety damages the levels themselves. We're subjected to some platforming challenges, and while they're not terrible by any means, they kill the pace a bit.
The introduction of "weak points" on some enemies which can only be damaged by specific weapons, while I can see the rationale in service of variety, ultimately takes decision-making out of the player's hands by offering an optimal strategy. When I see one of those robot scorpions, I'm switching to one of the two weapons that can easily destroy its main gun and that's that. Why would I do anything else? Similarly, the archviles and totems, which can buff enemies, make such priorities of themselves that there's no point doing anything else until they're gone. The player simply flees until they get a location on the source of the buff, then takes care of it, there's no thinking involved.
Perhaps a more contentious point, but I think making 100% item collection more accessible with fast-travel actually ends up being a bad thing, amazingly. Why? Because it means you'll actually do it! In 2016, I just rolled with what I found and was satisfied. In Eternal, it's all at my fingertips, so how could I resist spending about a third of the time I spent actually having fun fast-travelling through once-bustling arenas looking for cracked walls? This might just be a me-problem though.
One final point; the marauder sucks. Way too restrictive, doesn't gel with other enemies at all, just bad bad bad. Should have been cut or even more sparsely utilised than he already is.
Otherwise, the game is incredible! It's just that, with a vast majority of its strengths being carried over from 2016, the new weaknesses highlight themselves as the most interesting thing to write about. It's still a great game, and the Doom series is undoubtedly in a good place right now. To end with a couple of new positives, I think the poles are a very nice addition to movement, and the grappling hook on the super shotgun is incredibly satisfying.
2016 had a much greater sense of momentum, for one, which was tied into the contextualisation of its levels. Waking up, getting your bearings, and slowly progressing into deeper and more hellish places... marvelous. By contrast, Eternal opts for a planet hopping adventure with a single main objective in each new location. Variety is valued over cohesiveness. While each has its merits, I would argue that 2016's approach is more synchronous with the core gameplay, in that you're always pushing towards something, be that the next environment or a demon who's about to lose his limbs.
Beyond structural issues, variety damages the levels themselves. We're subjected to some platforming challenges, and while they're not terrible by any means, they kill the pace a bit.
The introduction of "weak points" on some enemies which can only be damaged by specific weapons, while I can see the rationale in service of variety, ultimately takes decision-making out of the player's hands by offering an optimal strategy. When I see one of those robot scorpions, I'm switching to one of the two weapons that can easily destroy its main gun and that's that. Why would I do anything else? Similarly, the archviles and totems, which can buff enemies, make such priorities of themselves that there's no point doing anything else until they're gone. The player simply flees until they get a location on the source of the buff, then takes care of it, there's no thinking involved.
Perhaps a more contentious point, but I think making 100% item collection more accessible with fast-travel actually ends up being a bad thing, amazingly. Why? Because it means you'll actually do it! In 2016, I just rolled with what I found and was satisfied. In Eternal, it's all at my fingertips, so how could I resist spending about a third of the time I spent actually having fun fast-travelling through once-bustling arenas looking for cracked walls? This might just be a me-problem though.
One final point; the marauder sucks. Way too restrictive, doesn't gel with other enemies at all, just bad bad bad. Should have been cut or even more sparsely utilised than he already is.
Otherwise, the game is incredible! It's just that, with a vast majority of its strengths being carried over from 2016, the new weaknesses highlight themselves as the most interesting thing to write about. It's still a great game, and the Doom series is undoubtedly in a good place right now. To end with a couple of new positives, I think the poles are a very nice addition to movement, and the grappling hook on the super shotgun is incredibly satisfying.