Games you hate that everybody raves about

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I have to disagree, actually, having actually played this.


The ONLY thing in the game I dont like is the... er.... heart things. The bits where you fight waves. You actually only do this occaisionally, and I can understand the design decision behind it, but it's still moderately irritating.

But everything else? As a total, absolute fanboy of the original Doom, and Doom 2 (Doom 3, however, was a freaking tragedy) and as someone that bought and entirely read a 1000-page book on level creation and proceeded to spend hundreds of hours doing that, way back when.... fanboy indeed... this newest game IS Doom to me. This is what I wanted.

Labyrinth levels? Check. Devious secrets? Check. Pure run-n-gun? Check. All the usual weapons? Check. Total and utter lack of my most hated FPS mechanic, the "hide behind cover" concept? Check, check, check! Lots of chaos and things to dodge? Yyyyyyyep, that's a check.

Seriously, the game plays like Doom. If you've seen the multiplayer, it DOESNT play like that. Yes, I know this makes no bloody sense, but Doom 4 doesnt play like it's own multiplayer. Which was designed by a different team (???) for whatever reason. But nobody plays Doom for it's multiplayer, so that works out well enough.

And to a degree, you have to understand what Doom really is at it's core, so I'll respond to one thing I spotted in that post. It's absolute bloody freaking chaos. People often go on about a "horror" element, for instance. I'm sorry, but there is not, nor was there ever, a horror element to Doom 1 or 2. For number 3, yes, but 3 was awful, so let's pretend 3 didnt happen and instead replace it with the mental image of a poodle or something. But yeah, those two games had no horror elements to them. None. You werent some scared protagonist running around a survival horror area, you werent some normal dude pushed into an unexpected quest to save the world. You were freaking DOOM GUY. Basically some sort of hyper-Rambo in space. Doom Guy is afraid of NOTHING. The monsters are afraid of HIM. You went in, and splattered EVERYTHING. Again, the Rambo comparison. The game never generated a horror atmosphere at any point. It did generate a sort of "alien" feeling to the levels themselves, based on textures and layouts, but I personally think that was more a side effect of the way the graphics of the time tended to be, because ALOT of Doom clones of that era give the exact same feeling. Nor did Doom 1 or 2 use jump scares. The horrible diseased poodle used jump scares, which were frankly awful, but the others? No. Your non-poodle enemies were WAY too slow to do jumpscares. ALL of them in the first two games. No monster in either game moved fast. The quickest attack in the entire game came from Lost Souls (not counting the soldiers' hitscan attacks here), but... jumpscares? They're not capable of it. They float around looking rather dimwitted for like 20 years before they bother to attack you with their "become the projectile" attack. Then back to more floating. Even the "pinkies", the supposed rush-down troops of the game, were slower than dirt (and usually the single least-threatening monster in the game, due to their utter inability to get near you, what with how slow they were). And even when a hidden wall with jerks behind it opens, it's not exactly a fast scare. The game makes a loud "BLOOOONK" noise as a wall moves rather slowly out of the way. It was downright sluggish.

Even Nightmare difficulty isnt as hard as people seem to remember it; quite frankly I've always thought the entire game needed to be HARDER, including that mode, and I'm no FPS expert; I'm just good at dodging stuff. I wouldnt find speedruns to be any fun though.

So many things just arent what people often "remember" them to be. It's almost as if people are remembering some sort of Doom 2.5, a version of the game that never was, yet a version that COULD have evolved from the actual 2. The odd thing is, it's not exactly hard to go back and see what it ACTUALLY is like, but people still act as if Doom 2 was Doom 2.5, the mythical version. The new Doom is actually MUCH faster (and therefore, capable of much more difficult chaos), and does indeed involve alot of very sudden attacks. Unlike monster closets though, this game has a tendancy to warp things in right in front of you (just running down a hallway, minding your own business, when suddenly HELL KNIGHT IN YOUR FACE, for instance, was something the old games did not do), which... frankly, is more effective. Though it can do monster closets too.

All in all, the new game is faster and more chaotic, which to me is what Doom should be. Now, granted, to be absolutely fair, I'm not the best judge of speed. I react to and process huge amounts of stuff extremely fast, so as far as I'm concerned, most games may as well be in slow-motion. I recognize the fact that this is not the case for everyone. I recognize that MOST people dont have my speed, something which is ever more apparent as I deal with and meet more and more gamers. Perhaps to some, Doom 1 and 2 were fast. But I can only really go through with my own experience, so keep that in mind.

Now, a couple of odd things were added with this new one... the whole "pop an enemy and items come out" bit. I personally thought I was going to haaaaaaaaaate that mechanic. But no, I didnt. After actually trying it out, I quickly appreciated it. It's not a "do this purely to look cool" or "we'll give a crutch to the player" sort of thing. It's a "take this risky move which could get you set on fire, and get a reward if done properly". On lower difficulties it wont be much risk, but lower difficulties are boring, is what I always say. You *always* have to get right up in an enemy's face to do the things that cause them to drop stuff. No exceptions. The moves also take time to execute, leaving OTHER enemies time to eat your face or fling exploding death balls at you. The chainsaw in particular takes more time than any other attack in the game. Thus, a pure risk-reward system. Mechanics like that are GOOD things, as a rule; more games need to use risk-reward systems. Many games go for the reward without anything resembling risk (most AAA games, for instance).


And then.... there's the editor. I'll not go into the editor in this post. Level editing/modding and things like logic strings arent for everyone, definitely not. But for those such as myself, this ended up being bloody excellent. Oh, the campaign is nice and all, but... once youv'e done it, you've done it. For me, the place to go to from there is playing user-levels, and making my own. And considering some of the very loopy things designed with it's LittleBigPlanet-style logic circuit system (seriously, someone made a level with Harvest Moon style gameplay, for instance... and that was early on) there's alot of possibility here. But again, I'll not go into much depth here. Suffice it to say though, I like this aspect.


The big downer though is indeed the multiplayer. It's just.... well.... I wouldnt call it genuinely BAD. But I also wouldnt call it Doom. It's like they gave you a slighly odd second game, that's multiplayer only, as some sort of strange bonus for buying Doom. I dunno what bizarro decisions led to this, but... eh. Maybe it'll get improved later, heck if I know. Alot of people never played the Doom series for it's multiplayer anyway.

As for the art style, THAT is subjective. I dont really have any comments on that. Art is always subjective as hell. It looks fine to me, frankly, but then so do Atari 2600 games. I'm not one to be impressed by (or care about) graphics.

All in all, it's one of those games that has to actually be played to really "get it". It's not one that gives a very good impression in videos. I know I sure thought it looked bloody stupid originally, but someone I know wouldnt shut up until I agreed to give it a try when it came out. So I did, and found it grand. As a fan of the originals for decades (aside from that nasty little poodle) it is definitely Doom to me.

Not for everyone, no. But since I'm bored out of my mind, them's some thoughts on it.

I've played bits of Final Doom, but I've never even come close to completing it. That said, the last time I played was probably on Skulltag or some other sourceport with jumping and mouselook enabled. I didn't really care as much about authenticity back then. I have beaten Ultimate Doom with the Chocolate Doom sourceport however, using keyboard only controls too! I've also made it about halfway through Doom II on the original DOS engine with a WASD + mouse layout; Doom II is difficult enough that I have no idea how a person could beat it using only a keyboard.

I've also played a bit of CyClones a long time ago as well, though my copy was a crappy "abandonware" version that had the music and videos ripped out. I remember it used the numeric keypad for movement and turning, and the mouse aiming worked more like a Wii FPS than a typical PC or console FPS.

Skip to 5:05 to see gameplay.

So the concept of demons from Hell invading our dimension and committing genocide against all of mankind doesn't fit into the broader spectrum of horror?

I strongly disagree with your assertion. In spite of technical limitations, I have always sensed that there was a deliberate effort on the part of the level designers to suggest an all-seeing adversarial force -- a being that pulls all the strings, that stalks your every move, and looks upon you as a curiosity. You are like a determined little rat, constantly forced into mazes designed to test and to punish. And like a mouse held under the paws of a predatory cat, it could kill you at any moment, however it would prefer to savor the moment instead... Sounds pretty traumatic and horrifying to me.

Whereas all of this was only implied in the first two games, the third actually gave this omnipresent antagonist a voice. (I quite like Doom 3 for what it is, though admittedly it took me a number of years to finally come around.)

Also, just because Doom Guy is a bonafide hard ass and a stoic doesn't necessarily imply that he isn't utterly terrified of the situations he finds himself in. (Who wouldn't be if placed in his shoes?) Fear is the strongest motivator for survival. How else could he have made it to the cheese each and every time, whilst so many of his peers were reduced to various states of ornamental decor?



Doom 3 was guilty of spamming jump scares to the extent that they were rendered largely ineffectual, that much we can agree upon. But no jump scares in the first two games? Surely you jest! Monster closets in confined pitch black spaces, anyone?

Also, I refer to my earlier example of turning a corner in a very tight maze and being surprised by a well-placed Hell-knight (or maybe it was a Baron of Hell...) that was waiting patiently to ambush and sodomize a lone space marine such as myself. Slow things can creep up on you, especially when you are impeded.



Which is scarier: a loud noise after a period of relative silence, or the split-second realization of what said noise portends?

Metro 2033 on PC. Mouse control is broken and the y axis is ridiculously low sensitivity compared to horizontal sensitivity and this has been the case since its original launch and retained for its remaster. For some reason it's gone down as one of the best FPS games on the PC but for me it's in a completely unplayable state.

Hmm, you know, when I ponder these sorts of things.... it's interesting to think about just how subjective stuff like this really is.

Horror games, for example. I know people that just... really shy away from these. Too scary! I can understand that.

But I've always tended to have.... different reactions to stuff. If someone's playing a particularly scary horror game, they might have a moment where some monster leaps out, and their response is basically "OMG AAAAAAHHHHH gotta run gotta run it's going to kill me! Nooooooo!". My response is to charge at it and attempt to hit it with a stick or something. In games, to me, monsters of any sort promise the potential for exciting combat! Doesnt matter if it's a cute miniboss in a Kirby game, or some nightmarish, eldritch Lovecraftian horror: I'm going to charge at it. It's what I do. It is exciting and fun!

And even IRL, I tend to look at things like this. Someone points out, I dunno, some haunted looking place? Typical reaction to that for many is "Oh god, that looks terrifying". My reaction is "ooooooh I WANNA GO IN THERE. Let's explore!" Tend to be comfortable around/with creepy things/places. No, I dont know why.

But it's easy to NOT apply these ideas when explaining stuff like Doom there. Now granted, even considering my views on that stuff, I still really dont think it was ever meant as a horror game. The whole "Rambo" idea was WAY too prevalent, and your characters ability to kick the everloving crap out of EVERYTHING was just... too strong. To me, in that game, YOU were the monster. All the forces of Hell couldnt stop you. Alot of the time, even on the highest difficulties, it wasnt a "battle", but instead was what I call a "rampage". I mean, hell, Doom 4 just furthers the idea that Doom Guy is A: the ultimate badass, and B: afraid of literally NOTHING. It also implies... rather heavily... that some of the leading forces of Hell actually are seriously afraid of the guy. Like, freaking terrified of him. And he absolutely knows this. This is the sort of guy that'll leap right into a demon's face ("demon" being the original name of the "Pinkies", I always thought Pinkie was a dumb name) JUST because he thinks it'll be fun to jam it's own jaw into it's ear. He doesnt HAVE to do that. He just WANTS to. The game does a very good job of showcasing Doom Guy's personality without ever needing him to say anything. It's hard to explain what I mean by that, but anyone that's played it would probably know what I mean. So this all just goes that much further from the horror stuff, because this is EXACTLY the same idea I had about the character back during the first two games. Everything about those games just furthered that in so many ways. Even some of the goofy tricks you sometimes had the option to do. Do I *have* to PUNCH this group of Imps to death rather than use the shotgun? Of course not. It's not exactly a tactical move. But it IS fun, so I'll bloody well do it! Even just the combat situations... the games tended to give a sense of overwhelming power, which affected perception of battles. Like "Really? They need to send FORTY monsters at me at the same time to stop me? And it's not even going to work! Bwa ha haaah!! !"

Now, Doom 3, which I loathe, THAT was a horror game. This is part of why I loathed it. It did NONE of those things I mention above. None of it. But Doom 1 and 2? Nah. To me they're absolute pure action/adventure, with some pretty decent exploration thrown in for fun.

Though again, that differing views bit I talked about. You mention the thing with the monster closets there, yes? Well, for me, there's two things about that: Firstly, the monster closet revelations are SLOW to me. They arent sudden events. They're doors that move like they're in some sort of thick sludge. The game doesnt do anything fast enough to catch me off guard, so it now occurs to me that this is where some of the "jumpscare" effect just... doesnt happen. Happens for others maybe. Doesnt happen for me. Something that comes at me slowly isnt going to make me jump. And this is followed of course by my reaction to everything else, which is to just charge at whatever the door revealed. Provided of course that what it revealed isnt a pit of acid. That would be dumb. And really, this is how these games always were for me. I cant even exaggerate the description of my own speed; it's my defining ability when it comes to gaming (and is UTTERLY USELESS in some types of games, yes indeed it is!). Even projectiles in those first two games are slow to me. The Cyberdemon? I stand right in front of him when fighting and shift position as he fires. His attack just isnt fast enough. Same with... everything else. There's ONE, and only one, enemy that I will not approach in that game: The Spider Mastermind. It's impossible to "dodge" his attack. Gotta use cover. But he's a rare encounter. So yeah, my playstyle just lends to this sort of thing. It does have it's downsides though... I can get TOO berserk... but that's another story.

I do understand that other people will have completely different talents and ability sets, when it comes to gaming. But... it's hard for me to seperate that from my own strengths/weaknesses and spot that. Sometimes I just dont, so... yeah, that's part of this, eh?


And I'm not going to say that I dont LIKE the idea, gameplay-wise, of monster closets. When I'm designing levels for Doom or games like it, of COURSE i'm going to use these. I may not even notice the jumpscare factor, but I DO notice the fun factor. I love when games do this sort of thing. Even if it doesnt provide a scare, it DOES provide unexpected tactical situations. Like "Huh. Enemies from over THERE, huh? And over THERE at the same time? And a big ranged guy on that ledge that wasnt there before. How do I go about dealing with this crazy situation?". That sort of thing. Does make for good gameplay, so I dont discount their use.

Though, there's also another aspect to all of this: That editor that Doom 4 has. One thing I realized going into the whole thing: If I didnt like the campaign levels... I'd just bloody well make the levels that *I* want to play. If the campaign wasnt going to do labyrinthine mazes, monster closets, hidden secret items (I love secrets), real levels of challenge? I could just do it myself! Which was something I'd end up doing regardless of wether or not I liked the campaign (fortunately, I do like it). Same way I looked at the old Doom games, too, I made the levels that I wanted to experience. And this game DOES give me a nice, wide array of different monsters, weapons, and items to use, so I absolutely have the ability to do that. It's missing a couple of monsters that I'd rather like to see (There's a Revenant, but where's my good buddy the Pain Elemental? Is he on vacation or something?) but it's still pretty freaking good. So that does up my view of the game.


Anyway, that's just some thoughts on it. And it really is fascinating to me to spot differing viewpoints on the same thing, when it comes to aspects of game design and even presentation. I could talk about that stuff all day, much to everyone's dismay.

Here's an interesting question though, just out of pure curiosity about a differing viewpoint: If Doom, the early games, gives you more of a "horror" vibe... what would you consider to be more of a "pure" action game? Any examples you can think of?

Pokemon Go. I don't hate it exactly, but I see it as a missed opportunity to create something awesome. It could have integrated many familiar mechanics from the handheld games, combined with something like "mobile 2 mobile battles/trading". Also not handing the project to some unknown entity like Niantic would have been a massive plus too!

Despite his proficiency in combat, your character lacks the agency to protect himself from that which is incorporeal. Like the overwhelming majority of survivors in the Doom universe, he too could just as easily succumb to demonic possession or suffer being transformed into a lost soul. His spinal column could literally rip itself out of his torso, and without any prior warning. All of the bullets, rockets, and plasma cells of the UAC would do zilch to prevent such a fate from befalling him. So, why is he (as well as a few other lone marines) allowed to advance when all of the pieces could easily be removed from the chessboard without such pageantry? Hence, my analogy of a cat tormenting a mouse. It is a game within a game, a cruel charade belying the truth...

Doom Guy is only allowed to remain at the party because he provides ample entertainment for his host.



Clearly, we each have a different conception of what constitutes horror. I do very much consider the original games to be functionally "pure" shooters, however I also recognize them as being thematically "horror" games. Need the two be mutually exclusive?

I've played enough of the new entry to know that it is ignorant of it's own rich history...oblivious to those first-person role-playing titles that inspired the creation of it's predecessors. In my eyes, it is nothing more than a misguided, facile and inferior product that reeks of fear, desperation and greed -- having been thrown together in haste by Id Software in an effort to appease their corporate masters; like most modern AAA titles, it was assembled by a committee and with too many cooks in the kitchen. Doom 64 may not have been as fast paced, but I consider that one to be a hell of a lot more palatable and evocative than what we were given earlier this year. (And I can play it for free.)

Though if it scratches an itch, more power to you I suppose.

But to answer your question, I can name off a fairly lengthy list of pure action games -- from past to present -- that I'd sooner waste my time playing. One example is Blood (1997), which features key elements lifted from Doom (undead and demonic hoards, monster closets, etc.) however lacking the aforementioned ubiquitous paranormal aspect (which carried over into Doom 3, mind you, in the form of disembodied laughter and other malicious taunting). It sports an original setting -- an alternate 1930s -- and it stars a colorful protagonist: a psychopathic, wisecracking undead gunslinger. It features what is perhaps the best weapons roster of any shooter ever made, providing the player with such lethal toys as a pitch fork, a flare gun, a double-barreled shotgun, a Tommy gun, a Tesla cannon, bundles of dynamite (including remote and proximity variants), an improvised flame thrower (consisting of a can of aerosol with a Zippo lighter), and even a voodoo doll. It has skirmishes in wildly imaginative levels, such as a train in motion (predating Soldier of Fortune by several years), a dark carnival (replete with attractions), and a haunted house ride that is located in the middle of a black forest. It has massive explosions, with ludicrous showers of blood and organs flying every which way. It is inspired, it has character, and it has a soul.

Overall, I can understand how a certain type of gamer could immerse him/herself in the functionality of a game. But I do not belong to that class; I require and I expect more, as a consumer and as a lover of the arts. It depresses me to see how far the industry has degraded as a whole since the 90s. There is no reverence anymore, because there is hardly anything to revere. Once upon a time, I could walk into a Babbages and spend literally an hour or more perusing shelves of promising, factory sealed computer games. Now...there is only Gamestop, which peddles people's unwanted console wares like a pawn shop. I wouldn't spend five minutes in there.

Every fps since is just a ripoff of that game, which I've played already. If I'm going to invest in a new game, I want a new game, not one that is repackaged and resold with new box art.