I love Doom 2, it’s one of my favorite shooters in part to it’s modding community. The official episodes are all fine and dandy, but some of the megawads people have made in the past truly elevate the game to a whole new level. Case in point, Eviternity 2 is absolutely amazing.
I enjoy the flow of the new Doom Eternal, once you get the hang of it you can keep an infinite supply of health and ammo that only runs out when everything’s dead - and you end up taking on much more than you thought possible.
However the jaw-dropping, frightening game that Doom was in 1993 will never be recaptured. Yes, scary games existed. Yes, 3D FPS existed. But nothing came close to Doom, it was a graphical marvel. I’d show it to friends, grandparents, anyone who’d look and they’d all either be amazed or reach for the bible. Their idea of video games was mario, Doom broke brains.
Doom 2 is what I played most. At the time, playing over a local BBS with my 28k modem (the fastest available!), I could see that network play was the future of gaming.
The original DOOM game was the first game I played with a friend where our PCs were connected together. It was a riot, especially when wearing headphones and hearing growls from behind you. I know modern tech has improved exponentially and graphics are unbelievable. But at the end of the day, it’s the experience that counts. And experiencing a multiplayer game for the first time like that, hasn’t been beaten yet, for me.
Same here. My folks caved and bought a second phone line for computing, however it didn’t help. My friend & I would use the first phone line for voice communication :)
The phone pressed to my ear with my shoulder, yelling to my buddy while fighting off cacademons, such good times.
After their initial boss fights in the original games, taking them on becomes more or less difficult depending on terrain. With smaller corridors the cyberdemon is more difficult due to his rocket splash damage, whereas out in the open the mastermind is harder bc you can’t avoid her hitscan chaingun.
It’s perhaps why Sigil 2’s M8 was so weird - these “rules” of Cyber or Mastermind usage have been known for a long time, and E6M8’s implementation just pisses over the rulebook and burns it in the corner.
It’s like Doom II’s Gotcha… but for primary school.
Honestly friend, I would give Sigil 2 a bash first. I’m sorry if I’ve spoiled it, but deffo give it the 90mins it takes to rattle through the episode before you YouTube it. It’s good fun all told!
My brother and I replayed a demo from a floppy over and over as kids,Doom 2016 is my favorite entry! If it had some of the combat changes from Eternal it would be a perfect game imo
I have a huge collection of Doom games and merch - I’m a big id fan and bigger Romero fan.
First thing people should do with an interest of the series is get a copy of Masters of Doom by David Kushner, absolutely brilliant read.
Next, subscribe to some awesome Doomtubers like Zero Master, Civvie11, decino, and Coincident. Zero Master’s stuff is generally commentary free but absolutely unbelievable, CV11’s stuff is hilarious, decino explains the mechanics very well, and Coincident puts it all together in one facerocketing package.
My only real claim to fame was writing the first FAQ for a Doom expansion, but it’s nice to have contributed back to the community.
I bought an Xbox 360 when I found out Doom was being re-released for it - I was already thinking about it when Alan Wake came out, but took a day off work and hooned Doom when it came out on the then-XBLA. I never really bothered with the Xbox One or Series S in the house either… until the Unity port came out. It’s a system seller for me.
It’s the game I’d take on a desert island with me - partly because the feel of the game is just perfect to me, but you’d never get bored with the endless WADS for them - particularly when you use limit-removing ports.
DooM 2 is my nostalgic fave. My area code had multiple free 20+ line BBSes, so I was constantly playing 4 player doom matches(more on heretic/hexen/descent etc).
Honorable mention for the new Doom and Doom eternal.
My current favorite doom though is doom seeker and zandronum. Keeping the dream alive with crazy mods. Megaman deathmatch and shotgun frenzy are a delight.
I’ve played the classics, 3, 2016, and Eternal, and honestly 2016 is my favorite. Eternal was good, but I felt that 2016 was a lot more straightforward with it’s combat loop. I found it easier to loose myself in the shooter trance. I never felt like that in Eternal.
Outlier in that my favorite was doom 1. Probably its second episode was my favorite, but they’re all good.
The graphics at the time were amazing. The skyboxes for some reason really made an impression on me. There’s like green mountains in the background of episode 1 I think. As a kid I used to think about exploring them.
The first time I beat the third episode without cheats, I finished off the spider mastermind with exactly 1% health left. Memorable as shit. (I think the game might do the thing where the last few percents of health count more, so it feels exciting when you just barely hang on. If so, it worked.)
I remember thinking my older cousin was so cool because he could clear all the levels without cheats.
Playing it now with mouse look and wasd it’s a much easier game, but back then as a child with keyboard only it was daunting.
Doom2’s level design had more confusing and frustrating parts for me. Also I didn’t get a copy of it until several years later, so it didn’t have the full magic of youth.
Doom 3 I don’t remember very well. I liked it but it didn’t have staying power.
I didn’t finish the new dooms. They’re fine but I never really clicked with them.
The sound design is half the reason why Doom was so good, and why Doom II is better - going up point blank to a tanky enemy with the super shotgun and making every shot count is borderline orgasmic - second only to beserk-punching an Imp into gibs while still moving forward, beautiful.
Doom 1 is the one that will always hold a place in my heart. The family PC back then only ran at 25MHz and Doom required 33 so my Dad would bring his work laptop home for me to play on. No headphones but it didn’t matter, it was such an impactful experience for me as a kid and I’ll always remember it fondly.
I got to meet Jon Romero a few years back too - they say you shouldn’t meet your heroes but he is definitely an exception. Super nice dude and he blocked out a full hour on his calendar to just chat with me.
It’s one of the most important game franchises of all time and I’m really glad that I experienced the original when it was new (well, I was a bit late to it, but time moved slower then), and at a time when it had a formative effect on my life.
I was playing Doom 1/2 when I was 10-12 years old, at friends houses who had the right computer OS+specs to run it. I wouldn’t say it was solely responsible for setting me on the path towards other adjacent media like horror movies, metal/punk music, etc but it was definitely an important stepping stone along the way.
That said, I didn’t spend too much time with it compared to other games. I was never very good at it, preferring instead to watch my friends play since they’d had more practice time. Over time we gravitated towards newer games, and my time with Doom was over for a while. (I was disappointed by Doom 3’s gameplay, possibly exacerbated once again by my computer being underpowered for the technical requirements to enjoy it)
Fast forward to 2020 and we’re all in pandemic lockdown. So I fired up my ps4 and went looking for some “comfort games” to play - old stuff that I knew I’d enjoy and wouldn’t break the bank. Sure enough, I found a cheap Doom bundle: Doom 1, 2, 2016, and Eternal. We’re back, baby!
I ended up beating the original gen and their available Unity port WADs (e.g. BTSX) on Ultra Violence, beat 2016 and Eternal on Nightmare (no ultra nightmare for me, though I did put in some honest attempts). And Ultra Violence for the Eternal DLCs also. I still will pop on Eternal for some casual slaughter - I really love the dynamic combat.
Along the way I got interested in some Doomtubers as well- Zero Master to see, well, the master; but most importantly Decino who I still am playing catch-up with trying to get through all his content. My wife sees me watching his vids sometimes and “can’t believe you’re still watching Doom”.
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