This article is a review focused only on factors affecting DOOM: Eternal Gameplay (ex. graphics, combat, etc.) of DOOM: Eternal and not things such as the story of the game.
THE GOOD
The Singleplayer
The campaign in DOOM: Eternal is full of action, gore, and secrets waiting to be discovered. There are 13 missions that take you to a wide variety of locations overflowing with demons. Each mission takes place within a large playable area filled with combat encounters, gorgeous views, and plenty of hidden secrets.
The single player of this game is the reason to buy this game. There are plenty of collectibles to be discovered, ranging from weapon upgrades to music discs, scattered across every level. The time it takes for a player to complete this game depends entirely on how they play it.
After completing the story the single-player gains new options. Each mission has a discoverable cheat code that can be activated in any mission. Even with these on you’ll still earn XP towards the battlepass and you can still pick up collectibles.
The Weapons
In comparison to most other games, DOOM: Eternal does not have a wide variety of weaponry at your disposal with only eight guns being in the game. The devs make up for this with weapon mods. Nearly every weapon in the game has two different mods that will completely change how the gun works. It is up to players to take advantage of how useful a lot of these modifications are.
The weapons in this game are also very fun to use. There’s a good mix of old and new ideas, like the return of fan favorites which are completely changed with mods. No weapon (maybe besides the combat shotgun) feels useless, each weapon has an important role to play when you play through this game.
The Slayer Gates
Throughout the levels, there are six slayer gates that you can complete. Slayer Gates are this game’s horde mode. In order to complete one you must survive three waves of demons in a single area. While these encounters will not be much different than other encounters in the campaign, they are very fun and your reward for completing every Slayer Gate is certainly worth it.
The Demons
Obviously this game would not feel the same if it lacked it’s villains. One of the first things I noticed when I first started playing this game was how many more demons they had in comparison to the previous entry. In total, there are 27 different types of demons in the game that can be split up into four different categories.
The first category is fodder demons, which are what their name implies, cannon fodder. These demons are the most basic demons and pose the lowest threat to players. They’re also the best source of ammo as they make up most of the enemies that can be killed by a chainsaw with just one jerrycan.
The second category is heavy demons. Most of these demons can take a lot more damage and inflict a lot more damage than fodder demons. These demons also usually come with at least one weakpoint, so make sure to take advantage of this and take out as many weakpoints as you can.
The third category is augmented demons. These are the same demons that are in the previous two categories but have been upgraded with augmentations. These enemies are stronger than their regular counterparts and become more common as you progress further into the campaign.
The fourth category is super heavy demons. A lot of these demons are introduced as a bossfight and then can spawn in with waves of other demons in later missions. These demons are the toughest demons you’ll face (outside of boss battles) with large health pools, high damage output, and the ability to easily turn the tide against your favor.
The Boss fights
The Doom Hunter
The Doom Hunter was a beast created specifically to deal with the doom slayer. This boss encounter appears at the end of Mission 4 and is not a very hard boss fight. The best weapon to deal with him at first is the plasma rifle as it will take out his shield but once his shield is gone any weapon works.
The Doom Hunter is the least interesting boss in the game when compared to other boss fights, but it was not created to be such a force of Hell. The Doom Hunter is a boss fight once and then can reappear in later missions as they spawn in with the legions of Hell.
The Marauder
First appearing in level 6, the Marauder is very unrelenting and can prove to be the hardest bossfight in the game for some. Marauders once fought for the night sentinels until betraying their brethren to join the Khan Makyr, who resurrected these turncoats into marauders after they had fallen in battle. The Marauder also can spawn in what seems to be the spirit of a dog pretty often to harass the Doom Slayer.
The marauder was the longest boss fight for me as he killed me more than any other boss. I loathed every encounter with one after that, but the Marauder is probably my favorite boss fight in this game. His mechanics force players to be patient and wait for opportunities to damage him, outside of when you have rocket ammo. In a game where you usually have to just fire everything you have into a demon until it lights up blue and orange for a glory kill, the challenge and extra thinking you have to do when fighting a marauder has made it my favorite boss fight in this game.
The Gladiator
The Gladiator is a boss fight that you’ll encounter in level 8 and comes with two phases. In his first phase he is very defensive, which makes sense given his weapon is a shield, but in the second phase he will be much more aggressive and will require players to constantly be on their toes. The Gladiator is a pretty fun encounter in the game that feels unique enough from other demons to feel unique.
The Khan Makyr
The Khan Makyr is a main antagonist throughout the story of DOOM: Eternal and players will finally face her in her homeworld in level 12. In order to defeat her you have to damage her shield and then grapple up to her to punch her and then you repeat this about five times. While doing this she’ll cover certain areas of the stage with a damaging goo forcing players to avoid these areas.
This boss fight is nothing crazy but not a bad encounter. By the end of the encounter the best word to describe how it felt was tedious. Having to repeat the same mechanic six times while in between each time more enemies spawn in and more area is covered with goo to make the survivable area smaller. Like I previously stated, this is not an awful boss fight, but in comparison to other boss fights in this game the Khan Makyr encounter is just not memorable because of uninspired mechanics for what should be one of the hardest battles in the game
The Icon of Sin
The boss from DOOM II: Hell on Earth returns to also be the final boss in this game. This boss was the fallen son of a Night Sentinel, the Betrayer, who betrayed his people in return for the resurrection of his son. He got his wish, except his son had come back as a towering monstrosity that went on to decimate the Night Sentinel’s world. His entrance to Earth would have also ended with its eventual destruction, if not for the Doom Slayer.
The boss fight itself comes in two phases. The first phase is penetrating it’s armor while the second phase is killing the beast. This boss fight is entertaining and certainly feels like a final boss fight. While it does not feel as unique as the marauder was, it is still a great way to cap off the singleplayer of this game.
Graphics
Being the first game running on id Software’s newest engine iteration certainly helps this game look as gorgeous as it does. Endless fields of lava with destroyed buildings populating these fields have never looked so good on a Playstation. The demons and the gore also seem to have been improved from Doom 2016 whose graphics still hold up today. It can run up to 4k and 60fps on consoles and is also very well optimized for PC so that even a pretty cheap graphics card can run the game at 60fps and 1080p.
The biggest issue that I’ve seen people complain about is that this game looks more cartoony than its predecessor. This is most noticeable in the Super Gore Nest level which features a lot of areas covered in some demonic goo. While it certainly does look more cartoony, I believe that it adds to the experience. Doom 2016 was a very bland game when it came to colors and unique areas so the more cartoony vibe of some areas gives the game more life and variety.
Multiplayer
If you played DOOM 2016 you’ll probably remember it’s multiplayer feeling more like Call of Duty or Halo than DOOM. In this game the multiplayer seems like it is going to be much more unique. While there are more modes promised to come there is only one multiplayer mode in the game currently, Battlemode. This mode is 1v2 with a Doom Slayer having to win against two demons controlled by other players. This is a fun gamemode and is worth at least trying, but it is no game-changer when deciding whether or not this game would be worth it.
The future for the multiplayer does look good however. id Software will be releasing new game modes, aliens, and other content to give the game a longer lifespan. One new mode will be invasions, which if you’ve played Dark Souls you already know what these will entail. A player will be able to join in someone’s level and play as a demon that will attack the player along with the AI-controlled demons. This can be turned off by players who do not enjoy the sound of this, but for players that don’t this feature may end up creating some of the best moments they’ll have in this game.
The Bad
Platforming
The platforming in this game is in my opinion the worst part of the game. There will be times that you’ll jump to a ledge only to find out it’s out of bounds. There will be times you’ll miss a climbable wall or ledge and spend 10 minutes figuring out how to complete an area. There may be a lot of other issues you may encounter while platforming in this game.
The platforming in this game isn’t that bad, it’s just that just about every other mechanic in this game is very well made so it’s platforming sticks out like a sore thumb. In a game that has such fast-paced combat as DOOM: Eternal completely slowing down for platforming sections, which like previously stated can take a while if you can’t figure out how to get from A to B, can ruin the momentum of the level. The platforming should not be a reason to not buy this game, it is just something to be prepared to be frustrated with.
The Strange
The Battlepass System
The source of loot in this game is from it’s free battle pass. Playing campaign and multiplayer will earn XP towards this and you can also choose up to three people to add onto any XP they earn for their battle pass to also be earned for your’s. If the battlepass cost money I would have been very disappointed, but I can’t be disappointed over something that is free. I would certainly say that it feels out of place in a heavily single player game and that a challenge system may have worked better, but ultimately the battle pass system has no monetization and id Software shows no interest in gutting their fans wallets.
