DOOM Eternal - the sequel to the 2016 reboot - now with The Ancient Gods DLC

[Ash]

Damn I never knew that. I just assumed they shared a cooldown like throwables did in Doom 2016. guess I should have experimented but the game hands you all details on a platter including even how to beat bosses, so I was trained to not explore mechanics. Also that sounds pretty OP.

 

[Multidirectional]

I figured I'd use ice grenades in my second run and would prefer to deal flat damage over a strategic stun. In higher difficulties I can see the ice grenade being more important for breathing room. Also the frag has the upgrade for two grenades which the ice doesn't have if I recall. Lastly, the frag is good for shooting in caco's mouths as well as putting enemies in stagger state which the ice grenade doesn't directly do. I could be wrong about the relevance of this.

It's not just stun from ice grenade. It's the upgrade that makes frozen enemies drop health that's even more of a reason to use it in my opinion. Freeze several enemies at once, then flame belch them and launch some sticky bombs or other aoe damage - enjoy glorious health and armor rain. For cacos I'd just use sticky bombs or Ballista Arbalest mode.

 

[Silly Germans]

Finished super gore nest last night. I'm still amazed that as much as I love Doom 2016, I'm actually enjoying Eternal more. The platforming parts I thought would annoy me have been a complete non-issue, and the guns and demons feel even better than in 2016. I just about came when I got the chaingun, holy shit. Glad Multidirectional recommended starting on nightmare again, too. It feels really good, you still die quickly but you might have a little more grace period with health/armor than in 2016, and I've died a few times but nothing bad at all. Speaking of grace periods, I'd almost guarantee there's something in the demon AI to give you a grace period after you finish a glory kill now. Doing glory kills in nightmare in 2016 was risky since a demon would often nail your ass as soon as you finished, but I was going glory kill-heavy in Eternal on nightmare because I wanted to see the new animations at least, but I don't think I've been hit even ONCE getting out of a glory kill now. I assume they changed that since 2016 sort of discouraged it on high difficulty (Except for the last few stragglers when it was safe) while in Eternal they want you juggling weapon selection/chainsaw/blood punch/grenade/freeze/flamethrower/glory kill all the time.

Just because it's mandatory though, the minor bitching. As much as I like the way the chainsaw's handled in Eternal, I wish it had a little more granularity. All demons are either 1 fuel or 3 fuel to saw, wouldn't mind some of the more mid-tier demons taking 2 instead of 3 (Like arachnotrons, maybe snakes, etc). I'm also not getting as much of a kick out of the story as 2016. 2016's text-dumps were slightly amusing because the first couple tiers tended to be generic boring "UAC demon research" and then the last one would have some silly UAC cult nonsense going on. Eternal's text dumps have been played entirely straight from what I've seen. I don't mind the external camera cutscenes because you can skip them and I'm not heartbroken on losing first person perspective briefly, but like I was concerned about doomguy feels like he's taking things marginally more seriously, bowing to dumbass ghost kings or whatever. Really minor complaint since it's story in a fucking Doom game and I'm only briefly paying attention to it my first time through, but what was a slight positive in 2016 (With the notable exception of the robot man office chat) is a slight negative in Eternal. And one final thing, if you pick the centered weapon position, the assault rifle with the scope can sometimes swing up over your crosshair. Another minor thing but I'd like centered weapons but that one gun irritated me so much I switched 'em back.

Game's really fucking good. Hoping whatever DLC they put out for it is actually fucking decent mission packs and they don't cheap out on it.

I replayed Doom 2016 recently on nightmare and started Doom Eternal also on nightmare a few days ago. Id say its offers more of a
challenge. The enemies show more aggression and have pretty good aim. Doom 2016 was definitely slower where
Doom Eternal reminds me somewhat of Unreal Tournament and Quake 3. They managed to reproduce the arena
feeling pretty well. You have to keep moving and firing nonstop or you die. Some of the early challenge areas and
the first fight vs two Doom Hunters took me a bunch of tries.
I find that it gets a bit easier as you unlock more stuff but overall its still a good challenge and didn't become trivial
up to this point (i've progressed to the BFG10000 level so far).

 

[Average Manatee]

It's good to see so much emphasis on platforming. With the realism focus of the early 2000s, what was standard convention in the late 90s faded away. Then came the popamole era of the late 2000s and not an action game let alone shooter in sight had platforming, or if it did it was brainless automated shit like batman and assassins creed. Lately platforming in action games has made a minor comeback and I want to see it continue.

I do like the platforming too. Its quite generous in how late you can jump without falling off ledges and in how early you can jump and still reach the target. Anyone who can't succeed at 90% of the jumps first try is basically retarded.

It's an extremely simplistic combat loop. Dash every 0.75 seconds while jumping and grapple hooking around till you are at max armor/ammo. Pull out rocket launcher and lock on, fire 1-3 bursts depending on what you are fighting, repeat. Sometimes replace with precision rifle/ballista swap or chaingun turret depending on situation. Use freeze grenades to create openings or recover health. That's basically the whole game from the start of level 4.

Super shotgun was one of my least-used weapons which I think contributed to my enjoyment of the game, The grapple giving you free armor did seem terribly stupid. Though to be fair you are more likely to be hit when grappling I found. I also barely touched ice grenades.

Since you mention "replaying higher difficulties", I presume you at the least didn't play on Nightmare. I'd recommend Nightmare Extra lives mode. It feels pretty good and adds a good amount of tension, but I also think you'll quickly change your opinion on the super shotgun and ice grenade. For super shotgun you only really target enemies you know you'll kill with the shot so that you don't dead stop on their face and instead can kind of continue your forward momentum.

Speaking of grace periods, I'd almost guarantee there's something in the demon AI to give you a grace period after you finish a glory kill now. Doing glory kills in nightmare in 2016 was risky since a demon would often nail your ass as soon as you finished, but I was going glory kill-heavy in Eternal on nightmare because I wanted to see the new animations at least, but I don't think I've been hit even ONCE getting out of a glory kill now. I assume they changed that since 2016 sort of discouraged it on high difficulty (Except for the last few stragglers when it was safe) while in Eternal they want you juggling weapon selection/chainsaw/blood punch/grenade/freeze/flamethrower/glory kill all the time.

I'm like 90% sure the AI completely loses track of you as a target while in a glory kill. If they are already in an attack animation they'll finish it but they don't start new attacks. Which is part of why I like glory kill distance and run speed runes rather than glory kill execution speed.

Yep, ice grenades don't get a second shot like frag. One thing to note though is that frag grenades and ice nades are on separate cooldowns even though you have to swap them, so if your brain can handle it (Tricky on nightmare with all the shit going on) you can be using both. Ice nades are also really useful for those fucking snakes and purple bastards.

Yeah, DoomE really incentivizes figuring out a good control scheme to be able to do all your actions consistently. I ended up moving grenade back to ctrl and grenade swap to alt.

I figured I'd use ice grenades in my second run and would prefer to deal flat damage over a strategic stun. In higher difficulties I can see the ice grenade being more important for breathing room. Also the frag has the upgrade for two grenades which the ice doesn't have if I recall. Lastly, the frag is good for shooting in caco's mouths as well as putting enemies in stagger state which the ice grenade doesn't directly do. I could be wrong about the relevance of this.

It's not just stun from ice grenade. It's the upgrade that makes frozen enemies drop health that's even more of a reason to use it in my opinion. Freeze several enemies at once, then flame belch them and launch some sticky bombs or other aoe damage - enjoy glorious health and armor rain. For cacos I'd just use sticky bombs or Ballista Arbalest mode.

Plus, the grenade itself triggers the "kill stuff with or affected by equipment to make equipment recharge faster" rune. I believe the effect of this rune is universal and stacking, e.g. if you kill a bunch of shit that is frozen it also recharges your flamer and frag a bit, and if you kill a bunch of shit with frags that is also on fire and frozen its almost an instant recharge of everything you just used. Which is silly powerful. Not sure if it works on chainsaw, haven't really paid attention.

Heh, I never found much use for it. I preferred to spend that ammo on Micro Missiles.

Pretty sure you just got lucky, I've died right after Glory Kill quite a few times on Nightmare.

The chaingun seems to absolutely shred everything I've thrown at it so far. Went the mobile turret route since it was my baby in 2016 too, and it's become arguably my favorite "Oh shit" get out of trouble gun. On a similar note, the Eternal rocket launcher is obscenely good. Almost feels stronger than the Doom 1 and 2 rocket launcher and that was already pretty fucking beefy.

Chaingun is pretty good as a weapon but I'm fairly certain that swapping between the the rifle's sniper shot and standard ballista shot and back is superior in DPS. Plus you're spreading your ammo consumption out. Though chaingun is probably still the best for the enemies that are weak against it, it staggers those guys insanely well.

 

[Ash]

Since you mention "replaying higher difficulties", I presume you at the least didn't play on Nightmare. I'd recommend Nightmare Extra lives mode. It feels pretty good and adds a good amount of tension, but I also think you'll quickly change your opinion on the super shotgun and ice grenade. For super shotgun you only really target enemies you know you'll kill with the shot so that you don't dead stop on their face and instead can kind of continue your forward momentum.

Upon looking again at the two highest difficulties I must say I'm disappointed. Iron man or Iron man with lives. No fucking middle ground. Why not if you lose all lives you back to the start of the level? Why must modern dev's idea of hardcore difficulty always be iron man? I have no interested in starting a 14 hour game over from scratch as punishment for failure. The game's not that good to warrant it. Why couldn't we have both modes, iron man and start the level over if you lose lives? Trivial to implement if there's already iron man in.

Iron man doesn't work for me in games like this. It works in rogue-likes because heavily randomised elements make each playthrough fresh-ish. It works in old school side scrollers and such because they were typically two-three hour long games, and even then it could sometimes be a bit harsh.

goddamn it Nu id. Guess Nightmare will have to be my peak when I replay this in a few years, even though it seems to do barely anything different to UV.

 

[throwaway69420]

I finished the game on Nightmare a week ago. I didn't like getting stuck on random shit on the environment because that meant you were probably going to die in the next .5 seconds. I didn't like the super shotgun blatantly not registering hits on 1/3 of shots, or how you needed the mastery upgrade to even bother using it in the first place. Plasma rifle kinda sucked dick as well as the AR basic fire, sniper was all it was good for and plasma rifle was only really used when I was out of ammo for everything else. Arbalest or whatever was kinda cool for ammodumping plasma ammo, minigun was excellent when using the turret mod. Wish there was a secondary rocket ammo weapon, maybe something like a missile launcher (opposed to rocket launcher) where for two rocket ammo you fire a much faster moving projectile with a bigger explosive radius and more damage. That would have been fun. The tri-rocket mod was okay for burst damage against nuisance monsters. BFG was excellent in its role, unmakyr I never actually used even though I was excited to finally unlock it. Crucible sword was fun to let loose with against cyberdemons. I never used the flamethrower because it just exposes you for too long to the point where any armor you'd pick up is drained from the hits you take getting it to drop off burning mobs. I never tactically used the grenades, just spammed them when I remembered they existed. I really enjoyed double jump and double-dash.

Marauders kinda sucked dick because their sweet spot was so precise. You kinda just have to let them wail on you until they move themselves into the sweet spot because trying to set it up yourself is just completely luck-based. Final Sin/Icon of Sin sucked a bunch of dicks, it was monotonous and took way too long. It was not hard at all although a friend told me people online were complaining that it was. It was just an endurance/attention-span test once you realized the important things like crucible recharges respawned. I was hoping it would be an homage to the original games and you'd just need to lob a rocket at some demonic face. FUCK the respawning trash mobs. I know why they did it, so you can chainsaw them to get more ammo to fight the heavy/super-heavy monsters, but once I realized they spawn infinitely until the big monsters are killed, I just ignored them unless I was charging a blood punch to use on the fat fucks with two cannons (who are also cancer to fight with their massive damage AoE on close-combat.) Pinky backside hitboxes were a little wonky but with good aim it's not a true problem.

Overall it was enjoyable for a single playthrough and gave a satisfying challenge, though I doubt I'll play it again. It also had obnoxious new game design problems that could have been avoided, but I can tell the game was made by a bunch of soy chuggers trying really hard to fight their own instinct to shit up the game with their faggotry, so like a weightlifting father says to his emasculated son going for a jog for the first time in years, I will say, "Good job."

 

[Ash]

I never used the flamethrower because it just exposes you for too long to the point where any armor you'd pick up is drained from the hits you take getting it to drop off burning mobs.

The flamethrower can be used simulataneously with any other action that isn't your shoulder mount. For example, you can spam it while spraying with the chaingun portable turret mod, or use it with the SSG grapple before you get the fire mastery. Grapple, as you draw close unleash the flames and shoot .1 second after, simply for the purpose of armor management. There is no good reason not to use it except to self-impose difficulty on yourself.

My favorite was to always spam it on anything I am approaching to chainsaw or glorify so that I get armor alongside health and/or ammo, or to combo it with high damage AOE attacks like frag grenades.

I am honestly surprised you beat the game on Nightmare without flamethrower use, but I suppose you just spammed glory kills or the SSG fire grapple instead.

You kinda just have to let them wail on you until they move themselves into the sweet spot because trying to set it up yourself is just completely luck-based.

Wail on you? No, you keep at mid range and dash-dodge that shit.

Also, something I've not seen anyone mention: with the rocket launcher and frag grenades you can wail on marauders. Remote detonate rockets behind him, and spam grenades for good measure. If you consistently get him you can take off a good chunk of his health this way while he is just sitting there with his shield up most of the time.

Agreed on the rifle being a bit shit aside from the sniper capability (or micro missiles), but the plasma rifle is actually pretty good with the heat blast mod. shoot the crap out of everything (and don't forget to aim for the head/weak points from time to time), and let loose a devastating heat blast when things get close.
It's a shame the plasma rifle looks way cooler with the microwave mod on it, cause that mod is pretty shit (locks you in place and takes ages to actually kill anything beyond fodder class).

Another problem I have with this game is most alt fire modes taking primary fire ammo. Why ever use combat shotgun primary fire when you have sticky bombs or autofire? this was a problem with D4's combat shotgun but that game had a reasonable cooldown on the sticky bombs, at least before you get the upgrades. To me at least, sticky bombs should have been alt ammo. Most other guns sharing ammo is fine but it's definitely noticeably bad on the shotgun.
the only time I used shotgun primary was when waiting for the relatively quick reload on the sticky bombs, or if something weak was right in my face. Even then I didn't want to waste a shot cause sticky bombs are just that much more powerful and you only have 18 shells.

 

[Durandal]

Another problem I have with this game is most alt fire modes taking primary fire ammo. Why ever use combat shotgun primary fire when you have sticky bombs or autofire? this was a problem with D4's combat shotgun but that game had a reasonable cooldown on the sticky bombs, at least before you get the upgrades. To me at least, sticky bombs should have been alt ammo. Most other guns sharing ammo is fine but it's definitely noticeably bad on the shotgun.
the only time I used shotgun primary was when waiting for the relatively quick reload on the sticky bombs, or if something weak was right in my face. Even then I didn't want to waste a shot cause sticky bombs are just that much more powerful and you only have 18 shells.

I think the game could have gotten away by having the shotgun primary fire (and possibly the assault rifle primary fire) not cost any ammo at all, what with how little you use them (I only ever used them for setting up staggers on fodder demons for Glory Kills). That way there'd at least be some use to them as an infinite-ammo fallback weapon, one that isn't as shitty as 2016's Pistol.

 

[Average Manatee]

Plasma rifle's heat blast is good enough that I would just shoot at walls to charge it up before fights as a panic button, and its primary fire is the best way to quickly chew through enemy health while ensuring you don't overkill past putting them in the glory kill state. Assault Rifle and Shotgun are pretty trash on their primaries though. There's also fairly little reason to use the minigun's primary fire when turret is everything but better.

Upon looking again at the two highest difficulties I must say I'm disappointed. Iron man or Iron man with lives. No fucking middle ground. Why not if you lose all lives you back to the start of the level? Why must modern dev's idea of hardcore difficulty always be iron man? I have no interested in starting a 14 hour game over from scratch as punishment for failure. The game's not that good to warrant it. Why couldn't we have both modes, iron man and start the level over if you lose lives? Trivial to implement if there's already iron man in.

The game is more like 5-6 hours if you know what you are doing and skipping cutscenes. You also get a half dozen lives per level and most of the actual risk is in the first hour of the game.

I think that if you do restart level on extra lives mode that you'll restart with the same number of lives you started with.

 

[Sodafish]

Got a new graphics card (RTX 2070 Super) as my GTX 970 was getting very long in the tooth. Been playing this a bit. Very well optimised. Playing in 4K and with everything maxed out (except motion blur and chromatic aberration, because fuck that shit), and it's smooth as butter.

Very early in the game yet, but initial signs are promising. Definitely seems more challenging than 2016.

 

[DalekFlay]

Got a new graphics card (RTX 2070 Super) as my GTX 970 was getting very long in the tooth. Been playing this a bit. Very well optimised. Playing in 4K and with everything maxed out (except motion blur and chromatic aberration, because fuck that shit), and it's smooth as butter.

Assuming you mean 60fps, it's not smooth as butter.

 

[Sodafish]

Got a new graphics card (RTX 2070 Super) as my GTX 970 was getting very long in the tooth. Been playing this a bit. Very well optimised. Playing in 4K and with everything maxed out (except motion blur and chromatic aberration, because fuck that shit), and it's smooth as butter.

Assuming you mean 60fps, it's not smooth as butter.

Not measured the FPS. Whatever it is it's more than enough, as I have not experienced a single moment of lag or jitter.

 

[Multidirectional]

I hate faggots who have to drop in and tell people how 60 FPS isn't enough. Keep in mind this nigger couldn't even finish game on UV with his mega awesome framerate, while I finished on Nightmare at 60 FPS.

 

[DalekFlay]

I hate faggots who have to drop in and tell people how 60 FPS isn't enough. Keep in mind this nigger couldn't even finish game on UV with his mega awesome framerate, while I finished on Nightmare at 60 FPS.

Jesus, what a thing to get so angrily butthurt over. Smug emoji = playful, you sensitive fuck.

Anyway... I turned it down because I didn't enjoy the game much, had nothing to do with framerate or challenge. I don't play games on hard unless I really enjoy them. 144hz is something that once you experience for a while you realize is a massive improvement, but until you do you probably think is dumb and overrated. You'll see someday.

 

[Multidirectional]

144hz is something that once you experience for a while you realize is a massive improvement, but until you do you probably think is dumb and overrated. You'll see someday.

Not saying it isn't an improvement. It's "my toys are better than yours so I gotta tell you yours aren't enough" behavior that makes you a fag. I'll make you a sweet deal - you buy me a 144hz monitor and a GPU to support it and I'll agree with you. Alternatively - shut the fuck up about it.

 

[DalekFlay]

Not saying it isn't an improvement. It's "my toys are better than yours so I gotta tell you yours aren't enough" behavior that makes you a fag. I'll make you a sweet deal - you buy me a 144hz monitor and a GPU to support it and I'll agree with you. Alternatively - shut the fuck up about it.

Dude, my rig is pretty midrange and 144hz monitors are extremely common and cheap nowadays. I'm not trying to brag, I don't have a 2080ti or an HDR display. I'm just spreading the word of how good 144hz is, in a typically playful Codex way. Too many are prioritizing 4k instead, and I'm a preacher in the cornfields telling the people what's really important. That's my angle, so stop being so quick to butthurt.

 

[Multidirectional]

144hz monitors are extremely common and cheap nowadays.

So you're buying them for all us then, that's nice of you.
You don't have to tell me higher refresh is better than higher res, it's exactly what I'm going for with my next monitor in a not very close future, while most likely staying at 1080p.

 

[DalekFlay]

So you're buying them for all us then, that's nice of you.

If I could I would, like the missionaries bringing water and rice to the poor Africans.

 

[Sodafish]

I'll keep my 4k 10-bit wide gamut colour accurate monitor, thanks. When it comes to displays I have larger concerns than gaming.

 

[Melcar]

The only "cheap" +144hz monitors are shit 1080p TN displays.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Why when I jump on the monsters there are no coins going out?

 

[abija]

The only "cheap" +144hz monitors are shit 1080p TN displays.

Cheap IPS or VA are usually garbage anyway so what's your point?

 

[Wunderbar]

DOOM Eternal’s officially released soundtrack is a poorly mixed mess that composer Mick Gordon barely had a hand in

DOOM Eternal may rip and tear through your eyeballs until the deed is done, but the audio part of this gore-heavy package is an unstoppable train of face-melting heavy metal and the tastiest of guitar licks. A dynamic explosion of sound that does DOOM 2016 proud, composer Mick “I own your eardrums now” Gordon’s medley of mayhem is one for the ages.

At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if you were armed with a Zippo lighter, had grown your hair out and were ready to hop into a mosh pit to rock out to the tune of super shotguns and instagibs that DOOM Eternal created between ever sick beat. Which you can do right now! Collector’s Edition owners of the amazing sequel can grab it for a solid listen.

But it’s not the best version of the soundtrack that it deserves to be. While it definitely sounds fine on a first listen, something seems to be…off. There’s a certain layer of polish not present, a clash of instruments competing for spotlight space like early 2000’s nu-metal band members attempting to outdo each other in the recording studio. There’s a reason for that: None of those submitted tracks were mixed by Gordon.

ACDCGuy went into detail of just how poorly mixed the majority of the DOOM Eternal tracks are, highlighting the lack of dynamic range and the lack of harmony overall: "Now maybe you’re unfamiliar with audio mixing , & you’re thinking “okay there’s clearly a visual difference, but how does that translate to what I’m hearing?” Basically when there’s more definition in the wavelengths, there’s greater dynamic range between the instruments. In the case of music, dynamic range gives instruments more “breathing room” so-to-speak. While there are exceptions, in most cases you don’t want instruments to compete with each other for dominance. You want them to harmonize together to create new & interesting sounds."

The gist of all this, is that the compression has resulted in every instrument playing at the same level of volume creating a crowded audio space, like real estate in Hong Kong. You’ve got a soundtrack that is essentially fighting aainst itself, instead of working with each unique sound to create a total package of savage awesomeness. Even worse? This may be the last time that Gordon ever works with Bethesda.

It’s a damn shame. DOOM Eternal’s soundtrack in all of its uncompressed glory is a work of art. Heavy metal magic that pushes your heart rate up and makes you sweat bullets as you weave a bloody path through the hordes of hell, Gordon’s work perfectly complements one of the best games of the year. It’s a soundtrack which deserves better. Remix and remaster until it is done, Bethesda.

 

[abija]

Why would they bother mixing it better when this version already gets praises like the starting paragraphs...

 

[Wunderbar]

Gordon says that one of the initial conditions for his working on the Doom soundtrack was that it shouldn’t feature heavy metal. The fear was that it was turn out “corny” and detract from “the visceral experience” that developer id Software wanted. “So we started for about six to nine months doing just synthesisers,” says Gordon, “and then after a while, I started going, ‘you know what, guys… if we can add five percent guitar in here, everybody will love it.”

So it's actually Id's fault that NuDoom's music is mostly electronic screeching, not Gordon's. Interesting.