Entire combat loop: I am all for changing the combat a bit, but Eternal's combat is overdesigned and bloated with pointless mechanics that nobody asked for:
- Why add dashes? Nobody asked for them. What's worse, in order to balance things out, they reduced the player's movement speed. What was the point then? Also, they are on a cooldown.
- They added a super powerful Blood Punch, but nerfed the regular punch so much that it barely does any damage. Also, it's on a cooldown (i.e. to be precise, it requires 2 Glory Kills to fill).
- Flame Belch's (or Flame Puff as it should be called) one and only reason for existing is giving you Armor. The fire does not have any other effect on the enemies: they do not panic, they do not receive any debuff. I don't think they even receive any damage and if they do, it is so marginal, that it makes absolutely no difference. And it's on a cooldown.
- Ice Bomb. An actually cool addition. Pun intended. On a cooldown.
- Frag Grenade. Better than the one in Doom 2016, especially after upgrades. On a cooldown.
- Chainsaw is now required to spam, in order not to run dry after firing your gun a couple of times: this is due to the fact that bigger enemies (anything that is not pure cannon fodder) are much more spongy than in Doom 2016 and you can carry even less ammo than in that game. In Doom 2016 I used it more as a f*ck-this-demon-in-particular button and the ammo was a bonus. Here, you very rarely have the opportunity to do so, since you have to use it constantly to replenish ammo, which in turn causes you not to have enough fuel for the larger demons. Also, guess what: it recharges one pip of fuel i.e. it's on a cooldown.
See a pattern here? In order to be effective, you need to manage 6 (!) cooldowns as if it's an MMO. Doom 2016 had only one, since all the equipment items shared their cooldown.
Now, the entire combat cycle can be summed up like this:
1. Shoot at non cannon fodder demons
2. Run out of ammo after a minute
3. Run around looking for cannon fodder enemies, which die to a strong fart
4. Set them on fire, maybe freeze them (when desperate for health), chainsaw them
5. If you get damaged badly, skip to step 3.
Rinse and repeat. Add some Glory Kills during this cycle.
The combat loop changes a bit when the Marauder comes along:
1. Shoot at non cannon fodder demons while avoiding the Marauder
2. Run out of ammo after a minute while avoiding the Marauder
3. Run around looking for cannon fodder enemies while avoiding the Marauder
4. Set them on fire, maybe freeze them (when desperate for health), chainsaw them while avoiding the Marauder
5. If you get damaged badly, skip to step 3, while avoiding the Marauder
6. Once everything is dead aside from the Marauder, focus on him
7. Change your entire behavior that this, and the previous game, have taught you, by standing still and looking for a slight opening when the Marauder's eyes glow green, because this is a 1v1 fighting game now for some reason
8. Repeat step 7 until either of you is dead
Marauder's design is puzzling to me. As mentioned above, in order for you to be effective against him, you need to do everything opposite to what this series has taught you. Mind you, I'm not talking about the difficulty here: once you discover that you can use a quick SSG-Ballista-SSG combo on him, he stops being so intimidating. It's just he brings the entire pacing of the game to a screeching halt, more so than the platforming sections. You can't stay at long range because he throws axe slashes at you. You can't stay at close range because he shoots the SSG at you. You can't stay at midrange, the one designed to be his weakness, because he may still frigging use his ranged axe or SSG or spam you with wolves for no bloody reason. Oh, and you can't use any Super Weapon against him (unless you are lucky and he spazzes out), because people would just blow him away with a BFG, and rightly so. The designer's wanted to create a cool, challenging enemy, instead they created a personification of everything I dislike in this game. And therein lies the problem.
The fundamental issue with this game is the fact that it forces you play in a specific way. Previous games gave you the tools and said "go and have fun!". All guns were, more or less, effective. Yes, this ended up with a lot of people cheesing their way with the SSG and Gauss Cannon, but why prevent them from doing so? If they have fun doing it, why stop them? The devs wanted to prevent this behavior and changed their philosophy to "play exactly like we tell you to play or die". There is no experimentation, no fun discovery. You are literally told what to do against each enemy in a small tutorial screen. And if you fail to adhere to these instructions? Well, this is the reason that the bigger enemies are so damn bullet spongy when not fighting them the 'correct' way.
