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The New DOOM Thread (2016)

shihonage

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Nope.
If I had just one sentence to describe the essence of a well designed large enemy encounter in SS then it would be: a high number of decisions the player has to make in a unit of time in a constantly changing environment.
It's achieved by:
- giving the player weapons with different strengths and weaknesses;
- throwing at the player hordes of enemies (preferably from various directions) of various types that require different weapons to kill them most effectively;
- a relatively large open space (preferably with few or no obstructions and places to hide).
Those elements create a CONSTANTLY changing scenario where you are forced to be aware of everything that happens around you and to CONSTANTLY make decisions about which weapon to use in the current moment and how to dodge, based on what kind of enemies you are facing, how they are located, what weapons you have, how much ammo, how much health, how powerups are located around the arena etc.
[...]
And the fun in SS is not supposed to come from exploring the level while feeling a sense of dread or suspense and fighting small groups or individual enemies that are baring your way. The real fun comes from those tens and hundreds of small decisions that you make during a single large encounter. The more decisions (up to a point) you have to make in a unit of time, the more the fun.

Yeah except the Doom 2 design is inclusive of all this, and a lot more. That's the superiority that you get with actual level design - you can make areas with large arenas where all hell breaks loose, without straitjacketing the player into the boring experience of doing this for the entirety of the game.

What are we arguing about, again? If you're trying to say "Serious Sam is as good as Doom but just different", then, well, you can't.
 
Self-Ejected

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-Why the game doesn't have the hellish moments and hordes from the older dooms and wads? Serious sam 3 had a detailed graphics and genuinelly apocaliptycal moments with hordes of creatures at the same time
To be able to market it as a 1080p 60FPS title on consoles.

And it can't even stick to that for the entire game, it dinamically lowers resolution to keep frame rate stable on certain sections.
 
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sullynathan

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-Why the game doesn't have the hellish moments and hordes from the older dooms and wads? Serious Sam 3 had a detailed graphics and genuinely apocalyptic moments with hordes of creatures at the same time
To be able to market it as a 1080p 60FPS title on consoles.

And it can't even stick to that for the entire game, it dynamically lowers resolution to keep frame rate stable on certain sections.
The digital foundry video shows that the PS4 version doesn't drop from 60 much (it drops to like 56) and the 1080p is stable.
 

lightbane

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I believe someone here boss battles were reminiscent of Metroid Prime's. Well, it seems they were right:



Gotta say, the Cyberdemon's new design is still ridiculous. Even Doom 3's Mecha-Balrog was better.
 

Unkillable Cat

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Cyberdemon's infamous stomping sound is gone, and now he's a generic boss fight with attack/defense patterns that need to be figured out. In fact, ALL the boss battles are like that.

This is a huge departure from the original Doom, and not helping D44M at all.

As for all the 'reviews' that are popping up everywhere - keep in mind that far too many YouTubers are being paid to review the game. Standard Bethesda marketing procedure, get as many shills and plants to do their work as possible.
 

UserNamer

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stuff about doom and serious sam

serious sam stands on his own merits even if it doesn't have the same level structure as dooms.


The arena criticism is blown out of proportion, considering how big they are most of the time and how seamlessly they are integrated one with the next ( for the most part). Maybe you are fixating on the first encounter - which is my least favourite, excluding serious sam 2- or the worst parts of second encounter (like the stupid as shit frog rooms).

I love doom and played a shitload of wads but serious sam (Bfe and tse) are probably even more engaging and fun action games, even if the dooms had a more articulate level layout.[/
 

shihonage

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serious sam stands on his own merits even if it doesn't have the same level structure as dooms.

The arena criticism is blown out of proportion, considering how big they are most of the time and how seamlessly they are integrated one with the next ( for the most part). Maybe you are fixating on the first encounter - which is my least favourite, excluding serious sam 2- or the worst parts of second encounter (like the stupid as shit frog rooms).

I love doom and played a shitload of wads but serious sam (Bfe and tse) are probably even more engaging and fun action games, even if the dooms had a more articulate level layout.[/

People like you are why we can't have nice things.
 

Angthoron

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serious sam stands on his own merits even if it doesn't have the same level structure as dooms.

The arena criticism is blown out of proportion, considering how big they are most of the time and how seamlessly they are integrated one with the next ( for the most part). Maybe you are fixating on the first encounter - which is my least favourite, excluding serious sam 2- or the worst parts of second encounter (like the stupid as shit frog rooms).

I love doom and played a shitload of wads but serious sam (Bfe and tse) are probably even more engaging and fun action games, even if the dooms had a more articulate level layout.[/

People like you are why we can't have nice things.
You're arguing about this as though Serious Sam and Painkiller influenced several generations of FPS games.

Except oh, they didn't. They're a pretty niche subset of the genre.

Only actual problem with S3/Painkiller design is that for some retarded reason DOOM apes that direction rather than does what DOOM was, well, supposed to actually ape in the first place. Coincidentally it's also what makes it a game not worth picking up, because if you wanted an arena room shooter, you could just get S3, nu-RoTT, HR or nu-SW instead and they'd be cheaper and better because teams working on those specifically worked on arena room shooters instead of on recreating Doom.

Fun part is, I actually don't think the designers took these games as an influence and just half-assed encounter design instead. Kinda like OH YEAH DOOM HAD LOTS OF MONSTERS IN ROOMS and OH YEAH DOOM 3 HAD MONSTERS WARPING IN BEHIND YOUR BACK!!! LET'S PUT THESE FEATURES TOGETHER IT WILL BE GREAT.
 

shihonage

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My point was, and remains, simple. "Shoving a bunch of monsters in a big empty room or open space and then locking it until player kills them" insults the very concept of "design", and any FPS that uses this so-called "design", is shit.

This includes D44M.
 

Doktor Best

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Except Doom 4 blows all those Serious Sams out of the water in regards of graphics, gunplay, enemy design and leveldesign. By far.

If you learn to accept that it is no direct spiritual successor for Doom despite being marketed as such it is a damn good hybrid of classic fps and arenashooters, and by far the best FPS to come out in years. My only complain is overemphasize on finishing moves (though you can atleast turn off the chromatic effect when they are dazed) and that it could be a tad bit faster.

I can get why people repulse the game. They wanted oldschool Doom, Bethesda PR promised them oldschool Doom, ID didnt give them oldschool Doom. I just came in with different expectations.

My point was, and remains, simple. "Shoving a bunch of monsters in a big empty room or open space and then locking it until player kills them" insults the very concept of "design", and any FPS that uses this so-called "design", is shit.

This includes D44M.

Original Doom hat a pretty similar concept though since slaughter maps were a thing since Doom1 Episode 1. The difference was that those were self contained maps and you could simply run through them, yet the highscore system punished you for that.

Also, please define empty rooms, so far i didnt run into any of those in D44M.
 
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Doktor Best

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Are you sure? I found D3 gunplay (and by extension, gameplay) pretty abysmal. Weapons felt dull, sounded dull, and were horribly paced in the early game, which contributed to the game feeling even more dull than it should've been.

Ah i should drink more coffee before posting, i meant Doom 4 gunplay ofcourse.

Doom 3 was a mediocre game and a much much bigger deviation from the original games. It had impressive graphics though and i remember liked playing it back then for that particular reason. I was young, i had a new gpu, i was a graphics whore.
 

Ermm

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Well, at least for me, Doom 3 always felt like an old school FPS, but with survival horror elements.
It was kinda/sorta survival horror-ish up until you reach hell, or at least shortly before (I last played the game like 8 years ago). Then it's like ID stopped all the pretense, the story threads started to dissipate, and it was just an oldscool shooter which dropped the horror elements almost altogether. Resurrection of Evil's expansion pack was pretty damn sweet, and a definite improvement over Doom 3.

Still, I believe that Doom 3 took itself a little bit too seriously, should have been more tongue in cheek. And the fact that zombies didnt have shotguns (maybe they did have them later in the game, as I said, played it a while ago). And the fact that the starting handgun looked more like a retrofuturistic flintlock.

Also, next game hell on earth plz.
 
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Durandal

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My team has the sexiest and deadliest waifus you can recruit.
Serious Sam is more like a tower defense game where you have to deal with all the shit thrown at you before it gets out of control, as the arsenal in SS is largely situational, which might come at the expense of using weapons because they are fun to use
I don't think people give Serious Sam's level design enough credit just because the levels don't have any layouts most of the time, level design also consists of enemy placement, enemy types used and enemy amounts. Although it's hard to notice any proper enemy placement when they just spawn in by the dozen. I like the enemy variety in SS a lot, since each enemy has its own role on the battlefield, an unique visual design, and can change the way you react to each situation, which is reflected by the weapon arsenal. I wouldn't say that each enemy encounter feels the same unlike Doom 4, the enemy composition and size of each encounter gives the level designers more than enough tools to create new situation, as more then often the layout can play a big role in terms of how the encounters play out, even if they are nowhere near Quake-levels of tight.
SS is more about crowd control whereas Doom is more about weaving through a labyrinth of enemies
SS wouldn't work well in Doom-sized levels and Doom wouldn't work well in SS-sized levels. Both games set out to do their own thing and accomplish that fairly well IMO
 

Increasing

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I can't say that I agree with recently popular dislike for Doom 3. That game was a nice fusion of old school shooting and survival horror tropes. First two gmes might coopletelz lack any kind of horror quality to them after two decades and inifnite number of wads, but they were indeed terrifying for many of us back in the day. For those that started with PSX port that horror quality was even accented, due to that version's music and lighting. Doom 3 choose to accent that horror side, which obviously wasnt to everyone's liking but that in no way made it a bad game.
Noah explained this well in his video:

That being said, purely as an old school FPS and Doom sequel, new Doom is a much better game.

Another thing, shihonage you were asked to provide proof of your claims about your Doom community career, as well as the names of wads you made. You have read my comment yet you refused to answer. Don't think that I will let this slide.
 
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I believe someone here boss battles were reminiscent of Metroid Prime's. Well, it seems they were right:



Gotta say, the Cyberdemon's new design is still ridiculous. Even Doom 3's Mecha-Balrog was better.

Just why?

Giant boss health bar? Really? Cyberdemon trapping you with spikes to force you to jump or duck horizontal slashes was so dumb I had to rewind the video to make sure I'm not seeing things and what even was that second enemy and that spin-in-place-and-shoot-flames-everywhere attack? I thought people were just extra edgy when they talked about earthworm jim.

This really reminds me of how bad and out of place bossfights were in DX:HR because some genius thought it's good idea to outsource them.
 
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Serious Sam is more like a tower defense game where you have to deal with all the shit thrown at you before it gets out of control, as the arsenal in SS is largely situational, which might come at the expense of using weapons because they are fun to use
I don't think people give Serious Sam's level design enough credit just because the levels don't have any layouts most of the time, level design also consists of enemy placement, enemy types used and enemy amounts. Although it's hard to notice any proper enemy placement when they just spawn in by the dozen. I like the enemy variety in SS a lot, since each enemy has its own role on the battlefield, an unique visual design, and can change the way you react to each situation, which is reflected by the weapon arsenal. I wouldn't say that each enemy encounter feels the same unlike Doom 4, the enemy composition and size of each encounter gives the level designers more than enough tools to create new situation, as more then often the layout can play a big role in terms of how the encounters play out, even if they are nowhere near Quake-levels of tight.
SS is more about crowd control whereas Doom is more about weaving through a labyrinth of enemies
SS wouldn't work well in Doom-sized levels and Doom wouldn't work well in SS-sized levels. Both games set out to do their own thing and accomplish that fairly well IMO
Folks at 4chan liken serious sam to touhou, a bullet hell shoot'em up with lots of animu girls in it. And they really like touhou. Although, in shoot'em ups you're slowly going forwards where as you run backwards in serious sam if you can afford to.
 
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Another thing, shihonage you were asked to provide proof of your claims about your Doom community career, as well as the names of wads you made. You have read my comment yet you refused to answer. Don't think that I will let this slide.
I find it hilarious that obvious shill that signed up to this forum only very recently just to advertise a game is asking long standing member for credentials.
 

Naveen

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
How do you spot a shitty shooter from miles away?

It has a shitty sounding, shitty looking, shitty functioning shitty shotgun made of cardboard. You can call this the Darth Roxor Golden Rule Of Shooters - I've never been let down by it before. If you don't trust me, you can go ahead and try applying it yourself, you'll see very quickly that I'm right.

Therefore, I hereby officially deem d44m a shitty shooter (as if that wasn't obvious yet).

Pretty much. The machine gun feels pretty cool, though.

I played a few hours and I'm a bit disappointed. I wouldn't say it's a bad game, but I think it looks better than it actually plays, almost as if it was made with YouTubers in mind. And the main problem I have seen can be explained with that one word: Shotgun. It sucks.

That's not a minor issue because the point of a shotgun in a game like Doom (or even, yeah, SS3) is that you can kill low-level enemies before they even shot back at you (e.g. sidestep around a corner, shoot, kill one or more stupid zombies/imps, hide back); enemies that are, by the way, more or less stationary, slow, or have predictive patterns. In other words, a game that is a bit like a shooting gallery maze.

On the other hand, most common enemies in WOOD (except those 'possessed' zombies) need 2-3 hits, and then you gory kill them. The shotgun only works at close distance, so it's obvious the game was made with console players in mind. Enemy positioning also doesn't seem to matter much because your main weapon sucks at long distance and enemies are jumping around all the time (and most will run towards you), so an imp that spawns at 50 meters, on top of a ledge, will probably jump to the ground and charge towards you. Therefore, level design and enemy positioning becomes a moot point.
 

UserNamer

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serious sam 3 was excellent, it is wrong to say they were lazily designed or what. You had pretty big arenas- not just a room- and it was cleverly designed in terms of enemy used, when and where they spawned, and item placement. I still remember some of the fights where you had some central area full of items like ammo health and armor, impossible to defend, so you had to be careful in retreating while not letting you get pushed too much back, so to have a chance to run in between waves and restock (something like this is impossible with d44m mechanics for example).

Also the enemy art design was clearly superior to the blizzardesque demons in doom 4. Even serious sam's mancubus looked better than d44m mancubus.

The second encounter was also excellent most of the time, probably even better than bfe, and the arenas were very large and nice to look at. TFE is my least favourite and I couldn't finish it. Never played ss2 because it looks ultra retarded

In conclusion, serious sam took the most frantic parts of the dooms (wads included) and made a game out of it. It worked well, it still works, and it is not retarded at all. The pacing most of the time is excellent and the game makes a terrific job of both having an overpowered main character (who is fast, can rip and tear medium sized enemies in one second, has a giant cannon ball shooting cannon as a weapon) and actually challenging you. In fact I think it was extremely stupid that they marketed serious sam 3 as "Just push s + mouse button 1 lol". I don't get the hate towards it to be honest, it seems to me like standard nerd mode of thinking: "It isn't exactly like x, so it's shit" or "doom had x and y, serious sam only has 3x and y/2, IT'S SHIT!!!!"
 

Unkillable Cat

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I find it hilarious that obvious shill that signed up to this forum only very recently just to advertise a game is asking long standing member for credentials.

In shihonage's shoes I wouldn't even bother replying. As this is an established Bethesda plant, that information is likely to be filed away and used against him in the future.

But back to D44M, where we get this:

hB2F2C901
 
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Well the problem with SS3 is the beginning levels, the awesome button kills, some of the weapons were secrets only, unnecessary reloading and ADS, and the infinte rocket ammo boxes in those waves areas to baby you. The bullshit was removed in the DLC, you got all of the weapons in sam's arsenal in the DLC by playing normally as well, the QTE moves are balanced because they don't give you i-frames, and even half-life 2 did the infinite ammo boxes what can you do.
 

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