Let me start by saying: this is the best first person shooter ever, in my opinion. It is a grimy, wonderfully designed, death metal screaming blood-flavoured sherbet bomb. It is a game about confronting all the evil that Hell can conjure. A game about facing the combined fear of the dark which all mankind know... and then setting it on fire, blasting it with a sawn-off shotgun and ripping it's head out with the spinal cord attached. That is, in a nutshell, one of the greatest strengths of Doom Eternal. It takes material that could come across as super edgy and dark, and injects a sense of fun. The whole thing comes across that the makers of the game asked a 12-year-old what would be cool, and said yes to every proposal. And it. Is. Glorious! Knights, ghosts, demons of every shape and size, giant robots, huge tentacled chthonic nightmare deities, alien races, and so much more is crammed into the story, like meat into an overly huge (and extremely bloody) steak sandwich.
The overall plot is this: Every demon from every nook and cranny of Hell are essentially swarming over Earth like brutal ants, led by celestial super-being The Khan Maykr, who is trying to save her own dimension through putting forward Earth as a sort of human sacrifice. The only thing standing in their way is the Doomslayer, a cross between Father Merrin and a Panzer Tank. The only way to stop them? Turn every demon in Hell into a fine red mist.
The actual gameplay, as players are thrust into the unstoppable jackboots of the Doomslayer, effortlessly straddles the line between immensely difficult and satisfying. Players are certainly thrust into the deep end, and if unfamiliar with the 2016 game's mechanics will die a lot, but are provided with so many weapons that it doesn't really matter. The violence is breathtaking, with a new feature which progressively damages the demons as you shoot them, and means that some stronger demons, by the time you Glory Kill them, resemble a wretched mass of beef jerky. Oh yes, and the Glory Kills are extraordinary well done and often sickening and satisfying in equal measures. The new weapons and mechanics , such as the Blood Punch, the Flamethrower, the Ice Bomb, the Ballista, the Meathook (Which I can't tell you about without eating half your fun), the Doom-Blades and the Crucible Sword, are fantastic.
The rendering of the backgrounds and gaming environments are phenomenal, and so well varied; one minute you're traversing an industrial death trap in the Arctic, the next you're crawling through the tentacle ridden guts of a dead, enormous demon. The heavy metal music, by Mick Gordon, perfectly compliments the bloodshed, and the Boss Fights find creative ways to bypass the usual shoot-it-until-it-dies gameplay, especially the last one.
It's not all perfect: the long stretches of puzzle platforming do get old quickly, some enemies are frustrating without being fun, and a returning Dr. Samuel Hayden is a literal exposition machine.
But damn, if it isn't a whole lot of fun.
The overall plot is this: Every demon from every nook and cranny of Hell are essentially swarming over Earth like brutal ants, led by celestial super-being The Khan Maykr, who is trying to save her own dimension through putting forward Earth as a sort of human sacrifice. The only thing standing in their way is the Doomslayer, a cross between Father Merrin and a Panzer Tank. The only way to stop them? Turn every demon in Hell into a fine red mist.
The actual gameplay, as players are thrust into the unstoppable jackboots of the Doomslayer, effortlessly straddles the line between immensely difficult and satisfying. Players are certainly thrust into the deep end, and if unfamiliar with the 2016 game's mechanics will die a lot, but are provided with so many weapons that it doesn't really matter. The violence is breathtaking, with a new feature which progressively damages the demons as you shoot them, and means that some stronger demons, by the time you Glory Kill them, resemble a wretched mass of beef jerky. Oh yes, and the Glory Kills are extraordinary well done and often sickening and satisfying in equal measures. The new weapons and mechanics , such as the Blood Punch, the Flamethrower, the Ice Bomb, the Ballista, the Meathook (Which I can't tell you about without eating half your fun), the Doom-Blades and the Crucible Sword, are fantastic.
The rendering of the backgrounds and gaming environments are phenomenal, and so well varied; one minute you're traversing an industrial death trap in the Arctic, the next you're crawling through the tentacle ridden guts of a dead, enormous demon. The heavy metal music, by Mick Gordon, perfectly compliments the bloodshed, and the Boss Fights find creative ways to bypass the usual shoot-it-until-it-dies gameplay, especially the last one.
It's not all perfect: the long stretches of puzzle platforming do get old quickly, some enemies are frustrating without being fun, and a returning Dr. Samuel Hayden is a literal exposition machine.
But damn, if it isn't a whole lot of fun.