We all know and love the story of good old Doomguy. He decided to take vengeance on the demons of hell after they murdered his pet rabbit, Daisy, in the plot of the original Doom. In Doom 64, our hero voluntarily remains in hell so that demons would not be able to escape into our world.
In general, the history of Doom Guy is quite long and filled with unexpected twists and turns: the order to shoot the innocents that he does not carry out, getting to Mars and Phobos, the sites of portal experiments that opened a portal to hell, and more. It launched a chain of events that led Doomguy to Sentinels and semi-godhood, and us to Doom: The Dark Ages, the center of today’s attention.
Note that there are spoilers ahead, be warned!
After being stuck in hell for a while, the soul of our Doomguy becomes darker. After all, you can’t remain exactly as you were after being in hell for a prolonged period of time.
He no longer perceives suffering and pain that would break ordinary people, he became something bigger, dangerous and frightening. The Night Sentinels from the world of Argent-Denur, who have already become known to us from Doom Eternal, captured Doomguy and made him into their puppet, sending him as an executioner against demons. After finding Doom Guy among the countless corpses of demons, the Sentinels saw his strength and accepted his desire to kill demons.
Doomguy was considered insane and thrown into the coliseum, where the Sentinels forced him to fight battle after battle. However, having become the Invincible Champion, fighting without pity and with incredible cruelty, Doomguy was left alive. Hundreds of years later, after endless battles with demons, Doomguy continued to talk about lands unknown even to the Gods of Argent-Denur, in his words the Sentinels saw another world ready to receive their blessing.
However… The war with the demons reached the Sentinels’ world. A huge titan was heading for their capital and no one could stop it. The Sentinels happily sacrificed themselves, but it did not bring any benefit. Hundreds of thousands of demons and Sentinels were killed, and Doomguy continued to furiously rip and tear apart the surrounding demons. He managed to impress Khan Maykr and Seraphim, and became subjected to processing in the Divine mechanism, endowing Doomguy with even greater strength and speed. That day, not just a man – Doomguy – emerged from the font, but a real Demi-God – called the Doom Slayer.
It is roughly around this time that Doom: The Dark Ages takes place. Technically, it precedes Doom 2016 and Doom Eternal, but it doesn’t make it less interesting in terms of the plot. The story will follow the fall of the Sentinels and the Doom Slayer’s war. Along the way, we will learn more about Khan Maykr, the King of Sentinels, and more.
I want to praise the narrative, there are a couple of hours of cut scenes alone, and even more varied dialogues. Conflicts of interest, betrayals, unexpected turns – the plot has EVERYTHING you could think of. But there is a lack of some context that would connect Doom 64 and Doom 2016. The same can be said about the more complete understanding of the plot of the game world. After all, in the previous parts, the deeper lore, if it was presented, was in notes and descriptions scattered across the levels, which you still had to find. How many people even knew that Doomguy had a rabbit once?
In terms of gameplay, the developers decided to rethink their old, but perfected to its smallest parts, concept of an arena shooter. Our Doom Slayer has become… slower. Remember Doom Eternal where you jumped around the arena, sometimes flying towards demons, cutting them and shooting, or jumping away from them like a mad rabbit? Well, forget it, the pace of the game has become noticeably calmer. Doomguy has become a real juggernaut, in his armor he can even kill enemies with a wave upon landing.
Each of his steps is felt and heard as a heavy, stately sound. Running sounds like a heavy movement, and not a weightless model, but a full-fledged warrior in weighty armor. Our hero was given a Shield, the core that developers built the gameplay around. And no, Doom is still the same: big maps, arenas with dozens, or even hundreds of devils and demons, mini bosses, huge bosses and awesome finishers, bloody and cruel, sometimes even fascinating and evoking emotions like “how did they come up with this, it’s bloody brilliant!?”
Set aside the good old shotgun, the skull thrower, and the rest. Rip and tear? No, parrying is the name of the game. In Doom: The Dark Ages, you will parry constantly. Your chain shield will become your main weapon.
Going through levels, fighting, finding secrets and solving puzzles, everything will be tied to your shield and its use. The shield will help you cut chains, press a button, and pull yourself into inaccessible areas, all the while breaking the armor of enemies and chopping up a bunch of smaller demons into minced meat. Enemies will always shoot at you with everything they can, traps will spew fireballs at you, fiery exploding skulls will fly your direction at any given opportunity… and all this can and MUST be parried with the shield. Protecting yourself from shots, from fire, from everything and everyone, this is your main task in the game. The shield can reflect certain projectiles, they will be painted green as an indicator, which will give you a boost, reflect a shot at an enemy, and sometimes help you complete a puzzle.
The shield can also replace the chainsaw, cutting a bunch of enemies with one throw, getting stuck in a strong monster and interrupting its attack or even stunning it. You can even rip the shield off shield-bearing monsters or shatter the armor of a boss. You can charge into enemies with a shield, killing them or stunning them, and you will very often have to rush around the arena in this way.
The developers have cleverly reworked the core mechanics of Eternal’s hurricane-like gameplay, turning it into a more thoughtful tactical puzzle. In a way, The Dark Ages is like bullet hell, where you are closed in arenas where ABSOLUTELY everything that can is shooting at you, sending forth projectiles of different types, shapes and sizes, and you have a limited number of attempts to reflect and block it all.
Note that the shield cannot block everything infinitely, it can also overheat, leaving the Doom Slayer without protection for some time. Some projectiles need to be dodged, others blocked, others reflected at enemies… Fortunately, everything is clearly distinguished by color, and it will be easy for you to determine which projectile goes where.
While using medieval motifs, the developers also cleverly designed the enemies. Some enemies also began to wear armor, carry heavy shields and have pretty good defensive properties. Enemy shields can be heated up, and then destroyed by throwing your own shield, getting some armor plates along the way. Bosses and Minibosses can be wearing heavy armor, which can also be heated up and knocked down, or simply destroyed if their attacks are reflected in them.
The shield is paired with melee weapons, there are 3 of them. The good old Chainsaw has been replaced by Power Gauntlets that are nice for beating the crap out of demons up close and personal, receiving ammo in the process. The Doom Slayer can also use the Flail, which does the same thing, but is bigger, more impressive and possesses greater range, and also stuns enemies. The last but not the least is the Dreadmace, that made me fondly remember the sword from Doom Eternal. It is capable of turning even a mighty boss into a sorry, bleeding piece of pain and suffering in a couple of hits! And it also fills your pockets with ammo when killing a Demon.
What’s interesting is that the series that made arena shooting popular was able to turn its origins upside down. With some enemies, you can no longer just shoot each other, for example, Adagon: as soon as you move away from him, he immediately raises his shield and simply stops taking damage. And the Cyberdemon will simply start pouring endless shots from his entire arsenal at you, but up close these enemies are successfully beaten with a shield.
According to rumors, the game can be completed even without using Firearms. Oh, how far we’ve come that DOOM can be completed almost without shooting, only in cases where it is necessary. One of the personal grievances with the new system is how much emphasis is put on parrying. I’m already sick of parrying in all more or less large games.
The enemy moveset isn’t that varied, and when the developers dump 100,000 Demons with 3-5 mini bosses into the arena, it’s really noticeable. It’s as if the fights are deliberately stretched out with the Boss’s large HP bar, as well as a shield or armor. As a result, the fight can look like this: 3 mace attacks, parrying the boss’s attack, which restores the melee attack charges and repeats… until victory. That’s it. If you’re really focusing on melee in Doom, make it more interesting and juicy, worthy of the Doom title.
There are 12 types of firearms in the game, 2 for each type of ammunition, and some have an alternative type of shooting. Not always useful, but certainly spectacular. For explosive shells, a Rocket Launcher and a Grenade Launcher, for rifle cartridges, a shotgun or a double-barreled shotgun, etc.
Alternative shooting opens up new possibilities, for example, the Impaler that shoots small pikes at enemies can accumulate fragments in the body of a demon and explode when it is killed, embedding said fragments into nearby enemies. You can also change the type of shooting to another, where you have only 10 huge silver stakes, capable of knocking down even mini-bosses with a couple of successful headshots.
Talents also add variety to shooting. They can be studied in the Sanctuaries of the Sentinels, either purchased for gold or unlocked by putting gems into your weapons. Everything has talents, every gun, every melee attack, and even the shield itself.
Do you want the shield to ricochet and kill not one demon, but a dozen at once? Level up the talent. Do you want the hammer to blow up enemies, and the shotgun to set them on fire? All that and more, the talents will allow you to strengthen and diversify your guns with additional effects. Oh yeah, where can I get this Gold and consumables for upgrades? On the levels themselves. Secrets, gold and all sorts of collectibles are scattered on the maps, for finding which you will be rewarded. Monster statues, various codex articles and gun colors will transform and replenish your codex.
This time around, secrets are quite obvious and simple, they can be easily found and collected if you do not rush like a hurricane from point to point, but explore the map. Moreover, the map itself shows you that there are secrets nearby.
The save points this time around are very sparsely located here, only at quest key points. If you decide to spend time exploring secrets on the map, then be kind enough to go through a very large chunk of the plot from the very beginning. This adds a certain level of stuffiness and grind to the gameplay, and the irony is that exploring levels is a must if you want to unleash the full potential of your guns and not choke in arenas for 10 minutes because of the general weakness of your weapons.
As a result, juggling the guns around remained as a feature, but the developers have significantly reduced the speed of the gameplay. The hurricane gunplay became more of a melee fistfight and bloody shredding of enemies with a shield. As one famous character said, “I’m not locked in here with you, you’re locked in here with me,” these are the words that come to mind after 10 levels with arenas and bosses.
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. Flying on a dragon and controlling a giant mech. They are a part of the game for sure. And if the mech is more or less a small performance that increases the time spent in the game, then flights on the dragon look a little more interesting at first … but only at first, as you fly along a pre-prepared route, with only a single mechanic: if you dodge in time, you strengthen your gun, which is what half of the battles on the dragon are built on.
You fly through an intestine-like corridor, aim at the enemy and attack, rinse and repeat. The developers somehow could not competently fit these mechanics into the game, except for dragging out extra time. And although in some moments this feature looks colorful and beautiful, this does not override how clumsy and repetitive it is.
The mech is almost no different from the dragon, you walk along the gut-like corridor, punching giant Titan demons in the faces, dodging them and … repeat it all again, infrequently adding shooting to the mix. The first time it looks epic and cool, but by the middle of the level it becomes boring. It seems that such levels are intended to diversify the gameplay, but throughout the game nothing real new appears in them, different from the level where you encounter these mechanics for the first time. There is no development of these mechanics or any progression at all.
A little more about the plot, the presentation to me seemed to be quite choppy. Yes, the notes scattered around reveal more lore information, but this is not enough. For me, it was necessary to include at least brief information about the adventures of Doomguy in the game. Why should I go to Wikipedia and the archive, read the notes from there, to understand what is happening in the Dark Ages? However, the Lovecraftian motif of the Ghost World, the plot twist at the end was a very pleasant surprise.
When it comes to the visuals, the game maintains a high level: dark and decorated corridors, large arenas, ruined gothic cities engulfed in flames, high-tech complexes and majestic palaces, filled with hanged guards and butchered corpses of demons, statues abound everywhere… In a word, simply beautiful.
And also destructible! Most of the decor can be demolished, shot, destroyed or mangled, which has an extremely pleasant effect on the atmosphere of the game. Walking around the arena as the Doom Slayer and breaking everything with your weight is quite fun, although it does not always seem right and logical. Everything is moderately colorful, bloody and devilishly terrible, there is no overdoing it, no eye-gouging elements. Bloody pustules and beating veins on meat decorations, moving eyes on the walls and bloody rain, bone elements, all of this is quite pleasing considering the game’s vibes.
Monsters can also be destroyed or skinned during battles, you can shoot off pieces of meat, and these wounds will appear on the monster model, further supporting the atmosphere of a meat shooter. There are also beautiful finishing animations, both by the Slayer himself and by his equipment, Titan and Dragon. I especially remember the dragon, opening the mouth of the demon titan and pouring fire into his throat. However, there are only a couple of finishing moves for each boss monster, so you can quickly get tired of them.
There is music in the game, and alas, it is not Mick Gordon. Yes, the music is pleasant, a kind of average generic metal that sets the rhythm and gets your blood pumping, but is not even very memorable. It lacks something, whereas Mick Gordon knew how to reproduce something killer, perky and cool.
As a result, Doom: The Dark Ages is still a good meaty shooter, the change in the paradigm of the gameplay will not appeal to everyone, the missions with the mech and the dragon are purely artificial gametime stretch, where a beautiful flight and mech control will quickly become routine. The fights are beautiful, but instead of hurricane gameplay they now offer slow tactical bullet hell, and of course parrying with a shield. The music nicely accompanies the gameplay, but is not something to gush about. The plot tells an extremely entertaining story from the life of the Doom Slayer, giving us a wider look at the game’s lore.
