ARMCoder

Shareware DOOM on a DOS 386 PC, circa 1993~94. I have fond memories that I'd like to share: - Those pitiful 3.5" floppy disks: even at that time I hated them, they sucked since their inception. - The 386 wasn't fast enough to render the full (320x200) resolution, I had to switch to half resolution (160 columns) and slightly shrink the viewport to get a decent framerate. Shortly later I got a 486. - Configuring the soundcard was a PITA, not a specific problem of DOOM, but of basically every DOS game. - The WASD keys and mouse aiming were not a thing at that time. I remember using the arrows to move forward/back and rotate left/right. Strafing was obtained by pressing the LALT key, IIRC. - The game scared THE HELL OUT OF ME. Hearing the demons groaning at a distance helped to sustain the sense of peril all the time. It may look silly today, but then, most encounters guaranteed a nice jump scare! - I played pirated copies of DOOM & DOOM2 for several years just because I was too lazy to register them, then I purchased the complete pack directly from ID (they had an online store at the time) to make things right.

Thanks! In a way, I'm not surprised at all that this behavior (along any other I could possibly grasp in my lifetime) was already scrutinized in depth at this point!

The classic BFG9000 is famous for its great assortment of curious behaviours... and today I've had an hypothesis that I decided to try, to see whether it existed. That's it: - Fire a projectile against a far away obstacle - Switch to another weapon (eg pistol) while the BFG's ball is still airborne - Aim at any enemies in sight The effect that I saw is that, whenever the BFG's ball hits the obstacle, the BFG's tracers still work and hit the enemies, even if the player is currently wielding a different weapon. Does anyone use this "hack" to his advantage? Is it any good for something? Just curious.

I'd like to see some extreme platforming like in the Exultia map, but not limited to it (that is, multi-dash-jump-monkeybar-midair refuel onto temporary surfaces that will fall in no time) relegated to bonus content / secret areas and removed from the mandatory path. Platforming is not bad in itself, but some design decisions seem (IMO) over the top and end up breaking the pace of the level progression. Too much time wasted in such sections, they are *really* hard to master and don't get any easier by selecting the EASY difficulty. My 2 cents.

I shot that Revvie and never gave a second thought about it... In fact I always thought the player was *supposed* to kill it in order to advance the mission. EDIT: in a way, I felt almost godlike while flying that Revenant, both in the Easy and in the Medium (HMP) skills (never tried in the UV and harder skills). It was the only moment I experienced that sensation of power fantasy, as the rest of the game seemed to me very punishing, even in the Easy level!

To say Eternal is a bad game is, besides just an opinion, too far-fetched IMO. But I can relate to the feeling that Eternal departed too far away from what Doom used to be. I didn't really enjoy the main combat loop (chainsaw - flame belch - shoot - glory kill - punch - rinse and repeat)... and also the overuse of long-jumping and climbing (at a time I felt like playing the OG Sonic the Hedgehog's Marble Zone level), and IMO, in the jumping/climbing department Mirror's Edge does a much, much better job! I stopped playing Eternal just after finishing "Cultist Base" in ITYTD, not because of getting stuck at all, I just lost interest in moving forward.

Okay, let me exhume this thread to lay my 2 cents of (first) impressions on Eternal's platforming. Firstly, I'm not really a big fan of platforming, although some of it can be fun. I liked platforming in Doom 2016, maybe except for a few rune trials where 100% accuracy in jump timing was mandatory to win, that was somewhat frustrating. Jumping in the main maps was nice, not staying in the way of the actual combat, and even helping to accomplish the battles. I've not finished Eternal yet, but it's now obvious that this installment raised the platforming to a whole new level. The Dash and the Spiderman-ish wall climbing are nice additions, the monkeybars are just okay IMO, my big gripe is about the very long dash-jumps, those ones that you have to pickup a sort of refuel mid-air. These jumps can be very hard to complete and I feel they are a little out of place in a Doom game. And finally, about the Exultia's last lava section, what's the guys were thinking? That rotating chain along the floating platforms are basically a Sonic The Hedgehog segment, for a moment I thought the main boss in this level was Dr. Eggman! Not only that part was a mere difficult jump puzzle, but it felt very unoriginal for me. That was I had to say about the platforming aspect of Eternal, the game is much more than that, I may comment about other aspects in different threads whenever I feel fit.

If you plan to play Doom Eternal someday, try to beat Doom 2016 at least in HMP mode. Then you will have an idea of what ITYTD from Eternal feels like. Yes, Eternal is harder to the point you have to shift down one skill level to get a challenge similar to 2016. I managed to beat 2016 in UV and found it VERY HARD (for me of course); in the end I think that I simply won by sheer insistence and a dose of luck. I'm playing Eternal in HMP, and in Map 2(!!!) I'm already struggling to survive... I'm seriously considering to downgrade to ITYTD to keep going.

The day has come and I finally finished the game in UV! Hell, I've learned a lot... but... what can I say about my experience playing in UV? The gameplay was mostly challenging but not oppressing, however the two final levels (Vega Central Processing and Argent D'Nur) were REALLY hard on me! I died a lot, and in the end, I think that sheer stubbornness was more decisive than actual skill. And no, I'm not playing Doom in Nightmare anytime soon. UV made me sweat enough and I think I've found my limits. I will try Eternal next, and of course, I will still keep playing 2016 just to relax.

Nice (and quite a large) review! My impression, after finishing the game in HMP, is that the maps become more and more interesting until "Titan's Realm" with the peak at "Lazarus Labs". Beyond that there's nothing really new or enticing apart from the bosses (the hell guards and the mama spider)... the battles just get harder with more monsters, at this point the two big map themes (tech and hell) begin to feel old and overused.

Just to amend my own post... I gave it a last try few weeks ago, and decided to make a more disciplined approach (HMP skill). That is, to look for and conquer every weapon upgrade, secret, challenge, rune, praetor token, argent cell (did I forget anything?) and make a slower level progression. I replayed all the past levels as needed to get all the rewards, what served as a good training too! In the end I earned 8 of the 12 available runes, from which I stuck to three that I really liked. The last rune trials are REALLY hard to me! There's no doubt that all the upgrades combined made a great change on gameplay, even the boss fights (Mama Spider included) got relatively easy to tackle! Finished at last! I'm not yet sure whether I will try the game in UV, maybe some day... Cheers!

I tried playing pistol-only in HMP, and could beat the first levels until the Foundry... there's one tight room there where a Hell Knight makes it very difficult to win with the pistol only, you have little space to evade and you have to hit the Knight a ton of times without being caught, it's certainly possible by I threw the towel after dying 10s of times in a row haha.

Since I wrote last time, things changed a lot... First, I noticed that although the framerate didn't drop too much, the game pacing began to slow down when the scene was crowded... this really hurted the gameplay, as precision aiming in fast paced combat became almost impossible. I solved it lowering the resolution, then the pacing became consistent even when Hell decided to throw all it had at once. Taking down those pesky Imps from a distance became a no-braner since then. There are several other important things that I learned that helped me a lot... to be completionist. I do really NEED every upgrade available to make up my lack of agility... so every weapon mod, weapon upgrade point, praetor token, Argent cell, mastery, and even rune that I manage to earn, is VERY welcome! So I'm being patient and searching for them all before progressing among the levels. And yes, the rune trials make a nice training sandbox, this is a thing I ended up figuring by myself. Some runes are still very hard, though. And let's say, the Super Shotgun with the Double Trouble unleashed is a hell of a fun, let alone combined with Quad Damage! Thanks!

Is there any world record for the LONGEST gameplay ever? I'm playing the game since 2018 and haven't finished it yet. At least I'm backtracking all the previous maps looking for all the secrets and goodies.

Most likely it's just a coincidence, but I always see a classic Cacodemon spreading its mouth wide open when I meet a gore nest!