Everything You Need To Know About Doom: The Dark Ages
Kill demons. That’s it, thanks for reading! Seriously, though, Doom: The Dark Ages hits as hard, fast, and bloody as its predecessors, and Id Software has managed to deliver unto us a third FPS that somehow manages to feel exactly the same and wildly different at the same time. If you haven’t bought it already, or just want some tricks from an admittedly mid-gamer, then this should help.
Guns. All The Guns.
Doom: The Dark Ages is all about killing anything and everything that stands in your way, so one of the most important tools is the weapons. Your primary, though not only, method of warfare, and Id Software, of course, delivered excellent tools for you to play with, from the Doom standard Shotgun with medieval sci-fi tweaks, to the Pulverizer that shoots enchanted pieces of demon skulls, to the BFC. No, that’s not a typo, your BFG is now a crossbow and hits just as hard.
I won’t spend the entire review glossing over every single gun they’ve brought to bear, just know there are plenty of fun and imaginative ways to just kill. Moreover, the progression in which you collect these weapons feels natural, deserved, and makes you work to learn how to use your weapons. Keep pushing, being aggressive, and use the Fodder Demons as testbeds for how best to use new weapons.
Melee Makes a Return
Remember when 2016 where your fist was a viable weapon, and Eternal made it a special move? Not anymore, because now your fists are a lethal weapon, and you have options. Doom: The Dark Ages wants you in the thick of it, so you need options for when you are surrounded by Fodder Demons, and whereas before you lobbed a Blood Punch, this time you just beat them to death.
The three main options you have are your fists, a flail, and a mace. But this is Doom we’re talking about, so that’s not all they are. The twist is that your melee weapons are really powerful and can be augmented to deal even more damage. Your effective range for using them is about the same as a shotgun, we are the Slayer after all, so don’t be afraid to use your charges even when the arena is spread out.
Upgrades People, Upgrades!
Doom is all about making your basics better, and your better your best, and Doom: The Dark Ages learnt all the right lessons from the previous entries. Your guns? Two modes. Your gun upgrades? Certain tiers have two modes you can swap between. Your Runes? Oh boy, plenty of options to choose from. You purchase them from Shrines, by collecting resources around the map either by exploration or puzzle solving, so make sure you’ve got everything before passing the point of no return.
Your Slayer, your playstyle, whatever loadout is the most fun for you, is often going to be the one that keeps you winning the fight, killing the demons, and demolishing the invasion. I haven’t found a build that I thought was inherently better than the others, but I have found that some were more fun for me than others, and because you can swap between upgrades, don’t be afraid to mess around.
Large, Expansive Battle Maps
The maps in Doom: The Dark Ages are huge. Each battleground is an arena, but it still requires a bit of trekking to get to each battleground. There’s plenty of room to maneuver, some static defenses to dodge projectiles when needed, and a plethora of details, life.
You have puzzles, destructible objects galore, hidden rooms, and NPCs that add to the atmosphere. You can drop into a cavern of cultists, pick up some loot, find a water tunnel, see some sunken treasure, and pop up into an area where Sentinels are holding the line, trying to protect civilians from the oncoming horde. It rewards exploration and puzzle solving in between exterminating demons, just enough that it’s still fun, but keeps the focus on slaying.
The Flow of Doom: The Dark Ages
So, I’ve talked about the guns, the melee, the upgrades, how to get them, and the maps. How does that all translate into the flow? The answer is beautifully. Explore the map, kill demons, solve puzzles, kill demons, collect resources, kill demons, upgrade your loadout, kill demons, and have I mentioned you need to kill demons? Because unholy hell are there demons to kill.
The entire flow of the game keeps you moving from one area to the next, solving puzzles, rewarding your efforts, and giving you new tools to repeat. What’s most important to me is that collecting things doesn’t feel bloated, they keep the focus on, say it with me, killing demons. The combat and the way it ties everything together really deserves its own in-depth review, I haven’t even touched on the parry system, the shield, the bullet hell mechanics, or the adjustable difficulty sliders.
Breaking the Flow without Harming It
The last major thing I want to talk about is something that I think elevates Doom: The Dark Ages above most others, the set pieces they included. There are three ‘important’ parts of the game that break the natural flow of the game by giving you something that still feels like you are playing a Doom game.
First, the turret segments. Hugo Martin said it best: “You are gonna stand and fight.” One way they grounded this mindset was by placing static turrets in certain levels, where the entire point was just to mow down waves of demons, and ground down a Titan, on foot. There’s something powerful about watching a mountain of demonic muscle walking towards you and destroying the environment, as you shoot bullet after bullet, supercharging your weapon until it finally goes down.
Speaking of powerful, the Atlan Mech. Good. God. They teased us in Eternal by showing us the remains in your Fortress, and now they give it to us. You are the Slayer. Piloting a giant mech that fights like the Slayer. Words cannot describe how fun it is to walk across battlefields, feeling multiple Titans, destroying the environment, and watching massively downscaled enemies be crushed underfoot literally.
Last, the best boi. Your goddamn dragon. Serrat is your cybernetic, turret-toting, jet-capable dragon. How Doom is that?! The introduction for Serrat has you walking through the aviary, where two dragons land and ‘fight’ over you, only to get scared off as Serat just lands in front of you. Serrat looks like someone Id Software said “what if the Slayer was a dragon” and delivered. Scarred, but mean. Serrat is eager to tear into Titans and mow down demons, and you absolutely should explore the battlefield when you get to fly with him to tear into the downright tiny demons from on high as they try to fight back.
Should You Buy This Game?
Yes. Absolutely. It’s a game meant to be enjoyed by both hardcore fans and newcomers, giving you adjustable difficulty sliders to tailor the game to your skill level, but even leaving it on the default and sitting down for some violent meditation for a few hours is some of the most fun you can have. It’s loud, unapologetically Doom, it didn’t have to be more than that, and yet Id Software made it more than that for the third time in a row.
