With the trailers Bethesda and id have released so far, it looks like Doom is going to be the festival of blood and guns that we fell in love with from the beginning. If these 5 wishes are granted when I finally get my hands on it, consider me the happiest gamer alive!
5. I want it to be FAST:
The pacing of Doom 3, although it was worth some scares, was not quite the classic Doom gameplay feeling I had grown up with. It immersed me with some cutting edge visuals at the time, and playing it on a friend’s high end PC with bitching surround sound made it an experience I’ll never forget. the pacing, however, was more reminiscent of a Resident Evil survival horror than Doom’s signature fast paced horror-action. I want to mow down hell spawn like there’s no tomorrow and no choice, and the adrenaline of taking out droves of those pricks can be big, stupid fun.
4. Event Horizon level of insanity in Hell:
While it is true that a series like Dead Space provided endless encounters with some seriously messed up otherworldly demons, Doom did that with just a hint of comedy but plenty of creepy shit elsewhere. I remember playing Doom 2 as a kid and seeing that giant goat-head looking monument staring back at me. Then when entering a no-clip mode code, I took a peek behind it, and much to my horror I stumbled into John Romero’s bloody disembodied head. If we’re encountering some kind of manifestation of all that is evil, it can’t all be just missiles and ass-kicking, I want to have something unexpected and very unsettling even if it means I have to stumble into it after activating a cheat.
3. Renditions of the same classic music that made Doom rock so hard:
When you finished a level, that dun-dun-dun-90’s MIDI samples rock let you know you took names and kicked Satan’s red, hairy ass. Your score racked up with the sound of ammunition firing off. The map in the background showed your progression through the game as you laid waste across the shores of hell. Along with those songs that rocked to the highest standard at the time, I also want the atmospheric pieces. When the amped up rock jams wore off and then you were progressing through Hell with a more somber sound behind you, it acted as a reminder that shit got real and it still very much is so. It gave the vibe that you were in the middle of something very, very ominous. It was awesome.
2. Mind bending maps:
I don’t know how it translates with today’s gameplay mechanics, but part of the fun of Doom for me as a kid was the lack of familiarity of the setting. Also the fact that the ever-changing layout was messing with my head. When I activated something, parts of the map would open, others would close off. In the same way that Zelda’s classic dungeons would trick your sense of direction, I liked how this contributed to the tension of being in some other world where your perspective is going to be messed with. Upon entering Hell in Doom 3, they did a bit of this with a shapeshifting terrain, and I want that back. A whole lot of it. It’s Hell. As an environment alone, it should be its own character of the game and have its own crazy personality that toys with you.
1. The BFG:
I don’t have doubts that it will be included, I just want to know that it’s there. The reason for the BFG in Doom is simple: why mow down one or two spawns of hell when you can mow down an entire room full of them? I remember when I first encountered this thing, the way its sheer bulkiness seemed to fill up the entire bottom of my screen. When fired, its sexy and sweet neon green orb of destruction lit up and obliterated every single demon in one shot. It symbolized the triumph of the victory, in that acquiring the gun in and of itself was its own way of saying you won. I don’t want this gun to be handed over to us early in the game. It has to remain the gun to end all guns, as well as end any blood sucking demon that wants to tango.
