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Patrol1985

Doom's style vs Quake 2 / 4

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Id has produced (or supervised) a number of FPS games over the years, all of which come from one of those series:

- Wolfenstein
- Doom
- Heretic
- Quake
- Rage (technically not a series yet, but a sequel is planned for an unspecified future)

Now, all of those basically come down to the same thing: shoot the bad guys. However, they also have their distinct styles:

Wolfenstein: World War II and its derivatives
Heretic: fantasy
Quake 1: techno-fantasy (Lovecraftian monsters in medieval castles fought with modern day or futuristic weaponry)
Rage: post-apocalypse (Mad Max 2 style)

However, Doom and Quake 2/4 are virtually the same to me. Honestly, the only thing that makes them different is the origin of the monsters (hell demons vs. aliens from a distant planet).

So can anyone give me a solid reason which would justify putting those games into separate genres? Couldn't have Quake 2 / 4 been put in the "Doom" series?

I thought that perhaps it's about the marine being alone in Doom: when you start the game, everyone except for you is already dead and you literally are the LAST hope of mankind. In Quake it feels as if you are a part of an ongoing war, with allies and enemies participating in it together with you, but I'm not entirely sure this justifies the separation.

Is it the horror perhaps? Quake 2 / 4 wasn't really meant to be scary. I think ID has always wanted all Doom games to be scary. It just so happened that Doom 1 / 2 is fast in addition to being scary and Doom 3 is considerably slower in addition to being scary.

Do you find any major differences between those titles?

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Patrol1985 said:

However, Doom and Quake 2/4 are virtually the same to me. Honestly, the only thing that makes them different is the origin of the monsters (hell demons vs. aliens from a distant planet).

So can anyone give me a solid reason which would justify putting those games into separate genres?

Yes.

Patrol1985 said:

(hell demons vs. aliens from a distant planet).

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Dragonsbrethren said:

Doom and Quake 2's gameplay is so different, how can you even suggest this?


I'm not talking about gameplay, because if we take gameplay into equation, then Doom 1/2 and Doom 3 should be from different series as well due to differences in that department. In fact, Quake 2 is closer to Doom 1/2 than Doom 3.

I'm talking purely about aestethics of the setting.

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I assume you're talking visual style, setting and atmosphere? Edit: apparently yes, that post wasn't there when I started writing...

Well, Quake 2 and 4 actually have their techbases much more... decorated? They definitely looked in places as if the Strogg were extremely patriotic (flags and emblems everywhere, not really making sense with robots) and had a sense of imposing, sinister style they maintained with their architecture. The bases feel like "their turf" unquestionably, while Doom's ones are meant to be ours, although conquered by evil. They clearly aren't built for anything but function though, whereas the Strogg bases also quite obviously look planned with aesthetics in mind on the outside.

There's also more contact with the landscapes in Quake 2 and 4, not just the insides of techbases.

And, of course, Q2 is so fucking orange... The atmosphere is honestly completely different from the Doom techbases. If only because of such a trivial thing as sky color!

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Doom and Quake 2's gameplay is so different, how can you even suggest this?


He's talking settings, for better or worse gameplay has little comparative relevance in franchises.

But even then I disagree. Doom 1 E1 is techbases, but later episodes quickly move into supernatural environments. Quake 2 and 4 are all sci-fi settings, techbases, all the time (...I think? Quake 2 bored me too fast to play all the way through).

Ok, you could swap levels between Doom 3 minus hell levels and Quake 4 and hardly notice a difference. But Quake 2 didn't look like Doom 1/2 much. Made more sense as a followup to Quake (not a lot of sense, but more sense nonetheless), same engine, same early 3D look.

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If anything, Quake is closer to Doom than Quake II. Otherworldly monsters living in gothic fortresses and palaces full of tortured people, who invade our techbases and that you fight with an arsenal of contemporary and futuristic weapons? Which game is that, Quake or Doom? (Hint: it's really both.)

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Except Quake doesn't have as many futuristic type weapons as Doom and Quake 2, all it has is the Lightning Gun while Doom has the PlasmaRifle and BFG, and Quake 2 has the Blaster, Hyperblaster, Railgun and BFG.

Antroid said:

not really making sense with robots

Well they're more like cyborgs than robots except only the Makron most likely keeps his original self in control unlike the others who're converted by a neurosight in Quake 4.

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Gez said:

If anything, Quake is closer to Doom than Quake II. Otherworldly monsters living in gothic fortresses and palaces full of tortured people, who invade our techbases and that you fight with an arsenal of contemporary and futuristic weapons? Which game is that, Quake or Doom? (Hint: it's really both.)


Good point there, but i still think Quake II is more close to Doom than Quake, maybe is the fantasy monsters that never really appealed to me

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Avoozl said:

Well they're more like cyborgs than robots except only the Makron most likely keeps his original self in control unlike the others who're converted by a neurosight in Quake 4.


Well yeah I meant mostly in the fact that the regular enemies didn't really seem like creatures with any sort of emotion or free will left, so they'd not really appreciate all the flags and shit... in fact the only one who would is the world leader, how depressing is that? Maybe some of the Strogg did in fact retain some intellect, otherwise Makron comes out as an extremely... fucked up person, the only truly alive one on an entore planet and he still bothers to pretend like there's an entire empire with people who can think.

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I agree that Doom and Quake had a reasonable amount in common. No question though, Doom buries Quake in every meaningful way and always has.

Doom 3 could easily be set in the Quake 2/4 universe if you set it on another planet with a different cast of characters. Actually, that would be quite an interesting idea if it didn't turn into a super-linear, scripted trek through endless Alpha Labs and Monorails in order to spend five minutes seeing what we actually paid to see (the alien planet/dimension/hell). And no "You need to activate/deactivate the power generator/defence system" or "link up with bravo team, oh wait they all get killed ten seconds before you turn up".

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The visual style is completely different, too. The only similar thing between the games, unless you want to get extremely vague, is the arsenal.

Like Gez said, Quake's setting is closer to Doom than Quake 2 is.

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There are similarities between all of them, both in terms of setting and the monsters faced, which is unsurprising as they're all from the same company. Ultimately they're separate games though.

What makes Doom and Quake 2/4 different I think really comes down to atmosphere and gameplay, even if they both have "shootin' bad guys in space" as a story.

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Antroid said:

And, of course, Q2 is so fucking orange... The atmosphere is honestly completely different from the Doom techbases. If only because of such a trivial thing as sky color!

It wasn't orange if you had a 3dfx card or just software rendering - the orange was for the rich nVidia kids (and now OpenGL, I guess).

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But Quake does seem to be the simplest of the three with a little less content than Doom, a lot of the weapon feel like doubles with slight differences in a greater and lesser sense, so that leaves only 5 unique kinds of weapons.

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Quake 2 is a lot more non-linear than Doom with the whole hub-worlds and everything.

Quake 4 lacks that style and is very similar to Doom. It's kinda like a more actiony Doom 3.

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After Doom and Final Doom (I always think of Doom and Doom 2 as the same game since there's no real distinction between them on the PSX version, which is the one I grew up playing), Quake 2 is the best game.

Quake 1 was kind of hard to distinguish the style and IMO it looks like shit, although I did think it was OK to play at the time.

Quake 3 was death match only so never played it. Quake 4 seems entirely derivative with nothing to recommend it over Halo.

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Disagree over Quakes 1 vs 2. I love 1 and I've never managed to get through 2 without getting bored out of my skull somewhere pretty close to the beginning.

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Avoozl said:

Except Quake doesn't have as many futuristic type weapons as Doom and Quake 2, all it has is the Lightning Gun while Doom has the PlasmaRifle and BFG, and Quake 2 has the Blaster, Hyperblaster, Railgun and BFG.

Except Doom doesn't have as many futuristic type weapons as Quake 2, all it has is the plasma rifle and BFG, while Quake 2 has the Blaster, Hyperblaster, Railgun, and BFG.

At least Quake with mission packs has as many futuristic weapons as Doom, since it has the Thunderbolt (which doubles as a Plasma Gun) and the Laser Cannon. :p

KevinHEZ said:

Good point there, but i still think Quake II is more close to Doom than Quake, maybe is the fantasy monsters that never really appealed to me


And Doom's monsters aren't fantasy? Imps, cacodemons, demons, lost souls, Hell nobles, undead demon skeletons... Even the cybernetic demons are cybernetic demons.

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There's quite a bit of difference between the sort of demons like we see in Doom and the sort we might see in Warcraft or Heroes of Might and Magic. The latter would completely not fit a sci-fi story, for one.

Also, Quake's monsters aren't really that fantasy. They're more lovecraftian, apart from the knights, maybe.

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Put some shamblers, vores and scrags in Doom, and they'll fit perfectly at home next to the mancubuses and pain elementals is what I'm saying. It's like they were designed by the same artists at the same time period. :p

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Dragonsbrethren said:

Doom and Quake 2's gameplay is so different, how can you even suggest this?

No it's not, especially between Doom 2 and Quake 2. Seriously, I felt at times like I was fighting Cacodemons and Revenants with the SSG in Quake 2. Often I feel like Quake 2 is a rip-off of Doom 2.

Antroid said:

There's also more contact with the landscapes in Quake 2 and 4, not just the insides of techbases.

All very featured in Doom 2.


And, of course, Q2 is so fucking orange... The atmosphere is honestly completely different from the Doom techbases. If only because of such a trivial thing as sky color!

Techbases in the more mundane regions of Thy Flesh Consumed.

Anyway, Quake 2 is very similar to Doom, but only with my least favourite recurring theme: techbases. Otherwise, Doom is very versatile, as it can fit with Heretic, Quake 1 or Diablo, just with the stock textures.

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printz said:

All very featured in Doom 2.

Not really, there's no real landscape or wilderness in the techbase portion of D2. At most you have a grass lawn like in map01 or a cave from map05, both pretty pathetic compared to some areas of Q2, even the very starting area, not to mention that one entire level of mountains and cliffs that I think it had somewhere in it.

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Gez said:

And Doom's monsters aren't fantasy? Imps, cacodemons, demons, lost souls, Hell nobles, undead demon skeletons... Even the cybernetic demons are cybernetic demons.


Demonic creatures =/= Fantasy creatures

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Avoozl said:

Fantasy games can have demonic creatures.


Yes, but you can't deny there is a difference.

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It's not rationalization, it's explanation to people who don't understand the arguments.

Such as that there's a very big stylistic and thematic distinction between demons like this and Doom's demons or Quake's monsters, or that there are indeed multiple reasons why Quake 2's techbases are very dissimiliar to Doom 1 or 2's, such as different visual elements and themes.

Although surely "Quake 2 felt like Doom 2 to me so therefore Quake 2 is barely different from Doom 2" is a better, stronger argument...

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