My dream Doom 4 singleplayer

Now that we are close to seeing actual Doom 4 singleplayer I would like to say that in my dreams Doom 4 could learn from... Dark Souls!

You see - large expansive interconnected levels with plenty of exploration. Deadly respawning enemies. Rare checkpoints. Ability to invade other players game sessions or be invaded for some quick coop or deathmatches. Don't you think a FPS game like that would be great? I know Doom 4 will unlikely be like that but a man can dream lol.

I don't think I understand this thread. It's cute to have your own idealization of the game and all...but we've already seen a preview of what we're getting, so why dream?

While I understand your love for From Software games, I don't think that the basic Dark Souls/Bloodbourne/Demon Souls recipe would translate to Doom.

The defining part of Froms games - at least IMHO - is threefold:
- the high difficulty (mostly without beeing unfair, in 98% of the cases you know that you died because you made a fault, not because the fight or the mechanics are unfair) and the need for yourself to master the game (thus evolving together with your character...go back to a high level character after not playing the game a year, and the level won't do much for you as all the timing is gone)
- the constant fear of losing the progress you made in terms of souls/blood echoes. It is a constant ride at the edge between "I go somewhat further, risking that I cross path with a new enemy who I don't know, losing everything I earned in the past half hour" to "there has to be the next short cut/lamp/fire around somewhere, if I make it to that, the area will get easier/quicker"
- online and in the correct areas, the fear of others invading and also taking all the progress from you

Why some of that wouldn't work in Doom IMHO is the lack of RPG-elements/leveling, and the lack of a more or less complex fighting system. In Doom, you shoot stuff dead, from a first person view. You do not dance with it in a bloody fight, learing it's moves, when he telegraphes a certain attack where you mastered the riposte/dodge. You see it, you shoot it.

The difficulty of Doom more or less comes from the way enemies are positioned in the world, how many you face, how you can make the architecture help you in the fight. Plus there is no real progression regarding skills. Disregarding perks, there is not the same need for sculpting your character to a certain fighting style as there is in From games.

Plus: I don't think there will be the number of (extremely hard) bosses than in From games.

I agree that the mechanics regarding co-op or even invading could be fun, and something similar to the Bloodborne chalice dungeons would also be incredibly cool (they have Snapmap already, why not create random dungeons/levels from it?)

Rare checkpoints... This is not good ever. A cheap method to add difficulty to the game by causing aggravation and monotony. Bores the game down a lot.

Absolutely agree.

The only games I played (and that is - sadly - quite many) where rare checkpoints make sense and work are the From games.

In about 99% of other games I found them to be no fun and they reminded me of early console games, where they often where needed due to techical limitations.

I expect Doom to have a constantly available save game system. If someone wants to F5 (or whatever quicksave will be) before every corner, it is absolutely fine. This way, everybody can tailor the difficulty regarding saves to what he likes.

VGames said:

Rare checkpoints... This is not good ever. A cheap method to add difficulty to the game by causing aggravation and monotony. Bores the game down a lot.

This has always been a tricky balance for me. Too many checkpoints make it too easy, too few makes it aggravating.

From Softare are saints of industry. More games must be Dark Souls in terms of difficulty.

id so stupid question how easy game must be, because Call Of Duty fans is Call Of Duty fans, Doom fans is different.

No checkpoints, nada thank you..

Orchid87 said:

large expansive interconnected levels with plenty of exploration.

Yes!

Deadly respawning enemies.

Hmm... Hopefully on high or very high difficulty, and hopefully not on Normal and below.

Rare checkpoints.

Oooh... You save whenever you want in Doom. Rare checkpoints are literally the worst thing about many otherwise amazingly good NES titles - I've never beaten some games I've owned for over a decade because of this bullshit (other than emulator save states, but that doesn't count)... I'd prefer Doom4 not to be one of them.

It always, always has struck me as a lame gimmick to get you to replay the same level 943859348534958 times, thus artificially bloating the time it takes to complete the game without actually seeing anything new.

Ability to invade other players game sessions or be invaded for some quick coop or deathmatches.

This is actually a really cool idea, though it should be optional. I'd always have it enabled but I know there are some people aren't into the MP side of things.


An FPS could be great with all the elements you listed, but the checkpoint thing in particular is very non-Doom. Interesting ideas though!

Hmmmm... I don't have a dream of DOOM 4 per se, though I have a dream of a different kind of spin on DOOM, a complete remake of the first DOOM specifically in a comical sense that it uses graphics and art style of the DOOM comic book, with more of a story alike the DOOM novels and comic and whacky gore/super cheese humor and action.

I'm not talking about some super-realistic graphics like DOOM 3/4 aimed for, but more comic-style, like a FPS graphic novel come to life, with 80's-action inspired sequences and 80's/90's inspired soundtrack (less metal, more synthesized like a lot of bobby princes music was)

I could see it being a HD-remake version DOOM rather than a sequel or reboot.

Kind of like redoing DOOM in a borderlands like-art style and BANG! POW! BOOM! SPLAT! of comic cutscenes or death scenes, but more comic-ish and less cartoon-ish.

I like his sense of insanity and 80's action-type of mentality in the Comics. It's laughable, but he's clearly gone mad after being exposed to such carnage.

My dream Doom 4: Do new things, make a game as innovative today as Doom was 20 years ago.

Recreating some of the old magic with shinier graphics is one thing, but they could blow our minds if they're as creative as possible. Sky's the limit.

My main hope is the level design is creative and surprises me. Do thing I don't expect. Have something happen, have a skull head on the wall come to life or something. And cosmetic stuff aside, do some crazy stuff with the levels that I didn't see coming. While maintaining fun and playability of course.

Buckshot said:

It's laughable, but he's clearly gone mad after being exposed to such carnage.

I like that, even in a more serious-ish game. Him going a bit crazy makes sense and could be fun. I could see him reacting a bit like Ash in Evil Dead 2. Not sure how they'd show this characterization if he's still mute and we don't see him though. Maybe he could very occasionally say some stuff, even an Ash-esque "What the hell...."

And that said, would be fun to have both a female and male protagonist choice. Should be even easier than usual if Doomguy only has like ten lines. And clearly the female marine should have a ponytail like in Quake 2.

PsychoGoatee said:

I like that, even in a more serious-ish game. Him going a bit crazy makes sense and could be fun. I could see him reacting a bit like Ash in Evil Dead 2. Not sure how they'd show this characterization if he's still mute and we don't see him though. Maybe he could very occasionally say some stuff, even an Ash-esque "What the hell...."

"He's a maniac... maniaaaaaccc... on the floor."
***chainsaw throttle roars***
"....and he's dancing like he never danced before..."
***manical evil dead ash screams, blood and guts go flying as the chainsaw roars**

Seriously.. a far more colorful, vibrant base levels, which spooky dark corridors, outer rolling hills of a more colorful mars atmosphere, and vast desert-like scapes of hell's scortched earth, with blood falls and lava rivers, with mountainous bluffs out in the distance.

All in very eye-appealing comic/cartoon-like style more alike the art of the first doom.

What comes to mind instantly is something similar, though I'd think it'd need more of a comic art style...

I LOVE your idea for a Doom game, Buckshot. Hell, that would make for a great spinoff series, really. For all we love Doom's gloomy, scary atmosphere, we also love those over-the-top BFG kills that gib rooms full of enemies - and the "corpses sliding down stairs" thing I feel proved beyond a doubt that Romero & co were/are totally into that kind of stuff as well.

GoatLord said:

It's cute to have your own idealization of the game and all...but we've already seen a preview of what we're getting, so why dream?

I second this.

MFG38 said:

I second this.

If it helps, pretend we're talking about Doom 5. =P

Doomkid said:

I LOVE your idea for a Doom game, Buckshot. Hell, that would make for a great spinoff series, really. For all we love Doom's gloomy, scary atmosphere, we also love those over-the-top BFG kills that gib rooms full of enemies - and the "corpses sliding down stairs" thing I feel proved beyond a doubt that Romero & co were/are totally into that kind of stuff as well.

I think, in all honesty, that's where DOOM originally was headed, and all current reboots/remakes (DOOM 3, DOOM 4, DOOM 64) are a misunderstanding of what DOOM 's vision and feel were originally was supposed to be.

I think DOOM started off in a more comical approach that was never to be taken quite so literally, and was more colorful and vivid... and ended up in a more serious horror tone with drab atmosphere and now apparently overly sy-fy in later recreations.

It basically did the complete opposite of the Evil Dead movies... where those movies started off on a serious horror note, then pulled a switch'a'roo and ended up becoming a comedy.

I think even 90% of the community misunderstood it for something it was never really intended to be... attributing it to metal, neogothic, and macabre, with a whiff of satanic occultism. Which highly influenced DOOM 64, DOOM 3, and now DOOM 64. It's just trying to be too realistic. Sure, it may had inspirations and hints from some of those thing.. Aliens, the Fly, Evil Dead, and various music touches... but ultimately id stuck with the horror approach in follow ups because, well.. I don't know why. I doubt it was intended to be specifically just those things. I honestly feel the first DOOM was a entirely different world and atmosphere than most think it is... and I think the comic book was more akin to the original vision of DOOM than any of it's sequels, despite how overly cheesy it was.

For example, the Phobos mountains and atmosphere in DOOM 1... when I play it, I get more of a sense of the mountainous regions and open atmoshpheric terrain more akin to the planet in Prometheus than I do some dark starry sky, empty gray moon base (which I don't mind, I think both are applicable actually).

I remember when DOOM 4 was announced and shown and Quakecon 2014, reading all the reviews and responses of people who saw it... and I thought "well this sounds like they certainly back on track with the original philosophy of the game, and it's original vision.". In my minds eye, from those reports, I saw the version I keep referencing behind those actions and events, with design and graphics far more like the first, and less like DOOM 3, far brighter colors, less crysis (than what it apparently is), far faster, and more manical mad man like DOOM guy from Quake 3 (running around screaming hysterically from insanity). More comical and much more action, with less Aliens-like corridors, thinking level design would be more like classic DOOM. Then they released the footage a month ago at E3, and I'm like "oh... guess not."

I don't mind the evil dead-inspired enemies.. but again, I think it goes clearly more towards horror and neogothic design rather than the more comical designs of the classics. It's still heavily borrowing from DOOM 64 & Doom 3. As if some are trying to take it too seriously and too literally... making it more alike Quake 1 than DOOM.

Not that there's anything wrong with this... I enjoy all flavors of DOOM just about the same. It's a different direction, and maybe it was meant to be different. Though, It's not what I envisioned a "remake" to be.

Buckshot said:

Though, It's not what I envisioned a "remake" to be.

It's more of a "reboot". Or I'd say in other words, it's just a sequel that isn't tied to past continuity. It's a new Doom game.

And talking about tone seems to be one of the more subjective aspects of these classic games. Maybe because of the low resolution of the sprites and whatnot, people's imaginations seem to be more involved in interpretation.

While Doom did have some humor and lots of over-the-top stuff, it was often very atmospheric, dark, and intense. Plus to some degree, having a cartoony or comicbooky style was the only option with the lowres sprites at the time.

And to me Doom 4 looks less serious and realistic in style than it does to you. From the screenshots, the Cacodemon for example is cute and cartoony. He doesn't need bright colors to be true to Doom. The Revanant looks very Doom, the Mancubus is funny, in general the monsters have a fun design to them, and the gameplay looks very over-the-top. Not taking itself too seriously or too "horror" style in my opinion.

But I do agree that not every game needs to go for realism, there should be more variety in art styles. But to me, at least going by monster design, this is going for much less of a "realism" style than Doom 3, and is more stylized.

PsychoGoatee said:

While Doom did have some humor and lots of over-the-top stuff, it was often very atmospheric, dark, and intense. Plus to some degree, having a cartoony or comicbooky style was the only option with the lowres sprites at the time.

I completely agree, a big part of it was the dark, spooky corridors needs to be there. It played a huge part in the atmosphere in certain respects.

But I'd still like to see a conversion of the comic/novelization version of the game with those aspects included. It's really hard for me to describe in writing, I can see it all in my mind thinking of it, of course... but a mashup of 80s-inspired comic/cartoon tv show art of action & darker fantasy stuff is really what I think when I see the DOOM comic and anytime I read over the novels.

I'm not sure if you had a chance to grow up in that era, but from what I remember as a kid, I saw a lot of that in DOOM that I'm not seeing today.

Maybe that's always been the case an its just me, but to me, its very distinct... theres the lighter more insane side of DOOM... and then there's the darker, more horror side of DOOM. Every release is either one or the other... where as the PSX version attempted to blend the mix. Clearly DOOM 64 followed the horror theme, as did DOOM 3, and so it appears with DOOM 4, whereas DOOM 1 and *some* of DOOM 2 had that insansity/fantasy vibe through it.

I often wonder if that was influenced by Tom Hall's & Romero's design ideas, where as both Carmack's envisioning was far darker for later designs... as clearly also seen in Quake... which apparently Romero has stated he wasn't a big fan of how it turned out. I think that was the turning point where stuff became strictly horror after their depature.

Buckshot said:

I'm not sure if you had a chance to grow up in that era, but from what I remember as a kid, I saw a lot of that in DOOM that I'm not seeing today.

I was there, I played Wolf3D and Duke Nukem 1 on shareware etc. :D

I just think you're taking the style a bit literally, and almost mechanically. For example by saying Doom 4 looks more like Quake than Doom. I almost think you're saying that because it's 3D, because I don't really see it. Unless colorfulness is the main factor for Doomyness there.

And I can see what you mean, but I do think Doom 4 looks a lot more fun in tone than Doom 64 for example.

PsychoGoatee said:

I was there, I played Wolf3D and Duke Nukem 1 on shareware etc. :D

I just think you're taking the style a bit literally, and almost mechanically. For example by saying Doom 4 looks more like Quake than Doom. I almost think you're saying that because it's 3D, because I don't really see it. Unless colorfulness is the main factor.

Personally I think Doom 4 looks like Crysis + Quake + Brutal DOOM + DOOM 3...

I completely agree it looks far superior to DOOM 3, though. Not saying anything bad about it, but I remember reading all the raving reviews about its return to classic style after Quakecon 2014, and then seeing it last month, and just wondering how they came to that conclusion.

Buckshot said:

Personally I think Doom 4 looks like Crysis + Quake + Brutal DOOM + DOOM 3...

Are you looking for a 2.5D DOS game? It doesn't make sense to not include Doom and Doom 2 in the list of components. I also wonder what you think Crysis brought to the table that Doom 4 is using? Or are we just talking about art style? Even then, how about that Cacodemon and Revenant?

It does have fatalities, so you could say it has a bit of Mortal Kombat, God of War, or Brutal Doom in that aspect, sure. Everything is influenced by everything to some degree.

I know we're on a classic Doom forum, and this is a modern game, it's not exactly the same. But it looks like it's taking a lot more from Doom 2 than it is from say Crysis.

You're in a surreal hellish place fighting Doom monsters in run and gun gameplay, I think that's what they mean by a return to oldschool. Not a literal return.

PsychoGoatee said:

Everything is influenced by everything to some degree.

No argument... but what I'm saying is it seems more influenced by OTHER games than DOOM itself from mechanics and design stand point.

Don't get me wrong... I love the new evil dead-inspired enemies, and double jumping, mantling, etc. But it's a different vision and art style than I had expected.

Despite it being a little hard to put into words, I totally agree with you, Buckshot. A few years back (while you seemed to be away from DW) I had a similar discussion with another user, about how Doom is very tongue-in-cheek, but they seemed to have that vision of the game as being "serious".. Oh, and just listen to John playing the early beta in that "1993 Id Software" video on YouTube - He clearly sees a lot of comedy as well as horror present all in one package.

Anyone who actually takes the time to read those absurd-yet-entertaining text walls between episiodes knows the truth: This game knows it's awesome, but it does not take itself seriously, unlike Doom64 and Doom3.

To cut it short, I'm right there with you.

I think the game took itself serious from the beginning. It's just that the graphics sucked back then and there wasn't a lot they could do with color and atmosphere back then. I think they always intended it to be serious. Of course at times it does have its funny moments but that's mainly because of the carnage that occurs. U know how something unexpected happens and monsters get killed in some crazy way and it makes u laugh? That kind of funny. I think it's always been a serious game. At least to me it always was. Doom 64 had much better atmosphere due to the tech at the time. And so the atmosphere has gotten better since then. So now without even stressing the point the game comes off as much more serious because of what all they can do with the atmosphere.

Doomkid said:

Anyone who actually takes the time to read those absurd-yet-entertaining text walls between episiodes knows the truth: This game knows it's awesome, but it does not take itself seriously, unlike Doom64 and Doom3.

^This.

Yes, it was more serious than say, Duke Nukem 3D, which was an obvious parody of different things. But it wasn't as serious as say, a big budget flick like Aliens. It has some design inspiration, sure... but it was really made "for the fun of it.". Yes it has a slight story, yes its dark and creepy at times (as its meant to be), but it was a genre mashup that was meant to be a game at heart, and less a syfy story with macabre space horror elements, which clearly the later iterations of DOOM are.

I think the only reason it wasn't more like that in the beginning was because they couldn't pull it off at the time. now they can for sure. And I like serious Doom. Like I said it's always been a serious game to me. Satanic imagery is serious stuff. The latest Doom will surely have that Doom 3 atmosphere which I'm very happy with.

Doomkid said:

Anyone who actually takes the time to read those absurd-yet-entertaining text walls between episiodes knows the truth: This game knows it's awesome, but it does not take itself seriously, unlike Doom64 and Doom3.

I replayed Doom recently, and I got goosebumps during those walls of texts. No joke. It evokes something, especially with the music. There's dark humor too, the ending for example with the bunny, but I'm not sure how the story text would support your idea that the game isn't to be taken seriously.

VGames said:

I think the game took itself serious from the beginning.

I largely agree with this, though the game does have humor in it and can be funny too. Doom 2 even more so with various joke levels like Barrels O Fun, etc. Hell in Doom 1 is genuinely disturbing though, especially for the time.

Overall I'd say Doom can do multiple things. It can have atmosphere and be intense, and it can have humor and nuttiness in the mix too.

I mean, I take DOOM seriously... on the account it's based on completley factual events that have/have yet or are currently happening.

Yes. That's right. I just said that.

And if you ask the general consensus within physics and science... they'd likely agree... Quantum universe based on quantum mechanics is subject to infinitely ever expanding parallel layers and fractal-like mandelbrots.

Infinite universes, with infinite possibilities and infinite outcomes.

Any thing you can think of has *and* has never happened.

Sound comical? It is and it isn't... humorous because of how we perceive, scary because its serious.

Just like DOOM ;)

PsychoGoatee said:

I replayed Doom recently, and I got goosebumps during those walls of texts. No joke. It evokes something, especially with the music.

I second this. Those were genius. Also KDITD ending shocked me back then. Doom had that perfect balance between serious and b-movie stuff. Have you ever played the first Red Alert game? The cutscenes there had "that" too. With the second and especially the third Red Alert game they lost the balance and fell into the "stupid parody" category like those Scary Movies. Some developers just have the skill to make this right, most haven't.

It's funny just how different people's perception of the game is/was. Some seeing it as kinda cartoonish etc.
My own experience of it was that Doom made everything else look like a cartoon.