Romero Interview in The Guardian

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Modern shooters are too close to fantasy role-playing games in how they shower you with new weapons from battle to battle, Romero suggests. This abundance of loot – which reflects how blockbuster games generally have become Netflix-style services, defined by an unrelenting roll-out of “content” – means you spend as much time comparing guns in menus as savoring their capabilities. It encourages you to think of each gun as essentially disposable, like an obsolete make of smartphone. “The more weapons you throw in there, the more you’re playing an inventory game.”

I wonder if this is subconsciously why a lot of the new (post 2000 lol) FPS games don't appeal to me. I'm a straightforward person who likes straightforward things. Not to knock the fantasy RPGs and other similar games, as a youngster I loved watching my brother play that kind of stuff and even today I like watching friends play them, they're just not for me. Good find!

I liked the article and completely agree with his point.  I've recently tried a few new games to play, in all of them I lose way too much time just staring at menus and comparing equipment.

I know John Romero is right because of the shotgun in Doom.  It is the best gun in the game, it's reliable, satisfying to shoot and quickly became synonymous with Doom.  I can't think of a modern shooter with such an iconic gun, not even Doom 2016.  Most modern shooters know that they can get more people to play if they support different playstyles, where as classic shooters were more arcadey, just boot up and go.  I'm now enjoying the classics more than the modern games because of this.

Its almost insane how many interviews and talks the man has done.

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So how do you get the chaingun and not cancel out the pistol? It’s to do with how much ammo it eats, and how inaccurate it is over distance – the pistol eats less ammo and is extremely accurate at a distance.”

oh no

The pistol does genuinely have a use though - to turn on projectile activated switches on ammo-tight maps

Did The Guardian ask his opinions on BRutal EXtinction International Tournament..?

Romero talks about how quality of weapons is more important than quantity. Then whose idea was 26 unreliable weapons in Daikatana???

I'd chalk that up to a lesson learned

On 11/12/2019 at 10:58 AM, Doomkid said:

I wonder if this is subconsciously why a lot of the new (post 2000 lol) FPS games don't appeal to me. I'm a straightforward person who likes straightforward things. Not to knock the fantasy RPGs and other similar games, as a youngster I loved watching my brother play that kind of stuff and even today I like watching friends play them, they're just not for me. Good find!

For me, it's a question of specificity. I love DOOM more than most games, but can also definitely enjoy more complex games (up to a point, I don't want it to feel like I'm working), RTS, turned-based strategy, RPGs, some puzzle games, et.c. But that's when I'm in the mood for that. If I want to play a shooter I'm generally not looking for that. But...

DOOM is actually quite a weird piece of work when you think about it. It's not an arena shooter (ignoring 2016 for now...) and relies quite heavily on very varied, sometimes complex map layouts that you have to break down in your head and learn how to navigate. The "dumb-dumb" switch puzzles requires you to pay attention to your surroundings, the automap is integral to the game play... I think you get my point. My peers usually think about DOOM as a straight-up murder-fest with as many monsters as possible and as little thinking as possible I usually erode that view pretty quickly by showing them some D1 or D2 levels.

I guess it's the fact that the combat is very simple, and the complexity instead lies in the levels themselves. I think what I dislike about most modern shooters is that they've sort of inverted that and made combat and weapons more complex, while dumbing down the rest. Not sure, actually.

EtA: I'm talking purely about the IWADs. With the infinite creativity of the map making community, DOOM has basically been everything by now.

7 hours ago, Loud Silence said:

Romero talks about how quality of weapons is more important than quantity. Then whose idea was 26 unreliable weapons in Daikatana???

It's almost as if he's speaking from experience 

44 minutes ago, CinnamonKilljoy said:

DOOM is actually quite a weird piece of work when you think about it. It's not an arena shooter (ignoring 2016 for now...) and relies quite heavily on very varied, sometimes complex map layouts that you have to break down in your head and learn how to navigate. The "dumb-dumb" switch puzzles requires you to pay attention to your surroundings, the automap is integral to the game play... I think you get my point. My peers usually think about DOOM as a straight-up murder-fest with as many monsters as possible and as little thinking as possible I usually erode that view pretty quickly by showing them some D1 or D2 levels.

I guess it's the fact that the combat is very simple, and the complexity instead lies in the levels themselves. I think what I dislike about most modern shooters is that they've sort of inverted that and made combat and weapons more complex, while dumbing down the rest. Not sure, actually.

Excellent post, a like isn't enough. I was actually thinking about how contradictory what I said was later on, because many of my favorite old Nintendo games, despite having simple input and being easy to understand, really do have some complex layouts and require solid navigational skills. This is just as true of Doom. There is more to the game than the easy to understand combat that often gets forgotten when discussing it in a more general sense.

On 11/12/2019 at 2:58 AM, Doomkid said:

Modern shooters are too close to fantasy role-playing games in how they shower you with new weapons from battle to battle, Romero suggests. This abundance of loot – which reflects how blockbuster games generally have become Netflix-style services, defined by an unrelenting roll-out of “content” – means you spend as much time comparing guns in menus as savoring their capabilities. It encourages you to think of each gun as essentially disposable, like an obsolete make of smartphone. “The more weapons you throw in there, the more you’re playing an inventory game.”

While I basically agree with this, sometimes I think it works really, really well, and I'd look no further than Borderlands for a good example. There are more guns in that game than I could possibly ever count, or even come across, and yet Borderlands is near the top of my list of FPS' where I have a genuinely unhealthy love affair with the guns. Yeah, there are countless disposable weapons in that game, but you're always constantly discovering that new one... that different one... that better one. And when you do, you savour it, you let it mold your playstyle and command the battlefield, you learn it's strengths and weaknesses, you form an unethical, unapologetically amorous bond with it knowing it could never be replaced. And then, Borderlands does what it does best, and the RNG gods spit out another one... it's incredibly satisfying. And a wonderful game-design choice that I doubt would've seen the light of day in an environment dominated by 90's era design philosophy. I guess what I'm trying to say is, sometimes, change can be good. 

Nice find , thank you for posting.

11 hours ago, Doomkid said:

Excellent post, a like isn't enough. I was actually thinking about how contradictory what I said was later on, because many of my favorite old Nintendo games, despite having simple input and being easy to understand, really do have some complex layouts and require solid navigational skills. This is just as true of Doom. There is more to the game than the easy to understand combat that often gets forgotten when discussing it in a more general sense.

Thank you. :) And yeah, I think a "simple" foundation i.e. base game play, with external complexity is what I enjoy the most. The more I think about it the more it's true for almost every game I enjoy.

The early (and possibly later, haven't played them) Mario games are great examples of this. Once you've tried like 2-3 power ups you've along with the simplest (albeit tight as fuck) controls explored the extent of what you can do. But the games do a nice job of ramping up the challenge and complexity to the point where there's so much on the screen that you start to rely more on instinct than pure analysis because there isn't time.

excellent article -- thanks for posting the link @Phobus

(sorry for the name confusion, looks like I finally need glasses)

5 hours ago, joepallai said:

excellent article -- thanks for posting the link @Phobos

Phobus. There's a Phobos on Doomworld, but the account was last active in 2007.

On 11/13/2019 at 7:01 PM, CinnamonKilljoy said:

I guess it's the fact that the combat is very simple, and the complexity instead lies in the levels themselves. I think what I dislike about most modern shooters is that they've sort of inverted that and made combat and weapons more complex, while dumbing down the rest. Not sure, actually.

Modern shooters have absolutely abandoned the traditional level design we saw in the '90s, and I think they are worse off for it. It's a big reason why games like Dusk and Amid Evil were so appealing to longtime fans of the genre. Sort of a return to form in a way.

Despite the greater focus on combat in Doom 2016, I do appreciate that it has some throwback style levels (Foundry is one of several examples) where you have some room for exploration, along with many secrets to uncover.