Brutal or Vanilla: Which do you prefer?

[Kr4mpu5]

There are a lot of doom players that seem to only ever play any variation of brutal doom, as well as many other players that seem to despise anything to do with that damn mod, and prefer to play vanilla.

 

What is your preference and why?

[TheMagicMushroomMan]

I use both depending on the wad. I replay wads with BD. It depends on the wad. Sometimes I use BD to spice up wads I normally wouldn't be interested in. I'm pretty sure this has been discussed about ten thousand times. 

 

I see this question every week!

[mxrgan]

I prefer both. I just mess around with BD or even PB (Project Brutality) sometimes. It depends on the wad though. 

[Maximum Matt]

I would absolutely play the living shit out of Brutal Doom if presented with the chance, but I would never go out of my way to find and install it, as Vanilla (or my preferred flavor, Chocolate) Doom is close enough to infinity for my liking.  Same goes with Doom 2016/Eternal; they look awesome, and I would get addicted to them easily, but oldschool Doom is waaaaay more than enough for a stooge like me

[spineapple tea]

Vanilla for pretty much everything, Brutal Doom if I'm just bored. 

[666shooter]

As Brutal Doom tends to unbalance certain mapsets (and even some maps in the IWADS), I always try to play through a set first on "vanilla" settings (though I use GZDoom/LZDoom). Then, if I liked the set well enough, I will go back and replay the maps with mods later. I find myself playing with Project Brutality moreso than BD nowadays, though, as I enjoy the extended arsenal better.

[Not so much the op hyper-reactive enemies.]

[Biodegradable]

I like to play BD occasionally. I started off coming back to the game using the mod and I do enjoy using different weapon mods overall, but I specifically look out for ones that don't affect Doom's core gameplay too much and focus on different weapons, animations and sound design. Since I've been exploring mods more in that direction though, I've been playing BD less and less often since BD does affect both demon behaviour and Doom stock textures to a greater extent.

[Murdoch]

Vanilla by a country mile. While I have been impressed by BD as a technical accomplishment, it simply does not appeal to me. Too overdone.

[baja blast rd.]

One of them is the experience we all remember fondly from our youth, scary and frightening and action-packed with lovable recognizable monsters, an experience that devs, still to this day, are working on, with new versions, with new mods, even as it has left an indelible mark on the culture, enough to get its own fucking Wiki page, and aliens hundreds of thousands of years from now will seek it out as a relic of human society...

 

...and the other is a grainy, pixelated mess that crashes with just a bit too much detail on-screen.

 

Easy choice!

[Komenja]

Neither of those let me kick ass as a beer-chugging eldritch cowboy and his 12-foot tall brickhouse demon gf, so I'm going with High Noon Drifter.

Spoiler

But for real tho, vanilla. BD's cool, but you always gotta come back to the OG. Besides, most stuff out there is balanced around it.

 

[Pirx]

1 hour ago, Biodegradable said:

I like to play BD occasionally. I started off coming back to the game using the mod and I do enjoy using different weapon mods overall, but I specifically look out for ones that don't affect Doom's core gameplay too much and focus on different weapons, animations and sound design. Since I've been exploring mods more in that direction though, I've been playing BD less and less often since BD does affect both demon behaviour and Doom stock textures to a greater extent.

 

 

this. i prefer vanilla since most maps are balanced for it and bd tends to change this. i use mostly cosmetic mods. however i play bd occasionally, mostly with maps i already know.

[XLightningStormL]

Vanilla.

Brutal Doom is too much of an exaggeration/parody.

[Oldschoolgeek32]

My preference is that if the maps are designed for primarily Vanilla or has specific and custom assets, weapons, and monsters unique to it (GZDoom-Based Maps), Then I would run the way it is. But if the map is designed to be some sort of add-on for Brutal Doom or if the map author advices that it supports the gameplay balance of Brutal Doom, then I'll play it using Brutal Doom

[Lizardcommando]

Neither. Although, to be more accurate, I would lean more towards "vanilla". And by vanilla, I mean Smooth Doom.

[AtticTelephone]

Vanilla, since I don't play Brutal Doom ever.

[MemeMind]

Is Guncaster an option?

[m8f]

This is a weird question. Why a binary choice between Brutal Doom/Vanilla? There are hundreds of gameplay mods, many of which are more elaborate than Brutal. Also, there is a full spectrum of flavors, ranging from slight tweaks of the original formula to "this isn't even Doom anymore".

[Edward850]

34 minutes ago, m8f said:

This is a weird question. Why a binary choice between Brutal Doom/Vanilla?

The correct answer is Zen Dynamics anyway.

[Mara]

1 hour ago, AtticTelephone said:

Vanilla, since I don't play Brutal Doom ever.

 

This would be my answer as well.

 

40 minutes ago, m8f said:

This is a weird question. Why a binary choice between Brutal Doom/Vanilla? There are hundreds of gameplay mods, many of which are more elaborate than Brutal. Also, there is a full spectrum of flavors, ranging from slight tweaks of the original formula to "this isn't even Doom anymore".

 

...but at the same time, also this. I play a lot of weird gameplay mods, just not Brutal Doom.

[Doomkid]

Personally, I never play doom without loading SUPRWEP8.DEH

 

 

[Grazza]

7 minutes ago, Doomkid said:

Personally, I never play doom without loading SUPRWEP8.DEH

Why muck about with all that firing and waiting around? PISUPEND.DEH is where it's at!

[Mayomancer]

Well, there's a very large spectrum of things in between both extremes. I really don't have fun playing PB or Brutal Doom, or anything that makes the game feel bloated really. But it's not like i have anything against zdoom format megawads and stuff, if something is good it's good.

[DynamiteKaitorn]

Brutal is fine if I want to just go around blowing everything up in bloody glory but vanilla is kinda what I'm used to nowadays.

 

 

 

 

Though if we're going for which I prefer... LaTailorGirl.

[Rapp0ng]

Prefer vanilla but i do enjoy brutal doom every now and then.

[CBM]

arrrr... rip and teeeaaarrr....

 

ok, seriously... I do prefer brutal doom or similar... since doom is meant to be a bloody fps game IMO

 

27 minutes ago, DynamiteKaitorn said:

Though if we're going for which I prefer... LaTailorGirl.

 

that is one cool mod

[Redneckerz]

I prefer to play some of BD's aspects on Vanilla.
 

 

[smeghammer]

BD is fun, but original generally better - too many WADs break with BD.

 

7 hours ago, Komenja said:

so I'm going with High Noon Drifter

Imagine Clint as doomguy. That would have been fucking awesome if Doom (TM, The Movie) were made back in the day - who remembers this:

 

 

[Fizanko]

Brutal Doom has rejuvenated a lot the gameplay on most of the old wads that were designed with vanilla gameplay by adding a very good layer of frantic energy.

By example replaying the original Doom&Doom2 episodes with vanilla was so boring to me (probably because i have played doom several time on a few formats since 25 years) and Brutal Doom made them fun again.

.

But it's not the only gameplay mod that re-attracted me to replaying old wads, Complex Mod is another amazing one.

 

That said, there are some wads that i still enjoy with vanilla gameplay, especially when i'm not used enough to them.

 

 

[Smite of Disrespect]

>Content count: 1

Spoiler

 

[whybmonotacrab]

Not gonna lie, Brutal Doom got me into Doom back in 2013. However, since then it's kind of not something I usually play. I generally play new mods vanilla/however they're intended and sometimes I'll go back and replay with Brutal, but I find that Supercharge scratches the same itch while being a little more balanced. If I really want an over the top gorefest I'll use Meatgrinder and play SF2012.