Let's discuss the essence of Doom

[Egg Boy]

People seem to forget that Doom was already a cultural milestone before mods. Perhaps the community would not be so big, but I wholeheartedly believe we would still be discussing Doom today even if it lacked mods.

[idbeholdME]

For me, it's mostly the combat. The amount of scenarios you can construct with Doom's enemy roster and clever map design is seemingly inexhaustible. The way maps allow monsters to freely traverse it instead of being locked to arenas makes the levels and enemies feel alive. And every enemy feels unique and is not just a "generic projectile dispenser #7945".

 

I especially like the hitscanners, because they force you to adjust. You can't just circle strafe everything to death while avoiding projectiles coming your way ad infinitum (a problem in a lot of the newer old-school FPS games). Contrary to popular belief, taking cover is often the wisest course of action in Doom/2, lest you want to die in the next couple of seconds.

[Murdoch]

2 hours ago, Egg Boy said:

People seem to forget that Doom was already a cultural milestone before mods. Perhaps the community would not be so big, but I wholeheartedly believe we would still be discussing Doom today even if it lacked mods.

 

Completely, just as Super Mario Brothers, Street Fighter 2 and others are discussed.

[sandwedge]

I definitely agree with people noting that doom isn't perfect, it's good despite its imperfections thanks to everything else it has going for it, including modders and mappers who know how to work within its limitations.  Plus everything can be modified thru dehacked or some other manner.  For example some of the enemies imo have issues, spider mastermind being the most obvious.  But imo the pinky and especially the spectre have some issues being almost harmless hunks of meat that can be a chore to get through (especially without the SSG, that makes them a lot better).  However fast pinkies are actually awesome since you actually have to worry about their movement and bite attack.  I've seen fast pinkies placed with regular speed monsters and it makes them way more interesting and dangerous.  Lost souls also feel a bit too meaty (again SSG is key here).  But mappers now know how to place these things or change them for the best.  I think that goes for a lot of aspects of doom, it does have an incredible base balance level since any game is going to have flaws, but the community can cast them in the best light as well.

[Marisa the Magician]

On 6/17/2022 at 6:48 AM, baja blast rd. said:

As an addendum: imo a lot of gameplay mods are flat-out better in terms of mechanics and feel than vanilla Doom, but the drop-off they suffer is a) they don't have mapsets designed specifically around their mechanics, which loses a lot; as much as I love some mods, I eventually need to play something that has an intimate marriage of intentional level-encounter design and base mechanics, which the pwad scene offers in abundance for stock Doom, but which is very rare for gameplay mods; b) they don't have the advantage that comes from everyone already knowing the meta. Every new "meta" you learn, no matter how enjoyable it is, has a time and energy cost. And that is a final edge Doom has over games too; you don't have to relearn it, or most of it at least, with every new pwad you play. And that's possible, yet again, because it's so ridiculously moddable.  

Honestly, the main explanation I can give about that first point is that we, as gameplay modders, tend to be that first and foremost, and when it comes to mapping we're either not very skilled or just plain can't wrap our heads around it.

 

Now, if some mappers were kind enough to make mapsets centered around gameplay mods, that'd be very nice. There's a bunch of 'em made for Supercharge already, so things ARE at least happening.

[OniriA]

Quote

the essence of Doom

 

1. Shoot stuff.

 

2. Moddability.

[Gez]

1 hour ago, OniriA said:

1. Shoot stuff.

 

2. Moddability.

So, Fallout 4 shares the essence of Doom? It's moddable, you shoot stuff, and can even put on the armor, get a BFG and participate in deathmatch. Totally Doom.

[baja blast rd.]

On 6/17/2022 at 4:33 AM, Egg Boy said:

People seem to forget that Doom was already a cultural milestone before mods. Perhaps the community would not be so big, but I wholeheartedly believe we would still be discussing Doom today even if it lacked mods.

 

On 6/17/2022 at 6:58 AM, Murdoch said:

Completely, just as Super Mario Brothers, Street Fighter 2 and others are discussed.

 

"Still discussing Doom today" is a much more sedate version of what OP is looking for an explanation for: 

 

On 6/16/2022 at 4:06 AM, Sneezy McGlassFace said:

I also remember @Biodegradable saying that he didn't play anything else in two years. 

It really seems like once you get bitten by the Doom bug, it's hard to get back to the more conventional stuff. Doom has a certain gameplay vibe that I haven't seen in any other game. Selaco is a super impressive game from what I've seen. So is Ion Fury / Ion Maiden. So is Dusk, and Amid Evil and a bunch of other games. They're all great but they don't have the Doom essence, whatever that actually is. 

 

I don't think that would happen, beyond speedrunners and "competitive" players, if it was just the base games without the extensive modding scene.

[garu32]

DOOM it's DOOM when it has DEMONS to KILL with a SHOTGUN or CHAINSAW

[Gez]

8 hours ago, LucasRafael132 said:

it's DOOM when it has DEMONS to KILL with a SHOTGUN or CHAINSAW

I see.

 

Demon, Shotgun, and Chainsaws. I've found another game that is Doom!

[TasAcri]

IMO, nothing beats DOOM when it comes to the overall "feel" or feedback. The movement is perfect. The right amount of speed, acceleration, momentum, weapon sway, head bobbing. I don't think there are many games that do all these right, at least one of them has to be wrong, especially as the time went on.

 

The level design is also great. There are some bad maps here and there but the good ones are the peak of FPS level design IMO.

 

It's a game of balance. There is a good balance of creepiness/silliness and cartoony/realistic. There's also a good balance of action/exploration. I hate it when people describe DOOM as a game where all you do is killing monsters. Even without the monsters you would still have the exploration part of the game where you try to solve the maps and find all the secrets. Enemies/weapons are also pretty much perfectly balanced. Even in DOOM II.

 

The art style is timeless. I don't know why DOOM is never boring or ugly to look at. I played every single FPS game on PC back in the day but i don't think anything has aged as well visually. Can't put my finger on why that's the case. The same thing can be said for it's sound effects. Things like the doors opening/closing or the monster growls are as iconic as Mario/Sonic jumping/coin/ring collecting.

 

Everyone in the DOOM team was the best in their field but also still young enough to be passionate and experimental.

[Marisa the Magician]

I wouldn't really agree that the movement is perfect, considering how friction makes it seem like all the floors are lubed up. :V

[TasAcri]

It's not realistic movement obviously. Nobody can run that fast either. But for videogame it's good enough to make it addictive even when you just run around trying to find secrets.

[Andromeda]

Besides friction wasn't part of the original game, it's a source port feature.

[Gez]

The source port feature is being able to change friction. Friction is definitely a part of the original game; that's why your character slows to a stop when you release the movement keys.

[sandwedge]

Grease up my doomguy, I want a frictionless doom.  Try my new sourceport GreaZDoom

[Marisa the Magician]

That sounds fun for a mini-mod idea.

[SMG_Man]

I've ruminated on this a bit, because recently I played the original Quake for the first time. By itself that doesn't sound odd, but I should mention that when I was a kid in the early 2000s, I played the shit out of Quake 2 and its expansions. So after 20 years with just Quake 2's singleplayer experience, I finally got around to playing the original, and I've gotta say it felt like something different entirely. It wasn't perfect or anything like that, but it was fun... so much more fun than Quake 2 ever was. And thinking about that difference there, why I liked Quake so much more than Quake 2, is a lot like this here; pondering why Doom and Doom 2 are so much different from games they (in)directly inspired, or even from the series' modern incarnations of Doom 2016 and Doom Eternal.

 

I'm pretty tired right now, so I'll probably have to come back to this later with more concrete thoughts.

[SiMpLeToNiUm]

"The Doom Essence" as it's applied in the OP and how the "Seasoned Doomers" who are being spoken for seemingly crave nothing else sounds really gatekeepy. Maybe not maliciously so, therefore I apologize for my rant in advance, but it has drawn my sweaty ire nonetheless. Doomers play plenty of non-Doom games all the time, irrespective of that Essence. That's not always what entices people, even in the retro-shooter fanclub. Selaco, Ion Fury, Dusk and Amid Evil were some of the titles cited as missing out on it. I must say I didn't miss the absence because well, I wasn't playing Doom, and I didn't have to be to enjoy them and extract bits from their unique designs, mechanics and implementations. I drew more from my experiences with other games and other media to find something to like with these titles, rather than any feeling that Doom was sorely lacking from their DNA. If anything, it was in there, just perhaps not so crystal clear.

 

Doom (and one's subjective interpretation at that) is not the only metric for what shooters should be, and decades of mega-successful titles agnostic to that "magic" formula can tell you that. Maybe not consciously or again, as I said above, maliciously, but that's where I felt the OP remained encamped. I'd chat about what that Essence is, but plenty of people have already done that in the thread, and I'd only be adding to what's frustrating me about this thread.

 

It occurs to me that the thread is actually less about that point and more about using that idea to compare that subjective feeling of something incomparable to the new stuff that's been coming out, so I thought I'd draw attention to that growing...opinion instead. There's nothing wrong with trying to see what Doom did well, and there's nothing wrong with being mega-passionate about Doom, but there's also nothing wrong with making a retro-shooter worthy of the name which is incapable of capturing what was quite literally lightning in a bottle, for an absolute multitude of reasons. These games can't be Doom, they shouldn't be Doom, and if people are truly trying to craft new experiences, these games won't be Doom or carry its "Essence" by the end of it. They are allowed to and should feel like their own things, regardless of how much love you and I have for the addictively simplistic and endlessly customizable experience that is playing and creating for Doom.

 

My advice to gamedevs both inside and outside of Doom would be to craft the experiences that are most inspiring to you, whether you get some of your juice from the OGs like Doom and try to do some of the stuff it did, or you reach from somewhere else. You can't ever erase what Doom did for FPS or for gaming, but you sure won't be able to satisfy The Essence of Doom as it's described, even if you try.

[sandwedge]

16 hours ago, SiMpLeToNiUm said:

"The Doom Essence" as it's applied in the OP and how the "Seasoned Doomers" who are being spoken for seemingly crave nothing else sounds really gatekeepy. Maybe not maliciously so, therefore I apologize for my rant in advance, but it has drawn my sweaty ire nonetheless

 

Yeah it's true people play plenty of games, I think we're talking about a phenomenon that people like me get.  Where I used to play tons of games and as soon as I got into doom it basically is all I play, and nothing else quite satisfies that itch.  I've had a PS5 collecting dust.  You're going to find a larger proportion of people on a doom forum who have this passion for it obviously. 

 

If you play other games that's great too, there's gonna be all sorts of levels of commitment to playing doom.  I don't think there's anything gatekeepy about this thread, just expressing wonder at how such an old, relatively simple game can captivate people in 2022 so well.  There aren't many games with the same level of mod support so that's a major reason that is not necessarily tied to the game mechanics, but the core mechanics make it worth playing and are such a pure form of fps gameplay.

[SiMpLeToNiUm]

8 hours ago, sandwedge said:

Yeah it's true people play plenty of games, I think we're talking about a phenomenon that people like me get.  Where I used to play tons of games and as soon as I got into doom it basically is all I play, and nothing else quite satisfies that itch.  I've had a PS5 collecting dust.  You're going to find a larger proportion of people on a doom forum who have this passion for it obviously. 

 

If you play other games that's great too, there's gonna be all sorts of levels of commitment to playing doom.  I don't think there's anything gatekeepy about this thread, just expressing wonder at how such an old, relatively simple game can captivate people in 2022 so well.

*EDIT - Actually really starting to regret this response. This is why I dont like forums. Too much time to sit there and stare angrily at what someone said rather than really understand what they meant. I really tried to rewrite this multiple times but realized I still settled for the sparky gotcha response. I'm not trying to piss anyone off or anything, but I do get defensive about this sort of thing and don't want people to start getting the wrong ideas about trying new stuff out. Sorry if I ruffled any feathers.

Spoiler

 

My comments were directed at the OP, not at you or your own personal intentions. I'll go on to clarify why I used "gatekeepy."

 

It was probably too inflammatory of a term because I don't really know the OP's intentions, but it's the one way I felt I could best describe feeling spoken for in the OP.

 

There's no real disconnect between Doomers and playing stuff that isn't Doom. The line lies between those who are only satisfied when playing Doom and those who are not or who can be but aren't always. Let's not say that the latter group can't be seasoned Doomers. Let's also not say that retro shooters are "missing something" when we're in the group that is only satisfied by Doom and we're speaking for other Doomers, because it's more complex than that, and there are more perspectives than that. Not only that, but there are plenty of retro shooters that can be made without what makes Doom a great game (and it is) in mind. Finally, let's not say that those aren't the things we've been trying to get people on board with from the OP, because they are. When you get right down to it, "The Doom Essence" really is not all that important for the enjoyment of other things, even among people who regularly interact with the game. It just reeks of that buzzwordiness that becomes the next "UV or bust" mentality later on.

 

Those are the elements that made me use that terminology. Again, not as if the OP was trying to be malicious, but let's be honest about what we're really saying and why.

 

 

Edited June 23, 2022 by SiMpLeToNiUm : Apology needed

[Sneezy McGlassFace]

@SiMpLeToNiUm what I meant to say isn't that doom's the best thing under the sun because of some innate nature of it. To be clear here, I'm not English native, and I was looking at doom from general game dev point. Doom has something that I called "essence" that makes it feel somewhat unique among other fps games to my knowledge. When you play doom, you know it's doom. Even with some mods applied, it still feels like doom. And I think it would be interesting to drill down to what that is, and whether or not the "doomy feeling" gameplay can be reproduced in other games. 

Hope that clarifies things a bit. I wrote OP during launch break, and as always, thought of a million things to say but not wanting to turn the post into an essay. 

[SiMpLeToNiUm]

15 hours ago, Sneezy McGlassFace said:

@SiMpLeToNiUm 

...Hope that clarifies things a bit...

Yeah, thanks for that. That's kinda why I wanted to take a step back and just wait to see what was actually being said just cause of how this stuff can spiral out of control due to a misunderstanding. I just wanted to avoid assumptions or generalizations. I apologize to you and @sandwedge if anything I said seemed in bad faith. I got a little bit too animated for my own good and was already up way later than I should've been last night, heh.

[Doomkid]

As someone who has like 250 classic game cartridges and at least 8 gaming consoles lying around the place, even the devs who do want to please oldschoolers shouldn’t take the opinions of people like me or other Doom fanatics too seriously.

 

My love for gaming in its entirety is “70% for Doom, 30% for literally everything else, including other all-time classics”.

 

I fucking love Mario RPG (just pulling a random example out of my ass), but it can’t even glance the hem of Doom’s garments, so to speak.. I know that’s a not-ultra-common opinion even among folks with old-era sensibilities, so I wouldn’t want any dev who sees Doom as “great, but just one piece of the pie” (like a normal human being) to be dissuaded from their vision because some of us Doom Heads are really addicted to the low-friction-ice-skates feeling of movement in Doom or other such arbitrary things. I didn’t think that was Hrnek’s intention anyway, but it’s good to get confirmation regardless.

[Somniac]

Fire up E4M1.

 

There's calm but bleak music playing.

 

Some fairly tough combat going on straight off the bat.

 

You pause for a moment to take in the warm, but strangely oppressive sky hanging overhead, the floor littered with corpses and the desolate mood.

 

I realise that's one out of several possible permutations of the essence of Doom, but moments like that sum it up nicely for me. 

[QuaketallicA]

On 6/16/2022 at 2:17 AM, Murdoch said:

Have said this before- Doom was lightning in a bottle. The right style mixed with the right tech at the right time. The one element that can be pinpointed to explain it's insane longevity is it's feel. But that really is kind of multiple things. Movement. How the weapons work. The environmental design. The combat. Remove or change any of those and you kill some of the feel. One need only look at Heretic.  Its an ok game. But it doesn't feel as good as Doom.

 

Good example. I've played Heretic, I think up to beating the first episode, but despite always liking it, I've yet to go back and finish it. It's a bit like the whole is less than the sum of the parts. The textures and sprites are good, the weapons are cool, the midi is nice, etc. but somehow it's less cool than Doom. I think probably the pseudo-RPG aesthetic probably makes it seem a bit too Dungeons & Dragons-y for me, even though it's technically an FPS. Whatever the reason, it hasn't aged quite as well as Doom has, despite being so similar and on the same engine practically.

[Budoka]

On 6/17/2022 at 6:48 AM, baja blast rd. said:

 

As an addendum: imo a lot of gameplay mods are flat-out better in terms of mechanics and feel than vanilla Doom, but the drop-off they suffer is a) they don't have mapsets designed specifically around their mechanics, which loses a lot; as much as I love some mods, I eventually need to play something that has an intimate marriage of intentional level-encounter design and base mechanics, which the pwad scene offers in abundance for stock Doom, but which is very rare for gameplay mods; b) they don't have the advantage that comes from everyone already knowing the meta. Every new "meta" you learn, no matter how enjoyable it is, has a time and energy cost. And that is a final edge Doom has over games too; you don't have to relearn it, or most of it at least, with every new pwad you play. And that's possible, yet again, because it's so ridiculously moddable. 

From the examples I've seen, every mapset that is built around gameplay or weapon modifications uses its own proprietary modifications as basis rather pre-existing ones. See Valiant, Struggle, Heartland... which makes sense when you think about it, each of those represents the cohesive vision of one particular game designer so they'll tweak things just the way they need them to be. 

[Gez]

9 hours ago, Budoka said:

From the examples I've seen, every mapset that is built around gameplay or weapon modifications uses its own proprietary modifications as basis rather pre-existing ones.

There have been a few maps or mapsets built around a preexisting gameplay mod. Supercharge has had several¹, D4V a few², there were some for Brutal Doom as well³...

 

1: The Mapwich 2, Ar Luminae, Technicolor Antichrist Box, The Demon Blade, Supercharged Break-In!, Supercharged Triathlon, Supercharged Radiation Factory, Supercharged Final Scourge Catharsis... Just do a forum search for "supercharge" and you'll find plenty more.

2: Chrono-Displacement Labs, Drought.

3: The first release of Legacy of the Slain being the most noteworthy example.

[sandwedge]

you know it's getting serious when someone breaks out the chicago style citations

[Mr. Freeze]

Doom is a few video essays away from having MLA citations being used.