Older players, how did your skills change with time?

[Memfis]

I've always wanted to ask this... How are older players doing today? Do you guys feel like you're unable to catch up with increasingly demanding difficulty of modern wads? Do you find yourself having to play slower, to choose lower skill settings, etc? Or did the age not affect your gaming experience at all?

[40oz]

I'm probably not anyone's definition of old (26 years tomorrow) but I'm definitely better now than I ever have been, and I still feel myself getting a little better each time I play.

[Tristan]

Happy birthday 40oz!

[RobinSena]

Everyone gets better with time, and not just Doom. I'm old enough to have played the original NES, and compared with how I was as a player than, I'm much better now (early 30's). Games like Zelda 2, Gunsmoke, Contra, which I though were all very hard as a kid, are very easy now. As a kid I always needed the 30 life Contra code to beat that game, whereas now I can easily beat it without dying.

Same for Doom. Had the PlayStation version as a teenager - thought it was VERY difficult on Ultra-Violence. Now I think the PlayStation version was WAY too easy. Now I'm almost exclusively a PC Ultra-Violence player, which is much harder than the PlayStation version, and I can break a bunch of the competn records (with gzdoom though).

The difference between me as a young teenage Doom player and early 30's Doom player now you ask? No contest. And yet I thought I was such a good player than. Time, for whatever reason, has done wonders for my gaming, even if it's been a decade or more since I last played a game.

[Combinebobnt]

all the best pvp players already quit the game so whatever is left is left

[Guest]

I've definitely improved over the years, but I'd probably get my ass handed to me in a deathmatch.

Edited July 26, 2017 by Guest

[geo]

My skill has probably gotten worse. I play on easier skill levels. I've become a casual.

[Alfonzo]

My skill level improved drastically in the first 2 years after I rediscovered the game in 2009, then plateaued. I'm certain this is because of my taking an increasing interest in critiquing and observing level design philosophy, leading me to play all sorts of WADs regardless of difficulty, and with barely a glance thrown in the direction of the Special Interest subforum. In 2013 I began casually duelling with an in-house group of players (CGI) and making tons of duel maps, and that sort of competitive environment saw a bit of improvement in the SP department, though by all accounts this is a one-way phenomenon; you're not likely to translate your beastly SP survivalist skills into DM frags. I haven't been down that road for many months, unfortunately, and have really dropped off the pace.

The Ironman gigs aren't really a good indicator, but if we want to entertain the idea then I'm well behind some of the hot shots like DotW, Wilou84, Bloodite Krypto and... the vast majority of speedrunners who take part. Except Dime - I'm definitely better than him. Not bad, but there's more to field in front than behind!

[Koko Ricky]

The creativity of mods has forced me to rethink combat many times. This has definitely helped improve my skill over the years.

[theJF]

I'm 41. Been playing Doom (on and off) since '94. I think it's starting to get worse but I wasn't so hot to start with. I rarely play on UV so maybe I didn't build up the old Doom muscles much in the first place. I don't plan to give up any time soon so all mappers please think about lower difficulty settings - maybe you'll need them in a couple of decades ;)

[Doomkid]

It's hard to tell. I mostly play in small not-too-serious deathmatch servers since my internet is total trash now that I'm no longer working for the telco. When I had 1st world net I was getting pretty damn good/dedicated but with high packetloss comes low frag counts and even lower motivation to attempt to git gud, as it were

Combinebobnt said:

all the best pvp players already quit the game so whatever is left is left

Said every deathmatcher ever for the last 16 years yet somehow we're all still here. Though I guess a lot of the actually good players are rarely seen these days, but oh well, at least there's still players to frag

EDIT: All that shit aside, in terms of SP Doomin' I'm easily at my peak right now.

[axdoomer]

I have been playing for at least or around 10 years and still I haven't got beaten by anyone in deathmatch except twice. (vanilla Doom and Doom95 only)

[Doomkid]

axdoom1 said:

I have been playing for at least or around 10 years and still I haven't got beaten by anyone in deathmatch except twice. (vanilla Doom and Doom95 only)

I've never lost a single deathmatch ever

Spoiler

while playing Eternity, GZDoom or Mocha Doom :^)

[Cupboard]

when I flop my big penis on the keyboard nowadays it's quite easy to SR50 compared to when I was 13.

[DoomGater]

I'm 51 and the reflexes are not as fast, as they were. I've no chance against a younger, skilled player. On the other hand, UV on every official map is no problem, yet (Thats what in earlier days was called a doom master, right?).
Getting old is not a bad thing, but you have to shift focus to other things than playing with the computer....(I say:wine, woman and song!!)

[jval]

My reactions are slower, compared to the mid '90s.

[VGamingJunkie]

As a kid, I straight up HAD to use god mode to get anywhere in the game because I was terrible at it and using the default control scheme which isn't great to begin with.

Nowadays, I generally default to Ultra-Violence unless it's a particularly difficult mod like Pokemon Doom.

[PizzaGuy]

I'm early 30's and I started out with DOOM on PS1 and I was pretty awful at it.
I gotta say I'm better now at the games than I've ever been but I'm not great compared to the other players on these boards.
I don't touch UV mode at all I'm afraid
I just enjoy the games these days above all else and this fine community I've discovered I might add.
The most enjoyable forum community I've ever come across. Just though I'd throw that in there.

[Reisal]

I'd say my skills are plateauing but random monster heavy Oblige maps do help keep the skills in place. This is for single and co-op only, however because I'm shit at deathmatch/FFA.

[Zed]

I've played Doom for 20+ years and I still suck.

I never change.

[Combinebobnt]

Well at least you admit it unlike ppl trying hard wads on uv and crying that it isn't as easy as Chex quest

Although c'mon ppl have had 20 years to get better, seriously

[axdoomer]

Doomkid said:

I've never lost a single deathmatch ever

Spoiler

while playing Eternity, GZDoom or Mocha Doom :^)

Mocha Doom doesn't have deathmatch. I don't know about the others. I guess you don't even use the other two. Great sarcasm.

TheCupboard said:

when I flop my big penis on the keyboard nowadays it's quite easy to SR50 compared to when I was 13.

Funny one. This should be your custom title.

[Doomkid]

axdoom1 said:

Mocha Doom doesn't have deathmatch. I don't know about the others. I guess you don't even use the other two. Great sarcasm.

You have to admit, saying you've only lost in DM twice becomes an absurd statement as soon as you add the (Doom95 only) bit. It's actually so ridiculous that I thought you were joking so I was just playing along saying something equally unimpressive - If you said you'd only lost 2 DMs on Zand or ZD or something, then it would actually be impressive/a gauge of your skill :P as it stands, even with my shit ping I still manage a roughly 50/50 win to loss ratio

[baja blast rd.]

There was a point at which I had only lost two deathmatches.

Spoiler

I had only played two deathmatches.

[hex11]

The Doom 1 and 2 games are easy enough now, but modern maps have raised difficulty a lot. I guess the trend started after Hell Revealed.
Some wads that were hard for me in the past (example: Verada) don't give me many problems, but it's probably nowhere near what's "normal" now.
But the map style has changed a lot too though, and I'm not much interested...

[axdoomer]

Doomkid said:

You have to admit, saying you've only lost in DM twice becomes an absurd statement as soon as you add the (Doom95 only) bit. It's actually so ridiculous that I thought you were joking so I was just playing along saying something equally unimpressive - If you said you'd only lost 2 DMs on Zand or ZD or something, then it would actually be impressive/a gauge of your skill :P as it stands, even with my shit ping I still manage a roughly 50/50 win to loss ratio

I only play on local LAN. I said I play Doom95 *AND* vanilla Doom, but Doom95 was a long time ago. I've deathmatched around 100 times in Doom95.

I have more than 300 ping in Zandro and I prefer vanilla because I'm a purist. I play Doom in DOSBox or Chocolate-Doom. I have deathmatched more than 500 times in these last two.

The two times that I have lost:
1- First map of FreeDM. Got beaten. 12 to 25.
2- Deathmatch in Doom II map01. We played 4 player deathmatch and someone got 3 frags more than me.

BTW, to impress you even more, I kicked the ass of people playing with a mouse and I was playing keyboard only. I kicked ass so much, nobody wanted to play with me because they always lost. Getting you ass kicked by someone who plays keyboard only is hard on the moral.

[Fonze]

Play online with real Doomers and that'll be slightly less funny.

[axdoomer]

Fonze said:

Play online with real Doomers and that'll be slightly less funny.

I don't want everyone to quit playing online only because they all get their asses kicked by a single person.

[Arctangent]

put some pants on guys ain't nobody want to see any of that

[Doomkid]

axdoom1 said:

I don't want everyone to quit playing online only because they all get their asses kicked by a single person.

What country do you hail from? I live in Australia but would love to have a Choco Doom DM with -extratics and -dup 2 so I can up that loss count to 3 ;)