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Astral-Doomer

Has Doom aged well?

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Doom has aged like fine wine.

I revisited it after playing another uninspiring faceless modern clone of a clone fps (I think Left for Dead), Doom completely blew me away with it's balls to the walls fast paced action, it's great visuals and it's dark hellish atmosphere.

Doom is fucking awesome.

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I too was going to comment on how Doom has aged better than fine wine... but then recounted that in the dueness of course even wine will spoil. Truthfully I'd sooner not contend with the possibility of cracking open a cask of Cabernet Sauvignon Château J. Paddock one morning to be greeted by the rankling stank of vinegar (suddenly abysmal map design) until I absolutely have to.

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Luckily for us there is a constant flow of fine maps & mods being crafted. My personal wine cellar contains about 2 gigabytes of such epicurean délices. And granted (purists, avert your eyes) my decanter of choice may be ZDoom, I do still enjoy it straight into a more classic ChocoDoom goblet. Finally, while some of the older casks may seem slightly bitter to our modern palates, the solid foundation on which they were crafted remains, and continues to provide endless inspiration for newer batches. May they age so gracefully.

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However... Borderlands 2 is, in my opinion, one of the first FPS that has gunplay which stand on the same level as Doom and Quake. With the right builds it can be all about speed and dodging projectiles, and it can be very old school if you collect the right guns (I don't keep anything that requires me to aim down sights, unless its a sniper rifle.) (Example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctrXGD8Hp-0)


Having just picked this up, it's amazing how much the gunplay was improved over the first one. Gone is that wobbly feel from ridiculous enemy HP bars and lackluster animations, and right from the start your weapons pack some punch. Along with seemingly more dynamic enemies and more projectiles over hitscans, the gameplay is so much more satisfying. I wouldn't quite put it in the same league as Doom and Doom-like games, but BL2 is definitely great as a FPS now, whereas the first one was only fun for its loot-based angle.

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DeathevokatioN said:

Doom has aged like fine wine.

I revisited it after playing another uninspiring faceless modern clone of a clone fps (I think Left for Dead), Doom completely blew me away with it's balls to the walls fast paced action, it's great visuals and it's dark hellish atmosphere.

Doom is fucking awesome.


This!!

The last couple of years I have just been modding Doom and not actually playing much of it. However, when ever I do go back to playing through all the levels after a long break of not playing it the gameplay is just AWESOME!

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When comparing older games to newer games, we need to take into consideration the limitations of the time it was created. I took an art history class a long time ago, and the professor explained that any credible art critic does this. For example, you cannot judge Giotto’s work with the same lenses as you would judge artwork from the High Renaissance period. Without Giotto’s innovations, the High Renaissance would not be. The same goes for comparing video games. I think it’s really dumb when reviewers give old games a low rating based on the standards of today.

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You know that. I know that. We all do, otherwise we wouldn't be on these boards. Problem is that Doom was around when most CoD fanboys weren't even born yet.

Case in point: the movie D.A.R.Y.L.was on over Christmas, and my niece (who's 12 and a big gamer) commented on how crappy and badly animated Pole Position looked. I didn't even have the heart to argue. My 19yo nephew, on the other hand, is a big Doomer (thanks in no small part to yours truly ;)).

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While I do agree with both scalliano and K. Kommando that we shouldn't judge works by our own times, I don't think Doom is old or irrelevant enough that we even need apply a relativistic filter when analyzing its quality just yet.

Certainly, it has been surpassed in many areas (audio-visual fidelity mainly), but Doom still nails the Zen-like thrill of a man and his keyboard singing in perfect unison to the best Hell has to offer. I haven't found that level of ecstasy in many other shooters - at least not for very long. Certainly not for 20+ years.

Doom has kept me from purchasing dozens of FPSes, because I realized I would have more fun just playing through E1 again, or loading up a good megawad. So in a limited sense it is still competing -- and winning -- against many modern shooters.

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I watched a few videos from a YouTube series documenting first person shooters, starting from the late 70s and ending in modern times. The video covering 1993 shows, quite clearly, how ugly and awful nearly every other shooter was in comparison to "Doom." The art direction, lighting, fast gameplay, level diversity and combination of techniques (sculpture, figurines, photographs, hand-drawn illustrations, pixel art) and utter consistency make "Doom" look good today. In terms of gameplay, the arcade style action holds up extremely well. It's a lot smarter than it's given credit for because you're not given any hints; you have to figure out the layouts on your own.

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