In the first Avengers movie, Nick Fury asks a member of the Security Council, “You ever been in a war, councilman? In a fire fight? Did you feel an overabundance of control?” It’s a line that kept repeating in my head as I played — or maybe survived is a better word — DOOM: The Dark Ages (PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC), a ridiculously frantic but also ridiculously fun horror- and fantasy-infused science fiction first-person shooter.
And while yes, you can say the same about 2016’s DOOM and 2020’s DOOM Eternal (and the best Call Of Duty games, the Gears Of War series, the Halo games…), there are things about DOOM: The Dark Ages that make it especially unhinged and, well, out of control.
Like DOOM and DOOM Eternal,
DOOM: The Dark Ages has the same gameplay mechanics that have kept this series going for over 30 years. Moving like you’re a roller skater on a freshly waxed floor, the game has you taking out demonic creatures who drop ammo, health, and armor shards when you kill them, especially if you stun them and then execute them in a way that would prompt the cast of Mortal Kombat 1 to say, “Woah, that’s a bit much.”
But what makes this DOOM sequel different, and in a good way, is the Dark Ages suffix. While previous games were set in our future, DOOM: The Dark Ages takes place in the past, and in a realm in which people who live in castles and wear armor they got from The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion get help from cybernetic beings in a Dune-looking spaceship.
More importantly, you have a shield in DOOM: The Dark Ages. And I mean a physical shield like in Avowed. Or, more accurately, Dragon Age: The Veilguard if you play that game as a warrior.
Not only can your shield…
be used to block incoming attacks (though only a handful before it temporarily breaks), but you can also use it to parry attacks if they’re green, sending them back from whence they came. This even works if said attack is an enemy leaping at you, teeth first, so long as they’re glowing green when they do it.
Then there are its offensive capabilities. Not only can you lock onto an enemy and do a powerful flying attack, but you can also fling your shield at them like the aforementioned warrior from Dragon Age. And yes, like the shield in that game, yours in The Dark Ages will come back to you.
In both cases, the end results depends on the strength of your target. While weaker ones are splattered, as well as any standing nearby, stronger enemies are only hurt or possibly stunned, giving you an opportunity to get a few shots in.
Your shield in DOOM: The Dark Ages…
is also used for navigation. It can be used as a gear in specific devices to make them work, and can be thrown into certain surfaces and then used as a grappling point. Similarly, you can use it to crash through weak walls or to move large boxes into place, while throwing it at locks can open up previously inaccessible passageways.
Now, because your shield functions are connected to the left trigger, this means the guns in DOOM: The Dark Ages don’t have secondary attacks like they did in DOOM and DOOM Eternal.
To compensate, DOOM: The Dark Ages gives you guns that are both effective and fun to use even without an alt-fire option. In fact, this is one of those rare shooters where every gun has value, be it the Shredder (an automatic weapon that fires razor sharp steel bolts), the Impaler (a precision weapon designed to insert metal spikes into people), or the Pulverizer (which sprays bone fragments that shred enemies).
Even the Chainshot was entertaining,
and I typically avoid guns that require you to hold the trigger for a second before it unleashes a charged shot of, in this case, a metal ball on the end of a chain.
DOOM: The Dark Ages also gives you new options when it comes to your melee attacks. As you progress, you’ll initially find a spiked metal glove, and later a flail (which, for those who failed “Dungeons & Dragons 101” in college, is a spiked metal ball on a chain).
But unlike melee attacks in earlier DOOM games — and, well, a lot of other first-person shooters — smacking someone in DOOM: The Dark Ages requires ammo. And, at any given time, you don’t have a lot of it. In fact, at first, you have just three shots. Though, thankfully, melee ammo recharges over time, and can also be found just lying around, so you never really go too long without being able to smack someone.
But what really makes DOOM: The Dark Ages…
even more frantic than DOOM and DOOM Eternal is where you get to use your guns, your shield, and your melee attacks. While previous games in this series (especially pre-DOOM) were largely linear, and in tight corridors, the ones in The Dark Ages are often large and open, with some being as big as the ones in Borderlands 3.
Which means you not only can attack your targets from multiple angels, but that they can do the same. And trust me, they will. Sure, you won’t get swarmed like you do in Days Gone when you disturb a zombie nest, but the demonic forces in The Dark Ages do like to gather in large groups, and they really hate interlopers.
There’s even some bosses that use this to their advantage, generating impenetrable shields that only come down if you eliminate a certain number of nearby enemies.
Now,
while most of DOOM: The Dark Ages is spent fighting on the ground, there are some moments in which you take a break from all the running and gunning. There are times when you use a turret to cut down waves of enemies, including some Godzilla-sized Titans; missions in which you punch those Titans in the face as you pilot a mech; and instances in which you pilot a dragon into battle.
Unfortunately, it’s during the dragon break that DOOM: The Dark Ages doesn’t work so well (unlike the others, which are engaging and nice changes of pace). In them, you have to take down some ships, which you do by taking out their turrets and then landing on their decks so you can destroy them from the inside.
But while the latter parts are as much fun as all the other times you’re on foot, the former can often be a bit dull. Specifically because the way you take out the turrets is by waiting for them to fire a green shot, which you then have to avoid by tapping a button and moving the left thumbstick. This, for some weird reason, causes their impenetrable shields to come down, allowing you to destroy the turrets.
It’s kind of like…
playing Guitar Hero if it had a super duper easy mode.
Now, you do face something similar when fighting giant bosses during ground assaults. Though in those cases, they usually shoot a spread of energy attacks, with only 1 being green and thus deflectable. But these instances work better because you can still shoot the boss, and your movement isn’t triggered by a single well-timed button press, but by you moving as you always do. Which is why they feel more like you’re playing tennis in WiiSports than something super duper easy.
Sadly, while this is the biggest issue with DOOM: The Dark Ages, it’s not the only one.
For starters,
it’s irritating how switching between melee weapons in DOOM: The Dark Ages isn’t as easy as switching between your guns. For the latter, you can tap the right bumper to use your previous gun, hold that bumper to bring up a weapon wheel, or, if you want to switch between guns of the same class — like, say, the plasma based Accelerator and Cycler — you can just hit the square (PlayStation) or “X” (Xbox).
But to switch between melee weapons, you have to pause the game, go into the “Melee Upgrades” menu, and make the switch there.
Thankfully, pausing the game actually does pause the game, unlike in some live service games we could mention.
DOOM The Dark Ages‘ large open battlefields might also annoy fans of the older games who prefer linear levels, while people who enjoyed the complicated platforming in DOOM and DOOM Eternal will find Dark Ages lacking in that regard.
Instead,
the open areas are often so intricate that you have to figure out how to get to specific locations. And not just secret spots, but ones you need to reach to progress.
It’s just too bad you can’t mark spots on the map, and then get some kind of on-screen direction.
Though as someone who’s been playing DOOM games for over 30 years, I have to say, most of the old school complaints didn’t bother me. Even the dragon stuff wasn’t that bad, since those parts don’t last long and are broken up by some fighting on the ground. Worth mentioning? Sure. But worth skipping this over, no.
And that’s because,
like DOOM and DOOM Eternal, DOOM The Dark Ages is ultimately an effortlessly fun shooter, one that is ridiculously, gloriously, unapologetically over-the-top…and all the better for it.
So much so, in fact, that I like this installment slightly more than its predecessors. The combination of shield attacks, effective guns, and open areas make for gun battles that are frantic and fun, and make you feel like you’re teetering on the edge of violent anarchy. Which, sure, would be hellacious in real life, even if you were an Avenger, but you’re not; you’re the Doom Slayer, and this is what you do. This is what you always do.
SCORE: 9.0/10
