How to easily add more strategy and variety to Doom Eternal

[RoamingMaster]

Guys at ID are fucking magicians in the games you are basically doing exactly the same shit all the time and still Doom 2016 and Eternal are not boring at all. But this can only go so far throwing more and more enemies at the player doesn't work to the point where the only viable strategy is just spending most of the time in the air and mindlessly spamming bullets at the demons. I think ID knows this and they addressed that issue in the DLC by adding spirit that is not an enemy itself but rather it changes the behavior of other enemies also by adding more buff totems, turrets and more invisible enemies but it doesn't solve the problem completely and after playing Doom eternal DLC gets repetitive, in my very humble opinion that is because you face the same demons no matter where you are, the environment may only looks unique but there are the same demons everywhere doesn't matter nekravol, UAC, phobos, taras nabad the same shit all over again, there is one exception maykrs on Urdak and this is cool I like it. The second reason is lack of variety and I don't mean we need more enemies I mean by slightly changing the behavior and properties of the demons we can easily add layers and layers of strategy and keep the gameplay fresh for dozens of hours.

 

For example there can be armored enemies from time to time (prowler for example) that you can't meathook to and can't chainsaw, different kinds of marauders there are already different skins for him the cultist marauder can have rocket launcher instead of shotgun or there may be one without the red shield but with two axes, energy shield similar to doom hunter and you can't falter him. Carcass that can ride cacodemons so they are mobile and more annoying than ever when you kill the meatball he becomes normal ground carcass, arachnotron's turret that slows you down instead of dealing damage, dread knights with flame belch that deals a lot of armor damage but little hp damage, fodders that can pick up your granade and throw it back at you, power ups for demons like quad damage or haste or temporary inviolability and the player has to keep an eye on demons and guard the power up. Arena where the player and the demons are given this yellow power up and there is this crazy super fast fight or buff totem or somehing is attached to the doomguy and every demon near him is buffed so the player has to kill demons from distance. I am just pulling these examples out of my ass but you get the idea.

 

The possibilities are almost endless you can go even further and create more parkour elements, focus more on movement you can even make a game where the player has two guns at the same time left click fires left hand weapon and right click fires right hand weapon you switch each weapon independently and every wapon has two mods one is alternate fire and the other contributes to the movement and parkour, hell, I can even imagine people playing with two mouses (aim independently) and navigating with their feet that would be epic.

 

Anyway I just wanted to share this thoughts with you guys I am little drunk while writing this lmao. Peace

Edited November 16, 2020 by RoamingMaster

[Martin-CAI]

Your ideas sound cool, but I think they wouldn't work. The game is really hard as it is, I couldn't even imagine the difficulty that could bring adding random variety of demons, because you'd make things extremely unpredictable. 

Personally, I think I could like it, but I'm not sure at all that most of the people would be really happy with the idea of not knowing what you're gonna face every time.

[RoamingMaster]

30 minutes ago, Martin-CAI said:

 you'd make things extremely unpredictable. 

Personally, I think I could like it, but I'm not sure at all that most of the people would be really happy with the idea of not knowing what you're gonna face every time.

 

That is the point, unpredictable but fair means not boring. Every time something new. That is why multiplayer games are so fun the actions of other players are unpredictable.

 

I can't say that eternal is very hard (easier than 2016), thousands of people beat the game on ultra-nightmare including me so personally I would enjoy more challenging gameplay.

Edited November 16, 2020 by RoamingMaster

[whatup876]

It might be because some of us like those gameplay mods for GZDoom that add a lot of enemies with weird abilities that sometimes ruin balance (hence why you use PillowBlaster mods) but i feel like the new games may have some sort of "restrictions" with enemy design.

Which is why Doom 1/2 returning enemies behave differently but even some new enemies have similar attacks to some other.

 

Because in classic Doom, with enemy placement, simpler AI and the enemies being treated as "level objects" throughout a maze, they can feel more "literal" with their attacks, both the basic entities and the more radical ones like the Archvile.

The new games give them more advanced AI but the focus on locked arenas, spawning into a map and movement may limit what attacks enemies can have.

Maybe even just the complex model designs and animation too.

 

Because in retro shooters, something like the Iron Lich from Heretic is like someone just figured out how to program a tornado in a game and used it to make a unique enemy.

Quake's combat and that of other older FPS can be different from Doom but even they have that "level design controlls the battlefield" philosophy that makes old Doom feel more like a side scroller with exploration while the new Doom's are more like a character action/hack and slash sort of thing.

 

But sometimes, i feel like i can be proven wrong and some ideas could work if there's some effort to make some enemies fit, like balance or making more use of feedback or weak spots.

 

With something like a horde mode, you could make "exclusive" enemies for it with weirder abilities just for fun, while the player can still upgrade his character.

 

edit: there's also the fact that most enemies try to have more than one attack.

Edited November 16, 2020 by whatup876