DOOM: Eternal, X35 Earthwalker

DOOM Eternal is the new DOOM game and developed by ‘Id Software‘ and published by ‘Bethesd‘. This game has already gotten the attention of many gamers and critics already. with different things being said. None of what they say matters though because after all… A game isn’t reviewed until X35 Earthwalker reviews it. That’s why you are here. You’re welcome. Time for what we think about DOOM Eternal. How good is it really? Let’s take a look.

DOOM Eternal continues from where we remember… killing demons. You start off on the Fortress of Doom… not the fortress of solitude, you’re thinking of Superman. Can you focus please?! This fortress is basically Doom guy’s head quarters. Through his computer system ally, Vega, he can have portals set up for him to travel to where he needs to go. It’s a big upgrade over the last game. We don’t know how he got to this fortress of Doom and we never learn. Last we remember he was sent away by Dr Samuel Hayden. Somehow he has a base now. This needs to be answered and maybe updates and DLC will explain this. After this though the story is basically straight forward, which is a step over the last DOOM game which wasn’t so straight forward. You quickly kill a hell priest by cutting off his head and nicely straightening his crown.

After slaying many demons, you set out to kill the remaining two hell priests. Doom guy let’s them run away, for some reason. You meet the main problem, who is the Khan Makyr. She’s a higher being who basically rules a messed up, discount, wannabe, technology made heaven. If you want to know more… then buy and play the game yourself (you cheapskate). Doom guy heads of for the next hell priest. Finds him, kills him, then goes to get Samuel Hayden because he needs his help to find the last hell priest because the Khan makyr moved him and hid him. With Samuel’s help, you find him, kill him and then set your eyes on stopping the khan makyr herself. So you go to hell, and find a means to get to her domain, prevent her from controlling the icon of sin, beat her and then set off to destroy the icon of sin. That’s the story basically.

Now straight away we can say it’s an improvement over the last DOOM game. Combat is more fast paced. It’s more ruthless, there’s more demons and they definitely swarm you a whole lot more.They do feel way easier to beat though because some demons like the cacodemon have weaknesses that players can exploit. If you fire a grenade or sticky bomb into the mouth of the cacodemon, then it get staggered instantly which makes them really easy but adds to the strategy of the game. We definitely enjoyed playing the game and it was a blast for sure. We weren’t over the moon like some others were but definitely had fun. You certainly felt like a powerful character and DOOM Eternal succeeds in demonstrating what the Doom slayer is all about. He’s direct, got fire power, violent and relentless.

Now let’s get into the main part. What’s good about DOOM Eternal. You have a new weapon called the ballista which is a powerful and very useful. Great for defeating flying enemies. Some of the weapon mods are very useful like the one where you can detonate the rockets you fire when you want. You have powerful weapons and they make a difference when facing a horde of demons. All of these new abilities that Doom guy has makes you feel powerful. The flame belch, shoulder grenade launcher, dash ability, frost grenade, blood punch and more makes you feel ready for everything. There’s lots of lore that you can find and then read. The lore are collectibles but when you have a lot of them you get a lot of information. Which is better than the previous DOOM game as now we can know a lot about the game, the past, characters and more. There are new enemies too which off course shakes things up. For example the Carcass is an annoying monster who likes to set up barriers which block your movement and fire. Can be busted by plasma rounds though resulting in an explosion. There’s even a Dread knight which like the hell knight, chases you down and plans to beat you up. There’s loads of collectibles and they are definitely worth finding as they actually do something. Also majority of them aren’t cryptic so getting all of them isn’t impossible at all. The Marauder is a cool new enemy that brings a sense of rivalry. They use to be the sentinels who doom guy joined and fought alongside in the past. They have similar skills in terms of the ability to dash, a super shotgun, good speed and even argent based equipment. Every time a marauder shows up, it becomes a duel. The journey through the campaign isn’t confusing. The levels have good design. There’s an artic level, hell level, destroyed earth level, ancient ruins level and more. More variety than the previous DOOM. We definitely liked how the game shows you the weaknesses of certain enemies and how you ca exploit them. They do this quickly with a video showing exactly what to do and with what weapon. That’s excellent and really came in handy. Excellent graphics, sounds are great, not a big fan of the music much but it suited the game though. The environments and the details in them are excellent and can at times tell a story. The level design for most of the levels are great and we enjoyed making our way through them and seeing what’s going on. Good variety in the levels. Lastly it’s been made sure that you always have a chance to get ammo and armour as during big combat, weak fodder enemies always spawn so you can chainsaw, glory kill or flame belch them, which is good game design.

Time for the negatives about DOOM Eternal. Yes there are negatives. First things first is that there is a lack of multiplayer. We really enjoyed the game modes of the last doom game and they were chaotic. They could have kept those with this new game mode. The multiplayer in DOOM Eternal is very intense but too hard for the player who is the slayer. We have seen people including Ohmwrecker play as the slayer and not win any matches, even after getting some experienced and knowing what to do. X35 Earthwalker played as the slayer and lost his first three matches and hated it because of how unfair it was but then practiced some more and now has won four in a row as the slayer against different skilled demon p[layers. Bottom line… winning as the slayer takes 100% of you and your focus to at times just barely win. We will talk more on the multiplayer later. Another negative about DOOM Eternal is that there’s one level called Nekravol part 2 which has an annoying challenge which you only have one chance to compete. It’s the one where you have to glory kill a tyrant demon from behind. This is simple but there is only one tyrant demon in the whole level and it’s at the very end of the level. If you accidentally did too much damage or miss the first stagger then you can easily miss your chance, which means you need to do the whole level over again (yes we know you can restart checkpoint). It’s annoying. Another thing that was annoying and could get you killed is that enemies who are touching you just slightly, even if they don’t look like they are touching you will completely block your dash which is stupid. It doesn’t make sense. Also some of the weapon masteries are unnecessary. Some like the microwave beam require too much of a set up to complete. You need to microwave beam blow up a master and need another monster to be near enough die from the explosion… 15 times. Not as simple as it sounds. Another problem is that cacodemons do too much damage with their shots especially. On Nightmare difficulty their burst can actually kill you straight out. Also Doom guys character doesn’t make sense here. Doom guy is impatient and will destroy demons on sight like with the first hell priest. Yet when the second and third hell priest is right there and didn’t even know he was there at the time, he walked around them, let them talk and even let them teleport away. This is a contradiction. He should have just killed them straight away. So not true to the character.

Another negative is that the ending of the game was honestly lame. We wanted to see some sort of result of what has now taken place after your victory. Does Doom guy go back into isolation, or stay under the radar while the arc broad cast continue to see if they can find doom guy and conspiracy theory over his action etc. Does humanity rebuild or what? What happens to Samuel Hayden? Also the enemies track you too well. Even if you continue moving they can hit you very well with good accuracy. You have to keep jumping and dashing all the time as well. Their accuracy and tracking makes fights not hard but plain annoying. The buff totems make the enemies too fast in our opinion, they should be shown down just a little. What we seriously hated and know is complete bullcrap is that one moment where you are introduced to the Arch-Vile demon. You see red glowing enemies and you think, because it’s always been the case in the past, that there’s a buff item powering these enemies up as they are faster and respawn. So you run around the place searching for a long time looking for this totem while they chase and bombard you. We saw the Arch-Vile and shot him nicely but being chased and knowing that if we kill him, he will revive, we moved on to look for the totem. We couldn’t find it. We even found a secret by accident while looking for the totem. We then learnt that there is no Totem! For some reason the Arch-Vile is the tome now. Wow! Thanks game, thanks for telling us. Yes we know the prompt that says there’s a buff them didn’t show up but we didn’t notice that but went by what the game trained us to think. They suddenly changed the rules and that wasted our time and annoyed us. The game normally explains new things like with the demons weaknesses. We hated that. Lastly is that the unmakyr was a huge disappointment. After all we went through to get it, we expected way more destruction and firepower. We ended up never using it because it shared the same ammo as the BFG 9000 and is weaker than it. The BFG 9000 is the better choice.

Now let’s talk more about the multiplayer. We mentioned that it’s very hard to win as the slayer and how the matches are always intense. Most likely the most intense multiplayer we have ever played, when as the slayer. For example, as the slayer you to keep track and think about at least 10 things at the same time. You have to keep track of your ammo, health and armour, decide when to go for each one of them. Keep an eye on your equipment cool down, know the locations of the enemy demons, be prepared for the loot block, avoid being trapped by summoned enemies, remember all your controls, know and use the environment lifts, teleports and poles, while remembering to dash and keep moving, while aiming at your enemies while moving. Now that messes up your head, especially since you have the added problem of the pressure you feel knowing two of your enemies are human controlled and therefore have intelligence. That’s all going on in the mind of the slayer. Also don’t listen to those so called no it all who say dumb things like “it’s just like the campaign”. It isn’t. It’s different. The campaign will prepare you but it’s not the same.

Things are different for the demons. The demons work together as it’s 2 demons against 1 slayer. The player demons can summon demons to fight alongside them. They can also create a damaging green field zone which is overpowered by the way, it does so much damage real fast. Worst of all is that they can loot block which means everything that the slayer gets from glory killing, flame belching and chainsawing disappears. It prevents the slayer from getting resources. Both demons get one so they can easily deny loot if they pay attention and activate at the right time. Also, the demons can come back after they die if their partner is still alive, within 20 seconds (we think… It could be 15). Plus with the demons having their own skills and attacks too. When X35 Earthwalker did play as the demon, it was easy. He won his first ever match as a demon even when he didn’t know how to summon anything. It was funny, he literally tried to figure out how to summon through the whole match and still won. That says it all. So multiplayer is fun but unreasonably hard for the slayer.

We enjoyed finding all the collectibles like the toys in DOOM Eternal. Each one rewarded you by having an impact in same shape or form. For example the toys look cute but when you head back to the fortress of doom, when selected they become the 3D model feature so you can see the demon or slayer as they are in the game. The records become music you can play while on in the fortress of doom. You see the record cover hanging up on the walls. The cheat codes are there for you to use and completely change how you play (like the skulls from Halo, including the confetti effect). The lore pages gives you… lore. The sentinel batteries grant access to other power ups, weapon mods and more. They were all fun to find and they weren’t cryptic level difficult to find. With some effort and using your head you can easily get them all. So they made collecting fun. Nice one. Our favourite toy has to be Arachnotron toy. So cool.

Quickly let’s just saw something we have noticed and was obvious to us. Have you noticed how the doom guy’s upgrades in DOOM Eternal over the last game makes him more like and closer to a certain more famous armoured super soldier? The Master Chief. We think the developers of DOOM Eternal saw that old episode of Death Battle and decided that they wanted to gear Doom guy up, ready for a future rematch. What? You don’t believe us huh? Alright hear us out.

Think about this:

Master chief from Halo 5 could spartan dash, now Doom guy can dash too.

Master chief is incredibly athletic, now doom guy is swinging of poles

Master chief had spartan charge which he used to get through cracked walls. Doom guy dashes through cracked walls now

Master chief survives a fall from orbit to a planet, doom guy now got shot out of a big weapon and smashes through a wall at high speed and survives

Master chief is a legend and leader amongst spartans, now doom guy is a legend and leader amongst the sentinels

Master chief has cortana who stays in his head in a chip like form, doom guy near the end of the game has Vega (an A.I) go into a capsule button like form and attaches it to him

Master Chief has the energy beam sword, doom guy now has the argent energy sword

Do we need to say more! Like come on. The developers are making him more like master chief and ready for a fight. We saw some you tubers talking about who would win in a fight and they were good at getting the feats and information but terrible at applying them to a fight. By the way we do believe that if they both fought that Master Chief would win quite comfortably but that’s a blog post for another time.

Overall DOOM Eternal is an excellent game with loads of strength and small weaknesses. It’s worth playing and worth buying. Excellent graphics, environments and liked the level design. There’s more we can say but let’s leave it here. We would say a high 9/10! The developers Id Software have done an excellent job with this game. Now DOOM Eternal may have a relentless deadly Doom slayer but he’s a complete wuss and joke if he faces… the ‘Earth Walk!’

For more information check out the link below:

DOOM Eternal action

DOOM: Eternal has off course gotten lots of attention. It is still the first person shooter game we all know and love but this time… it’s bigger. Much bigger. More demons, more areas, more kills, more style, more variety, more weapons and off course more DOOM Guy, also known as the Slayer. Let’s take a look.

DOOM: Eternal is being developed by ‘Id Software‘ but published by ‘Bethesda‘. The developers wanted to go in a bit of a different direction. It’s now more than just a game with chapters. There are worlds for players to reach and battle demons there. Their website says the words “never before seen worlds”. So DOOM: Eternal looks like it will play like Metroid and Destiny in terms of there being different locations and players can travel to them with lots to do in each one. It definitely feels like an open world but not as big. We can tell from the surroundings that Hell has been brought to earth. There are destroyed buildings, ruined roads and pavement, large chasms, lava around, fire around, bridges destroyed etc. Looks like things are getting real bad for humanity. Either Hell has been brought to earth or certain places on earth was brought to Hell. It’s more likely the former. We can say right now that if you enjoyed DOOM, then DOOM: Eternal is something for you.

DOOM: Eternal

There are some new weapons like the ballista which can spear demons with a explosive bolt. it’s almost like the Slayer had some training with the elves. it’s fires accurately and in a straight line but looks like a laser. The Slayer has his own super shotgun which has a device called the meat hook which you can fire at enemies and then zip line towards them at speed to get close for the kill or for increased mobility. Each of the weapons are suppose to be made in a way that one doesn’t outshine the other all together. Each one allows destruction of the enemy. The combat shotgun has the launch able grenades but now they can stick into enemies and then explode which will come in handy. The combat shotgun also has a feature where you can use an attachment that allows the combat shotgun to fire rapidly as the attachment rotates like a chain gun barrel. It does look awesome. The heavy assault rifle also has a second mode where if you zoom in, it becomes like a zoomed in single fire powerful rifle that is lethal with headshots. It can also pierce through enemies by the way, so get that double headshot with one bullet.

In terms of combat mechanics, there has been a lot of upgrades. for starters DOOM: Eternal has given players far more mobility than before. Players can jump into horizontal poles and pipes and can swing of them which you can then jump once again allowing the reaching of further and higher places. Players can now do a quick dash at great speeds and can also dash in the air. You can combine these movements with the meat hook to become nearly untouchable as you can double jump there, swing of a pipe, dash and then grapple a demon at a distance to zoom across in that direction, then jump off all while firing at anything and everything. That sounds crazy. The Slayer also has a shoulder mounted cannon weapon that can fire a grenade or even spray fire at enemies for assistance or just that additional damage. The Slayer now has a wrist extendable blade, sort of like what the Predator has. The Slayer uses it to stab enemies and mainly for glory kills in brutal but clean fashion.

DOOM: Eternal

An event can take place warning the player of ‘Incoming invaders’ which again suggests that it’s still earth or mars (whatever) that we are fighting on. When the invaders show up there job is to take down the Slayer. Now a gameplay did leave us some clues concerning the invaders. The Revenant and Mancubus we say had names above their heads. The Revenants was “D00t76” and the Mancubus had “Daisy121” Sort of like a gamer tag maybe… like what alpha and beta builds of games have where players have these given names when they play. That’s right, just like with Dark Souls, players can invade other players as demons to take them down. Imagine just playing and slaying and then all of a sudden two highly skilled Doom players invade and come straight for your head. It just got real… but wait… there’s more! Players can team up and form Slayer hunting teams. This will make your campaign more unpredictable. Off course players have the options to choose whether to play alone, or set their campaign to no invasions.

DOOM: Eternal

As for the demons themselves… well… there is a lot of them. Some of the old ones are back like zombie guys, off course imps, hell knights, Pain elemental and Mancubus (this is just some of them). There are also some new ones too who are going to be a real problem. The goal of the developers was to obviously make players feel powerful but making Doom Guy (the Slayer) feel powerful by having him defeat powerful enemies. There’s one who’s known as the arch enemy of the Slayer. This enemy is large, mechanical, hovers, got a double chainsaw for one hand while the other hand holds a big cannon, which we think is for blowing us up and right next to the hover jets are what looks short of like mini chain guns. There is also what looks like mini missile launchers too. Scary. There is also the Marauda (not sure if spelt correctly) which is confirmed to have a story behind it. It looks like the Slayer and we think it’s a fallen Slayer because we know there were more than one Slayer in DOOM history. The one we saw has it’s own super shotgun, demon energy battle axe and some armour. Basically a real problem when encountered in the battle field. The enemies like before are numerous, hurling projectiles and doing everything they can to bring you down. There are demons in the air, demons on the ground, fast and slow enemies and enemies with projectiles while others are trying to run you down to get melee with you. The demons aren’t playing around this time, that’s for sure.

We checked out some gameplay and everything looks very good indeed. The graphics are excellent and they are using a powerful engine which was called the Id tech 7 engine. The sounds are great also. In terms of environments and different areas, there is the hell on earth area which looks completely destroyed but there are some new places in Hell also. There is the new UAC and it has gotten far more cult like and technology based. There is also some places that has never been seen before. Off course their is some emphasis on the environmental story telling so look around for details and clues. We saw where the Slayer ended up on Phobos and everyone was scared of him. No one got in his way and no one tried anything crazy. Even the armed guards realised who he was and just let him take his weapon. Very different to Master Chief from Halo who has everyones respects and is loved, instead of feared. So you can Cleary see the difference. Love vs fear. Master Chief vs the Slayer. Awesome.

Overall DOOM: Eternal looks like an awesome game. The developers ‘Id Software’ did an fantastic job with this game without a doubt. We at X35 Earthwalker look forward to DOOM: Eternal. Killing demons is awesome for people like us. Now DOOM: Eternal may have a new and improved Slayer but even he is a joke and can’t compare to the ones who do… the ‘Earth Walk!’

For more information check out the link below:

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