First Official DOOM Alpha Gameplay Footage Released

[Conrad Zimmerman]

First Official DOOM Alpha Gameplay Footage Released

Looks like a Quake, walks like a Quake...

The first closed alpha test for the latest iteration of DOOM starts tomorrow, and id Software has released a glimpse of what that will look like when players get their hands on it.

The alpha will consist of 6v6 Team Deathmatch on a single map (Heatwave), with a limited arsenal of equipment and weapons. Two significant power-ups, a Demon Rune and a Gauss Cannon, will also be in the environment for players to fight with (and over). Collecting the Demon Rune will temporarily transform a player into a Revenant demon, equipped with a jetpack and dual rocket launchers. The Gauss Cannon is a powerful weapon capable of one-hit kills and providing the ability to see enemies through walls.

Other weapons featured in the Alpha will include the Vortex Rifle, Super Shotgun, Rocket Launcher, Static Cannon, Plasma Rifle and a Repeater.

The alpha will run through the weekend, ending on October 25, and will be available on PC (via Steam), PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Players who purchased Wolfenstein: The New Blood prior to May 26, 2014 (thereby ensuring access to the upcoming DOOM beta) may be chosen to participate in the alpha test also. Eligible players can sign up on the official DOOM website for a chance to be selected.

The combat pace, vertical elements, and power-up emphasis shown in the video reminds me more of Quake than DOOM. That's not necessarily a bad thing, and the brutal looking melee looks like it might give a little bit more of that DOOM edge.

Sources: Official FAQ [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTfe7V-_3r0]

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[Silentpony_v1legacy]

Umm...that looks exactly like Halo.

Oh for fucks sake, game industry! I was actually looking forward to this one!

 

[josemlopes]

Umm...that looks exactly like Halo.

Oh for fucks sake, game industry! I was actually looking forward to this one!

Halo is an arena shooter so its not hard for them to be similar.

What seemed to be missing here was a high FOV, a bit of a faster pace and a lot of jumping, other then that it wasnt that different from Doom, Quake or Unreal.

 

[NLS]

Umm...that looks exactly like Halo.

Oh for fucks sake, game industry! I was actually looking forward to this one!

What, it has space marines and big weapons in a first person view?
Unless they just made it as a WAD for the original Doom engine, there's no way it won't look like something else that has popped up in the last 20 years that in turn has been influenced by Doom themselves.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Umm...that looks exactly like Halo.

Oh for fucks sake, game industry! I was actually looking forward to this one!

Looks like Quake 3 to me.

But then, Halo did massively rip off a lot of Quake 3 right down to the announcer. I was kind of hoping they would rip off the female announcer from Unreal Tournament, the least appropriate voice over ever used in a video game.

That certainly looks good, but it needs to faster, because twitch shooters ALWAYS NEED TO BE FASTER. Slowing things down was far and away the worst trend that Halo brought about fourteen years ago.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

SNIP

SNIP

SNIP

My point is it doesn't look like Doom or indeed a horror game. It looks like Halo's multiplayer, with its bright lights, pew-pew-pew lasers, smug slightly sarcastic announcer, bouncy physics and camping rocket launcher fucks, all simply with the name DOOM in big white letters over it.

I see no horror anywhere. I mean yes, there are daemons that pop up from Pentagrams. But they're immediately spawn-camped by dudes with more firepower than an entire Battlemech.

You get the feeling the single player campaign is going to be very rudimentary, very run of the mill and a means to an end. The end being selling a game with multiplayer options equal to Halo.

 

[fix-the-spade]

My point is it doesn't look like Doom or indeed a horror game. It looks like Halo's multiplayer, with its bright lights, pew-pew-pew lasers, smug slightly sarcastic announcer, bouncy physics and camping rocket launcher fucks, all simply with the name DOOM in big white letters over it.

I think we played different video games called Doom, the Doom I remember involved sprinting round in circles, dodging volleys of fireballs at 40mph whilst chainsawing monsters in the face to the tune of Sonic Mayhem. It even has a button that lets you give people the finger on command.

If anyone was stuck in a horror game it was the monsters and not me!

I know Doom 3 went a bit System Shock with audio logs and darkness, but it was still best played by charging around and shotgunning the creatures at point blank range. Doom is a maze with puzzles and blasting, it's not and shouldn't be a horror game.

 

[step1999]

I think we played different video games called Doom, the Doom I remember involved sprinting round in circles, dodging volleys of fireballs at 40mph whilst chainsawing monsters in the face to the tune of Sonic Mayhem. It even has a button that lets you give people the finger on command.

If anyone was stuck in a horror game it was the monsters and not me!

I know Doom 3 went a bit System Shock with audio logs and darkness, but it was still best played by charging around and shotgunning the creatures at point blank range. Doom is a maze with puzzles and blasting, it's not and shouldn't be a horror game.

Most of that is right, but you do realize the flip-off button was added in the brutal doom mod, and wasn't in the original, right?

 

[Vigormortis]

Hate to go with an overused meme, but...

Spoiler

That was me watching the gameplay sample. And I'm not ashamed to admit it. [sub]I have no shame...[/sub]

This is basically the Doom game I've been hoping to see for years. As a long time fan of the series, and much of id's work, this game seems to be almost entirely what I'd hope for out of a modern Doom game. Fast paced gunplay. A good mix of stylized weaponry. Brutal violence. Grotesque creatures in a techno-industrial landscape straight out of 90's sci-fi. Just a fine mix of the old and the new, all running on a new, shiny engine.

This could be a real gem, id. Please don't fuck this up.

On a side note:
The sound design is fantastic. The music is surprisingly good and the sound effects have just the right amount of 'oomph'. A few things could use a rework, but overall the sound design seems great.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Most of that is right, but you do realize the flip-off button was added in the brutal doom mod, and wasn't in the original, right?

It was around before Brutal Doom, but the Brutal Doom added a 'F##k you' sound effect when you did it. I remember it first appearing shortly after Duke Nukem 3D came out, that has a similar thing in it and modders will be modders.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

My point is it doesn't look like Doom or indeed a horror game. It looks like Halo's multiplayer, with its bright lights, pew-pew-pew lasers, smug slightly sarcastic announcer, bouncy physics and camping rocket launcher fucks, all simply with the name DOOM in big white letters over it.

Erm, did you ever play Doom or Doom 2 deathmatches? That's exactly what they were, sprint-strafing round in circles firing rockets at the guy camped of the BFG spawn-point until some guy with the invisibility power-up runs up and chainsaws you in the back. I think what you mean is that this new Doom is not like Doom 3 ... which (speaking as someone who grew up playing 1&2) is a good thing.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

Yeah, that seems to play like Doom/Quake multiplayer, albeit perhaps a little on the slow side by comparison. Not really sure about the canned animation melee, but otherwise this might turn out fine. Guess I'll find out once it's released.

On a side note:
The sound design is fantastic. The music is surprisingly good and the sound effects have just the right amount of 'oomph'. A few things could use a rework, but overall the sound design seems great.

Aye, though I think the announcer sounds a little weedy. It's Doom, dammit, it's perfectly fine to get a little (a lot) testosterone in there. Something like the Quake 3 announcer.

 

[Glaice]

Eh, not really into PvP and I'm really disappointed there is no planned PvE co-op that I know of.

 

[Objectable]

Do people not know that the original Doom was in fact supposed to be scary?

 

[Glongpre]

with its bright lights, pew-pew-pew lasers, smug slightly sarcastic announcer, bouncy physics and camping rocket launcher fucks, all simply with the name DOOM in big white letters over it.

?????

Spoiler: Doom 2

Spoiler: Quake

Spoiler: Halo

Yea, you are right...looks so much like Halo because

bright lights, pew-pew-pew lasers,bouncy physics and camping rocket launcher

I'm sorry, but Halo is so different that I don't understand how you could make that claim using those qualifiers as comparison.

OT - It looks pretty good but could maybe use faster movespeed. It looks too easy to hit that one hit sniper.

 

[SilverLion]

I don't think it's as bad as everyone else is saying, but for fucks sake the super shotgun is WEAK!!!
In most multiplayer games the shotgun should be able to kill in one hit up close and the super shotgun in the original games had enough damage to kill a regular player THREE TIMES OVER with ONE shot!
Oh my god, even when it's doing better than I thought this game is still finding new ways to disappoint me!

 

[Bad Jim]

Do people not know that the original Doom was in fact supposed to be scary?

I know the original design docs were a lot more ambitious and had a real plot, but when they actually made the thing it was an action game. It plays like Serious Sam. The monsters could be made scary I guess, but when the game consists of you mowing down hordes of them, any pretense at being scary is gone.

 

[flying_whimsy]

Man, I thought the article was about the original Doom: I'm getting kind of sick of all this title reuse.

Anyway, looks cool, although the run speed looked a little slow. Whatever happened to outrunning your own missiles? Also, I hope they put as much work into the single-player. I'd hate to go through another generation where everything had to be multiplayer arena (remember quake III?).