But what is this garbage storyline? Literally why the fuck weren't they joking about making a "Doomverse" back at Quakecon?
I don't know about any jokes, but a few points:
a) The idea of Doom being part of a shared universe is one that goes back decades, what with Doomguy apparently being the grandson of B.J. or something, and Commander Keen being someone's relative. I don't know how seriously it was taken, and few would take it seriously now, but the idea of Doom being part of an "Id multiverse" isn't a new one.
b) The Quake Champions comic references the "Hellverse," and if we go by the game itself, we have the likes of Doomguy and B.J. among various other characters who herald from different worlds/dimensions as well.
c) Even if they were joking about a "Doomverse," Doom 2016 kind of hints it's in the same continuity as the Doom 1>Doom 64 one. Poorly, I might add, as the game's story is a mess, but it's there.
Doom 2016's story worked great, because it wasn't taking itself seriously.
You're right that it didn't take itself seriously. I disagree that made it "great," or it was even "good," period.
Doom 2016's story is a mess. Its worldbuilding is a mess. It's an actual regression from Doom 3. And among everything else, there's a sense of keepaway on the narrative front. That most people at Id didn't care about story, but they allowed people to work on a codex, only for the codex and everything else having the feeling of making things up as they went along. In Doom Eternal, its plot and worldbuilding is clearly planned. This is obvious as soon as we meet the Khan Maykr. Doomguy knows who she is, we don't, but by the time she's killed, we understand exactly why Doomguy hates her so much. Doom 2016 has barely any of this. The mentions of Argent D'Nur and the Night Sentinels for example come right before those things are introduced. Even if Doom 2016 had a plan for its world and plot, it's a poorly executed one.
But Eternal is trying to be serious about its story for whatever reason. It's got a lot of cutscenes with one note characters nobody gives a shit about.
I care about them.
It wastes time throwing around one cliche line after the other, and unlike in 2016 where Doomguy just fucks off and goes and kills demons, here we gotta stand around and wait for whoever the fuck this is to finish throwing threats/sucking our dicks so we can get back to the good stuff.
Doom 2016 did the same thing. The only difference was that Doomguy didn't care what was going on, but you still needed to go through cutscenes. Certainly that causd disconnect for me, in that I wanted to know what was going on, but the character I was playing as didn't.
Literally why give Doomguy an elaborate backstory? In 2016 he was a fucking force of nature. It didn't matter where he came from, only that he's an unstoppable entity of pure rage that has been killing demons in Hell for potential eons.
First, I don't know what we lose by giving Doomguy a backstory. He had a backstory in the very first game - an extremely basic one, but it was there. Second, Doom 2016 does give backstory. Vague, hinted at backstory that I suspect was kept vague because Id didn't want to commit to anything at that point, but it was still there. Prior to Doom Eternal, I was theorizing that Doomguy was a former Night Sentinel, while others were circulating the idea that he was the same guy as the original games. I was wrong, yes, but the fact is that there was a backstory there. So even if Doom Eternal is somehow lessened for exploring his backstory, it's backstory that Doom 2016 still laid the groundwork for.
That's all you fucking need. It's fucking DOOM. Rip and Tear!
Speak for yourself.
Doom 2016 came out in, well, 2016. That's over 20 years since the first Doom. I'm sympathetic to the idea of Doom not needing story, but the industry's moved on from Carmarck's infamous "story in a game is like story in porn" quote. In the context of the IP, Doom 2016's story is a regression from Doom 3. In isolation, it's terribly conveyed. Doom Eternal's story is better for many reasons, among them is that the story is conveyed in the game itself, not in endless codex logs. I agree that gameplay is more important than story, but story is almost always welcome (for me). Doom effectively squandered its story potential until this game, and it wasn't the only Id IP to do so (*cough*Quake*cough*). So thank the Father that at least someone at Id realized the worth of story, even if Carmack didn't back in the day.
But no, we have to talk about how *SPOILERS* he was found by these Night Sentinel shits and was trained by them and became their champion and blah blah blah I am falling asleep at this insultingly basic storytelling the writers think is good to interrupt gameplay time and again.
Well, again, speak for yourself. Doom 2016 bored me with its lack of story. Doesn't help that the gameplay had issues as well, that Doom Eternal also solved.
