john carmack |

Publisher: Bethesda Softworks

Developer: id Software

Release Date: 10/16/2012

Available On

Doom may be the father of first-person shooters, but like the eldest man, you can’t teach it new tricks (or were those old dogs?). I was really excited about this compilation because I expect a nice HD upgrade to Doom 3 and a lot of cool extras, but nothing like that exists. Instead, we get all three Dooms just thrown together, with 3D capabilities for Doom 3. What a waste of money and time. This is pretty much for people who have never touched Doom before, but if you have played them all, just skip this. I will talk about each Doom game separately, so here we go!

Doom 3

I didn’t have a high-end PC when this was released, so I got stuck with the Xbox version. It wasn’t all that great then, and it still isn’t. The game is very straightforward, linear, and lacks the fast pace of older Dooms. There’s barely a story holding all this together, and one of the biggest issues with the last two games plagues this one: confusing levels. I can’t tell you how many times I got lost in this game because every hallway looks the same. The guns are boring to shoot, and the graphics today look terrible with really low-resolution textures, bad lighting effects, and cheap scares. The game doesn’t even capture the sick and twisted satanic cult stuff from previous games. There’s a lot of keycard finding and door opening like in the last game, so is it even worth playing? Sure, the first time through is a bit fun, but if you played this once, don’t bother again. BFG includes the Resurrection of Evil expansion, which is just more of the same, but at least the environments are a bit different. There’s also no one playing online, so you can pretty much forget that feature.

Doom

I had more fun with the older Dooms than I did with the younger ones, mainly because I had never played them before. The pace is really fast, and it just looks more interesting and is more fun to play. New gamers may be put off by the 2D graphics or the fact that you don’t aim up and down; just point at the character and shoot. The biggest issue with this series is the stupid keycard finding and switch finding. The levels are laid out so poorly that you always get lost for longer than you should. The best levels were the ones that didn’t have switches or keycards. There is also a very small enemy variety, which makes shooting boring after a while, and Doom has three expansions to play through. Each expansion looks different but is utterly the same, with nothing new added. This is a classic game, though, and should be played by every FPS fan out there.

Doom II

Not much has changed from the original except for a couple new enemies and different levels. Doom II was shorter-lived than the first game, with only one expansion, but contained 21 levels. Doom II is still worth a playthrough because it is mindless shooting that is fast-paced and just entertaining. These games are meant to be played in short bursts, not hours at a time, or you will get bored.

As it stands, BFG Edition is really disappointing, with no upgrades or extras. I at least expected Doom 3 to be upgraded to HD with a cleanup job, but none of that exists. Why id was so lazy with this is beyond me, but they have been pretty lazy lately (the terrible Quake 4 and Rage are examples). I do not recommend buying this if you have played any Doom before. This is for people who have never touched a Doom game and are interested. For the low price point, it is a good bargain, but fans will be sorely disappointed.