Doom: The Dark Ages

PS5 Review

Doom: The Dark Ages serves as the third game in the recent Doom trilogy, but serves as the canonical prequel to Doom (2016) and expands upon the cutscenes in Doom Eternal of Doomguy being found after the events of Doom 64 and used as a weapon against the forces of Hell in the form of the Doom Slayer.

Doom: The Dark Ages is a First Person Shooter (FPS) and is available on all modern consoles as well as PC with the exception of Nintendo Switch at launch.

For my play through I played through the entirety of the game on the base PlayStation 5 and earned the Platinum Trophy for the game.

Pro:

Graphics.

The modern Doom trilogy has always been amazing from an art style and visual standpoint often regarded as some of the best in the industry.

Doom: The Dark Ages carries on this legacy with the return of Hell looking suitably demonic with its flame scarred planes and it’s literal burning and bloody hellscape environments that stand in stark contrast to the Mortal Realm with the Argenta civilisation with their gothic castles and architecture.

However the big new shiny addition to the lore and this game is the introduction of the Cosmic Realm, that borrows heavily from the works of H.P. Lovecraft with Eldritch abominations for monsters. The very space of the realm being twisted and warped, with the player going down infinite length corridors and gravitational anomalies slingshotting the player across the map and boost rings.

The Cosmic Realm is more akin to the environments of Quake ID’s other early FPS genre that hasn’t seen as much love as Doom and Wolfenstein. It is an environment that unfortunately the player doesn’t spend long in and does not learn much about due to the limited context and Codex being sparse with information.

In future games I hope the Cosmic Realm isn’t just completely abandoned, as there is a lot of potential there just like in Eternal introducing the realm of Urdak. Being that games equivalent of Heaven populated by the Maykr race. Both realms being polar opposites with the Cosmic Realm being insanity and chaos while Urdak is Order and technology work so well as a concept to give Hell a much needed break having been used heavily in all three games.

Framerate.

Unfortunately for Doom: The Dark Ages at launch on PlayStation 5 I was encountering more frequent frame drops than on Eternal as Doom: The Dark Ages was never able to maintain a stable and solid 60fps even outside of combat.

This became even more of an issue when the game relies on slow motion as a mechanic so often during combat with the Parry and Melee mechanics forcing the game to further slowdown. All this forced slow down and frame rate drops makes Doom: The Dark Ages feel like more of a slog to play than both Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal because not only have the mobility options been removed but the game chugs and forces slow down on the player that cannot be turned off in the options.

According to other sources, the PS5 Pro fares slightly better with 60fps in most environments except for the most intense open battlefield horde battles. The console that fares the best with framerate is the Xbox Series X, which outperforms even the PS5 Pro that has superior hardware.

This leads to the gaming conspiracy theories that because Microsoft bought Bethesda and thus Doom that Microsoft made it so the game runs the best on their own console rather than the rivals, but this is unsubstantiated and is only a funny theory.

Shield.

The Shield Saw is the brand-new combat mechanic unique to Doom: The Dark Ages compared to prior games where it mostly focused on mobility and overwhelming firepower.

Now in Doom: The Dark Ages the player has access to a shield that in the 2^nd level gets access to a chainsaw function.

With the shield the player can parry certain attacks from enemies to redirect them back and inflict damage on the caster along with potentially removing armor if done enough.

The shield gets less durability on the higher difficulties with it breaking after 1 or 2 hits depending on the enemy, so the player cannot block every attack safely at the higher difficulties.

The Shield Saw is also a replacement for some of the movement abilities in older games as now the player can Shield Bash to lunge at a distant enemy or object used it puzzles. This ties into a later mechanic that acts as a replacement for the Meathook but only on a certain object in the environment so platforming and exploration is more limited in Doom: The Dark Ages.

Then the final useful ability is to throw the Shield Saw like Captain America and have it ricochet between enemies when launched at an enemy with an energy shield. However when used on an enemy with a heated metal shield the Shield Saw will detonate with an explosion to wipe out enemies in a small area at a distance.

Accessibility.

Doom: The Dark Ages allows players to modify the game extensively apart from the usual difficulty options. However these modifiers not only can be used to make the game easier but also make the game a lot more difficult and punishing for players who want a real challenge with Doom: The Dark Ages.

This is because the game features a lot of modifiers through the use of sliders and toggles. As now players can increase the parry window using the shield so players can press parry earlier and still get a successful parry on enemies then players can also decrease the speed of enemy projectiles to help with learning how to parry.

Other useful options include the ability to always be sprinting (This was the only accessibility option I used in my play through) and I would recommend every player turn this option on to increase the speed and pacing of the game overall.

New players benefit from these sliders especially because now the player can reduce how much damage the Doom Slayer receives by up to 50% while increasing the damage that Demons receive by 1000%. This makes the game more lore accurate while making it less punishing for people with hand eye coordination difficulties.

Aside from combat focused modifiers the game has allows the player to recolour most other parts of them game from the parryable attacks from Green to another colour for colour-blind players to stand out. Players can also change the colour of the non parryable attacks along with the interact colour of objects and enemy outlines.

Variety of gameplay.

Previously Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal only saw the player take control of the Doom Slayer for all of its playthrough.

However with Doom: The Dark Ages introduces several new gameplay modes to increase the variety of the game with the turret, Atlan and Serrat all playing differently from the base gameplay loop.

Turret gameplay is dull as all turret sections are in videogames, but Doom: The Dark Ages uses them to better effect. This is by having players use the turret before a large horde of demons before getting attacked by the skyscraper sized Titans as the player blasts them apart for the sheer scale difference.

The Atlan sees the player finally take control of the colossal mechs from Doom Eternal and unfortunately are pretty underwhelming, but it is great fun to take the Titans one on one while stomping through hordes of tiny demons and tanks.

The final new gameplay mode is the dragon. Serrat and the player becomes a mobile turret on the back of Serrat. While it is fun to fly across the sky of these massive levels to look at the sheer scale and details of the floating castles and battle stations the gameplay let’s it down as the combat focuses on dodging certain attacks to destroy enemies like in the Atlan.

So while it is good to have new gameplay modes available to the player they do feel underdeveloped and rushed out instead due to lacking the complexity and focus of playing as the Doom Slayer.

Con:

Story.

One of my favourite aspects of Doom has always been its story and lore which was a lot deeper than most players gave it credit due to the Codex being mostly optional.

In Doom Eternal there were 13 levels with 50 Codex entries to pick up and receive through the course of the plot. This is in contrast to Doom: The Dark Ages that has 22 levels but only 26 Codex entries to get.

This just goes to show that with 9 extra levels there are nearly half as many Codex entries to cover this increase so even less of the plot or characters gets developed. Due to this the game’s plot and characters feel extremely rushed and not well explained.

The main villain Ahzrak and is the weakest villain in the reborn trilogy, who doesn’t really accomplish anything through his own ability in the story as everything just happens for him with every convenience. As every victory he gets is done for him with the new Witch character and his shining achievement in the whole game is killing off a minor character introduced in this game. 

So players don’t learn anything about him or his backstory through the Codex and don’t see him as a real threat apart from one kill in the penultimate level of the game of a minor character.

For example the first Hell level after the Ancestral Forge is completely pointless as the Doom Slayer leaves after upgrading his shield then is immediately in Hell. Then gets to the end of the level and portals back to the Mortal Realm accomplishing nothing and feels like a waste of a level.

On top of that the level structure also makes less sense as a lot of the time the player will finish a level and then be teleported into a new map for the next level or cutscene with no explanation of how the player got there or why.

The Codex entries themselves are also shorter and less descriptive than those found in prior games which doesn’t help matters leading to more confusion. With the huge new addition to the lore being the Cosmic Realm barely being explored or developed and mostly used only as background scenery.

As the game doesn’t explain how the Cosmic Realm ties into the rest of the franchise because did Davoth also create this dimension like all the others? As the Cosmic Realm isn’t even hinted at in the other games even though Doom: The Dark Ages acts as prequel to Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal.

Executions.

One of the biggest disappointments for Doom: The Dark Ages was the removal of most of the Glory Kills to help keep the pace faster and not be as repetitive due to the extra enemies in the stages.

Unfortunately this had the exact opposite effect because the animations are either a kick or punch for most enemies in a dazed state unless the player is blocking or jumping with the shield

Compared to Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal which used to have a unique Glory Kill animation for at least four cardinal directions plus from above, compared to the limited punch or kick from the Executions.

To the point that Glory Kills slowed down the game too much to be included in Doom: The Dark Ages I would argue that they were optional and not required and animation wise were only about twice as long as Executions so not that much extra time was saved from when the player gets control of the Doom Slayer again after the animation.

The Glory Kills were also one of the defining additions to Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal, so without them the game just feels incomplete especially since mobility abilities were also removed in this game to replace everything with the shield.

Puzzle simplicity.

In this game much of the player’s mobility from Doom Eternal has been taken away with nothing really to replace it instead relying on the shield for everything.

As with Doom Eternal the player had access to the double jump, the dash and also the Meathook on the Super Shotgun to act as a grapple to manoeuvre round the levels.

So now the player can throw the shield to specific points on the map with a green corpse then recall it by jumping to the shield, but this isn’t used much for puzzles instead mostly for minor secrets and the occasional mandatory level design.

Then the majority of other puzzles just involves the player using the shield bash to either push a crate into a location to then jump or on just use the shield bash to break a wall, but all the breakable walls have the icon of the shield emblazoned on them prominently so they are more difficult to miss.

Atlan and Serrat.

The two new styles of gameplay unique to Doom: The Dark Ages are the Atlan and the new Dragon based combat. Both of these feel undeveloped and rushed compared to the main gameplay loop of the Doom Slayer due to how simple they are.

Atlan combat is basically the same loop of dodging attack until the combo gauge maxes out and then press the finisher move to kill any Titans instantly with no variation aside from two guns that the player can use for a limited time before running out of ammo. 

Being a huge mecha fan with giant robot games and Anime seeing the Atlan reduced to Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots was such a let-down considering the variety of weapons we saw them use in Doom Eternal with Spears and all having working energy cannons but, in this game, only the King’s has usable energy cannons.

I would have just preferred more options in combat aside from the basic punches and repeated finishers for the Atlan missions.

The other new gameplay style is atop the players new dragon for the game called Serrat. It sees the player mount the dragon to start aerial combat that falls into the same dodge then attack gameplay loop as the Atlan since the enemies have shields that can only be broken when the player dodges a green projectile.

So both of these new gameplay systems involving waiting to dodge an enemy attack before counterattacking which slows down the pace of these levels. This makes the level more of a drag to play even though they allow the player to take in the scope of the massive levels that feature the Atlan of Serrata.

Level design.

For Doom: The Dark Ages the development team decided to move away from more traditional level design and instead go for more open field types of maps for a lot of ground-based levels.

Compared to Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal that were more focused on straight forward progress with linear design and platforming aspects now Doom: The Dark Ages has the Doom Slayer face off against multiple hordes in large warzones with the playing going from one corner of the map to the other for objectives.

This is compounded when going for 100% with all the player having to collect 300+ pieces of gold up on the map along with all the other collectibles and secrets. This really dragged the pace of the game down since older titles had the secret slightly off the main path and quick to discover but now the player has to sift through all the fog of war on a map to make sure they don’t leave behind a single piece of gold to help upgrade equipment and runes asap.

Music.

Unfortunately the music for Doom: The Dark Ages has had a downturn from Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal in quality for the soundtrack this time round.

This is due to Mick Gordon’s departure and the messy development of Doom Eternal that people and read up on to see how badly Mick Gordon was treated.

So for his replacement they brought in Finishing Move Inc. a band known for doing the soundtracks for The Callisto Protocol in 2022 and Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 respectively.

While their work on Doom: The Dark Ages isn’t bad, it is just a let-down compared to the uniqueness of what has come before in the franchise and instead feels more like traditional metal that players would hear in other games outside of Doom.

The majority of the tracks struggle to stand out and fade into the background mostly instead of being tied into the flow of combat and really stick in your mind. There are a few tracks I did enjoy during my play though that I listened to again on Spotify with those being Unholy Siege and Pursuit of Demons.

This compares to 2016 where most of the soundtracks stayed with players like BFG Division and Meathook from those games respectively. Both of those full soundtracks were unique (Even with the issues of Eternal development due to behind-the-scenes problems) and stay with the player and enhance the games by setting the mood and getting the player more engaged with the combat.

Locked Skins.

11 skins are in game with the default and 10 unlockable skins, but only 4 are able to be used in-game only without outside measures and that includes the default skin.

So in total only 3 different skins can be earned in-game and that is through beating the campaign on any difficulty and the last 2 by beating the game on the hardest 2 difficulties. This means that for my Platinum journey of 100% completion aside from the 2 permadeath difficulties of Pandemonium and Ultra-Nightmare I only unlocked 1 new skin after 100% everything.

The other 8 skins the player can unlock are through various other means and companies such as buying a specific ROG Astral GeForce RTX 5080 graphics cards for a PC at $2,000+ or buy ordering a specific limited time pizza from a specific chain called Prince St. Pizza in America only.

Otherwise the other skins available outside the game are more reasonable like pre-ordering the game (Which can’t be done anymore), linking an Nvidia account or purchasing an exclusive Xbox controller (Which limits PlayStation 5 players). Then there is one the player gets from a Twitch drop if they watch enough of a streamer on Twitch playing the game so that just involves making a Twitch account for free and watching an affiliated streamer but this will become harder to access in future when less affiliated streamers are streaming the game. Then the easiest free skin to get is to opt into Bethesda’s emails.

The other easy to get skin is to just buy the Premium Edition of the game which is now a bonus DLC if the player has the standard version of the game and that not only gives the player a new Doom Slayer skin but also one for the Dragon and Atlan.

Glitches.

Doom: The Dark Ages had the most glitches of any Doom game I played prior in this new trilogy.

As aside from the couple of hard crashes there were also segments when I fell forever through the environment while in the Cosmic Realm caught on video straight through the death plane multiple times due to slippery controls on small platforms.

The most annoying glitches I encountered though were with the weapon mastery challenges and mission challenges. For some reason while doing the weapon mastery challenges the progress would just stop counting completely requiring either restarting from a checkpoint or the level from the main menu.

This made getting the Platinum trophy a lot more irritating since you have to finish the weapon mastery challenges for every weapon to get their golden skin and all the level challenges on one save file.

A unique glitch I kept encountering during my play through was that the Field of View (FOV) slider which shows a wider view of the surrounding area on the highest setting of 120 degrees compared to 90 degrees on the lowest never actually went up to the 120 degrees when maxed out. 

No matter what I did of changing it in the menu and saving then restarting from the checkpoint or going back to the main menu then into a different level then FOV never actually changed and I had the same 90 degree view when the option cleared had it at 120 degrees.

This made the game harder for myself because when playing an FPS game I always prefer to up the FOV to make it easier to see the surrounding environment and enemies.

Conclusion:

A fun prequel that unfortunately takes the series in a worse direction with unnecessary underdeveloped mechanics with the Atlan and the open battlefields slowing the pace. Instead of tight linear design like the prior games along with the removal of movement options and Glory Kills just makes it feel like the game is unfinished compared to Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal.

Still a good game though it just doesn’t live up to its predecessors but could be improved with future DLC and updates, as the game did not even launch with other gameplay modes only the single player mode whereas Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal had multiplayer and Horde mode.

Score: 7.9