written by Peter Bathge
http://www.pcgames.de/Doom-2016-Spiel-56369/Specials/Gespielt-Video-Hands-on-id-Software-1183922/

Visiting the fathers of the first-person-shooter genre for a day - I couldn't say no to that. In Dallas, Texas, I played the actual Doom 4 for multiple hours and had to notice that there are no demons working at id (anymore), but ordinary people. John Romero and his supernatural hair are, of course, long gone. However, the remaining men and women of id have wrapped an explosive shooter-package. Here are some highlights of my hands-on-experiences:

- Doom plays very fluently and well on PC, with mouse and keyboard the shooting feels skill-based like in the 90s.

- The story is completely unimportant and doesn't distract, Doom (2016) mainly concerns itself with the flashy gunning down of demons. That's how it should be! For everyone interested: Once again you're a silent marine, up and about on Mars and a crazy female scientist unleashes the apocalypse.

- The weapon feedback is phenomenal, guns like the super shotgun and BFG, the rocket launcher or the plasma rifle and also the chainsaw feel awesomely powerful and are all different. Ingenious: Like the 90s, the hero carries every weapon found with him, which you can swap out by either the number keys or the time-slowing weapon wheel (convenient for players with gamepads).

- In terms of level-design, id goes back to the roots. Tubes like in Call of Duty are frowned upon, the levels in the reboot span multiple floors, contain hidden secrets and old-fashioned keycards. After over a decade of presumed casual-shooters, it's not that easy (even with two- and three-dimensional automap) to get an overview.

- Vertical movement is very, very important in the new Doom! You can climb up everywhere and, after some time, acquire a jetpack to double-jump, sidestep faster or hover over huge crevices with. And the best thing is: The enemies, in part, can do this as well! That way, attacks can come from every direction and you really have to be careful, especially on the higher of the four difficulties. Without mentioning the optional Nightmare-Mode, Doom 4 already made me break a sweat on "normal".

- The game speed is, compared to Battlefield and similar games, unbelievably high, although, or perhaps because, there's no run-button. The Doom-marine is just always super fast on the move and can become even faster with the right upgrades.

- Wait a second, upgrades? Yep, the hero becomes stronger as the game goes on. HOWEVER: There's no experience points or skill trees, no 5%-bonuses on weapon damage and all this new-fashioned stuff. No, if you thouroughly searched the levels, you occasionally get an upgrade-point, with which you can upgrade your character as you please. That way you may get a speed-boost after every melee-execution, get more health or get a second wind after a fatal hit.

- Doom also has weapon mods! You find those along the way and they give your weapons a second or even third firemode. Then the shotgun shoots three times in quick succession, the plasma rifle stuns enemies for a short time or the chain gun becomes a stationary turret. This spices up the gameplay with the right amount of variety!

- The absurdly brutal executions may lose their appeal after a while. During the preview, there were a lot of variations depending on direction, enemy type and proximity of level-objects.

- As of yet, there's no final verdict, but the chances aren't grim, that Doom (2016) will be released uncut in Germany with an 18+ rating. Bethesda is also optimistic, that additional cuts aren't going to be necessary.

- Small disappointment: Doom 4 doesn't have quicksaves, there's checkpoints instead. Thusly, the developer, id Software, isn't completely on the retro-track.

- The multiplayer mode supports a maximum of 12 players and is a great mixture of Doom and Quake. The new mode War Path especially astounded me, because here, the control point that needs to be conquered is constantly moving through the map and the action is constantly moving along a line, drawn on the ground.

- The demon rune is the best new multiplayer-feature of Doom (2016)! That is because you become a hovering revenant or a baron of hell. One fires a mighty dual rocket launcher and the other attacks with his claws in melee and absolutely destroys other players. You practically feel drunk on power when you're inside the skin of a demon. But people who evade and aim well can kill the demon as an ordinary marine as well and grab the fallen demon rune, which will still be active for a short time.

- Powerups are good manners in the single- and multiplayer-modes, during online-sessions there's also collectible weapons. However, here you can't carry all weapons at once but have to decide on two. Over the course of the game/match you also get an especially powerful superweapon. At respawns, you can change between prepared loadouts.

- Doom (2016) contains, at least from the get-go, no official mod-support and no professional tools for player-designed levels. This disadvantage is almost completely ironed out by ...

- SNAPMAP! The editor, called upon via the main menu, is absolutely fantastic and probably the biggest surprise of the hands-on. Snapmap uses a very accessible user interface and is easily controlled with the gamepad, from first-person or a bird's eye perspective, and allows even absolute mapping beginners to make sleek, complex maps.

- The created maps can be played in either the Doom-singleplayer, multiplayer or in the coop-mode with up to four players.

- Snapmap gives you access to all objects, enemies and environments, that id Software made for Doom (2016). The editor is mainly set up for pre-made rooms, which you can easily stick together. However, you can then change everything in detail: Sound effects, lighting, decorations, the amount and strength of enemies, door-placement, consoles, stairs and keycards. Yes, even the HUD can be changed to fit the mapper's needs.

- On top of that, there's the scripting language, that allows complex algorithms by simple connection of logic chains. Imagine it like this: You place an enemy and tell the game, that a door is supposed to open when it dies. Or you connect a switch with a weapon and arrange it that the weapon is only supposed to appear when the player hits the switch - and on the side, a different music track should play and a couple of hell knights should spawn in the room.

- Created maps (or rather, their much smaller build instructions, that are automatically read and acted upon by the game) are quickly uploaded to a community-hub, which even allows for downloads from other platforms.

- Bethesda.net is not an online platform, like EA's Origin or Steam, but only serves to manage Snapmap-maps. To upload a map, you need a (free) account at Bethesda.net. If you want to play on other platforms, you also need an account. If you want to share your creations with friends or are a PC-player who just downloads maps from other PC-players, you don't need an account.

- Tutorials and example maps make jumping into Snapmap easier. You can also study maps of other players as well as copy bits of architecture or scripts and use everything yourself. For fairness's sake, the name of the original creator will always be displayed, even if you upload the new map as your own work.

- Doom (2016) uses the id Tech 6 engine and it's this engine that still gives me headaches. While Doom ran wonderfully fluently on the hands-on date (60 FPS on consoles is also targeted), there's still texture pop-in, of Rage fame, when you quickly change directions. According to the developers, they'll work on it until release. It was still a bit of a disappointment, though.