Ralinas DOOM: The Dark Ages Review

The game has it's moments, the beginning was awesome, action packed, intriguing, the gun\shield play was an interesting twist on the formula. But it later on became bland and lackluster. I finished the game, 17 out of the 22 missions are 100% on the first playthrough and I don't feel like coming to finish it off with a 100% through. Gameplay The beginning as mentioned was astounding and interesting in terms of gameplay, the combos were great, the gun variety and their purpose was interesting, with the bigger missions really letting you go all out with it. Though after the middle, it seemed to become repetitive in the sense that the gameplay got old, it felt like a Serious Sam arena with me weaving through everyone, or hyper focusing on enemy danger hierarchy, like there was no management, just basically have a list of the most dangerous and work downwards one at a time. The whole shield mechanic seemed interesting, but the final bits really made it repetitive, as I had scenarios where I am holding down the fire button and then parrying, which makes it feel like a Dance Dance Revolution. Story Simple, to the point and awesome, there are great moments in between, lore to uncover and having played the previous installments, I had noticed nostalgic familiarity in some cases which was a nice touch. Atmosphere Mick Gordon is an artist, whilst what is happening is not my say, but I can confirm that his absence is something I felt, the designs of the missions, the characters all great, but the music which Doom 2016 and Eternal were known for, just not there, and you will feel the hit of it. You might think "Ah well, how bad can it be". Get this on GamePass, try it and switch to Eternal, tell me how it feels, especially if you try to imagine the environment with that music. Issues I run a full AMD rig, and have not encountered any issues on the highest settings on 1440p. Gameplay wise, it felt weird, as sometimes I would get into a great rhythm of combat, but then be thrown out by some weird calculations on the attack and parry. The mechanic works great 97% of the time, but something felt off with the 3% as if it weren't really a me issue (though don't take my word for it). Finish the game and then replay it, no additional challenge arenas, no scoreboards, nothing, only a harder difficulty set where if you die once - run over, start again. I played on the Nightmare setting, seemed fine, other than the 3% mentioned which really took me out of it. Overall I played this on GamePass, the 80 buck price point is not what I would pay for, and having played it, I can guarantee, that whilst the design work is worth it, the entire package is just missing parts and I would feel like I overspent. Get this on a Deal or play with GamePass, 80 dollars I would not have spent nor will, for this, and not because of the new norm, but the content amount found within is not at that price point, no matter how pretty and cool it might look (considering the cool atmosphere kinda wears of after the middle)