Doom Eternal: The Ancient Gods - Part Two (PC) - Review

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Following some mixed reactions to its first attempt at creating a fully fledged expansion for Doom, id Software has returned with some significant changes for round two. The Ancient Gods - Part Two follows the adventures of the Doom Slayer immediately following the events of Part One. After freeing the very uniquely titled “Dark Lord,” the Slayer must now journey through some new locales to resurrect an army and challenge the Dark Lord in ritual combat so that all of the demons outside of hell can finally be destroyed... or something.

If it sounds like I don’t have the firmest grasp on the story, it’s because I don’t. Like the Ancient Gods - Part One, Part Two really doesn’t seem to have much interest in catching the player up on whatever it is that’s going on. Terminology and lore gets thrown left and right with no real attempt to ever verse the player as to what it is that’s happening. While I do respect the decision to avoid bogging the player down with story in a fast-paced game, the choice to write a complex backstory and lore when the vast majority of players won’t even have a clue what has happened by the time the credits roll is still an odd one.

Ancient Gods - Part Two sees the Slayer trek through a variety of new environments to finally get to the Dark Lord, and the variety in scenery is a welcome one. I didn’t think I’d ever say this about a Doom game, but I’m genuinely glad the team put in the effort to create some areas that actually look like a decent place to be in. Castle ruins with sprawling grass, fields, rocky terrain; the majority of the environments look pretty hospitable. It’s a nice change of pace from most Doom locales, and while I thought that it would be a weird clash in tone initially, that never really bothered me.

Combat still possesses the same Doom Eternal feel; most of the weapons and abilities remain the same. The core gameplay is still immensely enjoyable, with the mixture of movement and weapon switching remaining one of the most satisfying experiences you can find in a modern FPS. When Eternal clicks, it’s an experience I’d compare more akin to a hack and slash title like Devil May Cry or Bayonetta rather than a typical first person shooter; with a variety of weapons and fun movement techniques working in harmony to create a sublime gameplay experience.

One new excellent addition to combat is the Sentinel Hammer. The Sentinel Hammer functions a bit like the Crucible from the base game, as a high powered melee weapon, but fits into the standard core combat much better. Rather than being purely reliant on finding ammo pickups, the hammer’s usage can be recharged by securing two glory kills. To compensate for this, the hammer isn’t an instant kill and has only one use per charge.

What perhaps sets the hammer apart as an excellent addition, though, is that it has a unique role to play. Whereas the Crucible was simply a one hit kill on virtually anything, resulting in a weapon that felt more like a fast forward button through fights rather than a fleshed out part of the player’s arsenal, the Sentinel Hammer is particularly useful for stunning enemies, which can lead to some extremely satisfying combos when paired with the super shotgun or ballista. Pairing it with the flamethrower or freeze grenade can provide a range of restorative effects as well, resulting in a weapon that you have to think about using to wield effectively.

Another improvement on the non-combat front comes with the integration of the Super Shotgun’s meathook into the now-standard climbing/platforming sections. Adding a de facto grappling hook into traversal is a small change, but it goes a long way towards making these interlude segments feel more fun and less like pure filler between shootouts. Another solid change is that most platforming sections now feature respawning armor pickups that you can collect while jumping. This removes some of the frustration from the base game and AG Pt. 1, where you could lose a good chunk of health because of something that doesn’t feel like a real part of the core gameplay.

The most notable change, however, has nothing to do with new mechanics. After fielding some criticism about increased difficulty in the Ancient Gods - Part One, id Software made Part Two substantially easier. Despite insisting in interviews that the team planned to retain the difficulty level from Part One, this outing is undeniably less challenging. I quickly found myself bumping the setting up to Nightmare, and even then the challenge level didn’t come close to Part One on Ultraviolence.

In some respects, this is a good thing. Ancient Gods - Part One's difficulty was in no small part derived from some questionable game design choices. Restricting player vision in combat, spawning tough enemies in cramped spaces, a much greater focus on enemies with limited vulnerability windows, etc. I likely only need to mention the words “Slayer Gate #2” for players who finished Part One to start getting flashbacks. Fortunately, most of the blatantly unfair/unfun design has been taken out. No blood swamps or equivalent thereof, fewer cramped arenas, and far less of Part One’s annoying enemy design.

Unfortunately, id saw a problem and went a step too far in correcting it. Not only have the more annoying level design elements been removed, but a wide swath of enemies have received significant nerfs, many of them unnecessary. On top of that, enemy waves are a lot less threatening; often filled with far more ammo fodder and fewer genuinely challenging foes. There were a myriad of instances later in the game where I found myself completing a fight only to think “...wait, that was it?” Even the final boss, hyped up as a being from before time responsible for creating the universe, was less challenging than a number of boss fights from the base game.

And herein lies Part Two’s biggest problem: it’s stripped away so much of the challenge that was present in both the main game and in Part One that it’s lost much of the satisfaction that comes from playing with a complex combat system. It’s becoming increasingly apparent that id Software’s Achilles' heel is not quite understanding what the core “fun factor” of Doom is. The problem with Part One was not simply that it was just “too hard,” it was that id achieved that difficulty primarily via obtuse level and enemy design, limiting player creativity and thus reducing the fun factor. Those gimmicks are now largely stripped out, but the developers have also watered down the core gameplay experience in the process by nerfing the difficulty.

The new standard enemies are something of a mixed bag as well. The armored baron, for instance, is a solid addition that has a unique weak point which rewards quick reactions and precise aiming, but doesn’t completely shut down the flow of the battle by only being vulnerable at specific points like many of the new enemies in Part One. Not so great is the cursed prowler, which, if it hits you, will induce a status effect that both drains your health over time and limits your mobility, which runs counter to a game all about mobility. On top of that, it can only be killed with a blood punch if you're hit, which makes this an obnoxious enemy to deal with all around.

Despite this, Ancient Gods - Part Two is still a step in the right direction, even if id Software did somewhat throw the baby out with the bathwater when it came to balancing. There are a lot of significant steps taken to refocus Doom on what it does best; Part Two is, at least, fun to play, which is more than I could say for large swathes of Part One. The ending gives the impression that it may be some time before we see the series return, but whenever it does hopefully it resembles this DLC more than its predecessor.

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