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First Person Shooters (Games)

DOOM and DOOM 2 Getting New Enhanced Versions (ign.com) 63

Posted by BeauHD from the what's-old-is-new-again dept.
QuakeCon 2024 kicks off today with the announcement of enhanced remasters of the first two Doom games, which will feature online cross-platform deathmatch, co-op support for up to 16 players, upgraded visuals, and additional content including a new episode for Doom 2. The compilation, titled DOOM + DOOM 2, runs on the KEX Engine and will include new maps, a newly-updated soundtrack, and support for 4K resolution, with a possible free upgrade for existing console owners. IGN reports: While unconfirmed, it appears that console owners who already own DOOM or DOOM 2 will get the upgrade for free. It's currently available for purchase on Xbox Series X/S for $9.99, though it has been pulled from the Steam store. When it's released, DOOM + DOOM 2 will be perhaps the most comprehensive version of the venerable shooters to date. You can watch the trailer here.
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DOOM and DOOM 2 Getting New Enhanced Versions More

DOOM and DOOM 2 Getting New Enhanced Versions

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  • Eh (Score:2, Interesting)

    by cascadingstylesheet ( 140919 )

    You can't go home again ... DOOM gameplay and visuals were really cool ... compared to, say, the Atari games we'd been playing before. Can't really recreate that moment.

    The games that really endure from that era are those with a good story, etc. Or just that indefinable quality of good gameplay.

    I don't mind low res visuals at all - in fact if there are guts involved, I prefer them, lol - but if the only thing a game had going for it was "wow, games can do this??", then that doesn't age well, by definition

    • > I don't mind low res visuals at all

      I played Yar's Revenge for a few minutes not too long ago and they barely had 40 pixels to work with. It was still amusing.

      I think all the gameplay innovation has gone to mobile now. Studio projects are too expensive for innovation.

      But the Doom guys are doing just what Sam Clemens advised for handling copyright justly so kudos to them.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Guspaz ( 556486 )

      What makes Doom special is the gameplay, not the wow factor. It's just as tight and simple and satisfying as it ever was, and very few later games have ever managed to best it (none have, in my opinion).

    • You can't go home again ... DOOM gameplay and visuals were really cool ... compared to, say, the Atari games we'd been playing before. Can't really recreate that moment.

      The games that really endure from that era

      Doom IS a game that's endured from that era. Just because you don't happen to play it, doesn't mean it doesn't still get a lot of play.

      There is still a huge WAD making community churning out wads and megawads in a variety of genres. People are still making new speedruns. Heck the greatest doom speer

    • > DOOM gameplay and visuals were really cool

      The graphics may be dated. But the gameplay from Doom, and the other classic Id titles, is STILL really cool... I would argue better than any of the current "shooter" FPSs. Do you even rocket jump, bro? 'Cuz FPS gameplay is so slowed-down, dumbed-down, and simplified these days so that the kall-of-doody konsole kiddies don't feel as bad about their inadequacies [youtu.be], that the only ones that are still worth bothering with are the FPS/RPG hybrids like the Deus Ex,

  • Leave it along - it was of its time and should stay there. Adding a few graphics enhancements is hardly going to bring its graphics into 2024 and anyone who wants to play the original still can. You might as well suggest updating space invaders or pacman to 4K - what would it add to the gameplay? Nothing.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by DarkOx ( 621550 )

      By the same token, some drop shadows and translucency of the ghosts, and other things you could do with more pixels to pacman would not hurt it either. Would it be 'more fun' I don't know it'd be different, and probably not bad different just different.

      Like another poster said, the games that have endured were about game play. Anything from the period before the first 3d accelerators appeared stretching back to 'Space Invaders' really fits the category. Even into the clock doubled 486 VLB-VGA era machines

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      You don't have to play it. You can't stop me from playing it.

  • Wish it was Voxel Doom (Score:3)

    by Misagon ( 1135 ) on Friday August 09, 2024 @08:13AM (#64692256)

    I wish they had based this on Voxel Doom [moddb.com]. All the sprites have been extruded into voxel 3D objects, retaining their original look from when watched from straight angles.
    I don't think that the sprites from Doom 2 have been given the same treatment though.

    Andrew Hulshult's soundtrack [doomwiki.org] is a awesome, but is also available to download for free.
    BTW. The live rock-band soundtrack to the ill-fated 3DO port of Doom is also out there.

  • so very few of the gzdoom mods / maps will run on this?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Guspaz ( 556486 )

      It's BOOM source compatible, which should cover most maps/mods, since it's basically the "standard enhancements" that are supported by most source ports. It's not gzdoom compatible.

    • Strip the WAD out and run it in GzD. The latest stable release runs it fine. Wad is id1.wad

  • that there already are a myriad of Doom source ports to Windows, Linux and whatnot for decades, some of them faithful to the original, others adding various enhancements, most of them are good, some are excellent, and all are free to play if you own the original DOS games. Too bad that Slashdot has seemingly turned into a place where advertisements for commercial products can be placed.

    Yet, if they include the original Doom data files in the package which they sell for 9.99USD, it might still be a bargain.

    • Too bad that Slashdot has seemingly turned into a place where advertisements for commercial products can be placed.

      Welcome to Slashdot, I see this is your first time on the site. How much did that UID set you back?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Guspaz ( 556486 )

      They do include the original Doom data files, DOOM.WAD and DOOM2.WAD are both there, along with PLUTONIA.WAD and TNT.WAD, and when you launch the game, it still asks you if you want to play the DOS version or the current version.

      This was literally a free upgrade to anybody who already owned the game, it's strange that so many people are shitting on a free upgrade.

      • I agree. they both showed up in my GOG account for free.

        I welcome the addition, but have no idea how these will differ from, or improve upon, all the myriad of source ports already available.

        Is is just the addition of achievements? Then for me it's whatever ...

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by edwdig ( 47888 )

          For starters, it runs on all major current platforms and I believe includes cross platform multiplayer. It also includes a new episode made just for this release.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Guspaz ( 556486 )

          You can read the release notes: https://steamcommunity.com/app... [steamcommunity.com]

          The tl;dr is that it comes with the new "Legacy of Rust" episode created by id/Nightdive/MachineGames, 16-player cross-platform deathmatch/co-op, a new remixed soundtrack from Andrew Hulshult (though I think only the Doom 2 tracks are actually completely new), split-screen multiplayer, more deathmatch maps, a community mod browser, and a bunch of making-of content. Plus all the stuff they added in the previous version of the remaster.

  • Bethesda should've just bought the rights to the mod and turned it into a new DOOM game. They'd have made bank.

    • If you already owned both Doom and Doom II it outright gives it to you. Don't know about owning only one or the other.

  • https://doomwiki.org/wiki/KEX_... [doomwiki.org]

    The KEX Engine is a proprietary cross-platform game engine framework originally created by Samuel Villarreal (Kaiser) for Nightdive Studios. It provides special support for the remastering of older titles, providing system abstraction layers and a broad range of interfaces to various libraries and platform APIs while remaining largely agnostic with respect to how game logic should function. This is exploited within Nightdive to bring aging titles rapidly up to date.

    KEX 3 was a nearly complete rewrite and redesign of the older KEX 2 code base. Its innovations included added support for a multi-threaded game loop allowing maximum GPU usage, support for the Vulkan rendering API, and portability to various console platforms. As of 2021, KEX 4 is currently in development and exchanges the multi-threaded game loop for GPU-level parallelism.

    It is notable for becoming the basis for the 2020 re-release of Doom 64 and the 2024 re-releases of Doom and Doom II as "Doom + Doom II".

  • Not shitty Snapmap, but full under the hood mod support with what appears to be a mostly complete engine toolkit.

  • Guess I'll just have to stick with the originals and DOSBOX. Thanks for nothing, Bethesda.

    • I've played many Kex engine games in Linux via Steam and Proton, they run great. Plus there are many Linux native Doom ports. The newer sucky Bethesday games run great too.

  • There's a sale going on right now for (I think) all the Doom games on Steam. It's $33. Does anyone know if these will get the remaster content, too? There's a Quake bundle available now, too.

  • I've been using gZdoom, Project Brutality, and the literal 1000's of levels found for free on the Internet for the past few years. Why would someone want to purchase this that probably has DRM attached?

  • I really liked the Duke Nukem 3D unofficial remasters that came out in the early 2010s.

    Unlike Doom, Duke Nukem 3D was a true 3D world, and these remasters really enhanced the game.

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