It's a satisfying way to kill, but it's also a fantastic way to restore health during combat. You can deliver the finishing blow from a distance with one of your many guns, or you can teleport inside of them and send bits of their insides tearing across the map. Hit an opponent hard enough and they become "staggered" and easier to kill. The best part of this teleporting system? It's actually part of the combat mechanics. Timed poorly, teleportation can fail and you find yourself sandwiched between the angry fists of a Hell Knight and the nearest wall. Timed correctly, teleportation is super effective for dodging attacks from the bruisers in this game. Teleporting in VR isn't new by any means, but in Doom there are consequences for not thinking about where you are going to go next and acting quickly. You can dash in any direction to either get out of the way of something or fling yourself into a portal, or you can teleport by pointing your controller and flinging yourself to the green circle you created on the floor. Since movement is such a hugely important part of any Doom experience, and the character you are playing is actually a floating set of mechanical body parts, movement is largely a combination of teleportation and dashing. Failing to switch weapons frequently means you can easily find yourself relying on the starter pistol with its unlimited ammo to keep from using your most powerful weapons on basic demons, which usually also means you're about to die. Standing still means you get overwhelmed and crushed easily. The idea here is simple and timeless - know where the supply drops are, keep moving, and cycle between weapons as frequently as possible. Each weapon has a standard firing mechanism and an advanced mode you unlock throughout the game, and many of the weapons share an ammo pool. If you've played the 2016 release of Doom, you're already familiar with the weapons in this game and how they work. Where some games really need smooth locomotion to feel less clumsy, Doom VFR would feel incomplete without teleportation. The rest of the experience is focused on the one thing Doom has always done better than anything else - kicking your adrenaline into overdrive and giving you all of the most absurd weapons for destroying the forces of hell. Despite my constant preparations, crouching in a corner of the elevator with my weapon drawn because I just knew something was going to hurl a fireball at me as soon as those doors opened, no such attacks existed in this game. As a result, you get one good jump scare at the beginning of the game and that's it. In VR, jump scares are cheap and frequently off-putting. On a flat screen with the lights off and the sound up, Doom will cause just about anyone to jump at least once or twice. And it shows, especially when it comes to how great the world looks and how you interact with the world around you. Where Bethesda's efforts to bring Skyrim into VR maintained the core ideas and designs of that world, Doom VFR is a re-imagining of Doom build specifically for VR. Which is cool, because those are the parts that can be tracked in by your VR system. Instead of pretending like you're a whole person, this version of Doom makes it clear from the beginning you are a pair of floating arms with a matching floating head.
One copy of Doom VFR for HTC Vive was provided by Bethesda for this review.ĭon't have a Vive or PSVR? Here's how to get Doom VFR on your headset! All forms of locomotion were tested during this review. We're writing this review after completing the campaign on the middle difficulty level (that's "Hurt Me Plenty" for those playing along at home) on both the HTC Vive and PlayStation VR. It looks like things are not going well around here. You'd better get to work, and make sure you have a gun or seven nearby this time.
Not to worry though, your consciousness was uploaded into a shiny new Union drone so you can fulfill your contractual obligations to the corporation! They'll keep running at you until one of you is dead and, well, you weren't exactly ready for that fight. I mean, we've all read the briefing reports on those things. Yep, Pinky demon came rushing right at you as soon as it locked eyes and you know how that goes.