PC Gamer UK 01.2021 @InternationalPress75

You inherit the Slayer plus all the

extras, souped up with weapon mods

and ability runes picked up during

Eternal’s original campaign. And

despite having completed it, I spent

the first 20 minutes embarrassing

myself, thumping at a reload key that

doesn’t exist. It’s the

shooter equivalent of

flicking into sports

mode and realising

you’ve activated the

wipers instead.

id Software, like the

Slayer, is at the height

of its powers. Doom

2016 saw the studio

reinvent the wheel – quite literally,

building the game around spinning

arenas that set you in constant

motion. Ever since, it’s been coming

up with inventive ways to thrust a

stick in the spokes, tripping up

players by disrupting the formula.

Doom Eternal’s most notorious

example was the Marauder, a

relentless runner who pursued the

Slayer like a shadow, if your shadow

owned an axe and a bright-orange

attack dog. He returns in The Ancient

Gods, and exemplifies id’s trend

towards enemies who can only be

defeated in highly specific fashion.

Take the Turrets, new fixed

placement shooters that appear like

miniature Eyes of Sauron. A couple of

shots through the scope of your

assault rifle will burst the orb – but

take too long during

targeting and the ball

will retreat inside its

pillar, surviving until

you can loop around

for another try.

HOST WANTED

Then there’s the Spirit,

which makes a

ghostbuster of the Slayer. Mostly

invisible, you’ll know it by the blue

aura that encircles its host – as well

as the super-speed, hyper-aggressive

assaults on your person. Once the

host is killed, the possessing Spirit

bursts out, and you have a few

seconds to zap it with the plasma

rifle’s microwave beam. If you’re

tardy or get distracted, then the Spirit

will hop into another host and you’ll

have to begin again.

You would think this kind of

step-by-step enemy disposal would

trap you into a process – as if

shooting by instruction manual. But

the Spirit presents more tactical

choice, not less: do you focus your

firepower on the host, and hope you

can follow through with the plasma?

Or demolish the most powerful

demons on the periphery first,

ensuring there are no large homes

left for the ghost to haunt?

The biggest worry going into The

Ancient Gods was that Doom’s

momentum might be stalled by the

absence of Mick Gordon, its

composer since 2016, whose hell

choirs and industrial crunch have

become central to the series. It’s a

fitting compliment to Gordon’s work

that he’s been replaced by not one

man, but two – and while there’s

nothing as striking as BFG Division

soundtracking the Ancient Gods,

Andrew Hulshult and David Levy do

an admirable job.

This is Doom at its most

oppressive and intimidating. There’s

a little respite outside combat, and

you certainly won’t find any in the

centrepiece battles. There were

moments, after several minutes in the

mosh pit, where the appearance of a

charging Marauder, or two towering

Tyrants or three Barons of Hell left

me buckling emotionally, not

knowing how I’d keep up the act that

I was the Slayer, the only thing the

demons fear. The truth is that The

Ancient Gods regularly frightened me

with its intensity.

The Ancient Gods – Part One is a

virtuosic display, then – and demands

that you rise to its level. After

finishing the campaign missions on

Ultra-Violence, I was so exhausted I

couldn’t quite tell whether I’d

actually enjoyed myself – synapses

fried by the sheer mental and

physical challenge.

NEED TO KNOW

WHAT IS IT?

The first half of Doom

Eternal’s master-level

DLC campaign

EXPECT TO PAY

£16

DEVELOPER

id Software

PUBLISHER

Bethesda

REVIEWED ON

Windows 10, Intel Core

i5-6500, 8GB RAM,

Nvidia GTX 1060

MULTIPLAYER

No

LINK

bethesda.net/en/

game/doom

89

Doom Eternal:

The Ancient Gods – Part

One is a frankly terrifying

exercise in pushing

Doom as far as it can go.

VERDICT

The truth is

that The

Ancient Gods

regularly

frightened me

I

f the Doom Slayer is a race car, as id Software has described him,

then The Ancient Gods – Part One is a series of victory laps around

three new courses. It picks up right at the finish line of Doom

Eternal, and the experience is akin to waking up at the wheel of a

Ferrari screaming down the track at 200mph. While it’s possible to

play without having completed its parent game, you’d be foolish to try.

VICIOUS CYCLE

Hell boils over in DOOM ETERNAL:

THE ANCIENT GODS – PART ONE. By Jeremy Peel

INFERNAL INTERN

The best quotes from the UAC’s fearless tea boy

“Ready for

launch,

Doomguy!

I’m sorry.”

“I, er, see that your

mission objective

states that you’re

going to destroy

the sphere, not

retrieve it?”

“I mean,

we’re about

to save the

world. Like I

said, I’m in.”

Doom Eternal: The Ancient Gods – Part One

REVIEW