3.5/5 ★ – MechaniChris's review of DOOM: The Dark Ages.

I’m a notable Doom Eternal skeptic. I think the balance between fast paced action and monotonous exploration is completely skewed. It also has a very narrow combat loop that I find more frustrating than fun. This game is somehow more of the same with some slight improvements. I had kinda hoped I would be dropped in actual medieval times and have to use axes and arrows and stuff, but no, dark ages seems to refer to an aesthetic more than anything literal. We do have a shield and a mace now, and the shield is actually great fun. The melee weapons are annoyingly sparse and basically only to acquire more ammo. I really want to LOVE this game. On the surface it’s got everything I could want: Flying dragons, giant mechs, blasting demons in the face. But it still suffers from the same problems as Eternal, which is that after a few minutes of fun, it kind of becomes tedious. There’s only so many times I can throw my shield at a wave on undead before it loses its luster. None of the guns are quite as satisfying to use as I want them to be. Even the rocket launcher barely does more damage than the shotgun. And of course, many enemies can’t be killed by powering through, you have to do a combat loop for that specific enemy. Again, none of it is actually bad! I just don’t love where the franchise is headed in terms of gameplay. I shouldn’t get over a Doom game halfway through. I should be ravenous for more