{"id":84181,"date":"2015-12-07T01:30:31","date_gmt":"2015-12-06T23:30:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/?p=84181"},"modified":"2015-12-07T01:49:08","modified_gmt":"2015-12-06T23:49:08","slug":"hands-on-with-dooms-alpha","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/features\/84181-hands-on-with-dooms-alpha","title":{"rendered":"Hands-on with Doom’s alpha"},"content":{"rendered":"

I had the privilege of spending a day playing the invitation-only Doom<\/em> MP Closed Alpha on PC, an experience that once completed will revive the golden age of arena shooters.<\/p>\n

These days, arena shooters are a rebellion against the pay-to-win and imbalanced antics of many other games.<\/p>\n

There are no superior perk loadouts and equipment afforded by a higher level or real-money purchases, and prowess is purely based on skill and know-how.<\/p>\n

Hopefully the finished Doom<\/em> will not include purchasable buffs, a slap in the face of our hyper-consumerist culture.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It was a blessing playing a shooter in which I did not die immediately if someone spotted me out of my field of vision.<\/p>\n

The meaty, armoured nature of players will definitely take some getting used to after the lifelike mortality of the modern FPS.<\/p>\n

Of course, Doom<\/em> has taken positive elements from today\u2019s shooters, such as customizing your loadout with two weapons and equipment items before each round.<\/p>\n

The Alpha was almost completely bug-free, already looking fearsomely built. Other than mild screen tearing, the game looks great, particularly the creative design of the guns.<\/p>\n

I was playing with an 8mb line on London servers, experiencing minimal lag.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So far, the game plays out in a pretty traditional arena layout; a balanced frenzy of rocket-jumping adrenaline gamers used to play before the days of Call of Duty <\/em>and Battlefield<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The Alpha plays out in only one stage, called Heatwave; a complex smelting factory adorned with the typical health, armour and ammo pickups and power-ups scattered across the plant, complete with columns of pouring, scorching, molten metal and a pit of the bubbling industrial lava below.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The stage is made up of various snaking corridors interlinked with chambers on various levels.<\/p>\n

All corridors lead to a central expansive chamber where the meat of the fighting will take place, as the fearsome power-ups are contained in here.<\/p>\n

The Alpha\u2019s one game mode is team death-match. Players are divided into two teams, 6 on each. The first team to reach 100 kills or have the most kills when the timer runs out wins.<\/p>\n

Massive advantages are granted by picking up power-up such as the classic quad-damage and invisibility.<\/p>\n

Then there is the specific demonic possession power-up available for the Alpha, the Revenant, the peak of enjoyment and pwnage.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Once temporarily unlocked, players will manically scramble for the floating pentagram rune which once snatched will engulf the player in transcendental flames, transforming one into a skeletal fiend, decked out with a beefy jetpack and shoulder-mounted twin rocket launchers.<\/p>\n

You can now begin tormenting the other team for a limited amount of time in a massive way, stomping about and flying into the air, always peppering your surroundings with missiles.<\/p>\n

Every beast has a hunter, and a weapon to hunt with \u2013 in this case the Gauss Rifle.<\/p>\n

This four-shot power weapon, which if you\u2019re lucky enough to find hovering in the map whilst someone is rampaging in demon form, is the perfect counter to the Revenant.<\/p>\n

Its atomizing arcs will quickly cut the ecstatic Satanist\u2019s fun short and will almost always guarantee an instakill against a normal player.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/p>\n

If the Revenant is murdered before the timer runs out, another player can snatch the now dropped rune and continue playing out the Revelations verse until the rune\u2019s timer runs out.<\/p>\n

I often found myself blasting the Revenant out of fright when it popped up from around a corner – even if it was on my team. It is a truly terrifying and intimidating spectacle.<\/p>\n

The demons add a great aspect to teamwork, as teams will have to work hard to support its killing spree or pool as much damage in to halt its dreadful advance<\/p>\n

Movement feels comparatively slower than what we\u2019re used to from games like older Dooms<\/em>, Quake, Unreal Tournament<\/em> etc. but the game is still a frantic and agile blitz.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The guns are radical, my favourite being the arena heavyweight – the rocket launcher – which can also be used to boost yourself into the air.<\/p>\n

Each weapon comes with a standard firing mode and an alternate one which can be accessed by right-clicking.<\/p>\n

For example, fired rockets can be detonated before impact by right-clicking, and the gauss rifle can enter a wallh4x zoom that lets you see highlighted players throughout the map.<\/p>\n

There are new and creative guns to enjoy such as the Static Cannon, which charges damage as you run. Doom <\/em>standards such as the Super Shotgun and Plasma Rifle remain.<\/p>\n

Equipment-wise, you have the choice between the volatile Frag Grenade and the Personal Teleporter, which once thrown will teleport you back to the attached location on command.<\/p>\n

\"Doom\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Melee involves whacking someone with your gun, taking several hits to kill someone, but if you manage to get a well-timed melee attack in on someone with low health, you will dismember your foe with your bare hands!<\/p>\n

This exclusive tester was completely wonderful. My friend and I felt like kids again, regressing in the chaotic reincarnation of one of our childhood favourites.<\/p>\n

Congratulations if you got an invite – make sure you share the experience with your mates!<\/p>\n

\n

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id has a real gem with this one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":230,"featured_media":84195,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[165,16182,883,2211,4894,2044],"class_list":["post-84181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","tag-bethesda","tag-closed-alpha","tag-doom","tag-hands-on","tag-id","tag-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/230"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84181"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84181\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84197,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84181\/revisions\/84197"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}