With the existence of the Doom + Doom II port, I’ve been trying out the cooperative mode. What is so appealing about the cooperative experience within this port is it supports cross-platform. Being able to play other players from various platforms is certainly a nice way to make this port convenient when it comes to finding public lobbies. It also features a new respawning system which is akin to the Halo games.
Basically, players will spawn near each other as long there aren’t too many hostile threats nearby. Admittedly, I’ve always lean towards the single player side of the old Doom games. It was just something I’ve always grown accustomed to when I want my Doom fix. During my younger years, I’ve always played the old games by myself. However, I did have some cooperative experience from the past with this series.
Every blue moon, I’d like to play some cooperative Doom with friends, but I’ve never heavily invested myself into this experience. Usually, diehard Doom fans would use a special port to play multiplayer like Zandronum.
Slaying Together as a Team
But the online playing experience of Doom + Doom II port has been surprisingly fun from what I’ve experienced. It might be the way to play if you want to experience the non-modded side of classic Doom. Players might think that a single player driven series like Doom wouldn’t have a cooperative player base. The answer is there are actually a decent amount of players that enjoy cooperative Doom. Even after three months of the release of Doom + Doom II, you should be able to find cooperative matches fairly easily.
A decent amount of games going on.
The big appeal of playing the old Doom games cooperatively is simply the chaotic nature. In single player, I always have a certain play style that I am comfortable with. Just like a lot of Doom fans, I enjoy slaughtering demons with haste and always having the urgency for more. I like to explore for secrets and managed items effectively. I mostly try to savor the experience if you would say.
Rush Playstyle & Gameplay Changes
However, when playing a cooperative mode, I do love how the game feels a lot more “rush oriented.” It seems like the people who enjoy cooperative Doom is more interested in trying to get through multiple levels as fast as possible. Players are still going to kill monsters and enjoy killing them, but levels will end way quicker than you’ll think. If you ever been in a game with at least six players, it can feel complete madness at times!
If you have never played any of the old Doom games with a buddy or two, there are some interesting features. There are additional monsters that are exclusive when playing cooperatively. Some of these extra monsters can definitely change up the experience. I remember when entering a public match of Sigil.
Playing No Rest For The Living with randoms is exciting.
I was shocked by how more frequent the players will have to deal with Barons of Hell and Cyberdemons. It certainly made Sigil a completely different experience, but it was also fun too. For example, on the third level, there is a Cyberdemon that can spawn and he can potentially spawn trap the players if he gets too aggressive. This means players are forced to kill the Cyberdemon or else he’ll constantly spawn trap.
It was certainly a brutal encounter, but hilariously exciting at the same time too. Another memorable level to play cooperatively is the The Plutonia Experiment’s MAP32: Go 2 It. This stage is an infamous level for being the gateway map to the Slaughter map genre. There are significantly more monsters for you to fight, and the final section is certainly for those that like to kill hordes of Cyberdemons.
Technical Issues – They’re Not Pretty!
Despite the fun that the cooperative mode can give me, I bumped into a decent amount of issues. I’ve had games where I would experience a “no clip vision” where I’m unable to see anything. This forces me to rejoin the lobby to fix the issue. There are rare moments where enemies appeared invisible and I cannot see them. However, their AI is still working. Sometimes, enemies appeared to be “sinking” on the floor too.
I can’t see any monsters on my screen, but they can see me!
I also noticed the Black Tower level can easily be softlocked in cooperative play. Same thing can be said for Trapped on Titan where there is a yellow wall behind the red door. In single player, there wouldn’t be a yellow wall behind the red door. The player is forced to go through the red door to get access to the yellow key.
In cooperative mode, you cannot finish the map properly because the yellow wall is blocking access to the yellow key! Hopefully, in the future, these issues can be resolved just to make the cooperative experience even better than what it is now.
You Should Try Cooperative Doom
As of right now, players can host maps from the original Doom, Doom II, and all its expansions. You also have the ability to host Sigil which is an unofficial fifth episode of the first game. Legacy of Rust is the new content that was provided by various developers and can also be played cooperatively. From my observation, it seems like players enjoy Doom and Doom II levels the most. You’ll still find matches of the other games, so don’t think it’s just maps from the first two Doom games.
There isn’t any way where players can play modded or user generated content cooperatively. It is only playable for solo players. However, I do believe it could potentially be a feature that will be added down the line because the classic Doom series is renowned for its community content. It’ll also be cool to play some of the fan made stuff with strangers.
Eight player cooperative experience on Hell Revealed sounds like fun.
My time with dabbling the cooperative side of Doom has been fun. It definitely made realized how different playing this game cooperatively can be compared to playing alone. If you want to spice up your classic Doom experience, cooperative mode is certainly there for that.
There are also a different amount of modifiers that players can play around too. For example, it is possible to increase the aggression of monsters or you can make every level force the player to start with a pistol. These are great options if you want to play around with them. I never thought playing old Doom with randoms could be this fun. I do see myself returning for some cooperative action if necessary.
