It’s Not Gritty
“Gritty” is one of those buzzwords that game companies like to just throw out as a way to explain their product. After the massive success and genre molding Call of Duty 4, we have been bombarded with dozens upon dozens of games set in a dark, realistic setting. Doom is not one of those games. While its predecessor Doom 3 could be seen as bending a bit to this formula, this latest entry doesn’t fall into the overused tropes we’ve come to expect from “gritty” shooters. Yes, Doom is a violent, bloody game but that doesn’t make it like Battlefield 4 or Rainbow Six: Siege. It’s fast paced, take no prisoners approach is an adrenaline shot to the arm of shooters. While there is nothing necessarily wrong with brown and gray military shooters; it’s rare that we get a game that is so content with its own gory revelries.
It also helps that it has a balanced blending of horror, action, and comedy that is rarely seen. Doom doesn’t dive to heavy into jokes or gags, like say Borderlands, but is clearly self-aware enough to poke fun at itself. There aren’t scares like in Doom 3, yet it’s clear how much effort was made into this games atmosphere. It’s the rare type of shooter that molds various genres, yet remains true to what defined the previous iterations as a success.
