Doom Eternal Delivers Over-the-Top Action and Insane FPS Energy

After absolutely loving Doom 2016, I came into Doom Eternal with pretty high expectations.

That first game was such a breath of fresh air. It was fast, focused, aggressive, and just plain fun. It stripped away a lot of the fluff modern shooters tend to pile on and brought the genre back to its core: movement, mayhem, and metal.

So naturally, I was curious (and a little cautious) about how Eternal would try to top that.

What I got was something that felt like the devs took everything from Doom 2016 and said, “Cool, now let’s crank it up to 11.”

Eternal is bigger, faster, more complex, more ridiculous, and somehow even more metal.

It’s also more demanding, both in terms of reflexes and how much stuff you need to manage mid-fight. It can be overwhelming, but it’s also incredibly fun when everything clicks.

There were moments when I was completely in the zone, dancing around demons, juggling cooldowns, swapping weapons on the fly, and just feeling unstoppable.

And there were other moments when I had no idea what key did what, ran out of the one ammo type I needed, and died repeatedly in a pool of my own keyboard confusion.

Still, despite a few frustrations, Doom Eternal delivers one of the most intense, high-energy FPS campaigns I’ve played in a long time.

And by the end, I walked away a bit exhausted but fully satisfied.

Visuals and Performance: A Hellishly Beautiful Game That Runs Like a Dream

One thing Doom Eternal absolutely nails from start to finish is its visual presentation.

This game is gorgeous.

Every level is bursting with detail, from massive, crumbling hell fortresses and glowing alien ruins to warped cyber-cityscapes and surreal, otherworldly arenas.

I found myself constantly stopping just to look around, soaking in the skyboxes, the architecture, and the sheer scale of some of these environments.

It’s all absurd in the best way, and it’s clear the art team went all-in on making every area feel distinct, brutal, and just a little bit unhinged.

And it’s not just about the scale or style, the color work is fantastic too.

Where Doom 2016 had a lot of reds and grays, Eternal brings in neon greens, electric blues, glowing glyphs, and high-contrast lighting that makes the whole thing feel like a heavy metal fever dream.

As for performance? Absolutely phenomenal. I played on PC in 5K ultrawide with maxed-out settings on a 4080 Super and got a rock-solid 120FPS the entire time. No stutters, no crashes, no weird texture pop-in, just buttery smooth chaos.

It’s honestly one of the most technically impressive games I’ve played at that resolution, and it made the whole experience even more immersive.

The optimization here is top-tier.

It’s rare to find a game that looks this good and runs this well out of the box, but Doom Eternal pulls it off like it’s no big deal.

If you’ve got the hardware, this is one of those games that really makes it shine.

Gameplay and Combat: Fun, Fast, and (Sometimes) Overwhelming

At its core, Doom Eternal keeps the same glorious foundation that made Doom 2016 such a blast, blistering speed, aggressive enemy encounters, and an absolute refusal to let you stand still.

Combat is still about forward momentum, staying on the attack, and being in total control of the chaos.

But this time around, things are… more. A lot more.

Where Doom 2016 gave you just enough tools to feel powerful and flexible, Eternal throws an entire combat toolkit at you from the start.

You’ve got your grenades, your flame belch, your blood punch, your chainsaw (for ammo), your dash (for movement), your ice bomb, your weapon mods, and your glory kills all layered on top of a wide weapon wheel and various cooldowns.

It’s a lot to manage, and if you’re trying to do it all with just a keyboard and a couple buttons on your mouse, it can feel like trying to play piano during a hurricane.

Early on, I was struggling, not because the combat wasn’t fun, but because I couldn’t keep up with what button did what, and everything felt just a little too frantic.

That changed completely once I switched to my MMO mouse with six extra side buttons and a few more on top.

I mapped everything (grenades, flame belch, ice bomb, weapon mods) to different buttons, and suddenly the game clicked.

Once I had all my tools right under my thumb, I could play the game the way it was meant to be played: fast, smooth, and brutal.

When it all comes together, Doom Eternal is pure adrenaline. You’re swapping weapons mid-air, launching grenades into groups, flaming enemies for armor, punching demons into pieces, and zipping around arenas in a constant ballet of violence.

It’s a rush but it’s also a lot to ask of players.

Without the right setup or muscle memory, it can easily veer into exhausting territory.

Still, once you hit that rhythm, few shooters feel this good.

Doom Eternal turns combat into a high-speed puzzle of destruction and when you solve it, it’s incredible.

Weapon and Enemy Design: Strategic Depth or Frustrating Limitation?

One of the biggest shifts from Doom 2016 to Eternal is how much more deliberate the weapon and enemy design feels.

In Eternal, you’re not just blasting demons with whatever you have on hand, you’re expected to counter specific enemies with specific weapons or mods.

Arachnotrons? Take out the turret with a precision bolt.

Cacodemons? Lob a grenade down their throat.

Revenants? Sticky bombs to the shoulders.

You get the idea.

On one hand, this adds a cool layer of strategy to the game.

Every fight becomes a fast-paced decision tree, where knowing the right counter makes a huge difference.

It keeps you on your toes, forces you to use your full arsenal, and adds a puzzle-like layer to the combat.

For players who enjoy that kind of tactical challenge, it’s a dream.

But on the flip side, it can also be a bit frustrating.

Sometimes you just want to go wild with your favorite gun but you can’t, because you’re out of ammo for the “correct” one.

The game is constantly nudging you toward optimal weapon use, and it’s not subtle about it. If you don’t play the “right” way, you’ll usually get punished for it.

Ammo management also becomes a key part of the loop, since you burn through it fast.

That’s by design though, you’re supposed to chainsaw weak enemies to restock.

It adds tension and keeps the pace up, but it can also feel like you’re juggling one more thing on top of an already busy combat system.

In the best moments, all of this works together seamlessly.

You’re swapping weapons mid-fight, countering threats perfectly, and keeping your ammo topped off without missing a beat.

But in the worst moments like when your key weapon is empty and the arena’s still swarming, it can feel like the game’s systems are fighting you just as much as the demons are.

Still, even with the occasional annoyance, the sheer variety of weapons and enemies keeps combat from ever getting stale.

When it works, it really works.

Difficulty and Progression: Brutal but (Mostly) Fair

Doom Eternal isn’t shy about its difficulty.

Even on the standard setting, the game throws everything at you, fast enemies, aggressive AI, huge arenas, and layered mechanics that demand constant awareness.

It’s intense.

And for a while, it’s a great kind of intense, the kind that pushes you to improve, gets your heart racing, and makes every hard-won victory feel like a fist-pump moment.

For most of the main campaign and the early parts of the DLC, I played on standard difficulty and had a blast.

The challenge felt right, tough, but fair.

I’d die, regroup, try a new strategy, and usually come out on top within a few attempts.

It kept me engaged and constantly thinking about how to approach each fight.

But as I got deeper into the DLC content (particularly the final DLC) things started to shift.

Enemy density cranked way up, arenas got more chaotic, and fights started dragging on and on.

Around two-thirds into that final chunk, I hit a wall. It wasn’t that I couldn’t win (I probably could have, eventually) but each encounter started taking ten or more tries, and I was just running out of patience.

At that point, I dropped the difficulty to the easiest setting just to push through and finish the story.

And honestly? I don’t regret it.

The core gameplay loop is still fun, but there comes a point where the sheer length and intensity of some encounters can wear you down. It’s one thing to be challenged, it’s another to feel like the game is trying to break your will.

That said, the difficulty is part of what makes Doom Eternal so satisfying when you are in the zone.  It’s a game that demands mastery and rewards precision.

But if you’re not in the mood for that kind of trial-by-fire experience, it can definitely start to feel like a grind.

Story and Lore: Goofy, Loud, and Weirdly Fun

Let’s be real, nobody comes to Doom Eternal for a thoughtful, nuanced story.

And yet… the game has one.

A big one.

A completely ridiculous, lore-drenched, metal-as-hell mythos full of ancient prophecies, space priests, demon wars, and power armor infused with divine rage.

It’s totally over-the-top, borderline incomprehensible at times and I kind of loved it.

The story takes itself just seriously enough to commit to the worldbuilding, but not so seriously that it forgets what kind of game it is.

It throws you into a wild mix of sci-fi and fantasy nonsense, with a straight face and somehow it works.

Even when I wasn’t entirely sure who was fighting who or why the Doom Slayer was punching a giant robot into orbit, I was along for the ride.

The lore is thick and there are codex entries, background details, and long cutscenes (sometimes too long) explaining the history of the Slayer, the Sentinels, the Maykrs, and all kinds of weird demon-hunting theology.

And while I wouldn’t say I hung on every word, I appreciated the sheer commitment to the bit.

The world of Doom Eternal is bizarre and self-serious in the most entertaining way.

And honestly, the fact that the game surrounds such tight, brutal gameplay with a story this absurd just adds to its charm.

It knows it’s ridiculous.

It leans into it.

And that makes the whole experience feel larger than life.

Audio and Presentation: Metal, Mayhem, and Maximum Energy

From the moment the first track kicks in, Doom Eternal makes it clear that sound is not just part of the experience, it is the experience.

The soundtrack, composed by Mick Gordon (and others for later content), is an absolute monster.

It’s a relentless mix of pounding industrial metal, distorted guitar riffs, and atmospheric tension-builders that perfectly match the rhythm of the combat.

Every time the music swells as enemies pour in, you can feel your heart rate spike.

And when you’re in the groove cycling between weapons, setting enemies on fire, glory-killing imps in slow motion, it feels like you’re conducting some kind of unholy orchestra of violence.

It’s pure, cathartic energy.

The rest of the sound design is equally sharp. Every weapon has a satisfying punch, from the crack of the Super Shotgun to the sizzle of the Plasma Rifle.

Explosions rattle just enough without becoming noise, and even subtle sounds (like the chainsaw revving or your grenade cooldown finishing) are distinct and useful.

Glory kills are crunchy and brutal in all the right ways.

Voice acting is solid across the board, though nobody’s really here for character drama.

Most of the delivery serves the pulpy tone of the world (gravely narrators, doomsday cultists, self-serious AI voices) and it all works.

Even when the writing is over-the-top, the performances sell it.

Visually and audibly, Doom Eternal is firing on all cylinders.  It’s loud, stylish, and absurdly confident.

You might not remember every line of dialogue, but you’ll absolutely remember how it felt when the music dropped and the demons started pouring in.

Final Thoughts: A Bigger, Bolder Doom That Mostly Delivers

Doom Eternal is a wild ride. It takes the fast, fluid combat of Doom 2016 and cranks it up in every possible way with more weapons, more abilities, more enemies, more systems, more lore, more everything.

And while that “more is more” approach occasionally gets in its own way, it’s hard to deny how thrilling the core experience still is.

When it’s firing on all cylinders (and you’ve got your setup dialed in) it’s one of the most intense, satisfying shooters out there.

The movement feels great, the gunplay is top-tier, the soundtrack is a relentless force of nature, and the sheer confidence of its presentation is something you rarely see in modern games.

That said, it’s not without its flaws.

The demand to constantly juggle abilities and counters can overwhelm some players, and the difficulty curve (especially in the DLC) gets steep.

Add in a few ammo frustrations and some overlong encounters, and it’s clear that not every escalation was necessary.

But none of that stopped me from enjoying the game.

I had a blast (especially once I adapted with my MMO mouse) and even when I dropped the difficulty near the end, I never felt like I was having a bad time.

If you liked Doom 2016, there’s a lot to love here.

Just be ready to give Doom Eternal your full attention, and maybe a few extra mouse buttons.

It’s fast, it’s loud, it’s ridiculous and it’s absolutely worth playing.

View our full playthrough on YouTube with the playlist below:

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Images are from the Doom Eternal page on Steam and used under Fair Use.