Doom: The Dark Ages Devs Explain Missing Multiplayer And Confirm It’s Not Open World

Id Software recently pulled back the curtain onDoom: The Dark Ages and revealed a lot more gameplay from the upcoming FPS while also explaining some of the biggest changes from past Doom installments. One of the biggest is that this time around there is no multiplayer mode.

During January 23’s Developer Direct, Id Software shared a lot more details on the upcoming shooter, which acts as a medieval-themed prequel to 2016’s Doom and its 2020 sequel, Doom Eternal. But the developers also held a roundtable interview with the press ahead of the event, where studio director Marty Stratton and creative director Hugo Martin provided more context on some of the changes and design choices that went into Doom: The Dark Ages.

Perhaps the biggest news to come out of the interview, as transcribed by WCCFTech, is that this time around Id Software isn’t developing a multiplayer mode. And while this isn’t the first game in the franchise to ditch multiplayer, it’s still pretty rare for the series to not include co-op or deathmatch modes of some kind. But according to the devs, they wanted to make a bigger, better game, and cutting multiplayer let them do that.

“There’s only the campaign, and we decided that from the beginning,” said Stratton. “We wanted to free ourselves to create experiences like the mech and the dragon. Those are both like their own mini-games in the game. We decided to put all our effort into creating the biggest and best campaign we’ve ever made.”

Martin added: “We didn’t do multiplayer so that we could make a better single-player game. Like, we couldn’t have done the mech and the dragon and all that other stuff if we spread the resources around different game pillars, so we’ve really just focused on single player.”

Martin and Stratton were also asked if Doom: The Dark Ages is an open-world game. Id Software says it’s the biggest game they have ever made and features the largest levels seen in a Doom game, but the devs were clear that this isn’t an open-world game like Skyrim or Assasssin’s Creed.

“It’s definitely not an open-world game, but it is the most expansive world we’ve ever built,” explained Stratton.

“You really feel like you’re on a battlefield. It goes from the typical linear Doom to these large sandboxes where the exploration opens up, and you get multiple objectives that can be tackled in any order. Exploration is also tied to power in that you can find and unlock several upgrades for your character.”

Dark Ages isn’t inspired by Quake and it’s not the end of a trilogy

Martin also said that a big thing they learned from Eternal was that too many currencies and skill trees can complicate a game in ways that aren’t fun. So instead, this time around exploring will make you stronger via The Dark Ages’ simplified progression system.

Martin also denied that Doom: The Dark Ages is inspired by Quake. Instead, Batman comics inspired the developers. “The inspiration was more something like Batman: Year One and 300,” said Martin.

“I’m a pretty big comic book fan. But yeah, there were rumors that it was called Doom: Year Zero and that was what we called it internally. I still think it was a really cool name, although Dark Ages is pretty cool, too.”

Finally, Martin was asked if Dark Ages, being the third game in a trilogy, is the end of this era of Doom.

“I don’t think I can answer that. We’re not supposed to talk about it. Anyway, I like making Doom games. I wouldn’t have a problem doing this for a long time. But this isn’t designed to be the end of something.”

Doom: The Dark Ages arrives on May 15 on Xbox Series X/S, PS5, PC, and Game Pass.

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