Ten Games To Play After You're Done With Doom Eternal

So - you’ve killed your three hell priests and turned back the tide of demonic invaders looking to turn the surface of the earth into a barbeque. Now what? 

We came away satisfied but unsurprised with the bone-crunching action of Doom Eternal when it released earlier this year. 

In our review, we said that “If the 2018 reboot of the most iconic and bloodthirsty first person shooter in PC gaming was a surprise, 2020’s Doom Eternal comes across as a known quality. It’s not bad but is exactly what you expect. It does little to evolve the formula or escalate the action. It’s more of the thing you want, but offers little in the way of the things the series needs to grow.”

Here are ten games to consider once you’re done with Doom Eternal.

Bulletstorm

Credit: People Can Fly

People Can Fly’s Bulletstorm is a gem with rough edges. It takes the arcadey old school design principles behind shooters like Doom and Wolfenstein and encourages players to be creative as they blast through the game’s ruined extraterrestrial metropoli. 

The writing and humor in Bulletstorm doesn’t always land but it’s a game that knows what it’s good at and, when it hits its marks, it’s nothing short of a blast.

Rage 2

Credit: Bethesda

The follow-up to id Software’s biggest misfire rights the ashes of the past and gives new life to the post-apocalyptic shooter. It also cribs a lot from 2016’s DOOM when it comes to the gunplay. 

In our review of Rage 2, we said that “Credit where it’s due, Avalanche have taken a relic of a bygone era and turned it into the game that the first Rage probably ought to have been. Rage 2 resuscitates a franchise that was arguably dead on arrival.”

Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

Credit: Remedy

Remedy’s Max Payne did for games what The Matrix did for films when it came to bullet time. However, it’s the sequel here that makes for a more natural companion piece for Doom Eternal.

Though the aesthetics and perspectives involved couldn’t be more different, the thing that Max Payne shares with the most recent Doom game is a commitment to doubling down. Both games take what worked about their predecessors - kinetic, fast-paced action that keeps you on your toes- and give you plenty more of it.

Superhot

Credit: Superhot Team

Although the black, white and red minimalism here might make for a striking contrast with DOOM’s meticulously-realised temples and scientific research facilities, the sense of style in action in Superhot has a lot in common with id’s shlocky sequel. 

Superhot puts the action of real-time, first-person combat front and center with a compelling twist: time only moves when you do. If you enjoyed the flow of DOOM’s combat encounters, you’ll probably have a great time with Superhot. 

Hotline Miami

Credit: Devolver Digital

Like DOOM, Hotline Miami revels in ultraviolence. This top-down combat puzzler sees you play as a homicidal maniac on a one-man crusade against the mob. There’s an underlying weirdness here to the storytelling that echoes the fresh twist that id Software have given the DOOM lore in recent entries and a killer soundtrack that helps keep the action feeling as psychedelic as possible.

Painkiller

Credit: People Can Fly

While Bulletstorm polished a lot of the rough edges away from People Can Fly’s neo-classical approach to arena first person shooters, there’s still an undeniable charm to the studio’s debut. 

Riffing on pulpy and self-serious supernatural tropes, Painkiller sees you fight your way through waves of monsters as you blaze a trail of bodies through purgatory. You won’t find a BFG9000 but you will find an arsenal of fun weapons to rival the best the genre has to offer. 

Dusk

Credit: New Blood Interactive

Where games like Doom Eternal blend together modern tech with old school design, Dusk flips that on its head. It looks and plays like games like Heretic or Hexen (and - of course - the original Doom) but it takes the conventions of those games and suberts them in fun ways by drawing on elements of immersive sims like Thief and Deus Ex. 

Ruiner

Credit: Reikon Games

A stylish top-down action game that sees you blast your way across a neon-lit metropolis in search of vengeance. Like DOOM Eternal, the combat encounters in Ruiner pushes you to your limits and forces you to use every tool in your arsenal to keep hordes of enemies at bay.

In our review, we said that “if you’re an absolute addict for cyberpunk fantasies or off-puttingly difficult games, RUINER might be worth a look.”

“After all, it's rare to find a game so striking in its absolute mastery of tone like RUINER is.”

Moons of Madness

Credit: Rock Pocket Games

If you disliked Doom Eternal’s pivot away from the space horror of the previous game, Moons of Madness might sate your appetite for more. 

Set in a future where a sinister megacorporation sends expeditions to Mars searching for the source of an enigmatic signal, you play a lowly-engineer on extraterrestrial research base, forced to adapt once supernatural phenomena begins to take ahold of the site and the bodies start piling up. 

In our review, we said that “Moons of Madness takes a basketful of familiar ideas and serves up a delicious picnic of science fiction horror with plenty of tension and a handful of memorable close-encounters with malevolent cosmic deities.”

Shadow Warrior

Credit: Flying Wild Hog

Before 2018’s DOOM reimagined a classic first person shooter for modern audiences, there was Shadow Warrior. 

A revival of the 1997 shooter, developer Flying Wild Hog breathed new life into a dated premise with ultraviolent combat encounters then leaned into the ridiculousness of its premise and let you swap between tearing foes apart with brutal swordplay and mowing them down with massive guns at a moment’s notice.