The name “DOOM” is one of gaming’s history books at this point. The original DOOM and DOOM 2 were responsible for making the first person shooter genre one to not ignore. Sure, Wolfenstein 3D came first, but DOOM permeated into pop culture in a big way, leading to novelizations, films, public outrage, talk show panels discussing the affect of the game on children and so on. DOOM was huge. DOOM 4 wants to be huge.
DOOM 3 happened and, well, it didn’t really move the needle in an already-crowded world of FPS games. It wasn’t that it was a bad game, because DOOM 3 was good for what it was, it was that DOOM 3 happened while gamers were eagerly awaiting Half-Life 2’s release. Then with the release of the Xbox 360 multiplayer shooters started to become more and more popular, with franchises like Call of Duty entering into the driver’s seat while DOOM was left as a relic of the past.
There have been changes within id Software, like John Carmack no longer being a part of the id Software family, with hopes that the DOOM franchise can be revived. So DOOM 4 isn’t really the fourth proper game, instead it’s a reboot of the franchise and we have no screenshots, videos or anything to document it outside of first-hand reports from those who saw the unveiling this week. At least they got people talking, right?
DOOM 4 will just be “DOOM” and will most likely be released on Xbox One, PS4 and PC.