History YMMV / Doom64

** In its day, ''64'' was criticized for being [[ItsTheSameSoItSucks yet another]] MissionPackSequel at a time when not only was the id Tech 1 engine no longer considered impressive, but that the original games had received [[PortingDisaster sub-par ports]] [[PortOverdosed on every other console]] for the last couple of years. As such, it drew unfavorable comparisons to the more modern ''[[VideoGame/QuakeI Quake]]'' and other more technically-impressive N64 shooters like ''VideoGame/{{Turok}}'' and ''VideoGame/{{GoldenEye|1997}}'', and it was also lambasted for lacking any sort of multiplayer, as PVP shooters became all the rage after ''[=GoldenEye=]''[='=]s release. Nowadays, with the benefit of its fan-made ''Doom 64 EX'' port, it's considered an overlooked gem for its solid map design and creepy atmosphere, and featuring a FinalBoss that's a huge step up from the Spider Mastermind. It's not uncommon to find people who consider it a better ''Doom 3'' than the actual ''VideoGame/{{Doom 3}}''. This came to a head with ''Doom 64'' finally getting an HD port to modern systems and computers in 2020 along with a set of brand new levels [[spoiler:to tie it and the first two games into the ''VideoGame/Doom2016'' continuity]].
** Additionally, while criticized in its day for not being a true 3D game at a time when full 3D games were heralded as the wave of the future and 2D was considered obsolete, when compared to its N64 shooter contemporaries and other games of its generation in general, its usage of sprites and 2.5D engine helps it hold up much better graphically than the other N64 shooters and most fifth generation games, whose primitive 3D models are very apparent in their age. Plus, it features the fast, classic ''Doom'' gameplay that still stands on its own today while its contemporary 3D shooters play much clunkier and have been long obsoleted by modern shooters. Its entire focus on good single-player shooter content also made it stand out more as time went on, when the shooter genre has become maligned for its over-focus on multiplayer, with there being a significant lack of shooting games with solid single-player experiences after the turn of the century.
* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: The Doom engine was really stretched to the limit for its time, even exceeding the capabilities of ''VideoGame/{{Hexen}}'' in some respects. Textures and sprites are smoothed out to eliminate pixelation, level geometry can now be scripted into intricate special effects, the skies are able to be smoothly animated and even display thunder and lightning, and levels can be made to fool the player into thinking they are more 3D than they really are. The levels in the second act of the game and latter really stand out with their castle-like designs and well animated skies, and the entire presentation wasn't quite like anything else on the N64.

** '''"Level 22: Burnt Offerings"''', while not the most outright difficult level has a dirty trick that fells poorly thought-out. At one point, you need to progress by picking up a Rocket Launcher, but if you happen to be full on Rockets, then you may become stuck as you can not progress without picking up that Launcher. When you do take the Rocket Launcher, you are lowered into a shallow pit and four dart launchers start firing at you which can lead to your death if you were unprepared and running low on health. Replacing the Rocket Launcher with a Mega Sphere would be a simple fix, preventing a cheap death and providing a challenge to get through the sequence with as much health as possible.

* DemonicSpiders: The Pain Elementals. While in ''Doom II'', Pain Elementals were merely annoying [[MookMaker mook makers]] that drew fire and distracted you from much more threatening enemies, they underwent a huge upgrade here. They shoot out two Lost Souls each time they attack instead of just one, and with no Lost Soul limit like in ''II'', Pain Elementals will quickly overwhelm the player if they're not dealt with promptly. Additionally, if the player tries hugging the Pain Elemental's face to prevent Lost Soul spawning like you could in ''II'', the spawned Lost Souls will instead explode and deal damage equivalent to a Rocket's explosion, turning them from completely helpless to extremely dangerous in close quarters. On top of that, the Lost Souls themselves are much more aggressive (but thankfully more frail), and will repeatedly charge at the player in sight unless stunned or killed, making them quite distracting and dangerous. All this results in an enemy that can soak up nearly as much if not even more ammo than a Baron of Hell, being nearly as much of an offensive threat as the Arachnotrons, and being able to completely trap and overwhelm the player unlike any other enemy in the game. Better hope you find the secret levels and the demon artifacts to power up the Unmaker before the later levels, where the game loves to throw multiple Pain Elementals at you at once in large open areas with little-to-no cover.

* SequelDifficultySpike: Among the console Dooms, ''Doom 64'' is considerably more difficult than the thematically similar [=PlayStation=] ports despite having the utterly broken Unmaker, and lacking Revenants, Chaingunners, Arch-Viles and Spider Masterminds. The increased difficulty comes from larger and more complicated levels, not having limitations in enemy variety per level (so unlike [=Playstation=] ''Doom'', ''Doom 64'' can throw all it strongest monsters at you in a single level), Lost Souls and Pain Elementals being made significantly more dangerous (the latter now being a bonafide DemonicSpider used liberally throughout the game), plasma cells being significantly more scarce (so the player has to be really stingy with their use of the Unmaker and BFG to ensure they have ammunition when they really need them), a plethora of death traps to quickly kill a unsuspecting player, arena-type levels having a special flag set that prevents [[SetAMookToKillAMook monster infighting]] from happening (so you can't rely on monster infighting to thin out the the large swarms of monsters you fight in arena levels), a new final boss that's significantly harder than the Spider Mastermind, and just generally putting the player into more dangerous situations in general. Previous entries usually have 1-3 event-triggering scripts in the entire game that is usually reserved for the final boss or specific level (i.e. Killing 2 Barons of Hell in Doom 1's Episode 1 opens up the building). Doom 64? Very common element; see Level 17's Watch Your Step where you HAVE to kill a group of enemies to bring back the next batch of enemies.

** In its day, ''64'' was criticized for being [[ItsTheSameSoItSucks yet another]] MissionPackSequel at a time when not only was the id Tech 1 engine no longer considered impressive, but that the original games had received [[PortingDisaster sub-par ports]] [[PortOverdosed on every other console]] for the last couple of years. As such, it drew unfavorable comparisons to the more modern ''[[VideoGame/QuakeI Quake]]'' and other more technically-impressive N64 shooters like ''VideoGame/{{Turok}}'' and ''VideoGame/{{GoldenEye|1997}}'', and it was also lambasted for lacking any sort of multiplayer, as PVP shooters became all the rage after ''[=GoldenEye=]''[='=]s release. Nowadays, with the benefit of its fan-made ''Doom 64 EX'' port, it's considered an overlooked gem for its solid map design and creepy atmosphere, and featuring a FinalBoss that's a huge step up from the Spider Mastermind. It's not uncommon to find people who consider it a better ''Doom 3'' than the actual ''VideoGame/{{Doom 3}}''. This came to a head with ''Doom 64'' finally getting an HD port to modern systems and computers in 2020 along with a set of brand new levels [[spoiler:to tie it and the first two games into ''Doom Eternal'']].

** The Lost Souls are much less durable then in the previous games, but are now far more aggressive. If you fight enough of them at once they can easy reach DemonicSpider status.

* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic: The soundtrack may be very different from those of the first two games, but it does a great job of establishing a dark, tense atmosphere.

* ThatOneBoss: The [[BigBad Mother Demon]] is a killing machine. She possesses the Revenants' homing missiles, fired in quads, as well as a flame trail that is fired in all four compass directions. Without the [[InfinityPlusOneSword Unmaker]] powered up at least twice, she is nasty opponent to fight. Also, your resources are partly spent from TheWarSequence that must be fought in this instance. However, if you find the secret levels in the game to assemble your aforementioned ultimate weapon it becomes a breeze. Find all three artifacts and you can seal off the demon portals and proceed to the final battle immediately. The Unmaker acts like a [[GatlingGood laser gatling]], easily [[StunLock stun locking]] her and [[GameBreaker leaving her dead in seconds.]]

** The addition of the Unmaker basically makes the Plasma Gun obsolete due to the Unmaker using cells. Once you've upgraded the Unmaker only once, there is no reason to even bother using Plasma Gun; the Unmaker will have a greater rate of fire after the first upgrade, and regardless of upgrades, each laser shot deals up to twice the amount of damage a single plasma shot will deal, and despite the lasers looking like projectiles, it's a hitscan weapon, meaning it'll hit its target instantly unobstructed with full accuracy. Get the second and third upgrades, it'll shoot two and then three laser shots at once, giving it an incredible rate of fire that can stunlock even the Cyberdemon and Mother Demon to death, leaving the Plasma Gun hopelessly outclassed. The Plasma Gun also got nerfed, fires 1/3 slower than the original version of the weapon, and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking emits an annoying loud buzzing noise at idle]].\\

** {{Downplayed}} with the {{BFG}}. It's still very efficient with cells against a large hoard of monsters and against individual Cyberdemons at point-blank range. However, the Unmaker shares its ammo and it isn't always obvious if using the {{BFG}} over is more efficient as the amount of simultaneous monsters rarely stretches the BFG's maximum output. Your are also vulnerable while holding out for the charge-up time. The upgraded Unmaker also has the advantage of locking monsters in a CycleOfHurting, reducing the chance of being hurt from retaliation by your target.

* CheeseStrategy: Beating "Hectic" the intended way is normally a TrialAndErrorGameplay experience, but due to an oversight, it is possible to actually collect the booby trapped Blue Armor without becoming stuck and dying from a crusher. By making careful, slow movements, the armor is acquired but you're still outside of the pit, and can freely collect all the keys and exit because the game can not run the encounter scripts simultaneously with the crusher sequence.

* CheeseStrategy: Beating "Hectic" the intended way is normally a TrialAndErrorGameplay experience, but due to engine limitations, it is possible to actually collect the booby trapped Blue Armor without becoming stuck and dying from a crusher. By making careful, slow movements, the armor is acquired but you're still outside of the pit, and can freely collect all the keys and exit because the game can not run the multiple encounter scripts simultaneously.

* SequelDifficultySpike: Among the console Dooms, ''Doom 64'' is considerably more difficult than the thematically similar [=PlayStation=] ports despite having the utterly broken Unmaker, and lacking Revenants, Chaingunners, Arch-Viles and Spider Masterminds. The increased difficulty comes from larger and more complicated levels, not having limitations in enemy variety per level (so unlike [=Playstation=] ''Doom'', ''Doom 64'' can throw all it strongest monsters at you in a single level), Lost Souls and Pain Elementals being made significantly more dangerous (the latter now being a bonafide DemonicSpider used liberally throughout the game), plasma cells being significantly more scarce (so the player has to be really stingy with their use of the Unmaker and BFG to ensure they have ammunition when they really need them), a plethora of death traps to quickly kill a unsuspecting player, arena-type levels having a special flag set that prevents [[SetAMookToKillAMook monster infighting]] from happening (so you can't rely on monster infighting to thin out the the large swarms of monsters you fight in arena levels), a new final boss that's significantly harder than the Spider Mastermind, and just generally putting the player into more dangerous situations in general.

** "Level 30: The Lair" is an anomaly among the secret levels, as while the other secret levels provided a big amp up in difficulty (Outpost Omega throws far more dangerous encounters at the player than they'll experience in the rest of the first 8 starbase maps, In The Void is chock full of tough enemies and features plentiful Pain Elementals in vast openness, and Hectic and the "fun" levels are just unfair), The Lair instead gives the player a big breather. Despite you having done several maps in Hell at that point, you mainly just fight small swarms of small enemies like Nightmare Imps, Spectres, and Lost Souls, while the only bigger threats are a couple Hell Knights and a couple Arachnotrons, the latter of which you can easily fight isolated to minimize your danger. The Lair is additionally really short, doesn't have much in ambushes, and has two Soulspheres in the map, which with the easy combat should easily allow you to leave the level with 200% health if you save one for the end. Plus you can get the second Demon Key near the beginning of the map to power the Unmaker to GameBreaker levels, and the puzzle to get it is a lot simpler than the puzzles locking the Keys in Outpost Omega and In The Void.

* ItsShortSoItSucks: The new episode included in the 2020 re-release, "The Lost Levels", has maps that are all high quality, but there's only six of them plus another bonus "fun level", whereas the size of a traditional Doom episode has typically been eight or more maps long, and it's not like the maps are especially big. If you like Doom 64 you'll certainly enjoy the new episode, but after finishing it you might be left yearning for more.

** The buff to the Chainsaw doubles its power, and helps prevent the Berserk Fist from being a completely superior. Now it's much safer against enemies it can safely stun-lock and kills them twice as quickly as well. While it's still a gamble to use it against more dangerous foes such as Hell Knights, it's not ''as'' risky thanks to the doubled damage output and is a possibility if you have health and armor to risk.
** One of the biggest weakness of the former incarnation of the Pain Elemental was that you could get into melee and neutralize them with even a Chainsaw or Berserk Fist without any fear of reprisal. However, Doom 64 made this tactic very risky, as every Lost Soul that fails to spawn will cause damage similar to a barrel explosion.
** Chaingunners, Revenants, and Arch-Viles were excluded from this game. It's very likely this was because fighting these monsters with an N64 game pad rather than a keyboard and mouse would be a frustrating experience due to their high movement speeds and/or devastating attacks. Even with keyboard and mouse at hand, these three enemies were still considered dangerous foes.

** '''"Level 16: Blood Keep"''' has a layout that is fairly complicated to figure out, and is a fairly long level. The potential issue is that [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bxjpc9gSf4o&feature=youtu.be&t=467 the exit room has a cheap death trap]] if you're unfamiliar with the map: Some Lost Souls assault you and are easy enough to deal with, but after they die, the edges of the room (2/3 the room) lower into an inescapable death-pit that kills you, which means that if you happen to wander here at the wrong time, [[WebVideo/AngryVideoGameNerd you go back to the beginning]]. Note that Doom 64: Absolution, a [[GameMod game mod]] that recreates the game on the PC, has an alteration of this trap, that is not to be confused with the original, where the sides lower right away, and the safe zone is even smaller, with the player surrounded by hell-knights. This game engine is built on [=JDoom=] and allows SaveScumming unlike on the N64, lessening the likelihood of redoing the level.

* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: The Doom engine was really stretched to the limit for its time, even exceeding the capabilities of ''VideoGame/{{Hexen}}'' in some respects. Textures and sprites are smoothed out to eliminate pixelation, level geometry can now be scripted into intricate special effects, the skies are able to be smoothly animated and even display thunder and lightning, and levels can be made to fool the player into thinking they are more 3D than they really are. The levels in the second act of the game and latter really stand out with their castle-like designs and well animated skies. The game's visual style really stands out on the N64 console among the games of the era.

** '''"Level 6: Alpha Quadrant"''' is where levels start causing easy deaths, especially on [[HarderThanHard Watch Me Die]]. What makes it painful is an abyssal room with severe darkness, populated with specters in the pit that can corner you easily, and Barons of Hell impeding your progress from across the room. Much time can be spent, trying to clear a safe path through this room to hit the switches you need to access the final key. By the way, you can't save scum on the Nintendo 64, so if you die in Doom 64, [[RageQuit you go back to the beginning of the level.]]

* AntiClimaxBoss: [[spoiler: The Sister Resurrector, who wants revenge against you in The Lost Levels after you have killed the Mother Demon. She is essentially just a rematch with the Mother Demon, but due to the level's layout, it puts her at a major disadvantage. The Unmaker is immediately available in the beginning, and you need to collect the 3 required Demon Keys in the level to open her door, which also powers up the Unmaker at maximum power. There are also 3 Invulnerability Spheres in the level; you can use one or two of them to clear most of the area out (in case you fear the Cyberdemon) or speed run it, and then save one at the end for a free win against her. Once you open the door, you can immediately fire at her effortlessly before she enters the portal because of the small pillar gap where your Unmaker's shots are small enough to go through. If she decides to fight you before entering the portal, none of her 2 attacks can hit you because the pillars are blocking her attacks. Even if she were to teleport in the main battling area and you decide to fight her without the Unmaker nor BFG rushing her, there are so many side walls and cover that can block her homing missiles before it directs against you, making avoiding her attacks simple unlike in the much more open Absolution. Then if you rush through the level with the Invulnerabilities and avoid killing the Cyberdemons, upon her being set free you can simply hide in one of the elevated side rooms where her and the Cyberdemons can't reach nor hit you, and then just wait for the Cyberdemons to kill her in the inevitable infighting that occurs from them trying to hit you.]]

** Just booting up the game ROM was potentially an awe-inspiring experience because the game starts with an actual rendered cutscene with the camera flying around a battle between multiple space marines and some of the monsters you'll be facing showing off the new Arachnotrons, Mancubi and Cyberdemon models. The camera then aims down and ascends into the sky showing the structure in the middle of the cutscene map to be the "[=DooM=]" logo, and the floor texture is disabled to present the Unmaker Insignia in the background for a unique seamless title screen effect. Quite an advancement from the previous static title cards of the previous iterations.

** Just booting up the game ROM was potentially an awe-inspiring experience because the game starts with an actual rendered cutscene with the camera flying around a battle between multiple space marines and some of the monsters you'll be facing at least showing off the Arachnotrons, Mancubi and Cyberdemons. The camera then aims down and ascends into the sky showing the structure in the middle of the cutscene map to be the "DooM" logo, even disabling the floor texture present the Unmaker Insignia in the background for a unique title screen effect.

** Additionally, when compared to its N64 shooter contemporaries, its usage of sprites and 2.5D engine helps it hold up much better graphically than the other N64 shooters, whose primitive 3D models are very apparent in their age. Plus, it features the fast, classic ''Doom'' gameplay that still stands on its own today while its contemporary 3D shooters play much clunkier and have been long obsoleted by modern shooters. Its entire focus on good single-player shooter content also makes it stand out more nowadays, when the shooter genre has become maligned for its over-focus on multiplayer with a significant lack of solid single-player experiences after the turn of the century.

** The Spider Mastermind and Icon of Sin in ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' and ''VideoGame/DoomII'' respectively got complaints for being underwhelming final bosses due to different reasons. ''Doom 64'' attempts to provide a worthy FinalBoss with the new Mother Demon, who uses the Revenants' homing rockets and dangerous lines of fire on the ground to keep players on their toes when battling her with conventional weapons, Unmaker aside.

** The Spider Mastermind and Icon of Sin in ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' and ''VideoGame/DoomII'' respectively got complaints for being underwhelming final bosses due to different reasons. ''Doom 64'' attempts to provide a worthy FinalBoss with the new Mother Demon, who use Revenants' homing rockets and lines of fire on the ground to keep players on their toes when battling her with conventional weapons, Unmaker aside.

** Chaingunners, Revenants, and Arch-Viles were excluded from this game. It's very likely this was because fighting these monsters with an N64 game pad rather than a keyboard and mouse would be a frustrating experience due to their high movement speeds and/or devastating attacks.

** Chaingunners, Revenants, and Arch-Viles were excluded from this game. It's very likely this was because fighting these monsters with an N64 game pad rather than a keyboard and mouse would be a frustrating experience due to their high movement speeds and/or devastating attacks.