Full Review

I first started playing Doom back in its first few months of being released back in the early 1990s. Man have things changed since then. Back in the day if you had a powerful 486 PC computer, you were the man! Now this fabulous title makes it’s way onto the greatest handheld gaming device on the market to date, and it supports all the multiplayer action memories along with it. What bad things can I say? Not a whole lot I tell ya! It’s Doom, but on a small screen. In my opinion, you will definitely need a lighting kit of some sort to play this game with to totally enjoy it. Why? Because, when you are knee-deep in all the action and there are monsters all over the place, you’ll be forced to have to tilt the GBA every which way. Therefore, getting glare. Now why is this bad for Doom (meaning, isn’t a GBA problem) ? Doom is a very dark game (in the lighting sense), and on the already dark screen of the GBA, it makes it very hard to play at times. Depending on the level or room lighting, you are in. The multiplayer action is where this game shines to most. I used to remember that it took a room full of 486 computers all networked together to play Doom via multiplayer (deathmatch), and sometimes setting up everyone’s machine with a DOS based LAN took up 50% of the overall time of your evening. Now, with the GBA this is all taken care of with the system’s multi-link capabilities. It’s very easy to setup, and you’ll need copies of Doom in each GBA to play, unlike Mario Kart. But a huge blast to play!

Now playing Doom (3D shooter) on a small LCD screen is much to my surprise very good. But, as I started before, you’ll want to get a good lighting kit to play Doom. None the less, the game has been transferred with practically the same graphics and sound, thus making this an instant GBA classic! Now, I don’t know if it was just me, but I had trouble finding the button or combo in order to switch weapons. I could find it in the manual at all. Can someone from Activision tell me how to switch weapons (Just kidding). But I honestly think they either couldn’t add it for the lack of available free buttons, maybe. Who knows. It is frustrating when you are in the heat of the action killing monsters from hell, and you’ve got your only trusty hand gun….hmmm. This is a shoot and kill game, with sleigh exception of finding colored keys, and getting the proper doors opened. Overall the gameplay it true to the classic Doom! Woohoo!

Nothing new visually here. It looks EXACTLY the same as it did back in the early 90s! Keeping it real! Just the way I like it! Beautiful. This game has transferred to the GBA beautifully!

The sounds have been preserved with precision. Two thumbs up! It’s all there, every door, screaming, dying sound in shear perfection, just like the good ol’ days. Crisp smooth sound is a nice treat on the Game Boy and it just adds to this incredibly deep game.

Wow what else can I say. This game is all around mayhem, combined with blasting things, and hunting monsters. You will never regret purchasing this game. Out of all the games I have played on GBA this is my favorite. Kudos to Activision for producing such a splendid game.