/vr/ - Retro Games

>>6307428
The old novels by Dafydd Ab Hyugh and Brad Linaweaver? Yes I have, I have the full set (the reprints with the new artwork, regrettably, I would have liked the original ones better). I would argue they have their own canon as well, as they pretty much have to invent a lot of character and story to write four novels about the premise of Doom, and also that they go completely off the goddamn rails by the end of the second one.

I don't think they fit comfortably with the canon of any of the existing games, because they conflict at the least with Doom 64, where hell is demonstrably still hell, and thus would conflict with Doom 4 and Doom Eternal. Really, I would say they conflict with the canon of the original games, because I doubt there was no other intention for the demons to be anything but actual demons from hell.

Some people hate them, some don't, I think they're fine, nothing great, but nothing awful either, as far as writing a story around a game with such a low calorie plot as Doom, it could have been much worse. They clearly run out of Doom to write about (and the last one for whatever reason makes me think about some of the later Team TNT's more esoteric projects), and you can tell the authors used to write Star-Trek novels.

Apologies for the small resolution of this art.

>>5920069
The first one is as good as it gets, the second one isn't too shabby, then they gradually get weirder and less Doom, almost feeling like old Team TNT stuff, you know with Icarus : Alien Vanguard, and Daedalus (and I guess also Perdition's Gate and Hell 2 Pay, just a little), where there's this idea that the monsters aren't from literal hell, but are aliens, and you can tell the authors don't really want to do something about hell, but rather want to do a sci-fi alien story (and the authors are oldschool Star-Trek novelists, which will explain certain things to you if you ever watched TOS).

I wouldn't call them bad, but I also wouldn't call them great, if you looked at them in a vacuum, separate from the games, they're ok.
They don't actually exist in a vacuum though, they're an adaption, and they can be pretty questionable in that regard, particularly as the books go. At the same time, I also see why some things were done the way they were, because you'd need to write some new material around the premise, as a silent protagonist quietly killing monsters doesn't exactly make for engaging storytelling, you need more characters, you need other things to happen, you need to expand on the base idea. On that point, arguably they should maybe not even have been made, depending on who you ask. For their flaws, I do not hate them.

There's also some libertarian soapboxing from the authors as the books go, points I may agree with, but also maybe wouldn't have inserted in a story like this.
Apparently one of them owns the bronze canon which Hunter S. Thompson had his cremated ashes fired out of as part of his funeral arrangements. Make of that what you will.

Doesn't Google have a tool to let you make a survey? Make one of those instead.

>>4196628
They aren't actually demons, they're various alien species genetically engineered to look like hellspawn as a form of psychological warfare, they're used as an attacking force by a race of aliens who enslave them.

The idea is that they first observed earth during medieval times, and gauged their weaponry and offenses accordingly, a bipedal goat demon ripped with muscles and capable of shooting ball lightning would be terrifying and a force to be reckoned with then. The attack on earth is also just one of many interplanetary skirmishes between factions in a larger galactic war.

However, it's revealed in the later books that humanity evolves biologically and technologically, way faster than near every species in the galaxy, what takes us thousands of years takes others millions, when the bioengineered forces struck, we suddenly had guns, vehicles, modern military tech (and actually tech beyond ours, as it takes place in the future).
As a result, the invasion actually kind of goes tits up. It was expected that they'd just come and steamroll us all easy, but what happens is that it develops into a stalemate that lasts for years and years and years, probably over a century, where humanity rebuilds and advances, while being at war with an unspecified continent infested with 'demons', that at some point is toppled and retaken.

Overall, this isn't exactly what I would have wanted from the books, but there's enough thought put into this and the twists that I at least find it interesting.
The books aren't perfect, but they're not horrible either, at least the first one manages to get me in the mood and mindset for Doom 1, and the second one a bit for Doom 2. It drastically goes downhill after the second one though, and the authors clearly ran out of ideas and just made shit up as they went, the 4th book goes totally apeshit.

I think it can be sort of worth reading, there's a fair few neat things, but there's also quite a lot to complain about.

>>3126767
Yeah.
First book is good and worth reading, it's way better than a novelization of Doom has any right to be.

Then after the first book, with each volume, it's like a 10% drop in quality, a 20% increase in weird, and a 30% increase in "This isn't really Doom anymore"

Like, I won't say that the other books AREN'T worth reading, or that they're outright BAD, but it pretty much is another story after the second one.

>>1701417
Track 4 - Death's Bells

>>1606816
>God I hate that name.
Really? I think it's alright. I think they call him "Fly" for short in the books.

The books had flaws, but I didn't think they were outright bad.

I wish I could have gotten them with the original covers though. The reprints have shittyass photoshops on their cover instead of the classic pulpy art they had first.

>>1435575
That was awesome.
You should also be able to go through their pockets, and take like food rations, ammo and stuff.

>go through unconscious nazi's pocket
>find sausage
>eat it
>regain 15 health
No homo.

I also recall Romero suggesting that you should be able to piss on dead nazis.