Going God Mode: Revisiting My Favorite First-Person Shooters

Get ready for some rippin’ and tearin’

Confession: I’m not a gamer. I know. I seem like someone who would be based on my many nerdy obsessions, but I’ve always been pretty casual when it comes to playing video games. That said, I still occasionally get hooked on a game that blows me away. That happened to me recently when I got my hands on Doom: The Dark Ages. It’s the latest entry in the legendary first-person shooter franchise from id Software and Bethesda. I’ve been having such a blast with it that I decided it would be fun to take a look back at some of my favorite first-person shooters over the years and why I like them so much.

Before I do that, I should probably define what a first-person shooter is and what criteria I’m using for my list. The most simplistic definition is that it’s a combat game set in a 3D environment where the player is looking through the eyes of the protagonist. I want to emphasize the combat aspect. I’m not including first-person role-playing games like Fallout or Deus Ex. I’m also not including first-person survival horror games where you are mostly unarmed like Alien: Isolation or Still Wakes the Deep. In order to be considered for my list, the focus needs to be on mowing down enemies.

Doom (1993)

Doom is to first-person shooters what Super Mario Bros. is to side-scrolling platformers. It may not have invented the first-person shooter genre, but it certainly became the gold standard that every subsequent game was striving to attain. The premise is ridiculous in the best way: you play as a soldier in the future who is sent to Mars when a research team on the Martian moon of Phobos accidentally opens a portal to Hell. Now hordes of demons are pouring through, and it’s up to you massacre every last one of them. It combines elements of science fiction, horror, action, and an absurdist attitude to craft a unique tone. The gameplay is a run-and-gun style with a frenetic pace, but it also mixes in some atmospheric horror elements as well. It’s probably the first game I ever played that had jump scares. On top of that, it also has one of the greatest assortment of weapons in video game history. The crown jewel of that arsenal is the BFG 9000 that annihilates any enemy in range with massive green fireballs. What does BFG stand for? Big Fucking Gun. How can you not love that? It also featured a bevy of Easter eggs as well as cheat codes. Few things are as satisfying as turning on invincibility (called God Mode) and running roughshod over any demon standing in your way. Lastly, it has an iconic soundtrack that not so subtly rips off some of the best metal songs of all time. It’s a damn near perfect game for its time, and it’s still a blast to play today.

Quake (1996)

Quake is id Software’s big follow up to Doom, and it is almost as iconic. It would have been easy to just make another Doom game with a different name, but Quake ended up being its own animal. It trades in the exaggerated action and borderline goofy tone for a much darker and more atmospheric look and feel. Instead of a legion of demons pouring into our world from Hell, Quake features more Lovecraftian foes in a more dark fantasy setting. Future entries in the series would go in a more science fiction direction, but I love the anachronistic style of melding fantasy elements with modern weaponry in the first game. Most importantly for me specifically, Nine Inch Nails provides the soundtrack for the game. That industrial sound fits perfectly with the game.

GoldenEye 007 (1997)

Truth be told, I don’t really care about James Bond. It has never been one of my favorite film franchises. The video game adaptations on Nintendo 64, however, is one of my favorite first-person shooters ever. Virtually everyone I knew played this game when it came out in 1997. It’s much more action oriented than the movie, and I’m totally okay with that. It features a bevy of fun levels (including one where you drive a tank), but it was the multiplayer that I remember most fondly. Bringing a controller to a friend’s house for a four-player battle royale was about as fun as it gets.

Turok 2: Seeds of Evil (1998)

I’ve talked about the Turok games before, so I won’t go too in depth here. The appeal of this game is similar to the appeal of Doom. It’s ridiculously violent with a twisted sense of humor. It also has dinosaurs, and dinosaurs are cool. Ask anyone what comes to mind when they think of this game, and the answer is probably going to be one of the coolest weapons ever: the cerebral bore. It’s essentially a homing missile that locks onto an enemy and then drills into their head and explodes. It rules.

Perfect Dark (2000)

Perfect Dark might be the most underrated first-person shooter ever made. It’s a spiritual successor to GoldenEye 007, but it isn’t hamstrung by being shackled to Bond continuity. It’s a futuristic espionage shooter with a gripping story, great enemies, and an array of cool guns. The multiplayer is essentially the same as GoldenEye 007, but it allows the player to add in numerous computer controlled characters along with the human controlled characters to make it feel like more people are playing instead of just those restricted to the four controller ports.

Halo: Combat Evolved (2001)

It’s entirely possible that I have spent more time playing Halo than any other game in my life. If I’m being honest, it’s the main reason I waited to buy an Xbox instead of a PlayStation 2 despite Microsoft releasing the system more than a year after Sony. I suspect I wasn’t the only one. What made Halo special at the time was a combination of a gripping story, improved enemy AI, a variety of different gameplay mechanics, and an excellent multiplayer experience. Up to sixteen players could play at a time, but this was before Xbox Live had been rolled out. Each system had four controller ports, so if you wanted to get sixteen total players then you needed to connect four Xboxes together with ethernet cables in the same house. So that’s what we did. I cannot overstate how chaotic this was. It ruled. The subsequent games in the series were also a lot of fun, but the original holds a special place in my heart.

Destiny 2 (2017)

I went a pretty long time without devoting much time to first-person shooters once I was out of high school. I still played certain titles (Doom 3, Call of Duty 2, and Resistance: Fall of Man all come to mind), but I didn’t play any of them with the same dedication as I did with the aforementioned games until I started playing Destiny 2. What was it about Destiny 2 that got me so invested once I started playing? It was because it felt to me like playing Halo all over again (also made by Bungie), but I was doing so with way more people and with constantly evolving gameplay mechanics, maps, and storylines. Also, it was free to play (though expansions are not). It was just a lot of fun.

Doom: The Dark Ages (2025)

I know. This game isn’t even a week old at this point, but I am having so much fun with it that it simply has to make the list. You’re probably wondering why this makes the list over Doom (2016) and Doom: Eternal for me. I have a few reasons for that. First off, I really love the setting for this one. Every Doom game is set in the future where you start off in our universe fighting demons before eventually fighting them in Hell. It’s a tried and true formula. This one changes things up ever so slightly by having the game take place in a strange futuristic realm that combines medieval aesthetics with futuristic weapons. It’s a dark fantasy element that reminds me of what developers were going for with the original Quake. That melding of fantasy and science fiction also leads to a medieval variation on the BFG 9000: the BFC (Big Fucking Crossbow). So metal. This entry in the series also has the most original story elements of any Doom game I’ve played by a wide margin. Does it totally make sense? Not really, but it’s fun. It also dials down the absurdist comedic elements a bit for a darker tone. The level designs are also very cool. You get the medieval style villages, huge military bases, and futuristic cities in the main universe, but you also go to Hell (this is still a Doom game) and a Lovecraftian cosmic realm at one point. But the thing that really stands out to me is the gameplay mechanics. You still cycle through range weapons like usual, but you also get a shield in this game that makes for a unique combat experience. I think it does the best job of any of the recent Doom games of forcing you into close quarters combat. Beyond the addition of the shield, this game also has segments where you pilot a giant mech and fight massive demons like you’re in a Pacific Rim movie as well as segments where you fly around on the back of a dragon attacking enemy airships. There’s even a fight with a specific being that will be very familiar to fans of cosmic horror, but I won’t spoil that. What’s not to like?