The consensus on beating Doom

[Misery]

I have been wonderin' somethin' lately. Recently I finished beating all the official levels from Doom ('cept TNT, 'cause I find it extremely boring), and I am curious about somethin'. What is considered beating the game, or levels, as far as gameplay. Is it really only considered beating it only when playing Vanilla? So, obviously, you can't jump or crouch, but are mechanics present in source ports like GZDoom too far from Vanilla to really be considered beating it? And does it have to be pistol start, etc.

I am only curious about the general consensus among the community. I know there isn't like an official requirement, or whatever. As amazing as GZDoom is (and it really is, 'cause I could never play it any other way now), I'm sure some of its mechanics can modify the difficulty of a level slightly, especially if you exploit it. So jus' wonderin' what people think in general. All opinions welcome.

[Rachael]

This is entirely too subjective for a solid consensus, and honestly what's more important than beating Doom is whether you had fun playing it in the first place, otherwise there's no point in beating it, as fun as that itself might be.

If you really think that playing only Vanilla is the only way to beat it, then it's time for you to go and load up DOSBox.

[Misery]

I know it is subjective. That's why I worded my question the way I did. I really am jus' curious about various people's opinions on the subject. Jus' maybe how people feel in general. It isn't goin' to change how I play one bit. Jus' wonderin' is all. This person thinks this. Other people think that. Blah blah blah.

And that would be a very strong NO on that DOSBox Randi and Graf have spoiled me with their awesome source port, and I'm never goin' back!

[Caligari87]

I haven't "beaten" Doom in a very long time. I think it stopped being a goal right around the same time I started experimenting with "tactical" gameplay mods like Hideous Destructor, where the expectation is that you'll eventually die an ignominious death against overwhelming odds.

My metric for enjoyment these days is usually seeing how far I can push against those odds. It's not about beating the mapset anymore, or even beating the map. It's about surviving the next room, the next door, the next encounter, and what creative solutions I can use in order to survive.

[m8f]

I find the term beat the game interesting. It sounds like a difficult, aggressive undertaking. In Russian, we say go through the game instead. One can say that they went through the game on the hardest difficulty or without cheats to clarify. It's a noticeable difference in the meaning. I grew up with the term go through the game and then carried over the meaning to the English term beat the game. Hence, my opinion, to "beat" the game is just to finish it, by any means, on any difficulty, even with cheating.

[Enjay]

I'd go with that too. I've never really used the term "beat the game" but I might finish it.

Sometimes I might even complete it. "Complete" often merely implies finishing it but where there are clear "you have completed the game if you have done everything possible" parameters, then I would use "complete" to mean that I'd done all of the available things. I'm looking at you smugglers caches in the seas around Skellige in the Witcher 3. Damn they were annoying, but I have completed the game - all available quests done. No question marks of any sort left on the map. I even got all those damned Gwent cards.

[Matt]

I have a near perfect record for never finishing a game without cheating.