How This Doom Eternal Mode Ratchets Up The Difficulty

Recent trailers for Doom Eternal have shown us that the Doom Slayer is not messing around this time. The latest entry looks to feature more ripping and tearing than ever before, with plenty of wild weaponry to take care of business. If this news regarding Doom Eternal's difficulty is any indication, then the Doom Slayer is going to need all the firepower he can grab.

According to a hands-on report from Shacknews, the new Doom will feature a difficulty mode higher than the daunting "Nightmare" mode. Unlike some higher difficulty levels, which give you tougher enemies or less ammo to deal with, this one punishes you for dying even once. 

That's right; this difficulty level only gives you one life to complete the entire game. If you get killed during this play through, no matter how far into the game you've gotten, you start all the way from the beginning. As TJ Denzer at Shacknews puts it, "No checkpoints or continues. Game over, man. Game over."

As a way of comparing your progress to other gamers, Doom Eternal will also mark spots throughout the game where other players met their end in this mode. This has the double-edged result of helping you to see how you stack up against other players, but also intimidating the ever-loving hell out of you. Imagine entering a room and seeing a dozen markers from fallen gamers. No one would blame you for backing out of the room slowly and scouring the level for more ammo. Maybe someone will make a "death map" of Doom Eternal, like the one made from the unlucky players of Dark Souls.

This isn't the first time the Doom franchise has flirted with a permadeath system like this. 2016's Doom featured "Ultra-Nightmare" mode, which also sent players back to the start upon a death. However, it didn't feature the interesting social features that this one is teasing. 

Find out if you're brave enough to challenge this beefed-up difficulty — and to have your failures immortalized — when Doom Eternal drops March 20.