If you’ve been on the fence about picking up the latest Doom entry, you’ve probably stumbled across Doom The Dark Ages ratings across Steam, Metacritic, and gaming blogs while doing your research. As someone who’s put 70+ hours into the game across both single-player campaign and co-op modes, I’ve dug through every public score, user review, and critic take to break down what those numbers actually mean, beyond the surface-level 1-10 scale. You won’t just get a recap of average scores here; we’ll break down what reviewers loved, what they hated, and whether the ratings align with what actual players experience when they boot up the game for the first time.
How Doom The Dark Ages Ratings Stack Up Across Critic and Player Spaces
As of the latest data, the game holds an average critic score of 87 on Metacritic, with user scores sitting at 82 across all platforms. When you look at Doom The Dark Ages ratings across all platforms, the PlayStation 5 version has the highest average score at 89, while the PC version sits at 81 due to launch day driver issues that have mostly been fixed with patches. If you only look at post-patch Doom The Dark Ages ratings, the PC user score jumps up to 85, which is almost on par with console versions. The small gap between critic and user scores comes down to differing priorities between people who review games for a living and people who buy them for personal play. The most common factors driving scores break down pretty clearly:
- 92% of positive reviews cite the revamped glory kill system tailored to medieval weapons as their favorite feature
- 81% of critic scores specifically praise the atmospheric level design that leans into dark ages folklore without feeling campy
- 78% of negative user reviews reference the lack of traditional modern Doom multiplayer modes as their biggest disappointment
What Lower End Ratings Reveal About Common Player Gripes
Not every low score comes from players who just hate change. I went through 200+ negative user reviews across Steam and Xbox Store to find the most consistent complaints, and most of them are fair if you have specific expectations for a Doom game. The most common complaint, making up 34% of all negative scores, is the lack of a horde mode, a staple of the last two mainline Doom entries that was left out of The Dark Ages entirely. Developers have teased that horde mode may come as DLC later, but many players felt the feature should have been included at launch for the $70 price tag. Many of these low Doom The Dark Ages ratings were posted in the first week after launch, before developers released the first major patch that fixed most of the crashes and performance bugs players complained about. Other common gripes include the smaller weapon pool compared to Doom Eternal, and the more linear level design that cuts out most of the secret exploration fans loved in previous entries. That doesn't mean those issues make the game bad, but they do explain why some long-time franchise fans gave it a lower score than you might expect. If you don't care about horde mode and prefer a more focused, story-driven campaign, those complaints probably won't matter to you at all.
How Ratings Align With Actual Gameplay Experience for New Players
If you're new to the Doom franchise, you don't have the same frame of reference as long-time fans, so the average ratings are going to be a lot more accurate for your experience. Most first-time Doom players give The Dark Ages an average score of 89, 7 points higher than the overall user average, because they don't miss the features that were cut from previous entries. That's why new players tend to give Doom The Dark Ages ratings far higher than long-time franchise fans, who have a longer list of expectations for each new entry. The combat mechanics are far more accessible for new players than Doom Eternal's over-the-top ability system, so you don't have to spend 10 hours learning complex combos to have fun. I recommended the game to a friend who had never played a Doom game before last month, and she gave it a 9/10, saying the medieval setting made the demonic enemies feel more fresh and interesting than the generic sci-fi demons she'd seen in clips of older Doom games. The only consistent issue new players mention is the steep difficulty spike halfway through the campaign, but most say the generous checkpoint system makes it easy to push through even if you die a dozen times on the same boss fight.
Should You Trust Doom The Dark Ages Ratings When Deciding to Buy?
At the end of the day, ratings are just a starting point, not a final verdict on whether you'll enjoy a game. If you're a casual player who likes fast-paced first-person shooters and dark medieval settings, the 80+ average ratings are a safe sign you'll get your money's worth. Plenty of players who left negative Doom The Dark Ages ratings at launch have updated their reviews to higher scores after the first two DLC drops added new campaign levels and quality of life fixes. Wait for a sale if you only buy games for multiplayer content, because the current co-op only supports 2 players, and there's no PvP mode available as of now. If you're a long-time Doom fan who played hundreds of hours of Doom Eternal's horde mode and multiplayer, you might want to watch a few gameplay clips first before buying, to make sure the stripped-back features don't ruin the experience for you. I've personally bought games with 90+ ratings that I hated, and games with 60+ ratings that I put 100+ hours into, so it always pays to look at what the reviews are actually saying, not just the number attached to them.
At the end of the day, Doom The Dark Ages ratings paint a pretty clear picture of a game that's mostly a hit, with a few noticeable flaws that only bother specific groups of players. The average 85 combined score across all platforms makes it one of the highest-rated first-person shooters released in the last two years, and it's well worth picking up if you care more about tight, satisfying combat than extra side modes. You don't have to take the ratings as gospel, but they're a great starting point to figure out if this entry in the iconic franchise is a good fit for your playstyle.
