DOOM: The Dark Ages | Revelations - Melee Weapon Exploration

In the very early days of development on DOOM The Dark Ages Revelations I was tasked to explore some melee weapon options. I tried out several things including a Hammer, Sword, Spear and specialty shield that could transform.

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The first round of 3D blockouts were done to explore how these could look to the player and more importantly how they would affect the screen space. Throughout all of Dark Ages and Revelations productions I worked closely with the design team to make sure we had a good and safe balance of how much space weapons took up on screen. This has been common practice for the franchise all the way back to DOOM (2016).
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After the first round of 3D blockout, the feedback was to replace the shield with the melee weapon which at the time I thought was wild…. But definitely the right call.

The subtle or dramatic iterations are always helpful to also see if we may or may not want to do something.
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Just a note that I didn’t come up with the idea of doing a spear as it was part of the conversation at the time; nor did I tackle the final pass on it, that was done by Ethan Evans! Slayer's Gauntlet, Shotgun and Shield Models taken from engine, all other weapon blackouts modeled by me. Also, before these iterations I had even done some traditional sketches on paper which unfortunately I do not have.

Final Spear Concept By Ethan Evans
https://www.artstation.com/emevans
Shield Model By Felix Leyendecker
https://www.artstation.com/felixleyendecker
Shotgun Model By Jake Hernandez
https://www.artstation.com/jakehdz
Art Direction Emerson Tung
https://www.artstation.com/emersontung