We are moving towards the end of the month and I haven't
done one of these articles for a while. I had to get this one off my mind
though; maybe just to exorcise it. There are quite a few enemies from Doom I
could have chosen: Pain Elementals are a nuisance, Cyber Demons are tough, Lost
Souls always seem to eat your rockets when they are right in front of you. But
this mongrel has been on my mind, gnawing at the edge of my conciousness. The
Arch Vile.
Sure, there are harder things to kill in Doom (well, three
things…). I have discussed this with my friends previously and some of them
just shrugged it off and said "...a couple of double barrel shotgun
shots...".
Yeah, well. They still give me the creeps.
There are only a few creatures that give you that instant
panic, that staccato voice in your head that says "kill it, kill it, kill
it, kill it." Chrysalids from UFO/XCOM come to mind, as well as most of
the special critters in Left 4 Dead (BOOMER!). But the Arch Vile. He sets off
some kind of panic cascade in my head as soon as I hear him. I can remember
loading a Doom .wad file that changed a whole chunk of the Doom sound-scape (I
think it was called “meganutz”). The plasma gun sounded like the plasma weapons
from Terminator 2: Judgement Day, and Arch Viles said “G’day Moiiiit” when they
woke up.
“G’day Moiiiiit.”
Kill it, kill it, kill it, kill it…
Name: Arch Vile
Background: I did some research into the Arch Vile on the
Doom wiki and found some interesting things about them. Conceptually, they have
a dualistic nature. They roast things with sorcerous flames, even other demons,
but when they have killed their prey they go around resurrecting the demons
that got caught up in the collateral damage. When they die, their death sound
is actually a recording of a young girl calling out “WHY?!” (in post-production, the recording was saved
as a sound file on a floppy disk and then dropped into that well from “The Ring”
for a few years). The idea is that the Arch Vile can’t fathom why someone would
kill it, as it only wants to do good for its fellow demon-kind. And it likes
warm hugs.
Weapon of Choice: Golden flames followed by a massive blast
that lifts you off your feet. The shot automatically hits at any range, unless
you break line of sight with the Arch Vile. Good luck if there are two of the
mongrels, and/or no cover. Two hits is usually enough to take you down, though
one will weaken you enough that something else will probably pick you off.
Claim to fame: Arch Viles resurrect weaker demons, which is
a real problem in Doom. I always found the game to be a constantly evolving
algorithm of ammo expenditure, health preservation and expedience. An Arch Vile
messes everything up by making you expend precious ammo on demons you have
already killed. They force you to move for LOS breaking cover or risk a
devastating attack you cannot otherwise dodge. Additionally, you can’t get other demons to
fight them, which is usually a good tactic for saving ammo and distracting big uglies.
You end up using your more powerful weapons to take it down quickly and save
you the trouble, but that leaves you short changed when something truly big
knocks on the door. Seriously, I hate these guys so much.
See you across the table,
M4cr0