10 Cruel Difficulty Modes You Can't Handle

There’s no series in the history of gaming that’s as fantastically and brilliantly over-the-top than Doom. With its visceral, bloody violence, face-melting soundtrack, and punishing range of difficulty levels, the franchise is one of the most stylish and challenging shooters ever created.

The recent Doom games have continued to build on the series' run-and-gun legacy, adding to both the violence and difficulty. Whereas the original game’s difficulty settings ranged from the easier I’m To Young To Die to the fiendish Nightmare, the 2016 game introduced Ultra-Nightmare, a mode so deviously demonic that none of the developers managed to beat it.

Unlike the already masochistic Nightmare mode where the slightest mistake is severely punished, Ultra-Nightmare only allows players to save after each mission. The mode is so diabolical that the game even asks players to confirm if they’re “willing to put [themselves] through this”.

Ultra-Nightmare returned for Doom Eternal, and it was made tougher than thanks to the faster combat and the addition of torturously tough enemies like the Marauder. In an extra cruel twist, players were locked into this setting, meaning they’d need to start over again as punishment for admitting defeat.

Ultra-Nightmare is not for the faint of heart.