by 
Last week, we covered a little bit about the release of DOOM: The Dark Ages - Revelations and how people seemed to be really enjoying it, but we didn't necessarily anticipate that it could be a potential Game of the Year candidate.
However, as you may have seen in our Metacritic roundup of the best first-half games of 2026 yesterday, Xbox was crowned with the best game in the form of Forza Horizon 6. That one has a 90 average rating on the platform, and DOOM: The Dark Ages - Revelations also has a 89-91 rating across both Metacritic and OpenCritic as things stand.
Here are a selection of reviews for the extremely well-received new DOOM expansion:
GameSpew (10/10)
"DOOM: The Dark Ages – Revelations offers a meaty new campaign for you to rip and tear your way through, complete with a new tool – the Chain Spear – which grants you greater mobility than ever before. Ultimately, it's DOOM at its best, making it a must-have."
DayOne (9.5/10)
"The future of id Software and DOOM as a franchise is unknown for now. What I can tell you is that DOOM: The Dark Ages Revelations is my favorite playing shooter, ever."
IGN (9/10)
"The Dark Ages’ action was already among the best in the genre, and this DLC elevates it even further by fusing it with just the right amount of Doom Eternal to make the two feel similar, but still wholly distinct from each other. It’s a steep difficulty curve to climb, but it’s well worth the effort."
Press Start Australia (9/10)
"As someone who’s sunk nearly 200 hours into DOOM Eternal and 50 into The Dark Ages, I can’t get enough of this evolved combat loop in Revelations. It feels like the best of both worlds without barring out fans of either style, complete with challenging content to put your skills to the test. This, alongside the hefty Ripatorium 3.0 update, makes The Dark Ages a DOOM game that I’ll regularly revisit. Revelations is more proof that no one makes first-person shooters like id Software does."
PowerUp! (8.5/10)
"Ultimately, DOOM: The Dark Ages – Revelations is exactly what a great expansion should be. It doesn’t reinvent the foundation established by the base game. Instead, it strengthens it, expands it and quietly fixes one of its biggest shortcomings by restoring the glorious speed that made DOOM Eternal so addictive in the first place."
Now, if you're questioning why Xbox would have a GOTY candidate on its hands when Revelations is only DLC, it's because some awarding bodies actually count expansions as full games.
The Game Awards, for example, says it will consider expansions as part of all of its awards, including GOTY:
"The Game Awards aims to recognize the best creative and technical work each year, irrespective of the format of that content’s release. Expansion packs, new game seasons, DLCs, remakes and remasters are eligible in all categories, if the jury deems the new creative and technical work to be worthy of a nomination. Factors such as the newness of the content and its price/value should be taken into consideration."
For the most part, Xbox will probably struggle to win many Game of the Year awards in 2026 because of the existence of GTA 6, but we anticipate both Forza Horizon 6 and the new DOOM DLC will get their share of awards nonetheless.
That only makes it sadder that DOOM developer id Software was hit with considerable layoffs just last week, with the studio now said to be around the size that it was back in the DOOM 2016 days. They clearly created something really special with Revelations, and here's hoping they get the awards for it come the end of 2026.