>>11944428
A big part of that misconception is also due to its contemporaries: CoD was gaining traction, Medal of Honor was getting big, and Halo was well established at that point. A shooter where you hold an unrealistic amount of weapons, where you go against an unrealistic enemy cast, and against very unrealistic enemy counts is way closer to the "classic shooter formula".
>>11944476
>I kinda agree with this. Serious Sam is a fun romp, but it's level design is shit.
>I liked painkiller better desu.
I didn't get into the Sam series for awhile because I played Painkiller first and thought it would be the same: That easy-to-do bunnyhop that minimizes stressful encounters makes it the true emphasis of that sloppy "mouse1+s" gameplay. The thing Painkiller had over it was not so much the level progression but the big variety of level themes, something I recall Yahtzee praising it for.