Hey, I loved Doom/Doom 2 back in the day, but haven't played them for years. I'm keen to try Doom 2 again with one of the recent source ports and I'm wondering which one to try. Brutal Doom looks really cool, but I would like to play through Doom 2 without too many changes to the fundamental gameplay.

So, how configurable is Brutal Doom? Is it possible to play Doom 2 with the 3D accelerated graphics, gore, gibs, etc. but without the more significant changes (e.g. new weapons, changed levels/enemy behavior)? If not, which source port would be my best bet?

Btw, I use Linux, so would prefer a port that will run native in Linux.

GZDoom all the way for custom content. It comes with many customization options.

https://zdoom.org/downloads

https://zdoom.org/wiki/Compile_GZDoom_on_Linux

Hey, thanks for your advice. I just installed gzdoom and brutal doom ... fuck, it's amazing! The engine is extremely slick and all the gore and animations are fantastic. And the music ... mmm ... heavy metal music ... (drool)

Brutal Doom has loads of settings options too. This is exactly what I wanted: fairly vanilla Doom 2 but with better graphics and more gore. I love it! :D

I think you misunderstand something here. Brutal Doom is not a source-port at all. It's just yet another one gameplay mod for (G)ZDoom source-port.
And choice of the source-port depends on what WADs you intend to run. (G)ZDoom is good for mods specific for this port family, while it's behavior is inaccurate with levels intended for the vanilla DOOM. And it does not even has complete feature support when you count in (Pr)BOOM family specific WADs.
So, there is no one and universal "best" source-port. Carefully read documentation which comes with your mods/WADs and use the source-port which is recommended there by the author. And you'll be good.

Hi, yes I realize now that Brutal Doom is a mod running on top of gzdoom. I was confused about that before. I realize as well that gzdoom is not totally faithful to the vanilla game, with the mouse look, jumping, etc. It's still really cool though and I think some of the more modern mechanics seem to breathe some new life into the game. It's insane how playable it still is after all these years!

So, which source port would you suggest, to be more faithful to the original vanilla games?

If you seek for a modern source-port with both good vanilla compatibility and hardware accelerated rendering the only possible option is PrBOOM+ (do not mistake with just PrBOOM).
It can render in OpenGL and latest versionseven have mouse look which, unlike in ZDoom derivatives, does not change the gameplay. Also it's a good substitute when your WAD requires: not the latest version of the vanilla engine, 'limit removing' port, BOOM/MBF. It even can playback demos from the different versions of the original game.
The magic is in the command line parameter -complevel. See corresponding tread on Doomworld.
There are other modern ports which give good vanilla compatibility but they are not hardware accelerated: Chocolate DOOM, Crispy DOOM. And their compatibility is limited with DOOM engine v1.9 only. While in the real life you could encounter old WADs intended for at least v1.6, v1.666, v1.7 and v1.8.

Ok, thanks for the detailed advice - I really appreciate it. I might give PrBOOM+ a try as well and see how it compares.