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Doom4
Doom4 has been announced, id are looking for people, if you are that person, and are good at what you do, have a look.

http://www.idsoftware.com/

Doom4, discuss it or not.
Doom4 
I have actually just wet my pants.

I look forward to Doom4, the wait has begun. 
Eh? 
what platform are they making it for? I had a quick look at the jobs page and at least for level designers they were looking for people with DS experience.

Besides, they should be making a new Quake game that follows Quake 1! :) 
 
i think i just came. 
Hopes For Doom 4 
*more enemies active at once
*better, more satisfying weapons
*COOP < most important thing
*larger environments
*more evilness
*more varied environments
*better level design
*no cutscenes
*heavier monsters used early on
*no shitty zombie commandos that can do somersaults and backflip behind cover. I don't mind the mutant ones with whip arms etc. but the regular z-sector ones were so annoying and not fun to fight.
*better AI on the more significant hellspawn creatures.
*mutant owl neck syndrome toned down
*monsters have finishing moves when they kill you, like in the first doom 3 leaked shakycam footage where the hell-knight eats the player's head. That kind of thing.
*the ability to use a flashlight and proper gun at the same time. 
DS Experience. 
than, just to put it simple: a proper action-packed shooter, instead of another futile attempt at cheesy horror where you cant see much. the rest is details

/me cares more about Rage, cause it seems to feature more open and varied gameplay 
 
and it would be interesting to see if the Doom frachise dies with the #4, just like Quake 
That Reminds Me 
* No shit story involving an evil scientist. I can't believe they didn't realise how amazingly cheesy this idea was.
* Don't give it to Raven to develop.
* Properly fucking visceral weapons. Remeber the super shotgun in Doom 2? Fucks sake. Look at the weapons in Half-Life 2. Listen to the sounds they make. Take notes. 
With This 
they might be able to apologize for the crap that was Doom3. Doom3 could have been great, but they made some stupid gameplay decisions. Here's what they should change, imo (many repeats):

-any activity monsters do should be ingame (not a cutscene) and in general this should be kept to a minimum
-AI that isn't shit.
-Similar art style would be OK, but, LESS REPETITIVE, more maps in Hell (come on this is DOOM!), and don't use ridiculously distinct monsters (a commando with a tentacle on his left arm). Infact most Doom3 monsters were shit.
-Level design. To me this was the hugest flaw in Doom3. Some of the maps looked decent some of the time, what you could see of them, but the maps were almost all tiny corridors - no joke, the layouts of these maps could almost all be remade in Doom1, albeit with sector-over-sector (like in Duke3d). What they need, is maps like Q2 Warehouse, but darker, with prowling monsters, forcing the player to behave intelligently and attack stealthily to make it through the environment alive.

-Cut the story. Come up with something vague and spooky, and leave it at that.

Fuck gameplay quirks like NPC's you protect, no duct tape, and so forth.

Coop could be great with large, nonlinear levels. 
Tronyn 
even Doom 1 had warehouses full of prowling monsters :) I think some of the early ep 2 maps had areas where if you fired your gun, loads of monsters woke up and started prowling around. Because the AI was very simple (walk towards player, if hit wall walk along wall for a bit, try and walk towards player...) if you couldn't get to the monsters straight away, they would often end up in very unpredictable places and scare the hell out of you. I didn't notice this at all in Doom 3 - possibly because there was actual pathfinding.

I thought the commando was better than the z-sector marines at least. It did seem a bit distinct perhaps, but at least it looked tougher than the regular zombies and was very aggressive.

The hell-knights, manacubuses, arch-viles and other high end monsters needed a bit more use. There was too much repetition of the trite ambushes and those invisible things. I would have also liked to see more use of the chainsaw wielding zombies. Also, I had no idea until after I had finished the game that the spiders and trites were not the same enemy, and the cherubs were too similar in function to them too. 
Meh. 
Probably agree with everyone.

I liked Doom3, thought it was a good game, had a good time playing it, proper scary in some places. But, it's been done. Don't really think it needs revisiting and it doesn't excite me as much as it could.

Quake V i.e. Quake update would be much more welcome, even if they gheyify it as would be expected. At least it would be a fresh revamp.

Quake 4 did a pretty good job of updating Quake 2... 
 
Doom3 was pretty weak IMO. I didn't even bother trying to finish it.

I hope they step up the design somewhat this time. 
Doom 3 
Had only 2 serious flaws:

1) Monsters spawning behind your back / from a closet got old really fast.
2) They really should've shipped the game with the "ducttape" MOD built-in.

After you install the ducttape mod which solves the problems with infuriating completely pitch black areas of the game, it actually becomes really good. Additionally, Doom3 is really one of those titles that becomes a completely different game once you get a PC capable of running it on high settings. Back when it was released, I had to play it on 800x600 medium quality at low framerate and although I found it interesting, it was nothing too special. When I replayed it in 1600x1200 Ultra Quality though, it was a whole different game: moody, ambient, scary and beautiful. 
Ok Lets Vivisect Doom3 While We`r At It! 
so whats a shooter in its basic?
aim, dodge, explore. manage your resources, use tactics (some shooter have that yeah)

where doom3 fails

aim: cant see shit!
and I mean it, in the time when you neeed it - during the combat. It not just dark. Excessive effects (like a thick chimney smoke) from all the weapons and monster projectiles. Excessive damage feedback - blood splat, view bluring and the ridiculous owl-neck shit (you better set g_kickime 0 to disable it if you want to enjoy the game at all) Combine all theses and you literary dont see where to shoot. jagos` mod wouldnt help much.

dodge: slow speed, low stamina, yeah they wanted horror and what-not, but it feels more like an annoyance. Sometimes you just have to sit and wait for the stamina to refill before engaging into a new area for a fight - no fun.
And lots of bullet-firing monsters which are very hard to dodge (doom3 bullets are _almost_ insta-hit) -no fun either.

explore: exploring the cramped dark claustrophobic levels is not much fun, no matter how detailed they are. An extra room here, a healthpack-reward under the stairs there... thats what doom3 exploration is all about. But lets admit _some_ levels were ok, and offered backtracking and 'secrets'. But time-limits in outdoors? plz ;(

resources: ammo was in abundance, armor? - usless on on the hard level (it only takes like 15% damage? - I never ran lower than 100 armor). Health was fine on hard. But how do you even expect to have a horror game with so much excessive ammo? And the leveldesign is a joke with the armomr/ammo trigerring monster teleports just making you avoid picking the usless items.

tactics hmm, hard one... no particular weapon specifications (no "hard" counters, like they say in RTS, where each weapon is most effective agains different monsters). unpredictable bouncy grenades, sg for close, rl for long, the rest is quite universal.
Monsters have rather distinctive patterns, and are very simple to fight, except the chaingun-guys but they are an annoyance, cause you cant dodge. Lets say human enemies are not very good by design and use in the levels too.

Now come on guys, help me here - did doom3 employ any use of tactics anywhere, cause I cant recall it all. Or was it just "come closer - SSG in your face imp!", "backpedal firing plasma somwhere into the effects-cluttered screen" and "watch your back for the surprise(oh not again!)spawns" 
Am I The Only Person... 
...Who didn't find it that dark? I mean it was definitely dark, but almost never did it matter, as rarely was there a monster in it (when there was, it was a zombie - illuminate them with the flashlight, put your reticle on their head, switch to pistol, click twice, move on). The only times I saw particularly dark areas, they gave you some form of light (a light source to follow, or one of those oddly adorable spider robots).

I am not opposed to being able to have a flashlight and a gun out, I just never found myself wishing I could have both. Probably because I never ever ONCE felt threatened when I was standing still, because danger was only posed by crossing a threshold or picking up armor (I swear, armor must be the secret gateways to Hell).

So yeah, it would need good coop support, interesting ai, interesting enemies, and perhaps level design this time.

than - I liked the Z-Sec, they didn't just charge me... Commandos? A bit boring. Straight line charge, just like a zombie only quicker... I hated the whip though, numerous times I would sprint out of its way, and it would still hit me - and I could see it clipping through brushes to do so.

Unless id has changed their form, a lot, I really don't want them doing a Quake sequel to be honest... 
Excessive Damage Feedback 
Oh fuck yes, how did I manage to forget about this. When I was playing Doom3 for the first time on a slow PC, the shaking screen and the enormous "slash marks" on my screen made me die many many times just because I couldn't aim worth shit with my screen going completely bananas. When I later discovered the console commands for toning that shit down it made the game a lot more enjoyable.

Actually UT3 suffers from the same problem, with default configuration, the damage feedback is way too excessive and when you are playing againt people who aren't completely retarded, you can pretty much give up as soon as someone starts hitting you with the Link Gun altfire, just because your screen will be too fucked up for you to be able to fight back. Thankfully, UT3 also allows near-complete removal of this bullshit via editing of the .ini configuration files.

Whats this stupid trend all about anyway? 
Doom4 Vs Rage 
I assume Rage isn't erased, just that id is doing both games at the same time, which is fine.

I also assume that Doom4 will be more of the same with better graphics, while Rage seems to be a new direction for id (but I don't like the direction.)

For both games, we can expect post-apocalyptic themes with pretty generic, yet super polished, details (pipes, crates, etc.)

If they ever did a proper Quake 1 sequel (Castle Shambler mod for Doom3 came pretty close to what I'd imagine it'd be like) I might get a teensy-bit excited. But right now, there's no reason to be based solely off an announcement. 
 
In my opinion, Doom4 should be exactly 1 level long; a large empty box, with 50 rocket launchers in it, and the Spider Mastermind. 
Yes 
...Who didn't find it that dark? I mean it was definitely dark, but almost never did it matter, as rarely was there a monster in it (when there was, it was a zombie - illuminate them with the flashlight, put your reticle on their head, switch to pistol, click twice, move on). The only times I saw particularly dark areas, they gave you some form of light (a light source to follow, or one of those oddly adorable spider robots).

Thank you, that was exactly what I was about to say. I found that the darkness interfered with the combat a grand total of one time for me - where you meet a revenant at close quarters coming down the stairs in a small dark room. Can't remember which level it was on. The only other times they mixed darkness with combat was, as you say, using slow zombies that gave you ample time to target, switch to gun, then shoot.

That section in Half-Life Episode 1 where you are stuck in a pitch black room waiting for an elevator and there are fast zombies and zombine continually spawning and throwing grenades at you and your fucking flashlight keeps running out was a million times more annoying than any time Doom 3 mixed darkness and combat.

And just before I get lynched for defending it, I just want to make it clear that I agree we don't need that sort of darkness in Doom 4. It's been done.

Everyone else complains about blur and owl-neck damage feedback, and I can sort of see where they're coming from, but at the end of the day the combat was so godpiss easy anyway that I was never bothered by it.

Personally, I'd like to see better weapon feedback (the machinegun and rocket launcher in particular felt really flimsy and fake). I'd like them to ditch the utterly retarded 80s-heavy-metal-tshirt visual design that some of the enemies had (lost souls, revenants etc.) Also, zombies are boring and don't interest me. While they're at it, let's get some variation in the environments, and some nice outdoor areas please, with no stupid oxygen depletion bullshit.

And of course do Hell properly, i.e. don't just do one level consisting of a string of small rooms, each with a lame scripted sequence showing some stones moving around. Hell can look beautiful yet incredibly sorrowful at the same time - just look at any of Beksinski's work.

Please. drop the shitty 13-year-old-Iron-Maiden-fan version of hell with fleshy anus-tubes and goat horns sticking randomly out of brick walls. It's crap. 
Scampie 
Isn't your point of view a little bit simplistic ?
;P 
 
at section in Half-Life Episode 1 where you are stuck in a pitch black room waiting for an elevator and there are fast zombies and zombine


ha. that was incredibly BAD
worst design in any HL and one of worst in any game ever. Cause there is that dumb NPC - alyx - which you need to babysit in that freaking darkness. and she kept on dying

darkness on its own is not the worst thing about d3, its the overall combination of all the effects that obscure your view 
 
Alyx died? She's invulnerable is she not? 
 
I thought that part of episode 1 was fantastic. Probably the most frenetic and suspenseful part of the game, definitely a highlight that I remember. 
Alyx Isn't Invulnerable.. 
she died on me once in city 17. it was game over (as if the player had died). and i agree with zwiffle, i fucking loved that part =) 
View Feedback 
RE: excessive damage feedback.

Whats this stupid trend all about anyway?

Dunno, but on a related note, in addition to yanking your view around with every little movement, I hope they don't get onboard this recent obsession with fucking with your FOV every time you do something other than stand still.

Every time I see a trailer for the latest generic FPS, I see them trying to outdo each other by making your FOV fishbowl all over the place when you run, or shrink when you take damage or shoot your gun. The problem is that when you are moving at a constant speed but your FOV changes, you get this horrible car-sickness inducing "crazy-mirrors" effect where the natural effect of the scenery approaching clashes with the changing FOV and everything goes all sort of wibbly-wobbly. Can't stand it, and it is not realistic in any way, unlike say, viewbob - which I can tolerate. 
I Just Can't Help Getting Excited 
I just can't. Anytime id software announce anything I get giddy like a schoolgirl.

I thought doom 3 was pretty disappointing though. And I don't know how they could go in much of a different direction for this...

I'm not a fan of the demonic style. It worked in the original doom because it was a lot more cartoony, but in a realistic, serious game, no thanks. For me, Lovecraftyness in games = scary, general creepy weirdness a la Silent Hill = scary, demonic goats heads and fire and brimstone = not scary at all.

The atmosphere was great in Doom 3 despite that though, probably because of the lighting.

I'm guessing in Doom 4 they're going to do all the things they couldn't do technically at the time of doom 3, like having more than a few lights, more than a few monsters in a room, proper outdoor areas and all that. Hopefully they'll take it a bit further though. 
Kinn 
...true That 
Also, I just realised this is being developed "in-house". That really surprises me. I wonder for what reason they have decided to dredge up a stale franchise and do it in-house rather than sponge it off to some other developer like they always do with anything that's not their primary project....? 
Re: Id's Version Of Hell 
I agree with starbuck's point.

Cheesy EVIL WITH LAVA AND SKULLS worked fine for the original Doom, and it worked fine in Quake3 (Temple of Retribution, for example). It's only when they tried to put that style in a "realistic" setting, like in Doom3, that it bogged down.

Some of the flesh parts were cool, but Doom3's hell was crap.

I think the whole problem with a hellish environment, is that it can never be as scary as areas with _hints_ of hell. Still, they should have had at least 10 maps in Hell, and just not tried to take it so seriously. Q3 style would have been fine.

It would have been kinda cool if they tried to do something based on Dante. It might be cheesy, but if done right all those tortures WOULD get disturbing. 
You Know 
Maybe that's the hook. Maybe they're getting excited about doing Doom 4 because it's going to be the anti-Doom3 - i.e. it mostly takes place in Hell, and the human environments are secondary this time.

One can only hope. 
Or... 
Doom 4: Hell on Earth 
I Think That Is Right 
Maybe that's the hook. Maybe they're getting excited about doing Doom 4 because it's going to be the anti-Doom3

The Id crew knows that Doom3 was a let down, and it is probably a sore spot for them until a proper version of the game can be done.

Doom 3 has been analyzed to death by all of us but for me it comes down to factors: The first several hours of game play scared the living shit out of me, and after those first few hours, it became too repetitive to thrill. I spent at least the last half of playing it just trying to get though with the game.

I hope they do get rid of most of the story element, but not all of it. Get rid of the cartoon villains that snicker and fold their hands together menacingly. Keep that aspect ambiguous and hallucinogenic, and therefore more real like a really bad day at the office.

The way I would approach story line would be to make it not too relevant to actually solving the game, but at the same time, if the player is the exploring type who has to know and see everything, he can uncover the underlying threads that would remain hidden if he were to take an approach that was more action oriented. Doom meets Lost. 
Kinn 
I vote you to lead Doom 4!

I just checked out that Beksinski guy and his work is amazing. If id made hell look more like that or Giger's Shaft cartoons I would fucking cum. Whatever though, they need more mature art direction this time around.

http://www.gnosis.art.pl/iluminato...

http://www.beksinski.pl/ 
Gimme Gameplay Like BioShock 
That was an immersive game. I dont think the narrative quite worked as well as it could have, but the gameplay was pretty scary. I think it would suit a doom style game. The RPG elements would help add an extra level of sophistication. Stalker is another example. The feeling of having to constantly maximise your resourcefullness adds to the tension.

I would also like Doom 4 to be a little faster. Faster enemies, faster movement for the player please. Just a little faster. 
You People Should Be 
game leads not level designers.
Inspirations:

Doom 4: Hell in Hell

Doom 4: Bad Day at the Office

Doom 4: Hell at the Bottom of an Ocean

Doom 4: Hell in a Temple at the Top of a Mountain

Doom 4: Hell on Venus (as opposed to Phobos, Earth and Maahs (tm) ) Think of city in the clouds... 
 
doom3 was ok. awesome tech, but meh gameplay (for me). what it needs/needed is/was more hell levels!!!

but is id now two teams? what bout rage? and why not a brand new game, instead of a brand new sequel? 
 
The Id crew knows that Doom3 was a let down, and it is probably a sore spot for them until a proper version of the game can be done.
lol what? best-selling game. They are fucking proud of it despite all the shortcomings (and what game doesnt have any?)
And if you watch Tim Willits vid, he even speaks positively about the Team Arena

than: ID has Nunuk. but I reckon he`s on Rage :P hence rage>d4 (stale franchise hahaha)

and bioshock is worse than doom3 (yeah flame on)
and frankly speaking nothing is scary when you have a gun. and quickload

<Friction> "in doom 2 the guy always wears a space helmet even though hes on earth"
"in doom 3 he never wears a space helmet even though hes on mars"
mind: blown

<Friction> Doom IV: Hell in Earth's Sewer System

Corporal Dean Portman: [looks down the sewer hole] I thought "being in the shit" was a figure of speech. (Doom movie) 
 
"bioshock is worse than doom3"

I'm trying to respect your opinions here but you're making it difficult. 
 
I didnt like how it looked, played and felt. wait 'didnt like' is not the right way to say it. I couldnt stand it! And nevermind that its a huge step back from systemshock

god knows I tried to like it. whole 3 times.
I couldnt drag myself past the second chapter (where you start to deal with the wee girls) 
It's OK Speeds 
I can respect your opinion.

I just think that the way that the actuall environment becomes incorporated into the plot is something which a modern shooter like Doom 4 should aspire to.

Like for example the part with the arty fella you have to kill, the one with the theatre. Rather that just being room-corridor -room-corridor, you have to carry out the tasks within the environment, with this guys unpredictable character controlling what happens.

Its pretty immersive.

I've never played System Shock so I cant comment on that :D 
 
"bioshock is worse than doom3"

I'm trying to respect your opinions here but you're making it difficult.


Well from what I've played of Bioshock, I easily prefer it to Doom 3, but they're very different games, so I can understand if you disagree.

Personally I thought the style of Bioshock was very impressive, and very unique. It's just very cool that they'd take the risk to make a game where the setting is Underwater + Art Deco + Future Colony, as opposed to the more safe, more boring route that Doom 3 took, which is Future Base + metal panels and pipes + Cheesy hell stuff. 
 
I can understand someone not liking Bioshock but to say that Doom3 was better ... dude, that's just crazy. 
Willem 
Well, comparing Bioshock and Doom3 doesn't make much sense in the first place as they are rather different games, but I can easily see someone not liking Bioshock all that much, yet enjoying Doom3 a lot. Despite all it's faults and flaws, Doom3 is a very good game. 
I Like 'em Both ! 
 
Sells, Smales 
The Id crew knows that Doom3 was a let down, and it is probably a sore spot for them until a proper version of the game can be done.
lol what? best-selling game. They are fucking proud of it despite all the shortcomings (and what game doesnt have any?)
And if you watch Tim Willits vid, he even speaks positively about the Team Arena


By that reckoning the folks who brought you those deer hunting games in the 90's should be beaming with pride too. Even the creators of Doom 3 have to know the difference between a cultural event that pushes their industry forward (Doom, Quake) versus a so-so game (Quake 2, Doom 3). 
 
"And if you watch Tim Willits vid, he even speaks positively about the Team Arena "

Not to state the obvious, but what did you expect him to do? Run down his own companies products? 
The Guys Who Brought You The Deer Hunter Games Probably Weren't Full 
of themselves 
 
If you have watched those series of Warren Spector interviews with developers, they are all quite open to discussing their old games, admiting the flaws in design process, what they would change etc. Same thing Willits admits TA totally failed having sold like 100 copies, but he still thinks its a good and fun game.

Doom3 enjoyed good sales and good reviews, why would they think its a "so-so game"? Its quite polished - they did it the way they wanted (and didnt it take like 4 years). And they even started to do another horror game codenamed "Darkness" (sounds like a joke doesnt it).
Same for Quake 2 - its been the most successfull of quakes and has more coherent design than quake and q3a. Thats what ID guys including Willits said, not my guess. And he says q1 was a mess design-wise.

Can you find any kind of post-mortem or 'looking back' at doom3 from any of the devs? I cant 
Hah Lun Wins 
you prolly know somehting of IDs opinion on their games that we dont, tell us plz 
RickyT23 
I just think that the way that the actuall environment becomes incorporated into the plot is something which a modern shooter like Doom 4 should aspire to.


but Doom3 had that too

Wasnt it cool, where you see a scientist trapped in a chamber and have a choice of letting him out or activating the chamber to bake him (and if you save him he opens an armory). The monorail, telecom, specimen containment lab etc. Robo-arms, npcs... But all that didnt really change how the game played - and thats what everyone seems to care about most.
Doom3 is shooting in the dark corridoors for everyone. And if the shooting part - core gameplay - is not that fun the rest becomes somewhat less relevant, doesnt it?
Look at FEAR - very bland environments (even for the realistic ones they look dull), cheesy story, same cheap scare tricks. But it got fun combat - and people like the game.

Speaking of Bioshi.. er shock, just consider me allergic to the way it looks and plays ( and why cant we compare it to D3 - its a shooter in the dark. with audiologs :0 And I think doom3 borrowed some elements from systemshock too) 
Will My 8800 Stand Up To Doom 4 / Aliens CM ? 
I fucking hope so!!!

Speeds - Fair point :D 
Speedy 
you're pretty much right. doom3 sold millions, it cannot possibly be improved.

I'd improve it by not mixing survival horror and run-and-gun shooter so poorly. Slowness and darkness aren't appropriate when the monster and level design expect you to be Rambo, and that's where the frustration comes from. 
I Just Want It A Bit Faster 
Just a tiny bit faster with the player movements.

Other than that I enjoyed it (it was a bit predictable, but I think doom is supposed to be!) 
A Bit Unorthodox For The Brand, But This Popped Into My Head Earlier 
Doom IV: The Infernal Heart

After the events on Mars with Dr Betruger, a man any German screener would've not trusted with such high level access, you were granted a return to earth, with a sizable pension and a moderate promotion. You saved their asses, and they wanted to pay you back - while still keeping you under their thumb.

But Hell wasn't closed. The big beasties and bad asses were beaten down, but the vulnerabilities were still there. Somewhere in space, a radio transmission is cut short. Somewhere on earth, a shadow clouds your mind.

With Betruger, Hell learned that even the modern, analytical human mind can still be swayed, even ensnared. It grows ambitious once again, and it reaches out to you. The flashbacks are terrible, especially when you're not sure if they really are flashbacks. People seem different. Company in which you once rested easy, you now unwittingly rest your hand on your sidearm, with a twitch you didn't have before.

Homegrown terrorism, you've read the propaganda, the fliers, but it actually happened. The ammunition depot on the edge of town lit up quite impressively, and all of the evidence points to one of your own men. Dead now, he didn't flee the flames... yet he was always a rather stable one. It didn't make any sense. But part of you can't blame him, part of you wishes you had the idea first... Hell has found a way.

DIV:The Infernal Heart is a first person shooter taking place in a small/medium sized town that shares land with a military base. Acts of terrorism have sprung up within the populace, just a few, but it has sown a deep seed of mistrust and paranoia. People are losing their grip on reality, faster than a community does even under such conditions, and you are starting to see things.

In The Infernal Heart, the player experiences rapid action and suspense, as Hell itself is truly invading, and corporeally manifesting, but for every foot it digs its heels into the town, it digs its claws an inch deeper into your mind. As the marine, you must make the decisions on what is friend and foe, and deal with your potentially worsening sanity while repelling the ever more numerous invaders, as this contemporary rustic place begins to gradually look more and more otherworldly, unrecognizable, fiendish, and designed for the sheer purpose of choking the life out of all it encompasses.

Main Elements - Typical demon killing action, exploring the changing city to protect citizens, and rescue survivors, battling with your own senses as to whether Hell is before you in that Imp, or in your mind, betraying the reality of a lost child to the barrel of your gun - take enough lives, you will eventually lose your own mind, and become yet another pawn to the fiends who strive for darkness.

In short, you have hallucinations, which do not increase generically but do so based partially on your exposure to Hellish elements for too long, and how many non-combatants you have mistakenly killed. All the while you do fight actual demons. Level design is realistic (though gradually more and more abstract) with overall goals in terms of surviving, finding resources, and protecting people (though no escorting, friendly AI could do that). The environment will change as you progress, and thus the element up to the player is maintaining their mind so that they will have their wits about them once within Hell (and not become a threat to the other survivors, who are not having their minds endangered in any exceptional way like you are). 
So How Good Will Doom 4 Be? 
As far as I'm concerned any game's quality can objectively be measured in how (subjectively) good its fanfiction is.
If we look at id's track record with Doom 3; how many good Doom 3 fanfics can you remember? Pretty much none? Yeah! Doom 3 sucked.
I mean, how can Doom 4 hope to compete with such heavy-weights as Team Fortress 2? Just look at this!

(Sorry I'm going to have to split this into two posts due to this board's niggardly character limit!
Also, you have to read this with a thick French accent!)



Bridget Spy's Diary


February 7th
Ha! Ha! Had enough of emotional fuckwittage from Engy and decided to decorate his sentry with finger paints and pretty bows. Later heard him screeching like deranged Fay Wray-like creature while I hid in resupply cackling. HA! Am brilliant and inspired.
Saw friend Gay Medic up on battlements shouting at Sniper for stealing the last Milk Tray. Apparently Gay Medic has new Russian boyfriend by name of Fat Heavy, who is (obviously) huge and therefore fatter than me. This is good, as am collossal blubberwagon of epic proportion even though scales and mirror suggest anorexic Twiggy-like figure (?) Do look smashing in new Hugo Boss pinstripe suit in deep mauve though. Attempted to flaunt said suit to Engy, who ignored me and went on whacking away at his sentry like the oblivious knobbucket he is. Hate Engy. Emotional fuckwittage. Will go have calming fag and then seek counsel With Gay Medic.

1am: Went down to Intel Room for Bloody Mary piss-up w/ Gay Medic and found him shagging soldier on desk. Ugh. Is a slag. Probably doing it with demoman too. Will cross off X-mas card list.


February 8th
Have chucked copy of Pride and Prejudice at Engy's head in furious indignation as found him making kissy faces at sentry, clutching bottle of beer like hideous Nascar-watching lumbering oaf. Sulked in resupply room eating gallons of chocolate and Emmenthal cheese slices, and am now fat and Engy will never love me. Boo hoo. Am getting drunk on Chardonnay with Gay Medic because Gay Medic is only friend and understands my plight, despite being STD-infested slag and possible prostitute.

2am: wus joly gd toneite. engy emotuional fuwkwit and wil never talkj to him agen. woops. fellover.


February 10th
Valentine's is in four days and nobody loves me. Will inevitably end up as hideous crone-like madman living in cardboard box in Paris, weeing into a jug and getting anally violated by desperate businessmen for 5 francs a shag. Have decided to adopt air of aloof, handsome James Bond-esque sex machine and seduce Engy with my sophisticated charms.

3pm: Ha! Is working. Put on best suit and strutted through Intel Room while Engy was camping it out, brandishing sapper as Engy hates it for some reason. I do not understand this, surely Sapper is some sort of machine and therefore related to his area of expertise (?)
Anyway, ignored Engy for good half hour and sat on his dispenser inspecting my gloves and smoking fag, giving him foul looks when he tried to use it. Sod his stupid contraptions and their stupid beepy noises. I may be fat but at least am not cold, unyielding machine of death and unable to love. Figure must be horrible being sentry gun, always having to shoot people all the time with no room for personal reflection. Maybe sentry gun secretely wishes to be ice cream maker, expresso machine etc etc? Feel sympathy for sentry gun as it possible that sentry gun wishes for something it cannot have, much like me. Oh no, have thought of Engy again and now feel horrible. Will go stab some medics to make me feel better. 
(cont'd) 
February 12th
Was just having nice, relaxing evening in resupply when Gay Medic bursts in in floods of tears. Was right about him shagging both Soldier and Demo (ugh, ugh) and now apparently he is overwhelmed by massive surge of suitors wanting to be with him and sending him roses, chocolate, tiffany boxes and the like. Told Gay Medic to fuck right off as was enjoying nice bout of self-loathing about own sexual dysfunction, and didn't want to be interrupted by dirty slags in histrionics boo-hooing about how everyone wants to shag them. Interestingly, before he ran off to presumably hang himself, he told me that Engy wanted to talk to me and that I should ship off down to the Intel room ASAP.
Score! Aloof James Bond-type persona has paid off and now Engy is lusting away for me like the pathetic dog he is. Will laugh at him and pretend to sap his sentry. Ha! Am amazing.


February 13th
Huh. Hung around intel room for entire hour waiting for Engy only for him to march in half-dressed, fresh from shower, and bark at me for skulking around in his hidey-hole. Like he owns the damn place. No mention of previous unsaid engagement so assume Medic was being a cow and taking the piss out of me. Is diseased, lying slag. Was furious at Engy as had spent all morning practising my best pout and sarcastic one liners, so particularly enraged as could not exhibit finely-honed James Bond-esque persona - was worth it for half-naked wetness though. Will probably spend rest of sad, romantically defunct life recanting image in my head. Mmm.

4pm: Went to sulk on battlements after being shouted at by Engy and found Scout snogging Sniper. Ugh. Everyone is getting a shag except me, even Sniper, who I found last week with his nose in a pair of dirty underwear he presumably filched from the laundry room. Now understand why my pants keep going missing. V. disturbing.


February 14th
Ugh. Is Valentine's day and still have not been bent over desk and shagged roughly by Engy. V. disheartening. (Am pathetic and need emotional validation by way of sex.)

11pm: Apparently our shipment of new uniforms was mixed up in transit with a shipment intended for theatre company, halloween shop, creative harem etc as instead of uniforms we now have a selection of dresses. Have been forced into french maid costume by drunken Sniper for impromptu Valentine's costume party - obv. punishment for unkown sin in past life. Note to self: take up yoga for cleansing of past life naughtiness.
Sniper is wearing v. smashing Cinderella ballgown, though. Strategic slip up side of skirt shows off his calves.
Engy refused delightful Southern Belle ensemble to go sulk in Intel room with crate of beer. Typical. Had had better part of bottle of wine myself so was not of entirely perfect composure, so ended up shouting at Engy for being malignant pig-beast and spoiling everyone's fun.
Somehow, in magnificent blur of noise and confusion, ended up on Engy's lap with his hand up my petticoats. Oh-er. Apparently Engy does not think of me as fat incompetent cow at all. Demonstrated this by removing said petticoats - and my underwear - and growling in delicious low bedroom-voice that would cause even the most hardened celibate nuns to throw themselves to the floor and scream "TAKE ME NOW!"

In hindsight, may have demonstrated a little more composure as aloof James Bond-types do not squeak during sex.
....Must invest in more french maid outfits. 
^^ I Didn't Write Any Of That Btw... 
 
^^ I Didn't Read Any Of That Btw. 
 
^^ I Read Part Of That... 
but then decided reading any more was a waste of time. 
What Spede Said 
and

Doom 4 - He... I mean, Terrism! On ear... I mean, in Our Town. Yeah. Terrism in Our Town.

Sounds like a realistic outdoor team shooter.

Or then Alien vs Predator Requiem. 
Also 
id is evil since they edit good maps to spoil gameplay. A songbird told me.

id isn't really the same to me without Romero. I guess it was a good if cacophonic mix of talents that wasn't harmonic nor couldn't last. You move on. I haven't played Doom 3 or Quake 4.

But they did make some awesome stuff during the nineties. Some of it is nostalgia but anyway, there's a lot to say about old stuff that sometimes just works so much better than anything new... 
 
No offense, but if you read that and got "Terrists Did It!" from it, then I suspect you also thought that Half-Life was about teleporters, Blood was about a man and his girlfriend being sacrificed, and Duke Nukem II was about a late night tv interview.

The emphasis is that rather than just generically possessing people into generally useless zombies, Hell influences the dark proclivity in us to sow fear, and paranoia, ripening the population for a very real invasion - which is what the game takes place during, the actual invasion of Hell. Just with the added detail of the fact that your own mind is one of the targets, so it adds another element to be concerned about, not just health and ammo (it reflects health definitely, just in a different aspect, a less numerical form, and one that gradients the good-evil spectrum a bit more). 
Romero 
Lol.

He is (was?) talented, but he also seems to have consistently acted like a retard every time he was given the chance.

Nevertheless, after id lost him and Sandy Peterson, id seemed to have lost something important. Although that also can be traced to the fact that the industry in general was changing at that time - I think there's a huge difference between the current (hollywood) games industry, and the games industry in the 90s. 
I Read The Whole Thing 
loved the ending 
Erm.. 
DooM4: Hell is other people. 
Doom3... 
i've tweak doom3 to pretty much how i'd like it...

increased player speed to default to slightly less than the sprint speed, substantially reduced the damage feedback, i use lightscale 3 making the lights 3 times as bright. this oversaturates some lights, but is a good balance between ugly oversaturated and brightness.

shotgun has no clip, chaingun has no clip, plasma gun's clip increased to 99, machinegun's clip increased to i think 80 or something, pistol fires as fast as you can click it, you can interrupt reloading animations to switch to other weapons. shotgun spread tightened up, but damage reduced. grenades act like hl 1 + 2 grenades; they don't explode in your hands.
probably the only questionable change: plasma gun changed to (almost) hitscan but accuracy degrades after 3 or 4 shots.

imp and hknight now fire standard projectiles, not ballistic but faster moving. wraiths can cloak without having to stop. zsec enemies have substantially reduced hitpoints. zombies die in 2 or 3 pistol shots. monsters will now fight each other regardless of 'rank'

i made all these changes over time... basically, it makes the game very fast paced and, to me, a lot more fun. it's a little unbalanced of course, because i never went through to change the map ammo loadouts, so things like the plasmagun being more effective as well as the shotgun being more versatile make some areas a little easier.
this is basically the kind of stuff i'd prefer to see in a doom4 game. 
Necros 
ooh, is the mod available for download yet? Sounds cool. 
Yeah Give Please! 
 
Necros 
sounds way too easy. needs maps made especially for it, with more enemies but I'd try it - url plz!

I editted the particles to be less dense and dissapear quicker and reduced dmg feedback. I played a bit with pm_walkspeed - setting it to same as sprint is pretty cool. TBH I wouldnt mind even faster movement, but the maps are not meant for it. Faster reloading/bigger clip didnt seem to have much impact, so i left it as it was. Tried some other stuff, dont even remember what... Also some testmaps with varied gameplay, from horde to hl2-ish physic puzzles - but nothing satisfying ;/ 
Btw This Is Ot But Is There Some Ultra-realistic Fps 
where you can sprint only short distances, carrying stuff makes you slow (and you can't carry much), you die of one hit or get seriously hurt, clips run out quickly, pistol shooting is much less accurate than rifle etc etc, reloading takes long, never mind changing your weapons, there are no health boxes, bandaging takes long...
It of course would have to be based on short missions in that way, it'd probably get very boring otherwise. 
Yeah 
Sadly necros, if there's one direction I don't think id will be taking, it's making the player movement and weapons more "arcadey" in their single player games. As environments get more and more detailed, FOV shrinks, movement speed slows; its a trend that I'm reasonably sure they'll be continuing, especially because id are all about fussy, unique, environmental detail.

Have you seen the latest Killzone 2 footage? I think they're currently leading the race with the narrowest tunnel vision FOV, and correspondingly the slowest player speed I've seen in an FPS yet.

Personally, I don't think that's going to be the main problem though. As long as id can come up with interesting level design, and drop all the stupid crap they did like monster closets and obvious spawning of monsters on item pickups and other arbitrary triggers, then that will be an improvement I suppose. 
 
bambuz

Condemned has some of that. Fire arms are hard to come by, mostly melee weapons from what you find in the environment, etc.

I can't think of any game that does all of that stuff though. Mainly because I would never play such an annoying game. :P 
Bambuz 
Hmm, maybe Stalker. It does most, but not all of that realism stuff. It's also pretty damn good.

Some of the military sims would push the realism more, but then you have to play a military sim. 
Stalker 
anyone tried the oblivion lost mod? Apparently it fixes loads of problems and makes the game way more realistic too. It improves enemy ai, makes the game a properly persistant world, adds some of the enemies that the stalker devs disabled in code, adds vehicles, fixes problems with blowouts etc.

I haven't played it yet and only have STALKER on my work pc, so I doubt I will be trying it anytime soon as I'd rather not spend lunch inside during the summer, but there is a page with lots of info here: http://forums.filefront.com/s-t-l-...

Sounds like a fucking cool mod. 
 
They should drop that Hell shit. I'd like to see a more general cross-cultural version of the underworld and the forces of Chaos.

give us werewolves, dragons, goddesses of destruction, bloodsucking seductive spirits. No more goats please.

There is a rich mythology out there. But I guess that won't sell to their target audience. 
So 
A vague depiction of an undefined otherworldly realm of evil not entirely unlike the original Quake then.

I'd probably be alright with that. 
Although 
i can live without those four examples of cheesy fantasy monsters you suggested. 
Bambuz 
Operation Flashpoint, basically. 
Also 
The multiplayer shooter Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45 does some of those, but doesn't venture as far and deep as Operation Flashpoint.

Then there's the spiritual successor to Operation Flashpoint called Armed Assault, but I haven't had the chance to play that yet, so can't comment further.

And of course the weird thing is, they aren't annoying to play, but really fun. 
 
none of them are fantasy monsters. 
Necros 
that's pretty similar to what I was doing with byzantine. changed a lot of those same variables to get the player out of his wheelchair and give him some decently useful guns. 
 
#74 posted by gb:
werewolves, dragons, goddesses of destruction, bloodsucking seductive spirits.


#79 posted by gb:
none of them are fantasy monsters.


Ok, I know I'm going to regret not letting this one slide, but I'm curious to know: How exactly are these not fantasy creatures? 
Kinn 
I guess England has been so densely populated for so long there aren't any of those anymore. How could a chimney or even a bell tower hold a dragon's nest, like they do for storks and owls. No way it could take all the weight. And with all the dimwits scaling the damn mountaintops constantly, there's simply no room left for those magnificient but shy and delicate creatures over there.
Only a massive accident could clear humans from a big area, think a nuclear reactor or some biological warfare lab leak... 
Bambuz 
You make me want to watch a zombie movie for some reason. ~_~ 
Oh, Sorry Guys 
this was just like a collection of modifications i made... not a mod or anything. i'll see about packaging up relevant changes into a pk3 though. if i do that, i should probably actually do some more rigorous testing to balance things out more. 
Doom3 
packaging up relevant changes into a pk3 though

That would be great, for Quake3, a .pk4 might be better for Doom3 :| 
 
Sacrilege I say! Meh, for me Doom 3 is Doom 3. I acknowledge that the movement and weapon mechanics could have been done in a more fun way, but it's the way that I played it and got used to it.

In my D3 project that may or may not see the light of day, there's combat in larger, more open areas, and outdoor scenes where you don't run out of air; but I haven't fiddled with movement or weapon behaviour. 
Kinn 
What's the problem?

They're creatures from mythology, not fantasy. A shambler is a fantasy creature (to my knowledge.) An ogre is a mythological one, afaik. As are werewolves, dragons, "succubi" and gods like Kali, and zombies, changelings, elves, dwarves and walking dead. Corresponding mythologies are Norse, Hindu, Celtic, African/Voodoo, Roman, Greek...

You may dismiss the mythology as primitive or whatever, but they're not cheesy fantasy creatures. People believed in them for ages before fantasy literature was invented.

I could call Satan or Jesus cheesy fantasy creatures just the same, and I would be wrong since they're from mythology, not fantasy. (Personally I find "Hell" more cheesy than some of the other myths.)

I hope you find this response civil and not offending. 
Yeah 
i can totally understand what you're saying kinn :)

that's why i never made this a mod. it was just tweaks to make the game more fun for me.

and i was looking over it last night, playing the game from the beginning, and it's more unbalanced that i realized.

these days, i just fire up doom3, go in the console and run a random id map and go from there. i just start with the default loadout they give you so probably why i never noticed it, but yeah, it's a lot easier if you play from the start. 
 
Ah I see, it's a semantics thing.

I'll leave it there because I don't think it's worth me derailing the thread for this. 
^ That Was A Reply To Gb, Not Necros Btw 
 
Necros 
Cool, all this talk prompted me to fire up Doom 3 this weekend and start playing through it again from the beginning.

To me, the game still oozes class, despite all its shortcomings, which are all really apparent and have already been beaten to death. It seems fairly obvious that the game was designed around the engine, and not vice-versa. What's more, I don't believe that id's designers have any desire to retread Doom3's gameplay in a newer engine.

I think Doom 4 will be built to show off the capabilities of idTech 5, and I'm assuming that means it will be taken far beyond the cramped, dark corridors of the UAC base. 
Doom4 
Will most likely have huuuuuuge areas, since at the very least Quake Wars was able to do it. It'll make those Spider Mastermind battles all the much better. 
Doom: The Movie: The Game 
 
Oh God, Please, No, I Hope Not... 
whatever price they're offering you for your souls, ill double it! 
Hell Yeah 
I'd go see Doom:The Movie:The Game:The movie!

Hope Boll get's to direct it unless some petitions or boxing rounds gets in his way. 
Gb: Thank You 
for the lesson in nit-picking. I'm pretty sure it will come in handy one day ;) 
Kinn, Megaman 
Thanks for not utterly destroying me. I mean I OBVIOUSLY kill the Quake community. Yep, I am the culprit. Kill the messenger.

always a good idea. 
what? 
O_o 
yeah, err...feel my wrath, etc. etc. 
Ok I'll Say It 
Whoever suggested that werewolves etc are not fantasy creatures is a fucking idiot. (I can't remember who it was, and I don't care what the reasoning is - that's clearly a ridiculous thing to say).

I'm sure you'll tell me you're not a fucking idiot, you're actually just a complete tosser, but you know what? The difference might matter to you, but to everyone else it's the same fucking thing. 
As For The Actual Topic 
Doom4?

Request non-shit game please. 
 
Whoever suggested that werewolves etc are not fantasy creatures is a fucking idiot. (I can't remember who it was, and I don't care what the reasoning is - that's clearly a ridiculous thing to say).

I'm sure you'll tell me you're not a fucking idiot, you're actually just a complete tosser, but you know what? The difference might matter to you, but to everyone else it's the same fucking thing.

Doom4?

Request non-shit game please.


That'll do Fribs. That'll do. 
Maybe Whoever It Was... 
...said it because they are a member of a secret society of Warewolves, and got annoyed at once again being tarred with the same brush as all of those fantasy creatures. 
Sheeeesh... 
Damn you, you Lycanthropophobes! 
Awesome. 
this thread just levelled up 
Hehe 
to quote family guy:

"I may be an idiot, but there is one thing i am not, Sir, and that, Sir, is an idiot." 
That Line Pretty Much 
sum up why I dont get family guy, it's just not funny or clever or both :) 
 
Family Guy is hilarious! I think I've seen every episode at least 5 times. 
Do You Remember That Time When... 
blah blah blah

The reason I can repeat watch family guy is because most of the gags have nothing to do with the storyline and so it's difficult to remember which episode particular gags are in. 
It Has An Answer To That 
"some people don't like it, when a show cuts away from the main plot for some joke"

cut to http://youtube.com/watch?v=G4B8WhS... (with less shitty music) 
Hmm 
The reason I can't repeat watch family guy is because most of the gags have nothing to do with the storyline and so it's difficult to remember which episode contains the one genuinely funny gag of that series. 
Family Guy 
Not sure what the big deal is about. I generally don't find it funny, not because the humor is random, but because it's genuinely not funny. I think I chuckle on average 1.5 times per episode, but not out right laugh.

It's like Family Guy is trying to be South Park without the substance. -_-* 
 
The big deal is that it's fucking awesome. 
I Think Family Guy Is Funny 
but after you've seen an episode it gets a bit boring the next time round.

It does make me laugh out loud tho!!

I suppose it's a personal taste thing. Like me for example - I think Jim Carey is really funny and a great (over) actor, but I like ALL of his films, even "The eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" and "23". Some people think he sucks. Which I dont understand..... 
Take This Shit Into The Family Guy Thread 
oh wait... 
Monster Closets Not So Unrealistic After All 
Hmmm 
I dunno whether to be more disturbed that this actually happened or that bambuz posted about it in the Doom4 thread.

Hmmm 
Lol 
I remember a japanese prank show that was particularly fucked up. One of the gags involved setting up a situation where the victim would be alone, working in an empty warehouse at night which had a number of clothes store mannequins. The gag was that one of the "mannequins" was actually a real person in makeup and obviously very skilled in standing motionless for long periods of time. After a build-up period where they rigged up a few minor events to creep out the victim - odd sounds, things repositioning themselves when not being looked at etc., the "mannequin" picked his moment to pounce.

Yeah, the victim's reaction was pretty fucked up to say the least :/ 
 
The Japanese had that show where they locked some guy in an apartment for a year and he had to survive on whatever he could win by entering contests and winning prizes. Truly fucked up - the guy came out of it more than a little screwed up. 
 
I saw a show where some chick had to wrestle an octopus and then the octopus wrestled back and then their aggression turned to passion and it was a good show to watch. 
Them Crazy Japs 
 
Zwiffle, I Have All The Episodes If You Want... 
¬__¬ 
After Doom 3 
does anyone here honestly think D4 is going to be more than a techdemo once again ?!

I remember ID making very bloomy promises before D3 also, and look what we got. 
And Look What We Got. 
best shooter released that year! 
. . . 
Just a shame they stopped putting gameplay in after the first few levels. 
 
does anyone here honestly think D4 is going to be more than a techdemo once again ?!

Haven't heard that one before ¬_¬. Say what you want about Doom 3's gameplay and whatnot, but fuck me, there was a lot of content in that game. Most FPS's released around that time (and since) clock in at half the length, if that.

Quake 3 might be a tech demo, if you want to get cynical. A 20-hour single player game sure as shit isn't. 
Err 
man, i've put a lot of hours into a techdemo :( 
 
"A 20-hour single player game sure as shit isn't."

Yes, but if you've seen all of the gameplay/environment variants in the first hour do the other 19 really matter all that much?

I thought Doom3 was OK but it was hardly what I would show someone as an example of a fun or awesome game. 
 
What annoyed me was that all the best gameplay was in the leaked beta / first couple of maps. Enemies crawling out of ducts, smashing through walls, leaving trails of blood between areas . . .

Then they just ran out of time for design. 
Really 
Where else could they have gone with the design? I think tbh they kind of boxed themselves into a corner design-wise.

Firstly, the FPS-horror genre seems to me to be incredibly stale. What FPS-horror games didn't get boring as wall-paint after the first hour or so? F.E.A.R.? Don't make me laugh, that was boring after 10 minutes. So really based off this design principle, I don't think Doom 3 is all that bad an example of FPS-horror, but it is as an example of FPS. I just think it was limited in part by it's primary theme.

Secondly, it's location was also very limiting. I mean, they probably chose the inside of a base on Mars due to the tech, so that was kind of limiting too. They couldn't have huge open areas with huge amounts of zombies, and let's face it, zombies aren't too scary unless there's just a fuckload of them. Other monsters aren't really scary imo, so they had to resort to the closet-monster tactic to shock the player, which wore off too quickly. Again, compare to FEAR, which totally swallowed balls, and I think Doom 3 beats FEAR again in this category. FEAR had incredibly redundant enemy "design," none of which lent itself well to horror at all.

Thirdly, this is id. They can do games with tension built into them, but to focus on such a narrow concept of horror when they're known for fast combat is a bit of a departure for them. They slowed down the pace of the game, which was just a huge mistake, but again I think it was limited by the environments. Running around super-cramped halls like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Total Recall doesn't seem to fit the horror theme too well.

I just think they did alright with the direction they went with. 
 
Yes, but if you've seen all of the gameplay/environment variants in the first hour do the other 19 really matter all that much?

Yeah Doom 3's gameplay is repetitive. Most FPS games are to be honest, except maybe Half-Life 2 - there's some cool shit you can do in that one. Edgy stuff! 
 
There are ways to keep it interesting. A lot of games do it so there's no reason to cut slack here. 
I Dont Want Driving Sections In My FPS 
thank you. 
Zwiffle 
There's a game called Penumbra: Overture released, er, last year, that should be pretty scary. It's still first person, but there's less shooting involved. 
 
like 100x less shooting 
Lack Of Surprises 
I don't think it was the lack of variety in the combat per se. I think the problem was that the scary ambushes were meant to surprise you, but after a half dozen of them they were repetative, and that meant they failed to be shocks. Because the game was so oriented around that idea, it kept falling short of the expectation it set itself. 
Well 
1. Teleport blob appears
2. Player turns to face it
3. Player loads shotgun
4. Player has a cup of tea
5. Imp appears and player shoots it

6. Repeat until reaching next area

That wasn't everything, but there was a hell of alot of it. When the gameplay did depart - like the tunnel crawling / trites section, it was twitchy and fun.

There just weren't enough different ways of playing. It didn't need vehicle sections, or hacking or drunken idea #57, just some slight deviation from gameplay design so archaic most mappers on this forum would complain and/or dismiss it if done in Quake 1.

I don't buy the argument that they did well within their chosen direction - if the game concept is lacking then you change it.

If you've marginalised the level design team and have a horde of artists and programmers then what you get is a well made game that looks good, but has repetitive, cheesy gameplay. 
Hmm 
In my opionion FEAR is the best example of a horror fps!

Fantastic gameplay, cool visuals (yes the locations were a bit mundane, but when the bullets fly its so pretty) and the horror factor worked a lot better than Doom.

Granted it wasn't THAT scary when it comes down to it, but it got under my skin more than any other fps game I can think of in recent memory. 
Penumbra 
LOL totally forgot about that one, althought I would not classify it as an fps, more a first person puzzle game with fps tones.

Utterly fantstic game, and a fuckton more scary than both doom and fear put together! 
I Envy You DaZ 
you are so easily amused 
Penumbra 
was scarier than doom 3 by a long way. Then again, I only played the demo, so maybe it wasn't so scary after the climax of the demo, which gave me a bloody huge scare even though it was possibly the weakest enemy in the game. Despite kind of crappy art at times, it manages to feel very immersive. The interaction with the environment is handled really nicely, so that might have had something to do with it. 
Well 
An enemy you can't fight, with time pressure applied so you're panicking trying to hide from it, that you can't even LOOK AT without going insane and revealing yourself, which has kind of wierd russian only-so-good art which is eerily more scary than something by a good artist, is gonna be pretty damn scary. 
I Tend To Agree With Zwiffle... 
...and Kinn. 
Doom3. 
I think that what a lot of people are forgetting is that there were definitely cool aspects about the game at the time - monsters, effects, lighting, atmosphere, scariness, some of the style etc etc - which I think made for a pretty cool game at the time, but not one that has lasted the test of time combat-wise. A bit of a one off "initial impact" experience....and I suspect that many people who are now dissing D3 probably enjoyed it then but it's easy to forget about the good qualities when it's not longer a fresh experience... 
Shambler... 
.. you are right ! 
Eh 
I remember it like it was yesterday, because, well... it almost was. WTF, this is practically a new game as far as I'm concerned!

Anyways, you're right to some extent... there are plenty of good qualities there, but the reality is that the gameplay, i.e. the only thing that really matters, was mediocre at best and definitely did not deserve the mighty DOOM name. 
 
"but the reality is that the gameplay, i.e. the only thing that really matters, "

I wish people would stop saying this because you know good and well that you wouldn't play Quake if it was butt ugly. 
Willem 
I wish people would stop saying this because you know good and well that you wouldn't play Quake if it was butt ugly.

I wish people would stop saying that because it's largely irrelevant.

You are perfectly right - there's a certain minimum standard (different for everyone, of course) that a game will need to be at in terms of graphics/sound/etc for people to play it at all. But in order to continue playing (or re-playing) a game, the gameplay has to be pretty solid or you'll pass on it.

Don't get me wrong, Doom 3 is obviously a quality game and I played it through to the end (which in itself is a remarkable thing these days). However, I wanted to see it through to the end despite the gameplay flaws, rather than because it was truly fun. The art and atmosphere (when it wasn't being spoiled by shitty monster-spawning-behind-you tactics) was exceptional and made me want to see more.

Ok, the gameplay was mediocre rather than actively bad for the most part, but the problem is it was Doom motherfucking 3! Expectations for the gameplay were so high because Doom was (and still is) the best single-player FPS of all time, and Doom 3 failed to deliver (falling drastically short of the mark). Simple as that.

p.s. you know full well that Quake is butt-ugly by modern standards, but we continue playing it because the fun factor is high. :D 
 
"p.s. you know full well that Quake is butt-ugly by modern standards, but we continue playing it because the fun factor is high. :D"

For me, that's incorrect. I really like how Quake looks. It exudes a personality that few games are able to match. The graphics are a LARGE part of the Quake experience for me.

And nothing you said refutes what I said. Gameplay is clearly NOT the only thing that matters. 
Well Yes 
I can't refute what I agree with. You're right. Gameplay is not the only thing that matters.

It is however, as I said originally, the only thing that really matters. 
Hello 
*pokes Fribbles with a sharp stick* 
Hehe 
Obviously a rift in our opinions here lads!

I personally think that Doom3 is an excellent game! I quite like the gameplay. The areas which are supposed to be "lame" in gameplay I dont think are too bad. I like the way the player is made to feel restricted in movement, and I like the fact that you cannt have a flashlight and a gun at the same time. It adds to the tension.
I also love the deserted feel to the game. The exploratory bits are cool!

The graphics were mind-blowing at the time!!

I still play it. Nitin has re-played it. Some of us have mapped for it. We argue about it all the time!

Fribbles is allowed to complain about it. Its his job!

Gaming companys: Increase your output! I wouldn't mind paying an extra 10 pounds for a game if there were more games to play and the games were bigger. MORE RELEASES!!! CREATE AN ARMY OF STAFF TO MAKE MORE GAMES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!... 
 
"I can't refute what I agree with. You're right. Gameplay is not the only thing that matters.

It is however, as I said originally, the only thing that really matters."

You're still saying that gameplay is the only thing that matters - you're just doing it with many more words. The meaning is the same. And you're wrong. 
 
Try an experiment - play a game of Quake in "r_drawflat 1" (or whatever that mode was called). Still fun? No? Surprise! 
Errr 
everybody plays mp in as shitty graphics as possible to see better. 
 
I know. The fact that a small niche community downgrades the graphics to mud doesn't mean that the "gameplay is the only thing that really matters" mantra is universally true. 
 
Or, I could counter by saying that when I and my friends play multiplayer games we play in the highest settings our machines can manage. Point negated. 
Well 
in a game, all features count. IMHO visual / ambiance is at least as important as gameplay. In Doom3, I was not deceived at all by the gameplay, as I remind how it was difficult to finish some level in Doom already, having to play in the safest possible way, saving after each kill, each corner.
Doom3 is in the direct Doom style, with more tense, more scariness, more fear... How would you react if you were the player in reality ? Would you jump into the melee or would you try to save your life at any price ? Would you run through corridors, or would you progress slowly in order to avoid bad surprises ?
Well, each player has his own point of view, but definitively for me: Doom3 was a success, and I love this game...

... I want to see Doom4 now !! 
 
i want doom2 again with more grafics!!!

fuck Doom4 :p 
Trinca 
Don't be mean :P 
Hehe Well 
I would have to say that if its done properly, the graphics/sound enters into the gameplay realm to make even mundane activities fun.

Take Stalker for example, a lot of the factory areas were empty of enemies, yet it was fantastic to just walk through them and explore because the atmosphere was so thick, the gameplay was basicly walking along and not fighting at all, but it was just as fun and involving as a shoot-out.

So my opinion is that graphics/sound is very much part of the gameplay and really matters... ;) 
 
the only game that u loved also was Painkiller the only problem that Painkiller have is no, exploracion or puzzle is just kill kill kill :\ but the guns and the monsters are fucking cool!!! 
To Summarize... 
... each player just found what he likes where others just see crapiness... How do you want to please everybody ? It is impossible ! 
The Great 
Shame of Doom3 was that the leaked alpha had more gameplay than the game itself.

Hopefully in Doom4 the design team won't run out of time for level design and just leave it to the artists. 
 
yes, you right JPL i was joking :p 
Actually 
Try an experiment - play a game of Quake in "r_drawflat 1" (or whatever that mode was called). Still fun? No? Surprise!

Yes, absolutely. It should be noted though that I love Quake DM and I play it almost purely for the fun factor rather than anything else.

I probably wouldn't want to play SP with those settings, because I don't find Quake SP anywhere near as fun gameplay wise as DM, so I'd want a little extra incentive ;)

You're still saying that gameplay is the only thing that matters - you're just doing it with many more words. The meaning is the same. And you're wrong.

Look, you understand what I'm saying, you just don't agree with me. I understand what you're saying, and I don't really agree with you. A difference of opinion on an internet forum? Surely not!

We can agree to disagree, but without any offence intended I would say it's fairly ignorant to try to suggest that your opinion is the only one that matters, and that everyone else is just plain wrong. 
Also 
The fact that a small niche community downgrades the graphics to mud doesn't mean that the "gameplay is the only thing that really matters" mantra is universally true.

No, but it certainly is indicative of the fact that for some people, the focus lies much more heavily on gameplay than the graphics.

Or, I could counter by saying that when I and my friends play multiplayer games we play in the highest settings our machines can manage. Point negated.

For you maybe. In multiplayer games I'll always prioritise framerate over visuals because it will allow me to experience more fluid gameplay. I might try the higher settings on the first run, but if the game is worth repeat plays then I'll quite likely turn the settings down for more FPS or (in some cases) better visibility (of other players in a DM situation, for instance). 
Bees 
 
Bees ? 
Where are the bees !!!??? 
Willem 
r_drawflat 1 is not a downgrade. It's a useful feature. Similarly, I don't play chess with pieces painted like characters from the Lion King or The Simpsons. It's too distracting. 
UT3 
When I "play" UT3 I don't even notice the detail. It's all a blur to me anyway. It's too cluttered, there's too much stuff, not very unified. I tend to get the "big picture" but that's about it.

Of course, I don't play UT3, cuz the game sucks, so all I do with it is go around and look at the detail. I basically got it as a benchmark to test my system.

Having said that, yes, ultimately a game boils down to one thing and one thing only: GAME PLAY. Yes, game play. Super detailed ultra advanced graphics are nice, but are not required for a good game. Period. 
Hmm 
Similarly, I don't play chess with pieces painted like characters from the Lion King or The Simpsons.

Personally I play chess with my brain, regardless of which set I use.

Of course, there may be an essential flaw in comparing a fast paced action game where you should people with rockets and rely on reactions to an ancient game of strategy and thought.


Also, I like the attempt to resurrect the UT3 is good/bad debate, but unfortunately When I "play" UT3 I don't even notice the detail. It's all a blur to me anyway. It's too cluttered, there's too much stuff, not very unified. I tend to get the "big picture" but that's about it seems like a complaint that could also be levelled at life. While I agree that the ability to simplify life to make it easier to deal with would be useful, it would somewhat remove the challenge. 
Hmm 
Dammit shoot, not should.

And it was such beautiful flame bait too :( 
 
"Having said that, yes, ultimately a game boils down to one thing and one thing only: GAME PLAY. Yes, game play. Super detailed ultra advanced graphics are nice, but are not required for a good game. Period."

That's naive at best. People won't play an ugly game no matter how many times the gameplay makes them cum. 
 
"r_drawflat 1 is not a downgrade. It's a useful feature."

For debugging maps, yes. For playing the game, no. 
I Play Solitaire 
And Quake. And sometimes I even play HL2DM in those rediculous low-G box maps - the graphics suck for those but the gameplay can be fun!!

Hehe - One of my mates has discovered the emulators you can get for old console games - I've had Wonderboy games on my computer this week. (Meh)

But he likes the gameplay of those old platform games!

Personally I think there has to be a balance. I keep having a go at replaying crysis, lured back in by the pretty graphics, but it never lasts long because of the boring gameplay!

UT3 OTOH is GREAT!!!! Excellent graphics AND gameplay. The engine is so FAST that the eyecandy works for me, because it's no trade-off for gameplay.....

:) 
 
I played QW like this for the longest time. http://img242.imageshack.us/img242... Recently I switched to normal textures just as a matter of taste. I like how eg Warsow looks.

But then the sheer tasteless ugliness of many free open-source games made me not try them once.
There is a different between gfx-wanking and ugly. Quake is not ugly, it has dated looks. Just like old adventures, they look amazing if you are into that kind of graphics. They are not ugly. 
 
i never played QW like this ;) always 24 bits textures! 
Err, Correction 
There is quite something between gfx-wanking and ugly. 
The Wii 
Look at the Wii. Does it sell like hotcakes? Are people buying this system and playing its games? Do those games look like Xbox360 or PS3 quality? But people still play them? Yes? Ok then. 
 
Do they look like crap? No? OK then. 
They Kinda Do Look Like Crap.. 
Mii Avatars are hardly realistic. LEGO StarWars looks prettier than your average Mii!

I have a Wii - all it gets used for is bowling. I do enjoy a spot of bowling from time to time. My girlfreind likes the tennis and some of those other kids games......... (?!) 
 
http://quotes.fov120.com/?show=sin...

Willem you're missing the point. The point is that a LOT of people get Wiis and play them over the Wii's graphically superior counterpart. This indicates that graphics are not the main concern of games.

Having said that, yes, my comment about games boiling down to GAME PLAY is a bit of an oversimplification. But regardless, it's true. That's why they're video GAMES. If people just wanted pretty they would watch Transformers all day. But, since people need interaction and control, game play is what drives (should drive) design in games; graphics should follow design. (I'll admit that style has a lot to do with graphics, but I feel style is more important than having a super-high-poly post-apocalyptic super soldier-mutant guy. Different topic for a different debate.) 
Willem 
hates blind people. Jerk! 
Nonentity 
You barfed this nugget: "there may be an essential flaw in comparing a fast paced action game where you should people with rockets and rely on reactions to an ancient game of strategy and thought."

Where does speed chess come in on your trite dichotomy? And QW? There is no flaw in comparing them. 
Ricky 
Bees
#168 posted by RickyT23 [217.44.37.217] on 2008/07/16 18:02:10

Bees ?
#169 posted by JPL [82.234.167.238] on 2008/07/16 21:29:49
Where are the bees !!!???


is just saying he misses me because I have been on the run this week (the kid is not mine!) and I have had little time for the board. He knows bees and talk of bees is a garanteed way to make my knee jerk. Damn bees. 
There Are Pretty Looking Games With No Depth Of Gameplay 
the same as there are special-effectsy movies with no depth of character.

The fact that there are always more of one than the other is just proof that most people are more than content to "turn their brains off" as I'm always told I'm supposed to do before such movies and let their eyes do the drooling.

That's your problem, Frib. Stop expecting to actually be engaged, because only naive people have standards, and join the staring masses! 
And... 
...more whining too.

My point, BTW, isn't that DOom3 was amazing, nor that the gameplay was that great, just that the overall initial experience of playing was probably a lot better at the time than people, looking in retrospect, give it credit for.

And although I am bit of a graphics / look / atmosphere whore, I do think gameplay, particularly feel, is important. 
This Thread About Doom 4 Is Seriously Lacking In Doom 4 News 
here's a little gem you might have missed (summary courtesy of Shacknews):

Though powered by the same id Tech 5 technology as id's open-world shooter Rage, Doom 4 will be so detailed that it appears to run on "a totally new game engine," according to id co-founder and software engineer John Carmack.

The jump in graphical fidelity comes about as Doom 4 is targeted to run at 30 frames per second, whereas Rage will run at 60 frames per second. Carmack claims this allows id to throw "three times as much horsepower" at Doom 4.

"[Doom 4 is] going to be a 30Hz game," he told Maximum PC. "It's going to look like a totally new game engine on there, even though it's going to be built on the four years of effort that we spent developing this generation of technology."


the article in question is here:

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/f...

Personally i'm more excited about Rage. id shooter + open-world = insta-spunk. If the art design and the atmosphere in the trailers alone isn't enough to make you empty your sack quicker than Father Christmas, then you should check your pulse. 
 
"empty your sack quicker than Father Christmas"

I'm not sure you're entirely familiar with how the male genitalia actually work... 
Rage 
Saw the latest trailer, I did like the look of it. Not sure about racing but the style looked good.

Doom4, 30 FPS, hmmm. I always thought 30 FPS was the bare minimum for SP playability? 
I Get Confused 
with all the talk of "this game will run at 30hz".

From what I can gather, 30hz does not mean 30fps, but something to do with the frequency of updates done by the engine.

For example Carmack said that rage would run at 60hz as you need to extra control responsiveness for the car driving, where as a corridor shooter like doom you can get by with 30hz.

Please correctly if my arse has grown a mouth... 
Lol 
I need less coffee... 
Daz 
except he goes on to say that "this means we can throw 4 times as much detail at it", which suggests FPS. 
Good Point 
I think my brain kinda figured that with less updates per second you could cram more things into the scene before you start noticing the performance hit.

I dunno... NEED TECHIE HELP PLX! =) 
I Think 
with consoles it's extremely important to be above either 30hz or 60hz at all times, as the tvs refresh at 60hz and with 59 and sync you're essentially only seeing 30fps?

so, with a game you aim at either 30 or 60 fps. 
Or... 
fuck the consoles and develop for a proper gaming platform... 
 
LOL 
Hmm 
Proper gaming platform... Nintendo DS? (which can be chipped with a flash card and... kekekeke)


But I'm assuming Carmack is talking about server refresh/tick rates here (the same way D3 was locked at 60hz server refresh rate regardless of frames per second (to avoid the Q3 72/90/125/etc fps/jump speed glitches)), but if that's the case then the designers can put enough detail in for the game to run at only 30 or so FPS and not cause any control responsiveness lag... 
Maybe I'm Misunderstanding It 
but I assume he means Doom 4 will average 30fps on a 360/PS3.

Hello modern PC. Meet Doom 4. 
 
i'm pretty sure i've seen this type of thing before...

was it like project offset or something where they were (are?) planning to make the game run at 10 or 20 fps but use motion blur to hide the jerkiness... the game would only update at that speed too, sort of like how some physics engines run independently of game speed in most modern games.

i'm not sure i really get that, i mean, if you're firing a machine gun, for example, how then do you get the really fast light flicker from your gun if your engine is only refreshing and recalculating 10-20 times in a second. we're basically back at quake, where you fire the nailgun and the light can't flicker on and off because it's firing 10 times a second, and the game defaults to only updating 10 times a second. 
Sounds 
like a really shitty idea.

But muzzleflashes are rendering only, so it's not that difficult to do. 
Doom3 
I have a theory as to why so many people hate the gameplay, apart from some of ID's laziness in implementation (ie monster closets next to items, monsters spawning behind you, monsters behind doors).

You have to take damage in a fight.

That's the way the game is designed, you dont move that fast, some of the monsters move faster than you, where they dont you have restricted movement space.

That aspect seems to be compensated with a generous scattering of health and armour but if you dont like taking damage in a fight, that's hardly a consolation.

Now it could be that the higher difficulty levels have a lot more of the lazy gameplay ideas mentioned above, but ignoring that point, any thoughts? 
Monster Spawnage 
I have a theory as to why so many people hate the gameplay, apart from some of ID's laziness in implementation (ie monster closets next to items, monsters spawning behind you, monsters behind doors).

i think the monster closets triggered on item pickups (and more generally, any monster spawn tied to an obvious, but arbitrary trigger) are naff, because it is far too "mechanical" (i don't really know how else to describe it) - what i mean is that it's something that would only happen in a cheesy game, and doesn't exactly contribute to the immersion that id are trying achieve.

The other points - monsters behind doors, and monsters behind the player aren't too bad - they are the sort of things you would expect if you were a space marine fighting the xenomorphs on LV-426 - (the Alien series clearly being the primary influence with Doom). 
Nitin 
You have to take damage in a fight.

You are exactly right, that really seemed to be their one design focus. This goes back to my core complaint, about player ability versus player character ability. The game puts a slow character in fast situations, so the player himself can't ever really become 'good' at the combat, just lucky. So then designers can't challenge the player at all because the only clear strength he has left is that he can pick up items the designer gives him, so the design goal seemed to shift from 'put the player in danger from which he can survive and escape if he is good' to 'how can we fuck the player over?' 
Monster Spawning 
Spawning powerful enemies close to the player is the cheapest trap possible, and it became boring and repetitive after a couple of maps, there wasn't enough variation.

Being immersed in the game, only to have that immersion disrupted by events 100% out of my control sucked too often (agree with Nitin here). Perhaps the resulting lack of satisfaction/accomplishment is a reason why the gameplay annoyed so many.

The game puts a slow character in fast situations, so the player himself can't ever really become 'good' at the combat, just lucky.

You could always accelerate for a limited time (stamina), which was nice for realism, but being 'good' in D3 isn't just about aim and movement like an old-skool fps; I got owned many times by Imps just because I couldn't see properly and I cannot say that it was always fun, it felt often tedious. 
Lun 
I think you can definitely learn to become better at the game, I certainly did after a few maps, but the improvement plateaus a lot quicker than in other games where you can continuously improve as a player.

That, of course, leaves you with the situation where a bit of luck is definitely needed which does diminish satisfaction/accomplishment but concurrently increases a sense of danger. Perhaps they went too far with this tradeoff?

As for the darkness aspect, I have to say I had no real problems on my screen barring a few instances where it was meant to be pitch black. Most the other times the dark areas were nicely contrasted with well placed lights so you were never 'blind'. 
Yeah 
I never really had trouble seeing, myself. My main gripe was weapons and movement, combined with a lot of similarity in level design and pacing. 
Hm 
i had several areas where it was too dark to fight and still there were enemies. Mostly weak ones, but still, very annoying. 
Megaman 
... and I think this is how to make a frightening game... who knows what will come next entering a dark area... it generates stress and tense, shall I go there, run, risk to die...hmmm ?... On top of this just add good sounds for the ambience, and you're in: this is how DOOM works >D 
Jpl 
you need to provide the player with options then. 
The Only Good Option... 
.. is survive or die :P 
Ok, But 
It's a game.

Presenting the player with near certain death just means they'll quickload until they either stop playing or know all the mechanics inside out.

What I mean is that having a demon rip its way out of a cupboard to attack you is scary. Seeing it happen twenty times from the same cupboard isn't.

Ideally I reckon the idea is to present the player with the illusion of nigh-impossible odds.

In the same way a normal sized sword in a game is going to look like a toothpick - although various games take it too far and have the characters waving motorbike sized weapons around. 
 
i know its about doom4, but i get 404 error when i click "view all threads" to look for the d3 one.

can anyone point me in the right direction for awesome doom3 sp levels and mods? kinda like a lvl for d3 sp maps?

your reward will be a cosmic yay in the form of jesus wishpering to the ears of the universe. 
Here 
65.100.219.191 
you get a 404 on THIS website, when clicking "view all threads?" 
Jah Mon 
yes, i got a 404 error whenever i tried to visits the "view all threads" link on this site. not just recently, but for a long, long time.

i don't know, but sometimes when i was on the mac and came here, it all worked ok! then on the pc it didn't work. then on the mac it didn't work, but on the pc did...

thanks for the link daz. my lazyness stopped me from doing a google search, though i somehow end up with doomwadstation links and i gave up on all life when visiting such website. 
 
It is really saying "404" or are you just saying that and mean "some error"?
I remember some people having a problem with the bigger threads. Their ISP did a time-out on the connection because it took a while to load, maybe it's that? 
It Was Actually... 
the server taking slightly too long to serve the page, and some browsers had a quicker timeout than others.

The browsers give a completely useless "can't connect to server or DNS error" type message, of course.

Anyway, I had fixed that to most people's satisfaction like a year ago, but maybe it's back. I'll test. 
Hmm... 
just tried with internet explorer, which was the problem browser last time, but it works.

Nakasuhito, what browser/platform are you on? And, can you test to see if the page works when you are not logged in? 
Hmm....... 
Split the 'view all threads' page into groups of 25 like thread views are now?

sort by title/date posted/date of last post/name of poster would be handy ... ¬_¬ 
... 
Carmack, who agreed that complaints of the "contrived nature of monsters hiding in closets" and overly dark environments of Doom 3 were "completely valid."

http://www.shacknews.com/featureda... 
Dang 
i would've been pissed if the game i was working on was summarily dismissed because the company owners one day finally figured out it actually sucks.

oh well. :P 
 
Survival horror sells badly? Ok, I'll bear that in mind. As corporate bullshit speak.

contrived nature . . . sounds like a post from func.

When I see the title of this thread I always wonder who posted it.

Let's hope Rage is everything it's cracked up to be. 
Heh 
seems a lot of people forget that Doom 3 was four years ago. Four years is plenty of time for a game development team to shift their design philosophy or publically acknowledge the weaknesses in their previous games. Happens all the time. 
Uuhh 
actually i said that without reading the article. So yeah, it seems they just deciding to can "Darkness" one afternoon. Cool.

i would've been pissed if the game i was working on was summarily dismissed because the company owners one day finally figured out it actually sucks.

Actually, having a game canned because it sucks is a million times better than having your game canned because of other reasons. 
Yeah 
It's often even better than having it not canned despite the general suckiness... -___- 
When 
The suckiness qouta breaches a predetermined threshold that means your team leaders are fucktards. 
Who 
'Announces' a prototype anyway? 
Less 
Coffee needed. 
Doom 4 
http://www.shacknews.com/featureda...

2 day-old news now, but it's essentially confirmation from Carmack, that Doom 4 will not be about darkness, or monster closets, or survival horror; instead the focus will be on blowing away hordes of demons with heavy weapons, and the game will be more about "winning" as opposed to being "frightened". 
MONSTAR WARS! 
I'm smelling a coop game, here. Maybe with one team playing the demonic horde (or doing some "imp-herding"?). 
I Always Wanted A Doom Mod 
where everyone plays imps and stuff except for one dude, who has The Guns.

whoever gets the kill on the dude gets to be the dude with The Guns next. 
That Is Genious 
 
That Is AvP 
multiplayer game mode 
I Know 
dooooooooom

kell you're never around we have so much to discuss you and i 
 
"For me, that's incorrect. I really like how Quake looks. It exudes a personality that few games are able to match. The graphics are a LARGE part of the Quake experience for me.

And nothing you said refutes what I said. Gameplay is clearly NOT the only thing that matters."

I agree with you, quake, while dated, is appealing to look at (in high resolution), it is a pretty interesting visual experience. I'd say it aged much better than quake 2.

Regarding Doom3 I think it suffered from some pretty bad design decisions. It wasn't a worthy successor to the doom\quake formula and it was overall very mediocre.

The doom\quake games had better pacing, level design, monster positioning, ambush sequences etc.

Also, only a small handful of a very small niche of players actually downgrade graphics to shit in multiplayer. I confirm this. For me this is fun-killing, perpetuated by fun hating people. They talk about gameplay, not about fun. Videogames should be a relaxing even if slightly challenging experience, not a sport where you resort to every fun killing measure to win. 
I - Really - Like - Doom 3 - : ) 
I get tired of people bashing it.
I remember when it came out it was MIND - BLOWING.
The visuals were just as Revolutionary as Quake 2 or Quake 1 or Doom over Wolfenstein. Fantastic.

I would make levels for doom 3 but I dont know how. I'm sure however that it would take too long.

:-) 
Yeah 
Doom 3 was class. It just wasn't as classy as HL2, which is why it often received a bashing. I guess Quake had it's Duke3D and Q3A had its UT, so they figured they could do it again but got a little too cocky this time around and lost the popularity contest.

I thought ID managed to get the balance between story and level design just right with D3. These days, most level design sucks because the designers are forced to adhere to a strict beginning, middle and end so they try so hard to shoehorn the rubbish plot devices in that they actually forget to immerse the player in action, whereas Doom 3 was all about the immersion from beginning to end, throwing the odd short cut scene or diary entry in to give it all some context.

I also liked the multiplayer side. It's fairly slow paced but still nicely balanced so you don't get pwnd within five milliseconds of spawning by some bunnyhopping maniac.

In spite of all that, I'm glad they're taking Doom 4 in another direction because I like new stuff. 
Hm 
Doom3 wasn't as bad as many (myself included) make out. I played it again the other day and it has its moments. But asking a hard core community of mappers / modders to put up with lazy design isn't going to get you anywhere.

The story was terrible, for me. I've seen better plotting in an episode of Xena.

Saying that it only got a bad rap because hl2 came out at more or less the same time doesn't cut it either. This is Id software; they invented FPS, they have no excuse for not blowing hl2 out of the water. It's like they couldn't be bothered, because they knew it'd sell anyway. 
"They Invented FPS" 
England invented Football but we didn't even qualify for this years European cup. :(

If you ask me ID are still at the top of their game and doing what they do best, but what they do isn't necessarily what the general public want anymore. HL1 changed the direction of the FPS, and HL2 improved upon that direction. Doom 3 made some halfhearted attempts to live up to new expectations, but obviously HL2 was always going to do that better because Valve have a head start on that front. 
#239 
You mean "UT had it's Q3A", right?? Since you seemed to be talking about major games (former) that had pale imitations (latter)... 
 
http://crackle.com/c/Jace_Hall/Jac...

Jace Hall Show - Doom 4 sneak peak 
 
Doom 3 had a terrible story, that's true, but I didn't think the level design was as terrible as people say, it was just very logical, tight and cramped, and militaristic in the way that Tim Willits has always liked it. I would have preferred a faster paced, hectic, manic crazy out of your mind kind of gaming experience like the first two, but what we got was still very immersive, and some of my favorite parts was listening to the PDA recordings. It also really helped that I used a good CRT to play it on, because I think with LCD you cannot get darkness looking right, and I had turned down the brightness setting all the way. 
Meh 
I guess I was disappointed in Doom 3 because I wanted a sequel to Doom.

...

Disappointed, but in no way surprised. (See Quake "sequels"). 
WTF Shambler 
You are "ranking" UT above Q3A? 
Don't 
get Shambler start on Q3A. 
Started 
yeah 
 
The names of their games only matter so much. Quake II was supposed to be a different game entirely, but for legal and commercial reasons the same name was chosen again. Nonetheless I fear Doom 4 will just be a lot like Doom 3. I don't think they have much creativity at id anymore, what with Tom Hall and Romero and McGee and others long since gone. 
It Will Be A Short Debate. 
UT was the better game, Q3 had the better engine. QED! 
 
I would like to be an art director there and work on my own game for them which would be a revitalization of the Space Harrier / Night Striker genre, but for the Nintendo DS. It would use both screens in simulatenously 2:1 aspect ratio action ( a lot of flying room). I think a modification of the ORCS & ElVES engine would do just fine, and I *would* want it to be sprite-based, because that is more exciting, coming at choo, than is like seeing smoothly-scaled and rotated polygons. 
> UT 
Epic has never managed to rub me the right way (although I haven't played any of their UE3 stuff). 
I Likr Both 
I would probably prefer UT gameplay, if push came to shove though. 
 
And why were the brown inducing commandos from the alpha replaced with crappy z-tek soldiers, basically cloned from any other FPS. 
Fribbles 
is completely spot on regarding the UT vs Q3A debate.

While Q3A engine allowed for better mods and other custom content, if you compare stock game vs stock game, UT beats Q3A hands down. 
UT... 
Had better default maps too, mind you, both games had their fair share of really average maps, but Quake3 just didn't have many good ones at all in my opinion.

Quake3 engine is the best though! 
 
doom3 isn't so bad but IT is flawed. 
 
and I mean "not flawed" not in the sense of "it is not perfect" but "it has some pretty severe flaws, while managing barely to not be 100% shit" 
>>>>>>>>&g... Q3A 
 
Yes 
That was deliberate. To show my contempt. 
UT Was Fun 
but only in the same way that it's fun to dive in to Quake progs and make the rocket launcher fire a gazillion homing missiles every time you fire and change the axe to do 8078798 dmg. It was OTT fun that's best enjoyed at a LAN where you can shake your fist angrily at the guy next to you.

Q3A was a more balanced approach to competitive play and in that regard I think it succeeded. It takes a much better developer to create a considered, if slightly 'minimalistic' game than it does to just shove every single weapon/powerup/level gimmick/graphical feature you possibly can in to one box and hope for the best, which is what Epic did.

The original Q3A levels varied in quality, but most of the lesser ones were improved considerably with Team Arena, I think. 
Wherein Everyone Posts Their Opinions Of Doom3 Again 
 
 
To show my contempt.

your contempt seems more like a pose throughout the years. If you can't be arsed to read some console cmd page and make a proper config: ok, but y the h8 homie ?

if you compare stock game vs stock game, UT beats Q3A hands down.

I completely agree with your argumentation, good points there...

Q3A was a more balanced approach to competitive play and in that regard I think it succeeded.

spot on, just look where the real good players play today, before stating opinions as fact. 
Fuck Q3A Up The Arse. 
It was shit. The feel was shit. The player visibility was shit. The bouncing arcade bollox were shit. Yes I had a proper config, a proper config that allowed me to adequately control it and feel the shitness.

I tried the demo and it was shit. Against my better judgement and in the interest of giving it a fair go and appeasing any people who would accuse my contempt for being a "pose", I bought the full game and it was shit. I gave it away.

UT I kept playing for quite a while. Sure it was a different feel to the classic Quake style of deathmatch but it at least it was a good game in both gameplay and overall. 
What? 
How was the feel shit? If you ask me, one of the things ID have always done better than anybody else is make the player and weapon physics feel weighty, whereas UT has always felt to me like I'm walking on air and shooting feathers rather than bullets.

If I were to level one complaint against Q3A it would be aimed specifically at the aesthetic design. The levels all looked very nice in their respective themes, but that was compromised by the stupid day-glo Nintendo-wannabe powerup art. 
Weapon Damage Feedback 
was pretty shit (cpma fixes this though). 
Was 
The airspeed for me. Very spacey. 
Jeez, Shambler 
What, did you start crying after the bots beat you? 
In UT? 
Nope. 
Wht? 
weapon dmg feedback in stock q3 is great :( esp. with blood 
Yeah! 
So great they had to add a silly little beep sound each time you hit someone! 
HONK HONK 
HONK

HERE COMES THE LIGHTNING TRAIN HOONNNNNNNNNK 
Lunaran For President 
 
Zwiffle For Vice President 
...


=/ 
I DON'T THINK SO, SISTER 
Oh Yeah 
I forgot the damage """feedback"&q... in Q3A was TOTALLY CUNTED UP. Guess I've successfully blocked out of my mind the horror of: Damage feedback where the on-screen intensity of the feedback correlates solely to how much health you have left, not to how much damage you've taken. I.e. if you had 20 health left and took 2 damage, you got MORE damage feedback than in you had 100 health and took 50 damage....despite the latter being far more serious damage and change in your health situation.

Can't believe they did that and can't believe players found it at all acceptable. 
 
the ut weapons were a bunch of arse. that's why i preferred q3a. 
Shambler 
Doom3 did it exactly the same way, including the big red decal right in your face, only with the horrible view kick angles to boot. Honestly, I couldn't really believe you found that at all acceptable.

So is "damage feedback" really why the entire game, engine, and custom map scene of Q3A is completely worthless to you? 
Lun 
more tolerable in sp IMHO. 
Well 
Q3A sucks because the feel is like you're controlling the guy with thin rubber strings. QW in comparison is crisp, solid and smooth. Like you were on the server physically.

Of course most of the Q3A maps are huge open spaces too and the players move pathetically slow. So no movement, just rail aim. The sophisticated ballet that is QW is missing as well.

Haven't played UT.

I have no hope for mainstream FPS games anymore. On the other hand, if you want a business hint as a small developer... 
Hmm 
To start with; I liked both Q3A (after patching/CPM) and UT. I mapped for Q3 because I prefered the engine.

But, Q3 out of the box was a pile of shite. Everyone seems to be forgetting how much has been patched by OSP/CPM (which arose for Q3 rather than UT not due to superior gameplay, but a superior engine for modding).

Q3A was a more balanced approach to competitive play and in that regard I think it succeeded.

Armour that ticks down? No different grades of armour? 125 spawn health?

If I wanted to play a game based around moving as fast as possible and passing certain points at the right time (that'd be running all the armours because of the armour tick down) I'd play a racing game. Q3 is supposed to be a shooter, and frankly UT had way better combat, the dodging/double jumping, while useless for running around the map very fast, made for much more exciting and skillful combat situations.

I play these games to shoot things, not to see how fast I can trick jump around a map. I imagine Shambler does the same, hence the Q3 hatred.

And as for a majority of caffeine wired ADHD kids telling me how an entire genre should work because "that's how pros should/do play", see the critisms of the Painkiller design in the PC games thread... 
Hmm 
Damn, I meant minority, not majority (ofc).

I was so proud I managed to make that post without personally insulting anyone I forgot to proof read it :( 
Meh 
yeah I always thought UT as a boxed product was far superior to Q3A. I'm not talking about which game is more "pro", or what had the best community-made content.

Bit weird to think those games are nearly a decade old now.

Nice thread about Doom 4 btw. 
Eh? 
Are they making Doom4??

Sweet dude! 
Id Or Eye-dee? 
they're too busy making a racing car game. id owe me their souls for that. 
"ihdd" 
one of the guys that used to be at big rooster worked at id a long time ago (like wolf3d ago) and said even back then they'd joke about renaming the company "It isn't fucking I-D-software software"

they probably shouldn't have capitalized both letters. 
Of Course... 
they haven't even been consistent on the capitalization. Seems like they've been ID, Id, and id. 
Actually 
and iD :) 
If They Changed Their Company Logo 
to something, like:

Take the lid off your id, and blow some shit up

There would be no problem. 
 
i always thought it was I.D., until i watched a video with that long haired fabio (todd hollenstead) the other day calling it ihdd. what the fuck is an id anyway.

ok so i just looked it up...

Id, ego, and super-ego are the three parts of the "psychic apparatus" defined in Sigmund Freud's structural model of the psyche; they are the three theoretical constructs in terms of whose activity and interaction mental life is described. According to this model, the uncoordinated instinctual trends are the "id"; the organised realistic part of the psyche is the "ego," and the critical and moralizing function the "super-ego."

more pointless knowledge :) 
You Mean 
Take the lid off your id, and blow up some shid

(all our games cost forty quid)




(check them all out in this brand new vid) 
Oh No He Didn't 
oh yes I did 
Lun's Shameless Bid 
never getting rid
of his life as kid
acting age mid 
OMG - He Said "Quid" 
Do I sound like a flid? 
 
where did lun-aran hid'?
down there in the pit,
wrestling with a brit
who quite looks like a twit 
Shit 
 
OK That's It 
I hereby cancel Doom4 just to get you all to shut the fuck up. 
Zwiffle 
wins trhead

request close plz 
Making Lyrics That Rhymes To A Companies Name Must Be The Nerdiest 
thing evar. 
I Was Just Proud To Use The Word 
FLID, thats F - L - I - D ! !!

Peace. 
No, Don't Close It, 
this is some great stuff; it makes us nerd not dorks, nerd implies some intelligence. 
Errr 
as a prime example:

it makes us nerd not dorks

it makes us dorks, not nerds.

That Canadian beer I drink has finally wrestled the last remaining brain cell in my head down for the count. 
Sure Q3's Art Direction Was Pretty Lame 
but to me unreal and UT always looked about as good as this: http://www.freewebs.com/sharsart/w... 
Replaying Alpha Labs Section 
of Doom 3 last week, I realized I was subcounsiously employing a tactic as I moved through the rooms and corridors. Upon entering an area, I would scan it looking for detailed modeling and keep my back oriented to those models. Monster closets were only made with simple brush work, so it was a safe assumption to
make while playing. Imp sized areas would become pretty much self evident. 
 
I.D. software sounds way better than "eeehddd" 
 
"Game Design is 99% programming and 1% design" - John Carmack

That's why. 
"eeehddd" ? 
it's supposed to rhyme with "rid" not "red" 
And 
"Design is law" - John Romero

id games before romero left: awesome

carmack games without romero: systematic, methodical, repetitive, uninteresting

romero games without carmack: unfinished piles of unchecked ambition

see? it all makes sense 
We Really Need To Get Those Two Back Together... 
 
Okay Here's The Plan 
I'll invite Romero over, saying it'll be a casual get together. You get Carmack over here with the promise an iPhone contract. When they meet up, we'll lock them in a room until they work out their differences or one cannibalizes the other to surive.

Something big is happening here, people. 
Hm 
That sounds very similar to a Strafe Left strip I read a while ago on RPS... 
#310 FTW 
 
#310 
Something big is happening here, people.

and it's happening in my pants 
Kinn 
lay off the vindaloo dude 
Speaking Of Pants 
wasn't this thread about doom4 
 
"Game Design is 99% programming and 1% design" - John Carmack

One of the stupidest quotes I've ever seen attributed to a smart person. Is it legit? 
Apparantly 
Got it from 'On Game Design' by Chris Crawford.

Good read, btw. 
John 'JBJ' Carmack EYHO 
 
99% Tech, 1% Design 
Gets you rubbish like UT or FEAR. Design gets you Quake, BioShock, Fallout 3... etc. 
Well 
In Carmack's case Tech and Design are almost the same. 
 
Design gets you Quake

The whole point of Quake is that they scrapped the original design and just slapped a bunch of random shit together. 
 
Good designers know when what they've got isn't working and take appropriate action.

*ahem* FEAR *ahem* 
¬_¬ 
i'm sure carmack said that in 1992 or whatever, when "design" also meant you had to be an assembly coder or some shit.

this discussion is going nowhere. 
To Be Fair 
There was some sour grapes in the comment.

Doesn't mean it wasn't said, or not easily taken out of context, now.

Assembly coding was maybe five years earlier than that, though. 
Blitz 
yeah, they slapped shit together and it's still fun 12 years later.

meanwhile, they cop a squat and concentrate for three years and squirt out Doom3. 
Actually... 
the was still some assembly code in Quake. Just a couple of functions, though. Which reminds me, i need to get around to removing that... 
Corporate Nonesense 
Forula = money

So why is japan making so much. Alot of the bigshots like to come across as pioneers, but the truth is that if anyone hasn't done it before and made cash, they don't want to know.

The most important thing to have in any concept is 'this game is like game X, but better'. 
Forula = Formula 
 
Please Do Metl 
I can't do a clean rebuild of fitzquake because I can't get the assembly converter build step to function consistently but I can't risk wiping out the .objs :( 
You May Need An Old Copy 
of the ML.exe that came with VC Studio 6. The MASM pack version is likely to still work fine, but if not, I can put it up on line. 
Hmm 
You guys seem to have missed an important point; Zwiffle apparently has access to an early release copy of Fallout 3!

(That or his post was opinion based hyperbole rather than having the slightest grounding in reality) 
 
Fine, if you don't think Fallout3's gameplay looks amazing, then replace with Team Fortress 2. Problem solved. 
Assembly In The Quake Source 
you can safely remove all of it because there are fallback functions. You just need to uncomment them in the appropriate files and remove the asm files. Easy! 
Sleepy: 
right, i think it's everything inside "#ifdef id386" blocks 
 
After playing through Serious Sam II and then coming back to some Doom3 single player levels, I found the walking speed of the player to be excruciatingly slow. ID are morons for making it so slow. I guess it was so they could make smaller levels because it takes so bloody long to walk through them. Cheap copout imo. Anyway, I decided to do a search to find a walk speed hack. There isn't one really, the only way to fix it is type pm_walkspeed "230" (seems to be a good speed) into the console everytime you play, but shit does it make the gameplay more fun! Way more fun! r_lightScale "4" (or 3) is a good one too, to brighten the contrast up.

Hmm guess this is supposed to be about D4. Well, I hope D4 has a much faster walking speed. 
 
After playing through Serious Sam II

After the first two in the series I thought this 'franchise' couldn't get more silly/childish, but this is absolutely unsufferable: the intro, the music, the models, the sounds...hello ? (glad to have picked it up for 5€ in the bargain bin)

ID are morons for making it so slow

I disagree, it's one of the few things that actually enhances the game imo, combined with the limited stamina; monsters are few and generally far between and the game is based more around mood/suspense than on pure action. So if you want to speed around like in Quake...play Quake :)

Anyway, I decided to do a search to find a walk speed hack

u lama xD 
Hehe 
i disagree with you sielwolf :)

i find doom3 infinitely more fun after setting pm_walkspeed to 280.

also, kona: if you extract /def/player.def from the pak file, you can modify the pm_walkspeed (and other settings, of course) in there instead of having to manually change it every time you play.
i also changed 'pm_staminarate' to 200 so you have infinite stamina and then changed 'pm_runspeed' to 80 so that the game behaves as if you have autorun on and shift makes you walk. 
 
oh sweet. although i can't ever imagine a time i'd want to 'walk' haha. i also put the speed up to 4000... that was interesting :D i had to turn it off after a while because it would probably make me sick.

sielwolf: the slow walkspeed definitely makes the game more intense, considering your slower than half the monsters, but i also think its not quite as action/adrenaline pumping. depends what you want out of a game. i want action! :D 
Yeah, I Love Slow Walk Speeds In Games 
It's awesome when monsters are throwing fireballs at me and I know I can't move my bounding box far enough to avoid them to make it even worth bothering to strafe around so I just shoot back and hope I win thinking "boy what a great game" 
 
it'd be like a fps on a console; don't worry about dodging anything, just stand there and fire. 
 
necros i deleted /def/player.def completely out of the pk4, put it in it's own folder with changes, and it still wouldn't work. how did u do it? 
Mm 
you shouldn't have had to delete it from the pak.

as long as it's in /doom3/base/def/player.def, it should override no problem.
the line you want to look at is 780. 
There Is 
an interesting thing about 'g_armorProtection' by default its value == 0.3 (q green armor) i think its more comfortable with 0.6 value (q YA) 
Lun 
isnt that when you press run and direction key (ie a quick dodge of sorts)? 
Yeah 
I would play doom3 for a while and realize my pinky was getting sore from instinctively holding down shift all the time, like maybe if I pressed it hard enough I'd enjoy myself 
F'thagn 
i disagree with you sielwolf :)

what boldness is this ?

like maybe if I pressed it hard enough I'd enjoy myself

press harder and you will enjoy yourself

My point was:

- DooM3: scary game,
default speed = walking = fitting design
stamina = realism = fitting design

- crap like Halo/Red Faction: (where the running speed feels like walking speed - .... 
My Point Is 
turn walking speed up and play one difficulty higher = much more fun 
Lunaran 
I broke my pinky playfighting with a freind.
So I'm totally screwed. Cant even play my guitar properly.

It's driving me insane.

Whaaaa - whaaaaaa !!!! Ooooowww-w (sniff) :O

I would have enjoyed Doom 3 a bit better if they just pumped the walking speed up a *tiny* bit. I've said it before, I'll say it again.

Also I've been playing it with "Dentons Enhanced Doom 3" mod. Which doesn't change that much really. Just a few tweaks here and there. And simnultaneously Dafama2k's parralax mapping mod. Which simulates parralax mapping. Supposedly. The elevators look smart anyway.....

(shields head in anticipation of flogging) 
Parralax 2.0 That Is 
 
The Fuck? 
HEY HEY HEY 
Hey, Your Name Isn't Brushwork Anymore 
does that mean the book is dead? 
 
The book was stillborn, lun.

:( 
ROE 
Just finished this last night and although it sticks to the same rigid system of Doom3 - even simplifying the email trawling for lockers into cut+pasted messages - it felt more fun to play.

Bigger guns, more diverse environments, more fearsome enemies, including the lost zombie commandos, though sadly without their original snfx.

The powerups were a bit at-odds with the nature of the environments - you need souls to power your artefact, which gives you invincibility, frozen time and berserk when fully charged and the levels and filled with corpses, souls ready for extraction. There's also lots of health and ammo, with most of the combat being player at one end of a corridor, enemies at other end - shoot.

I didn't die, playing on veteran, until I reached the final boss.

What I'd like for Doom4:

Roaming levels - doesn't need hubs or anything, just levels that consist of more than a lineal route A to B.

Dump the Email - keep the PDA system there, but the trawling email idea seems to assume that the player will be bored enough of playing to do it. Or be forced to in order to get 20 shotgun shells. The occasional audio log is good to listen to whilst you're playing, but reading email is pretty tedious.

Build on the powerups system.

Bin the 'grabber' - there's no need to include a gravity gun.

Finally, it'd be nice if the player had two hands and is able to hold a pistol in one and torch in the other. Just like Jack Bauer. 
ROE Was Really Good 
The dubble shotgun was relly cool. 
Masterdoom 
MORE DOOM4 NOW NEW GAME WE WONT. 
 
i liked the gravity gun. except that it slowed down gameplay a little. best thing about ROE was the double shotty. 
 
agreed.
still think it was worse than D3 though. 
While The Thread's Up 
post 339 was classic Lunaran sarcasm; I mean I agree with the point (in fact that REALLY frustrated me about Doom3 and I hope they do a lot differently and don't let Carmack's "design decisions" rape their game with Doom4), but even if I didn't that's still the kind of post I enjoy. 
 
Allegedly, this will be the Doom 4 title music: "Humans"

No confirmation from any source but Doom 4's audio director and the composer weren't very pleased about it, apparently. http://twitter.com/#!/Mick_Gordon/...

Thoughts? 
Errata 
The tweets are unrelated. 
MEH. 
Trying to be more indifferent, but I can't. 
Go 
play some more Doom 1 
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