Doom3 [old review found]

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dosraider
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Doom3 [old review found]

Post by dosraider »

Found another review I wrote for that ol'defunct AW site ........

DOOM 3

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Pc : 19.99 $ => 2006 // $ 2004 ??
Mac : 49.99 $ ( DVD )
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Publisher : Activision Publishing Inc.
Developer : id Software Inc.
Platform : Windows, XBox, Linux.
Released : 2004
***********************
Publisher : Aspyr Media
Developer : id software ? Aspyr media ?
Platform : Mac
Released : 2005 ( ? )
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Minimum System Requirements PC
Microsoft® Windows® 2000/XP
Pentium® 4 1.5 GHz or Athlon™ XP 1500+ processor
384MB RAM
8x Speed CD-ROM drive (1200KB/sec sustained transfer rate) and latest drivers
2.2GB of uncompressed free hard disk space (plus 400MB for Windows® swap file)
100% DirectX® 9.0b compatible 16-bit sound card and latest drivers
100% Windows® 2000/XP compatible mouse, keyboard and latest drivers
3D hardware Accelerator Card Required - 100% DirectX® 9.0b compatible 64MB Hardware Accelerated video card and the latest drivers.
Internet ( TCP/IP - broadband connection ) and LAN ( TCP/IP ) play supported
For multiplay on internet patch 1.3 is required.
To play in high resolution a high end PC is required.
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Minimum System requirements MAC
Mac OS X 10.3.6 or later
PowerPC G5 1.5 GHz or faster
384 MB RAM (512 MB recommended)
2.2 GB free disk space
ATI Radeon 8500/nVidia GeForce 3 or better
32 MB of Video Ram (VRAM)
DVD drive required to install and play
To play in high resolutions a high end Mac is required.
==============================

Gate. A gate. In fact The Gate, The Gate to Hell. That's in Doom 3. Again those darn scientists. This time they screw up Mars. You would think : no problemo, far from my bed. Wrong. And wrong again. Once they open The Gate to Hell, now, euuuurh, Hell breaks open you could say. One man is welcoming this event, Betruger, the chief scientist. He lays on the base of this big screwup. Beneath Mars soil there is a discovery, ruins and in them tablets who describe the development of a teleporter by an ancient Martian race. Argh those damned Martians again! Not a random teleporter gate, but a teleporter who was routing through Hell. Soon this ancient race was at war with the creatures from Hell, and were loosing this battle. They decided to sacrifice themselves creating a Soul Cube, containing all the souls, or almost, from them, and so they could defeat the creatures from Hell.
The remaining Martians left plenty warnings not to rebuild this teleporter technology and fled Mars, leaving it inhabited. Till the humans arrived, and those darn scientists, discovering the technology it was only matter of time and they activated the teleporter again, Betruger closes some kind of pact with those demoniac creatures and Mars is invaded. The traitor of his kind, Betruger takes the Soul Cube, the only weapon who can defeat the demons, and hands it over to the Guardian of Hell, an very wicked, enormous demon. The major part of the scientists and safety personnel is killed and changes into zombies. Some survivors hide in corners or ceilings, hunted by the zombies and demons.

Here you are then, marine , assigned to the Mars City security troops for a routine mission. You escape the slaughter, being on mission, sure, what you think, if you were killed there would be no game to play, isn't it ? So you escape, returns to Mars City and gets orders to do this and do that. Go here , go there. As good marine you execute those orders, on your way fighting whole hordes of zombies, zombied and armed security personnel and demon creatures. You mister are an one man army. This one man army is always hungry for goodies, health boosters , weapons and ammo, armor shards and armor vests. AMMO AMMO, djees never enough ammo in this game. And also never enough light. You work on the nerve of Betruger, who finally send you to Hell where you can say hello, how are you today? to this Guardian of Hell and a swarm demons. Yes, join the marines if you want to see something else than your boring everyday neighbourhood.

In a first person shoot'em'up the story is never of great importance , yet it's always agreeably entertaining when the base story is good and well done. Don't expect ingenious or reality schemes. The only storyline here is the chewed Doom story. The cutscenes are short, nicely done and providing, disclosing information, I dislike long ingame cutscenes, if I want to see a movie, I wouldn't play a game.

The story develops itself during the game. You learn bit by bit the whole story and Betruger's betrayal is revealed piece by piece, you will learn about his whole scheme. You will get info from the survivors, from the dead also, via their PDA's who's content will upload on to your PDA. Learn work with your PDA, it's a valuable instrument. Through this PDA you will know the codes to open stores who contains goodies. You will need to use the computers who are omnipresent on the base, not some barely working screens, but well done screens, you would believe they are real working PC's who commands the machinery, neat. Working machinery doing all kind of things machinery does. You will have to activate several of them throughout the game. A real shame you can't see much of it due to the darkness. The maps are really nicely made, huge, lot's of stuff and whatnot.

Enough of the story, let's take a look at the game itself, shall we ?
Graphics are the best you can get now, there isn't better. This means that you will need a good PC and a good videocard. In the system requirements id state that a 64MB card is enough, I don't believe it. Make that a 128Mb card if you want some higher resolutions. Certainly if you allow the nice extra light effects in this game. Also a fast CPU will have his work with this game. If you want fluid gameplay 512MB RAM is really the minimum, better have 1 Gig RAM in your PC. The game comes on 3 CD's, you will need them all on install, to play the first is needed, they use Securom protection.

Brings us to the NPC's, they are good, even in the cutscenes. Those cutscenes are also important, you will constantly learn the what and who through those. You can interact with all the NPC's, sort of anyway, even the zombied ones, meaning interact as killing those zombies. Many survivors will help you on your journey, showing you the way or helping you with info and goodies.

Plenty of weapons in this Doom 3, from the lousy semi-automatic pistol to the OMG I love the chaingun. The shotgun has a low firing rate, but is capable of doing great damage at short range on zombies and demons. The plasmagun is an all-round weapon, usable in most critical situations, will save your ass many times. Of course the BigFuckingGun, sorry, officialy BioForceGun, is present. The weaponry makes a lot of smoke in use, lovely done. Your fists can fell an opponent in one blow if you have the berserker powerup.

The sounds are fulfilling their purpose, conversations are good understandable, SFX are really good. THX for the 'no music', I dislike all those games with a soundtrack, if I want music I am more than capable to choose what I like ( ACDC RULEZ ). The only minus regarding the sound is the lack of background noise, certainly in the cutscenes, I hardly can believe a base as Mars City is so quiet.

Enemies enough in this game, spawning from all sides, hidden behind doors or opening walls. Those walls usualy opens in your back. After the twentiest time they spawn'd in your back, you think : here we go again, turn around , shoot the bastards and for sure some others will spawn, again in your back, big deal. The enemies, even the zombies, aren't the slow kind, they are fast. The zombied security personel is armed and dangerous. Also the zombied marines. They give you a good fight, hiding behind crates or all that can give them cover, they are the quickly kind and deathly. The demons are powerful and ugly, they don't like you being alive, sure thing. As the spawn triggers are hidden lines, no random spawning, they always appear at the same spot when you cross the triggers. Big deal again, that was acceptable in the original Doom back in 1993, but in 2004? Even if the game is a burden on the CPU, it is not acceptable anymore in ower days. Some random spawning is a minimal requirance for a shoot'em'up.

Multiplayer is good if you like the DM concept. The DM maps are varied and well designed, lot's of corners, stairs, dark alcoves and weapons, the BFG is not present if you don't use a mod in multiplayer. Wait a minute, where the fuck is the COOP? Not implemented, that sucks, really sucks, the original Doom aquired the most die hard fans (me included) with his excellent COOP mode. What? This isn't Doom but Doom 3 ? Oh yeah ? Don't call it Doom 3 then, but something completely different, give it a entirely other storyline on another godforsaken planet, then I will not compare it with Doom. id made it a sequel, so I reserve myself the right to compare it with the original.

The good:
An excellent 3D game engine, beautiful light effects.
Good designed maps.
Outstanding artwork and level design ( when you can see it ).
The gameplay of this Doom 3 is good, not excellent.
The graphical engine is the best you can get owerdays.
The lightning and smoke effects are neat.
Machinery serves a purpose, PC screens are working items, adding value at this game.
Cutscenes are short and well done.



The not so good :
In my opinion the designers has too much leaned on the effect of sudenly darkening rooms, lights go out? Forget your flashlight and begin shooting as a madman, surely some demons will appear. Stand with your back in a corner, or you will be assaulted from two sides. This happens the whole game through, the effect after 20 times the same spawning of demons is tiresome. A demon spawning in front of you? Watch your back. It becomes soon predictable, dullness is lurking.

The game is also a bit too dark for me, of course as the teleporter is draining most of the power, there isn't much left for the lights. So everytime demons are going to spawn the lights go off. Yeah yeah, whatever, too dark is too dark. Your flashlight isn't much help as you can't hold a gun and your flashlight at the same time, seems they forgot to ship duktape towards Mars. Personally I would have preferred a better view on the level design and artworks, they are well done. This cheap B-movie darkness effect is after a while galling the gameplay.

Another great lack this Doom 3 has is the mentioned absence of COOP in multiplayer mode. A real shame, even if the game maps aren't really suitable to fight with 6 or more side by side. An implemented COOP mode would been great. Shame, this must be one of the most glaring errors in game developing.

It wasn't a good idea to call this game Doom 3, my expectations were too high, Doom was an unbeatable classic. Doom gave me and still gives me lot's of fun, certainly with the appropriate mods, using the Winports (JDoom) in high resolution with modern keyboardsettings and mouse support, this sequel was better named a whatever game, with an own appropiate storyline, not the chewed over Doom story, they missed the opportunity to make a new game. In fact it's a dispassionately remake, even the demons are recycled. I don't believe this game will last 13 years on my PC as the original Doom. Definitely not with only single player and deathmatch mode.

To conclude :
My personal quote for Doom 3, even if I would like to give it an A+, can only be a B.


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wardrich wrote:The contrasts in personalities will deliver some SERIOUS lulz. I can't wait.
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