Doom 3 Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I, like so many others, was an original Doom 1 & 2 customer back in the "download it from the local BBS" days. I couldn't wait for Doom 3 after learning about it a few months back.

Now that it's been out a few days (I bought it the morning it was released), here's the deal:

1. The engine is incredible. The sound and graphics are top notch, as is the overall environment, physics, etc. These guys at id always show everyone else how games are done. Everyone will now copy them for the next 5 years until id does it again. However, it's far more of a hog than we're being told. This is a game that forces you to buy a new computer (much to the industry's delight), just like all of id's other games (each Quake release forced us to buy new machines). I have a brand new Dell 3.2 GHz machine with a GeForce FX and 7200rpm drives. For Doom 3, I had to kick all the detail and graphics settings down to rock bottom, and also down to 640X480 jsut to keep it from being a slideshow. It's now merely "playable" (still looks great!). As computers and graphics cards get faster, this is really going to be cool, so id was wise to go way over the top detail, performance and feature-wise. Technically speaking, this game will enjoy along life (if other things are fixed - keep reading).

2. Creep factor - not nearly the frightfest we were hyped up on. This is basically you walking around in an "Alien" movie. Not a single goosebump while playing it at work. If I have to play it at night to get goosebumps, then it's not that scary. Fright factor of the old DOS Doom was way more scary than this one. The original Doom game truly SCARED us, and scared us JITTERY. It was mesmerizing and all-encompassing. It was a combination of atmosphere (the levels were downright intimidating and revolutionarily epic) and originality. Doom 3 just feels like you're a pest control guy from Orkin who's wandered into an "Alien" movie.

3. The gameplay is great, but monotonous. Here we are in the 22nd century, and still holding flashlights? Heck, I strap on a little battery-powered head lamp when going out to my wood pile so I can use my hands and have light AT THE SAME TIME. A high-tech space marine doesn't have a combat helmet with a light on it? Or nightvision? I've played this game less than 6 hours and I'm already sick to death of getting killed because I'm holding a flashlight instead of a weapon. This aspect of the game is not only ridiculous and unbelievable, but downright stupid.

4. The monsters are great. Too bad you don't get to appreciate them. They're so fast you never get a good look at them. It's so dark when you drop your flashlight to shoot them that you never get a look at them. You have to kill them so fast that you don't get a good look at them. And when you do kill them, they vaporize, so again, you never get a good look at them. This is a real bummer, because the game is all about the monsters. One of the fun aspects fo the original Doom games, at least when it was "new", was seeing that pile of guts laying there after you rearranged his internals with a rocket.

5. I agree with the "Doomed 3" review - this game is all about finding PDAs to get through doors. Boring, redundant, and gets in the way of playing the game. This is a lame attempt to add storyline and "cerebral content" to a game that, for obvious reasons, needs none. I mean - a revolutionary computer game forcing you to use a simulated PDA to get through a door? It's ridiculous, tedious and interruptive. Give me Quake 2 any day, where every door works so I can go in there and waste monsters. There is such a thing as too much realism, such as flight simulators being so complex that they're no longer fun. Doom 3 gets very close to this problem - not good for any game, especially a shooter.

6. Hallways. As brilliant as the surroundings in this game are, I'm sick to death of hallways. Doom 1 and 2 had wide open areas where you could enjoy really fun long-range shots with rocket launchers and get good views of your enemies before pulling the trigger. You got to see huge hoardes of monsters out in the open and have lots of fun blowing those groups apart with long range rockets, plasma and BFG. Atmosphere is incredibly important, and hallways get boring really really really fast. What's the point of having a rocket launcher in this game when you're always in rooms too small to use it without blowing your own face off? This forces a very boring "pick them off one at a time as they jump you" gameplay scenario.

7. Weapons - fantastic. I love the reloading function. They did a great job on the weapons, and it couldn't be better. Now they need to give us some wide-open spaces with daylight to actually use them to their full potential. One thing I mes sis the bodies flying. When you hit an Imp in Doom1/2, the body went flying as it came apart. I haven't seen that in this game so far, and I really miss it. That was not only realistic, but VERY realistic.

8. Speaking of daylight, we're on MARS, for crying out loud! Let's get out there in the Martian terrain and have some fun! THAT would be atmosphere! Enough with all this crappy "dark hallway" stuff. It's putting me to sleep. Now, I confess I'm not all the way through the game yet, so hopefully the whole game isn't like this. I have faith that it eventually improves.

9. Speaking of darkness and gameplay, the endless darkness everywhere seems rather obvious that it's otherwise a very boring game without the suspense of being in the dark. Not good. This game is all engine and little fun in the sense that the original doom games were. Again, hopefully this improves as you go through the game.

10. This game REQUIRES serious multiplayer network ability, and id really blew it here. After giving us the Quake games, Return to Wolfenstien, etc., there's just no excuse for this limited, wimpy 4-player-only stuff. Shame on you, id. You guys know darned well that this would piss us off. And DOOM 3, of all games. If there was a game that needed to be perfect in network multiplayer capabilities, it's this one. And after games like the Quake series, I can't believe id botched multiplayer up so badly - the one function that makes their games legendary. If it would have taken another year to get Doom 3 out the door with the multiplayer abilities it deserves, we all would have been more than happy to wait for it.

11. This game is REALLY going to shine when the general public starts creating new levels for it. That is, if the guys at id release a level editor (have they?). Also multiplayer networking MUST be brought up to at least Quake 3 capability. This MUST happen, or Doom 3 will be a flash in the pan due to boring environment, lack of industry standard multiplayer networking, monotonously predictable monster attacks and ridiculous darkness darkness darkness.

12. Game's awesome, but only because of it's potential once people start creating custom levels for it and the assumption that multiplayer will be fixed. Doom 3 without multiplayer "warfare" capability just will not do.

I highly recommend the game, it's great. Could be better, but it's still top notch, especially for the single player.

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Product Description:
Doom 3 continues the incredible shooter action of the first two Doom games! The MarsResearch Facility has been invaded by demons from Doom, leaving only chaos and horror intheir wake. You're one of the only survivors - to stay alive you'll have to fight your wayto Hell and back.

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