Doom III Expansion

Yeesh Far Cry was one of the biggest dissapointments of last year. And the graphics were less than impressive, they certainly didn't even remotely compare to Doom 3.
 
I REALLY liked far cry, it was a fun game with excellent shooting gameplay, great enemies, great weapons, great level design, looong distances and lots of baddies to kill with nice sniper rifle... And some very pretty graphics. Its engine has some features that are quite useful i.e., draw distance. it can helpe making some cool games. And, like Halo PC, the combat was simply quite fun.

HL2 was trully, trully marvelous and amazing and awesome... No two "levels" have the same gamplay formula... on one you have to run, then light gun fights, then the boat, then the zombies and grav gun, then the buggie and antlions and thumpers, then bigger gun fights, etc. the last level was pure joy to play. It has a subtle plot, but at least I has some reason to keep playing, actually some very good reasons. the ending is kinda confusing, but I can't wait to play hl3. hope it doesn't take too long. I really enjoyed it.

Doom3 is a chore. it's a job. I've stopped after the comm room, I simply have no reason to keep going. lame weapons, worst level design after Oni, and I don't know if the enemies are good, because all rooms are very small and cramped. the baddie-lockers are ridicculous... and even if the flashlight thing is a design decision it kinda fucks up the suspension of disbelief... Reid mentioned WC's artificial gravity... Well, it is far easier to accept crazy future technologies in a sci-fi game then to accept that common daily stuff is absent ina sci-fi game... I'm playing Riddick, and HIS weapons have built in flashlights, just like there are today... anyway, it was a design decision and so I played the game without any flashlight mods. So yeah, d3 is the best darkness simulator ever!

I've read and seen that the Xbox version of doom 3 is not only quite inferior graphically to the pc one, but also it is just the same game, so I have no idea why would someone play it after beating the original... even more if using the gamepad. Well, to each its own.
 
HL2... I've only played the demo, but (when I'm not, you know, broke anymore) I'm hoping to have the full game soon.

DooM3 on the other hand... was exactly what I expected, but might have been more accuraty named DooM3D. No great plot (hey, like DooM1!), Mediocre character interaction. It corrected a lot of the issues from the original DooM, like the entire feel and design of the Mars bases and the whole vertical-scale thing. I spent the entire game wondering if I would have to wait til the next installation to fight the Baron of Hell... and then I found myself looking up, and up, and up... and noting the first actual EXPRESSION on the most anyone's face through the entire game as your security guard nearly wet himself. Speaking of security... you're a guy outfitted to patrol a closed base against human targets with similar equipment, so you can expect well-lit environs and thusly don't have weapons with built-in lights... or a light on your suit, like Master Chief (didn't the rescue force at the end have some kind of light on at the same time their weapons were out, however? Freakin elite forces, taking the illumination budget.) So, the flashlight thing made sense, as did the ten-monsters-or-less-at-a-time because the game mechanics would make suriving a twenty-Imp charge more or less impossible in the closed corridors until you got the bigger weapons. The closed corridors: perfect. You're on a base, exposure to the outside will KILL you, and suddenly the big nasty pink dogs and HellKnights are much, much (did I say MUCH?) scarier. Killing became an art - the shotgun (the spread of which isn't that bad, considering barrell length) is useful within a small range but within that is utterly lethal, the SMG is an excellent weapons for certain situations (spiders!), explosives had this beautiful concussive smack to them, and a single elegantly placed BFG shot can take out two of the mamma spiders at once. It's not about a grand fantasy scifi epic, it's about taking the minor detail that the Hellbeasts are after you and your Earth in a very *personal* matter, and applying proper force to counteract this.

Two last little fun things - yes, the majority of the game was a pattern, but the deviations are what are fun and freaky. The *SPOILER, sorta* spider crawling from behind something I was trying to use*/spoiler* was surprising and unwelcome, because I had just started a reload cycle on my SMG and all the other weapons were empty (big firefight, much splattering). Things like that, and things like little environmental interactions are what made the game really entertaining. Shooting cans. I shoot at cans a lot in real life, so when I found it was possible in game... well, guess what I did. Then I shot a can with the rocket launcher. I'm a bad man.
 
I really looked forward to Doom3's release and bought it immediately after it hit the shelves. I dropped every other game I was playing and went after it like gangbusters. I truly enjoyed it, but can sympathize with what many of you have written.

I thought the story could have been better, though it did take a few twists I didn't expect. Most of the bosses were flat out easy to beat (Sarge- huh, what a punk), and I too found myself getting a bit bogged down in the repetition. I wish there had been more opportunity to fight out in the open on the planet's surface instead of almost always indoors and in close quarters.

I too found the shotgun to be the most useful weapon overall (the combat shotgun from Doom2 would have been nice), but I still liked using the rocket launcher from a distance against say a Revenant, and watching him cartwheel into the air when the blast lifted him off the ground. Commendable improvements over Doom and Doom2 were made to the Plasma Rifle and the BFG for Doom3. I thought going to the Internet and getting the combination for the MartianBuddy locker was a real laugher- I'd never seen that in a game before.

The game's lighting, level layouts, sound, and overall ambience were pretty solid. I played it in the dark with Dolby 5.1 turned up, and I must admit that I actually jumped 3 or 4 times when something truly unexpected happened, a first for me in a video game. Still, as others have noted, the repetition began to get a little tiresome. From that aspect I think the game could have been a little shorter, say 22 levels.

Overall I am glad I played it, but I won't be getting the expansion title(s).
 
I would disagree with some points.. level layout was terrible. just generic random corridors and rooms. I've played for several hours and saw only 2 environments. The level layour didn't add to the gameplay, it was just aesthetical. Doom1 had a lot more variety... I heard that the hell levels are different, oooh, one more kind of room. nice.
 
Now that I think about it, I would kill for a straight-up port of System Shock 2 into the Doom 3 engine. Too bad the license will never be released.
 
That's just wht I thought the fisrt time I played D3!!! The engine is perfect for System Shock Gameplay. just picture the cyber nanny... THAT was scary. The pipe zombies freak me out even now. "Ruuunnnn... HIIIDE!!" and "I'm SOOORYYYY".
one of the 5 best games I've played.
 
Edfilho said:
I would disagree with some points.. level layout was terrible. just generic random corridors and rooms.
I thought the "randomness" of the levels was one of the game's strengths, not something that made the level layout terrible.
I've played for several hours and saw only 2 environments. The level layour didn't add to the gameplay, it was just aesthetical.
Two principal environments (though others are added later in the game) would make sense if you think about it- inside the complex and outside on the surface of the planet. Plus, there are many variations on each mixed in. However, the aesthetic differences are what made each level unique, and since when does that not add to game play?
Doom1 had a lot more variety...
Uh.....no. I loved the original as much as the next guy, but the single player mode had very little variety.
I heard that the hell levels are different, oooh, one more kind of room. nice.
I'd recommend getting a little farther into the game before taking something as gospel that you've only "heard" about but haven't witnessed first hand.
 
Well... I've just gotten the Doom III expansion pak... and all the complaints are valid... but...

I have about 10mins at a time to devote to it and in those doses its perfect for a quick scare before getting back to work :)

Anyone who bought Doom III expecting a deep plot driven experience can only be described as... anyway ;) Its a blast :)
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Edfilho
I would disagree with some points.. level layout was terrible. just generic random corridors and rooms.

I thought the "randomness" of the levels was one of the game's strengths, not something that made the level layout terrible.

The level design (or lack thereof) in D3 is crap for the gameplay. Mindless repetition of the same action was ok for the atari 2600, but even the NES had some variety. take SMB... I mean, you do pretty much exactly the SAME moves in every room. they are too small to allow some maneuvering, there is pretty much little to no cover, you usually can't back into the last room and set a trap, it's just how fast you click your mouse button, there is absolutelly no tactical gameplay... unlike say, far cry, where you could approach a base sneaking through the foliage, climb the tower, kill the guard with the knife and snipe the baddies from up there. or run in the jeep shooting... or sneak around the other side and strike from the back...

In hl2 you had different tactical situations in each part of the game. and several rooms where you had to employ different approaches...

People criticized halo 1 single player because it was repetitive. especially the library level. I personally had a great time, simply because I found the battle parts to be a lot of fun... and the layout, although repetitive, allowed for tactics to be employed.

In d3 you find nothing of those options... all you do is enter a room, walk on until imp appears and then frnatically shoot, because there are no options. the rooms are pretty and full of moving and glowing stuff, but they have no gameplay uses...

You might like that, it is your right. but it is not possible to argue that Doom 3 is any different. they even use some contrived arbitrary stuff like the ridicullous niches where monsters hide. That kind of thing was fun 10 years ago, but it makes no sense today.

And doom1 did have more variety, at least in the visuals and level layout. each level had a different feel.
 
Back
Top