Sign in to follow this  
arrr_matey

Doom

Recommended Posts

Does anyone play Doom or Doom 2 anymore? I know everyone's talking about how great Doom 3 is going to be, and I have fond memories of the original Doom, but I tried playing it the other day and it was boring as hell. Same with Quake. It made me wonder why I ever got addicted to it in the first place.

Is this going to happen to Half-Life when Half-Life 2 comes out? Or is it just because Doom had absolutely nothing going for it at the time of its release except its graphics? Doom has no redeeming qualities now that technology has surpassed it. Compare to, say, Monkey Island where the technology is totally dated, but the game is still totally playable.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Adventure games haven't really undergone any major fundamental changes. Today's best adventures, such as The Longest Journey, play pretty much the same as the old-school 2d adventures. The most "evolved" adventure games these days aren't counted as real adventure games by fans of the genre (things like Beyond Good and Evil), so for that classic puzzles-and-story-and-nothing-else feel, the old ones deliver about the same as the new ones. On the other hand, the FPS genre is radically different than it was ten or fifteen years ago. Technological improvements as well as more elements of character and plot have put the genre in a very different place, so older entries feel more dated. Games like Doom and Quake still deserve their place in gaming history for being revolutionary for their day. That they no longer provide quite as satisfying gaming experiences does not diminish that.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

In the UK, a Doom Collector's Edition pack is being released by Activision on July 2 (RRP £9.99). It contains Utlimate Doom, Doom 2, Final Doom and loads of Doom 3 preview material. At that price I will be buying it immediately, before using certain free programs to have these games running on my Pocket PC :D...

I really wish I'd bought these games when they first came out, so I fancy a nice nostalgia trip...

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah, I saw that collector's edition in play.com's coming soon list, I'll propably buy it too.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
...I tried playing it the other day and it was boring as hell. Same with Quake.

WHAT!?!?!?!

Quake isn't boring in the slightest! I always found Quake great fun to play and still do.

My god.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
WHAT!?!?!?!

Quake isn't boring in the slightest! I always found Quake great fun to play and still do.

My god.

Yeah, heathen. It's the fact that you can blow the baddies APART that does it. Load up with quad damage and boom, blast, splatter! So much for all your new-fangled Havok physics, give me Quake and a rocket launcher and some quad damage and watch the body parts FLY! They even bounce.

And Quake multiplayer is still some of the most frenetic action-packed, erm, action, ever. In fact... damn it, I hope I've got my Voodoo 2 drivers installed. :gaming:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Though Q1 singleplayer doesn't really do it for me anymore, I jump at the chance to get in on (and lose at) some Q1 or Q3 multiplayer whenever the opportunity arises (rare these day).

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Though Q1 singleplayer doesn't really do it for me anymore, I jump at the chance to get in on (and lose at) some Q1 or Q3 multiplayer whenever the opportunity arises (rare these day).

Yeah, I guess it's the singleplayer that makes me yawn.

I don't know. Blowing people into pieces *is* pretty fun. It's just that I'd rather play a cutting-edge technology game if I'm going to blow people to pieces, not a ten-year-old game with no story.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Doom deathmatches were so much fun.

Quakeworld did it better, but I have fonder memories of Doom.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Back when Doom was new, I didn't enjoy it because of the graphics necessarily. It was just the fact that it was sort of 3d, and I could roam around more freely and examine things closely. There were tons of secret rooms you could find, something I'd previously not experienced.

Plus, I was about 12 so blowing things up was a satisfactory storyline for me at the time.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I yes goddamn sir do play Doom, I also make maps for both sometimes, right now I have an AGS themed "mod" in progress... slow, as another game has been stealing all my attention lately, the much I have used a computer.

But, Doom is a classic. (I have a 266 MHz 96MB Ram 2MB video card laptop, so...) I wish they'd make a game like Doom2 in the Ultimate Doom spirit... several several dozen level episodes with sprite graphics and heavy midi music.... *D

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I still find Quake to be a good play, the weapons are great, probably the best in any FPS. The nail gun was superb!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I played through Doom 2 a couple of weeks ago, so that it will still be fresh in my noggin when 3 is here. now. here. soon. here.

..................................second story.............

The essence of fear is no..................buildings.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Doom had its moment, definitely, and obviously would have nothing on, say, Half-Life if released alongside that. The genre has just become better in quality it would seem. From Quake onwards there's been a steady improvement in the richness of these games - looking up and down! more interesting 'puzzles'! more story-driven gameplay! Unlike adventure games, where the game's way of conveying a story actually hasn't changed much in 10 years, FPSs have moved on a lot. The whole point of these games is shooting enemies and reaching the end of a level, and technology has allowed for far more interesting ways of doing this over time.

So logically, who would play Doom when they could play a modern FPS that has so much more going for it? Well, lots of people, but I couldn't say why. I think there's just times when you just feel like loading up Doom and blasting your way through a bit of 'Knee-Deep In The Dead', I have on occasion. I'm sure it's more than a nostalgia trip, there's something about the simplicity of it that appeals.

It's like the best dumb action movie ever, it can still be really likeable, but its qualitatively still not as good as a more developed action movie.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

We should all play doom multiplayer just before doom 3 comes out. Then we could do doom -> doom 2 -> doom 3.

That would be totally sweet.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

FPS have moved on alot?

It doesn't have a story because iD are now, and afaik have always been utterly terrible at anything other than writing very good engines, and playing lots of multiplayer so that's usually balanced reasonably well (apart from Quake 2, ok..) iD games have always suffered from bog standard crate/barrel/corridor crappy level design, imagination-less monsters "ooh zombies! with shotguns! wow!" and a complete lack of anything approaching a story.

DOOM3 will be good because it's a pretty proof-of-concept for the nextgen of gaming. It looks better than anything else out there, and they're going to try and scare you lots. these are good things. I predict my own personal ph34r level will diminish considerably once asked to get a red keycard however.

The FPS hasn't really changed much since half life. The in-game scripted events and sense of immersion the player felt were revolutionary. Nothing since then has had the same impact imho.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

You're absolutely right, Bob. I think id Software never tried (or cared for?) becoming a game developer with a current-day approach. I think they're sort of trying it with Doom 3, by actually hiring a writer, making some concept art and really creating a world, but I'm still skeptical.

Somehow I think they're not going to really pull off the "fully immersive game world experience with an actual level progression and a good story" school of design that 95% of the other developers switched to long ago. id just doesn't have much experience in that, and lacks a strong art/conceptual division within the company to really pull that off at a satifying level of quality. (I might be proved wrong, of course.)

Doom 3's story might be good, but it takes a great sense of irony to make it a genuinely good experience. I mean... just look at those monsters ¬¬ As you can tell I'm really skeptical of Doom 3. I secretly hope that Half-Life 2 will actually be vastly more engaging thanks to its consistent art style and focus on characters, and Doom 3 to turn out to be a sort of "movie of week" equivalent of gaming except with the special effects of a major blockbuster.

I don't mean to disrespect id ... I was scared shitless by Doom 1 just like anyone else. But I think other studios are being much smarter about where to push games next.

I'm rambling.

P.S. I want Thief 4 with Doom 3 shadows technology.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
In Ultra quality, we load each texture; diffuse, specular, normal map at full resolution with no compression. In a typical DOOM 3 level, this can hover around a whopping 500MB of texture data. This will run on current hardware but obviously we cannot fit 500MB of texture data onto a 256MB card and the amount of texture data referenced in a give scene per frame ( 60 times a second ) can easily be 50MB+. This can cause some choppiness as a lot of memory bandwidth is being consumed. It does however look fantastic :-) and it is certainly playable on high end systems but due to the hitching that can occur we chose to require a 512MB Video card before setting this automatically.

http://www.shacknews.com/finger/[email protected]

So it seems I'll be playing this game in max detail in 3-5 years from now.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
FPS have moved on alot?

It doesn't have a story because iD are now, and afaik have always been utterly terrible at anything other than writing very good engines, and playing lots of multiplayer so that's usually balanced reasonably well (apart from Quake 2, ok..) iD games have always suffered from bog standard crate/barrel/corridor crappy level design, imagination-less monsters "ooh zombies! with shotguns! wow!" and a complete lack of anything approaching a story.

Perhaps I should point out that "bog standard crate/barrel/corridor crappy level design" didn't exist until id came along and invented it

Also, Quake 2 MP is perfectly balanced (try playing it again sometime). What hurt multiplayer was poor networking code (compared to quakeworld). Conversely, Quakeworld is not balanced at all, it's a rocket launcher game (and a damn good one at that).

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Does anyone play Doom or Doom 2 anymore? I know everyone's talking about how great Doom 3 is going to be, and I have fond memories of the original Doom, but I tried playing it the other day and it was boring as hell. Same with Quake. It made me wonder why I ever got addicted to it in the first place.

Is this going to happen to Half-Life when Half-Life 2 comes out? Or is it just because Doom had absolutely nothing going for it at the time of its release except its graphics? Doom has no redeeming qualities now that technology has surpassed it. Compare to, say, Monkey Island where the technology is totally dated, but the game is still totally playable.

Actually a friend and I had a nice competition about who could pass DOOM the fastest beginning to end.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
... and heavy midi music.... *D

Yes dammit, the Doom music was excellent! I can still remember and happily hum several of the level themes, which is more than I can say for, oh, any other FPS I've ever played. Hence for me, the original Doom music has not yet been beaten in any FPS since, which makes the game still rock today, regardless of whether or not the rest of it holds up or not. Unfortunately, I never had my own copy, it was my dad's, who deliberataly died at the beginning of every level on Ultra-Violence difficulty, just so he could play through the level starting out with just a pistol. Still, he's getting too intolerant and long in the tooth for FPS games now, so maybe I'll go and 'borrow' some of those old classics ;)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Is this going to happen to Half-Life when Half-Life 2 comes out?

As an aside, there are fairly substantial rumours that Half Life 2 will include, as an extra, the whole of Half Life (1), converted to the Source engine. Even if the main game sucks total balls, this is reason enough to buy it. :gaming:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
Sign in to follow this