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. 

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. 

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. 

thank you. 

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 

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. 

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. 

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. 

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! 

you are so easily amused 

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. 

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. 

...and Kinn. 

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... 

.. you are right ! 

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. 

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. 

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.