Damn hippies... 

I posted this in General Abuse but since this thread is about graphical advances - well this video sure features some very impressive graphical and lighting advances as well as some amazing enemy models.

It can be grabbed here: http://www.edgefiles.com/file.x?id=/games-fusion.net/www/videos/unreal3engine_e3.zip

A search for the Unreal3 Engine Demo should turn up alternative download choices as well as smaller file sizes with the same content.

As far as gameplay alone goes - seeing this demo reveals nothing new that hasn't been done with less impressive game engines. I suppose that highly detailed environments with subtle colour variations and dim dynamic lighting could camouflage enemies pretty well. You are admiring some sweet scenery and suddenly your head gets bit off by something hiding right next to you. Enemy camouflage could really add tension and deviate from the more typical head-on attack and cover style of current enemies. Such a tactic would benefit from the new generation of game engines since it's harder to hide in an older game engine. 

Such a tactic would benefit from the new generation of game engines since it's harder to hide in an older game engine.

Apart from the invisible pinkies in Doom =)

But I see what you mean, enemy camoflauge as a function of the enviroment rather than a function of a particular enemy. 

but I'm surprised no one has mentioned better world physics, as in HalfLife 2. Being able to collapse or knock large objects into a squad of baddies, pick up found objects for use as protection or weaponry, or create barriers to block off a particularly enemy-crowded areas if I'm low on health puts a new dimension on play tactics.

Also, I do remember a few years ago there was some hype about games featuring deformable terrain, but I guess it died out dead because I've not heard anything more of it since.

Anyway, I would be pleasantly surprised if I found myself playing a game that allowed significant interactivity with the environment. The ideal would be, of course, to be limited not by the game world but by my ability to discover ways to use it to my advantage. 

...would be a game to fear. Deformable terrain AND level geometry, with Havoc physics to play with. That would be one juicy game indeed. 

You sir, are in need of Worms3D. 

Worms 3d is pretty nice, I'll admit.

What i was more talking about though, is the destroyed pieces of terrain fall off, so if you shoot a hole out of the ceiling the chunk of ceiling falls to the ground, maybe in several pieces. Then you could interact with them a bit more :)

Besides, I want it in an FPS. Worms is good, but no action-packed fragfest...especially since network play has that nice 2 second lag behind everything. 

Actually, deformable terrain is probably possible in Quake 2 and even Zerstorer Quake. And, it's all in the hands of the mapper. Theoretically, one could make all or most of the walls out of breakable wall entities with a leak preventing structure underneath. So that whenever a stray weapon shot hits any architecture, pieces of it would "gib". However, render speeds and no. of entity limits and packet overflow (and amount of mapping work) would probably reduce the extent to which one could implement this.

But... it might be neat to see. I wonder what a small DM map with this would be like. 0_o 

http://ged.ax.pl/~tomkh/vox1_en.htm
An impressive, but pointless, example. 

http://opera.redeemedsoft.com/_media/pubsolace2.jpg 

http://www.ce.chalmers.se/old/staff/tomasm/soft/ 

the Opengl code could fairly easily (well not easy in regard to time it would take to code, I just mean that it is straight forward) be implemented in Quake 2.

I'll keep this in my faves file. I would like to come back to it when my current activities are completed. 

...but now you're revitalised this thread, perhaps people could point out if any of Doom3's graphical advances have improved the gameplay (aside from the obvious one of shadows)?? 

Its only partially a graphical advance (its also a design/polish thing of course), but I'd have to say that the single best/coolest thing in Doom3 are all the computer consoles and such that you can use throughout the game.

The screens look beautifully clear and crisp regardless of the resolution or quality setting, and its almost always very obvious what the buttons and stuff will do. Being able to interact with the level geometry and stuff via the computer systems is pretty awesome, and there's some actions you need to perform which are almost like minigames within the game; they provide a nice diversion from the (fairly predictable) core gameplay.

Furthermore, the way in which you use the screens is consistent and very easy to understand, so using the computer interfaces is easy and fun. 

The screens are really really cool, I want to purchase that turkey puncher game, it rocks! :D

Sure the shadows do add to the gameplay, but the sheer graphical detail of the textures & environments really makes them come to life also, I have never been so immersed in a game before, Far Cry was the last game that got me fully immersed with its graphical richness, Doom3 topples it with style. When I first ran out onto the mars surface I actually died from lack of oxygen becuase I was looking around :)