Although I haven't played the game yet, I suspect that the reason more scripted monster introductions weren't used was due to time constraints and stuff. If there's one thing to be said about id, it's that they're generally pretty good at getting their games finished. 

Sorry for my late entry: I was distracted by my last few days of work for the summer, so I guess you could say it spawned behind me. I'll also warn you that it seems I've written a fucking essay on the topic here, so maybe get a glass of water or something before you start.

Before I continue I'll say I haven't beaten the game yet. I'm playing on Veteran, and I've gone through hell. I'm in I think the CPU (I just passed the homage to the computer maze in E1M2, which actually warmed the cockles of my heart to see), but I really just haven't felt like playing the game very much. It feels too much like work.

I blame a combination of design and implementation for the monsters. They often don't lend themselves to good implementation at all - they're not often very versatile - but id's effort to use them erred on the side of making the game hard for the wrong reasons.

Monster's strengths are often played to a little too well. The imp, for example, being probably the most versatile monster in the game, capable of being dangerous at any range, is almost never used at a distance in a grenadier fashion. They're always stuck in your face (or up your ass), where you've got a lot less chance to avoid the fireballs and even less chance of getting away in reasonable shape should they get close enough to use their arms.

The chaingunners are another example. The farther away they are, the more of a bitch they are, and id's designers tended to throw them in far enough away that dealing with them was a chore and not a challenge. There is no decent way to avoid being hurt by these guys, and if they're at a sufficient distance it's even harder to retaliate effectively.

I can only remember one case where this isn't true: at the bottom of a lift in delta labs (I think), you're treated to a pile of boxes, and a door. Chaingunner comes in, and you're clearly meant to crouch behind the boxes where he can't see you. If you try and stand up to take potshots at him, you're almost instantly treated to damage. I flung hand grenades over the top of the box until I heard his body sizzling away. Once again - a chore.

After my third or fourth one, I was struck with a thought: "Hey, the chaingun takes time to spin up. Maybe that's the weakness I'm meant to try and exploit." I tried it, but to no avail - spin up time is slim to none. Having some would have been a great addition to this monster, in the same vein as the bit of warning you get before a Shambler's lightning attack, but alas, such is not the case.

Take trites. The melee monsters in this game all fall into two categories: the kind that come toward you slowly, then leap directly into your face, and the kind that come towards you at the exact same speed as your sprint, without stopping. Trites are the first kind, as are those GOD DAMNED MOTHER FUCKING WINGED INFANTS. Pinkies, tentacle-grunts, and maggots (the two-headers) are in the second. The lost souls are in a much more horrific category all their own.

Now, let's break this down. We already seem to have basically agreed that melee damage is far too difficult to recover from thanks to mutant owl neck syndrome. The problem is compounded by the fact that melee encounters are also far too difficult to avoid in most cases. With trites and cherubs, the leaps cannot be avoided because there's almost no anticipation cue to let you know it's coming. Besides the fact that they always hit you a little above eye level, the fact that they're so small (and therefore also difficult to hit, conveniently enough) means they then drop out of your field of vision altogether and are now somewhere around you. After your neck recovers, you search frantically, find it by your right ankle or something, but by the time you're ready to shoot it IT DOES IT AGAIN.

Then pinkies. Oh, pinkies. I'm mostly through the game and I could count the number I've encountered in this game on one hand, and I can see why. It almost feels to me like the designers are going so far as to acknowledge that they know there's nothing you can do about these damn things so they're trying to be nice. You can maintain the same distance with them if you backpedal at full speed. This is all well and good if you've encountered the monster on the fucking Talladega motor speedway. In the game, you are going to back into walls and railings and have to go backwards around corners and through doors and more often than not wind up in a corner. Then what? There's no room in this monster's design for any actual gameplay.

more after the 5000 character limit ... 

For the melee creatures, the plan of attack never changes, and always consists of "back the fuck up until they're all dead." This alone is bad enough - %100 of the player's attention is sapped by dealing with one monster. If you add any second monster, in the close quarters of a UAC base, you're basically fucking the player over. id in true form goes and makes things even worse by always sticking that monster behind you. (As an aside, does anybody else who doesn't have money laying around to buy an entire surround sound system find it completely unfair the game more or less requires one?)

The eventual upshot of all these things combined is that the player winds up having to find exploits and "safe methods" to deal with the monsters, because playing with them in what I will go out on a limb to call 'normal' fashion is just too damn unrewarding to be any fun. You don't want to try and tackle a monster by putting yourself in danger because even though that might make it easier to deal the damage necessary, you know that the arrangement will be far from fair.

Here's what I've always been under the impression that monster combat in an action-oriented FPS like this should consist of. You enter a situation, and there's monsters. They're in different places, and attack you in different fashions, and you should have to keep moving, using cover when you have to, and use your brain to avoid as many attacks as you can while balancing that with polishing off the monsters. In what order and with what weapons adds to the reflex-strategy of the whole thing. Yes, I am basically describing Q1SP. We all like Quake, don't we? The challenge to the player is in knowing how to use the options his environment presents him to avoid damage. Greater difficulty levels should mean greater difficulty in avoiding damage, but never impossibility. You could, if you were fucking Fred Astaire, play through Quake on nightmare without getting hurt very much at all. It wouldn't be easy, of course, but that's the idea.

As you progress through a game, your health is slowly worn down, depending on your skill, and the amount of health the designer gives you along the way to offset that. Thus, on higher difficulty, you spend a lot more time in poor shape, and thus each encounter has higher stakes. If you get lumped into some big final combat in Quake with 13 health and a nail, and there's some shells on the other side of a room past a bunch of Ogres and Scrags, it might take you a few tries but Quake's design inherently doesn't discourage you from trying because you know it's doable. If you're quick, and the Elder Gods happen to smile on you, you can clear the room and still have 13 health. Once you finally pull it off you're on cloud nine.

Doom3 isn't that forgiving. Quake, and even the original Doom, would always have me saying "Man, lemme try that again." A session of Doom3 usually consists of me angrily stabbing F9 and going "Come on, what the fuck was that?"


Here's what I propose.

First of all, there's owl neck. Shambler, frankly, I don't care how much it contributes to the atmosphere, if it ruins the gameplay mechanics then it's wrong. Fiends still scare me in Quake because they really hurt when they slam into you, but you can recover. They don't fuck you over in one shot. A lot of the monsters in Doom3 will do that.

I've got a simple solution to this problem. Instead of skewing the player's view up/down or left/right, roll it. You can tilt it until the player's head is on sideways, and it'll still give the player that sense of a hard jolt, but don't you dare move the crosshair. I'm surprised this was even an option, but taking away control of the crosshair during combat, I would think, should be an absolute fucking paramount no-no.

That alone might help things considerably IMO. The monsters, though, could use some tweaking. You should always be able to avoid attacks. If I'm in a big empty box map with any one monster and a crate in the middle it should be a cakewalk avoiding damage. Mentally put yourself in a map like that with any Quake monster, and think about what you'd do. The challenge comes from how those monsters are used - what space is presented in the level design to deal with them, and what other monsters the player has on his hands at the same time.

I can't picture any kind of scenario in Doom3, as it is out of the box, that allows for that. Any kind of room, any kind combination of what monsters come with the game. If the monsters' modes of attack are changed it changes how they are best implemented by an enormous degree. I've already written enough, though, and I'll be taking time later to determine exactly how the monsters that I want to use for my project will be changed. 

That's looks like an impressive essay on the matter; certainly long enough to satisfy. Unfortunately, I can't read any of it because it's blatantly full of spoilers :P necros has though, so he can filter me the relevant details. 

I haven't finished the game yet, but so far I agree with most of what Lun said. I end up saving after almost every monster encounter and definitely after ever major monster encounter, obviously so I minimize the duplicated gameplay after a 'what the fuck that wasn't fair' encounter. Takes quite a bit of immersion away and since I started doing that a while into the game I haven't really been able to get 'into it' as much and be adequately tense/scared. I'm guessing thats not what iD was going for.

Instead of skewing the player's view up/down or left/right, roll it.
Word. Also, theres all this cool (ragdoll?) physics, with the little boxes and barrels you can move and orange pylons that get kicked every which way. But when a monster melee attacks you, do you get thrown every which way, abiding by a somewhat real sense of physical cause and effect? No, instead you get some red celophane shoved in your face and your eyes poked. 

It would have been worth paying Lunaran his weight in gold for Id to have had him as Boss Beta Tester.

It wasn't the difficulty that bothered me, or even losing control of my mouse when a pinky collided with me either. It was the utter predictabilaty of the encounters that pissed me off. I could start firing a centi-second before a complete turn around knowing my ammo would not be wasted on empty space.

It deserves high ratings on atmosphere though; the old school playing style didn't bother me -- in fact I think if Doom3 had turned out to be a hi-rez repackaged version of Ultimate Doom it would have been the greatest game ever made; instead it has to share the patheon with others instead of knocking old Yahweh off his throne. 

What Lun said. Also...

It would have been worth paying Lunaran his weight in gold for Id to have had him as Boss Beta Tester.

Fuck that. Just make him a designer. They clearly need help in that area. 

 

If you try and stand up to take potshots at him, you're almost instantly treated to damage. I flung hand grenades over the top of the box until I heard his body sizzling away. Once again - a chore.

...

use your brain to avoid as many attacks as you can while balancing that with polishing off the monsters

Sounds like the time that you did you bitched.

I think a lot of complaints boil down to the fact that Doom isn't Quake. I welcome the ensuing flaming. 

Pushplay makes a valid point. Doom3 is definitely NOT Quake. In fact, it's not even an action-oriented FPS. It is much slower and relies more on tense atmosphere/environments for its adrenaline rush than it does on straight action. Combat is slower.

Although I do agree that crouching imps hiding behind doors is cheap, its more of bad gameplay design than monster design (same with owlneck.) Whenever I was in a 1-on-1 with an imp I always knew when he would get ready to spring, and could dodge it accordingly. Most of the combat situations I thought weren't hard at all (I played veteran.) Yeah, I died a lot of times, but I never got stuck in any area because it was "impossible to beat."

(SPOILERS AHEAD)


It took me about 3 tries to beat the Vagary. Once I learned I could just duck under the spiky blob things after you heard the sound it became ridiculously easy.

The hardest enemy in the entire game I thought was the chaingunner. Whenever I saw one, I busted out my RL and in a couple hits they weren't too much of a problem anymore. They don't really chase you like maggots, so rockets are ok for them, and if you had tons of pistol ammo, like I had, sniping them was easy too.

Pinky demons. They're NOT hard. Honestly. 1, maybe 2 shotgun blasts (just like imps and maggots) and they're dead.

Trites/Cherubs aren't very difficult. Yes, they're small and speedy, but they always make sounds so you know that they're SOMEwhere, and it's not that hard to figure out they're on the ground somewhere. They also can't take too many hits, so a machine gun clip can take out about half a group usually, and if they get too close switch to shotty.

I totally just forgot where I was heading with this. Something about Doom3 not being Quake, so don't treat it like Quake, or something similar. Realize that it's not about strafing around at 100 mph in open areas, it's a much more methodical, slow paced game. Take your time, let the tension build up. That's what the goal is.

Personally, I don't think the monster design is bad at all, far from it. It's really how the designers used the monsters (the implementation) that's cheap. The "spawning behind the player" thing is kind of cheap, but very predictible (-able?), and rarely, if ever, seriously dangerous. The worst thing they did was just putting imps behind doors.

On a side note, I think the Plasma Gun is so fucking cool, 1st place weapon. Props on that weapon. Soul Cube comes in a close second. 

not really. crouching in a corner where the monster can't get to you and tossing grenades at him is exploiting two things: 1. the monsters are too stupid to get out of the way of grenades and 2. the fact that monsters can't fit into certain areas (or bend over to aim their guns in that particular direction or whatever) and will tend to sit and wait for you instead. (or roam)

yes, it's using your brain, but i think lun meant using your to avoid attacks while still playing normally, not camping crouched in a corner exploiting the weak areas of the ai and game. 

How do Doom 3 monster/weapons compare in quality, use and design with PainKiller monster weapons (I have only played the demo to the later so far). Any opinions? 

Pushplay makes a valid point Worst. Flame. Ever.

I think the weapon design in D3 is some of the best. Just about every weapon feels useful, both in sp and mp. Of course, having grenades on 6 is useless because it's so far away. I put grenades on M3, rl on Q, pg on E, fists on 0, and everything else was shifted left one accordingly. SC doesn't apply in MP. Unless I'm carrying a pistol, I'm never wandering around in MP thinking oh know, I have the ____________ the same way you might say shotgun in Q3 or nailgun in Q1. 

Oh no. Whatever. 

Yeah, Doom3 isn't Quake. I wasn't trying to say that it should be. I was only using Quake as an example of how gameplay could be engineered, to illustrate how Doom3's could have been done better.

Quake's not without it's problems. When you're up against a single vore for example, the only real method to defeating it is the old hide-and-shoot, which systematizes the combat and thus makes it a chore again. A vore and two fiends, though, then you're in for it. :)

Sounds like the time that you did you bitched.

What necros said. Hiding like that was the only way I could clear that little stage safely. I think there's a lot to be said for the basics of moving around your environment, and it's an important enough element that I don't think a game would benefit from having it removed from the gameplay by engineering the monsters to keep it from being an effective aid.

Quake2 seemed like a step halfway from Quake to Doom3 - the monsters were still a little more fun, but most of them were so damn slow each one was just another hide-and-seek. The Tank Commanders were about as effective as a heavily armed toaster.

Pinky demons. They're NOT hard. Honestly. 1, maybe 2 shotgun blasts (just like imps and maggots) and they're dead.

The shotgun has enough of a spread that it's almost uselessly weak after a very short distance. Good luck hitting it enough to stop it before it gets to you.


Maybe I'm a stupid git but the monster-behind-you trick rips me within 10% of my health every time. I've also never once noticed a sound cue for something appearing behind me, and not just because I'm playing 2.1 - I never hear a sound at all. Being predictable doesn't justify it, it just makes it even worse. Ever hear "two wrongs don't make a right?" I don't see unfair gameplay as being benefitted by consistency.

I did notice what Shambler meant - I do find myself nervous that there will be a monster in an area I had already cleared - but the reason I'm nervous is not because I'm going to fight it, it's because I'm going to be hurt by it no matter what I do. It's fun if it's a series of challenges, but not if it's just a continual sequence of the designers bludgeoning me into submission until I stop playing for the night. 

i think ID deliberatley chose to design the gameplay to be simplistic. As if the last 10 years evolution in FPS gameplay had never happened.

I think this was their deliberate goal, and in terms of that goal they suceeded.

If i come down on one side, [i have only played the first 5/6 levels and am not going to play anymore until i upgrade my graphic card], i think they made it to simplistic.
The basic-ness of the gameplay is somewhat surprising given the long development cycle of the game.

Now of course whether that original goal i mentioned at the start, is itself is good or bad thing, is open to debate [see this thread]. :) 

Kell's post #7 is really good. 

I'm just glad that I am not the type to analyse everything, I just play the game, and had the best gaming experience I have ever had, bar none. Most of the stuff talked about in this thread seems a bit foreign to me (like I played a different game),at least to the point of it distracting me from the immersion of the game, I didn't have any trouble with it.

The shotgun has enough of a spread that it's almost uselessly weak after a very short distance. Good luck hitting it enough to stop it before it gets to you.
Downing pinky with the shotgun was to easy, 3 shots max and he's down. I found the shotgun to be useful in many conflicts.
As far as monsters spawning behind you, I never had a problem with it after the first time. I mean, once bitten twice shy. I just loved being confronted with a monster/monsters head on, and always being aware that there could be an attack from behind at any minute, flicking around to check your back while in a fire fight. Just twitching, dodging, turning, moving as fast as possible, using cover, managing available stamina, while in the midst of it all was exhilarating. Then when the fight was over, and you settled back into the slower paced nervousness of the game, excellent. The way the screen reacts when a powerful monster straight from the bowels of hell rips into you with all its might, I thought was both good, and deserved. The atmosfear is magnificent.

means they then drop out of your field of vision altogether and are now somewhere around you. After your neck recovers, you search frantically, find it by your right ankle or something, but by the time you're ready to shoot it IT DOES IT AGAIN.

I don't know, but to me this just seems natural. In my younger days (now 41) I was a boxer. If you have ever caught a decent hit from anyone, you'll know that for a time you loose it, and if you have not got your whits about you, and don't recover quick enough, your going to get hit again, and deservedly so. Thats the best way to a KO, and the usefulness of a combination, the first stuns you, the following hits take advantage of that,whack, whack, and it's lights out.

lunaran, it may seem as though I am aiming at you, quoting you etc, it is not so. Just next to the last things I read

To many things been said in this thread, can't comment/remember them all, but everybody is different, we play different ways, we expect different things, we will all have differing experiences. I'm just so glad I had mine. Anyways, I'm back into it, on my third time through the game, and loving it. 

i think ID deliberatley chose to design the gameplay to be simplistic. As if the last 10 years evolution in FPS gameplay had never happened.

They were remaking DooM, not the wheel. 

Can someone paraphrase Lun's essay so I have a chance of reading it before HL2 is released and we're all arguing about that?? 

Lun, you're wrong. Retaliatory essay time. I'm just past Hell too, on Marine difficulty.

The imp, is almost never used at a distance in a grenadier fashion. They're always stuck in your face (or up your ass)

Not on Marine skill. They're used far more often at medium range where you can avoid fireballs than at really close range. There's even a fair few at longish range, probably the same amount as at very close range.

The farther away they are, the more of a bitch they are, and id's designers tended to throw them in far enough away that dealing with them was a chore and not a challenge.

Not on Marine skill. Very easy with rockets, sometimes you won't get any damage, sometimes you might take a bullet or two. Pretty easy with plasma too. Or as you say, grenades.

With trites and cherubs, the leaps cannot be avoided because there's almost no anticipation cue to let you know it's coming.

Errr, generally one avoids the leaps by killing them before they attack. Given that both of them move slowly, and Trites at least are so puny that they tend to dissolve if you so much as reload your weapon, if you're letting them hit you there's something wrong. And there is a little bit of a warning before the leap - enough to dodge on Marine skill.

In the game, you are going to back into walls and railings and have to go backwards around corners and through doors and more often than not wind up in a corner.

Or, just possibly, if you're using your wits, find something to dodge behind or lure the pinky around. I admit there are a couple of occasions where you can get trapped (of course, one does know that the shotgun is very effective against pinkies at close range), but the majority you can run around something and avoid the pinky.

I wish they were used more. They're cool. I did get a bit shocked at first by getting trapped and getting mutant owl neck. So I learnt from that - OMG learning from a gameplay experience and tackling the challenge in a better way, what a novel idea, you should try it sometime.

For the melee creatures, the plan of attack never changes, and always consists of "back the fuck up until they're all dead."

Or use the scenery, dodge around things, lure monsters into more favourable scenarios. Okay and then you might get another monster thrown in - cunning little bastards eh, attacking you when you're already busy - live with the challenge.

(As an aside, does anybody else who doesn't have money laying around to buy an entire surround sound system find it completely unfair the game more or less requires one?)

Not at all. Never even think about it.

5000 yadda yadda 

You don't want to try and tackle a monster by putting yourself in danger because even though that might make it easier to deal the damage necessary, you know that the arrangement will be far from fair.

Boo. Hoo. Cry me a fucking river. So the monsters and where they appear don't make things easy and simple for you?? So they try their damn hardest to damage you?? Here's some late-breaking news: That's the fucking point - they're demons and possessed zombies and they're there to rip your bowels out by whatever cunning, malicious instruction, and nasty attacks they can muster. So you have to be more cunning and learn their weaknesses and try to outwit them and react quicker than they appear?? That's how it should be.


As you progress through a game, your health is slowly worn down, depending on your skill, and the amount of health the designer gives you along the way to offset that.

Doom3 isn't that forgiving.

Loads of health and armour on Marine skill. Of course, you have to hunt around a fair bit, which is good.

You should always be able to avoid attacks. If I'm in a big empty box map with any one monster and a crate in the middle it should be a cakewalk avoiding damage.

I can't picture any kind of scenario in Doom3, as it is out of the box, that allows for that. Any kind of room, any kind combination of what monsters come with the game.

Not on Marine skill. Here's what I've faced so far and to what extent they'd pass your arbitrary box test:

Zombie - avoidable
Chainsaw Zombie - avoidable
Possessed Security - just about avoidable but hard.
Imp - avoidable
Pinky - avoidable
Cacodemon (?) - avoidable
Trite - avoidable
Cherub - avoidable
Those two-headed things - avoidable
Geezer with whip arm - unavoidable
Chaingunner - unavoidable
Mancubus - avoidable
Revenant - unavoidable (although possible to shoot rockets)
Hell Knight - avoidable but hard

pwx0red.

So.......


There are two strong points that are striking me about this:

1. There could be a VAST difference playing on Marine compared to playing on Veteran. I'd be interested to know if there is. I chose Marine skill because I was after immersion rather than challenge, and I go for "Medium" skill with any new game.

2. I think the main issue is: You people complaining are struggling to adapt to a new gameplay style. Pretty much all of what you're complaining about is something you can learn about and adapt to, instead of expecting a smooth ride through UAC Mars to be handed to you on a plate. Stop your moaning and start adapting, learn that this is a different challenge and you have to fight and react in a different way. D3 isn't Quake, Quake2, HL, Unreal, etc. It's it's own gameplay style - not that that gameplay style is revolutionary or necessarily better or excellent or what-have-you, BUT that pretty much all the complaints can be nullified by learning to play the damn game and accepting it's different.

Now where's that damn Reset button... 

No sarcasm at all--I think it's great. I disagree and agree with various points from just about everyone, and may well reply with an essay of my own when I finish the game, but this thread is excellent food for thought. 

just want to point out some things:

Geezer with whip arm - unavoidable
Incorrect, ducking just as he jumps to wack you avoids the damage. From there, you fill his face with shotgun ammo before he attacks again.

Chaingunner - unavoidable
Chaingunners have always been unavoidable, and it makes sense. They have fucking chainguns. Now quit saving your rocket ammo like an idiot and blast them.

Revenant - unavoidable (although possible to shoot rockets)
Rocket dodging is difficult, but wholly possible. Just need to work on some timing to start moving when they're near so they can't adjust quick enough. And shooting the rockets is very easy using a rapid fire weapon aimed at his head.

Hell Knight - avoidable but hard
These guys are basically Shambler's with a range attack that's easier to avoid. Also, the chainsaw can make quick work of them if you're willing to take a small bit of damage.


I've found, after playing the game and going back to screw around, the enemies are much simpler than I'd anticipated. Chainsawing Hellknights is one idea I picked up from god modeing around. Also, did you know it takes a single punch to kill a Lost Soul? Not useful to know when they attack... but whip out a pistol and it's simple to snipe them. Pistol is also good for spiders.

Btw... don't attempt chainsawing mancubi, it's almost impossible in god mode due to their very quick melee attack that has a ton of knockback. 

Here's some late-breaking news: That's the fucking point - they're demons and possessed zombies and they're there to rip your bowels out by whatever cunning, malicious instruction, and nasty attacks they can muster.

Calm down, sizzle chest. Follow that train of thought for a few more miles. If the point is to be as nasty to the player as possible, why don't we just go even farther? Let's make all the monsters move faster than the player, and be able to kill him in one hit, unless he's got more than, say, 100 armor. Oh, and throw in some instant death traps with no warning signs for good measure. Does that sound fun?

No?

I know damned well it's a different style of gameplay. But I'm expecting there to be an actual game to play, and I so far haven't enjoyed much of one. If the player is hardly given a chance then it's not fun, and there is no game. When I play QUAKE AND OTHER GAMES a sticky spot is never impossible because there's always inherent chances for me to get the job done. Doom3's design tries to achieve difficulty by circumventing so much of that charity to the player that I find the game reduced to nothing more than irritation in seven rendering passes.

Difficulty should say to the player "Keep at it," not "Too bad." So many friends I've talked to have all independently shared with me that playing this game just feels too much like work, and I agree with all of them.