Doom 3 - My Opinion

Okay, you've probably gathered that I don't like this game. Now what is it exactly that I do not like ? Let me list what I do not like :

Okay, now for a point-by-point flyby :

Lame Monster Spawning

This is a really dumb trick to play on today's players. Go into an empty room, tour the room, nothing there. Go to the other side and turn around, still nothing. Open the door, and BAM ! Some monster is attacking you from behind.

That does not create suspense, it is not masterful, it is all too plain and easy. It is the ugly hack of gaming, the bad excuse for technical limitations or lack of imagination. It is a destruction of continuity and believability. It is BAD.

We're in the third millenium now. Leave these cheap tricks for B-grade films where they belong. Today's leitmotive is supposed to be realism. Well, it is not realistic to pull this kind of stunt anymore. It's not even funny.

Drop it, and take a look at Splinter Cell, or Half-Life (not HL2) to see how things should be done. In Splinter Cell, the enemies are all there, waiting to be found. You get surprised only if you are stupid enough to charge in, guns blazing. Do it slow and careful (like you should), and you'll find the enemy before he finds you. That is part of the thrill. That is realistic. In Half-Life, monster spawns were rare, and generally confined to certain areas. For the rest, all the enemies you were going to fight were there when you got there, and that made for a bit of attack planning.

Okay, I agree, Doom III is supposed to call upon its granddaddy's atmosphere. Well, I think Serious Sam did a better job of doing that. And don't tell me that id wanted to make something scary. It would have been a lot scarier to be relentlessly pursued by howling hoards of Imps throughout a mad (well-lit) corridor chase then to go about in semi-darkness, killing one or three zombies at a time.

Give us a realistic environment, where we can discover what is waiting for us, and scare ourselves with what might have happened to us if we had just opened the door without paying attention.

Stupid Flashlight Trick

Okay, so we're decades into the future, on a base on another planet. Our incarnation is an elite Marine, and he's forgotten how to hold a flashlight and a gun at the same time ? Or, in the immortal words of a forum poster : "don't they have any sticky tape ?". This is the very first thing that was changed by game modders.

Creating an atmosphere is an essential part of a game, but basing the atmosphere on the assumption that a game character is not going to do what any sane individual would in the first place is not good for believability.

And I don't think anyone in their right mind, when stranded on a scientific base in the dark with monsters all around that can see you without light, is going to happily take to the corridors with a flashlight AND a gun and only use ONE AT A TIME.

Nope, don't think so.

Corridor Crawl

This is just boring to death. Open door, kill creature, creature spawns behind, kill creature, pick up useful item, go to next door, repeat. As you progress, more creatures will spawn, then different kinds, then mixes of different kinds, then a boss, then two bosses, then . . ah, you get the picture. Predictable. Besides, it really is incredible how much armor, weapons and ammunition is strewn around top-secret scientific bases. Not to mention health kits you can find lying on the floor. On the floor. Is that supposed to be the normal storage method for health kits in the future ? I think not.

Not to mention the ridiculous notion that weapons and armor are supposed to be haphazardly distributed all around the base. You know what, even in the middle of a purely military compound, there is only one place where you'll find weapons and ammo : the armory. Elsewhere, the only place you'll find a weapon is where a guard is holding it. Okay, some guards are really dead, so their weapons are available. But that would normally mean that you should have to get armor, weapons and ammo from dead guards, not from random spots on the floor. Sure, the best weapons you find are hidden in some locked cabinet (thank God), but as soon as you pick it up, a monster spawns behind you. Always.

Predictable, thus boring.