DOOM 3 Multiplayer Impressions

Praetorian

It looks like Doom 3 is shaping up to be a fantastic game. Gamespy have a preview located here http://www.gamespy.com/quakecon2003/doom3/

Pczone have also given their opinion http://www.pczone.co.uk/

I’m a little worried about the 4 player multiplayer limit. Hopefully this will be rectified when the full game is released.

tHE vAGGABOND

they said from the start it is not designed as a quake3 style multiplayer game, its a single player game..

Gummy Panda

There is no Multiplayer elements in the game. They designed it to be a solo horror affair like Resident Evil. Plus they believe that most people's systems who play the game, won't be up to task of multiplayer.

Retr0gamer

Both PCZone and Gamespy are on the wrong side of dodgy. They also regularly except money for good reviews and wouldn't know a good game if Link kicked thenm up the ass. Unless there was a big brown envelope with the kick. I'm not going to trust them and then make up my opinions when I play it. The 4 player limit and the slow pace might make a refreshing multiplayer game, with players hunting each other down and taking things slowly and none of the rocket jumping light speed madness of other DM games. i doubt Co-op will match the original Doom series. They're still the best co-op games ever.

Retr0gamer

Past 1000 posts and I didn't even notice

Giblet

There will be mods of course, so I don't think we have to worry about the multiplayer elements.

And Retr0 again you're talking ****, completely unfounded accusations.
Seriously theres a "fanboy" wiff off most of your posts.

Retr0gamer

Yeah whatever Giblet.

Had a good proper read of the article there and I'm not impressed all that much with what was said. Gamespy are trying to make gimmicks that are in the engine like the physics and 'per-pixel targetting' sound new when we have seen them in a few games already. However the talk about the shadow engine sounds very promising (especially for some one who loved turning the lights on and off in the CS mansion level )

Giblet

Bounding boxes are still pretty much the standard, and are f*cking horrible in games that need accuracy. In fact Doom III doesn't need accuracy as much as say, CS does. CS is old though, so i wouldn't expect them to redesign it just to accomodate it. In other words it's not so much a gimmick as a required feature, maybe not in Doom itself, but whatever mods come out for it, or games which use the engine. And no, theres not a plethora of games which are using it.

That article is basically repeating what was said by ID, and not in any way "influenced" by brown envelopes. Just stating facts.

BKtje

you could easily hear the "YAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!" of an enemy berserking from pretty far away,

Rofl i think thats gonna be fun

It's now possible to watch a rocket pass under a player's arm

Sounds tasty.

lowers your gun automatically, and allows you to interact using the primary fire button

Errr what if your mid fight tho? I can see that becoming a pain...

Retr0gamer

you could easily hear the "YAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!" of an enemy berserking from pretty far away,

I've fond memories of using the berserker in co-op doom. If we picked it up we would shout out 'Punch of Doom!' and then go and take on as many weeds as we could or go for the big kills like barons of hell. Actually everything was renamed 'something of doom' like the shotgun of doom but the berserker pack was by far the most fun.

jesus_thats_gre

Overall the game is looking very impressive. Obviously the game is being developed mainly as a single player experience but the deathmatch aspect seems to be a bit of a giggle as well.

As for the 4 player limit, I would be of the opinion that this was the limit placed on this build to ensure it ran correctly for the journalists.

Both PCZone and Gamespy are on the wrong side of dodgy. They also regularly except money for good reviews

If you are gonna make such statements, at least back them up with some facts. Stupid accusations serve no point other than to suggest you are a console monkey. Seems to be a history of a lack of appreciation of PC games in a few of your posts.

feylya

There has been no press release or any other official statement to say that multiplayer Doom3 will be limited to 4 players. Like Jesus said, it was more than likely purely for the journalists benefit. We'll find out after ECTS at the end of the month I imagine.

jesus_thats_gre

Had a good proper read of the article there and I'm not impressed all that much with what was said. Gamespy are trying to make gimmicks that are in the engine like the physics and 'per-pixel targetting' sound new when we have seen them in a few games already. However the talk about the shadow engine sounds very promising (especially for some one who loved turning the lights on and off in the CS mansion level )

I disagree... The polygon collision detection is a welcome addition and is a massive improvement over the limitations of collision boxs that are currently used.

Also, the use of shadows and lighting effects is going to add dramtically to the atmosphere and really is not comparable to any other game of this style that are currently on the market.

Giblet

It has been stated in the past that Doom will only have limited mulitplayer or the emphasis will be on single player, but the only solid thing I have heard is that players can't just join random games, and have to be in them from the start, ala C&C.

Whether this still holds true or not remains to be seen. I expect that it will have 16-32 player support (16 most likely) to accomodate team games etc.

I think though, that OSP style mods will be used as standard for multiplayer with tuned code, speccially designed maps, and a host of different multiplayer options.

Retr0gamer

Maybe the 4-player limit is because the levels have to be quite small? Anyone who has played the beta knows that this game eats ram for breakfast. It may be improved before launch but I wouldn't be expecting large outdoor maps and huge sprawling levels.

I'm not a console monkey it's just that for the past 2 or 3 years the consoles have been providing a far larger quantity or great games especially action games. It annoys me that ever since I got a new PC 2 years ago that I have only ever used it for emulation and the odd games of Warcraft 3 and Op flash. The PC really lacks decent action games and anyone who thinks SOF2 and RTCW and their like are good games is a fool. Hope it changes with HL2 but I'm still not sure about Doom 3 especially considering that Quake 2 was dire in single player.

feylya

According to pczone.co.uk, the multiplayer levels are actually quite large. And the version that was leaked was a sub-alpha version, ie nowhere ready. It was optimized for certain ati cards and computers. It was designed to run properly. It was designed to test new function implementation on new graphics cards and was rushed in time for E3.

Giblet

Of course the maps can be big, or else the ENTIRE game would be unfeasable. Judging by an alpha version is stupid.

Jalt

Doom3 looks kick ass. As for MP, I just seen 2 more screenshots http://www.shacknews.com/screens.x/doom3/DOOM+3+Multiplayer/1/081403/doom3_mp_1.jpg

http://www.shacknews.com/screens.x/doom3/DOOM+3+Multiplayer/1/081403

po0k

Here's some stuff I pinched from ArsTechnica, screenshots possily same link as Jalt's. Cba checking.

Multiplayer Screenshots - Shacknews.com
Multiplayer Preview - Eurogamer.net (seems to have been removed or is just b0rked)
Overview of DoomIII DM @ QuakeCon - HomeLanFed.com

QuakeCon Booth Babes - HomeLanFed.com - imho: yes, yes, no, no.

tman

Originally posted by SyxPak
QuakeCon Booth Babes - HomeLanFed.com - imho: yes, yes, no, no.

prolly, hells yeah, hells NO!, maybe.
doom 3 is looking pretty mint too

jesus_thats_gre

In this case, where a game is literally quite a few years ahead of most opposition, obviously its gonna require a highly spec'd machine to run it properly. But its extremely foolish to base a games performance on a stolen beta that is a year old and a multi player demo that was purely shown to keep the waiting public happy.

As the game progresses, the engine will become more and more optimised and will make efficient use of the available hardware. This is the case with any game as you know.

As for the levels. The games levels will not be small in size due to restrictions of the engine or available processing power, it is to do with the style of game Id are creating. Small, enclosed and dark enviroments far more effectively create a tense atmosphere as oppossed to sunny, grassy valleys or large city scapes. There iwill be a few levels that will provide large landscapes and cityscapes seemingly.

CodeMonkey

Originally posted by jesus_thats_gre
In this case, where a game is literally quite a few years ahead of most opposition, obviously its gonna require a highly spec'd machine to run it properly. But its extremely foolish to base a games performance on a stolen beta that is a year old and a multi player demo that was purely shown to keep the waiting public happy.

As the game progresses, the engine will become more and more optimised and will make efficient use of the available hardware. This is the case with any game as you know.

As for the levels. The games levels will not be small in size due to restrictions of the engine or available processing power, it is to do with the style of game Id are creating. Small, enclosed and dark enviroments far more effectively create a tense atmosphere as oppossed to sunny, grassy valleys or large city scapes. There iwill be a few levels that will provide large landscapes and cityscapes seemingly.

Yeah but what you've said doesn't make a fun and entertaining game like what Half Life 2 looks like it's going to be. Doom3 has atmosphere but it just looks like what's been offered before many times over but in prettier packaging. And who really cares about the merits of the graphics engine unless you are a game developer looking into making use of the available features. ID doesn't really make games, especially single player games. Their last effort was Quake2 which is now very old school and way below everyone's expectations. They have really no gameplay direction as far as I can see, just John Carmack pumping out fantastic engines and lots of money. Well, eye candy sells well enough I guess.

BKtje

Most games these days lack atmopshere thats why i think im going to love this game, not for its multiplayer stuff but for its singleplayer elements. I'm hoping they do a good story line that will immerse me in the game and make it hard to stop playing at2am the night before your big exam etc. Atmosphere is an awful large chunk of making a good single player game. Lets hope the story is decent too

po0k

If the effect of my bullets stipping mutated daemonic flesh from rotting bones is tesselated out so that I can acually see the hydrostatic shockwave I'll be happy, atmosphere or no.

Shinji

ID doesn't really make games, especially single player games.

Which would be why they had Graeme Devine in showing them how to make singleplayer games on Doom3 (he moved to Ensemble last week).

By the way, afaik the four player limit WILL be in place in the final build. The id guys gave no impression that it was a temporary thing, as far as I can gather (I didn't go to Quakecon myself, but I chatted to a lot of journalists who were at it and met up with them and some of the id guys in a restaurant in Dallas entirely by accident...)

Actually, having played it a lot this week, I reckon the best game of the forthcoming FPS games for multiplayer will be Halo PC. The stuff Gearbox have done with it in multiplayer absolutely rocks - assuming the netcode holds up, it'll be a cracker online. I doubt either HL2 or D3 will be as good multiplayer until the mod teams get stuck into them.

Giblet

I see no-ones pointed out the obvious fact that HL2 could be rubbish.
After all, we've just seen what it looks like.

feylya

It could be but if you look at valve's record, mainly the original half-life, it's highly unlikely.

jesus_thats_gre

The whole Half Life 2 craic is just looking to start an argument. It is inconceivable that the game is not going to be top class...

Retr0gamer

Exactly. Remember all the hype about Rise of the Robots and Enter the Matrix and how great they were when they came out.

Hype doesn't make a great game. But I think HL2 will be great at the very least. I hope they do a traditional DM multiplayer game like HL1 because I'm sick of CS clones.

BadCharlie

The game im looking forward to most has to be doom3. As i just loved doom and doom2, i have lost count of the amount of times i cleared them games. Half life is a great game i hope hl2 will be just as good. But one player shooting games all started for me with doom "So Bring On D3"

bloggs

Sorry if it was asked before, but does anyone have a release date for Doom3?

I am also in two minds on which to get it?

PC - Pros Downloads, perhaps better graphics
Cons Small 15' screen, not the gaming feel you get from tv

Xbox - Pros 32' tv, fun you get with people in a multiplayer
Cons PCs Pros.