I was talking to a friend of mine over the internet and he was intrigued of why he got Doom 3 in less than 10 minutes and why it took id over 4 years to get it done. What's wrong with id's internet connection, he asked? Well, I tried to explain him that they actually had to make the game, and that's a bit harder than just downloading it over the internet... uhm, buying it at the local games store that is.

You've probably heard by now how Doom 3 looks great and fucks your computer up performance wise, while not being the great game everybody had expected. I don't know much about tech shit, couldn't care less about un-izo-tropical fighting or whatever, I don't what's the use of bum mapping, I mean what's that, you have a map of where bums are located, and you put that map on some texture, or what? Screw that shit, I don't know, I just had the game auto adjust for my machine, launched it and guess what? It ran smooth, it looked good and it felt great. So you can take your "Doom 3 ready PCs" and shove them so far up your ass you can taste it, my computer seems to have been Doom 3 ready for two years now.

Oh, and before we dismiss all the technical details, let me just say that Doom3 sounds fucking great, especially if you have 5.1, or that's what I heard, I play it with headphones, for a more personalized experience.

Yes, this is the way Doom 3 is supposed to be played, in my opinion: home alone, late at night with all the lights off, and with headphones on, so you can get the most out of that intimacy feeling. Then, before launching the game for the first time, go into the cfg file and change the value of the line that has nightmare in it from "0" to "1", so you know you get the most out of the game from the start.

Because of the late date this review is going to make its first appearance on the internet, I'm not going to approach this the normal way, talking about tech, story, gameplay, blah blah, because you've probably read thousands of reviews so far. Most of the ones I've read say that Doom 3 is not a very good game, that it is disappointing from certain aspects and so on. What pisses me off most is when people start talking about how Doom 3 is not a scary game, that the "survival horror" label tagged on its back is bullshit and that the scripted scenarios just don't cut it anymore. Sure they're probably right, and I even know why.

After years and years of playing games, the level of immersion obviously lowers with each game I play through. So I've been playing video games for like 10 years now, it's obvious I couldn't give a flying fuck about the cyberdemon smashing through the wall, ripping my arm off and beating me to death with it, then stuffing it up my ass. I just sit back, relax, watch the whole scene, light up a cigarette in the mean time, than when I'm done I load my previously saved game and shoot the shit out of that demon, 'cause I know where it's going to pop up from.

 

Dark and scary corners obviously hide enemies, no need to check it with the flash light, I just shoot first and hear the misc monster die, and that's it. But that's not the way games are meant to be played, regardless of gaming experience of level of boredom. That's why I go for the home alone - naked - lights off - headphones combination, so I can get involved in the action as much as possible. Doom 3 is a scary game, but some prerequisites have to be brushed upon first: a good attitude towards the game, a fair level of excitement and understanding of the "Doom" concept.
I remember the first Doom game had exactly the same story: shit hit the fan on Mars, all hell literally broke loose, and the marine killed them all and saved the world.

 

From this point of view, I had zero expectations and I was glad to see some sort of story eventually putting itself together while the game progressed. They say they hired some professional story writer to make up a good plot, and he obviously fucked up, but I don't really care, my goal of having some sort of motivation to blow shit up was reached nevertheless. Even more, the voice acting and in-game cut-scenes are great, a good plus for the game and a pretty good way of making you curious of what was going to happen next.

As an interlude, some friend of mine told me he's going to the beach wearing nothing but a pair of tanga bikinis. I can only imagine his hairy crotch... you know, BEING THERE! Shit man, had Carmack put my friend's hairy crotch as some monster's head, THAT would have been one God damned scary game right there.

Ok, so where were we? Oh yeah, playing Doom 3. Hmm, I wonder what would happen if you typed <<seta cyberdemon_head "my_friend's_hairy_crotch>> in the console? Oh well, we already set the difficulty level to nightmare, which only means your hit points drop faster, aka monsters do more damage, but there's not more of them, nor are they smarter. And their crotches are nice and shaved.