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EDGE, the only Doom source port with a name that seems to mean something significant (it stands for Enhanced Doom Gaming Engine, in case you were kept in the dark about that), is beginning to get exciting. Why is it exciting? Well, let me tell you.
When it first started, way back when and under a different name, EDGE was a pretty run of the mill source port – y’know, high resolutions, jump, mouse look that sort of thing. It did not rock my world. But know it’s known as EDGE, all that’s changed, and this is the most exciting port since ZDooM appeared. “Why is it so good?” I here you cry. Well, let me tell you. First of all, there’s the true 3D. Let me repeat that… true 3D. Not faked up ZDooM bridge 3D, we’re talking proper full on multi-level Quake style goodness- no wonder Fanatic is making QDooM for EDGE. The 3D effects work unbelievably well. The second is DDF. I’m not quite up on this, but here’s my view… it’s like Dehacked crossed with ACS but better… correct me if I’m wrong there. What this means is that you’ve got ZDooM like scripting abilities and some very cool hacks coming your way – for example take one of EDGE’s flagship WADS, Covert Ops… the weapons are nothing like their DooM counterparts, and we functions like the bomb. All very cool. Also there’s the cool weapons mod Immoral Conducy, formerly Action DooM, which also makes full use of DDF and will be reviewed in a future issue of this very magazine. There are, of course, problems. Nothing major, but enough to stop it being truly fantastic. Firstly, it just doesn’t play as well as ZDooM or Legacy, both of which are very much ‘players ports’. The main problem is the mouselook function is a bit jittery at the best of times, and you can often perform a 180 º turn at a minor flick of the wrist. All very snazzy, but kinda useless when you’re up against a group of ravenous zombies. Second gripe – I think this is something carried over from the original DooM exe, but it’s been a while since I’ve played that, so correct me if I’m wrong – is that when the color map changes (for example it changes to red when you get hit, or very quickly green when you pick up a weapon) it stays that way. Damn annoying, because it means that your view is almost completely obscured. Third and finally, I couldn’t save. I don’t know if this is a problem with my computer, or the engine as a whole, but again annoying. We’re not all DooM gods, y’know, some of us still like the save function. What this engine does have, however, is a hell of a lot of potential and a very cool title screen. Which is good in my books. |
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