Doom3 BFG and specs + Steam promotion!

Why isn't there a thread title? 0_o

I'd guess your system will run it fine. The only thing is the graphics card -- a bit on the low side, but Doom 3 isn't very demanding for modern cards that it may not matter for you.

BFG Edition is a fairly comprehensive and well-done collection of Doom 1, 2, and 3. I'd recommend picking up Doom Classic Complete if you want better compatibility with source ports, multiplayer, and various mods released (though most ports support the BFG IWADs too now). The original Doom 3 release can also provide you with support for various mods that are never going to be updated for BFG Edition; multiplayer on it, however, is pretty much dead so don't be buying it for that.

In short: original versions for maximum flexibility/compatibility. BFG Edition for a pretty simple collection of them to just play; some extra perks include the new expansions for Doom 2 and Doom 3, and achievements.

I have that same card and the original Doom 3 on Ultra (or whatever its highest quality was called) never dropped below 60 fps as long as I didn't have AA enabled. If I did enable AA, it would drop during a few of the more intensive effects, the portals in Delta Labs specifically. I was playing at 1600x1200 or 1920x1440, can't remember. At that high of a resolution, AA is pretty much unneeded anyway.

No clue on the BFG Edition, haven't talked myself into buying it yet. I wouldn't worry about compatibility with its classic Doom iwads since we've had BFG to 1.9 "downgrade" patches since day one, practically.

chungy said:

I'd guess your system will run it fine. The only thing is the graphics card -- a bit on the low side, but Doom 3 isn't very demanding for modern cards that it may not matter for you.

It isn't (well, the original wasn't) but it will not run with certain ATI cards, even though it will run on "equivalent" nVidias. E.g. it WILL run on my 2008 laptop with an nVidia GT 8600M 256 MB GPU, yet it will NOT run on a desktop machine with an ATI X1650 with 512 MB RAM, even though they are of around the same generation (OK, the nVidia was designed with much more foresight, and has DX10.0, SM 4.0 and OpenGL 3.0 support, which apparently Doom 3: BFG can't live without). That was the only disappointment I got from the BFG edition.

Maes said:

It isn't (well, the original wasn't) but it will not run with certain ATI cards, even though it will run on "equivalent" nVidias.

ATI hardware is only equivalent for DirectX. Here's a quick cheat-sheet:

Graphic chipset of generation n

Manufacturer  Nvidia   ATI   Intel
Direct3D        n       n     n-3
OpenGL          n      n-2    n-5        

In short right now it's a better deal money wise to buy Steam's Doom 3 Pack and Classic Pack separately than BFG Edition. ($6.98 total for those two compared to $14.99 for BFG Edition, though with BFG you would get the extra Doom 3 levels of course and newer features.)

XCOPY said:

Hm okay so there is a chance to be laggy (the BFG Edition). I was thinking about buying it mainly because the native joystick support (yes I know, it sucks for FPS but it's more comfortable that way, for me) and widescreen. Although I'm insecure about buying it since I have a generic PSX like joystick (I hate the D-pad of the Xbox 360 one).

I think if you want gamepad support, you'll definitely want the BFG Edition over the others. Don't know about non-360-controller support, but there's also Windows drivers iirc to emulate a 360 controller with others.

Original Doom 3 kind of supports widescreen; you need to use console commands to set up the resolution and aspect ratio. It works fine, but BFG Edition of course has it just work out of the box. I don't think the original release had gamepad support, but there's various gamepad->mouse/keyboard remappers available too, so it's not an entire deal-breaker.

There definitely are advantages to the new release. Basically exactly the same games, but a few added bonuses and conveniences. :P