You peeps stay away from my woman

Hey, get this. That video game store I was at, that had wall-to-wall hard to find games, systems, and imports? Guess what.

His daughter works there. :)

I'm going back there this friday... I'm still trying to construct how I'm going to be smooth, and whether or not I should wear my leather trench... oh fuck it.

Let's talk Doom 3 some more before we have a crying circle and start beating drums.

How many people think the Doom 3 guy should be named Flynn?

My vote?

FUCK NO.

deadnail said:

Flynn?

Better than Gary. Or Adam.

But not as good as Gustable Dingleberry. There is no better name than Gustable Dingleberry. He came into my mom's work once. He was cool :P

Hmm... forgot about Cliff Yablonski. He rules too.

I think flynn should be his middle name or nick name, wtf country would you name your kid "FLYNE" in though.

Hmm, I don´t get this video-store-girl story, I wasn´t here for a time...
But "Flynn": I think the arch evil end-of-the-game monster could have this name, but not our hero :)
My suggestion is a polish sounding name like Blaskovicz, the Wolfenstein guy.

Flynn Taggard... what the hell is that??

I´ve been thinking about the main character of the game. I´m surprised that no one has ever used this idea :

I´m tired of FPSs were the Army/Faction/Kingdom/Nation could
discard all their military forces, and have you as the only defense (wich proves to be wise in games like : DooM 1&2, Quake 1&2, Shogo, Half-Life, SoF, SiN, Blood, Duke Nukem, Jedi Knight, NOLF, Wolfenstein 1&2, Hexen 1&2, Heretic 1&2 and many others).

Instead of being THE GREAT SOLDIER OF THE APOCALYPSE, the game could be splited in several missions or episodes, whatever you might want to call them.
The game starts like Half-Life, a level were there´s no harm, could be a spaceship, a barrack, anything.
When chaos begins, the game behaves like a movie. Each time you finish one specific part, the action would focus on other character. To put it simply, take some 4 or 5 guys, and use them separatedly. They all start in different areas, but they all approach to their common objective, the Hell or whatever it might be.
They can help each other (no, no sidekicks), im talking of radio messages & stuff like that. It would be nice if you could find them personally on specific parts of the game, but they should stick to the "lone guy formula" of DooM (they would take sepparate paths). Some of the guys would die on a specific time of the game, in some kind of sacrifice for the sake of the mission.

In Doom 3 you should be able to name him whatever you want, and somehow, during scripted sequences, NPC's will pronounce it perfectly, not like a robot.

That would be nice, but unfortunately, today´s phonetic tech won´t spawn anything revolutionary by when D3 comes. The main drawback its the gallery of emotions that you can link to a word. Someday there will be no more speech audio files, just plain text, like a script, and some vars that defines character tone, emotion, voice, etc.

Malum Archon said:

In Doom 3 you should be able to name him whatever you want, and somehow, during scripted sequences, NPC's will pronounce it perfectly, not like a robot.

I would also be happy if I could name my alter ego just whatever I want. But for scripted scenes there is an easy solution without robotic pronounciation: the characters just call you "marine", "spacemarine", "corporal" or whatever, I think that would be ok. In addition to this you may read your individual name in messages during the game, in a computer note or sprayed at the wall as a warning :)

No comment, primarily because I'm starved for inspiration.

S./

Zaldron said:

Doom 1

There are other marines, but they're all killed

Doom 2

All other surviving humans have evacuated the planet

Quake 1

Ditto Doom 1

Quake 2

There are other marines, most get shot down, but you do actually see some getting killed with your own eyes (especially in The Reckoning mission pack).

Shogo

Never played it, so no comment.

Half-Life

There are LOADs of soldiers around, unfortunately they're the enemy. Most people who work at Black Mesa are killed, but there are several security officers around to help you out.

In HL: Opposing Force, you often meet up with other soldiers who help you out.

SoF

Never played, so no comment.

SiN

Most of the missions require stealth, so sending in huge teams would be a bit stupid.

Blood

You're betrayed by your former boss, so it makes sense that you're on your own.

Duke Nukem

Everyone else is killed or mutated by the aliens. Apparently Duke Nukem 4Ever will have friendly characters though.

Jedi Knight

There's often a lot of other people around to help you out, especially in the mission pack.

NOLF

It's inspired by James Bond, and that nearly always revolves around just one secret agent (i.e. Bond) and maybe a sidekick, apart from the huge battles that take place near the end of many of the films.

Wolfenstein

You're an escaped prisoner. It makes sense that there's no-one else to help you.

Spear of Destiny

You're a commando type, and they were often sent in alone to places during WW2.

Heretic, Hexen, Hexen 2, Heretic 2

Everyone else has been enslaved or killed.


I agree with you that there are very few FPS games where you have AI controlleed team mates for the entire game, or even most of it. The only two I can think of right now are Voyager: Elite Force (in which you have team mates in nearly all missions), and Daikatana.

There are plenty of FPS games where you can control the entire team, although most of them are army games. Space Hulk, a VERY old FPS (pre Wolfenstein) allowed you to control quite a large squad (I think it was five or six), and there's also an upcoming X-COM FPS that will be team based.

Alternatively, many of the games you mention can always be played in co-op :)

Zaldron said:

In addition to my previous post, here's some thoughts on your idea of having "episodes" focusing on different characters.

Basically there are three choices. Either each episode is set after each other, they're all set at the same time, or a combination of the two.

If they're set at the same time, perhaps you could actually see the other characters through windows or whatever, like in one of the missions in HL: Opposing Force where you see Gordon Freeman legging it into the dimensional rift.

If they're set after one another, seeing previous characters being killed or sacrificing themselves would indeed be a good idea, especially if you've become emotionally attached to them (of course a good story rather than just a "kill 'em all" type game would be needed for this); for example, in Ultima 7 Part 2, when Dupre sacrifices himself, it is actually pretty sad considering he's been a companion in all the previous games.

By the way, the two Quake 2 mission packs both focus on different marines and are both set at the same time as Quake 2, although they're all in completely different parts of the planet so you never meet up with each other.

The Doom guy should remain nameless, maybe just having a call sign like the Quake 2 guy.

Also, BURN THOSE DAMNED NOVELS!

NiGHTMARE said:

Ultima VII part II is a good example. It shows how a character can gain a lot of respect, admiration or even love with his actions and behavior. A good way to get good games is to make compelling characters. Each one with his own personality, and in this case, each one would acquire different weaponry, they would suffer different experiences, etc.

I like a combination of the two. It would be cool to have 2 or more characters solving certain mission at the same time. You would hear his radio messages & see him in certain places.

About the games I mentioned early, you´re right, everyone has an explanation. It´s just that i can´t imagine than no one ever makes some advance trought the game as you do.
There are some exceptions to the rule, in Hexen II Tiranyth travel through the 4 countries before you do, but dies on Eidolon´s Cathedral.
What i´m saying is that survivors would have to try to work together, not go by their own.
Seriously, what are the chances that one marine, a guy who is nothing more than a private, banquish an entire horde of demons who almost destroyed earth??
If we were talking of RPGs, that guy would be level 220.

I think the soldier you're playing shouldn't have a name so anyone could picture himself as the soldier...

Oh... and by the way... Good luck with that girl. I hope it 'll work out !

If Doom 3 is set years after Doom 2, it could be one of the Taggart family, example: Lloyd Taggart or John Taggart. As I don't think Flynn will still be alive.

Flynn is a candy ass name. "Look at me, my name is Flynn, want to hold hands with me and write a sonnet?"

The Doom guy needs a fuckin' cool name, either that or no name at all. In Doom and Doom 2 you never found out "The Doom Guy's" name, so why not leave it like that.

JudgeDooM said:

If Doom 3 is set years after Doom 2, it could be one of the Taggart family, example: Lloyd Taggart or John Taggart. As I don't think Flynn will still be alive.

kinda like the castlevania series right?? as far as the doomguy's name goes i dont care names arent that important to me as long as the gameplay is good