So how come people don't think Doom 3 is scary

[DefilerPhil47]

Scary is too strong of a word for Doom 3.  I would say it's intense, but mainly at the beginning of the game if its your first or second run through of the game.  When I first played Doom 3 for the first time, I was at the edge of my seat ; the environment and setting drew me in and I crept closer and closer to the screen, and then I got to one of the first jump Imp jump scares of the game, I fucking jumped!  It was pretty damn funny now that I think about it, but after the first few levels you fall into a groove, the game becomes a bit predictable, the darkness gets a little annoying because you actually just can't see much at all.  Jump scares lose their touch and right in the middle of the game there is a huge lull, where nothing is really happening and you just move through from point A to point B and shoot everything in between.  

[BLλZING_DUST]

Overused jumpscares, frustrating game mechanics, poor story writing and presence of combat.

 

If you want to genuinely scare me, give me a game that's alike Amnesia TDD or SOMA.

[Gerardo194]

Simple, we, the humans will always deny when we feel scared when we actually are. That's why some people say Doom 3 isn't scary. When you can say it isn't scary after all is when you get used to it.

[Cant delete my DW account]

Because it isn't,especially in BFG Edition.

[Reisal]

The BFG Edition ruins any semblance of tension or scariness by oversupplying you with health, armor and ammo. And lighting.

If Doom 3 used far fewer monster closets and relied more on the overall atmosphere that isn't too dark, it would have been more positive among fans. I personally like it for what it is, despite its flaws but I do like some of the unsettling moments mentioned earlier (Maggot intro, "They took my baby", Lost Soul intro, demon creature in the door in Communications, which this one noone mentioned). I can enjoy myself a B level sci-fi action horror FPS in the Doom universe.

[D4NUK1]

Because later is just a more action game, FEAR make better use of scary tactics and action game that Doom3, and that game also have closet monsters, the only thing that not have demons until much later, and is not like a really demon creature as Doom.

That maybe works if we overflow the doom campaing with more enemys, trying to keep you on your kness and the ammo is less and less. Like a FPS version of RE 1 or 2.

[ILOVEDOOM!]

On 10/23/2018 at 1:35 AM, Avoozl said:

I didn't exactly find it creepy but it did make me sick at some parts.

 

On 10/4/2018 at 6:38 PM, TakenStew22 said:

The only thing that truly "scared" me in Doom 3 was that cheap mirror jumpscare.

 

same

[DolphinPolice]

Fear is derived from a sense of being in danger, not from being danger itself.

[Raimund Clement]

Good topic, it’s only a pity that it is abandoned.

 

Personally, I think that Doom 3 would have won much more if two different teams had done it in parallel - for example, the Americans would have been responsible for the action and level design, but the Japanese would have done the plot and the horror component.

 

I know it sounds stupid, but remember how bad (by all accounts) Silent Hill Homecoming was - because of a too exaggerated sense of fear, American developers could not create a truly atmospheric game, limiting themselves to ordinary screamers and other attributes of modern horror films. But this game was released four years after Doom 3!

 

It seems that in the beginning of the 2000s there was a fashion for horror in shooters, and id Softweir Publishing House could not find a balance between this fashion and their best “recipe for shooters”, which is why Doom 3 came out as a rather ambiguous game (which I like, do not think!), which left an unpleasant residue on the series until Doom 2016.

 

I mean, the game should use less screamers, and focus on the atmosphere of loneliness and fear, removing these ridiculous Swann with Campbell and Sergeant, and exchange Betruger for the off-screen forces of Hell. Indeed, when you see that the instigator of all this nightmare is a nervous old man, then a doubt creeps in about the seriousness of what is happening.

 

Oh yes, and the main character - sorry for the expression - a dumb puppet with a gun. After the super-elaborated story of Silent Hill 2 (year of release - 2001), it is not very interesting to play the supposedly “horror” Doom 3, because we do not expect anything from the main character - no phrases, no flashbacks, or even a little bit of normal motivation. In the manual for the original game, at least we were told the reason for the appearance of the hero on Phobos, and in the "remake" - the reason for the arrival of unmotivated arrival in Mars City. :facespalm:

 

If, apart from me and Bratish, there would be a 3D designer, levelmaker and screenwriter in our Fatal Deminity Crew, then I think we could create an acceptable story in which the main character - an ordinary person - flew to a hotel located on the Moon, and there he was expected would his "shattered forgotten memories" mixed with the synergy of our version of Hell. Like Silent-Hill-in-Space. But all this is a dream, alas...

[snapshot]

I had a relative of mine play through it for some time yesterday, surprisingly he found it scary, said the way the screen shakes when he gets hit or shot gave him heart attacks. He would have probably changed his mind if he got to play it more. I always thought they went overboard with that thing, but that was probably the point.

Edited December 27, 2019 by sluggard

[diosoth]

The problem is... you expect it. You know what's coming. It's not a surprise when you're ready for the next enemy popping out.

 

The low monster encounters don't help either, which is a problem with most games since the 3D era began. It's usually 1 or 2 monsters at a time- th emost I've had so far in my current play is 4 and it's usually the zombies with low AI and simpler models in such groups. You won't find yourself in a room with 5-10 enemies all of a sudden. The silent Marine that gives this "bleh, what now?" impression of everything around him(he only ever seems to get terrified when he crawls under the Cyberdemon) probably also makes it feel like he's just handling this like anything else.

[Nnja]

I played Doom 3 twice really in my life.

 

My first encounter was the first time I'd ever played a Doom game. My system wasn't up to scratch and the frame rate made it impossible to play so I shelved it and got a copy of Doom and Doom II to play instead. I do remember perceiving it as somewhat scary - maybe due to the lighting and general environment style but didn't get far enough to appreciate it.

 

The second time around was late last year (had not played Doom 2016 by this point). I played roughly to the end of Communications but got bored and 2016 was burning a hole in my Steam library. I think my main problem was that the game incorporates some aspects which create 'fear', the woman's voices, I liked how the Cacodemon popped out the Garage floor on Communications (although I thought the Cacos were poor) and I recall opening a door into a corridor where there was a stack of boxes which what I was 60% sure were glowing eyes in the shadow behind, upon investigation behind the boxes, there was nothing which could have created the two dots - That aspect should have been focused more on, rather than teleporting enemies in behind the player and walking bullet sponge former humans out from dark corners (why are they there anyway, why don't they stand in the middle of the room?).

 

Overall I distinctly remember some of Doom 1 being more 'scary' than Doom 3 - maybe tense is the word I'm looking for really. I feel Doom 3 missed the mark by trying too hard and it's a shame. I probably ought to finish it but I'm just not interested.

[Adekis]

YouTuber Noah Caldwell-Gervais makes a good observation that it's not really "horror," it's more like the horror of a "b-movie," designed more to make you go "okay, where's the next one coming from?" than to actually unnerve you. I'm paraphrasing. But I really think that's right. There are horror elements to Doom 3, it's horror flavored, but it's not a horror game. How can it be? There's a hard limit on horror when you can become a Berserker-Packin'-Man-And-A-Half!

 

But still, I love Doom 3.

[OliveTree]

I dont find Doom 3 scary so much as heavy. It feels relentless in its traps and such, giving and taking supplies in a way that makes you feel oppressed despite usually being exceptionally well armed. There's an element of playfulness that doesn't get it's due credit. It's sadistic stuff, on harder difficulties.

[DavitW]

The only time I can recall getting spooked by Doom 3 was a level where a spider comes out from behind a computer screen, I fucking shit. Other than than I prefer more ambient horror than the jumpscares Doom 3 relies on. The atmosphere can be decent at times, but when almost the whole game's dark hallways and blood covered walls it starts to lose its effect.

[⇛Marnetmar⇛]

Because Doom 3 isn't a horror game. It's an action game with scary things that happen in it. The proper building blocks that would make it a horror game aren't there. 

[Deleted_Account]

Doom 3 still manages to give me a good fright.

[Tetzlaff]

On 4/4/2020 at 3:35 AM, Marn said:

Because Doom 3 isn't a horror game. It's an action game with scary things that happen in it. The proper building blocks that would make it a horror game aren't there. 

 

Why? It's not a Survival Horror, but a horror game for sure.

[warman2012]

From my perspective, the graphics sucked ass, even for its day. Everything was too either dark or lit up to properly be a horror game. The soundtrack wasn't too particularly evoking something to be scared of. Scenery for the most part was constant metal corridors with some blood on them which tends to become bland after two hours or so. All the enemies looked like melted ballsacks. I think they tried a more lovecraftian element, but that failed, at least for me. The pinkie and cacodemon are by far the worst incarnations in this game. 

[Tetzlaff]

8 hours ago, warman2012 said:

The pinkie and cacodemon are by far the worst incarnations in this game. 

 

In my perception it's the complete opposite! The original Pinky is such a goofy, silly looking thing with it's oversized head, the comically small arms and the big glowing eyes. The Doom 3 demon on the other hand looks like a brutal beast that's there to hunt and kill you.

[hybridial]

I'd say overall not many games have legitimately scared me. Doom 3 is certainly not one of them because it is just too much of an action game. Like the later Resident Evil games, the attempts to bring in tension really don't work. I wouldn't call classic Resident Evil scary but it could at least be creepy and offer some tension. I'd also say Quake's sound and level aesthetics were so good it managed it too. 

 

I feel it quite notable is to say one game that legitimately scared me, was Clock Tower. The original Clock Tower. On the SNES. That game is terrifying at various points. It has excellent atmosphere and graphics for the time, and when I watched some of the horror movies of Dario Argento, the influence there is pretty obvious. Silent Hill, Siren and Fatal Frame were pretty effective too. Almost all the horror games I really liked were made in Japan, I don't know why but those all just seemed to get the memo better than any western horror games I can think of.