Doom 3: Phobos devblog update

[DoomUK]

A long-awaited twelfth update to Team Future's Phobos development blog is available to feast your eyes upon. Point your browsers towards the website for a bunch of awesome new screens and info.

[cbronson]

This is good news! Almost all of the big, ambitious projects that surfaced after D³ was released have died... :(

[DoomUK]

cbronson said:

Almost all of the big, ambitious projects that surfaced after D³ was released have died... :(

This is true :(

As outlined in the devblog, Phobos has had to be reduced in scope somewhat to what was originally planned; a triple-episode game featuring a total of twentysomething levels. But deciding to make a smaller mod has resulted in a case of "quality over quantity" I think. People are very hard at work on this thing producing something of exceptional quality.

[Mechadon]

Nice to see a new update! Yea that's too bad they had to cut down the number of maps. But quality over quantity is the way to go any day of the week, so I think that was a good choice. The screenshots still look beyond amazing too, so it looks like they are following that adage very well :)

Aaaand I still haven't found a copy of Doom 3 :P. All the stores around my area stopped carrying it. Guess I'll have to do some snooping around the internet for a copy.

[kristus]

You can probably get it cheap on Steam.

This looks very good. Few of the areas in the shots that I recognize. Seem like a lot has and is happening. I'll sure be looking forward to playing this when it's done.

[Creaphis]

Yeah, it'll be great to play one solid episode rather than nothing at all. Still, it's a shame that there won't be a "Hell episode," as making up for the minimal treatment of Hell in Doom 3 was one of the central goals of this project, I believe.

cbronson said:

Almost all of the big, ambitious projects that surfaced after D³ was released have died... :(

This, The Dark Mod, and Hexen: Edge of Chaos are still being worked on, so I'm happy.

[JadedLexi]

Yay!! Glad to know it's still alive and being worked on. :)

[printz]

kristus said:

This looks very good. Few of the areas in the shots that I recognize. Seem like a lot has and is happening. I'll sure be looking forward to playing this when it's done.

Weren't you working on this project?

[Pirx]

cbronson said:

This is good news! Almost all of the big, ambitious projects that surfaced after D³ was released have died... :(

why this? too complex, not interesting?

[Megamur]

I imagine it's hard to develop DOOM³ maps because of how complex they are, yes, but I assume a lot of it also has to do with how DOOM³ just wasn't very popular. It's also a bit inflexible for mod purposes, due to the harsh sort of way it renders lighting, and how basically all the stock resources are gray techbase and rocks and nothing else.

[Mithran Denizen]

Yeah, I've tried my hand at making some Doom 3 maps, and it's kind of tedious, with a lot more effort required to get reasonable results.

It's not really much harder than other 3D games, I guess; if you know how to lay down brushes and can half-ass some textures and models you can build a basic map, but it'll take a lot more attention and skill to make something comparable to the quality of the base game.

[kristus]

printz said:

Weren't you working on this project?

I was. But I'm not anymore. I sort of drifted away from it as I and the rest of the team didn't want the same things. Basically, they put a lot more focus on perfection than I did. I lost steam and in turn worked less and less until I didn't get anything done at all but only worked on personal projects instead.

Megamur said:

It's also a bit inflexible for mod purposes, due to the harsh sort of way it renders lighting, and how basically all the stock resources are gray techbase and rocks and nothing else.

Stop making up stuff and presenting them as facts.

[jerrysheppy]

Creaphis said:

Yeah, it'll be great to play one solid episode rather than nothing at all. Still, it's a shame that there won't be a "Hell episode," as making up for the minimal treatment of Hell in Doom 3 was one of the central goals of this project, I believe.

This is pretty much my reaction to a T. I don't fault them at all for having to scale back their project per se, but taking an approach that means it'll be almost entirely "Mars base" (even if on Phobos) pretty much kills 95% of my interest in their project. :(

[Megamur]

kristus said:

Stop making up stuff and presenting them as facts.

I admit to not having ever made any DOOM³ maps. Still, several DOOM³ mods I've seen that feature large outdoor locations had terrible, spotty lighting instead of making it look uniform and proper. However, maybe the level authors just didn't know what they were doing.

I stand by my original assessment of the limited texture options, though. At the very least, I've yet to see modders do anything with the stock resources beyond making caves and techbases.

[geX]

jerrysheppy said:

This is pretty much my reaction to a T. I don't fault them at all for having to scale back their project per se, but taking an approach that means it'll be almost entirely "Mars base" (even if on Phobos) pretty much kills 95% of my interest in their project. :(

You will still have hell areas scattered around the base. :)

[DoomUK]

Megamur said:

Still, several DOOM³ mods I've seen that feature large outdoor locations had terrible, spotty lighting instead of making it look uniform and proper. However, maybe the level authors just didn't know what they were doing.

You must be looking at the wrong examples. It's quite straightforward to light large and/or outdoor areas in Doom 3 in a realistic fashion. Obviously whatever you do isn't going to stand up to the capabilities of a more modern platform, but that's because we're dealing with a seven year old game. Perhaps the lighting of said areas a little tricky to get to grips with, but it's no steeper of a learning curve than figuring out all the other peculiars of Doom 3 mapping or level editing in general.