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Kinsie

Five Years And Nothing To Show: How Doom 4 Got Off Track

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printz said:

One of the things from the reviewers that annoyed the shit out of me when Doom 3 came out was comparing it with other games I don't care about, such as Far Cry or Half-Life 2.

Yes how silly of those reviews to compare a high profile first person shooter with other high profile shooters that where out at the time.

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GoatLord said:

Two things:

1) Doom 3 was already behind the times when it came out. It was seen as old hat in comparison to deeper shooters like Half-Life 2. And on top of that, I don't think it was a particularly good translation. Too many things made it feel like a completely different game than what Doom in 3D should have been.

2) I'm not saying that the final product that is Doom was how id imagined it. I'm saying that the gameplay elements have a certain idiosyncratic nature to them that would be awkward on a modern engine.


by you got to give thumb to John Carmack and his tech4 engine, right?? it was doing something revolution, such as normal mapping, and by that combine with real time dynamic lighting, it can make low poly objects appear complex/high poly, in short, using lower power to give the illusion of much higher graphic power!!

Doom 3 was trying anything too new, and it was trying to stay close to its root, some people complaint linear gameplay, but isn't it how classic doom did it back then?? the production team knew they were doing something not too different form the old doom, cause if they did, would you complaint about it being "non-doom"??

and answering to your previous post, when you say "I'd like to know how id expects to take a cartoonish, unrealistically fast, labyrinthine, somewhat surreal, non-representational 2.5d shooter and expect to translate it to today's market."

this is who they did it with Doom 3, they reinvented it, yes, after what we have seen in Doom 3, we can say, hmm, not necessary a good idea, but you have to understand that that was the first time they reinventing doom, and thats the decision they took, and it pretty damn good, we can say it now cause we actually have classic doom and doom 3 on the table to compare. I know, people would have wanting a pure demon butt kicking like the old doom, but isn't that what Id gonna do (I hope :/) in Doom 4?? and Doom 3 is a good game in its own right, just not 100% doom, thats all.

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I wish I still had access to that review of Doom 3 that linguica wrote on a now defunct website (called failmath or something) we he describes with more whit and finesse then I can muster that Doom was remembered as two different games, one as super action shoot 'em up demon slay-a-thon where you just slaughtered demons all the time with impunity (basically this) and the other where doom was this borderline survival horror game where oh man you better save all your bullets because the next demons will wreck your shit and man just forget about those two guys at the end man! They're just impossible! (basically this)

Despite these versions of doom being being seemingly at odds, neither of these versions of doom is %100 incorrect, so id tried to recreate both of these ideas into doom 3, where it had the look and feel of a survival horror game with the manics and damage model of a far more action heavy game.

Result was... controversial. Doom 3 has it's fans, but I think it's safe to say that most fans of the original game where somewhat disappointed.

and now the popular narrative of doom looks like... This:


Thanks to Serious Sam and Painkiller being constantly compared to doom by people who've obviously never actually played doom.

Turning into a Painkiller Clone is what I'm worried about. I would honestly rather it be another Half-Life wannabe (though not a Call of Duty wannabe at all ever god damn.)

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Captain Red said:

I wish I still had access to that review of Doom 3 that linguica wrote on a now defunct website (called failmath or something) we he describes with more whit and finesse then I can muster that Doom was remembered as two different games, one as super action shoot 'em up demon slay-a-thon where you just slaughtered demons all the time with impunity and the other where doom was this borderline survival horror game where oh man you better save all your bullets because the next demons will wreck your shit and man just forget about those two guys at the end man! They're just impossible!

Despite these versions of doom being being seemingly at odds, neither of these versions of doom is %100 incorrect, so id tried to recreate both of these ideas into doom 3, where it had the look and feel of a survival horror game with the manics and damage model of a far more action heavy game.

Result was... controversial. Doom 3 has it's fans, but I think it's safe to say that most fans of the original game where somewhat disappointed.

and now the popular narrative of doom looks like... This:

Thanks to Serious Sam and Painkiller being constantly compared to doom by people who've obviously never actually played doom.

Turning into a Painkiller Clone is what I'm worried about. I would honestly rather it be another Half-Life wannabe (though not a Call of Duty wannabe at all ever god damn.)


It BOILS my blood whenever I hear someone wishing Doom 3 were more like Serious Sam. They have NOTHING and I mean NOTHING in common except a few SUPERFICIAL similarities. I get even angrier when I hear Painkiller is the "real" Doom 3.

PLEASE get that article somehow so that we can slap some sense into people.

People also fail to realize just how better Doom 3 was than most modern shooters. The levels are not nearly as linear, cutscenes are quite sparse and it's not a damn console port.

I agree about the seemingly clashing versions of Doom. It seems that in Doom 3 they were unsure about where to take the franchise. Besides the darkness, perhaps the most controversial issue were the monster closets. The fact is that monster closets were very much in the original. Let me give you an example. In E1M3, in the Red Key room, you are in a relatively confined space with a key flashing in front of you. As soon as you pick it up, the lights go out and a closet of imps opens behind you. Sounds familiar? The problem in Doom 3 is that every good thing taken out of the original (darkness, general moodiness and monster closets) were overused. They paid little homage to the other aspects of Doom such as clever monster placement and good combat.Why? As I said, maybe they were unsure what else made Doom such a great game OR maybe they thought that after so much time the perception of Doom had diluted in the minds of people and remembered Doom only because it was scary. I'm not speaking of Doomworld of course, I expect people here to know that Doom is more than just having 30 enemies on screen.

I very much agree about the Half Life sentiment, they have much more in common to be completely honest. Speaking of which, how is Doom 3 inferior to the original Half Life?Sure it's a copy but people generally say that it's worse than HL. Why exactly?

EDIT: This article should be the Doom anthem http://vectorpoem.com/news/?p=74

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I've realized recently that I have a really hard time picturing what I think Doom 4 should look and play like. I usually end up picturing something akin to Doom 64, because it fully retained the original's spirit while focusing on a slower, scarier, more puzzle-driven style of gameplay, as well as establishing a new but appropriate art style. In a lot of ways, it was more effective at being Doom 3 than Doom 3. id needs to recognize the need to horrify players while satisfying their trigger fingers.

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Since i not quite sure DooM 4 will be a great game, i wish they try it hard.

I want to kill demons, lot of them, but not as you said, the same way Serious Sam did or Painkiller. (SS3 gameplay was quite good, but the maps arent)

The main difference are the maps. Great non-linear maps that offered great gameplay: fast and furious battles where you need to move and evade all weird fireballs, plasma, rockets, etc. Huge spaces to battle, not scripted, let the ia fight! And monster in-fight.

I wish to expect nearly to zero videos, maybe some radio speak as little as Quake 2 in order to make replay much better (if DooM needs a tutorial, you are doing it wrong). Let the history of the game be told by the maps (For example, the old Duke Nukem 3d can tell you an history just for the different maps you go through)

I want to be alone, fighting the demon spawn. Looking how miserable is hell turning our reality. A desperate fight, something that i will never win. A game, that will be never do. Maybe.

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Naitguolf said:

Since i not quite sure DooM 4 will be a great game, i wish they try it hard.

I want to kill demons, lot of them, but not as you said, the same way Serious Sam did or Painkiller. (SS3 gameplay was quite good, but the maps arent)

The main difference are the maps. Great non-linear maps that offered great gameplay: fast and furious battles where you need to move and evade all weird fireballs, plasma, rockets, etc. Huge spaces to battle, not scripted, let the ia fight! And monster in-fight.

I wish to expect nearly to zero videos, maybe some radio speak as little as Quake 2 in order to make replay much better (if DooM needs a tutorial, you are doing it wrong). Let the history of the game be told by the maps (For example, the old Duke Nukem 3d can tell you an history just for the different maps you go through)

I want to be alone, fighting the demon spawn. Looking how miserable is hell turning our reality. A desperate fight, something that i will never win. A game, that will be never do. Maybe.


though i don't share exact your desire, but I think you have got good insight! something the mega corp publisher seldom have...

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Gruson said:

Doom 4 must have what Doom 1 and 2 had:

- Great soundtrack for each level. Everyone knows the Doom music. Keep it simple and memorable like a movie score. No heavy metal or songs.
- Classic monsters. Pinky, Cacodemon, Imps, Cyberdemon, etc. They all had a great look with their own sound effects and quirks. ;)
-Deathmatch. It has to have fast action paced deathmatch.
-Fun levels. Keep them simple yet fun and a little challenging but don't go overboard.
-Doom 3 failed because it lacked these things. They tried to do way too much with it and forgot their Doom roots.
-All of the weapons from Doom 1 and 2. We must have that classic BFG again!

In other words, just give us more levels and make the graphics a little better but keep everything else the same. :)


This is exactly the kind of attitude that led to all the whining about Doom 3. I took the ridiculous approach of actually listening to the developers when they said to expect a re-imagining of Doom using modern tech. You went into it expecting a $60 glorified source port. As a result, I thoroughly enjoyed D3 and you were disappointed.

There were things wrong with Doom 3. But there were things wrong with the original games too *gasp* I hope nobody here has a nervous breakdown. I LOVE the old Dooms. I just got done with another playthrough a few weeks ago. I play them over and over. But I loved Doom 3 as well, and if they don't botch it up with all the gimmicky crap in most modern shooters, I hope I'll love Doom 4 too. That was what Doom 3 did right, they implemented some modern elements but nothing too fancy. If you just want Doom with better graphics, your needs have already been met by the Community.

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Face23785 said:

There were things wrong with Doom 3. But there were things wrong with the original games too *gasp* I hope nobody here has a nervous breakdown. I LOVE the old Dooms. I just got done with another playthrough a few weeks ago. I play them over and over. But I loved Doom 3 as well, and if they don't botch it up with all the gimmicky crap in most modern shooters, I hope I'll love Doom 4 too. That was what Doom 3 did right, they implemented some modern elements but nothing too fancy. If you just want Doom with better graphics, your needs have already been met by the Community.


I think thats true too!!

p.s not kissing ass around here!

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What I can't understand is why games like Duke Nukem 3D get the advanced graphics mods like polymer bumpmapping while Doom doesn't. :/

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Avoozl said:

What I can't understand is why games like Duke Nukem 3D get the advanced graphics mods like polymer bumpmapping while Doom doesn't. :/


Im sure we will get there, the future is 3D bump mapped Doom with amazing 3D models and cool effects, while still having the same amazing game play as the originals :)

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There's either going to be a shortage of artistic/consistent talent, or simply not enough manpower, for something of that scale to turn out as anything other than disappointing.

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bcwood16 said:

Im sure we will get there, the future is 3D bump mapped Doom with amazing 3D models and cool effects, while still having the same amazing game play as the originals :)


when you say 3d bump mapping, did you mean normal mapping (used in Doom3), or something new, next gen stuff??

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Face23785 said:

This is exactly the kind of attitude that led to all the whining about Doom 3. I took the ridiculous approach of actually listening to the developers when they said to expect a re-imagining of Doom using modern tech. You went into it expecting a $60 glorified source port. As a result, I thoroughly enjoyed D3 and you were disappointed.


You hit it dead-center.

Face23785 said:

There were things wrong with Doom 3. But there were things wrong with the original games too *gasp* I hope nobody here has a nervous breakdown. I LOVE the old Dooms.


And I'm surprised by how many people never seem to be able to acknowledge this. The original Dooms weren't perfect games; they were awesome games that came out at the perfect time.

Honestly, I get so tired of people who see the original Doom games as so much more than they actually were, because they can never take off their nostalgia glasses.

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Caffeine Freak said:

You hit it dead-center.



And I'm surprised by how many people never seem to be able to acknowledge this. The original Dooms weren't perfect games; they were awesome games that came out at the perfect time.

Honestly, I get so tired of people who see the original Doom games as so much more than they actually were, because they can never take off their nostalgia glasses.


Boss battles and fugly Doom 2 levels say hello. In any medium whether it be books or movies, when something becomes a classic, any argument that it is not entirely perfect gets laughed at.

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There was another game that rebooted several times before it was shit out. It didn't kick the ass it claimed to.

Unless this is only the story in the game manual this seems like a problem >> 'In Doom 4, you’d play as an average human being who was gradually cajoled into joining the Resistance—a ragtag group of civilians and military—to help fight legions of demons that were invading Earth. It was... cinematic.'

That's not what Doom is.

Doom 4 won't do CoD numbers. Trying to reach those numbers just means they'll go bankrupt before the game is ever released.

Another problem >> 'It’s not just the demons: everything around you is changing. Humans are starting to struggle to go through an environment that is partially familiar, partially unknown now.”'

^^^ Great... hope I get to shoot them after a 2 minute cut scene about the inner struggle they're going through and how they want to die before they're a zombie. Are Oscars given away for video games? No? Well then... let me shoot things.

'When Id's management finally did look at the game, they decided that it didn't live up to their expectations.'

^^^ And it never will. It will never be Doom. That's why they just need to give it another title.

'ZeniMax decided to start getting more involved with Id’s development process.' >> Someone has to. You know maybe ID needs to hire a project manager that has done big games like GTA, Elder Scrolls or God of War. Someone that can herd cats (cats love boxes).

'John Carmack got up in front of everyone and said something like, "Doom means two things: demons and shotguns."' >> At least one person gets it. Good thing he works for them.

'One source described the scene as a “power struggle,” as managers from both Rage and Doom 4 tried to figure out how to merge their teams.' >> See that's a problem. You two.... fight to the death. The winner will run the whole thing. You now have more manpower. Use it to get more done in the same amount of time.

“[The story] again became lame and unfit for a late night sci-fi channel” >> What's this I keep reading about a story? See read the shotguns and demon part. The only story should be.... I the player use my shotgun to shoot demons. It doesn't need to be Half-Life 1. It can be Doom 2. Mario has been saving a princess for 25+ years.

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Oh wow, another disillusioned 90's gamer who will never be satisfied with anything other than the same old thing, over and over again.


I dunno, I thought Doom 3 was a boring slog, and there are newer games I do like. It's not about being biased toward newer releases, it's that the straight line corridors connected by cutscenes model is incredibly uninteresting and provides dick all replayability.

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Caffeine Freak said:

Oh wow, another disillusioned 90's gamer who will never be satisfied with anything other than the same old thing, over and over again.


Doom 3 kinda felt like a new HL1. Its all been done before. I also enjoyed Doom 3 for what it was. And again the dissatisfaction that any new Doom will bring compared to the old is why I say... don't call it Doom.

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The fact that Doom 3 BFG edition threw away mod support concerns not to mention the dumbing down of it, Doom 4 might not ever have mod support.

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Doom used to make the standard.... not catch up to it.

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Time's have changed. DOOM did the right thing in the right time. It's not really about some kind of perfect balance or magnificent design. It just happened to pull the right strings at the right moment. That's it. With the current size and state of the industry, even if you make a groundbreaking game, it still won't have the same kind of impact.

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Touchdown said:

Time's have changed. DOOM did the right thing in the right time. It's not really about some kind of perfect balance or magnificent design. It just happened to pull the right strings at the right moment. That's it. With the current size and state of the industry, even if you make a groundbreaking game, it still won't have the same kind of impact.


Yeah...that's something to think about.

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We just want the game. What we all want is different. But with a 5+ year dev cycle, they should have Skyrim or GTA ready :-) Know what other games took 5+ years? Duke Forever and Aliens Colonial Marines.

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I hope we'll get some comments on the subject at QuakeCon. Considering the current version is barely 1,5 years old, there's zero chance for a reveal this year.

One of the things I'm curious about is whether they're going down the currently popular way and making it cross-generational or jumping straight into next gen (PC, PS4, XBO). I'd prefer the second option but I think that's unlikely.

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Avoozl said:

The fact that Doom 3 BFG edition threw away mod support concerns not to mention the dumbing down of it, Doom 4 might not ever have mod support.

Technically that is not true. They just severely raised the bar for modders. In simply just releasing the source code. It's perfectly moddable, Just that you can't do it easily.

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The five year development cycle pretty much confirms that those leaked shots were legit. Along with the fact that they were described as not representing what we'll actually see, when id could have easily said, "That's not Doom 4." Disappointing, since 1) Those shots, while not at all ugly, didn't look at all like they were from the current generation, and 2) were completely uninspired, especially the human models.

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Since Doom 4 will take place on Earth (supposedly) and people are calling it Call of Doom.... why not switch gears and make it Grand Theft Doom?

And if they got so far... why not just put it in a box and ship it? Even if Doom 4 sucks it still makes money and Doom 5 will be better. While I know you want a top quality product, you also want to make money. Hmmm I guess Gearbox does that :-(

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id is putting a lot of pressure on themselves to make a good product. This is both good and bad. That attitude is certainly what put killed DNF. I don't think it'll take another decade to release the game though.

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I think DNF ran out of money a while ago and Gearbox just scooped it up and shit out out. Nostalgia. Remember Duke? Buy it now! Remember Aliens? By it now! Remember Doom? Bai it now!

It'll come out to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Doom 2 :-)

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