Ubik

TWO. BILLION. TRITES. :D

I need to get back in the habit of finishing music, maybe this can kickstart me back into it. "Industrial" is what they're mostly looking for, eh? I wonder if they mean Skinny Puppy, or Einstürzende Neubauten, or Coil... :D

I imagine that'd work well with lots of the figures. :D And you could include different guns with the zombies and Doomguy, like G.I. Joe figures. Hell, you could even give the Cyberdemon interchangeable weapons for his arm. I'd like them to look the way they do in Doom. No more, no less. And a Cacodemon with an articulated mouth would undeniably rock.

No, the musician's name is definetely Bobby Prince.

I haven't had many dreams about playing Doom, but ever since I started playing the game - even when I took a long hiatus from it - I've had Doom architecture show up extremely often in them. I'm talking the general look and feel of the levels, even if nothing is going on in them. Although I did once have a dream that presaged Hell Revealed-type gameplay: zillions of monsters (including a dozen Pain Elementals) swarming around a series of generic platform-type buildings. I can't describe it much more clearly than that, as it was ages and ages ago.

I feel the same way, mostly, but I think there are some ideas executed in Doom WADs that would work extremely well in Doom 3, and I'd like to see some of those.

I don't think there's a single redesign that I dislike, but there are a few instances where I either appreciate the original Doom design more, or consider the two either too different or too similar to really compare. I thought the Imp was an excellent redesign, making it more predatory and alien. The Pinky redesign was pure awesomeness. The Revenant and Arch-Vile were both nearly identical to their originals, while the Mancubus merely had a few enhancements. The Cacodemon was a brilliant redesign, and the Hell Knight was more predatorily threatening than his goat-legs counterpart. The Lost Soul is entirely different, but a totally excellent concept and execution. And the Cyberdemon is simply a different interpretation of all the aspects that made the original so awesome. Quite frankly, all I really missed were the Mastermind and Arachnotron. All the new designs were satisfying.

Atheism is not technically a religion, but it can be more properly viewed as a theological perspective; that is, a viewpoint about the subject of supreme powers that categorically denies their existence. It's also true that atheism can be viewed as a religion in that its adherents are often equally guilty of the flaws, mistakes and hubris ascribed to religious belief; I've known more than a few atheists who were as contemptuous and misunderstanding of Christianity as some Christians are of Islam, and this relationship exists between pretty much every theological perspective. And mekka is correct in saying that it's absurd to believe that all the demonic references and such in the Doom games can be written off as an "alien civilization;" it's pretty obviously intended to be the Hell most commonly imagined by Christians. It doesn't promote Christianity or imply any sort of belief or faith, but simply uses the (understandably fascinating!) premise of a Hell (of any sort) to create a SF/horror combo platter. The concept of Hell exists in several faiths, and exists as a cultural meme even in secular societies. There's no conflict there, simply the use of a cultural idea to make a kickass game. And, as cultural archetypes go, it's a particularly interesting one if you ask me.

IT'S A FREAKING GAME I don't need to believe that eating flowers allows me to throw fireballs in real life to enjoy Super Mario Bros., why would a game's inclusion of Hell faze my agnosticism? Although I do confess a certain fascination with all the different versions of Hell out there.

A full reproduction of Hell Revealed map24. Just to see how many CPUs it'd fry. :D

On the "fire not giving light" point: I believe that in Paradise Lost, Milton asserted that Hell was a pit of flame that gave no light, and was a place of ultimate darkness. I could be mistaken, though, since it's been a long time since I've read it. I absolutely love Doom 3, but there are several qualms I have with it: -Not enough time in Hell. The quest for the Soulcube should have at least been longer and more epic, instead of being a quick jaunt through Hell to get to the Guardian. -Too many Imps, not enough of some of the other monsters (especially Mancubi, Hell Knights and Vagaries). I got particularly annoyed when Imps started spawning in every other step of the way, and they started becoming more of a hassle than a genuinely threatening enemy. -I hate excessive gimmick bosses, and the Cyberdemon was disappointing; not visually or viscerally, but the fact that he could only be harmed with the Soulcube took a lot out of it. -Betruger needed less cheesy, reverbed threatening and more visceral, physical villainy. Other than that, I really enjoyed and appreciated most of the game's aspects.

Excellent-looking Caco there, man :)

Skeleton hockey.

It seems a pretty safe assumption that Betruger was actually a demon in disguise all along. Consider the fact that "Betruger" is German for "deceiver" (although technically it's Betrüger, or Betrueger, changing the proper pronunciation some), implying that Betruger's intent and methodology were deceptive all along, hiding some larger and more sinister goal behind his actions. Also consider the plot point that the demons had occupied Earth before, and were eager to take it again; therefore, that would give them not only sufficient motivation for a sneak attack on Earth, but the possible foresight and knowledge of human affairs to do so. A sufficiently powerful and intelligent demon would no doubt be able to "project" a human image onto the human plane of existence, or at least occupy a human body, and direct circumstances towards a condition most accomodating to a demonic invasion. Betruger's face being at the end of the demon's tongue could mean a number of things (there's a symbolic connotation of the demon "speaking through" Betruger), but most likely it was just meant to convey the fact: "HEY! BETRUGER WAS A DEMON ALL ALONG!" There's also the off-chance that Betruger was indeed human, and had made a deal with Hell that, upon his failure, earned him some real estate in the doubtlessly foul regions of a demon's maw. But it seems more likely that, if that were the case, we'd see Betruger burning in a lake of fire or being physically eaten by the gargoyle instead. I was kinda hoping that Betruger would be more of a Faustian character - that is, an actual human with more personality than just plain villainy, who gets his comeuppance later - but I suppose that'd be too much complexity for a FPS plot. :)

Revenant sniping a Commando with rockets. Amusing to see.

The only part of the game that's disappointed me so far is that nobody's said, "Get your ass to Mahs."

Oh, quit bitching. XP is seventeen orders of magnitude better and more stable than 98 anyway.

Email sent.

The new Caco, from what I can tell, looks fantastic. I don't know what the hell is wrong with you naysayers.

MONOCLES FLYING HIGH Now I need to get a 9800Pro before August! :o

"Grand Heresiarch" could work.

A Gateway 486DX2-50. I remember the company made a big deal about it having an 8-bit sound card, a 2MB video card, and a whopping 420MB of hard drive space!

That is one of the most colossally stupid things I've ever heard. And "destroy the monotheistic religions?" OOH, how hardcore. [insert rolleyes here]

http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~ubik/doomrock.jpg ???

All I have to say is: fucking awesome. :D