DOOM III This Summer

Crusader writes "Activision and id Software have issued a press release announcing that DOOM III will be released this summer. A Linux client has also been in development alongside the requisite Win32 version."

Comments

w00t!

[Anonymous Coward]

No need to splurge on sunscreen this year - I won't be outside except to go buy more beer!

Re:w00t!

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

No need to splurge on sunscreen this year - I won't be outside except to go buy more beer!

I'd buy the bottle of sunscreen just in case, if I were you...

Re:w00t!

[the_thunderbird]

Waddya mean beer, if you drink too much of it, you will pass out! Forget the SUN screen in the UK we have no sun at the moment... BUT! What we really need is caffine... Lots and Lots and Lots of caffine... mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm caffine!!! I think I will take a week off from the day I get a copy my week will be: doom III, caffine, doom III, caffine... oh and maybe a couple hours sleep inbetween caffine and doom III every 20 hours or so... :P w00t!!!

Re:w00t!

[flewp]

Waddya mean beer, if you drink too much of it, you will pass out! Forget the SUN screen in the UK we have no sun at the moment... BUT! What we really need is caffine... Lots and Lots and Lots of caffine... mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm caffine!!! I think I will take a week off from the day I get a copy my week will be: doom III, caffine, doom III, caffine... oh and maybe a couple hours sleep inbetween caffine and doom III every 20 hours or so... :P w00t!!!

Dude, you've already had way too much caffiene, chill out.

Re:w00t!

[the_thunderbird]

Very true... I have been drinking too much caffine, I can already sense my heart not liking me anymore... Been a very busy programmer!

Deja Vu?

[ViNsAniTy]

Wasn't this announcement made the same time last year?....and the year before that....and the year before that...

Re:Deja Vu?

[j4ck50n]

no, that was aforementioned DNF and HL2. Id seems to be able to actually follow thru on their dates.

Re:Deja Vu?

[irokitt]

Up until now, the official quote from Id has been "when it's done". Other sources have hinted at release dates, but this is the first solid date that has been set by Id.

Re:Deja Vu?

[gabec]

I'd say that was a great example of a flame backfiring, wouldn't you?

Re:Deja Vu?

[mobby_6kl]

>..the official quote from Id has been "when it's done".

uhh.. I thought "when it's done" was copyrighted by 3DRealms...

Final Version

[UnkyHerb]

I anticipated this game more than any other game ever I think. I wonder how much different the final version will be from the alpha that I played so long ago. Trent Reznor's soundtrack will be a definite plus as well!

Re:Final Version

[Hatta]

What's the story on Reznor and Doom III? I heard he left the project to work on a new album. Anyone know if he left in the early stages, or if most of the work was done before he left? I hope his work is a major part of the project, the man's a fucking brilliant musician and a flat out genius at sound engineering.

Re:Final Version

[Anonymous Coward]

I heard he left the project to work on a new album.

What new album? Don't listen to that Trent fanboy bullshit. He won't be making anything new.

Re:Final Version

[nomadic]

I wonder how much different the final version will be from the alpha that I played so long ago.

Which alpha? Doom, Doom II, Quake, Quake 2, or Quake 3? It's all the same game, just with progressively better graphics. It would be nice if they got their inspiration from something other than bad heavy metal album covers.

Re:Final Version

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm just glad that a company (iD) actually spends time on a game making a QUALITY release. I have gotten tired of games that rush to make a release date, and when you purchase the game, it lacks in so many features and you get a billion patches in the first week. I'd much rather wait for a game for a long time and get a single quality release (not to mention linux client alongside the win32 one), and be able to play a quality game out of the box.

Well, I hope so at least, we'll see what this game looks like when it comes out. oh and, to iD, I don't mind the wait, as long as the game is GOOD!

Re:Final Version

[karnifex]

Oh really?

Re:Final Version

[F34nor]

Look at this game it's a horror version of Halflife. THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT THE GAME. This is the last engine that they are making, Caramack says that it will do anything he ever wanted and so he's done. All he wants is to create a structure for you to hang your own game on. Its exactly like Lukas and the "new" StarWars movies no story, only a paradigm shit for the industry.

So go on, go make that bunny shaving game you always wanted, make it for all of us.

Re:Final Version

[brsmith4]

From what I have read, Trent was supposedly involved in the design of the sound engine and most of the sampling that is part of the game (he was a CE or EE student at some point in the past). When you get the game, you will know if it was Trent or not.

Re:Final Version

[brsmith4]

But I am probably grossly mistaken. ;)

Re:Final Version

[king-manic]

wait wait wait, then wouldn't Half life be a B-movie rip off od Doom. (since doom 3 and doom have the same story).

Re:Final Version

[warrax_666]

[...]only a paradigm shit for the industry

Freudian slip?

Re:Final Version

[yerfatma]

Good point. I never even considered "shift" as a possibility. In fact, I'm going to start babbling half-baked ideas and explain I'm just providing a paradigm shit, like a one-man brainstorm held on the hopper.

Re:Final Version

[SillyNickName4me]

The quality will be the engine, not the game.

While at their time, Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake were more or less ground breaking as a game also (tho Quake less so already, it was a bit more about technology there),

It is interesting that this is one from the Doom series, one that has so far been ruled by 'pseudo 3d' engines as opposed to Quake series real 3d engines.

At any rate, in the last half decade or so, ID's main market seems to have been resellign its engine to others who build cool content for it (Return to Castle WOlfenstein comes to mind), which finally resulted in onw of the 3 games so far that has managed to keep my attention for more then a few months, Enemy Territory (thanks again for giving away this superb game, Activision, Spashdamage and all others involved, and thanks to all the great mapmakers out there ;)

The cool stuff is not Quake 3 itself but its engine, and in a way that has been true ever since Doom II. Somehow I have little doubt that this will prove true for Doom III as well.

On another note, does that mean we are gonna get a GPLed Q3 engine? that would rock.. seeign what people are doing with maps (and mods not that the ET sources are available) makes me wonder what peopel can do when they have the engine.. oh, and I want a native FreeBSD version ;)

Re:Final Version

[bobej1977]

Had to fact check, NIN used to be one of my faves. Reznor did 1 year in CE & music at Allegheny College. I'm not trying to be an edu-snob, I just was curious.

Re:Final Version

[nomadic]

Look at this game it's a horror version of Halflife. THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT THE GAME.

THEN THEY SHOULDN'T SELL IT. Just sell the goddamn engine. But if they're going to sell it retail then they better goddamn well expect criticism. How hard is it to hire one person with like, an imagination? God knows they have the money.

Re:Final Version

[F34nor]

Ahhhh but you forget! Why sell b2b in bulk when you can sell b2b in bulk AND also get half the 18-24 year old males in the US to shell out $50.00

Now before you all get rilled up at me, just remeber this, I will buy it, I will play i, I will like it, and I will not complain about the plot too much. Then I will download many TC's and play them and love them and pet them and make them my very own. Lenny, is DOOOMIII going to have rabbits?

Re:Final Version

[nomadic]

Ahhhh but you forget! Why sell b2b in bulk when you can sell b2b in bulk AND also get half the 18-24 year old males in the US to shell out $50.00

That's my point entirely. They're doing it for the money. Which is fine. But then their fanboys start saying how you can't really criticize them because they're only releasing the retail game out of greed. Uhh, excuse me?

Re:Final Version

[adler187]

While I agree with most of what you said. Return to Castle Wolfenstein was made by id.

Re:Final Version

[thrash242]

It wasn't made by id, as far as I know, id kind of supervised it. It was made by Gray Matter studios at the request of id. Similar to how Metroid Prime was a Nintendo game, but was made by Retro Studios, for instance.

Re:Final Version

[BlackHawk-666]

Perhaps people have forgotten how good Doom was to play when it first came out. That second level with the flickering flourescent likes flickering malevelently gaves me the willies. It was dark, engrossing and intense, all despite it's now comparitively crude visuals. I'm willing to bet that Doom III will be more of the same. It won't be a Half Life type of experience, but something darker and creepier. You can count me in :-0

Re:Final Version

[mikeg22]

So go on, go make that bunny shaving game you always wanted, make it for all of us.

How could you have possibly known about my bunny shaving game?

Re:Final Version

[YOU LIKEWISE FAIL IT]

Look at this game it's a horror version of Halflife.

Dude, Halflife is the horror version of Halflife.

Re:Final Version

[junkgrep]

Actually, id seems to be serious interested for the first time in proving that they can deliver a really A quality SP game. They really seem to be trying hard this time, taking a nod from the path that Half-Life forged with scripted sequences to make the game a series of "events" rather than just cooridors full of random monsters. They even have a pretty neat "short cutscene" thing where they briefly zoom out of the character's head while a cutscene plays, and then zoom back into the characters head where the action immediately resumes. A cool way to tell a story without being too jarring.

Re:Final Version

[junkgrep]

Saying they all have the same story is saying that all action movies have the same story. Sure, they share the common element in the start of science gone wrong, but Half-life has all sorts of little in game elements to tell the on-going story about how the military is struggling against you and the whole government conspiracy angle and the escapees and setting up the trip to Xen and the way the final boss actually seems like a good guy who you were wrong to kill on behalf of some dude who seems a little bit evil.

Doom had none of that at all, and Quake had "Evil Quake attack! Are you a bad enough dude to kill Quake" and then you reach the end of the game and you're like "hey, er, where's Quake? This final boss thingie is, like, the lamest elder squid god ever that just sits there and does absolutely nothing but quiver."

Re:Final Version

[F34nor]

Why would he be discouraged? The guy's into math. He's interested in the game engine, the lighting, the curved surfaces. Hell, in his persoanl life these days he seems to be really interested in real chemical burning engines, you know the Ansari X-Prize and all that.

The bunny shaving game was directed at the fact that he makes his games open to all to make it there own. I am not in a bad mood, I look forward to the game. I just look foward to a DOOMIII Engine version of Natural-Selection more.

Re:Final Version

[king-manic]

Basic story:

1-Scientists discover portals to alternate dimentions.
2-Somebodyd screws up and things come out of this alternate dimension.
3-HEro goes and tries to see whats wrong.
4-Hero fixes whats wrong.

Ohh I was responding to someone who said doom 3 was ripping off Half life. I was just pointing out Half life is ripping off doom 1 just as much.

Re:Final Version

[junkgrep]

Sure, but when you make a story that basic, you can make anything sound similar.

Damn it

[VanWEric]

I had such plans for the summer: Regular cardio excercize, some hacking on a project or two, social interaction... AND NOW ID IS LOCKING ME IN MY BASEMENT WITH DOOM III I wonder how much productivity FPSes have stolen from our lives?

Re:Damn it

[Anonymous Coward]

According to that Masters of Doom book, Intel and Carnegie Mellon had to set policy blocking the original Doom during work hours because people spent too much time playing it and all the network play even killed the servers.

Re:Damn it

[Coryoth]

I wonder how much productivity FPSes have stolen from our lives?

There's a great quote from Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails to the effect that he would have released a couple of more albums if it hadn't been for Doom. Of course now he's doing all the music and sound design for Doom III, but at least you can claim that's productively spending all your time on Doom...

Jedidiah.

Re:Damn it

[avageek]

Trent isn't doing the sound anymore...it was posted a while ago that he decided to ditch the effort since it was taking too long for them to get done with the game.

Re:Damn it

[fredrikj]

Of course now he's doing all the music and sound design for Doom III

Nope. He quit.

Re:Damn it

[Trigun]

That's because the original Doom had incredibly shitty network code that would saturate a lan and swamp a pc.

Re:Damn it

[SnowDeath]

Did you ever try to play anything on a LAN that people were playing Quake1 on? My gosh, we'd be in the middle of all-night Starcraft lans and 3 people would decide to play Quake. We are talking about 1-2 10/100 hubs cascaded together with less than 12 people and that's all, and Quake would bring StarCraft to a screeching and grinding halt or at least close to standstill.

We ended up banning Quake1 from local LANs from then.

Re:Damn it

[SomeGuyFromCA]

> all the network play even killed the servers.

Well, if memory serves, this was due to some primitive netcode design - for example, each chaingun bullet was a separate UDP packet.

Re:Damn it

[Anonymous Coward]

In the early days, Doom players probably wouldn't be using IP -- IPX all the way.

IIRC, the widely distributed shareware version had a bug that would flood and crash NetWare servers. This was patched, but banning the game was a common response.

Re:Damn it

[mattgarnsey]

[Trent Reznor] decided to ditch the effort since it was taking too long for them to get done with the game.

in other news, local pot calls kettle "black"

www.nin.com has updated...

Re:Damn it

[Anonymous Cow herd]

[Nine Inch Nails] would have released a couple of more albums if it hadn't been for Doom.

Heh, who would have thought that Doom was the best thing to happen to computers *AND* music. :-)

Re:Damn it

[SomeGuyFromCA]

Heh, you're right, it was IPX.

I thought 'networked gaming' and UDP came to mind... or fingers.

But whatever kind of packet it was, I'm fairly sure that each chaingun bullet got its own packet.

Re:Damn it

[no reason to be here]

Actually, TR has a new album (titled bleedthrough) coming out sometime Q4 this year.

Re:Damn it

[Marsala]

Don't look at it as lost productivity.

It's "training".

Because, believe me, when you get sucked into a parallel dimension and you're standing face to face with an 8 ft tall pink dog-demon and all you've got is teh crappy 9mm the government issued you, you're going to be glad that you've at least seen the scenario before. You'll find that having at least rehearsed it a few times you'll be able to bunnyhop to safety (or better armament) while plugging the beast with a few rounds as if it was second nature instead of just standing there in a puddle of your own making and wishing you'd paid a little more attention to that DoomIII "game" instead of wasting all your time on City of Heros (because really, how likely is *that* to happen?).

Never forget: Just because you haven't needed these skills up till now doesn't mean they're useless.

Re:Damn it

[Short Circuit]

Did that change with the advent of QuakeWorld? The network code is much better...even to the point of limiting bandwidth usage. (5KB/s, IIRC. It's been a while since I had the oppertunity to play.)

Re:Damn it

[Anonymous Coward]

And there you go with your racist comments again.

-Omarosa

Re:Damn it

[HD Webdev]

There's a great quote from Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails to the effect that he would have released a couple of more albums if it hadn't been for Doom.

I don't understand that.

After all, remix releases shouldn't take up too much time.

Re:Damn it

[coopaq]

[Trent Reznor] decided to ditch the effort [and pull out the Nail gun] since it was taking too long for them to get done with the game.

In other news: small Office in small town in Texas turns into a seen out of the video game Doom when local geek heros attempt long term project with cool dark angry rocker!
Bertha, receptionist of small insurance business in the same building, heard a scream through the wall what sounded like, "I'M GONNA FUCK YOU LIKE AN ANIMAL!"

Geeks: Maybe we can't be rockstars ourselves but we can enslave one for our long term code complete idealistic projects until they turn on us and fuck us like animals!

Re:Damn it

[Anonymous Coward]

Another Britney Spears lover is on /. again, damn.

Re:Damn it

[Kynde]

[Nine Inch Nails] would have released a couple of more albums if it hadn't been for Doom.

Heh, who would have thought that Doom was the best thing to happen to computers *AND* music. :-)

Mind you, Quake 1 ambient music tracks are imho still by far the best ever game musics. I still frequently listen to that CD at work while coding. Just to get my mood right, i.e. no comments, short'n evil variable names and creepy inline asm allover the code. And those Quake 1 musics were composed by Trent Reznor.
(that is not to say that I'd be such a huge fan of NiN, but I'm compelled to put credit where it's due)

Re:Damn it

[bitrott]

Your lack of taste is showing. I'd be embarassed if I were you.

Re:Damn it

[Kent Recal]

for example, each chaingun bullet was a separate UDP packet.

So with proper iptables settings I could filter or rewrite the individual bullets? Neat.

Re:Damn it

[overloadhz]

I used to have a life. Now I have several. I just can't tell which one is real anymore.

Re:Damn it

[No. 24601]

Because, believe me, when you get sucked into a parallel dimension and you're standing face to face with an 8 ft tall pink dog-demon and all you've got is teh crappy 9mm the government issued you, you're going to be glad that you've at least seen the scenario before. You'll find that having at least rehearsed it a few times you'll be able to bunnyhop to safety (or better armament) while plugging the beast with a few rounds as if it was second nature instead of just standing there in a puddle of your own making and wishing you'd paid a little more attention to that DoomIII "game" instead of wasting all your time on City of Heros (because really, how likely is *that* to happen?).

Thanks for the rundown, Will Hunting.

Re:Damn it

[shamilton]

Eskil Simonsson for life!

Re:Damn it

[biglig2]

Heh, once you can change the packets themselves you will be The One, Neo.

Really Good News

[Rikerag515]

This is really great to hear, a major software publisher is actually going to have a Linux Client available, possibly in around the same time the Windows client is released, bravo ID.

Re:Really Good News

[Anonymous Coward]

Been there. Done that. Quake 3 had "simultaneous" relases for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux within a week of each other. In fact the q3test came out for the Mac OS before windows or linux.

Re:Really Good News

[i.r.id10t]

Yeah, not like they did it before. Remember how the Quake3 test release was Linux first, then Mac, and finally Windows? Or perhaps the native Linux Quake2 binaries? Or even the native Linux Quake/QuakeWorld stuff?

Sarcasim aside, I too am glad that id continues to support us Linux gamers, and I plan on paying my $$ as soon as it is available.

Re:Really Good News

[los furtive]

My Unreal Tournament 2004 came with the Linux client. Didn't yours?

Re:Really Good News

[SilentChris]

Not only that, the Linux dedicated server came out first.

Not only that, it was the first game (or so Epic claims) to have an Linux install script right at the root of the disc, and a Penguin right alongside the Windows and Mac logo on the box. It was a small gesture, but I remember reading one of the creators saying "We thought it'd be cool."

Re:Really Good News

[Fearless Freep]

And to think John Carmack is competing for the X-prize on the side.

He's trying to get of the planet...I think he knows something we don't and his games are an attempt at a warning

Re:Really Good News

[shiftless]

Unreal Tournament 2004 has already done this. But yes, it's nice ID is doing it too.

Re:Really Good News

[RESPAWN]

Yup, as a matter of fact, I bought my copy of Quake 3 just so that I could have some good games to play while I was running Linux on my only machine at the time. That and it also came in that cool tin that was a limited time thing with the Windows release.

The ironic thing about it though was that I never did get the game to run under Linux. I was having some really weird driver issues related (I think) to the fact that I had a dual video card system, but was only using one of the video cards. Anyway, I just ended up booting back into Windows to play the game. However, since the Linux version of the game was actually cheaper than the Windows version, a lot of my friends went out and bought the Linux version, despite running Windows on their primary box. I still get a chuckle out of that...

Re:Really Good News

[Rikerag515]

Oops, well at least id is now doing it, I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention to UT2004 when it came out (and to what clients were available). I'm just happy to see that Doom 3 will also include it.

Re:Really Good News

[HD Webdev]

Not only that, it was the first game (or so Epic claims) to have an Linux install script right at the root of the disc, and a Penguin right alongside the Windows and Mac logo on the box. It was a small gesture, but I remember reading one of the creators saying "We thought it'd be cool."

The UT2003 disc set had the Linux client installer also.

Re:Really Good News

[k_187]

Actually, the Q3test was mac, then linux and windows. I'm picking nits, but that was the case. id is about the only company that I know of that does all three.

Re:Really Good News

[junkgrep]

Er, what? Doom3 has been in develpment almost as long as HL2 has been, and they are slated to come out at roughly the same time. The only reason you don't know about id's delays is because they were never firm on a release date. But two years ago, Carmack was saying things like "I'd be very surprised if Doom3 wasn't out before the next E3." Heck, the game was even quietly delayed right after HL2 was last fall.

Re:Really Good News

[lewp]

I think he's trying to get to Mars to kick some demon ass. His work here is done.

Re:Really Good News

[SilentChris]

Yes, there was an installer, but they didn't put it at the root of the directory. Small token of appreciation, but they said it was to show their support of Linux this time around.

Re:Really Good News

[HD Webdev]

Yes, there was an installer, but they didn't put it at the root of the directory. Small token of appreciation, but they said it was to show their support of Linux this time around.

It is in the root of the cdrom directory.

I have had the CD's since November, 2002 and just checked.

Do you mean that the installer wasn't on Disc 1?

Take that DNF

[fiftyfly]

now was that Duke Nukem Forever or Did Not Finish?

Re:Take that DNF

[Fammy2000]

Actually, it's Due Next Fall. Unfortunately, it's only ever this fall when fall comes around.

And in a year or two...

[Kenja]

there will be a game that uses this fine engine. Untill then we'll just have to poke at the demo app that ID is including with the runtime.

Re:And in a year or two...

[Kenja]

"Well, I thought it was funny."

As did I (sigh)

"Seriously though, I think they actually wrote a real single player game to go with this one."

Thats what they claim. But they said the same thing about Quake. Then again they also said Quake was to Doom what Doom was to Pac Man.

Re:And in a year or two...

[HellKrisp]

I think the grand parent was "inspired" by this gag.

Re:And in a year or two...

[mahdi13]

It wasn't a joke, it was fact =P

Quake III by itself was awful, the multiplayer was well defined but it was more of the same. Unreal Tournament did a much better job with gameplay

But look at all the Q3 licensed games that came out.

Heavy Metal F.A.K.K.2
Return to Castle Wolfenstein
Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory
Jedi Academy
Alice
Star Trek: Elite Force
Medal of Honor Allied Assault
Team Fortress II
James Bond 007: The World is not Enough
Soldier of Fortune II: Double Helix
Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast.

And I'm sure I've missed a few...

At $250,000 a license, they made a few bucks in just licensing
I've heard that the new Doom III license will be going for $1,000,000

id Software's Technology Licensing Program

Re:And in a year or two...

[rpdillon]

It was...pac man was flat, doom had heightfields, and quake was full 3-d. Hmph.

Re:And in a year or two...

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

no, but sierra coughed up big bux for the license to use it in TF2.

Re:And in a year or two...

[brsmith4]

You know what sucked though? Only a few of those games, based on the quake 3 engine, were ever made to run on linux despite the fact that the engine was. Damn game companies.

Re:And in a year or two...

[FreonTrip]

I don't think Quake III was awful. id sought to create the ultimate pure deathmatch game, and Christ knows they succeeded. The original Unreal Tournament was a real kick in the pants that offered a more diverse array of options, sure, but at least under Windows if you weren't using the software or Glide renderers you had all sorts of thoroughly dreadful glitches, framerate hitches, and general graphical weirdness to look forward to. Even when using the Direct3D renderer with an Athlon XP 2500+ and a Radeon 7500 it's still intermittently choppy when things get complicated; that's simply not excusable.

This also doesn't take into account Unreal Tournament's unbalanced weaponry (if you had the flak cannon or rocket launcher you were often untouchable) or mediocre modeling. The sequels have righted a lot of the wrongs present in the series' progenitor, but sometimes I think Epic's still trying to outdo Quake III...

Re:And in a year or two...

[MrBlue VT]

Nah, it was really the sniper rifle that made you untouchable in the original UT. You had a crosshair in unzoomed mode that was perfectly acurate even if you were jumping and twisting around in mid air. Once you got good with that thing, it was often one bullet head shot kills.

Re:And in a year or two...

[icedcool]

TF 2 was licensed to the q3 engine, but I think its going to be used as the multiplayer component to HL2. Thats why its such a big secret, when hl2 comes out it is going to be this big "OMG WTF, how in da hewl did all this happen." 4 years of work plus a delay at sept 30... thats how.

Re:And in a year or two...

[GarfBond]

Team Fortress II? Is this a different game than the one I know of?

IIRC TFC was a remake of a mod done for an earlier version of quake, but TF2 is a game on its own. It'll be done on the Valve Source engine, whenever that's released (a whole different discussion altogether). That makes sense, because they're Valve games...

Re:And in a year or two...

[Tweester]

For me Q3 restored that feeling of roaming the map areas on an elastic string... a certain snappiness of response, balance of speed of player movement and gameplay etc. that really gave a pleasurable multi-player experience. Like the first time my brother-in-law and I played Doom2 on new P-133 machines. Q1 and Q2 did not quite have it.

Re:And in a year or two...

[brsmith4]

Feeding the trolls here, but i never said they had to release it for free. They would have got my money, at least for a few of those titles.

Re:And in a year or two...

[danila]

But I don't think anyone cares much for TF2 anymore. Now that we have CS, BF, UT2004 and tons of other lesser known multiplayer team games, TF2 is no longer that impressive or unique.

Re:And in a year or two...

[mahdi13]

Quake III looked nice, gameplay was just quick and smooth but lacked substance which UT was full of

Cool Easter egg

[LNO]

In the third level of the game, when you're going through the ruins of 3D Realms' corporate headquarters, type "idd3d" and you'll get to play Duke Nukem Forever.

No, seriously! I swear!

Re:Cool Easter egg

[Dr Caleb]

If you go into a corporate office, sit at the desk and type "iddqd" it will run an Excel 97 demo.

Re:Cool Easter egg

[stephenisu]

also, you can type IDKFA for the office keys, and if your boss is a "heretic", don't try the IDDQD thing, he will kill you instead.

Re:Cool Easter egg

[SamSim]

And if you then press F5, type X97:L97, hit Enter, then Tab, then hold Ctrl+Shift and click the Chart Wizard toolbar button, you can play a doubly-secret flight simulator game...

...within which, if you type "yellow" and then press Backspace six times, hold down Alt and click, you get taken to a secret load screen, from which you can start a game of Doom III!

Mac Version

[somethinghollow]

I guess a Mac version won't be too far behind if there will be a Linux version. Now... all I need is one of those new fangled G5s to play it on...

Does anyone know where system requierments might be found / when they will be announced?

Re:Mac Version

[millahtime]

I can only imagine a dual processor G5 running this game. It's like a wet dream come true.

Re:Mac Version

[mbbac]

I ordered my PowerMac over the weekend. I'm going to be ready for Doom 3.

Re:Mac Version

[grub]

It's like a wet dream come true.

I believe that's called "Sex". :)

Re:Mac Version

[Anonymous Coward]

Given the history of gaming on mac, and that no mac support was specifically promised, this seems to me like a kind of odd statement.

"I ordered my PowerMac over the weekend. I'm going to be ready for Doom 3. "

Re:Mac Version

[mbbac]

Given that Doom and Quake were developed on Apple Computers (NeXT at the time), and that I have Quake 3 Team Arena for the Mac; I expect it to be released very closely after the Win32 version.

Re:Mac Version

[mbbac]

Oh yeah, the first Doom 3 demo was at Macworld, too.

Re:Mac Version

[Refrag]

Yes, NeXT does == Apple. Apple bought NeXT in 1997 to base their next OS (Mac OS X) off of NeXTSTEP. Steve Jobs came back over from NeXT as part of the purchase and a few years later became Apple's CEO.

My point was that Carmack likes Macs and will release Doom 3 for them. At least Id makes a profit off of the Mac releases unlike Linux.

Re:Mac Version

[Jeremy Erwin]

So reading those dreary processor reviews at Tom's Hardware is really a waste of time? Pages and pages of comparisons between the P4 EE and the Athlon XP-- and all for naught?

Cool. I'm going to pick up a cheap PII 233 with my next GeForce 6000 card.

Re:Mac Version

[nova20]

I believe that's called "Sex". :)

tell me of this "Sex", oh wise one.

/nova20

Re:Mac Version

[JoeBar]

I'm sure you and your one button mouse will pwn!

Re:Mac Version

[Methuseus]

He would, if he had ever experienced it. I won't tell yo uof it because it's better to keep the plebeians in their place by not telling them what they are missing.

Re:Mac Version

[mbbac]

I actually use a Logitech mouse. Thanks for trolling, though.

Re:Mac Version

[Anonymous Coward]

lol mac defenders rule

Re:Mac Version

[log0n]

bwahahaha!

( and I'm a mac user :> )

Re:Mac Version

[LionMage]

The first Doom 3 demo may have been at Macworld, but if you go by historical precedent, that's no guarantee that a game will come to the Mac in a timely fashion. I am, of course, referring to Halo.

Halo eventually made it to the Mac, after the PC port made it to market. Yet the first public demo of Halo was at Macworld, on the (then cutting edge) G4 PowerMac.

Re:Mac Version

[mbbac]

Well, Halo is a unique example. Bungie was a Mac developer primarily before Microsoft bought them. That's why Halo was (as you said) seen first at Macworld.

Re:Mac Version

[LionMage]

Well, Halo is a unique example. Bungie was a Mac developer primarily before Microsoft bought them.

I know all this, and fail to see what your point is. My point was simply this: Just because a product is demonstrated first on a Mac doesn't mean it will make it to the Mac, or that it will arrive first on the Mac. I provided a real-world example. Yes, I know Halo is kind of unique because Bungie used to be a Mac developer, and then whored themselves to Microsoft. However, that doesn't make my example any less valid.

Doom 3 was apparently demoed "first" on Mac OS X, according to the poster I was responding to. Their assertion was that this is a guarantee that Doom 3 will be available for the Mac platform. I am simply stating that this is not a guarantee. We'll be very lucky indeed if we see Doom 3 at all on the Mac -- id needs to make a business case to promote a Mac port, and even though they're throwing in a Linux port "for free," that's not a guarantee that anything will make it to the Mac.

Personally, I'm guessing we'll see Doom 3 on OS X within a month or two of the Windows release. A simultaneous release would be nice, but may not happen.

If id doesn't do the OS X port themselves (a possibility, though unlikely as they insisted on doing Quake 3 for the Mac themselves), there are always other Mac software houses that can step into the breech and take over this role. And surely some company would, but then the delay might be measured at far more than two months.

Re:Mac Version

[mbbac]

I'm the poster you were responding to. I never said Doom 3 for the Mac was a lock because it was first demoed at Macworld. I do think it makes it likely that it will. Especially since it will be available for Linux.

Hear that sucking sound?

[Power Everywhere]

It's the vaccuum in my bank account, left after I withdraw enough to buy a new video card that can handle Doom III.

Re:Hear that sucking sound?

[pmjordan]

Actually it shouldn't be too bad. I hear it'll run fine on a GeForce4 Ti or Radeon 8500, which are from 2002 and 2001, respectively, and can be had for very little money. For the full effect, you'll need a Radeon 9500+ or GeForceFX, of course, but even then, the lower end of those isn't exactly overpriced.

Re:Hear that sucking sound?

[Zhe Mappel]

If $200 at Newegg.com on a Radeon 9800 Pro will do that to your finances, I'm glad we don't have a joint account.

Re:Hear that sucking sound?

[Erit]

or is that just the sound of the newest nvidia card? :X

Re:Hear that sucking sound?

[SamSim]

Video card prices are coming down all the time. Me, I'd wait until maybe a month before the release date before purchasing my Doom III-specific video card. I mean, sure, if you needed a new one anyway to run Far Cry or some other games, fair play to ya, but if you are upgrading in anticipation of D3 specifically I'd suggest being patient. By the time it does come out, you'll probably be able to afford a better one.

Nice graphics..

[DR SoB]

Too bad I'll need a new computer that comes with the kitchen sink to run it..

The screen shots look suspiciously similiar to Half-Life 2 though, what's up with that? Even some of the monsters look HL1 like. I have a feeling this isn't going to have nearly the popularity as Doom1 did (well it might but that'll just be riding there fame). It's kinda like movie sequels, you're so excited about a new edition, but then it always ends in disappointment..

If HL2 and Doom3 battled I wonder who would win? I wonder if the fundamentals of the game will be the same between the two, and if Worldcraft (or hammer) is going to work on both as well?

Re:Nice graphics..

[bladesjester]

Kitchen sink? Nah. It'll just require the same machine it takes to run longhorn ;)

Re:Nice graphics..

[mydigitalself]

the first thing i thought when i watched the trailer a few months back was "this IS half-life". not even the monsters but how about the story line. if you remember half-life, it started off with you as a scientiest travelling on this mono-rail-like thing into the secret underground base and then the experiment went horribly wrong etc... so not just the monsters - the entire story line!

Re:Nice graphics..

[It's Oz]

HL2 would win, nerds (Gordon Freeman) always win when they're in a game/movie about fighting big hulking men.

Re:Nice graphics..

[Hard_Code]

"secret underground base and then the experiment went horribly wrong etc... so not just the monsters - the entire story line!"

Wow, you mean just like the FIRST DOOM?

Re:Nice graphics..

[Anonymous Coward]

If HL2 and Doom3 battled I wonder who would win? I wonder if the fundamentals of the game will be the same between the two, and if Worldcraft (or hammer) is going to work on both as well?

In many ways, they're two very different approaches to an FPS engine - from a point of view of the lighting systems, what they can render (indoors vs outdoors) and what they can do.

In particular, the lighting models are completely different. Half-Life 2 uses pre-calculated radiosity lightmaps which, while awesomely realistic, are somewhat static. It does preserve some directional information in the lightmaps for model lighting, normal maps etc, but I gather it's limited to simple non-shadowed dynamic point sources like the original Half-Life.

Doom 3, however, looks like it does everything real-time. I don't think there's any precalculated radiosity light maps (but I could be wrong), and all lighting is done on the fly with what are effectively point sources. Things can be hugely dynamic, with lights casting shadows from world geometry, models, etc, but it's not particularly realistic due to the absence of radiosity 'bouncing' and the ultra-sharp shadows. It can also project textures as lights, giving the atmospheric 'light through a grille' effect and so on.

The scenes they can render look very different, too - Half-Life 2's got a terrain engine thing which can render some pretty huge outdoors maps, along with parallax-enabled, brush-based 'skyboxes' which can be rendered behind everything for giant-looking city scenes. Doom 3 seems to specialise in highly detailed indoors scenes, with a couple of outdoors scenes being effectively just large rooms.

The engines are very different, but they seem well-suited for the games they've been written for. The slightly plastic-looking, ultra-atmospheric-lighting indoors engine of Doom 3 would be rubbish for Half-Life 2, while the naturalistic, realistically-lit indoors-outdoors engine of Half-Life 2 would look terrible used for Doom 3.

In terms of editors, I do know that an enhanced Hammer is being used for Half-Life 2, but I've heard very little about Doom 3's editor (and that's with friends working for Raven!) I understand it's somehow integrated with the engine, and it definitely sounds like another home-grown thing, but other than that I don't know. I'd be surprised if Hammer (or another brush-based editor) would work with Doom 3, but of course I could be completely wrong. :-)

Re:Nice graphics..

[RatBastard]

Considering that Half-Life ripped off the basic backstory for DOOM, yeah, I'd say they were pretty similar. If you read Tom Hall's Doom Bible, you'll see that Tom Hall planned to have a monorail in the original game.

From looking at the Doom Bible, it looks like DOOM 3 is going to be a hell of a lot closer to Tom's original vision than DOOM1/DOOM2 ever was. I wonder what the hell the Hand of Lothar will be used for?

Re:Nice graphics..

[damien_kane]

Exactly, and Longhorn comes with Kitchen_Sink-1.0, so you don't actually need one beforehand...

Re:Nice graphics..

[ckaminski]

Hah! I had to find a guy two towns over. It was like crack, man...

me: w0ts up d00d
him: d00d, go g3tz th1s sw33t m0d: <serdoom>
me: dr00l

yeah, good old days of one on one rocket fests... That was what, 1993?

Then there was the time I got busted in '94 with 6 of my friends coopting the SGI's at work to play networked Doom. Now that was a blast.

Re:Nice graphics..

[Minna Kirai]

Wow, you mean just like the FIRST DOOM?

Not at all! Half-Life's secret base is underground, but DOOM's secret base was in outer space. Totally, completely different things.

Re:Nice graphics..

[bonch]

if Worldcraft (or hammer) is going to work on both as well?

John Carmack has stated on several occasions that the editor will be integrated into the engine. You'll be able to play it as you create it.

No idea about Half-Life 2. I actually know very, very little about the Source engine, despite the incomplete code leak so long ago.

Re:Nice graphics..

[SomeGuyFromCA]

> DOOM 3 is going to be a hell of a lot closer to Tom's original vision

Uh-oh. The last time we heard something like that, Greedo shot first...

Re:Nice graphics..

[ildon]

The screen shots look suspiciously similiar to Half-Life 2 though, what's up with that? Even some of the monsters look HL1 like. I have a feeling this isn't going to have nearly the popularity as Doom1 did (well it might but that'll just be riding there fame). It's kinda like movie sequels, you're so excited about a new edition, but then it always ends in disappointment..

That might have something to do with the fact that, as mentioned by other posters, HL's story line is a blatant ripoff of Doom's story line (or Quake's. They were pretty much identical).

From a more technically graphical standpoint, I still say they look nothing alike. It's like saying Quake3 and Unreal Tournament look the same. The only thing they have in common is that they come from a similar hardware/software generation and therefore have about the same limitations and advantages to deal with. Even the settings are completely different. One is a modern, post-apocalyptic eastern European city setting while the other is a super shiny, futuristic space station on Mars. And don't get me started on the art styles or monster concepts.

If HL2 and Doom3 battled I wonder who would win? I wonder if the fundamentals of the game will be the same between the two, and if Worldcraft (or hammer) is going to work on both as well?

Worldcraft supporting Doom3? HAH! Try using GtkRadiant, as it's FAR more likely to support both than any other editor. Especially one made by Valve.

While it's cool that Doom3 will have D3Radiant built into the engine, it's my understanding that it's a fork of Q3Radiant which means it may not have all the enhancements that were later added to the GtkRad tree. Maybe the editor code will be in an external dll so you can create a plugin for any editor you had the source for? That would be sweet.

Re:Nice graphics..

[williwilli]

DoomRadiant does use the Doom engine for building and world modeling, etc. This means that you can demo the world immediately and directly from the world editor, as opposed to requiring an intermediate build to be exported from the editor and then run in the actual game engine (as Quake3Radiant required). IIRC, this is not only good for accelerating and smoothing workflow, but also provides for more accurate preview display in the editor mode. (I could be wrong.. it's been a while ;-) )

Re:Nice graphics..

[junkgrep]

They are releasing a full SDK. The map editor is Hammer, but you also get a free version of XSI, a program to create facial expressions, a model viewer, scripting guides, etc. The standard package (save the cool XSI thing)

Re:Nice graphics..

[mobby_6kl]

[whore=karma]
HL2 would win. :)
Googlefight
[/whore]

Re:Nice graphics..

[big daddy kane]

a while back I tried the doom iii alpha (I got it legal officer I swear!) and there was a nifty feature that allowed you to place lights wherever the cursur lay, which was needless to say rather cool. From the best I could tell it all seemed to be realtime, the shadows disapeared and formed based on the lights.

Re:Nice graphics..

[justins]

Too bad I'll need a new computer that comes with the kitchen sink to run it..

That was true about 3 years ago.

Re:Nice graphics..

[junkgrep]

There's something a bit fishy though: try turning off the shadows: some of the dynamic ones vanish, but the game still seems to have static pre-cast shadows, which sort of belies the claim that everything is fully unified and dynamic.

Requirements

[Griim]

Does anyone know what the system requirements will be for this? In particular, the video card?

Re:Requirements

[irokitt]

Supposedly pretty 'low'. The game has been in development for a while. But the demo rendering was done with a Radeon 9700 Pro, so a 9800 or 9600 variant should work. The importance of good OpenGL drivers can't be ignored though.

Re:Requirements

[dr_dank]

I don't know either, but I imagine beowulf cluster of these.

Re:Requirements

[aliens]

I would think a Geforce3 or better seeing as they first did tech demo's on that hardware way back in the day. I'm guessing, but Pixel Shaders would probably be required and that means GF3.

Of course I can't wait till GF4MX users try and play.

Bear in mind HL2 is supposedly very scalable so Doom III should be too. Although I can't imagine it being as immersive without a great video card.

Re:Requirements

[fredrikj]

~800MHz processor, 256MB RAM, GeForce1 are as far as I know the minimum requirements. That practically means 320x240 without many visual effects, however, so I wouldn't try playing it with that. I'd personally go for something like a 2GHz CPU and a GeForce 4, but slightly less will probably provide an enjoyable experience as well.

Re:Requirements

[zerocool^]

Maximum PC this month had a feature on the new GeForce FX 6800, and then had a blurb on the new year's games, and the hardware they expected to be needed.

For Doom3, they recomended a GeForce FX 5800 + or an ATI 9800+, w/ 2.8 or 3Ghz proc (quoting from memory).

But for reference, they also said that you'd need a GeForce FX 5700 to play UT2004, and it works fine on the geforce4 ti4200 I used to have before it went titsup. So, YMMV. You'll probably want a 9800 ATI to take full advantage, but if you've got something 9200 or 9600 level, you're going to be able to play it, just don't expect full detail.

~Will

Re:Requirements

[Rallion]

UT2k4 also runs fine on a geForce4 MX220, just for a bit more reference.

Re:Requirements

[meadowreach]

Quote from Popular Science, June 2004 issue, page 20, an article titled "The New Forces of Doom" (a short article on...Doom 3): "Naturally, to experience the full complement of Doom 3's stunning visual effects, you'll need to invest in some new hardware: a PCI express graphics card from ATI or nVidia and a new PC with Intel's Alderwood or Grantsdale chipset with the card slots to support them." So, I won't be playing it for a while it looks like.

Re:Requirements

[zerocool^]

But, for further reference (for anyone who's reading this thread), UT2004 does NOT run fine on my backup card, a GeForce 2 MX200/32MB. With all the textures turned down fairly low, it works ... ok. But, even at that, it's not too good.

So, if you expect to play doom3 with a geforce2, expect to be looking at 640x480.

Re:Requirements

[sjwt]

I got the leaked Alpha to play on my Athlon 1500+ with 512 megs memmory and a TNT2 M64, everyting turned down to minumim and i got a rock solid 6fps, occasnly rocketing upto 13!!

Re:Requirements

[Krilomir]

Depends on which All In Wonder card you have. 9600? 9800?

Re:Requirements

[Richthofen80]

Please translate this into Nvidia. Not all of us speak ATI-ese.

Re:Requirements

[rbrinkman]

Got to love Maximum PC. Great mag! They also quoted 2GB of RAM for Doom3, a gig more than any other game they profiled (included HL2, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., etc.). 2GB of RAM? What's up with that? Mind you that was to play the game at its highest detail levels.

Re:Requirements

[The Barking Dog]

What do they define as "playable"? Until yesterday I was playing UT2004 on a GeForce2 (rest of the system is a P4 1.4GHz, 512MB RAM)...granted at 640x480 with most of the detail levels set low, but it was still playable (and a hell of a lot of fun). Then I picked up a cheapie GeForce FX5200, and it's a lot sweeter.

Re:Requirements

[irokitt]

The 9800 is the top-of-the-line $500 ATI card. Roughly analogous to a 5900. A 9600 is a mid-line card, priced like a 5700 but with slightly better performance than one.

I'm probably biased, but if I were planning on running DOOM 3 on Windows, a 9600XT w/ 128MB of RAM would be my choice. If I were planning on the running the Linux version, a FX-5700 w/ 256MB would be great (not that the extra 128MB makes a difference, but I can't seem to find a 5700 locally without 256MB of RAM). The different choices reflect the fact that Nvidia has better Linux drivers than ATI does.

Re:Requirements

[Methuseus]

I'm surprised, those are almost the same framerates I got on a GF2MX200 with an Athlon 1800+.

Re:Requirements

[sjwt]

yerh, but id wager it looked much better on your system.

Mine looked like quake being played in 16(not k) colours at 320*300 with no textures at all.

Re:Requirements

[TomorrowPlusX]

Yes. Like me. My g4 quicksilver and my 1st gen PB 12" *both* have the GF4MX cards. Well, I guess I'll be outside bicycling this summer, unlike you cool people with fast non-beleagured PCs and top-notch graphics cards.

Regardless, I gave up 1st person shooters by and large back in '97 when I started having quake-themed nightmares.

Re:Requirements

[pantherace]

The different choices...

Also, that FX-5700 will run faster in Linux than Windows. In general, NVIDIA's hardware runs about 10% faster in Linux than in windows, where there are equivelent setups: eg quake3, ut2003 w/opengl, etc on the same hardware. The same cannot be said for ATI. It has held true for a while, and Linux is much smoother with NVIDIA (has been on all the hardware I have personally tested, heck I can play quake3 if I turn some things down while compiling large things like KDE.)

Re:Requirements

[bishiraver]

My experience with the (non-optimized, un-configurable) leaked alpha was that it was very choppy on my p3-800mhz / geforce3 ti200. I'm betting that if some of the eye candy was turned off, it would work fine with my configuration. Granted, I need to upgrade - but alas, education comes first. Gameplay in the leaked alpha, by the way, was decently smooth until a creature came on the screen, and then it got rather choppy. Decently smooth by survival horror standards, not twitchy quake-3 standards.

Re:Requirements

[Omestes]

Funny thing is, UT2004 runs perfectly at full everything on my Radeon 7500, and a measly 1.2ghz AMD.

I will only upgrade one component for HL2 and Doom3, and that will not be the graphics card, I don't have 300 to shell out for something that does me no good except for gaming. Now a faster processor....

Re:Requirements

[thrash242]

I could be wrong, but I believe that the new X800 is now the top-of-the-line ATI card. Soon after I get mine...figures.

Re:Requirements

[Zathrus]

The 9800 is the top-of-the-line $500 ATI card.

No, the top-of-the-line $500 ATI card is the new Radeon X800 XT PE (which isn't actually shipping yet, but the $400 X800 Pro is).

You can get an ATI Radeon 9800 XT 256MB (last generation) for around $400, an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB (1/2 generation back) for around $200, an ATI Radeon 9700 128MB (1 generation back) for around $180. A Radeon 9600 XT 128MB (last generation, mid-level card) is under $150. All are quite capable of running D3 in Windows at adequate frame rates... certainly the best buy is the 9600XT, and it'll fall in price in the coming weeks as well.

Right now is a very, very bad time to buy a video card -- both nVidia and ATI have just paper-released their new cards, so the old cards haven't fallen in price yet and the new cards will be top dollar when you buy them. Unless you absolutely, positively need a new video card right now (like your old one died), then wait until you need to upgrade. If you want to play D3/HL2 with the goodies on, then you'll need to upgrade if you don't have at least a Radeon 9500 Pro (GeForce4's will not cut it).

I agree with your recommendations on which card to buy, although I'd really think twice about buying the last generation of nVidia cards. If you're set on nVidia then spend the money for this generation -- it's a much, much better card and chipset.

Re:Requirements

[irokitt]

Note that I only recommended the Nvidia card for Linux ;)
BTW, I'm running a 9700 Pro in my box, and I'm not planning to upgrade anytime soon.
As for the release of the x800, here in San Diego it might take a while-it did with the 9700 and 9800. And no, I wouldn't upgrade video cards right now, just like I wouldn't upgrade cpu/mobos right now (waiting for AMD's new sockets and PCI-Express).

Re:Requirements

[Tim C]

Just to add my anecdotal evidence to yours - while I've not played the full game, I've played the demo of UT2k4 a lot recently, mostly onslaught. It runs absolutely fine at full detail levels at 1024x768 and 32bpp, on my P4 2.4GHz machine with 1/2gig of RAM and a GeForce 3 Ti 200.

By "fine" I mean "I don't have fps stats for you, but it's perfectly playable as far as I'm concerned".

Re:Requirements

[mp3phish]

For Doom3, you definately do NOT want the radeon 9600XT.

The lower priced nvidia cards beat it in doom3 and any other opengl game in existance. I would recommend to get a Geforce 5900SE (or XT, same diff) If you want a good priced card for DX9 games, then I can see where you are coming from. But if you plan on playing DX9 games on a 9600 be prepared for low resolution and no FSAA.

Re:Requirements

[Bob Davis, Retired]

No, you can play it. You just can't experience the 'full compliment of Doom 3's stunning visual effects.'

Re:Requirements

[mp3phish]

Actually, in openGL in windows, ATI cards are slower than nVidia's.

You are thinking DX9 where no good games are out for it yet. But in DX8 and OpenGL, nVidia pretty much rules in windows and both linux.

The same will be true for DoomIII's OpenGL code. Even Carmack said that the nVidia cards are going to run it faster and at equal or better quality.

Re:Requirements

[mp3phish]

Dude, your an idiot then. the nvidia cards rape the radeon cards in all quake3 games, all unreal games, and in doom3 beta leaks at the same price point. Wether its the 5700 vs. 9600XT, or the 9800 Pro vs. 5900.

If you call bullshit, you are just denying what is true. Just like the ignorant sone of a bitch you are.

I Will Be Out Like a Shot to Buy This One

[List of FAILURES]

I loved the original Doom and Doom II. Unfortuantely, people seem to have moved away from the fun of game playing to trying to outdo each other in teh 3D graphics realm. I think the 3D engines are pretty decent, so how about some fun single player game levels. Screw the multiplayer crap.

Re:I Will Be Out Like a Shot to Buy This One

[mydigitalself]

multiplayer was the reason that quake 1 kept going for years and years after its release.

Re:I Will Be Out Like a Shot to Buy This One

[sweet cunny muffin]

Get a fucking clue, fuck wad. Doom III _is_ single player centric, just like Quake II was.

Re:I Will Be Out Like a Shot to Buy This One

[It's Oz]

It's all about a person's personal beliefs, I suppose. Some people prefer to play with other people online to challenge the skills they believe they have or just because it's more interesting than fighting AI. Some people prefer single player because they don't have to put up with other people that rant and rave about things no one cares about or think it's cool to type with caps lock on.

I go both ways, some games I prefer to play online because that's all the fun (Diablo 2, Jedi Oucast/Academy), other games I'm very content with just the single player, though most games focus more on the multiplayer than the single player. They forget that not everyone has broadband internet or even has the internet at all.

Re:I Will Be Out Like a Shot to Buy This One

[phrasebook]

Ah yes, fun with Doom wad file names.

fuck.wad
dick.wad

and... that's about it.

Aaargghhh!

[gowen]

Its the first of the signs of the Apocalypse:
Doom III appears;
then Duke Nukem Forever gets a release;
then Hell Freezes Over;
then Taco actually checks slashdot before posting another dupe;
Then the world is destroyed in a great conflagration, the dead rise, the Messiah returns, four Horsemen, yadda, yadda, yadda

Re:Aaargghhh!

[Anonymous Coward]

Its the first of the signs of the Apocalypse:
Doom III appears;
then Duke Nukem Forever gets a release;
then Hell Freezes Over;
then Taco actually checks slashdot before posting another dupe;


Luckilly, anyone reading this post will be long dead before the second sign appears.

Re:Aaargghhh!

[zakath]

All jokes aside when did iD become the butt of jokes for promising *anything*. They have never promised any release date aside from 'when it's done'. Yeah D3 has been in development a while but not *that* long. From what I'm reading gamers better get used to long development cycles for cutting edge games. The content for this stuff is getting ever more difficult and time consuming to create - especially for smaller shops...ala iD.

Re:Aaargghhh!

[Kenja]

1 And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a boxed eddition of Doom III, sealed with seven seals.
2 And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the box, and to loose the seals thereof?
3 And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon.
4 And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon.
5 And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not: behold, ID of Activision, hath prevailed to open the box, and to loose the seven seals thereof.
6 And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the Redmond beast, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Linux client, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the even Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.
7 And he came and took the box out of the right hand of him that sat upon the throne.
8 And when he had taken the box, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down before the Linux client, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints.
9 And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the box, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation;
10 And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.
11 And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands;
12 Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Limux client that was respawned to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing.
13 And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Linux client for ever and ever.
14 And the four beasts said, Amen. And the four and twenty elders fell down and worshipped him that liveth for ever and ever.

Re:Aaargghhh!

[woodhouse]

Actually, I think you'll find Hell Freezing Over takes place slightly before DNF is released. But other than that, your post is 100% correct.

Re:Aaargghhh!

[the chao goes mu]

Maybe it's related to Lumix?

Re:I'll believe it

[JesseL]

That can't be right. I thought the Duke Nukem Forever release was defined as the last discrete event to happen before the universe collapses completly.

NVIDIA & ATI stock

[PoderOmega]

NVIDIA and ATI's stock just jumped a few points I'm sure.... Its a good excuse to replace an otherwise fine Ti4200 at least

Re:Finally!!!

[baudilus]

"Finally" is what they said about every other game that id made. "This summer" is a loose euphamism for "sometime in 2004, maybe 2005."

Wait and see.

Predictions

[Plaeroma]

I give it a month before the date gets pushed back again. Stop teasing us damn you!

There's just enough time!

[teamhasnoi]

To invent a time machine to go 100 years in the future and buy a machine that will run it!

Re:There's just enough time!

[mydigitalself]

when you get there, find another time machine and go another 100 years into the future - that way you can bring back a machine that will run Doom III on Longhorn! ;)

Re:There's just enough time!

[RatBastard]

Or you could just go buy an XBox.

Re:There's just enough time!

[Methuseus]

Or you could have high detail gameplay.

Linux version with.....

[millahtime]

Anyone know how the linux version running with linux compatability (under the bsd) with X11 will work?

Re:Linux version with.....

[Have Blue]

It won't work at all because it will be for x86.

As far as I know, doom 3 will be a simultaneous release for all 3 platforms and the submitter didn't bother to mention the Mac.

Re:Linux version with.....

[shiftless]

Probably the same as UT2004 does.. superbly.

Re:Linux version with.....

[Methuseus]

umm, he could also be talking about playing it on an x86 FreeBSD box. Or did you forget there was something besides x86 Linux, Windows, and Mac.

Re:Linux version with.....

[Lord Kano]

Or did you forget there was something besides x86 Linux, Windows, and Mac.

Well, nothing that isn't dying. :D

LK

Re:Linux version with.....

[mbanck]

Or did you forget there was something besides x86 Linux, Windows, and Mac.

Well, nothing that isn't dying. :D

/me whispers "AMD64".

Michael

NIN

[Power Everywhere]

Has anyone heard if NIN's soundtrack is making it into the game or not?

Re:NIN

[Brando_Calrisean]

I don't see why not - I heard he did the sound effects as well. Did you hear anything that would indicate this?

Re:NIN

[Anonymized Coward]

Trent Reznor has decided to quit the soundtrack job. From the Trent Reznor Wikipedia Page:

[...] Trent returned to working with id Software in 2003 as the chief sound engineer for the widely anticipated upcoming video game DOOM 3. He later quit the project to return to working on his upcoming album, Bleedthrough. [...]

Re:NIN

[br0ck]

If you can believe this post, KMFDM may have recorded 12 new tracks for the game. Some more idle speculation here.

Pre-order at Best Buy

[tedgyz]

They had boxes at Best Buy for pre-ordering. I saw the box and nearly wet my pants. Then I read the pre-order caption. Doh!

Interesting on Linux

[SamiousHaze]

Carmack has been seemingly a little disappointed with linux sales and such. So i found it interestin that they are gonna jam with a linux client anyway.

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=20503&cid=2195 211

and (from linuxgames.com search for Carmack)

[carmack] "We are going to continue to support linux in future products, but unfortunately it doesn't look like a strong business case can be made for it. The mac version outsold the linux version by quite a bit, and even that didn't hit 5% of the windows sales. Mac versions are still valid business cases, because the support is way easier than on either windows or linux platforms, and the sales numbers amount to something noticeable. There is no way that a linux box will hit the shelf at the same time and have the same price as a windows box, assuming the publisher is making a maximum effort for the windows box. If this is truly a gating factor, linux boxed games just won't succeed. Loki wants to get away from making games "convertable" between platforms, to force linux players to buy the linux boxes. I have issues with this. Not making executable binaries available online sucks. I hate binary patches, and requiring either patches from different versions, or the installation of all previous patches. Just releasing a new executable is so much easier. Our options from here are to move towards a hybrid CD and pay Loki for official support (which makes linux support look like an expense, rather than a benefit), make a hybrid CD but leave the linux version in an "unsupported" directory, or just make unsupported linux executables available online like we used to. It is going to be quite some time before DOOM ships, so we can't say anything definitive at this point. I will probably do the initial development work for DOOM on linux, but I'm not interested in tracking every change that goes on in the linux world. The initial work will probably be with the Nvidia driver, which already has all the features I need, then I will work with the Open Source mesa drivers to bring them up to par. "

Re:Interesting on Linux

[pubjames]

but unfortunately it doesn't look like a strong business case can be made for it

Time for us Linux fans to put our money where our mouths are. You want to see widespread use of Linux on the desktop? Buy Doom3. I'm serious - if there were significant sales on Linux it might persuade other software companies to start coming out with stuff for Linux too.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Lussarn]

As you probably know with Q3 you could by the cheaper windows version and download Linux binaries. I'm pretty sure Carmack understands that too. Not to mention it was quite a while since Q3 was released, the market has hopefully grown a bit.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[pubjames]

Our options from here are [...]

Another option - why not just sell the Linux version online? Nearly all current Linux-types are techies who are going to have big bandwidth connections. Might reduce the cost of suppling the Linux version and increase the business case for it?

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Metallic Matty]

You have an excellent point. I know quite a few people who whole-heartedly support linux, but then fail to use it for gaming when they can. I admit, even I am guilty. I run WinXP so I can play games, and I don't own any that work for linux.

And that's just the trick, it isn't going to become an option unless they see a significant reason to bother. After all, if they put the money and work into developing it for linux, and the market share is too small, they won't bother in the future.

So, support Doom3 for Linux if you want to see more games for your beloved OSS.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[pangloss]

eh? how does this work? b/c my copy of q3 for windows is languishing would be great if i could play q3 on linux w/out having to repurchase

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Cthefuture]

What? I did the same thing. I bought the Windows version and downloaded the Linux stuff. Much easier that way and I can play on both platforms if I wish (even though I only ever use Linux).

First copy your Windows install of Q3 over to your Linux machine (or copy the stuff straight off your Q3 CD). Then download and install the latest Q3 point release for Linux. Install it in the same directory.

All you need are the Linux executable and the .pk3 files off the CDROM (which work on any system).

Just make sure you install the point release last because it updates/overwrites some of the pk3 files.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[dpilot]

Actually, I bought two copies of Linux Q3, on sale for $10 ea at EB. I was trying to pump at least a little cash into Linux games, plus I can have legit multiplayer on my LAN at home. Then I ended up downloading Windows code and using one Linux game under Windows. (Actually dual-boot, Win and Linux on that machine play by the same CD key.)

Re:Interesting on Linux

[sjwt]

see, hears the problem,
you guys will need to buy more then just doom3,
you can splure on one game then bitch a year later when no one is buying other games.

The OS gameing comunity needs to keep buying linux games, the sales need to stay up there.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Spoing]

1. Time for us Linux fans to put our money where our mouths are.

[looks over virtual shoulder]

Hmmm...I think I've done that in spades. If you want more Linux fans to buy games that are compiled for Linux, you need more Linux gamers!

Re:Interesting on Linux

[hal2814]

Ok, so let's suppose that all the Linux gamers go out and buy Doom 3. It looks to me like the Win32 client and Linux client will be packaged together. How is ID going to know that we are buying Doom 3 for the Linux version and not just buying it to play on Windows? Do you really think that if game sales are high Id is going to be thinking, "Wow, it's a good thing we released the Linux client in with this. It's really boosted our sales." Even if strong Linux user sales do somehow make Doom 3 a bigger seller, I doubt it'll be perceived that way.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[7-Vodka]

is this a very old comment?
because he says "I will probably do the initial development work for DOOM on linux... It is going to be quite some time before DOOM ships"

Cause if it is I'd like to hear what he's learned since then. For example 100% of the large sample group that I informally polled, bought the windows version because it came out a week or two before the linux version and they couldn't wait.

Maybe carmack could discuss how many linux binaries were downloaded?

Re:Interesting on Linux

[RatBastard]

Loki did screw the pooch on that one. The initial release of Quake 3 for Linux was that overpriced tin box edition. They bet the farm on that one and lost. It resulted in poor Linux Q3:A sales and it sunk Loki.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Schnapple]

The initial release of Quake 3 for Linux was that overpriced tin box edition

Quake 3 was released in that "limited" tin box for Windows, as well as a cardboard box. Both on Windows cost the same. People stated they wanted the tin box for Linux, so Loki came through. Either the port of Quake 3 was going to be that expensive either way, or Loki had to pay extra for the same thing. I don't think they survived long enough to do the cardboard box.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Minna Kirai]

Carmack has been seemingly a little disappointed with linux sales and such. So i found it interestin that they are gonna jam with a linux client anyway.

Well duh. He released Quake3 with a separate Linux-only box! That's just plain idiocy... ok, call it "over-optimism" if you want to be nice. Anyone should've been able to tell that'd be a huge waste of money.

Actually writing the Linux client was rather cheap for such hotshot programmers (since they needed to make a Linux server and a non-DirectX Mac version anyhow).

But actually pressing separate runs of CDs and shipping multiple boxes to stores (paying for all shelfspace) was obviously just burning money. (Eventually, the stores that were stuck with pallets of unsold Linux versions slapped stickers on them giving the URL for the Windows EXE and sold them at $1/each).

It was surprising that Carmack didn't predict that would happen, but he's learned his lesson now.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[drinkypoo]

I think it makes a lot more sense to just give the linux binaries away, possibly with or near demo game content. You still need licensed wadfiles (or modern equivalent) to play the full game and the binaries are the smallest part of the package.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[drinkypoo]

By the time the games reach $10 they probably aren't printing any more of them, just emptying warehouses. Those games are already paid for. If you want to pump cash into linux games, you have to buy the game when it's new, which means sales go up, which means they order more copies - which is when the game development studios and the publishers get money.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[dewke]

You have an excellent point. I know quite a few people who whole-heartedly support linux, but then fail to use it for gaming when they can. I admit, even I am guilty. I run WinXP so I can play games, and I don't own any that work for linux.

I'm guilty of this. I do everything at home on linux except game. I would love to get doom3 on linux except my linux pc won't be able to handle it. Not being made of money I can't afford two top end gaming rigs/vid cards. If it was only a matter of playing doom3 etc... I'd switch, but of the games I play, such a small percentage run on linux that it's not cost effective.

I guess it's a downside to linux that it can run so effectively on hand-me-down hardware. If it was winxp I wouldn't be able to use a p133 or an old abit bp6 :)

Re:Interesting on Linux

[dpilot]

Actually, I generally buy NO games new. By and large, I wait until games are on the bargain shelves - Window, Linux, and in the olden days, DOS.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[drinkypoo]

I buy almost nothing new myself, but do you know what message that sends to game publishers? None whatsoever. And no message is as bad as saying you hate it, because they only notice cash flow or things they believe will lead to changes in cash flow.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[statusbar]

But I run Quake3 ( for Urban Terror ) on Linux, and I bought the Windows Quake CD in order to do so. So as far as Carmack knows, I bought the windows version. But I didn't. I bought the Linux version.

--jeff++

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Augie De Blieck Jr.]

The people behind UNREAL 2004 track on-line players to see what platform players are using. It was mentioned in a Slashdot thread here at the time.

Assuming that the id people do the same in such a case, then the best thing you can do is buy the client and play it on-line. A lot.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Marsala]

I'm serious - if there were significant sales on Linux it might persuade other software companies to start coming out with stuff for Linux too.

First off: other companies are coming out with stuff for Linux. Check out icculus's site: http://www.icculus.org/

If you're offering a multiplayer FPS, you really need to get a dedicated server binary out there ASAP. No one wants to waste a server just to run your game over Terminal Services (ggz NovaLogic).

And, it's not uncommon to see folks kick out a Linux version of the client for their game either (although those never get hyped and good luck finding 'em on the *planet mess).

Secondly, I'm not sure what the context of that quote was, nor do I know when it was made. What I am pretty sure of, however, is that aside from a version of Q3 Rocket Arena distributed through Loki, I don't really recall iD ever actually selling the Linux version of any of its games. The instructions have always been "just download the binary, and copy the paks over from the Windows cd".

Given that you could download a bin for Q3 and use the paks from the Windows cd's you had already purchased, I don't see any need for a Linux gamer to pay for a game a second time, so I don't think those sales figures are all that surprising. I'd suspect that checking out what OS clients on pub servers are using might be a better indicator of what the market looks like (like how the UT2K4 guys are doing it).

But whatever. I'm getting tired of WWII shooters... getting back to dropping the smack down on hordes of hellish minions and raging faces with a 40ft tall boss that's been engineered to dispense pain and anguish like it was being paid on a commission sounds like a good plan to me. :)

Re:Interesting on Linux

[Grausam]

The problem with this is IMHO you don't get the shiny Doom III box. When I'm paying for a game, I wan't the whole shebang. I wan't the manual with some nice concept art (usually), and basically something physical I can put on my mantle, so to speak...

I like the idea of a hybrid disc though. That would also get the cute li'l Tux logo (hopefully) on the box right besides that so colourfull waving banner. Maybe, and just maybe, that would get more users to think of Linux as a competitor or equal to Windows...

As of now, all the games i buy are from http://tuxgames.com to get it in a nice fluffy box.

Maybe if this was multiplayer only, a pay-for-download option would be sufficient for me, but a single-player book is like a good (or bad) book. I wan't to show it off, shallow as it might sound.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[NoMercy]

I'm curious if the 'Quake3 Linux Sales' is derived from the number of users who are playing games using Linux, or the number of users who went out and bought a specilised Linux CD.

I bought a windows CD version, but I play my games purely under linux... bet there's quite a few like me.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[justins]

Time for us Linux fans to put our money where our mouths are. You want to see widespread use of Linux on the desktop? Buy Doom3. I'm serious - if there were significant sales on Linux it might persuade other software companies to start coming out with stuff for Linux too.

Or just play Quake 3 or Doom 3 on Linux. They monitor who's using which client versions and the Linux client usage is just as unimpressive as the Linux client sales figures.

Re:Interesting on Linux

[FuzzyBad-Mofo]

I'll probably get it, but I'm a little concerned about the system specs. I'm "only" running a AMD 2600 with a GF4TI. Will that be enough?

huh

[BigBir3d]

I will believe it when I see it in my hands, and not a second before.

I think I have heard this all before...

Re:huh

[BigBir3d]

Not until I feel the weight... could be an empty box ya know. ;-)

Just not funny

[WapoStyle]

Duke Nukem Forever jokes just aren't funny anymore. Sorry off-topic.

Countdown...

[carvalhao]

... to some really nasty pissedOffNeglectedGirlfriend Action! Count on Explycit Lyrics!!

New Doom 3 trailer

[crt]

A new Doom 3 (Xbox) trailer came out yesterday. Looks like all new in-game footage. Get it at IGN or FilePlanet

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[Anonymous Coward]

Fileplanet.

Anyone who actively recommends usage of any *planet or GameSpy program, site or other form of crap should be stabbed in the face with a blunt spoon. I mean, what kind of a joke is Fileplanet anyways? "Pay good money to look at and play... Demos, trailers and assorted unfunny junk. Woot!" I actually wanted to download a few demos from a game developer a few weeks ago, but they were only hosted on Fileplanet. Lovely. I then voted with my wallet helped myself on some 700mb ISO "demos" using bittorrent. Fuck them.

I'm not even going to start on GameSpy on the unintelligent ooze that makes up the *planet staff. IGN was pretty horrible too in the past, but I genuinely forgot why so it couldn't have been that big a deal...

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[CaseM]

Why are you modded insightful?

FilePlanet and the rest of the *planet file services are just that - services. For less than the price of a couple of burgers or a movie ticket each month I can get any of the patches, demos, movies, or other related multimedia without having to worry about where or how fast I'm going to download it.

Bandwidth isn't free, damnit, and neither is my time, which is my most precious commodity. For the convenience of having all the crap I want to download gathered under one roof, services like these have proven invaluable to me.

And just for the record, I'm not employed by any such company or any of its affliliates.

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[Blackhalo]

I hear you brother. My old pc's mobo gave up the ghost recently, so I bought one of Dell's stripped down minimum config servers ($299) to hold me over until either DooM III or Half-life came out. So at that time I could bump up the proc and vid card with whatever is decently priced. Anyway, after moving all my existing hardware from my old box to the new and reinstalling all my favorite games, I went to start downloading the patches from the various publishers for my games, and almost every one linked me to file planet for the damn patches. Needless to say I was highly irate.

Hell, Fileplanet does not even work without macromedia flash. I refuse to run flash, even if it means I have to do without Homestarrunner. No adware for me, thank-you. That I have to suffer this indignity, this lack of support, because I go out and buy version 1.0 of my games when they come out? Intolerable! From now on I will only buy games from reputable publishers who are willing to support a game and the "licence" that comes with it YEARS after it comes out. Like Blizzard does, or to a much higher standard Id, who acually open thier old code. No more of this fucking abandonware.

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[justins]

Anyone who actively recommends usage of any *planet or GameSpy program, site or other form of crap should be stabbed in the face with a blunt spoon.

Of course that implicitly includes about 95% of the game publishers out there. How many publishers actually host their own update patches?

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[phrasebook]

I can get any of the patches, demos, movies, or other related multimedia

Bandwidth isn't free, damnit, and neither is my time

These two don't go together. I'd say if you've got time for any of the patches, demos, movies etc that you want, then you've got time to find an alternate link.

And just for the record, I'm not employed by any such company or any of its affliliates

It's ok. I believe ya.

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[CaseM]

Bandwidth = resource #1. Free? Nope. Meaning someone has to pay for it, ergo the great-grandparent's post about how everything should be free, etc, etc was without much merit.

Time = resource #2. Free? Not really. Time wasted looking for trailers and downloading them at shitty speeds after finding them is time a) I could be charging to a client or b) I could be spending enjoying said trailer, demo, patch for a game or with my loved ones.

"It's ok. I believe ya."

And I believe at this point you're just trolling, now go away.

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[IncohereD]

Time = resource #2. Free? Not really. Time wasted looking for trailers and downloading them at shitty speeds after finding them is time a) I could be charging to a client or b) I could be spending enjoying said trailer, demo, patch for a game or with my loved ones.

How is time you're downloading not time you could be doing something else? Unless you're that transfixed by the download progress bar?

Re:New Doom 3 trailer

[IncohereD]

IGN was pretty horrible too in the past, but I genuinely forgot why so it couldn't have been that big a deal...

I just tried reading the interview with the id guy on IGN, and WHILE I WAS READING the screen refreshed to full-page ads, with no click-outs, for about a minute. That's beyond annoying, to the point of offensive. I was MID FUCKING SENTENCE.

What?

[teamhasnoi]

One item of note: the PC version will lack the cooperative multiplayer mode featured in previous DOOM games.

No cooperative for PC? Is this some kind of sick joke?

How will people ever learn to work together like the Amish if we don't have cooperative multiplayer?!?

Re:What?

[phalse phace]

From IGN.com,

"IGN: Last question. There's co-op offline and online for Xbox, but not for the PC. I doubt it could be a technical concern, so what's the reasoning for that?

Todd: That's a good question. The Xbox version, because it's in contemporaneous development with the PC. When it was started, basically was conceived as a console implementation of what we're trying to do on the PC, as opposed to a port where they take whatever we do on the PC and "boom" slap it on the Xbox. The Xbox version was designed from the ground up to support co-operative play over System Link and Xbox Live. There [were] some changes, concessions, considerations that had to be made from a lot of different standpoints in terms of stuff as mundane as how narrow the hallways are to the ability of the AI of the enemies to focus on one versus two players -- because it's no fun to play the co-op guy that the world seems to ignore -- to how the narrative of single-player story is told.

On the PC version, it was always conceived of as a purely single-player experience. The whole, "you're alone in your room and all the lights are turned out." It's an experience where we want you to be afraid to get up and turn the lights off because you're alone. Whereas, because the console market is different, because people like to play together. Now, we won't have the ability to do split-screen, but the console consumer is more, "Hey, we love co-op" and it's all supported within the Xbox with Xbox Live and System Link. It made a lot more sense for us when we were designing [the game] to include that feature, [which] was never considered to be a critical feature for the PC [version], given that our goal from the start with the PC version was to make it the best single-player game that id had ever made."

Re:What?

[drinkypoo]

Clearly the folks at ID (or at least Todd) don't understand the internet. It brings us closer together. Not supporting co-op play ignores that particular factoid entirely. The fact that it's being implemented in the Xbox version indicates that most of the code is going to be present in the PC version, too, but they're not implementing co-op anyway. Probably someone will come up with some half-baked mods for D3 that will allow co-op play, and then everyone will be loving it and wondering WTF ID was thinking when they didn't include it in the first place.

Every game which supports network play should support co-op play.

Re:What?

[mrtroy]

Real reasoning:

You can prevent piracy on xbox live a lot easier than any PC based multiplayer versions.

Why did he not try to justify that instead of making false claims?

It is understandable they want to make money, and Xbox could be where its at for them...

Re:What?

[dwpro]

I don't understand your logic, how is making co-op play any less secure than the player vs player mode?

Re:What?

[Cochonou]

How will people ever learn to work together like the Amish if we don't have cooperative multiplayer?!?

People will learn to work together like the Amish in Serious Sam 2.

Re:What?

[Chris Pimlott]

Um, yeah, sure... I'm sorry, piracy on the Xbox is so easy it's not even funny. I highly doubt that that had anything to do with their decision.

johnc, feel free...

[eddy]

.. to update your .finger with some techno-babble. We love it!

(I'm serious, it's been ages, and the new cards he talked about in 2003 are now here, NDA-free)

So a mac version won't be long now!

[amichalo]

A Linux client has also been in development alongside the requisite Win32 version.

So I guess us Mac owners can expect a version summer of '09.

As a Mac Gamer it hurts me that a Linux client will come out before an OS X version will.

Re:So a mac version won't be long now!

[Lussarn]

As a Mac Gamer it hurts me that a Linux client will come out before an OS X version will.

Why do you care about Linux games? As a Linux gamer I don't give a shit about Mac games.

Re:So a mac version won't be long now!

[amichalo]

Why do you care about Linux games? As a Linux gamer I don't give a shit about Mac games.

No doubt you don't give a shit about Mac games - there aren't any! My post (a joke) was pointing out how sad it is that the mac platform never had anything other than the most popular PC games ported to it (and years AFTER the PC release). Now even the linux platform is getting DOOM III well before OS X will.

Checkout the video clip I lonked to - worth the download and can explain better than I can.

Re:So a mac version won't be long now!

[clichekiller]

No doubt you don't give a shit about Mac games - there aren't any! My post (a joke) was pointing out how sad it is that the mac platform never had anything other than the most popular PC games ported to it (and years AFTER the PC release). Now even the linux platform is getting DOOM III well before OS X will.

How do you explain Halo, admitedly 6 mos. later, and oh Warcraft III (simultaneous), and oh yeah Unreal Tournament 2004 only a week after the PC release.

The Mac is getting more and more games and earlier then ever before. Take a walk into an Apple store or the section of a CompUSA and you will probably find more mainstream games for the Mac there then exist for Linux.

Re:So a mac version won't be long now!

[C_Kode]

Hey you got MS Office before Linux!! Ermm.. nevermind.

Re:So a mac version won't be long now!

[stephenisu]

You know what is great about development in linux? Porting to OSX takes little effort IF you plan ahead of the game. Seriously, just need a good video card. OSX is practically BSD with a dress on.

Linux version

[ari_j]

"A Linux client has also been in development alongside the requisite Win32 version" for over a decade now.

correction

[CobwoyNeal]

DOOM III will be released this summer.

In DOOM III time, that means it might be out by christmas.

..of 2007 ... right after Duke Nukem Forever and Half-Life 2.

So what's the copylocking?

[Thinkit4]

To me, the greatest advance in software would be the publisher actually trusting the consumer, and not requiring a cd-check. It was finally removed from quake 3 for the single-player mode. Another example of craziness due to artificial scarcity.

Re:So what's the copylocking?

[FrostedWheat]

It was removed from UT, UT2003 and Q3 a few months after each was released. This means D3 will probably still have the cd-check but it may eventually be removed like in Q3. It's interesting to note that the Linux version of UT2004 does not have this 'feature' while the Windows one does.

Your right tho, they shouldn't do it at all. It doesn't accomplish anything. If people are going to copy it, they'll find a way. Myself and everyone I know usually have to install cracks or patches just to play our legally bought games without having to keep bring out the disks. Sometimes the CD checks are so badly writtin that even with the disks we cannot play them - so we *have* to install the patchs.

Re:So what's the copylocking?

[RatBastard]

Why should they trust the consumer? DOOM 2 was leaked out onto the Internet weeks before it was officially released. Hell, people created a USent newsgroup for it and were posting about how good the game was and how to fix this or that problem weeks before it was released.

The one thing id Software has learned is that people will rip them off. They've learned that they can not trust the consumer.

Re:So what's the copylocking?

[dewke]

The one thing id Software has learned is that people will rip them off. They've learned that they can not trust the consumer

No kidding, remember the quake "shareware" cd with all the other software locked on it.

It took all of what a week before a keygen leaked?.

Re:So what's the copylocking?

[krist0]

Dude, I remember getting Doom2 before it was released, had to download it on a 14k modem from some BBS. Took a while.
Ah, the days of BBS'

I remember walking into a computer store after school and talking to the sales person about how awesome it was. I remember he asked me for a copy (this was in Australia, shipping lags/lagged there). heh.

Re:So what's the copylocking?

[MrResistor]

It's interesting to note that the Linux version of UT2004 does not have this 'feature' while the Windows one does.

IIRC ut2k3 didn't do cd-check on Linux either.

Myself and everyone I know usually have to install cracks or patches just to play our legally bought games without having to keep bring out the disks. Sometimes the CD checks are so badly writtin that even with the disks we cannot play them - so we *have* to install the patchs.

The worst was Diablo 2. I swore never to buy another Blizzard game after that. It's one thing to have some copy protection, and I can even respect that, but it's quite another when your copy protection causes enough problems that you have an entry in the FAQ about it, and yet you refuse to do anything to fix the problem. Between that and the bnetd thing, I decided to give my money to companies that at least pretend to care about their customers.

Re:So what's the copylocking?

[Xeleema]

What is with Viviendi? For the longest time, it seemed like they had the gamer close to heart. Then they started throwing every kind of copy protection on their products. I quit giving them cash when they started picking on F/OSS projects. Last time I checked BnetD's website (a few weeks ago), it pulled up Blizzard's battle.net site. Thought I had a typo and found the real site. I've been giving them hell ever since. With any luck, Blizzard will be bought-up or crushed in a few years.
I may speak with my wallet, but a cable modem and a good FTP server speaks louder...

He's out

[TheBurrito]

The last I heard (and this was months ago), Reznor indeed left the project to work on a new album because the game was taking longer than expected. At the time, word was that none of his work would appear in Doom 3. Don't know if that's changed. *crosses fingers that he's still in it*

Re:He's out

[drinkypoo]

I know I'm in the minority, but frankly I think reznor's quake soundtrack work to date has been horribly uninspired. The best thing you can say about it is that it more or less fits the mood of the game. I'd far rather see someone else like A Perfect Circle go at it. I see using Reznor again as being stuck in a rut.

Re:He's out

[cayenne8]

Well, Trent DID take some time out to come see David Bowie with us all here in NOLA....

I think Ray Davies of the Kinks was there too...

Re:He's out

[thrash242]

I think think that Trent's ambient work was just what Quake needed. It was by far my favorite work by him. I didn't think it sounded like his normal work, so I don't know what you mean about a rut.

That being said, I never would have thought he could do a good soundtrack from hearing his previous work.

Why would you say Perfect Circle? The last thing Doom 3 needs is a rock music sound track. I think an ambient soundtrack by Trent would probably be good. (but I'm not a fan of the guy or NIN)

The best thing one can say about *any* soundtrack is that it fits the mood of the game/movie/whatever. That's the purpose of the soundtrack, not to wow people with your inspiration. If it does that too, then great, but first and formost it should fit and enhance the mood of the work.

There are other artists that I'd like to see doing a soundtrack for Doom (Skinny Puppy, Controlled Bleeding, etc), but if Trent's soundtrack to Doom3 (If he is still making it) is as good as the Quake soundtrack, I'll be happy. Hopefully there will be some dynamic music, also. Changing for combat, etc.

On the slightly off-topic note: while I'm even less of a fan of Marilyn Manson, I though his work on the Resident Evil (movie) soundtrack was fantastic. He's another artist I don't normally like that impressed me. He might also be able to do a good Doom3 soundtrack.

Re:He's out

[dirtyboot]

Back when I was playing Quake a lot, I thought Steve Albini's stuff fit in pretty good, particularly Shellac's "At Action Park" and Big Black's "Songs About Fucking."

Re:He's out

[RatBastard]

I can't say as I even remember it. I turned the music off moment I figured out how. I do that with most games if I can. Very few game soundtracks actually help the game at all. And it was only recently with the abandonment of redbook and the adoption of dynamic music that I've bothered to leave the music on.

Re:He's out

[Hays]

I disagree, I think it's some of the coolest "music" I've ever heard. It sets a wonderful, creepy, scary atmosphere that I just love. I don't want to hear guitars and drums, I want to hear scary sounds and pulsing heartbeats... I don't want it to be anything resembling mainstream music. I hated the Quake2 soundtrack, for instance.

Re:He's out

[arcanumas]

The last thing Doom 3 needs is a rock music sound track. I think an ambient soundtrack by Trent would probably be good. (but I'm not a fan of the guy or NIN)

Ok i agree on Doom3 becaue it's supposed to be scary too, but i _really_ think that Metallica - Kill'em All is a Quake3 soundrack.

No Remorse,
Whiplash,
Metal Militia
These go well with a frag frenzy :)

Re:He's out

[BlackHawk-666]

The guys I'd like to see do it are Scorn. Their shit freaks me right out while stoned and lying back, what the hell would it do to my mind when stoned and playing Doom III...can't wait to find out (I can always switch off the music in Doom and play their stuff as MP3's).

Re:He's out

[zero_offset]

and Big Black's "Songs About Fucking."

Man, until today I thought I was the only person who actually bought that.

Or did you just download it from me back in the Napster days? :)

Re:He's out

[Jesselovesscripts]

not to get into music again, but you just mentioned a person who does, have a particular sound, one in fact... and his screaming industrial music would be dope for doom3. Perfect Circle is the same shit, same rut. it's tool light, for tools.

Re:He's out

[iLEZ]

Yes, Skinny Puppy on the Doom3 soundtrack! oGre could do the voices for the monsters. =)

Re:He's out

[AveBelial]

Dont know what to read into the comment, but Heres Trent dropping a pointed comment on his site, His Fourth reply Down

http://www.nin.com/access/5-10/index.html

System Requirements

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

I believe they are similar to those recently announced for the next version of Windows.

Re:System Requirements

[RatBastard]

Say what? Have you ever tried to install DirectX 8 on a Mac? It ain't easy, let me tell you!

trailer

[Meterman]

Here's the link for the large movie trailer.
http://www.doom3.com/video/trailer_large.mov
Enjoy

Re:trailer

[Zakabog]

YOU BASTARD! Do you have any idea how long I've been downloading the small movie trailer! And I have to get to work soon, man I'm gonna get fired :-/

Re:trailer

[SomeGuyFromCA]

C:\downloads\movies\trailers\games\id\doom3> wget http://www.doom3.com/video/trailer_large.mov
--11:01:56-- http://www.doom3.com/video/trailer_large.mov
=> `trailer_large.mov'
Connecting to www.doom3.com:80... connected!
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 41,097,753 [video/quicktime]

0K .. 0% @ 9.96 KB/s
50K .. 0% @ 1.35 KB/s
100K .. 0% @ 10.01 KB/s
150K .. 0% @ 2.53 KB/s

This is gonna take a while.

Re:Trailer

[atomic-penguin]

Nevermind I used wget to get their index, and followed the code to their java popup.

Here is the link:
http://www.doom3.com/video/trailer_large.mo v

Re:trailer

[choconutdancer]

the file is gone now. would someone who DL'd it please bitorrent it?

thanks.

Re:trailer

[Epistax]

I'm still waiting for the Doom movie staring Schwarzenegger as the retired-boozing-grumpy-soldier turned lovable-plush-novelty.

Re:wow

[superpulpsicle]

Don't celebrate yet. It's going to have to top many online games out there to be a real competitor. Look at UT2004, there is 10 modes of play for example. Single player doesn't really sell... though in this case, this game has been hyped beyond all hell.

Obligatory Ghost Busters Quote

[sublimusasterisk]

"Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together - mass hysteria."

I'm booked until Christmas...

[NanoGator]

Doom III this summer, GTA San Andreas this fall... ugh, my girlfriend's gonna leave me.

Re:I'm booked until Christmas...

[cheesekeeper]

Is she hot? My video card won't be up to snuff, so I'll have time to pay her some attention.

If she wants to find me, I'll be the guy sniffing for Doom 2 servers.

Re:I'm booked until Christmas...

[NanoGator]

"Is she hot? My video card won't be up to snuff, so I'll have time to pay her some attention."

Yeah because you can be sooOOOoooo choosey about if they're hot or not.

Re:I'm booked until Christmas...

[Sunnan]

Well, which do you prioritize? Doom can wait.

Re:I'm booked until Christmas...

[That's Unpossible!]

OK, so she's not hot, then.

its time

[virtualone]

i think its time to revise our definition of "summer".. so as long as doom III isn't out i'll be wearing shorts and t-shirts.

So, when, exactly?

[superdan2k]

So what you're saying is I should plan to make a trip to the store in January of 2006?

Direct X Question

[superpulpsicle]

I am a little confused on this linux client thing. Supposedly Doom III will utilize insane directX 9 graphics, but then directX is windows exclusive??? So is openGL being used for the linux side?

Re:Direct X Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, no DirectX 9. Actually DirectX 7 should be enough to run the game, it is only for input devices and 2d.
Everything else is OpenGL, OpenAL and SDL.
Direct X is just a buzzword, you can do everything just as well in OpenGL.
DirectX just defines how card should be made, while OpenGL give the card producers a say in the development.

No Networking??

[Anonymous Coward]

Did I read that blurb correctly? Quite frankly I don't play single-player games anymore, I find them boring. The future of gaming is all about broadband internet connections that enable large or even massive multiplayer games going on. I can't believe Id Software is ignoring networked gaming support on the PC ... but supporting it on the Xbox?!? The arguments given were pretty lame (boiling down to: the Xbox is about people playing together while PC gaming is about ... people locked in a room all by themselves??!?? ... guess they've never heard of LAN parties). Quite frankly I'm stunned.

Re:No Networking??

[sjwt]

only Co-OP..
it will have Death match and or equivlent.others.

Re:No Networking??

[ildon]

So... What exactly was I playing at QuakeCon last summer? I thought it was Doom3 Deathmatch, but obviously not according to whatever "blurb" (which I can't even find) you're talking about.

Pixel Shaders are important.

[Anonymous Coward]

Doom 3 will use the latest and greatest pixel shading technology to the fullest extent. You might consult John Carmack's somewhat old .plan file where he suggests the ATi ~9800 line of cards fall short of being able to run the number of long and complex shader programs he wants to use. ID is partnered with Nvidia on Doom 3, which suggests they aren't going to pull punches on shader length for ATi compatability. Not saying it won't run on ATi, just saying it might not run all the shaders or might use an alternate yet inferior set of shaders. As for the capabilities of the X800 it seems most sources suspect it's the same core as the ~9800's so the shader capabilities (Pixel Shader 2.0 instead of the newer 3.0 support) should be the same although I can't verify that.

That said, Nvidia has been taking some shit for inferior image quality and speed. That said, Doom3 will run fastest and maybe prettiest on the X800, it just might not run will all the effects enabled that the Geforce FX+ cards will.

Re:Pixel Shaders are important.

[Methuseus]

Here is a review of the new X800 card. It seems to have the PS2.0 like you say, but with extensions. Other than that it's comparable, but faster (raw pixel pushing and such), than the new nVIdia card. Now, I prefer ATI cards for their raw speed, but I acknowledge that nVidia's card may possibly be faster or prettier in the new engines.

I hope it comes with...

[CSG_SurferDude]

I hope it comes with the new and improved sub-orbital rocket launcher!

Knoppix

[IceFox]

I wonder how long after it is released a Script/app comes out that when given disk 1 (DoomIII) and disk 2 (Knoppix) it will give you an iso that you can burn and then boot straight into DoomIII under Linux without anything else running for maximum performance without the hassle of installing Linux.

-Benjamin Meyer

Re:Knoppix

[SomeGuyFromCA]

And exactly how would you handle saving games? Not everyone has USB pendrives, and you know Linux and NTFS...

Re:Knoppix

[brxndxn]

Back in my day, you didn't have a hard drive! You just had to put a floppy into the computer and boot from there.

and I'm 22..

Re:Knoppix

[neurojab]

>you know Linux and NTFS

The latest Knoppix includes the "captive" package, which uses the windows NTFS driver (if it can find it) to give Linux NTFS read/write support!

That said, this still isn't that great of an idea. Linux is fast, but video driver tweaks make all the difference in frame rate comparisons. Do we expect this bootable linux doom3 combination to blow away the performance on Windows, when video card companies focus their driver tweaking efforts on Windows?

I doubt it. You'll get "about the same" performance, but have to re-boot to use the game. The whole advantage of a linux client is not having run windows at all (greater stability, usability, speed etc), re-booting back and forth is a waste of time.

Re:Knoppix

[karmatic]

Your school was better than mine.

In all seriousness, half the software my elementary had were on casette tapes.

I'm 20.

Re:Knoppix

[BagOBones]

So you want to go back to the gaming days of DOS where all the drivers where part of the game an you had to hope your hardware was supported?

Re:Knoppix

[carlcmc]

This is a phenomenal idea. My windows xp install is bloated and slow. If there is a way to get people to try linux this would be it. Have a iso image of knoppix to boot and detect my video card and sound card and cd etc. Then launch Doom 3 for maximum performance! I'm salivating just thinking about it since i only have a 900 mhz AMD.

Re:Knoppix

[Paladine97]

If you're excited about your 900 MHZ AMD running Doom III WELL, you can pretty much forget about it. You might be able to squeeze 320x240 at a decent frame rate. But don't count on it ;-)

Re:Knoppix

[mattACK]

Rather than turn your PC into a console, just buy an XBOX.

Re:Knoppix

[sryx]

This is a rather good idea. Yes I know that we already have something like it (XBox) but I think some cleaver competition couldn't hurt. I think it should go a bit further though. How about a Knoppix distribution that can make a perfectly tuned gaming platform. Ok so the premise is a bootable CD that once started sets up some kind of CFG file (either on a USB Pen drive or as a single compressed file that can reside on the primary HD (it would only need to hold configuration settings and maybe a binary driver or two as devices are updated (so you can have the current drivers without consonantly re-releasing the distribution. Then the games could be defined by XML files that can be hand created or stored on some central repository online. These XML files give basic information about the game to some launcher; the user specific stuff is held in the user space config file. All the distribution would need to do is provide SVGALib, SDL, OpenGL, X11 (only when absolutely necessary), Joystick and network support.
Maybe a simple email client and web browser for searching for cheats, heck maybe a memory freezer (is that the right term? Think Game Genie for a computer). Everything else that might take system resources wouldn&#146;t be present. This would be a great use of a Linux From Scratch system. People could burn the distribution and then burn games and their corresponding XML files to other disks. The result would be a simple yet powerful gaming experience that would be simple to share. Maybe work with the MythTV people for a clean interface. This could be a great way to introduce Linux to new people. This is after all one of Linux&#146;s primary strengths, the ability to customize everything.
What do you think? Am I ranting here?
-Jason

Re:Knoppix

[Blackhalo]

I'm pretty sure that my existing computer (2.4gig celeron) and whatever video card is selling for 125$ at the time this game comes out, will be able to run DooM III at a greater resolution and higer frame rate than the X-Box. If not, I can always bump my CPU up to whatever is the going rate for a 3.2 P-4 on game day. I have been pretty much holding off either buying a new computer or upgrading my old one until DooM III or Half-life II come out. I mean what else in the last 3 or so years really calls for an upgrade?

My gamer geek fantasy though is to get a group of my PC enabled gamer friends to somehow log on to X-Box live and wreak havoc on the X-Box, DooM III players with our unfair advatage of mouse, keyboard, and pure PC muscle. Of course if I want a real challenge I will probably have to log on normally to a regular server and get my ass handed to me by those with real skils.

I don't mean to denegrate what I'm sure are quite skilled gamers on the console, but come on a FPS on a console? Yuck.

UT2004 Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

My Unreal Tournament 2004 came with the Linux client. Didn't yours?

Yup. Sure did, and the Linux version plays on my SuSE 9.0/AMD Barton 2800+/512MB/GeForce5200FX equally as smooth as it does on my WinXP/P4-3.2GHz/512MB/Radeon9700 machine.

Re:UT2004 Linux

[stratjakt]

Regardless of OS, the 5200fx isn't nearly as capable as the Radeon 9700, no fanboy would dispute that.

It may run as smooth, but in resolutions and/or detail settings.

Re:UT2004 Linux

[DarkSarin]

Perhaps, but I happen to like the way nvidia actually supplies current drivers for linux

Re:UT2004 Linux

[ImpTech]

*Cough* unless you reverse the OSes. If he'd said he was using the Radeon in Linux I'd have called bullshit right away. The ONLY way you're going to get comparable performance to Windows in Linux is with a Nvidia. That said, UT2004 is quite playable on my 9600 Pro in Linux, and the levels load a good bit faster than in Windows.

A few questions...

[phorm]

Linux Version

I'd expect that this will be included with the windows version, not bought seperately, and will be compatible in network multiplay with windows machines. Can anyone confirm?

One item of note: the PC version will lack the cooperative multiplayer mode featured in previous DOOM games.

Does this mean that in the console version there is expected to be co-op multiplayer, or perhaps in a patch/mod later on?

Demo

Are/will there be any demos available. I'll probably toss out some cash for an upgrade if needed (yes, I know upgrading just for a game is a bit obsessive), but it would be nice to see how the game runs on my hardware before purchase (and I'd rather not pirate or try to get the unauth beta beforehand)

Re:I'll believe it

[Atrophis]

That can't be right. I thought the Duke Nukem Forever release was defined as the last discrete event to happen before the universe collapses completly.

Nah.. Thats not possible. They need more time.

Re:Sure, whatever....

[sjwt]

Oh god yerh,
I meen who the hell wouldn't want to bring out a bug filled inferor game sequal screwing fans out of as much cash as posible then laughing as the price of the game falls to below wholesale in the first two months.

thank goodness some game companys still are willing to put in the hard yards and work out problems with games before announing relase dates to sucker punch fans out of money.

Re:I'll believe it

[beta21]

Non no no....that's just the demo.

bah, summer in what country?

[Zed2K]

And when exactly? Does this mean June? Does it mean late September? I'll believe it when I see it on store shelves.

In other news

[JRootabega]

Activision has also announced that they will be releasing this summer next fall. In its place, look for a rerun of winter 1986, and a short period during which we will have no weather at all, and will probably die.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl

[Zx-man]

Ok, DooM III is just fine, but, since I'm form Ukraine, 'tis more exciting for me && I'm more waiting for the S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

Here are the movies from the game: Video

P.S. I'd really like to view them, but, ahh, my 14400Bps modem just rules the world! P.P.S. Unfortunately, it uses Micro$oft DirectX, so do not expect a version for GNU/Linux or MacOS X...

Re:S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl

[ildon]

Personally I see Stalker as more of a replacement for HL2 on my list of games to play than Doom3. HL2 and stalker seem much more similar than Doom3 and, well, pretty much anything else I can think of off the top of my head.

Re:S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl

[Barto]

Most Mac OS X games are ports from DirectX to OpenGL (by hand at OmniWeb or using Transgaming technology - WineX basically - at Westlake).

If it sells, expect to see a Mac OS X version.

Re:S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl

[Zx-man]

If it sells, expect to see a Mac OS X version.

I've talked to the developers on their forum and they said something exactly opposite...

Re:I'll believe it

[rpdillon]

id is well known for being very accurate on release dates, mainly because they don't give them. I believe they coined "When Its Done", but in any case, every time they have given a release date, they have made it. It'll be out this summer.

No Linux Client

[Bruha]

There has been no announcement on a Linux client. Someone misquoted Linuxnews's article.

Re:No Linux Client

[MrResistor]

Given id's history, I think it's safe to assume there will be one. Besides, even though there hasn't been an official announcement regarding a Linux client, it has been strongly suggested, like for example Carmack saying that innitial developement would be done on Linux, and mentioning various options for distributing the Linux client in a way that suggested that was the only decision to be made.

Far Cry

[Mitchell Mebane]

Far Cry is the best single player FPS game I've played since, well, Half-Life. It has some great voice acting, and the graphics are also excellent. DX9, though, so there's no Linux version. :(

You forgot

[gosand]

Its the first of the signs of the Apocalypse:
Doom III appears;
then Duke Nukem Forever gets a release;
then Hell Freezes Over;
then Taco actually checks slashdot before posting another dupe;
Then the world is destroyed in a great conflagration, the dead rise, the Messiah returns, four Horsemen, yadda, yadda, yadda

Isn't "Linux takes over the desktop" somewhere in there?

I keeed I keeed.

Re:You're Lucky

[Power Everywhere]

I don't think I'll have to. I have a 1 GHz Pentium III, 256 MB RAM. Please tell me that's enough to run a game.

I still call it vapor ware

[Mr.Dippy]

If the game is going to be released 3 months then why haven't they posted any specs? I still havent' gotten worked up about this game because I'm not sure if my machine can handle it. I have a 2.6ghz Comp with a 128 meg graphics card. I have a bad feeling that the game will still look like crap on my computer. Id's going to demand everybody get a 3.2Ghz comp with a 268 meg graphics card. I just know it.

What?!

[Anonymous Coward]

UT2004 runs slower on Linux than on Windows. This, however, is mostly due to the slower OpenGL code that gets used on Linux. You can see a similar slowdown by selecting the OpenGL renderer on Windows. Epic only has one guy working on OpenGL, I hear.

DOOM 3 - SMP Compatible?

[toby360]

Quake 3 was somewhat SMP compatible, does anyone know if Doom 3 will be fully SMP compatible on both Linux and Windows versions? A lot of power users now have adopted dual systems for a variety reasons but unfortunatly its hard to find games which properly utilize both processors. Having dual 2400MP's, SMP Support would be a huge plus for this game!

Re:DOOM 3 - SMP Compatible?

[the_2nd_coming]

does it run on a machine with 2 procs? if so, then it is compatible.

now, if it can USE that other proc, that is a different story.

Re:DOOM 3 - SMP Compatible?

[SuiteSisterMary]

Having dual 2400MP's, SMP Support would be a huge plus for this game!

What is so good about having two procs waiting on the GPU, rather than one?

Re:DOOM 3 - SMP Compatible?

[toby360]

Not all processing in a game is GPU related, extra cycles can be addressed on non GPU related items time improve gameplay. Game Physics, enhanced AI and applying filters to level geometry to take a load off the GPU. Each enemy needs to have its own logic to how it plays. How complex this is is up to the designers, but I'm sure a level with many monsters on it can put more of a burden on the CPU.

A game designer can potentially take a huge load off the GPU to do some of the simpler graphics processing tasks on a 2nd cpu. Its all in how the game is designed.

Games from ID as far as I recall have always used BSP, for Doom 3 i'm not sure if this is the same, but if they've changed the nature of the engine to do more on the fly scene culling then quake 1,2 or 3 did, then a huge burden can be taken off one processor. Framerates also improved drastically with 2 CPU's in Quake 3, even with the video cards available at the time. Framerates can EASILY be affected by a too busy processor at times.

Re:DOOM 3 - SMP Compatible?

[SuiteSisterMary]

Yes, CPU can be used for physics, netcode, and other nifty things.

For something like DOOM 3, though, they won't be. You'll be GPU bound.

As for BSPs and what not, my understanding is that more ram will do you better than more proc, as you can load more of the tree into memory and parse it fairly quickly. Could be mistaken on that, though.

Re:DOOM 3 - SMP Compatible?

[toby360]

Yes thats why I was asking if its SMP compatible :) Not will it run on an SMP system. A game running one processes on an SMP computer is not "SMP Compatible" unless it utilizes other processe(s) to distribute work between the two processors.

Re:I'll believe it

[jcoleman]

I'd just like to pipe up and say that you are the first person on the internet to spell the word "discrete" properly. "Discreet" means "secret," folks. :)

trailer for download?

[Maimun]

I don't have a quicktime plug-in, but even if I had, my Internet connection is ridiculous, so ... Does anyone know a URL for the trailer? I mean, for download of the movie. Thanks.

URL Please

[mfh]

> Trent isn't doing the sound anymore

I think if you're going to make a statement like that, you could at least offer up a URL to qualify it. I'm miffed if this is true.

Re:URL Please

[bigbigbison]

Nearly a year ago it was announced that Thrent Reznor was no longer involved with Doom 3.

Re:URL Please

[mekkab]

Google it. (look at the 5/13/2003 update on NiN Hotline). Heck, you can even find it in French and German!

you are not worthy.

[sjwt]

iddqd, idkfa, iddt, idclev(Episode,Level),idbehold(X, many choices ok so i cant rember))and idspispopd, anda few others, but i realy didnt use them, but bad memmory for what you didnt use is acceptable, hell i didnt use anything other the automap and warp, but you can not be allowed to incoreclty post IDSmashingPumpkinsIntoSmallPilesOfPutridDebris.

Re:you are not worthy.

[RatBastard]

idbeholdX where X =
S - Strength (Berzerker Box)
V - inVulnerability
I - Invisibility (blur sphere)
A - Automap
R - Radiation Suit
L - Light Amplifaction goggles

idchoppers -Gives you a chainsaw and prints "Doesn't suck, GM" on your screen.

idclevXY - DOOM 1: Warps you to Episode X, Level Y

idclevXX - DOOM 2: Warps you to map XX. Maps 10 must have a leading zero.

idclip - DOOM 2 only: No clipping - lets you walk through walls.
iddqd -"god mode", 100% health, you can not be damaged except by: Teleport Frags and A special sector type that ends the game after it kills you (DOOM 1, E1M8)

iddt - Changes the automap between three states: Normal, All Lines, and All Lines And Things.ect). Only cheat that works in Nightmare mode.

idfa - Gives you all weapons, armor, and ammo, but no keys.

idkfa - Give you all weapons, armor, ammo and keys.

idmusXX - DOOM 2 only: Changes the music to the map number typed in (01 - 32).

idmypos - Displays your current position and facing in hexadecimal.

idspispopd - DOOM only: Same as idclip.

Re:you are not worthy.

[sjwt]

thanks :)

but lets look past the doom2..
it just wasnt the same as doom.

should of been a 10 map pack :)

and then . . .

[kmankmankman2001]

and then the Cubs win the world series. Boom, no more universe.

Re:and then . . .

[Methuseus]

Seems like it. They weren't doing too badly until they started playing the Rockies.....

Best Buy??!!!

[phorm]

I had a similar experience. I went to a local best-buy clone and found an open portal into the neverworld, hoardes of evil demons walking around, and... oh wait those were the normal salespeople and customer service reps one would expect to see at Best Buy.

Seriously man, why would you pre-order from best-buy... customer service 0% - you'll be lucky to see your pre-order when it comes out.

Re:Best Buy??!!!

[squidbeast]

Yeah, they'll probably just cancel the pre-orders like they have before, and then have you arrested if you try to pick up your oder.

Try virtual cds

[Thinkit4]

I think they can work if you have the disc space. Most games install all data, so the only reason for the virtual cd is the cd-check. It makes somewhat more sense for multiplayer-oriented games as the master server is checking your key. At least the MMORPGs aren't stupid enough to require it.

Press releases make me giggle uncontrollably

[ArmpitMan]

"This summer we're sending game fans on a first-class trip to Mars -- with a layover in Hell," said Todd Hollenshead, CEO, id Software.

Tee hee hee hee hee hee hee hee!

Honestly, I don't see how anyone could say that with a straight face. That quote makes it sound like id is producing a parody of survival horror or something. (Which would admittedly be pretty cool, if that was what they were up to.)

Re:I'll believe it

[niko9]

That can't be right. I thought the Duke Nukem Forever release was defined as the last discrete event to happen before the universe collapses completly.

No, no, no, you silly man. First, Duke Nukem Forever get released. Then Slashdot reports on it in an accurate and grammatically correct manner and in a manner adherent to highest ethos of journalistic reporting, and without a biased editorial rant/slant thrown in, AND they promise not to dupe the story. THEN the the universe collapses.

Re:I'll believe it

[aardvarkjoe]

Oh, great. Now the spelling nazis are replying to examples of good spelling too.

Although thinking about it, that might be a more efficient way to do things on slashdot.

We're retro now.

[raygundan]

Unfortunately, it's been long enough that Duke Nukem Forever jokes are retro. Sure, they were out of style for a while, but now *all* the kids are into it, along with puffy-front mesh trucker hats.

Re:We're retro now.

[thadeusg]

Damn the Mesh Hats! Damn the Girl's Jeans!

DAMN THE FASHIONCORE!!!

Sorry, I had to let that out after seeing that.

Test/Demos?

[antdude]

Will there be tests or demos before the full version release?

Damn, this is a disapointment

[G00F]

playing the game for the first (or X times) with someone with the computer on hardest is aways toons of fun. That was something I missed of the doom1/2 days.

It just seams that multi-play has forgoten that not all multiplay is PvP. Try playing NWN or some game in co-opt mode and you will be disapointed in it as well.

Re:I'll believe it

[AviLazar]

Duke Nukem FOREVER - thats how long until the game comes out.

Far Cry beat them to it

[bonch]

I was blown away by Far Cry. It matched the Doom 3 screenshots I saw, but running NOW. In addition, they had the nerve to set the game in an outdoor tropical environment with no visibility limit.

That game seamlessly goes from hunting mercenaries on an island camp in the jungle to entering a cave and suddenly being in a Doom 3-esque claustrophobic environment shooting at genetic mutations.

As far as all the reports and screenshots have shown, Doom 3 is almost entirely shadowy, indoor environments. Blech. Far Cry was a breath of fresh air.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[netdudeuk]

Yes, the game is awesome and does indeed look as good as some of the Doom 3 images. For example, in some of the indoor scenes you'd be hard pressed to differentiate between the two. Try shooting a suspended strip light and admire the lighting effects as it rocks on it's chains.

Outside though, we have a Trueman Show behaviour. I sailed right away from land and you get a helicopter come and blow you away !

I'd rather just bump into a wall ;-)

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[nomadic]

It's always been like that. Id has always been at the top of the industry, but they've always had company. The idea that they're somehow at a higher technological level is just hype. Like right after Doom came out, 3dRealms released Rise of the Triad. Now, no, ROTT wasn't nearly as good as Doom, but the engine was doing the same sort of things. Unreal Tournament was on the same level as Quake 3. If Id is so good that it requires all these interviews and updates and hushed tones of awe, why do other game companies with anonymous game coders come up with the same technology at the same time? (or at least right after?)

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[mog007]

DooM3 isn't going to take place just on the surface of Mars (this iteration isn't on Phobos and Deimos). It's also going to have some action in Hell, and probably a little action on Earth, too.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[bonch]

To be fair, how else would you stop the player from swimming out into the ocean? An invisible wall that stops them? Made more sense that you're more "detectable by their radar" on the open sea, and so it's easy for them to send a chopper to kill your ass.

What a weird criticism. You're annoyed that you can't swim forever into a completely blank sea?

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[bonch]

I'm definitely looking forward to going to hell. Don't get me wrong, I'll be buying Doom 3 the day it comes out.

There's just something ballsy about coming out with a Doom 3-level engine that takes place mostly outdoors on a vast tropical island with no visibility limits. I found myself constantly stopping to check out distant hills with my binoculars and hearing things going on clear across the island with the "sound amplifiers." I once heard a helicopter revving up somewhere, which was just great--the engine played a sound event in the event that you're listening. I headed for the trees before it could spot me over the mountains.

I just got tired of the dark, indoor stuff from Quake 1, 2, and even 3. Doom 3 looks to be even MORE confining. I like being able to see things now, not have them shrouded in darkness for fright effect. Wracks my nerves more than anything.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[JAD lifter]

how else would you stop the player from swimming out into the ocean?
You could just have the ocean be really turbulent the farther out you swim, so there are like these really big winds and waves that push you back into shore.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[Talinom]

how else would you stop the player from swimming out into the ocean?

Sharks with frickin' lasers?

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[Prof.Phreak]

...I like being able to see things now, not have them shrouded in darkness for fright effect. Wracks my nerves more than anything.

Isn't that the whole point of DOOM3? Carmack once said that it's mostly a moody horror game.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[will_die]

Beyond the graphics, the enemy AI is amazing.
Two examples:
I was in a room with 2 doors,besides the one I entered, I hear men from one door so I take the other and clear that area out. Then head back to finish thoses 2 off. I go back to that original room, and as I open the door I see them one kneeling and the other one standing behind him both guns pointed at me.

The other was in an outdoor area, I had saved and was goofing around with the area a few times so I knew where all the enemy were located. I lined up a guy with my sniper rifle and missed, he started to hide then jump up and down to keep my attention. While that was happening one of the enemy with a sniper rifle moved from this current location, climb up some stairs and took me out.

The only thing bad about the game is having to turn on a dev mode so that you can save where ever you are.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[junkgrep]

Or how about.... fricking water ninjas!!!!

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[junkgrep]

Seriously. People act like Carmack is the only one in the universe who can create an engine with shadow volumes, like it's some magical secret nobody else knows. In fact, it's a very simple brute force method that other devs have held off on picking up until you can do it without having to compromise so much else (it's VERY preformance intensive just for the lighting alone) and because there are much better looking methods for direct lighting that would make a better jump up.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[Deraj DeZine]

ROTT was based on the Wolfenstein 3D engine that was developed at id. True, it had a lot of tweaking, but the Doom engine was vastly superior and not based on a grid of squares (I think ROTT had some areas that were not made of squares, but for the most part, it felt like Wolf3D).

But your point about id not being head and shoulders above the rest of the industry nowadays is true (though I would argue it formerly was, around the releases of Wolfenstein 3D and Doom).

Also, I'm not sure of the specifics, but Carmack pioneered the technology needed to do real-time shadows (for Doom 3). The algorithm has since been copied (at least by Tenebrae) and I'm sure another coder could have come up with it, but everything before Doom 3's real-time shadows was just a cheap hack.

Re:Far Cry beat them to it

[netdudeuk]

LOL - now that WOULD be cool !

CryEngine?

[bonch]

I guess you've never seen or played Far Cry.

Re:I'll believe it

[stanmann]

Holy Zarquon I think you've got it

You know...

[Short Circuit]

I wonder if NiN was the reason for the "nailgun" in Quake. People who knew of the band could hardly miss their logo on the ammo boxes.

And many of us who'd only heard of them because of the game saw it, too.

Just one of those things I wonder about.

Re:You know...

[biglig2]

The fact that, as you say, the band's logo is on the ammo boxes for the nailgun would suggest a causal link, don;t you think?

Re:You know...

[IncohereD]

I wonder if NiN was the reason for the "nailgun" in Quake. People who knew of the band could hardly miss their logo on the ammo boxes.

Trent Reznor (i.e. Nine Inch Nails) composed the entiriety of the Quake soundtrack. And you even got it by buying the shareware version which was awesome. It was even funnier because the shareware was like $9, but indie record stores were selling the illegal Italian import of the soundtrack for like $23.

Re:You're Lucky

[DarkSarin]

Don't get your hopes up...the RAM may hold you back unless you run a minimalist wm (xfce4 anyone) under linux. If you run winXP, you should double that.

sweet!

[Cruciform]

ID Software: Doing their part to protect geeks from dangerous UV exposure.

Oh yes.. that PA quote..

[AzraelKans]

Thats not YOUR comment but a quote from Gabe from penny-arcade and there are 3 details about it:

1.-He has not played the complete game or even a demo, he's taking conclussions from the screenshots(which he finds pretty amussing) and the history (which to be honest is not very good).

2.-He doesnt like horror games, he gears towards games like zelda, metroid, final fantasy, his horror game was about alice RE and dino crisis they were all negative comments, his latest comment was about RE outbreak and it was (guess!) negative. I dont even know if he ever played silent hill or fatal frame. He mentioned ONCE he didnt finished "Undying" because it was "too scary" Horror is just not his thing.

3.- The guy is smart, sensitive, funny and a great cartoonist and game journalist (yeah Gabe we love you with the heat of a thousand fucking suns) but dont you think you should get your OWN opinion from the damn game? I mean seriously, you dont even know what the thing is like.

Re:Oh yes.. that PA quote..

[Bob Davis, Retired]

Well, resident evil has been the exact same game, more or less, for its entire existence as a 'series'.

Shoot zombies. Find curious star-shaped indentation on a pedestal at police station. Proceed to other area. Shoot more zombies. Find door which needs to be opened from first area. Go back to first area. Shoot more zombies. Open door remotely. Return to collect star-shaped gem. Shoot more zombies. Return to first area. Place star-shaped gem into slot on pedestal. Enter door that just revealed itself. Find 'red' and 'green' herbs. Take 'red' and 'green' herb, combine on small sheet of paper (check it out in the games) and roll into doobie. Use doobie to recover health and / or recover from toxin.

Repeat.

The Mac Compactor

[Mulletproof]

Yep, time to throw away whatever Mac you current own and upgrade, right? :p

Re:The Mac Compactor

[sky289hawk1]

I bought the Dual 2GHz G5 right when it came out. I can't wait for ATI to release its x800 for the mac, and then I'll REALLY be able to own id's bad boy's butt

What? No bunny head on a stick????

[gatkinso]

I am sooo disappointed!

Re:You're Lucky

[Power Everywhere]

Windows XP Pro, SP1 runs pretty well, but then I don't too much with it that demands much. RAM is cheap for this motherboard so I might as well go to 1 GB some time soon. I'd hate to admit that a game was the reason though. :(

Re:I'll believe it

[saudadelinux]

I'm not sure I trust a press release, in which the legal folderol is longer than the release itself.

Linux version created because it is "cool"

[AHumbleOpinion]

I think it was id's Brian Hook that said in Game Developer magazine that Linux versions of their games do not make sense from a business perspective, that they are done because it is cool to do so. Fortunately id is successful enough that they can afford to do cool things.

id's games are not entirely designed to make money

[AHumbleOpinion]

Keep in mind that client are only part of id's business. The other part, and possibly the greater part, is licensing their game engines to other developers. Their game are not strictly intended to be money makers, they are also working models and advertisements for the engines. This is why id can have very high system requirements. By the time a licensed developer has their game ready today's high end hardware has become midrange and common. Similarly a Linux client is in part an ad for the engine, Linux support in the engine is a bullet item on a marketing brochure. Other developers may be gambling that a Linux game could be profitable in a year or two. There is actually one more reason id does Linux versions, they think it is cool to do so. They are successful enough that they can afford to do cool things that don't make sense from a business perspective.

Re:I'll believe it

[Hatta]

No, no, no, you silly man. First, Duke Nukem Forever get released. Then Slashdot reports on it in an accurate and grammatically correct manner and in a manner adherent to highest ethos of journalistic reporting, and without a biased editorial rant/slant thrown in, AND they promise not to dupe the story. THEN the the universe collapses.

How would they dupe it anyway, considering the universe collapses?

Re:I'll believe it

[Junior J. Junior III]

Man, forget about Duke Nukem Forever, that's old news.

I can't wait for the suquel, Duke Nukem Never... Literally!

hmm ...

[cascadingstylesheet]

For me, the charm of the original Doom was that it was the perfect balance between realism and cartoon.

I really don't find that ever more realistic body parts and blood sprays or echos really add anything. Kinda like poetry ;) - the limitations of the format fostered creativity :) With simple sprites and repetitive sounds, Doom managed to be very cool.

Re:Bill's Whore

[An0maly]

last time i checked, MS made WINDOWS. how did ID whore themsleves out to MS?

co-op is xbox exclusive

[John Harrison]

There have been several articles stating that two player cooperative mode will only be included on the xBox version. There is no plan for a co-op on the PC.

DooM 3, a sequel to Diablo.

[fafaforza]

The font in the images on the official site is pretty close to that used in the Diablo series. Wonder if that might expose them legally, or whether the font is freely available, like Times New Roman.

*yawn*

[koan]

Wow another FPS game that requires expensive hardware to run correctly, there is nothing new or exciting about this game and it will be about as cool as Quake 4...(twitch twitch)
I'm waiting for something truly interesting in games not the usual run around and shoot things.

This is an old trailer (E3 2003)

[Andorion]

I was gonna mod you down but I'll post this to be informative instead ;)

This is the E3 2003 trailer. For the new footage, check out this helpful fellow's post:

New Trailers

~Berj

Re:You're Lucky

[SomeGuyFromCA]

> 1 GHz Pentium III, 256 MB RAM. Please tell me that's enough to run a game.

Depends on the video card and on the game. Also, that RAM amount is a little low. Anything you run will be much happier with 512.

Advice: find your local heatseeker. Not the kind of heatseeker that buys the newest gear and then overclocks it, just the kind that buys the newest gear. After Doom 3 comes out - and he runs to the store with cash clutched in hand - offer to buy his old video card off of him for half of what he paid. Knowing those types, it'll be just fine for playing.

Actually, you could save some more cash and buy his copy of Doom 3 off of him when he gets bored with it. Those types quickly do.

30K/sec? Too slow!

[AndersM]

Here. Faster.

Trailer

[atomic-penguin]

Could someone please post link to the trailer, it says I need quicktime. I have xine which works fine, but the page is one of those force quicktime downloads. I can't view the page source either, else I would get the hyperlink embedded there.

check out farcry until doom3 appears

[werdnapk]

I didn't see any mention of farcry. It's on par with Doom3 and Half-Life 2 and it's reviews have been very positive... check it out.

Does anyone know...

[srcosmo]

..how mod-able Doom3 will be?

A big reason that Quake was such a hit was Id's release of the "QuakeC" code, and availability of all kinds of WAD/PAK expanders, model editors, level creators, etc. Quake lived solely through mods for years

What is Id doing to ensure Doom3 has longevity? I don't feel like plunking down $70 on a single player campaign that I can finish in 2 weeks. I don't want another Quake2.

Re:Does anyone know...

[ildon]

Uh, first let me say Quake2 had just as a successful mod community as Quake. And Quake3's is arguably more successful than either of those.

That being said, Doom3 will have both a scripting system which will control much of the game logic and entity properties in addition to the standard compilable dll/vm (who knows which) mod code. Maps will be distributed as the uncompiled .map files.

The main barrier to Doom3 mods will be the content creation time. Models and textures will require over three times longer to create on average. All this according to the mod round table at QuakeCon 2003.

Better start saving now...

[manavendra]

..so that by the time it's released, I'll have enough money to buy not only the newest, fastest, bad ass graphics card, but also replace the chip, the motherboard and the ram to get enough FPS to make it playable!

Re:I'll believe it

[Dimensio]

I believe they coined "When Its Done", but in any case, every time they have given a release date, they have made it.

Apparently you don't remember the 1.666 patch for the first Doom, which was given a release date of "two weeks". For several months.

Geez, I feel old for remembering that.

Tweaker

[T-Kir]

Chris Vrenna is doing the sound, which is fine by me. He did the soundtrack for American McGee's Alice, plus he used to be in NIN... mind I've just ordered 2am Wakeup Call, just waiting on the international shipping!! :-)

ATI?

[T-Kir]

What about a damnation for ATI? After all they were 'rumoured' to have been behind the alpha leak (AFAIK)....

Mind, given the HL2 situation with nVidia card performance, both id and Valve have pretty much setup camp in opposing companies as well as well as on the field of major releases.

Re:I'll believe it

[DarthTaco]

"How would they dupe it anyway, considering the universe collapses?"

I think God collapses the universe to enforce Slashdot's promise. If they didn't make the promise, it wouldn't fullfill the prophecy, and then there wouldn't be any need to collapse the universe.

Dupes? Here? Never!

[medscaper]

How would they dupe it anyway, considering the universe collapses?

You're new here, aren't you?

I think the utter collapse of the universe may be the only think that could honestly prevent a Slashdot dupe.

Of course, even then...I wouldn't bet the farm on it.

Doom III Mods

[Gumpmaster]

So how long after release until the great Doom III mods start hitting the net? The great engine should allow some spectacular mods. One of my personal Doom favorites was the Beavis and Butthead mod. Classic.

Nope; behold

[Venner]

You're both wrong. According to the ancient Bovispuerus Nealus Prophesies, at that point, the only way to save the entire universe is for some poor fool to inadvertantly post the story as a dupe before we all imlpode into nothingness. Unfortunately, the writings are vague on just who this person will be, just that he will be a great warrior of the 'laxus aranea mundi', wherever that is...

Weeeee. I really need some sleep.

Re:Nope; behold

[Hatta]

ah well, I was really hoping someone would make a good resturant at the end of the universe joke.

Re:I'll believe it

[TheBurningDog]

they're trying to promote a kinder , gentler image of a grammer nazi.

Whaaaa?

[msimm]

Tuxgames preorder ($49.00).

This product is due to be released on December 14, 2004.We are giving you the opportunity to be the first to purchase it. Please bear in mind this is a predicted release date. It is based purely on estimates made by Tux Games. This date is not supplied to us by the product developer. This is NOT a confirmed release date!

Tux Games will order the product on the day it becomes available, and will ship it immediately to you. Delivery time will be as listed below from the day we receive our stock.

Minimum Requirements
Currently Unspecified

Also Linux release is mentioned on FilePlanets Doom III info page, here and states:

It will also be released for Linux and MacOS X as well.

Not that I'd be surprised if they'd made a mistake, but enough big mistakes probably would have been corrected.

Last one (no real new info in any of these).

In related news...

[Provocateur]

Massive dumping of home computers has been observed on auction sites ebay and ubid, never before seen, to the delight of the out-of-work or underemployed from the tech sector who have been plagued by outsourcing.

until then...

[Dreadlord]

You can always play an enhanced version of Doom [1|2] here.

isn't *this summer* snow season in hell

[KaeloDest]

No for reals. Either it's snowing in hell, and Duke Nukem is the seventh seal of the Armigedion AND the Mac client will be released simultaneously... or iD is full of crap

Better luck next deadline

Indeed, co-op multiplayer for PC is a goner

[LionMage]

And this is puzzling to me, because early in the development cycle, we were assured by id that there would be some form of multiplayer in Doom 3, albeit not the kind of multiplayer that Quake 3 was famous for (and, frankly, designed for).

Now we find out that multiplayer is Xbox-only... and the article really doesn't give much detail on the real reasons why this decision was made! I think the excuses given in the published interview were lame. Multiplayer (cooperative or not) is what made the original Doom franchise so much fun, and gave it such lasting replay value.

My guess is that Microsoft insisted that the Xbox version have unique features not present in other versions, and since Microsoft is busy pimping Xbox Live, that was a reasonable area for id to concede and focus on for Xbox. I suspect that a lot of gamers are going to cry foul, and id may wind up releasing a patch for the PC, Linux, and Mac versions of Doom 3 that enables multiplayer.

Speaking of the Mac version, that's another thing that's not got a lot of mention lately. Early in the development cycle, we were assured that there would be a Mac version of Doom 3, but nobody's spoken about it much recently. Perhaps this, like PC multiplayer, got dropped from the roadmap?

I won't buy it - programming cant replace humans

[Selecter]

What makes the gameplay of the Battlefield series so good is the nature of the poeple behind the computers. Multiplayer is where it's at for me, and any game that does not have a GOOD MP part will be a game that gets none of my money.

It's the humans behind the little solders you see on screen that make those games so interesting. Doom III cant give me that, and at age 41 I'm immune from the gee whiz lookit them graphics crowd that impressed me 15 years ago.

To *Heck* with Doom III. Big Yawner for Me.

No Multiplayer support for PC

[eples]

On the PC version, it was always conceived of as a purely single-player experience. [...] Whereas, because the console market is different, because people like to play together.

What? Can anyone find out if they signed into some sort of contract agreement with Microsoft (for Xbox) that limited them in this respect?

Because otherwise, I mean, I don't buy this bullshit for a second.

Re:No Multiplayer support for PC

[gid]

I believe they showed Doom3 multiplayer at quakecon last year, and from rumors I've heard, Splashdamage is working on the doom3 multiplayer levels.

check this out

My Voodoo 3 3500 won't work :( ??!??

[Dareth]

Well hell... what's this world coming too!!!

All these young whippersnappers and their fancy video cards make me sick.

Re:I'll believe it

[Vampyre_Dark]

And that's not even a playable demo.

"Not Yet Rated"

[NotQuiteReal]

I'll save them the trouble, if it will help speed up the release.

Slap an "M" on that baby and ship it already.

Oh, yeah, why would anyone think 1024x768 wallpaper is "large"? This is not the 20th century anymore.

Re:Knoppix - Linux game releases - small market

[Tweester]

That seems to be the problem... People who play PC games tend to have a Wintel box for broadest choice of titles and the best performance from those titles. (Even when they use Linux for nearly everything else.) The Linux game releases are only attractive to those without a Wintel box, or those buying for political reasons. Chicken and egg problem that creates an activation energy barrier for igniting game performance development on Linux...

idSoftware rocks my world.

[SphericalCrusher]

Wow. idSoftware is actually giving us a semi-release date! Not that it bothers me that they don't, I'm just surprised. That seems to be more of a John Romero move... but he's no longer around, haha.

If you remember from awhile ago, John Carmack had the attitude of "It'll come out when it's done." and still even to this day, he maintains it. John Carmack is a God.

Summer?

[Kris_J]

You mean I have to wait until December?

What if Doom III were Linux Only?

[atlantis191]

I was reading the Slashdot summary and it notes that a linux version is being released along with the "requisite" windows version. It got me thinking... what impact would it have on the use of Linux if a highly anticipated game were released on Linux only? While it is obvious that it would be a poor business move its curious to think about.

Re:Finally!!!

[davew2040]

I actually don't think id software is known to be in the habit of lying about release dates, once they put out a final statement.

You muddled up that sentence.

[Trejkaz]

I think you mean, "A requisite Linux client has also been in development alongside the Win32 version."

Hence Futurama

[SamSim]

Hence the subtitle for Bender's dating service in Futurama: "Discreet and discrete".

Re:id's games are not entirely designed to make mo

[_|()|\|]

Keep in mind that client are only part of id's business. The other part, and possibly the greater part, is licensing their game engines to other developers. Their game are not strictly intended to be money makers, they are also working models and advertisements for the engines.

I used to think the same, but I read an interview in which an id executive claimed it was a surprisingly small portion of their revenue. I don't have the link handy, but Google found a quote from Todd Hollenshead: "engine licensing accounts for 20% of id Software's revenue." 20% is a big piece of the pie, but it seems the games are still the moneymakers.

Reminds me of a joke...

[MacDork]

When Jane initially met Tarzan of the Jungle, she was immediately attracted to him, and during her questions about his life, she asked him how he had sex.

"Tarzan not know sex," he replied.

Jane explained to him what sex was.

Tarzan said, "Oh... Tarzan use hole in trunk of tree."

Horrified, she said, "Tarzan you have it all wrong, but I will show you how to do it properly." She took off her clothes and laid down on the ground. Here" she said, "you must put it in here!"

Tarzan removed his loincloth...stepped closer with his huge manhood and then gave her an almighty kick right in the crotch.

Jane rolled around in agony for what seemed like an eternity Eventually she managed to gasp for air and screamed, "What in the Hell did you do that for?!"

"Tarzan check for bees."

Correction

[The Dark Rabbit]

they're trying to promote a kinder , gentler image of a grammer nazi.

That's "grammar" Nazi.

Re:id's games are not entirely designed to make mo

[AHumbleOpinion]

It would be interesting to know if that is a multiyear average, happens to be a year when a new game was released, etc. Is licensing the slow but steady earner that pays the bills year after year, the game sales the spike of profits every few years? I guess we'll have to wait for id to become a publicly traded company. ;-)

Re:wow

[spike hay]

Single player still can sell, provided it is really, really good. The best selling game right now on Amazon.com is Far Cry, which almost completely focuses on single player, although it does have multiplayer. (If you don't have it already, get it. Near Doom3/HL2 level graphics and exceedingly good gameplay)

If Doom 3 can deliver a very good, compelling single player, I have no reason to doubt that it will be a bestseller. Hell, even if it isn't good, which I do kind of doubt, it will still sell very well on brand recognition alone.

Single player isn't completely dead. When you think about it, it might not be that people don't want single player, it might be just that companies aren't making single player FPS's. Most major ones have focused completely on multiplayer ever since UT and Q3A. This year, it look like we are having a revival of single player.

Carmack isn't afraid to be wrong.

[Ayanami Rei]

And here's to hoping he just might be. Give it 10 years. Something will bubble up, some new emerging trend in competitve gaming. Here's to hoping it'll be Carmack who'll bring it into the mainstream and do it right, when the time comes.

We need A.R. Rahman...

[Branch_Dravidian]

...to do the Doom3 soundtrack.

WOLF!!!

[NMEismyNME]

WOLF!!

Oh my Gods!

[wolf31o2]

With everything I have seen regarding Doom III, I am so stoked about this game finally being released. John C and crew have done it once again, proving that they can deliver a very visually stunning masterpiece of an engine, then put a great game on top of it to force us all to upgrade our video cards, yet again. There's 3 lines I simply cannot wait to type in for Gentoo:

$ cvs add doom3.ebuild
$ echangelog "Doom III initial import. PHEAR!"
$ repoman commit

I don't even think words can describe the anticipation. I'm really looking forwarding to doing the cvs commit for that ebuild into portage

Web Site

[johkir]

Looks like the folks over at id MAY have made a little site for a game about the game:

http://www.ua-corp.com/

just a little something I picked up watching the trailer...