Doom 3's Release Date; Quake Turns 8
LehiNephi writes "Apparently, GameStop has an updated product page for long-awaited PC FPS Doom 3, along with the note: 'Official launch date of August 3rd, 2004 confirmed!', although the official Doom 3 site hasn't yet been updated, sporting just a 'coming soon' notice. [Blue's News also has further info, noting 'that the British Board of Film Classification has a DOOM III Listing with a rating for the game, a seeming indication that they've already been able to review all its content'.]" In related news, Ag3nt writes "One of the biggest leaps in PC gaming technology, Quake, celebrated its 8th birthday yesterday, according to an AmpedNews piece - there's also a birthday note on John Romero's homepage."
Seeing a confirmed date on a reporting site, heck even on ID's site, seems like reading portents in the tea leaves. Even when they announce ship dates, these companies are notorious for having last-minute changes. Thirty-six hours before you should be able to pick up your precious pre-order, it's announced that you'll have to wait another two weeks... maybe three... they're not sure.
I'll believe the release dates when I have a copy in my grubby little hands and not before.
Start a happiness pandemic
No doubt that this game's gonna have everyone flipping head-over-hoof. I just hope the game will actually deserve its reaction. Much like any good trilogy, the third release is often a dissapointment. (with the exception of the original star wars trilogy ;-)
Wow, I can't believe that it was only 8 years ago. When the original Quake was released, I honestly wasn't that impressed by it. Perhaps that's because I never had such hot hardware to run it on. But, mostly I remember thinking that the main way in which Quake, as a gaming engine, improved on Doom / Doom 2 (which I really loved) was by providing a true 3D environment, as opposed to Doom's psuedo-3D. Yet, to me, Doom was so well done in terms of level design, etc, that all Quake did was make me aware of things that Doom did not do, but that I had never missed in Doom as I never really realised that Doom wasn't doing them.
Understanding is a three edged sword. - Ambassador Kosh Naranek, Babylon 5
When is the Linux release date? Does it say anywhere whether they are doing a concurrent Linux/Windows release? Will there be a nice free demo, as is ID's habit?
"'Yrch!' said Legolas, falling into his own tongue."
id software's games are the only reason I buy new computers. Sure, I'll update my video card, or get a bigger hard drive, but as far a whole new system goes, it's just when id's new games come out.
Quake 3 - new machine
Wolfenstein - new machine
Doom 3 - ordered new machine yesterday. (from endpcnoise.com - wife is complaining the 3 computers in the office are too loud. We'll see if thay are as good as they claim.)
I wonder how much hardware worldwide id is responsible for selling?
After reading Masters of Doom, this smells a little like sour grapes to me ...
"Those alien bastards are gonna pay for shooting up my ride..."
I clearly remember when Quake came out like it was yesterday. I remember that at the office I was working at there was a big debate on what was the better game... Duke Nukem 3D or Quake. In the end Quake won, but not without some heated arguments in DN3D's favor.
And of course, before that I remember playing Deathmatch Doom on the office lan on a 386 with a b&w monitor (shivers).
"The Wright brothers were the first to fly with a heavier-than-air machine, but boy did they have a lousy plane"
Not sure if things have changed in the last year or so, but Carmak's origional goal was to have it play on any card with a vertex shader which meant the lowest end card is the GF3Ti200. Today there are laptop's with MUCH more powerfull GPU's including the GF4Go, GeForce FX Go5700, and ATI offerings.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I think a "measly Radeon 9600" will be able to run D3 as well as HL2 just fine. The recent Doom 3 leaked Alpha runs on my Athlon 2600 / Radeon 9600 XT with perfectly acceptable rates. I can't actually see or adjust the detail level, but the default is still nice looking. I imagine that the retail version will have some tweaks and optimizations that will improve performance.