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First Person Shooters (Games) PC Games (Games) Entertainment Games

No Doom 3 This Year? 434

Ant writes "According to an article at Blue's News: 'Though id Software basically invented the idea of using "when it's done" as a release date, and thus did not specify a release date when DOOM 3 was announced, many have been assuming that the game would be available for this year's holiday season. Now a report on HomeLAN Fed cites Activision's 2003 release calendar and quarterly financial conference call... [saying that] Activision admits that this matter is entirely in id's hands, but that they are not expecting the game this year, and have it "penciled" on their calendars for fiscal Q4 (Jan-March) 2004.' Additionally, Quake IV is now due in Fiscal 2005 (which begins April 2004)."
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No Doom 3 This Year?

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  • by connsmythe96 ( 576445 ) <slashdot AT adamkemp DOT com> on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:01PM (#6506474) Homepage
    Or maybe Doom Whenever?
    • by commodoresloat ( 172735 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:39PM (#6506876)
      Why not just "Doomed"?
    • Re:Doom Forever? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by frankthechicken ( 607647 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:59PM (#6507039) Journal
      Anyone else feel ID got a little scared when they saw the Half Life II trailer [fileplanet.com]? Much like the 3D Realms guys see their technology be eclipsed every six months?

      I cannot express the feelings I felt when I first saw this game, except that pervailing knowledge that my life will become less meaningful than usual come September.
      • by Admiral Burrito ( 11807 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @11:14PM (#6508352)
        Anyone else feel ID got a little scared when they saw the Half Life II trailer? Much like the 3D Realms guys see their technology be eclipsed every six months?

        Looking at the HL2 and D3 trailers, it is pretty clear that the lighting effects in Doom are far superior. Watch the HL2 guys pass through a shadow and their entire body changes shade all at once (kinda like in the original Doom :P). In D3 the shadows pass over the creatures in a far more realistic fasion, including shadows cast by dynamic lights (remember the bathroom scene?).

        The HL2 physics appear to be a lot better though. Not a big suprise there, Id has never really shown much interest in good physics (strafejumping anyone?). I'd also bet HL2 will have the better AI. And the HL2 engine will probably be more versatile: larger areas, more enemies on the screen, stuff like that.

        I expect HL2 will be the choice for "kill your friends online", and D3 for "at home with the lights off getting the shit scared out of you". Personally I'm getting kinda tired of the former, so I'm really looking forward to D3.

        • by Hatta ( 162192 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @11:48PM (#6508557) Journal
          Don't forget Halflife revolutionized the single player FPS. I'm hoping for some strong single player adventure elements from both these games.
          • by EverStoned ( 620906 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @11:53PM (#6508590) Homepage
            I'm sorry..you must not have been here in 1993..Doom didn't revolutionize the FPS genre..it created it!
            • by Moofie ( 22272 ) <.moc.nrutasfognir. .ta. .eel.> on Wednesday July 23, 2003 @01:10AM (#6508957) Homepage
              How is that mutually exclusive with my grandparent's (absolutely accurate) statement?

              id hasn't made a decent single-player game since Doom II. They make game engines, and deathmatch games. That bores me. Just my opinion, of course, but I thought Half Life was the game the Quake engine was born for.

              And HL2 is going to be even better. Can't wait!
            • Quake and Doom were always nice engines.

              HL took the engine and wrapped it into a gaming experience that was much more than just "kill everything and advance to the next level".

              So, imho, yes, HL revolutionized the FPS genre. I can't say I've ever had the inclination to finish one of the Quake or Doom games in single-player mode. After a few levels I got bored of "shooting stuff".

              HL had me hooked, right to the end. A good plot, great voiceacting, and some clever twists. I expect the new one to be even m
        • The reason I would disagree with that is because the physics engine in Half-Life 2 will (or should lead to a lot more creativity in games). Sure, lighting effects are atmospheric, but that's it; they don't really enhance the game play as such. The parts I loved most from the HL2 demo engine was the gravity engine pulling individual letters from a storefront and then repulsing them at the enemy, or where a radiator is ripped from a wall and used as a make-shift shields. It's those sections which showed you h
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:01PM (#6506478)
    Obligatory: Doom 3 Forever.
  • by CoyoteGuy ( 524946 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:02PM (#6506497)
    As long as I don't have to buy a Pentium 6 with 2GB ram and a Geforce 10 running windows 2005 with Directx 15.
  • by TWX ( 665546 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:02PM (#6506498)
    "DOOM!"

    "DOOM2: Hell on Earth"

    "No DOOM 3? What the Hell?"
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:03PM (#6506501)
    ...No wonder I couldn't find it on Kazaa!
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:03PM (#6506502)
    ...I will be able to afford the hardware needed to play it at 1600x1200 when it is released.
  • woot (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:03PM (#6506508)
    That leaves a chance we'll get play Duke Nukem first!
  • Release Date? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dagarath ( 33684 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:03PM (#6506510)
    What's the purpose in trying to predict the release date of a game that doesn't have a release date? Activision doesn't know exactly when the game will be released, and if ID releases it before this prediction then I'll bet Activision will make time to publish it.

    There will be no meaningful comments to this article, unless John Carmack or one of the other ID guys decides to respond.
    • Re:Release Date? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Mike Hawk ( 687615 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:25PM (#6506731) Journal
      They have to predict a release date. This is a major product for a publicly traded company. The stockholders are entitled to know what to expect for the near future. It is responsible to give the quarter a product is expected to ship as well as when a product's shipping slips to another quarter. Predicting an exact date can make one look foolish, but that was never the case with this title.

      C'mon dagarath, I know you could have thought of that if you tried.
      • Ahh yes, because the stockholders don't have the foresight to look into next quarter, let alone next year.

        The stockholders' demands of 'money now, Now, NOW!' is a large part of what's wrong with business in the US these days -- Nobody wants to wait for a long term big payoff when they can have a tiny short term game right now.

        (not to disagree with you, Mike, because you hit the nail right on the head. But it's still really annoying that today's businessmen have no sense of the 'long haul')

        --Jeremy
        • Pressure to report quarterly is spreading rapidly the world over...

          On the one hand, quarterly reporting is a bad thing since it encourages short term thinking. Although I think this is less the [original] fault of the companies, and more the fault of the investment community in general. The ole dot-com bubble certainly did not help in that regard.

          On the other hand, I think there are enough total dirtbags running publicly traded companies that a year is way too long to go without getting some numbers, even
  • Michelangelo (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Hadlock ( 143607 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:03PM (#6506512) Homepage Journal
    I thought it was Michelangelo, when painting the Sistine Chapel's celing, that he said "When it is finished!". I'd post the IMDB link to the particular movie emphasizing that, but I'm not sure which movie it was. I'll let someone else reap the karma rewards.
  • I am a huge admirer of John Carmack and the work he's done with Id. That said I'm disappointed that he's not doing more than just recycling the same style FPS. Honestly, there hasn't been anything truly new in the FPS genre since CounterStrike came out ages ago.


    It seems that everything imitates one of a few different styles. I'm saddened to see that an intelligent and creative man like John Carmack is just repeating himself.

    • by Papineau ( 527159 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:11PM (#6506598) Homepage

      Consider that he's mostly "only" doing the 3D graphics engine, and that a couple mod groups have started to modify Quake into something quite different from a FPS (I remember a racing game). Once the engine is up and running, you can code the actual "game implementation" anyway you like, ie any game style. I'm pretty sure somebody could evolve Doom3 into a RTS, given enough time and incentive.

    • What you say doesn't make sense. Counterstrike is multiplayer and it's true that most of the current popular multiplayer games owe a lot to CS.

      We don't know yet whether Carmack will be repeating himself, Quake 3 was multiplayer only and was developed too early to be influenced by CS. Their has been movement in the single player FPS genre, witness Half Life and Deus Ex. It will be interesting to see the influence of these games on Doom 3 (if any).

      Bearing in mind the potential for the licenceing potentia
    • by Natalie's Hot Grits ( 241348 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @09:37PM (#6507702) Homepage
      It seems that everything imitates one of a few different styles. I'm saddened to see that an intelligent and creative man like John Carmack is just repeating himself.

      Carmack is mostly a 3D guy...Kindof like the kernel hacker in the back. He has say and cares in what type of games get put out, but in general he is focusing on the engine... id releases their engines every once in a while, with new upgrades of features taking advantage of the latest video cards, 3D innovations, and performance upgrades. The game they are working on just happens to be the label for that new engine.

      So far, Carmack's only 3D sons are Quake, Quake2, and Quake3 engines. Technology from Quake1 and 2 spawned halflife, and thus the HL MOD Counterstrike. It became a huge success, with id's engine doing the grunt work underneath.

      Then Quake2 begot Soldier of Fortune, another huge single player and multiplayer success. So successfull that SOF eventually begot SOF2 (based off an independant engine I believe)...

      After a while, id decided to release their Quake3 engine. It came with a multiplayer DM and CTF style game only, with no single player except playing the MP game with bots inserted. This quake3 engine gave a whole new meaning to 3D graphics engines, with curved surfaces, fully 32 bit color rendering, huge advancements in lighting, and large terrain support, stable and known consol/script interface for the "pro" gamers, amongst numerous features. (note: there were other competing engines that had similar functions, UT for example)

      Quake3 was an instant hit. It carried on the hardcore gamers tradition from the land of Quake2 deathmatch and CTF to a newer generation of Quake gamers. With the release of OSP competition mod, quake3 was the first game to introduce serious gamers to serioius tournaments. People started Modding the Quake3 engine and created navy seals games, and others. Companies started putting out their own mods and releasing them as standalone games. Namely, Quake3 begot Jedi Knight II, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, and the new FREE multiplayer online game: Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory. The latter 3 saving private ryan like semi massive multiplayer FPS and James bond like single player games were huge successess both in sales, but also in online gaming. Semi massive multiplayer reality online FPS games are one of the new big things, and id's Quake3 engine is behind it. (note: Battlefield 1942, using a competing engine, is of the same type, but with vehicles and larger terrains)

      Quake3 will likely spawn more games, and improve its children into perfection. Quake3 is showing its age though. No vehicle support, and very large terrains are hard to build without killing framerate (wolfenstein has shown this). And new technology has built up since Quake3 has been released way back in 2000(?).

      DOOM III will be id's next generation engine. With a new name, and an all new rendering paths for various card manufacturers. The latest technology in 3D rendering will be included, and you can bet it will be stable and fast and beautiful as ever. From the looks of it, DOOM III is scheduled to beget Quake IV as its online counterpart (developed by a seperate company, but using the DOOMIII engine). DOOM III should support vehicles in all shapes (aircfaft, cars, bikes) and will have unbelieveably large terrain support. Improved lighting engines and geometry and physics engines. All new sound engine. One thing I MUST mention is the all new network code. It will be improved to allow better scalability for massive multiplayer online gaming and with better prediction technology and lag fixes.

      Virtually everything will be all new and improved. You can bet that the DOOMIII engine will live long and prosper.

      thank you.
  • by SuperDuG ( 134989 ) <[be] [at] [eclec.tk]> on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:09PM (#6506585) Homepage Journal
    ... I heard that they're going to release a 3 part box set ...

    1.) Duke Nuke Um Forever
    2.) Team Fortress 2
    3.) Doom III

    They're calling it the "vaporware of the century pack" and it will be available for the low cost of $0.00 that's right folks, free.

    Just playing, I mean it's not like there aren't screenshots that people love and a huge crowd of ever-anticipating buyers just waiting.

  • by captain_craptacular ( 580116 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:11PM (#6506595)
    Is nVidia and ATI. The new version of any game like this generates as much sales for them as it does for whoever put the game out I bet.

    I'd also bet that AMD and Intel see a nice little spike when a new generation hallmark game comes out. Thats the kind of thing that everyone is waiting for to upgrade...
  • Awwww. (Score:2, Insightful)

    Looks like 2003 is going to be a bit less of the kickass-gaming year it looked to be. And if Doom 3 is only out in 2004, some games that will be released meanwhile could make id's design look real old. *cough* [members.aon.at]
  • by felonious ( 636719 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:11PM (#6506603) Journal
    I'm thinking that after Valve's E3 techdemo and their subsequent best of show awards with little mention of ID/D3 that ID were taken off guard. I'm sure they thought they'd waltz in there and floor the place but Valve came out of no where and blew the socks off of everything hands down.

    I think ID realized that they would have to revamp somewhat and code additional features into the engine itself as well as enhance gameplay so the worlds would at the very least be as interactive as the worlds in HL2.

    I've never been a HL fanboy the movies I've seen of in game play not cinematics are amazing! They have revolutionized gaming and are taking it in a new direction in terms of a fully interactive world. Go dl a movie of HL 2 off Kazaa or BT and see what I mean.

    I had no intentions of purchasing HL 2 but after the tech-demo/in game movies I will now buy it.
    • by jace48 ( 566123 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:31PM (#6506806)
      ***
      I'm thinking that after Valve's E3 techdemo and their subsequent best of show awards with little mention of ID/D3 that ID were taken off guard. I'm sure they thought they'd waltz in there and floor the place but Valve came out of no where and blew the socks off of everything hands down.
      ******

      Or just a maketing strategy seeing the demo movie of Doom III and Half Life 2. Half Life is far superior to Doom III, and since Doom III is slated to be released on 2 fortnite of Spetember ID does not wants there sales to be affected by HL. Once people have already had the taste of HL ID can safely release Doom.

    • by lucasw ( 303536 ) <lucasw AT icculus DOT org> on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:51PM (#6506969) Homepage Journal
      I had no intentions of purchasing HL 2 but after the tech-demo/in game movies I will now buy it.

      I feel the same way- and I'm usually patient/apathetic enough to wait for the bargain bin for pretty much everything. It's been a long time since I've ever felt really inspired by a game, but the movies of HL2 are incredible (also, despite the wierd proprietary bink video format, I really liked not having some murky mpeg and actually seeing the game like it will be in play).

      There's also DX2 down the road, though I haven't seen more than a few screenshots. And hell, when Halo 2 comes out there will be two reasons to buy an Xbox and the price will have come down more by then.

      Of course, what I really want is the facial animation of HL2 with the shadows and detail of Doom 3 with Halo's battle sequences but put in the setting of Deus Ex...
  • ...for FPS gamers over the next couple of years

    We have Half Life 2 coming out, its engine alone will be used in numerous games and for numerous mods, then Doom 3 and its engine will produce yet more games and all before Quake 4, whose engine is likely to be used in as many games as Half life 2s engine. Thats not even inculding those three games themselves which will all be first rate.

    And of course following the release of HL2, the DNF team will switch to the HL2 engine and start again... then to the
  • I don't want to state the obvious or anything but this game is gonna sell whether it is released at Xmas time or not.

    I'm not too bothered, AFAIK both Half Life 2 and Deus Ex 2 are still on track for release in quarter 4 (if I am being honest I am anticipating DX2 much more than Doom 3).
    • Of course they care. For one, the XMas buying season is the largest buying time of the season. Companies count on that revenue for their quarterly earnings. If it is released another quarter, their earnings are effected. Another reason is that people have less money to spend in January than they do in December. In December, many will pick up games for their kids or friends. Not so often in January. Moreover, once people get their December credit card bills, they may be more reluctant to spend $50 on a game
  • When its done... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Sylver Dragon ( 445237 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:14PM (#6506635) Journal
    Is it just me or does this ideology seem to lead to titles dying from over engineering. I don't think it'll come as a shock to anyone that when you let the engineers decide when a product is ready to ship, that it will never ship. On the other side of the rope are the marketers who want to realease it now, now, now. What you need is someone in the middle who is willing to give a cut-off date, a deadline. This means that the engineers are not allowed to keep adding features, creating bugs, and fixing those bugs after a certain point, and that the marketers have to wait for a product to actually exist before booking orders. Ya, deadlines suck, most of us probably deal with them in our jobs, but they are necessary to making a company run, as long as they are realistic. Too short, and the product sucks, too long and the product dies in engineering or misses the market. When its done, seems to be a deadline that is just way to long for bringing a product to market, and slowly builds dissatisfaction in the customers who would buy your product.

    • Re:When its done... (Score:4, Informative)

      by Glock27 ( 446276 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:50PM (#6506961)
      Is it just me or does this ideology seem to lead to titles dying from over engineering. I don't think it'll come as a shock to anyone that when you let the engineers decide when a product is ready to ship, that it will never ship. On the other side of the rope are the marketers who want to realease it now, now, now.

      Wow are you dead wrong.

      When the "marketeers" (also known as management) decide to ship a title before the techies think it's ready, debacles like Falcon 4 happen.

      It's a great game now...after many patches. The initial reviews sucked, and sales never recovered.

    • by Anonymous Coward
      I don't think it'll come as a shock to anyone that when you let the engineers decide when a product is ready to ship, that it will never ship.

      Unless he's an electrical engineer.
    • Re:When its done... (Score:5, Informative)

      by leshert ( 40509 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:55PM (#6507001) Homepage
      I don't think it'll come as a shock to anyone that when you let the engineers decide when a product is ready to ship, that it will never ship.

      That's only true if you have a culture that encourages (or forces) engineers to add features at their whim. If you have a culture that says, "This is what we're going to do in this release; we may do less, but we won't do more unless we are told we have to," then you have a much better chance to ship.

      Reading that, you may think that it's a Dilbertesque way of working ("less work! more pay!"), but it's one strategy for actually getting things done.

      Having been in the game industry, it's about 180 degrees from the way they work, though... it's nothing to come in on a Monday and find that over the weekend, some programmer got uppity late Saturday night and coded an AWESOME NEW (unplanned) FEATURE that will plague you with bugs in six months. Maybe things have changed in the past few years, but that was the state when I was there.

      Additionally, I don't know what segment of the industry you work in, but most channels have such a long lead time that if you don't have your marketing people putting out tendrils and your sales people booking units long before the ship date, you'll be burning through a lot of cash before you get dollar #1 out of the customer...
    • kidding right?

      id coined the phrase "when it's done". The head of id is a bloody engineer. And, I'm in no fear of id dying. Good lord man you must have confused this article with an article about *BSD or something.
    • Well, remember that many companies will license the engine once it's done and if you want to compete in that market you need to have the best technology.

      Also large companies rely on fast product releases to cover the operations costs. ID seems like a small company that can afford long times between releases as long as the quality of the product warrants huge sales.

      They simply have a different business model than other game companies.
    • "religion is the opiate of the masses."

      ...and yet we can sit here and seriously discuss VIDEO GAMES. Talk about opiates of the masses...

      On second thought, I suppose in America that actual opiates are the opiate of the masses. But anyway.
  • by soupart ( 691584 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:15PM (#6506648)
    Gaming go only go so far without getting dull and the need for TRUE innovation is a needed factor in the grand sceme of things. It's gotten dull. I don't need more fps. I don't need the same fps with different weapons. And, of course, more frames per second with different guns does me little good as well.

    Maybe this is a sign that there are good things to come. I just hope that there is some true innovation involved.

    • Oh for crap's sake (Score:3, Insightful)

      by aliens ( 90441 )
      Way to be narrow minded. Don't need more FPS? You discount an entire genre right off the bat? Do you lump Wolfenstein with HL2? Hell let's just lump everything that uses a pixel as FALSE innovation since it's not really doing anything new, just reusing those same pixels.

      I'd have to say that those two games(wolf & HL2) are different genres, two totally different worlds of gameplay. I really dislike this arguement that "games suck there's no innovation". The whole argument of more frames per second died
  • If you consider how scaleable the Quake 3 engine is, and the fact that many games are still being released using it today (Star Trek - Elite Force 2 for example) then it is no surprise that Carmack wants to get the Doom 3 Engine right. After all ID will be licenscing this technology left right and center for 3 or 4 years at least.
    • If you consider how scaleable the Quake 3 engine is, and the fact that many games are still being released using it today (Star Trek - Elite Force 2 for example) then it is no surprise that Carmack wants to get the Doom 3 Engine right.

      I have zero insider details, but there's a flip side to your argument. If Quake 3 is so scalable that it's still usable today, what compelling features would make id's customers upgrade to (and pay more for) Doom 3? Similarly, gamers would have to want to pay for Doom 3 and

      • by Natalie's Hot Grits ( 241348 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @10:02PM (#6507910) Homepage
        I'll chime in... not to correct, but to provide some of my observations...

        Quake3 lacks scalability to large numbers of people. The main problem is that the server sends the same info about each client to every other client. So if 64 people join a server, there are 64 different clients that you have to know about, even if you shouldn't (like, they aren't close to being on your screen). This effectively limits Quake3 based games to a MAX of 32 players per server (due to outgoing bandwidth limitations of the server, CPU time is also a concern, but not as great).

        I do not know what DOOM III is going to do to solve these types of problem, but I have heard rumors that it will support the ability to tell clients about only the relevant players on his screen. This would increase security (prevent cheaters from using "radar" cheats via packetsniffing) and dramatically increase the number of players capable of being on a single server.

        Also, larger terrains will be supported. In quake3, you make terrains with a 3D mesh, and the computer must render every polygon in the terrain no matter your distance from it. In many newer games, the level of detail of the polygons are reduced when viewing terrains from large distances, thus improving performance dramatically without costing any visual degredation. DOOMIII will likely support these enhancements.

        Vehicle support is another big thing for DOOMIII. One of Quake3's biggest drawbacks is that it does not have cars or planes to drive. Battle Field 1942's popularity has proven this fact online, where the Q3 equivilent game (wolfenstein, and wolf ET) are in competition, but most everyone who plays BF1942 stick with its engine dispite it being buggy,slow, and crappy physics simply because of its vehicle support.

        The list can go on and on, but those are the 3 biggest points that are preventing Quake3 from selling to developers. With DOOMIII's upgrades, id will have the upper hand on the game engine market and many game developers are itching for it is release.
  • This is pretty amusing, considering that our store's main distributor recently posted a release date of October 6 for Doom 3.

    Then again, the clairvoyants over there also seem to think the release date for Halo 2 is sure to be Oct. 15, 2004.

    Anyone else in retail care to enlighten me as to where distributors get these dates, aside from directly out of their asses?
  • Maybe this is just insurace agaist the SEC. Games tend to get delayed, so they give a conservative estimate, and if it gets done "early", they release it then. This way they can't be accused of letting the game slip but using it to boost profits/stock price/whatever.
  • I know you should never trust release dates for games, but with retailers citing a specific date for so long (August 21) I've been counting the days until Doom comes out.

    Amazon now states November 14. Why exactly?

    I very nearly bought a new graphics card the other day, figuring I'd have a month to make sure it was installed and working properly. (Home PC == work PC so I can't tinker.)

    But then, an extra six months or so... it won't kill me. And the game will be better. Hell we might even have broadband in
  • by Cyno01 ( 573917 ) <Cyno01@hotmail.com> on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:22PM (#6506708) Homepage
    but idspispopd better still work.
  • by nomadic ( 141991 )
    Who really cares? By the time it finally comes out we'll have been playing better designed and more exciting games (think half-life 2) for several months. All Doom 3 will be is standard Id product; a pretty engine, and graphics and a storyline ripped off the cover of a bad 80's heavy metal album.
  • by tds67 ( 670584 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:27PM (#6506762)
    Of course there's Doom this year. It's called the RIAA.
  • by DragonMagic ( 170846 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:52PM (#6506974) Homepage
    id Software has always been about quality over quantity. They generally release software that requires some patches after release, but those patches fix mostly network and driver issues, and not serious game problems.

    I'm glad id is waiting to release Doom III when it's done instead of releasing it on a schedule for holiday sales. The sound engine they've described, the lighting and camera abilities they've described, and just the basic plot make me really want this game, and I'd rather have it finished than nearly-there first.
  • March 2004 (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Ciderx ( 524837 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @07:57PM (#6507023)
    In the past week, this date has just come out of nowhere and is now generally accepted as the release date. Not that long ago, there was an interview with someone at id that suggested the engine was complete and it was just down to finalising level design.

    It wouldn't surprise me if HL2 has been a factor here. Everyone was shocked at the E3 debut of Half Life 2, and full, full credit to Valve. Over the past 2 years especially, Valve have taken all the criticism of "you're just happy to sit on the laurels of Half Life you lazy b's", and sat back and blown everyone away when it mattered.

    Certainly some aspects of the Doom 3 engine seem from reports awful in comparison to HL2's engine - poorer scaling in terms of system spec, Environment manipulation (which HL2 blew everyone away with at E3 but is apparently very poor in the current Doom 3 engine) and a plethora more effect/shader programs than Doom 3.

    The competition is good, because its a chance to force id's hand to play catch up. For too long, id and Carmack have sat in almost demi-God mode over the PC games market with the Doom 3 hype and you have to wonder if maybe they have got a little complacent.

    Oh, and a final issue, purely to play Devil's Advocate, I understand Half Life 2 uses DirectX and some might suggest that it is the reason why HL2 apparently is more scalable and achieves more effects more easily across many performance levels. Could HL2's apparent conquering of Doom 3 at the moment be the defining moment of DirectX's conquering of OpenGL?
    • by KalvinB ( 205500 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @09:07PM (#6507514) Homepage
      DirectX 9 was the first to allow the use of all the latest fancy pants shader stuff of the bleeding edge graphics cards.

      I believe OpenGL can do those things to an extent but at least until OpenGL 2.0 comes out, DirectX will be the top graphics API.

      What really blew me away though about HL2 was the physics and wickedly creative game play like shoot the rope and the huge thingie swings down and kills everything in it's path. And those rediculously tall creatures. Things which really have nothing to do with the graphics themselves. It's phsyics and creative character design.

      DooM3 relied on more corridors and darkness. HL2 brought the monsters out into the light which is so much less cliche it's actually "scarier." Plus you actually get to see the full magnitude of what it is you're shooting at.

      Walking down a brightly lit street and a huge monster jumping out at you will make me jump higher than one jumping out of the shadows where they have been hiding for years.

      HL2 is definitly getting my money as will ATI or nVIDIA. DooM3 I'm skeptical about.

      Ben
    • OpenGL (Score:3, Insightful)

      by woodhouse ( 625329 )

      Oh, and a final issue, purely to play Devil's Advocate, I understand Half Life 2 uses DirectX and some might suggest that it is the reason why HL2 apparently is more scalable and achieves more effects more easily across many performance levels. Could HL2's apparent conquering of Doom 3 at the moment be the defining moment of DirectX's conquering of OpenGL?

      No. OpenGL is just as functional as D3D where it counts, although until recently it was a pain to implement vertex or pixel shaders due to the fact you

  • by aSiTiC ( 519647 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @08:00PM (#6507044) Homepage
    See the Doom3 specs posted at BluesNews: Link [bluesnews.com]

    Even if you assume that to really play the game you need twice the minimum specs which would be approximately:

    2 Ghz CPU

    512 MB RAM

    GF2 or Radeon 8xxx series card

    I would guess that's gonna be one outdated computer system by Jan-March 2004.

    So much for Doom 3 forcing everyone to upgrade and sparking a business revivaling for PC parts manufacturers....

    • Well for some users it might. Doom3 will be the next big game in the GNU/Linux gaming world, after the excitement of UT2003, which just about runs on my Duron800Mhz CPU with 256MB of RAM. If I wanted to play Doom3 and had the money (you never know ;), Doom3 could be the reason.

      I bet Intel, AMD, nVidia and ATI are all wetting their pants at the thought of the GNU/Linux gaming community upgrading ;-)
    • Take Planetside, for example -- 512MB and a GF2 will make you wish you'd never bought the game...
  • by Brian Kendig ( 1959 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @08:09PM (#6507113)
    I'm sick and tired of software companies saying that such-and-such product will be "released when it's done" or "done when it's finished."

    Since when has any software product ever been FINISHED when it's released? Usually -- and *especially* with PC games -- the release is full of bugs and requires a couple of quick patch cycles to bring up to par, followed by a few more patch cycles over the following months to make it solid.
    • by mmdurrant ( 638055 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @09:01PM (#6507478)

      I'm sick and tired of software companies saying that such-and-such product will be "released when it's done" or "done when it's finished."

      Since when has any software product ever been FINISHED when it's released? Usually -- and *especially* with PC games -- the release is full of bugs and requires a couple of quick patch cycles to bring up to par, followed by a few more patch cycles over the following months to make it solid.

      Would you prefer them to release it when its half-done? This could be an interesting new business model - sell a half-completed product to generate revenue to finish the other half.
      Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me that ID (iD, Id, ID, whatever the hell you want to call it) has bucked this trend. Granted, there have been quite a few patches for their games, but the games are always quite functional. Take for example the game "Rise of Nations" which I could not play for 15 minutes without it freezing and forcing me to reboot.
      As far as the comment about "usually and especially with PC games", I've never seen a game on a console that had a patch. Please correct me if I am wrong.
      Yes, patch cycles do happen. When you cease testing a product on 10 machines and begin testing it on 1000-10000, lots of weird bugs you didn't see before begin popping up as a result of video cards, drivers, sound cards, moon phases, etc. You don't need me to tell you this, but it seems some might need a friendly reminder.
    • by Captain Beefheart ( 628365 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @09:44PM (#6507760)
      I wasn't going to respond to this, but it got modded +5 Insightful. No offense, but the overwhelming majority of games are released when the devs run out of funding, without any mention of "when it's done." It is a very, very select few who can actually finish a product at their own pace. Perhaps you are tired of hearing this phrase because it come from prominent dev houses who use the phrase a lot. But I assure you it is not "software companies" in general. Additionally, those very few who have used the WID phrase issued a product that was indeed relatively bug-free and feature complete. Or, in the case of DNF, they haven't issued it at all.
  • I thought Debian pioneered the use of "when it's done" as a release date. Sarge is due out RSN!
  • Out-source the programming to India.

    It seems to work for everything else.
  • by FatBobSmith ( 555928 ) on Tuesday July 22, 2003 @10:25PM (#6508076)
    My chances of getting laid this year just increased! I may even pass college with this much free time on my hands!
  • by Rogerborg ( 306625 ) on Wednesday July 23, 2003 @06:52AM (#6510032) Homepage

    Daikatana? How everyone who was granted a preview said it looked to be amazing (gee whizz, I wonder if there's a connection) and it was only when it was released and the advertising money was already in the magazine's pockets that they declared that it sucked more than anything had ever sucked before?

    I'm not saying that Doom 3 sucks. I'm just asking if you remember how much you believed that Daikatana didn't suck either.

    In brief: let's wait for the reviews, rather than wetting our pants every time we get a sneak peek preview.

  • by joeytsai ( 49613 ) on Wednesday July 23, 2003 @11:26AM (#6512287) Homepage
    I'm a little bit perplexed about the responses for this story. Many people think that the reason why the Doom III may be delayed is related to Half Life 2, which had an incredible showing this year. This may be true, but that seems rather unlikely, and there is a much more reasonable explanation.

    Firstly, it seems to me the phase of development D3 is in right now is polish. The graphics engine is more or less complete, which is demonstrated by the fact that the screenshots from last year compared to this years aren't much different. They've story-boarded the game's story like a Hollywood movie, so unless they're changing a fundamental story element (why?) they're just working on finishing the level designs and maybe enemy (and ally?) AI. I personally figured that that has been pretty much what they've been working on all this year, and why they would release this holiday season.

    Now, this far into the development process, close to a final product, you don't fundamentally change everything just because you see some game clips from another company. I too was quite impressed with HL2, but I don't see why we can't just expect two great games. Carmack strikes me as an incredibly pragmatic person, and it really doesn't make sense to me to fundamentally change your development for an unreleased game.

    What seems much more likely and actually has been hinted on is that they're delaying the game to so they can have a simultaneous xbox release. id has confirmed there will be an xbox port, and Carmack has been quoted saying Microsoft is offering them a pile of money if they have a simultaneous release. Although the xbox is just a PC variant, because of the fixed hardware and TV constraints (though xbox can output HDTV quality), optimizing the game for a system pretty close to D3's minimum requirements is going to be a slight challenge.

Keep up the good work! But please don't ask me to help.

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