Originally posted by: PingSpike
I don't know why everyone hates on D3. It wasn't amazing beyond its graphical aspects in that it broke no new ground gameplay wise...but its not like it was shit either. It was more polished then your standard crash fests and had good atmosphere in the early levels. I actually enjoyed the game up until "return to the return of the return of delta labs - 4 hour extended edition: more monster closets". They should have just cut that section right out. Certainly, not an amazing game on its own...but I don't remember quake 3 doing anything new or different besides graphics. iD makes game engines with cybernetic robot demons as the tech demo.
The game play in Doom3 was actually unique, in that respect it was also uniquely hated. What people found out through Doom3 was that most casual players did not like having to choose between a flashlight and a weapon, it was too scary or frustrating for them. (Most will tell you it was just frustrating but I don't personally buy it).
Comparing it to Quake3 is a big difference though. Quake3 didn't need to do anything different in the game play because it was a multiplayer based community that was already huge. So the best thing Quake3 did was the engine, an incredibly scaleable engine that went on to be used in many, many scenarios from there on out.
Originally posted by: CP5670
The game didn't look any better than others of that era, having good lighting but distinctly below-average textures, and the fixed physics rate and its effect on performance constantly annoyed me throughout the game. I think Far Cry and Riddick:EFBB both looked better in different ways, without carrying any such issues.
I agree with you in some respects. We are finding that regardless of how good an engine looks, low res textures supersede everything else because people spot those first. And Doom3 did have some oddly low res textures, but it also had some amazing architecture, the likes of which no game even now has pulled off. The indoor environments were insanely complex, pipes going everywhere, all sorts of structures, million different surfaces. The engine did this incredibly well as seen by the fact that architecture and the way the world shapes itself were both seen in Quake 4 and Prey as well.