Despite the proliferation of first-class FPS games in recent years such as Half-Life and Return to Castle Wolfenstein, the release of Doom 3 has been much anticipated, much more so than with its predecessors "The Ultimate DOOM", "DOOM II", and "Final DOOM", thanks to the sneak peaks, claims of superior graphics and it being an update of a familiar favourite.

The most frequently praised feature of Doom 3 is the quality of the visuals and sound. Unfortunately, as with so many newly released games, you really must have a "games machine" to appreciate it, in particular a good quality graphics card and plenty of RAM. My Pentium4 2.8 GHz with 512MB RAM and onboard video (a sacrilege to dedicated gamers) would run Doom 3 only with settings at their lowest quality, and it still struggled to keep up with the visuals when I was being attacked by multiple monsters.

As dedicated gamers would have long ago absorbed all the pre-release information, early reviews, blasted their way through all the levels and started on the modifications, patches and multiplayer possibilities, this review is more for those who play these types of games occasionally and don't have the "latest and greatest" PC.

Doom 3 is played from the view of an unnamed marine on a Mars station. Initially all seems normal, and you are instructed to search for a missing scientist. But things have begun to go seriously wrong with the top secret experiments being conducted, and you must fight for your life against an onslaught of demons and the undead, while working your way through the various levels.

The main resources at your disposal are the various weapons picked up along the way, plus a PDA that you can use to download data from the PDAs of (usually dead) scientists you come across. The PDA contains e-mails, videos and audio logs that give you access codes to various cabinets and rooms. The e-mails can be a fun read, and even include a spam message that sends you to a Web site http://www.martianbuddy.com to retrieve a code. The e-mails also include lots of complaints from various people about the number of accidents and other strange things that have been going on recently. They do help give a more complete picture of the whole story. However, you'll probably end up just skimming these for the information you need.

The weapons are a fairly standard lot, with the addition of a "Soul Cube" that comes in towards the end of the game. I didn't find the weapons particularly differentiated in terms of specific uses, they all pretty much did the job. Most of the fighting is at fairly close quarters, so there wasn't much use for long-range weapons-although some kind of sniper rifle would have been useful for picking off the occasional possessed marine shooting from behind a box in the distance.

There's a lot of darkness in this game (as per the horror movie motif), so use of the flashlight is frequently necessary, particularly to check dim corners for spare ammunition and other goodies. It's annoying to have to switch between weapon and flashlight, as you can't use them both at the same time, which seems a bit silly - but at least the shortcut key allows you to quickly toggle between the flashlight and the last held weapon. It's recommended to get good at this, as the lights fail at the most inopportune moments, and monsters tend to take that opportunity to leap out and rip you apart, limb from limb!

The overall level design felt fairly standard for this type of game, although I missed out on the high level of detail and quality of textures that would have been available if this was a better PC. But I was able to appreciate the attention to detail - there's even a silly console game on the first level that you can play. Plus various computer terminals you need to operate in order to progress. And it's always fun visiting the toilets and looking in the mirror. Not many objects were "interactive", but those that were held very closely to realistic laws of physics (and no, I'm not referring specifically to the toilet visits!).

I would have appreciated some type of map feature as my sense of direction in these types of games isn't particularly good and I would often find myself near the end of a level, having killed all the monsters but needing to attempt to retrace my steps through the whole level to find a passageway, door or ladder that I'd missed. At times I resorted to some of the "walk-through"s that are available online, eg. http://www.doom3portal.com/walkthrough/ or http://www.planetdoom.com/doom3/walkthrough/index.shtml to get that final step.

I admit to using the fast save function a lot, and reloaded if my health got too low after going through a tough section with lots of nasties. But I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so I liked trying different ways of getting through (such as different combinations of weapons, firing from different locations) with the least amount of health damage.

The monsters in the early parts of the game were a little repetitive. There seemed also to be a fixed number per level, so if I retraced my steps (such as when I got stuck near the end of the level), I'd be wandering through empty corridors, with no new monsters to get in my way.

I haven't quite finished the game yet, but apparently have some interesting acquaintances to make in the near future!

The sound is very atmospheric, with a nice combination of music and ambient sounds. I only have basic speakers, but playing at night with the sound up loud it is pretty impressive. I can only imagine how it would be if one could take full advantage of the 5.1 surround sound. 

The conversations you hear in the distance or over your radio can be interesting, telling you more about what's going on, and the screams and pleas for help, plus the weird groans from monsters that are lurking in the shadows, remind you of the awful situation you're in.

The multiplayer option was initially limited to four players and few scenarios - very disappointing to those who spent many hours in vast multiplayer Return to Castle Wolfenstein games. Apparently the designers wanted to concentrate on the single player aspect of the game. However modifications are coming out, and more maps are being produced. Of course a broadband connection is required, preferably cable.

This is a technically well constructed and enjoyable game, but it hasn't really advanced the genre in the way the original did, or as much as was expected. Sure, the realism of the environment has taken strides ahead, and the sound is fantastic, but when you pare it down to its basics as a first-person shooter, there's really not a lot that's new, particularly as it's now just one of many quality games in the genre.
 
Having said that, it's certainly well worth playing, particularly for fans of the original, and even for those without the latest and greatest PCs! Now, bring on Half-Life 2 (to be released later this year), I've got some more aggression to work out of my system.

Doom 3
Developed by id Software
Published by Activision.
RRP $99.95
Minimum System Req:
PC, 2 GHz CPU,
512 MB RAM,
3D video card with 128 MB,
DirectX 9.0b