This is totally nuts. I haven't gotten around to playing it yet, but I feel like I totally should.
If Doomworld knows about this (they probably do: they maintain /idgames), it's definitely going to win the Mordeth this year.
If Doomworld knows about this (they probably do: they maintain /idgames), it's definitely going to win the Mordeth this year.
You don't see that as much in modern games, though, because they seem to be targeting a very different audience. Neither Doom nor heXen style games are being made at all right now as far as I can see.
Demon's Souls is also excellent suspense wise, even though it's a different genre. The author mentions it as inspiration.
Now Strife, OTOH...
Quake was actually quite a lot of fun, especially in MP. Singleplayer was quite good as well, but it's not as good as Doom's: Technical limitations mean that you don't get the massive waves of enemies of varying power, instead getting maybe a strong enemy or two, and a weak enemy or two, as there can only be ~7 enemies on screen at once (at least, on the hardware of the time).
Quake really came into its own in MP, where it and its descendants are unparalleled to this day. Quake 3, and QuakeWorld probably being the best.
Another good MP shooter is Xonotic: it run on a heavily extended Quake engine, and it's pretty cool.
Another fun MP game was Rise of the Triad.
The controls were clunky, though.
Especially with the flying item IIRC, that was impossible!
With the current Dosbox defaults, the game installs nicely, is easy to configure, and runs well. Based on getting the demo running just now:
Extract the files somewhere. Mount the directory in Dosbox. Mount another directory as an install location. Run the install (the demo's is just install.exe). The installer drops you into the game directory when it exits. Run setup.exe. Select Sound Blaster for the SFX, and either Sound Blaster or General MIDI for music (personal choice). Save the configuration and exit. Run the game (blood.exe). Oh, I also set it to 800x600 resolution, when given the option to set a display mode (it's available under the VESA setting).
I see Blood available on Steam for $4.99, on GOG for $5.99...or on Ebay for various higher prices, if you really want the hard copy and the classic-ish setup experience.
The start of that game actually scared the crap out of me.
You can read up on the plot via wikipedia. Other than the very beginning Doom is devoid of plot (and even then I didn't even know it took place on a moon of mars).
Dead Space reminds of the movie "Event Horizon" which I guess is now a very dated movie (damn I'm old).
I also liked the mechanic of requiring dismembering of the aliens. I guess for the ADHD Crossfire of shoot em in the head it is tedious but I think it brilliantly slows the pace of the game which is sort of needed for horror games.
Doom didn't need a story. It wasn't that sort of game.
Doom is a game cut from the the gemstone of cutting edge technology perfect mechanics, sharpened against the edge of brilliant level design, polished to a mirror shine, and embellished by perfect sound and graphical design to match. It was an idea whose time had come, and I say that without irony. It's not about killing demons on Mars, it's about that feeling as you pick up a shotgun for the first time, and stare in awe as you reduce an imp to gibblets for the first time. The philosophy of Doom is summed up best by John Carmack:
"Story in a game is like story in a porn movie: It's expected to be there, but it's not that important."
You can love story-based games, but to judge Doom by those criterion is comically missing the point, as Edge found out to their eternal shame: "If only we could talk to the monsters" indeed.
> For me it was just an another over-the-shoulder shooter with plenty of boring sections (especially near the end) and a story that didn't make much sense.
Dead Space may suck for its tedious game play but it is known for its plot.
Frankly I think Doom is overrated. Sure it was revolutionary and it was first but so was half a dozen social networks (ie friendster and myspace).
As I said much earlier I still think "Duke Nukem 3D" was way more fun and more sophisticated than Doom (there is an interesting story about the developer who wrote the Build Engine... Carmack respected him greatly).
Other than the chain saw Doom essentially had the same weapon and really it was mainly the shotgun.
And Doom's level and art are just not relatable to a 16 year old. I wanted to blow shit up in suburbia not battle in some surreal artistic hell pit that doesn't even look like a space station or hell but rather a slightly superior ROT [1]. Wolfenstein was better in this regard.
Compare this to Duke Nukem 3D with shrink rays, pipe bomb, laser trip mines, mini grenade gatling guns, etc... Even kicking was cool. With that level of cool weaponry multiplayer was hilarious and super fun.... Oh and Duke Nukem 3D had replay and mirrors as well. As well as various insta deaths besides tele frag. The interactivity with the environment was pretty cool as well (ie toilet flushing, earthquakes). In some ways Duke Nukem 3D was a precursor to GTA 3.
The maps in Duke Nukem were pretty darn awesome. I kept hearing in this thread that a realistic space station or space ship would not be a cool map but in Duke they did by creating a scene via a crashed space ship that included more than just the space ship.
I will say most of Dooms demons were very cool and the game play by frame rate is very smooth. Duke sort of had crappy monsters. They were funny but sort of crapp.
Yeah you might have game snobs who will say Quake, and Doom are better designed for competitive play but I take Duke Nukem 3D for fun factor any day.