DOOM 3™

Activision, Inc.
Science has unlocked the gates to the unknown. A sci-fi horror masterpiece, DOOM 3™ is like nothing you’ve ever experienced. Dramatic storyline, pulse-pounding action, incredible graphics, and revolutionary technology combine to draw you into the most frightening and gripping first-person gaming experience ever created. Fight for your life in single player, online multiplayer, or the Xbox Live™ exclusive co-op mode.

The ruins of an ancient Martian civilization have unlocked the secrets to teleportation, and the UAC will stop at nothing to harness this world-altering technology. As part of a marine detachment sent to protect the facility, your duty seemed simple enough.until the invasion. Now, in an epic clash against pure evil you must fight to understand who is with you, who is against you, and what must be done to stop this nightmare from reaching Earth. Built on ID's revolutionary new 3D graphics engine DOOM 3 draws you into the most frightening and gripping 3d gaming experience ever created.

Doom 3 Features:

• Never before seen detail with Real-time lighting and shadows
• Real-world physics and killer AI
• Battle in team or Deathmatch-based multiplayer modes
• Walkthroughs for each level with detailed maps pointing out important checkpoints and items.
• Each monster has different attacks, strengths and weaknesses. The Game Guide will detail how to approach each beast and how best to defeat them.
• Strategies for conserving your ammo and health to help the player get through the game.
• Combat techniques and tactics will be covered.
• Multiplayer section will prepare the player for the inevitable on-line experience.

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Doom 3 Strategy Guide

Hint: Duck Hellfire: The projectiles thrown by the imp and hellknight can be ducked if you time it correctly (it will do no damage). Naturally, you want to do this against enemies on the same height as you, not on shots coming at diagonals.

Cheat: God Mode: During gameplay, hold LEFT TRIGGER and press X, Y, B, A to become invincible.

Cheat: Skip Level: Call up the PDA and select the Objectives tab. Hold LEFT TRIGGER and enter B, A, X, Y. When you leave the PDA screen, your space marine is zapped to the next map with what ever you have at the moment.

Cheat List: Ultimate DOOM and DOOM 2: These are the Ultimate DOOM and DOOM 2 cheats which are only included with the Limited Edition Doom 3 game.

• All Keys, All Weapons, and Full Ammo: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press A,B,A,B
• Berserk Mode: hold LEFT TRIGGER and press X,X,X,Y.
• End Level: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press A,A,B,B.
• Chainsaw: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press B,B,A,A.
• Weapons and Ammo: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press B,B,B,B.
• GOD Mode: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press A,A,A,A.
• Invisibility: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press X,X,Y,Y.
• Light Amplification Goggles: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press Y,Y,Y,X.
• Radiation Suit: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press X,Y,Y,Y.
• Show All Map: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press Y,Y,Y,Y.
• Temporary Invincibility: hold down LEFT TRIGGER and press X,X,X,X.

These codes can be entered any time while playing the game.;All codes can be toggled on/off, except the All-Weapons codes, and the Computer Map code, which cannot be toggled off

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Doom 3 Gameplay

Well, for the Xbox version, id and Vicarious Visions decided to make Doom a turn based card battle game, just kidding.  Doom's still an FPS game and you still kill a lot of demons. One of the main things you'll notice is that the game is a lot slower than it used to be. The emphasis is now placed on trying (emphasis on "trying") to scare you. There may have been some disturbing imagery used in Doom, back in the day, but I wouldn't consider it a horror game, like I would with Doom 3. The overall gameplay is somewhat similar to the original Doom, you go around shooting demons and unlocking doors, although you use a PDA instead of card keys. The story progresses through PDA information you pick up, which can also give you clues on how to open storage lockers and other various things. Your PDA will also inform you about various notes and keypad numbers as you progress.  You can also read more on the story if you want, but really, the main thing it does is break up the action. You face a great deal of Hell's minions, including some who are from the original game, such as imps, possessed soldiers, hell-knights and cacodemons. While Doom 3 has the atmosphere for a great, horrific game, it unfortunately falls flat in many categories.

I knew placing the bulk of the gameplay on horror was a bad idea from the start, but it really doesn't help Doom 3 in any way. I honestly didn't find Doom 3 scary in the slightest, playing in the dark, adding to the mood did nothing for me, yet I was scared playing Fatal Frame II on a sunny day. I was slightly startled when the first imp jumped out at me, got right in my face and started slashing me, but after that, it just became tedious. The entire gameplay is literally walking down a poorly lit corridor (more on this later), seeing enemies that spawn in or jump out and then shooting them, that's it. About halfway through the game, there was no change, I was just walking down and shooting whatever lame enemy jumped out at me, until I got to an escort mission, where I had to walk with someone and shoot the lame enemies that spawned in. The gameplay is incredibly stale and lacks any sense of variation. All of the enemies are a lot like the level design, flat-out boring. Not only do the enemies lack any unique or distinct features, but they're all pretty much a dull grey color, like the levels. For most of the game, you're in small, cramped corridors, that do have a distinct industrial feel, but it gets old, very, very fast. It's really hard to write much about the gameplay, when it's all basically the same stuff over and over again. The first hour barely differs from the next few hours, you're still walking slowly and shooting the same boring enemies that pop out at you with the same boring weapons. One thing I really didn't like was that many times it's hard to find out where you're being shot from.  The guns, as a whole, lack a much needed "oomph", which could've immensely helped the immersion factor. You do get some cooler weapons later on, such as the awesome chainsaw and others that I won't spoil, but it's really too little, too late. It also doesn't help that the combat further takes you out of the experience, as it's not very engaging or immersive.  It doesn't feel as if you're shooting anything, because the guns feel weak and disassociate you from the experience.

I mentioned earlier that Doom 3 has poorly lit corridors, which leads to one of the biggest complaints that people had with Doom 3, the lighting. Sure, the lighting is technically great and looks nice, but the levels are dark nearly all the time, which is where your flashlight comes in. Now, you'd think a rugged space marine, who has to save the universe would be able to get a gun with a flashlight on it, or have one on his uniform, but nope. In one of the worst decisions known to man, you have to switch between the flashlight and the gun, and if you're wondering why this isn't in any other game, play Doom 3 and you'll quickly realize why. It was stated that the switching between the flashlight to the gun was made to add tension, but all it really does is irritate you. It's not scary when something in the pitch black is attacking you, while you fumble to put your flashlight away (you can hit them with it, but it's just as useless as the pistol), because all it will do is annoy you. It's bad enough that your character walks like he's stuck in molasses, but to not be able to see anything just serves to further aggravate you. Since this is on the Xbox, there's no quick mod to download to add a flashlight to the gun, so you can either endure, or play in co-op and force a buddy to hold the light for you.  Sounds like fun, doesn't it?

Doom 3 is the second Xbox game to feature online and system linked co-op play (after the very recent Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory), mainly because the game was too technically demanding for splitscreen co-op. For Xbox users, the main draw of the game is the co-op play, which is pretty good, I mean, not only can you be bored, but you can share the boredom with a friend! Co-op is just as you imagine it, instead of one person walking around poorly lit corridors, shooting enemies that pop out, you have two people doing it. With the co-op, you can select any level and start from there, but since most levels are pretty much the same, it doesn't really matter where you start. One nice thing is that the loading isn't very long, nor is it very frequent, which keeps the "action" going at a good pace. There is also the easily forgettable four player multiplayer on the PC version that made the transition to Xbox. The real question is why would you even want to play this game's multiplayer? Even though you do move faster, the multiplayer offers nothing innovative to drag you away from much better multiplayer experiences, it just seems like an afterthought in this game.

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Doom 3 Graphics

I'm really amazed that the Xbox version sports graphics that are comparable to the PC version. This is a great looking title, but it's most likely because you're indoors nearly all the time. Doom 3 looks great, plain and simple. The environments are highly detailed, purveying a dark, dirty, industrial feel. The game looks terrific, but the reason it can look so great is that you're in small cramped arenas for most of the experience, which is nowhere near as technically demanding or as entertaining as a large outdoor level. Most of the levels look the same and the character and enemy models stop being impressive pretty quickly, as they're all quite generic. The satanic imagery has returned as well in full force, so if you're sensitive you should know that there are quite a few pentagrams; one is even used as a loading icon. The levels, as boring as they may be, do look very impressive and this is still one of the best looking games on the Xbox. You can really see what the Xbox is capable of with this game, and the Hell based levels look the most impressive, thanks to all the fire and lighting effects.

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Doom 3 Audio

The audio is easily one of the best parts of Doom 3, as the atmosphere and immersion is owed almost entirely to it. Hearing screams or growls around you and not knowing where they're coming from is great, and adds quite a bit to a game that needs all the help it can get. The ambient sound effects really help purvey the scary atmosphere that the game wants to provide. On the music side of things, you get some decent rock tunes that seem to improve the action and make things seem faster and more intense. Voice acting is also well done, and the gruff marines sound like one would expect them too. It helps create a believable experience. The sound effects of Doom 3 are some of the best out there.

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Doom 3 Gameplay Controls

I was truly surprised that Doom 3 controlled so well on the Xbox. Its slow nature works in its favor here, making dual thumbsticks just as good as a mouse and keyboard. It's very easy to aim in this game and aim precisely for that matter, much easier than many other games as a matter of fact. Like you probably expected, Doom 3 controls just like Halo, and consequently, like every other Xbox FPS. You can assign weapons to the d-pad, for quick access (especially good after having the flashlight out) and Y and B will switch to your previous and next weapons respectively. White is the annoying flashlight while Black is the PDA, which you'll be using frequently since much of the game is based around it.

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Doom 3 Replay

I can honestly say that I'm not going to touch the single player of this game again. If this was the PC version, it'd be marked down a lot in this category, but this isn't the PC version and there is co-op play. The four player multiplayer is nothing special and probably won't take much time from you, especially with so many superior online games out there. So, the biggest feature and probably the game's only real saving grace is the co-op, since it makes the game a bit more fun than trudging through the game by yourself. Granted, there are much better co-op games out there, like Halo, Serious Sam and TimeSplitters, but Doom 3 being online or system linked can either help or hurt it, depending on the player mainly. It really doesn't make all that great of a co-op game anyway, because there aren't a ton of enemies thrown at you simultaneously, it's just a couple of guys that pop out. Still, the co-op means that you have to play the mediocre story mode again and that's not really something on the top of my "to do" list. Despite all the (average)online features, your likelihood of replaying Doom 3 is pretty low.

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