Doom 3 2004

Is it still worth playing?

id Software's 2004 shooter for Windows, with Linux, Mac and Xbox versions after, which turns Doom into a horror game. It is set on Mars in 2145, at a UAC research facility where teleportation experiments open a gateway to Hell and a demonic invasion begins. The engine, id Tech 4, lights the base and casts shadows in real time, and the design leans on the dark, with corpses, blood, breathing and unexplained voices. You hold a weapon or the flashlight, never both, which makes the pace slower and more deliberate, and PDAs carry emails, audio logs and codes that open doors. The Resurrection of Evil expansion added twelve levels, and the 2012 BFG Edition mounted the flashlight on the armour. Its atmosphere is why it is worth playing now: the dark, the sound and the empty base keep it tense.