X-bit labs

Be Doomed: Performance Preview of the Doom III Game

Category: Video

by Anton Shilov , Yaroslav Lyssenko, Alexey Stepin

[ 08/03/2004 | 07:47 AM ]

Be thrilled, be excited, be doomed, as we benchmarked today’s high-end graphics cards in 5 demo scenes of the much-anticipated Doom III game. Check out the fastest graphics cards on Mars with us!
UPDATE: X-bit labs have added Doom III scores for ATI RADEON X800 graphics cards with CATALYST 4.9 beta drivers.

Table of contents:

• Doom III: The Story
  
• Dooming Game-Play
  
• Dooming Graphics
  
• Shadows and Lighting
  
• Geometry
  
• Textures and Bump-Mapping
  
• Faces and Mimics
  
• Music, Corps and Physics
  
• Dooming Image Quality
  
• Dooming Testbed and Methods
  
• Dooming Performance
  
• Hell Level, Pure Mode
  
• Hell Level, Eye-Candy Mode
  
• CPU Level, Pure Mode
  
• CPU Level, Eye-Candy Mode
  
• Recycling Level, Pure Mode
  
• Recycling Level, Eye-Candy Mode
  
• Hellhole Level, Pure Mode
  
• Hellhole Level, Eye-Candy Mode
  
• Deathmatch demo4, Pure Mode
  
• Deathmatch demo4, Eye-Candy Mode
  
• Dooming Conclusion
  

UPDATE: Added performance numbers for ATI RADEON X800-series of graphics cards achieved with yet-unreleased CATALYST 4.9 beta drivers along with new comments across the whole range of demos and in “Conclusion” section.

Doom III: The Story

Humankind have managed to land a man on the moon and sent multiple expeditions to other planets, such as Mars. While the Spirit and the Opportunity are investigating the possibilities of life on the Red Planet, scientists are developing technologies to send a spaceship to Mars with people onboard. Just in case it transpires it is possible to live on Mars, a laboratory will almost certainly be established on the planet to learn more about space, existence of life and other worlds. But what do we know about technologies we use and different life forms apart from ourselves? Could the combination of the unknown open the gates of hell bringing doom, fear, violence and horror? Looks like yes, as id Software’s legendary title that had just saw a new incarnation says…

Id Software has been known for pretty interesting titles since the late nineties, but became really famous after the release of the classic Castle Wolfenstein in 1992 and massive Doom in 1993. Both games have become legends and brought astonishing respect to id, who then released such big titles as Quake, Quake II and Quake III. Originally id specialized on quality first-person shooters, but after the Quake II ended up as a mainly death-match game, the company decided to create a title that would be a death-match from the ground-up. So born the Quake III, after which the head of id John Carmack said he wanted to make a yet another quality first-person shooter, not a yet another LAN massacre, so emerged Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Doom III.

First discussed in late 1999, the Doom III has been delayed a number of times and was finally released on the 3^rd of August, 2004. Almost five years is not a typical period for a game development. Let us see what did those “extra” 2 or 3 years bring us.