BFG? Yeah, pal, this is a Bad Fucking Game.

[gets hit by chairs and beer bottles until unconscious]

Alright, alright, Doom 3: BFG Edition is not a bad game, it's just a depressing and sometimes boring one. It's not Doom, even if it may be lousy with monster closets and big fat EXIT buttons that whisk you to the next stage. The pacing is slow, there are few open areas, and there's a significant emphasis on plot, and I do not find any of that to be inherently bad. In fact, I respect Id for trying to do something different. Sticking the player with a dogshit shotgun and wimpy BFG is unforgivable, though.

Doom 3 is much more of a horror game than it is a "boomer shooter," and that's totally fine, even if it might be a bit ill-advised to make it a numbered entry. The problem that I have with the BFG Edition is that it interferes too much with the atmosphere Id tried to build by nixing dynamic shadows and lighting and making the infamous "flashlight mod" the default. Now, I'll admit I haven't actually played the original Doom 3 (I have bought a copy and am waiting for it to arrive), so it's hard to give a full-throated denouncement of these changes. But I can also look at side-by-side comparisons and, god damn, one of these pictures is not like the other.

It's also not that hard to take in how Doom 3's levels flow, what locations Id chose to make pitch dark, and intuit how the flashlight was meant to place you in risky situations where your gun is not drawn. Sure, I need to close my eyes and imagine a game where firefights are lit only by muzzle flash and fireballs, but I can appreciate how this might build more stress in the player and foster doubt that a room is truly safe. It sounds interesting. Wish I was playing that game!

That's not to say Doom 3's faults are entirely isolated to the BFG Edition, though some of the most egregious ones are. I am not a fan of replacing color-coded key cards with numerical codes, mostly because you need to dig those out of PDA documents that are incredibly dry and bereft of humor. Late into the game I saw a monitor that read "Download hell portal safety tips" and it was like this brief flash at a better game that was about a decade down the road. Not that Doom can't have any story, or even a very self-serious one, but I just don't think any character is particularly well-written in Doom 3 and I found the beat-to-beat moments of the plot to be dull.

I also got the Speedrunner trophy because I beat the game in about 7 hours which is surprising to me, because I feel like I played it for a least twice that. See you all at GDQ, I guess.

I'll be moving on to the DLC next, but I'm not too excited for it. Real bummer that I had a more bone-chilling experience with Bomberman Act:Zero but I guess that's what happens when you completely gut your game of atmosphere to appease those who (somewhat understandably) wanted more Doom in their Doom 3.