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There are people that say Doom 3 is a scary game. I am not one of those people and I don’t say that to be edgy or contrarian. I just really don’t think it’s as scary or terrifying as some people make it out to be. To each their own, of course. Yes, it’s dark. Yes, it’s atmospheric. Yes, it can be unsettling and even creepy at times. But the horror doesn’t work because the gameplay doesn’t back it up. Despite my issues with Doom 3, I still enjoy it. It’s not a terrible game by any means. And I didn’t make this video to point out its faults. If you want to know what I really think about the game, check out our review. The reason I bring up my feelings on it is because I’m always on the lookout for mods that change up the gameplay. Mods that change it in a way so it can support the horror the game is trying to convey and I think the boldly titled Perfected Doom 3 mod is worth talking about.
I’m always interested in Doom 3 mods because I feel several things about it could be better. I’ll quote a part of the summary on the Perfected Doom 3’s Moddb page, “Perfected Doom 3 is more then just a tweak mod. It attempts to completely overhaul the entire game with new monsters, rebalanced weapons, rebalanced monster stats, better graphics, new gameplay features and much more.” To me, that all sounds great. It’s a pretty popular mod as far as I can tell and I did check it out years ago and remember enjoying it. It’s a mod designed for the original PC game and there is a version for the Resurrection of Evil expansion. For this review, I played through both the Doom 3 campaign and Resurrection of Evil campaign using the Perfected Doom 3 mod and I also installed the sound packs on offer on the mod’s Moddb page.
Perfected Doom 3 is a gameplay mod so the stories in both campaigns remain unchanged. It does feature some new Hell levels but they don’t really affect the narrative in any meaningful way. Perfected Doom 3 does come with visual improvements and things you may have seen in other mods like the headlamp, and “NextGen” visual enhancements provided by Sikkmod. These include bloom, color grading, motion blur, shadows, SSAO, and sun fx. I didn’t fuck with the Sikkmod options this time because I every time I’ve done so in the past, I make the game look like shit or something looks weird and I end up spending a lot of time tweaking options only to find more and more things that need to be tweaked as I go on. You need to know what you’re doing with some of these enhancements and you can make the game look amazing. If you don’t know what you’re doing, tweaking can become a trial and error process.
The visual improvements are indeed nice but it’s the gameplay changes that are the highlights here. Everything has been rebalanced. So for me, the question becomes, does Perfected Doom 3 actually back up the horror? My answer is no. But I don’t blame the mod nor do I think that was the intended goal. I also think the general design of Doom 3 probably makes it very hard to fix the issues. Nevertheless, Perfected Doom 3 is actually quite amazing. But the campaigns and content aren’t changed enough to really make for a terrifying experience. Enemy behavior feels mostly the same and the jump scares are still predictable.
One of the biggest differences between Doom 3 and Perfected Doom 3 is damage values. Your weapons and enemy attacks had their damage values increased or altered in some way. The blast radius of certain attacks has also been modified. At the very least, this makes enemies more dangerous but it also makes you more dangerous. I did play through the campaigns on the Marine difficulty and can tell you they felt more challenging than the vanilla campaigns on the same difficulty. So that’s a good thing. The flashlight was removed but you can turn on a headlamp allowing you to see what you’re shooting at any time. Medkits and the Berserk power-up can be stored and activated manually. You can replenish health at the press of a button as long as you’ve acquired some medkits and you can enter Berserk mode at the press of a button as long as you’ve acquired the power-up or adrenaline.
Despite changes made to enemy damage values and even health values, I do think the rebalancing leans more in the player’s favor. Weapons now come with alternate fire modes, hand grenades double as proximity grenades, and your run speed and jump height have been increased. I do wish fall damage was removed or reduced but it never became a huge problem. The machine gun sounds a lot more powerful and explosions sound amazing. I did notice headshots seemed to drop certain foes like Zombies and Imps instantly and this can make getting through many areas a lot easier. The double barrel shotgun has been added to the Doom 3 campaign and the chainsaw has been added to the Resurrection of Evil campaign. You can perform melee attacks while holding weapons, dual wield weapons like the pistol and double barrel shotgun, and some weapons allow you to aim down sights.
Due to the changes to damage values, enemies can drop you quickly if you’re not careful. I found myself taking things a little more slowly here. It also means small foes like Souls, Trites, and Cherubs are much more of a threat now. They still arrive in numbers and can overwhelm you if you’re not paying attention but the changes to damage values means they can drop you even quicker than before. You want to avoid getting cornered by foes that rush you because they can and will attack you relentlessly just as they did before but will drain through your health much quicker here. Basically, Perfected Doom 3 makes it so you can’t just stand around and tank damage. You want to approach areas with some caution and stay behind things more often to avoid taking damage during combat. A lot of enemy attacks can drop significant chunks of your health and you can’t store an infinite amount of medkits, either.
Other than what’s already been mentioned, not much else about the enemies has been altered as far as I can tell. They still give themselves away as they spawn in and their movement and attack patterns are still simple. Basically, they exhibit the same behavior but do more damage now. Perfected Doom 3 does mix things up, though, by introducing some new foes which seem to replace existing foes in certain locations. I use the term “new” because they’re new to Doom 3. Several of them should be familiar to classic Doom veterans. Barons, Pain Elementals, and Spectres are here along with Nightmare Imps among some others. While many of the new foes do feel like simple variants of existing foes, some will change how you approach certain situations. Barons, for example, are spongey as fuck so dropping them isn’t quite as easy as dropping Hell Knights. Pain Elementals fly around like Cacodemons but they unleash Souls and if you’re not expecting them, you may find yourself getting attacked from multiple directions and can be easily overrun by Souls.
To me, most of the changes in Perfected Doom 3 make it so that you more or less have to be more careful. Or to put it another way, I feel like it rebalances things in favor of more cautious gameplay. But it does make the gameplay feel more intense which I enjoyed. I won’t say it makes the game scarier or more terrifying but I was more vigilant and alert. Jump scares and ambushes can be much more dangerous here especially if you’re caught off guard. That said, despite taking things slowly, I can’t say many encounters proved to be significantly more challenging than before. Sure, I was thrown off by a Baron here and Pain Elemental there, but for the most part I didn’t need to alter my tactics all that much. In fact, the deadlier firepower and dual-wielding ability often made me feel overpowered when up against certain foes. But at the very least, the mod makes the combat feel more satisfying thanks to not just damage value changes but also the better gore effects. Blood will splatter everywhere and you can turn enemies into gibs. Plus, dead bodies stay on the ground a bit longer now.
Not only does Perfected Doom 3 include all of these changes but it also includes new Hell levels and a new campaign. First, I’ll go over the new Hell levels. After you defeat the Guardian of Hell in the Doom 3 campaign, rather than go back to the base on Mars, you’re journey through Hell continues in a new series of levels and ends with a fight against the Icon of Sin. And I would argue this new boss level is the easiest one to get through. I thought most of the new areas were confusing. I found myself running around in circles on more than one occasion trying to figure out where to go or what to do. The pacing in these levels isn’t consistent with the rest of the campaign and I might even say they act as a difficulty spike. Some of the encounters can be tough. But I was more frustrated with not knowing how to progress or struggling to figure out what I was missing.
I do feel a little bad complaining about these levels because this is a free mod after all, and I can’t say they’re poorly designed, but I just don’t think they’re a good fit for Doom 3. In the vanilla game, the Hell levels make for a wonderful change of scenery and I’ve always felt it was a shame you don’t get to spend more time there. So I actually appreciate that the mod extends your time in Hell. I just wish the levels were more consistent with the rest. I guess I would say they’re reminiscent of classic Doom levels in the sense they require some exploration and thinking. More than what Doom 3 requires of you, that is. But in my opinion, this style doesn’t really mesh well with Doom 3’s more linear and straightforward environments that keep the action contained. The new Hell levels are not super maze-like or anything but in some cases you will have to find things to interact with so you can progress and what you need to do is not always obvious or clear.
If any levels are reminiscent of classic Doom levels it’s the levels in the new In Hell campaign. In fact, some are recreations of classics with noticeable changes. It is stated in-game that the levels in this campaign or expansion are inspired by Ultimate Doom. You get no PDA and have infinite stamina. You will have to figure out where to go and what to do to progress in many cases and you may find yourself backtracking and platforming from time to time. There’s even secret areas to find. These levels are well crafted and, in my opinion, they all seem to convey different tones and atmospheres. Some feel more like classic Doom, others are darker or more ominous, etc. And I won’t lie, I definitely enjoyed some more than others. There’s quite a few levels here and it does come with New Game Plus variants of levels which I felt was a neat addition. Ultimately, I really welcome this campaign. It’s a great addition that should keep you occupied for a little while.
As mentioned before, Perfected Doom 3 comes with visual improvements. Despite the mod making the game look better, the presentation does remain faithful. It still looks like Doom 3 and the new visual effects and better gore effects really help elevate the gunplay which I’ve always felt was pretty average in the vanilla game. It just feels so much better here. The new sound effects also play a role in making the gunplay and combat feel better. I did witness several visual oddities like weird looking shadows and effects here and there, dead bodies would sometimes get stuck and bug out, and weapons would get stuck in mid-air from time to time. The game also crashed on me a couple of times. But for the most part, it ran fine and I can’t say there was anything that really broke or ruined the experience for me.
Out of all the Doom 3 mods I’ve played, Perfected Doom 3 is probably my favorite. At least it is as of this review. It rectifies a lot of the issues I have with the vanilla game but I can’t say I’m a huge fan of the new Hell levels in the Doom 3 campaign. Regardless, I feel like this a big improvement overall. I love almost everything about this mod. While the gameplay is better, I still don’t think enough was done to back up the horror element, but I do think Perfected Doom 3 is a step in the right direction. At the very least, it forces the player to be more cautious and that’s a good thing. The gunplay feels better and enemies are more dangerous. It’s a big mod that changes a lot and includes a lot of cool stuff, including an additional campaign. You can see a lot of care and time was put into it and I feel it makes the Doom 3 experience more engaging.
I would absolutely recommend Perfected Doom 3. But I would recommend you play through the vanilla game first just so you can appreciate it more. It’s a quality modification that makes positive changes and contains cool new content. It looks better, feels better, and the rebalancing makes it more enjoyable than the vanilla game in my opinion. Definitely check it out.