Games These Days (Continued)

Now, let's take a look at another fairly recent game which didn't really require a high-end system to play. Since we're in the strategy genre, let me re-introduce to you guys, Blizzard's masterpiece - Warcraft III!

Now, if you ask anyone in my circle of friends, they would tell you that we have all enjoyed Warcraft III thoroughly for years! Some still do, even today! It was extremely fun and highly replayable.

Best of all, you can even run it on low-end systems. Even my IBM laptop with its 16MB Radeon 7500 Mobility was fast enough to enjoy a good, lag-free LAN session with the gang! Who cares if the texture quality is not that sharp or if the characters are blocky? You won't even notice the difference in detail during an intense gaming session. The most important thing about the game is that it's really fun to play!

Now, some might argue that improvements to graphics and sound are also important in the gaming industry. Of course, I don’t deny that. In fact, this is the reason I’m not hitting on Doom 3 as the blooper of the year. I’m sure some of you out there might think that I’m out of my mind for saying such things about the most highly anticipated game of the year.

id Software’s Doom 3 – Superb eye-candy

Now, while Doom 3 didn't quite cut it as the best game of the year - or even ever, it plays a very important role in the gaming industry and how it will evolve in the future.

Taking a look back, some of the most successful games were built on game engines that were not created in-house by the game developer themselves. These games include the likes of Valve's Half Life, Ion Storm's Deux Ex and even Ravensoft's Star Trek Voyager : Elite Force.

The engine that powered these games? None other that id Software's Quake I and Quake II engine and also Epic's Unreal engine. By building on these engines, game developers can concentrate on what makes a good game - the storyline and gameplay!

However, it looks like many developers are now putting all their efforts into creating life-like graphics for their games instead of concentrating on storyline and gameplay!

Graphics quality is important - to a certain extent. John Carmack, continuing his record of expanding the horizon on 3D engines, has pushed the bar even higher with Doom 3. He has presented what may be one of the best 3D engines in the industry and made it available to other game developers to power their next award-winning masterpieces.

So, now, game developers can build on something even more powerful, in terms of graphics-rendering capabilities. Let's hope that they'll finally focus on the most important elements of gaming - storyline and gameplay.