Doom 3 - hints, cheats & easter eggs

Ponster

I though that this thread might come in useful.....

I found this on the doom 3 forums at planet doom and it really helped out with performance.

---

In your DOOM 3 directory, find "DoomConfig.cfg" (x:\Program Files\Doom 3\base). Open DoomConfig.cfg in Notepad.

Find the line:

seta image_cacheMegs "32"

I changed 32 to 96.

I got a nice boost in performance.
After setting it to 128 the frame rate went up a LOT... I can even run it on the high settings now... I'm going to increase it to 256 and play some more. I'll update w/ problems if they arise.

256 was an even bigger boost. the game is running real good now. I'm gonna up the ante a bit more and try it at 384.

I got brave and set it to 512mb... I dont think there were any huge frame increases... but a small amount. I don't think i'll go any further unless i get feedback from others who have tried it.

People have changed it to 128 and 256 with big performance gains

If you have a gig of ram you can do 128-512

anything lower then a gig stick to 96

---

I'm running a AMD 2800+, ATI 9600 Pro 256 and everything seemed to be a *lot* smoother when I changed the setting to "128".

Ponster

And if you still haven't found the BFG9000 waepon then try this...


It's in Delta Labs 2A









As you can see, inside is the gun but you need a code
On the door you see the name M. Abrams.
Check your PDA files you got his file way back in the game.
Listen to what he has got to say + read his mail, then you can figure it out

maybe some of you already knew this....but it's for the ones who dont know it..

glimmerman

Post your easter egg locations in this thread.

I'm still right in the beginning of the game. Check out the kitchen area just before the Marine HQ. There's a video game called "Punch the Turkey" or something to that effect. Play it.

Doomguys head is part of the display, changing expressions just as he did in Doom 1 and 2

Gonzo

cheers for the performance tip, my aging 2.4ghz Pentium4 with 1gig of ram and geforce4, 4600ti is performing quite well after that tip, getting between 30 and 60fps at 1024x768 on medium setting.

ChipZilla

I haven't tried this trick myself yet so I can't vouch for it, but anyway:

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=17657

mayordenis

yeah i gave it a go its running nice and smoothly i must say.

[CrimsonGhost]

Link ain't working for me? What does it say?

rob1891

Change config and speed up your Doom III

A tweak is a long time in politics

By Fuad Abazovic: Thursday 05 August 2004, 07:31
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO to speed up your Doom III is to change one key in Doomconfig.cfg file and your game will go much faster, it's claimed.

We haven't had a chance to try this out ourselves, so do so at your own risk.

The report is that if you find Doomconfig.cfg file in x:\Program Files\Doom 3\base and open it in Notepad, and edit one line, the game will go faster.

When you find seta image_cacheMegs "32" you change 32 number to 96 or even 128 or 256 and your Doom will go faster, it's claimed.

These guys here that found this key haven't tried any benchmarks yet, so it remains to be tested. µ

http://www.forumplanet.com/planetdoom/topic.asp?fid=5733&tid=1438663

GinjaNinja

from the link

"
A tweak is a long time in politics

By Fuad Abazovic: Thursday 05 August 2004, 07:31
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO to speed up your Doom III is to change one key in Doomconfig.cfg file and your game will go much faster, it's claimed.

We haven't had a chance to try this out ourselves, so do so at your own risk.

The report is that if you find Doomconfig.cfg file in x:\Program Files\Doom 3\base and open it in Notepad, and edit one line, the game will go faster.

When you find seta image_cacheMegs "32" you change 32 number to 96 or even 128 or 256 and your Doom will go faster, it's claimed.

These guys here that found this key haven't tried any benchmarks yet, so it remains to be tested. µ
"

Ponster

Already posted here.

RuggieBear

worked for me.....

As for this god dam refresh rate.....

LegacyUser

That tip is deadly. I can run it on ultra and 1280 * 1024 now!!!! cheers!

Not bad on a 9800 pro, 2.5ghz and a gig of ram.

Ponster

And if this tip doesn't work and you still have problems then try this site...


http://ucguides.savagehelp.com/Doom3/Doom3Guide.htm


1) Load Doom3 using the shortcut that enables the console
2) Open the console using the ~ key below ESC or press CTRL ALT ~
3) Enter the command timedemo demo1
4) Wait until demo has finished and note your FPS

Then adjust whet they tell you and try again until you get a decent fps.


To test your FPS while online type "com_showfps 1" at the console.



Go here..

http://www.tech-recipes.com/windows_games_tips537.html


to get a list of all the command available from the command screen.

Here's a short summery :

---Cheats---

god - God Mode
notarget - Enemies can not see you
testlight - Increases the light in the room
give all - Gives all weapons
give weapon_chainsaw - Chainsaw
give weapon_rocketlauncher - Rocket Launcher
give weapon_machinegun - Machinegun
give weapon_shotgun - Shotgun
give weapon_plasmagun - Plasmagun
give weapon_bfg - BFG
give all - Gives all weapons
give ammo - gives max ammo for all weapons
spawn monster_boss_cyberdemon - summons a cyberdemon


---Demo---

benchmark - benchmarks your system with different sizes of screen
sizedown - decreases the size of the screen
sizeup - increases the size of the screen
recorddemo - closes the console and starts recording until you die, send a stoprecording command, or quit. It defaults to \Doom 3\base\demos and names it subsequently demo000.demo
stoprecording - stop the recording of a demo
timedemo demoname - run a demo for a benchmark
playdemo demoname - play a recorded demo
aviGame - writes AVIs for the current game
avidemo - saves a demo as an avi

ChipZilla

Ponster wrote:

Already posted here.

Congratulations.

Ponster

Errr, yes.....?

Just pointing out that the mods made a special thread combining all the DOOM tips and stuff so they'd be easier to find. No need to have 2.

glimmerman

I got outstanding results using the above guides. I had jerkorama til I did this stuff, now the game is buttery smooth on my xp1700, 512m, 9800pro 128m

I'm running at 1024 x 768 at high quality: seriously, its a hell of a lot smoother than before the tweaks, but the timedemo still runs like crap.

heres my autoexec.cfg

seta com_videoram "128"
seta com_allowconsole "1"
seta image_downSizeBumpLimit "512"
seta image_cacheMegs "128"
seta image_filter "GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_NEAREST"
seta image_anisotropy "0"

seta image_downSizeLimit "512"
seta image_ignoreHighQuality "1"
seta image_downSizeBumpLimit "512"
seta image_downSizeSpecularLimit "64"
seta image_downSizeBump "1"
seta image_downSizeSpecular "1"
seta image_downSize "1"
seta image_forceDownSize "1"
seta r_useOptimizedShadows "1"
seta r_useTurboShadow "1"
seta g_decals "0"
seta g_showBrass "0"
seta g_muzzleFlash "0"
seta g_showPlayerShadow "0"
seta image_anisotropy "0"
seta image_filter "GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_NEAREST"

monument

Ponster wrote:

Errr, yes.....?

Just pointing out that the mods made a special thread combining all the DOOM tips and stuff so they'd be easier to find. No need to have 2.

Actually, truthfully - congratulations! Some people can’t read old treads - the ‘new tread’ button is like a big red button some people just have to press.

Merged.

Ponster

Not a great tip as such but if you're tired of using the mouse-wheel to switch between the shotgun and the flashlight when you need both at the same time, try binding the flashlight to the right-mouse button instead and using spacebar to jump.

This way you flick from light to gun in one button-click rather than using the wheel.

weemcd

any ideas on how my comp will run the game, ive got an xp2000, 256mb of 2700 and a new 5900 card waiting to be installed. I think the ram is the major problem, how are other people with 256 finding the game?

AB03

256mb isnt enough, the min is 384mb, and Id say it runs like crap even with that amount

Loobz

People I did the same as above. But mine said seta image_cacheMegs "30" instead of "32".

I didnt notice any change at all using:
2.8 P4
1 Gig DDR
128mb 9800 Pro

IO set it to "96" but no change. What should I change it to considering my hardware? Thanks

glimmerman

change it to 128 at least, I'd say. I have 512M and 128 works well for me (along with the other settings I mentioned in my previous post)

In fact out of all the setting I have, I'm not entirely sure which one causes it to work so well. Try using all of them. Create an autoexec.cfg file in the doom 3\base directory, and those settings should work at least as well for you, perhaps better since you have more ram than me.

Also, I'd say don't bother measuring changes with the timedemo (which bizarrely still runs like crap). In actual gameplay everything is MUCH smoother.

Loobz

Thanks Glimmerman. I will try that. Its one sweet game!

RuggieBear

Ponster wrote:

Not a great tip as such but if you're tired of using the mouse-wheel to switch between the shotgun and the flashlight when you need both at the same time, try binding the flashlight to the right-mouse button instead and using spacebar to jump.

This way you flick from light to gun in one button-click rather than using the wheel.

Good tip Ponster.....this is what i've done from the start....makes things a little bit easier. Just as well Id don't believe in alternative fire weapons!

Loobz

Nice one Ponster - will do that later.

Am I the only one who's seta image_cacheMegs "30" instead of "32"?

I havent tried changing it as per Glimmerman yet. But when I changed it to 96, I noticed no change. Why?

Tusky

Loobz wrote:

Nice one Ponster - will do that later.

Am I the only one who's seta image_cacheMegs "30" instead of "32"?

I havent tried changing it as per Glimmerman yet. But when I changed it to 96, I noticed no change. Why?

how much ram have you got ?

Ponster

image_cacheMegs =

Maximum MB set aside for temporary loading of full-sized precompressed images.

Set cache megs to a higher value if you have 512 megabytes or more of system RAM. Guideline is 1/6 to 1/4 of your system RAM.


There's a page here that explains what each variable does.

And here is a much more user-friendly version.

Loobz

I have a Gig in me rig. Its just weird why mine says 30 and everyone elses says 32 by default.

swiss

I pulled this from another board. I haven't tested it personally but if anyone wants to give it a shot, the following tweak supposedly gives a very good boost in performance in single player mode only. The catch is that following this tweak means you can't connect to dedicated multiplayer servers, so online gaming may be out unless you create a copy of your doom3 directory (taking up an extra 2gigs).

After installation, the Doom III Folder consists only of the doom3.exe and some .PK4 files. Those PK4 files includes the entire game (sounds, videos, textures etc.) compressed. They are normally uncompressed in mid game, which is very hard on your CPU. Lets fix this!

1. Make a copy of ALL the files in C:\Program Files\Doom 3\base. This is some big filage, but if you want to revert to MP without reinstalling you need to do it.

2. Unrar the following .pk4 files (just pretend they are .rar's and open them with winrar) into the C:\Program Files\Doom 3\base folder (each one should unrar a single folder such as textures or models):

pak000.pk4
pak001.pk4
pak002.pk4
pak003.pk4
pak004.pk4 (This one has many files, put them all in \Base and over right any that apply.

3. Now delete the files above (pak000-004) or move them to another folder for storage so you can revert to multiplayer.

When you want to revert to multiplayer, restore everything you had before and get rid of the new stuff. I'm not sure if the folder "maps" is the same or not, so make sure you back that up.

When in normal mode, you should have "maps" "savegames" "config.spec" "doomConfig.cfg" "doomkey" "game00.pk4" and "gamex86.dll", nothing else.

Ponster

With those specs I would have thought that you were aleady running at:

Resolution: 1024x768
Texture Quality: High Quality

and therefore wouldn't need to change anything in the config file to get a better fps rate.

Ponster

Thx swiss. I'll give it a go later on this evening and let you know how it turned out.

mayordenis

Loobz wrote:

I have a Gig in me rig. Its just weird why mine says 30 and everyone elses says 32 by default.

it aint too wierd mine said 20 :P

Ponster

I think when you first run the game it'll detect your settings and it encountered something which told it to set the variable at "30" instead of "'32".

I'm only grasping at straws here though

Loobz

Thanks Ponster. Yeah, I was a little disappointed at the FPS I am getting. I have to turn down AA and all in the control panel to make it run smoothly. Im using latest drivers but theres a bit of lag when turning sharply in the game. It sux when u know the PC should do better : (

RuggieBear

Just posted this in the Doom 3 Rant thread but perhaps it might be more useful here. Apologies for the double post

There is a duct tape mod out already. It allows you to tape your flashlight to your gun......

Look for it at here if you want to ruin your game....