Two months ago—in "DOOM 3 Arrives: Technology Apex or Video Game Porn?"—I wrote about the amazingly realistic experiences that the DOOM 3 PC game offers. I wasn't intending to cover similar video games again so quickly, but with this month's long-awaited releases of Microsoft's Halo 2 for the Xbox console and Valve's Half-Life 2 for the PC, I'm in a curious bind. Both of these games are, at least superficially, similar to DOOM 3, offering realistic and fun environments in which to run around, destroy aliens, and thwart otherworldly attempts to subjugate Earth. But there are some serious differences between each of these games. And in at least one case, the bar has been raised, quite dramatically—even in the short couple of months since DOOM 3 was released.
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