Spectre
From DoomWiki.org
- For information about the Spectre enemy from Strife, see Spectre (Strife).
Spectres are partially invisible, ethereal beings which, except for their fuzzy, blurred appearance, are exactly the same as the demon in behavior and attributes. They often hide in darkened areas, waiting to startle players. Spectres do not have states or sprites of their own, but instead share them entirely with the demon.
Spectres appear as shimmering beings, acting like a lens which distorts and reflects the light passing around and through their translucent bodies, making them hard to spot in dark areas or against certain textures, such as grey speckled walls. However, in bright areas, they are noticeably visible and spotty. The original README.TXT included with the shareware version of Doom described spectres as "vague, half-formed shapes".
The spectre's official description follows:
Variations
In many OpenGL source ports, as well as in Doom 64 and the Sony PlayStation version of Doom, spectres do not "shimmer", but are instead rendered using translucency. This is because the partial invisibility effect is very difficult to reproduce using such a renderer. EDGE, however, emulates the effect using a shader, and GZDoom allows users to select one of several "simulated" effect presets to suit their tastes.
For similar reasons, the Atari Jaguar code base omits support for the partial invisibility effect entirely. This port, along with most others based on it, therefore do not truly contain a spectre monster - though spectres still occur in some of the maps, they are rendered identically to demons and are thus completely indistinguishable from them. Others were selectively removed or replaced with normal demons, without any consistency or discernible pattern.
The PlayStation version, aside from featuring ordinary spectres at both 25% and 100% additive translucency levels, introduced a stronger version of the spectre called the nightmare spectre which uses subtractive blending, giving it a dark green, ectoplasmic appearance. These spectre variants are retained in the Sega Saturn port. (though they are indistinguishable from the regular spectres in said port as they do not use the unique colors.)
In Doom 64 specifically, inactive spectres are initially rendered as opaque demons with a green tint (a nod back to the nightmare spectre), becoming translucent upon detecting the player. Upon death, they revert to an opaque state again. Spectres also appear in the Doom 64 Cast of Characters sequence at the end of the game, unlike the spectre in the Doom II cast sequence.
In Doom II for Game Boy Advance, the spectre is notably present despite its absence in its predecessor, due to using an off-the-shelf game engine purpose-built to run on the platform. It is rendered with a bright silhouette and refractive lens-like effect which distorts the background behind it, though it lacks the static noise of the original. However, this effect does not typically make the monster harder to see, but in fact makes it stand out.
Notes
- There are some tricks that can help make spectres more visible: their shimmering outline is much easier to see with the inverted colors of an invulnerability sphere, for example, and they feature a fully visible blood-splatter effect when hit.
- The spectre does not appear in the Doom II cast sequence at the end of the game.
- If a spectre's corpse is crushed, the pool of gibs left behind continues to display the partial invisibility effect. In most hardware accelerated ports, the gibs will be translucent.
Data
|
|
|
Bites needed to kill1 | Mean | Standard deviation |
Min | Max |
Player (100% health, no armor) |
5.16 | 1.20 | 3 | 9 |
Player (100% health, security armor) |
7.32 | 1.33 | 5 | 11 |
Player (200% health, combat armor) |
18.86 | 1.60 | 15 | 22 |
Barrel | 1.50 | 0.66 | 1 | 5 |
Trooper | 1.50 | 0.66 | 1 | 5 |
Sergeant | 1.97 | 0.77 | 1 | 5 |
Wolfenstein SS | 2.98 | 0.95 | 2 | 7 |
Imp | 3.29 | 0.99 | 2 | 7 |
Chaingunner | 3.84 | 0.99 | 2 | 8 |
Lost soul | 5.16 | 1.20 | 3 | 9 |
Commander Keen | 5.16 | 1.20 | 3 | 9 |
Demon | 7.48 | 1.31 | 5 | 11 |
Spectre | 7.48 | 1.31 | 5 | 11 |
Boss brain2 | 12.15 | 1.59 | 8 | 17 |
Revenant | 14.31 | 1.57 | 11 | 18 |
Cacodemon | 18.86 | 1.60 | 15 | 22 |
Pain elemental | 18.86 | 1.60 | 15 | 22 |
Hell knight | 23.52 | 1.50 | 19 | 27 |
Arachnotron | 23.52 | 1.50 | 19 | 27 |
Mancubus | 28.15 | 1.35 | 24 | 32 |
Arch-vile | 32.84 | 1.30 | 30 | 36 |
Baron of Hell | 46.72 | 1.79 | 42 | 51 |
Spiderdemon | 139.43 | 2.32 | 134 | 144 |
Cyberdemon | 185.64 | 2.97 | 180 | 192 |
- This table assumes that all calls to P_Random for damage, pain chance, and blood splats are consecutive. In real play, this is never the case: counterattacks and AI pathfinding must be handled, and of course the map may contain additional moving monsters and other randomized phenomena (such as flickering lights). Any resulting errors are probably toward the single-shot average, as they introduce noise into the correlation between the indices of "consecutive" calls.
- Assumes that direct hits are possible, which does not occur in any stock map.
Appearance statistics
In classic Doom, the spectre is first encountered on these maps:
The IWADs contain the following numbers of spectres:
Game | ITYTD and HNTR | HMP | UV and NM |
---|---|---|---|
The Ultimate Doom | 51 | 102 | 183 |
Doom II | 37 | 93 | 175 |
TNT: Evilution | 83 | 150 | 224 |
Plutonia | 95 | 102 | 111 |
- May be encountered earlier if the secret level is played.
See also
Monsters from Doom and Doom II |
---|
Doom: Baron of Hell | Cacodemon | Cyberdemon | Demon | Imp | Lost soul | Shotgun guy | Spectre | Spiderdemon | Zombieman Doom 2: Arachnotron | Arch-vile | Commander Keen | Heavy weapon dude | Hell knight | Mancubus | Pain elemental | Revenant | Wolfenstein SS | Final boss |
Monsters from Doom 64 |
---|
From Doom: Arachnotron | Baron of Hell | Cacodemon | Cyberdemon | Demon | Hell knight | Imp | Lost soul | Mancubus | Pain elemental | Shotgun guy | Spectre | Zombieman New: Marine | Mother demon | Nightmare imp |
Monsters from the Sony PlayStation version of Doom |
---|
Doom: Baron of Hell | Cacodemon | Cyberdemon | Demon | Imp | Lost soul | Shotgun guy | Spectre | Spiderdemon | Zombieman Doom 2: Arachnotron | Heavy weapon dude | Hell knight | Mancubus | Pain elemental | Revenant New: Nightmare spectre |