Doom (1993 Video Game)
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''Doom'' (stylized as ''DOOM'') is a 1993
first-person shooter First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the p ...
(FPS) game developed by id Software for
MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few o ...
. Players assume the role of a space marine, popularly known as
Doomguy The Doomguy (also spelt Doom Guy, as well as referred to as the Doom Marine, Doom Slayer or just the Slayer in '' Doom'' (2016) and ''Doom Eternal'') is a fictional character and the protagonist of the '' Doom'' video game franchise of first-pers ...
, fighting their way through hordes of invading
demon A demon is a malevolent supernatural entity. Historically, belief in demons, or stories about demons, occurs in religion, occultism, literature, fiction, mythology, and folklore; as well as in Media (communication), media such as comics, video ...
s from
hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location in the afterlife in which evil souls are subjected to punitive suffering, most often through torture, as eternal punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hell ...
. Id began developing ''Doom'' after the release of their previous FPS, ''
Wolfenstein 3D ''Wolfenstein 3D'' is a first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Apogee Software and FormGen. Originally released on May 5, 1992, for DOS, it was inspired by the 1981 Muse Software video game '' Castle Wolfe ...
'' (1992)''.'' It emerged from a 3D
game engine A game engine is a software framework primarily designed for the development of video games and generally includes relevant libraries and support programs. The "engine" terminology is similar to the term "software engine" used in the software ...
developed by
John Carmack John D. Carmack II (born August 20, 1970) is an American computer programmer and video game developer. He co-founded the video game company id Software and was the lead programmer of its 1990s games ''Commander Keen'', ''Wolfenstein 3D'', ''Doo ...
, who wanted to create a science fiction game inspired by ''
Dungeons & Dragons ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TS ...
'' and the films '' Evil Dead II'' and ''
Aliens Alien primarily refers to: * Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country ** Enemy alien, the above in times of war * Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth ** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
.'' The first episode, comprising nine levels, was distributed freely as
shareware Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer ...
; the full game, with two further episodes, was sold via
mail order Mail order is the buying of goods or services by mail delivery. The buyer places an order for the desired products with the merchant through some remote methods such as: * Sending an order form in the mail * Placing a telephone call * Placing ...
. An updated version with an additional episode and more difficult levels, ''The Ultimate Doom'', was released in 1995 and sold at
retail Retail is the sale of goods and Service (economics), services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturing, manufacturers, dire ...
. ''Doom'' is one of the most significant games in
video game history The history of video games began in the 1950s and 1960s as computer scientists began designing simple games and simulations on minicomputers and mainframes. ''Spacewar!'' was developed by MIT student hobbyists in 1962 as one of the first such ...
, frequently cited as one of the greatest games ever made. It sold an estimated 3.5 million copies by 1999; between 10 and 20 million people are estimated to have played it within two years of launch, and in late 1995, it was estimated to be installed on more computers worldwide than
Microsoft's Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation, multinational technology company, technology corporation producing Software, computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at th ...
then-new operating system,
Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturi ...
. Along with ''Wolfenstein 3D'', ''Doom'' helped define the FPS genre and inspired numerous similar games, often called ''Doom'' clones. It pioneered
online distribution Digital distribution, also referred to as content delivery, online distribution, or electronic software distribution, among others, is the delivery or distribution of digital media content such as audio, video, e-books, video games, and other so ...
and technologies including
3D graphics 3D computer graphics, or “3D graphics,” sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for th ...
, networked multiplayer gaming, and support for custom modifications via packaged
WAD Wad is an old mining term for any black manganese oxide or hydroxide mineral-rich rock in the oxidized zone of various ore deposits. Typically closely associated with various iron oxides. Specific mineral varieties include pyrolusite, lithiophorit ...
files. Its graphic violence and supposed hellish imagery drew controversy from different groups, such as parents and the news. ''Doom'' has been ported to numerous platforms. The ''Doom'' franchise continued with '' Doom II: Hell on Earth'' (1994) and
expansion pack An expansion pack, expansion set, supplement, or simply expansion is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game, video game or collectible card game. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, characters, or ...
s including ''
Master Levels for Doom II ''Doom II'', also known as ''Doom II: Hell on Earth'', is a first-person shooter game by id Software. It was released for MS-DOS computers in 1994 and Macintosh computers in 1995. Unlike the original ''Doom'', which was initially only availabl ...
'' (1995). The
source code In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a program is specially designed to facilitate the ...
was released in 1997 under a proprietary license, and then later in 1999 under the GNU General Public License v2.0 or later. ''
Doom 3 ''Doom 3'' is a 2004 survival horror first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Activision. ''Doom 3'' was originally released for Microsoft Windows on August 3, 2004, adapted for Linux later that year, and ported ...
'', a horror game built with the
id Tech 4 id Tech 4, popularly known as the ''Doom 3'' engine, is a game engine developed by id Software and first used in the video game ''Doom 3''. The engine was designed by John Carmack, who also created previous game engines, such as those for '' Do ...
engine, was released in 2004, followed by a 2005 ''Doom'' film. id returned to the fast-paced action of the classic games with the 2016 game ''
Doom Doom is another name for damnation. Doom may also refer to: People * Doom (professional wrestling), the tag team of Ron Simmons and Butch Reed * Daniel Doom (born 1934), Belgian cyclist * Debbie Doom (born 1963), American softball pitcher * ...
'' and the 2020 sequel '' Doom Eternal''.


Gameplay

''Doom'' is a
first-person shooter First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the p ...
presented with early
3D graphics 3D computer graphics, or “3D graphics,” sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for th ...
. The player controls an unnamed space marine—later termed "
Doomguy The Doomguy (also spelt Doom Guy, as well as referred to as the Doom Marine, Doom Slayer or just the Slayer in '' Doom'' (2016) and ''Doom Eternal'') is a fictional character and the protagonist of the '' Doom'' video game franchise of first-pers ...
"—through a series of levels set in military bases on the
moons of Mars The two moons of Mars are Phobos (moon), Phobos and Deimos (moon), Deimos. They are irregular in shape. Both were discovered by American astronomer Asaph Hall in August 1877 and are named after the Greek mythology, Greek mythological twin charac ...
and in
hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location in the afterlife in which evil souls are subjected to punitive suffering, most often through torture, as eternal punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hell ...
. To finish a level, the player must traverse through the often labyrinthine area to reach a marked exit room. Levels are grouped together into named episodes, with the final level focusing on a
boss fight In video games, a boss is a significant computer-controlled opponent. A fight with a boss character is commonly referred to as a boss battle or boss fight. Bosses are generally far stronger than other opponents the player has faced up to that ...
with a particularly difficult enemy. While the environment is presented in a 3D perspective, the enemies and objects are instead 2D sprites presented from several preset viewing angles, a technique sometimes referred to as
2.5D 2.5D (two-and-a-half dimensional) perspective refers to gameplay or movement in a video game or virtual reality environment that is restricted to a two-dimensional (2D) plane with little to no access to a third dimension in a space that other ...
graphics or billboarding. While traversing the levels, the player must fight a variety of enemies, including demons and possessed undead humans, while managing supplies of ammunition,
health Health, according to the World Health Organization, is "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity".World Health Organization. (2006)''Constitution of the World Health Organ ...
, and armor. Enemies often appear in large groups, and the game features five
difficulty level Game balance is a branch of game design that is described as a mathematical-algorithmic model of a game’s numbers, game mechanics, and relations between the two. Game balance consists of adjusting values to create a certain user experience. Pla ...
s which adjust the quantity and damage done by enemies, with enemies moving faster than normal on the hardest difficulty setting. The monsters have very simple behavior, consisting of either moving toward their opponent if they see or hear the player, or attacking by throwing fireballs, biting, using magic abilities, or clawing. They will reactively fight each other if one monster inadvertently harms another, though most monsters are immune to attacks from their own kind. The environment can include pits of
toxic waste Toxic waste is any unwanted material in all forms that can cause harm (e.g. by being inhaled, swallowed, or absorbed through the skin). Mostly generated by industry, consumer products like televisions, computers, and phones contain toxic chemi ...
, ceilings that lower and crush objects, and locked doors requiring a keycard or a remote switch. The player can find weapons and ammunition throughout the levels or can collect them from dead enemies, including a pistol, a
chainsaw A chainsaw (or chain saw) is a portable gasoline-, electric-, or battery-powered saw that cuts with a set of teeth attached to a rotating chain driven along a guide bar. It is used in activities such as tree felling, limbing, bucking, pru ...
, a
plasma rifle A directed-energy weapon (DEW) is a ranged weapon that damages its target with highly focused energy without a solid projectile, including lasers, microwaves, particle beams, and sound beams. Potential applications of this technology include we ...
, and the
BFG 9000 The BFG ("Big Fucking Gun") is a fictional weapon found in many video games, mostly in id Software-developed series' such as ''Doom (franchise), Doom'' and ''Quake (series), Quake''. The abbreviation BFG stands for "Big Fucking Gun" as describe ...
.
Power-up In video games, a power-up is an object that adds temporary benefits or extra abilities to the player character as a game mechanic. This is in contrast to an item, which may or may not have a permanent benefit that can be used at any time chose ...
s include health or armor points, a mapping computer, partial invisibility, a safety suit against toxic waste, invulnerability, or a super-strong melee
berserker In the Old Norse written corpus, berserker were those who were said to have fought in a trance-like fury, a characteristic which later gave rise to the modern English word '' berserk'' (meaning "furiously violent or out of control"). Berserkers ...
status.
Cheat code Cheating in video games involves a video game player using various methods to create an advantage beyond normal gameplay, usually in order to make the game easier. Cheats may be activated from within the game itself (a cheat code implemented by ...
s give the player instant super powers including invulnerability, all weapons, and walking through walls. The main campaign mode is the
single-player A single-player video game is a video game where input from only one player is expected throughout the course of the gaming session. A single-player game is usually a game that can only be played by one person, while "single-player mode" is usually ...
mode, in an episodic succession of missions. Two
multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system ( couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...
modes are playable over a network:
cooperative A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-contro ...
, in which two to four players team up to complete the main campaign, and
deathmatch Deathmatch, also known as free-for-all, is a gameplay mode integrated into many shooter games, including first-person shooter (FPS), and real-time strategy (RTS) video games, where the goal is to kill (or "frag") the other players' characters ...
, in which two to four players compete to kill the other players' characters as many times as possible. Multiplayer was initially only playable over local networks, but a four-player
online multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system ( couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...
mode was made available one year after launch through the
DWANGO The Dial-up Wide-Area Network Game Operation, better known by the acronym DWANGO, was an early online gaming service based in the United States. Launched in 1994, it was originally known for its compatibility with '' Doom'', for which it functio ...
service.


Plot

''Doom'' is divided into three episodes: "Knee-Deep in the Dead", "The Shores of Hell", and "Inferno". A fourth episode, "Thy Flesh Consumed", was added in an expanded version of the game, ''The Ultimate Doom'', released on April 30, 1995, two years after ''Doom'' and one year after ''Doom II''. The campaign contains very few plot elements, with the minimal story instead given in the instruction manual and in short text segues between episodes. In the future, an unnamed marine (known as the "Doom marine" or "Doom guy") is posted to a dead-end assignment on
Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...
after assaulting a superior officer who ordered his unit to fire on civilians. The Union Aerospace Corporation, which operates radioactive waste facilities there, allows the military to conduct secret
teleportation Teleportation is the hypothetical transfer of matter or energy from one point to another without traversing the physical space between them. It is a common subject in science fiction literature and in other popular culture. Teleportation is oft ...
experiments that go terribly wrong. A base on Phobos urgently requests military support, while
Deimos Deimos, a Greek word for ''dread'', may refer to: * Deimos (deity), one of the sons of Ares and Aphrodite in Greek mythology * Deimos (moon), the smaller and outermost of Mars' two natural satellites * Elecnor Deimos, a Spanish aerospace company * ...
disappears entirely, and the marine joins a combat force to secure Phobos. He waits at the perimeter as ordered while the entire assault team is wiped out. With no way off the moon, and armed with only a pistol, he enters the base intent on revenge. In "Knee-Deep in the Dead", the marine fights demons and possessed humans in the military and waste processing facilities on Phobos. The episode ends with the marine defeating two powerful Barons of Hell guarding a teleporter to the Deimos base. Emerging from the teleporter, he is overwhelmed and comes to with only a pistol again. In "The Shores of Hell", he fights on through Deimos research facilities that are corrupted with satanic architecture and kills a gigantic
cyberdemon The Cyberdemon is a fictional character in the ''Doom'' video game franchise by id Software, where it was introduced in the first-person shooter game ''Doom'' in 1993. It has appeared in several other id games, including all main-line ''Doom'' ...
. From an overlook he discovers that the moon is floating above
hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location in the afterlife in which evil souls are subjected to punitive suffering, most often through torture, as eternal punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hell ...
and rappels down to the surface. In "Inferno", the marine takes on hell itself and destroys a cybernetic spider-demon that masterminded the invasion of the moons. A portal to Earth opens and he steps through, only to find that Earth has also been invaded. "Thy Flesh Consumed" follows the marine's initial assault on the Earth invasion force, setting the stage for '' Doom II: Hell on Earth''.


Development


Concept

In May 1992, id Software released ''
Wolfenstein 3D ''Wolfenstein 3D'' is a first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Apogee Software and FormGen. Originally released on May 5, 1992, for DOS, it was inspired by the 1981 Muse Software video game '' Castle Wolfe ...
'', later called the "grandfather of 3D shooters", specifically first-person shooters, because it established the fast-paced action and technical prowess commonly expected in the genre and greatly increased the genre's popularity. Immediately following its release most of the id Software team began work on a set of episodes for the game, titled ''Spear of Destiny'', while id co-founder and lead programmer
John Carmack John D. Carmack II (born August 20, 1970) is an American computer programmer and video game developer. He co-founded the video game company id Software and was the lead programmer of its 1990s games ''Commander Keen'', ''Wolfenstein 3D'', ''Doo ...
instead focused on technology research for the company's next game. Following the release of ''Spear of Destiny'' in September 1992, the team began to plan their next game. They wanted to create another 3D game using a new engine Carmack was developing, but were largely tired of ''Wolfenstein''. They initially considered making another game in the ''
Commander Keen ''Commander Keen'' is a series of side-scrolling platform video games developed primarily by id Software. The series consists of six main episodes, a "lost" episode, and a final game; all but the final game were originally released for MS-DOS in ...
'' series, as proposed by co-founder and lead designer
Tom Hall Tom Hall is an American game designer best known for his work with id Software on titles such as '' Doom'' and ''Commander Keen''. Career Hall attended the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he earned a B.S. in Computer Science. In 1987 ...
, but decided that the platforming gameplay of the series was a poor fit for Carmack's fast-paced 3D engines. Additionally, the other two co-founders of id, designer
John Romero John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Secon ...
and lead artist
Adrian Carmack Adrian Carmack (born May 5, 1969) is an American video game artist and one of four co-founders of id Software, along with Tom Hall, John Romero, and John Carmack (no relation). The founders met while working at Softdisks ''Gamer's Edge'' divi ...
, wanted to create something in a darker style than the ''Keen'' games. John Carmack then came up with his own concept: a game about using technology to fight demons, inspired by the ''
Dungeons & Dragons ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TS ...
'' campaigns the team played, combining the styles of '' Evil Dead II'' and ''
Aliens Alien primarily refers to: * Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country ** Enemy alien, the above in times of war * Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth ** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
''. The concept originally had a working title of ''Green and Pissed'', but Carmack soon renamed it ''Doom'' after a line in the 1986 film ''
The Color of Money ''The Color of Money'' is a 1986 American sports drama film directed by Martin Scorsese and released by Touchstone Pictures. The film was created from a screenplay by Richard Price, based on the 1984 novel of the same name by Walter Tevis. Th ...
'': What you got in there?' / 'In here? Doom. The team agreed to pursue the ''Doom'' concept, and development began in November 1992. The initial development team was composed of five people: programmers John Carmack and Romero, artists Adrian Carmack and
Kevin Cloud Kevin Cloud is an American video game artist. He graduated from LSU-Shreveport in 1987 with a degree in political science. Cloud acquired his first full-time job as a computer artist at Softdisk in 1985. He was hired by id Software on March 10, ...
, and designer Hall. They moved offices to a dark office building, which they named "Suite 666", and drew inspiration from the noises coming from the dentist's office next door. They also decided to cut ties with
Apogee Software 3D Realms Entertainment ApS is a video game publisher based in Aalborg, Denmark. Scott Miller founded the company in his parents' home in Garland, Texas, in 1987 as Apogee Software Productions to release his game '' Kingdom of Kroz''. In the ...
, their previous publisher, and self-publish ''Doom''.


Design

Early in development, rifts in the team began to appear. At the end of November, Hall delivered a
design document A software design description (a.k.a. software design document or SDD; just design document; also Software Design Specification) is a representation of a software design that is to be used for recording design information, addressing various des ...
, which he named the ''Doom Bible'', that described the plot, backstory, and design goals for the project. His design was a science fiction horror concept wherein scientists on the Moon open a portal from which aliens emerge. Over a series of levels, the player discovers that the aliens are demons while hell steadily infects the level design over the course of the game. John Carmack not only disliked the idea but dismissed the idea of having a story at all: "Story in a game is like story in a porn movie; it's expected to be there, but it's not that important." Rather than a deep story, he wanted to focus on the technological innovations of the game, dropping the levels and episodes of ''Wolfenstein'' in favor of a fast, continuous world. Hall disliked the idea, but the rest of the team sided with Carmack. Hall spent the next few weeks reworking the ''Doom Bible'' to work with Carmack's technological ideas. Hall was forced to rework it again in December, however, after the team decided that they were unable to create a single, seamless world with the hardware limitations of the time, which contradicted much of the document. At the start of 1993, id put out a press release, touting Hall's story about fighting off demons while "knee-deep in the dead". The press release proclaimed the new game features that John Carmack had created, as well as other features, including multiplayer gaming features, that had not yet even been designed. Early versions of the game were built to match the ''Doom Bible''; a "pre-alpha" version of the first level includes Hall's introductory base scene. Initial versions of the game also retain "
arcade Arcade most often refers to: * Arcade game, a coin-operated game machine ** Arcade cabinet, housing which holds an arcade game's hardware ** Arcade system board, a standardized printed circuit board * Amusement arcade, a place with arcade games * ...
" elements present in ''Wolfenstein 3D'', like
score Score or scorer may refer to: *Test score, the result of an exam or test Business * Score Digital, now part of Bauer Radio * Score Entertainment, a former American trading card design and manufacturing company * Score Media, a former Canadian ...
points and score items, but those were removed early in development as they were not in keeping with the tone of the game. Other elements, such as a complex user interface, an inventory system, a secondary shield protection, and
lives Lives may refer to: * The plural form of a '' life'' * Lives, Iran, a village in Khuzestan Province, Iran * The number of lives in a video game * '' Parallel Lives'', aka ''Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans'', a series of biographies of famous ...
were modified and slowly removed over the course of development. Soon, however, the ''Doom Bible'' as a whole was rejected. Romero wanted a game even "more brutal and fast" than ''Wolfenstein'', which did not leave room for the character-driven plot Hall had created. Additionally, the team believed it emphasized realism over entertaining gameplay, and they did not see the need for a design document at all. Some ideas were retained, but the story was dropped and most of the game design was removed. By early 1993, levels were being created for the game and a demo was produced. John Carmack and Romero, however, disliked Hall's military base-inspired level design. Romero especially believed that the boxy, flat level designs were uninspiring, too similar to ''Wolfenstein'', and did not show off the engine's capabilities. He began to create his own, more abstract levels for the game, which the rest of the team saw as a great improvement. Hall was upset with the reception to his designs and how little impact he was having as the lead designer. He was also upset with how much he was having to fight with John Carmack in order to get what he saw as obvious gameplay improvements, such as flying enemies, and began to spend less time at work. In July the other founders of id fired Hall, who went to work for Apogee. He was replaced in September, ten weeks before the game was released, by game designer
Sandy Petersen Carl Sanford Joslyn "Sandy" Petersen (born September 16, 1955) is an American game designer. He worked at Chaosium, contributing to the development of ''RuneQuest'' and later creating the acclaimed and influential horror role-playing game ''Call ...
. In 2020, Petersen recalled that Carmack and Romero wanted to hire other artists instead, but Cloud and Adrian disagreed, saying that a designer was required to help build a cohesive gameplay experience. They relented and Petersen was hired. The team also added a third programmer, Dave Taylor. Petersen and Romero designed the rest of ''Doom'' levels, with different aims: the team believed that Petersen's designs were more technically interesting and varied, while Romero's were more aesthetically interesting. In late 1993, after the multiplayer component was coded, the development team began playing four-player multiplayer games matches, which Romero termed "
deathmatch Deathmatch, also known as free-for-all, is a gameplay mode integrated into many shooter games, including first-person shooter (FPS), and real-time strategy (RTS) video games, where the goal is to kill (or "frag") the other players' characters ...
". According to Romero, the game's deathmatch mode was inspired by
fighting game A fighting game, also known as a versus fighting game, is a genre of video game that involves combat between two or more players. Fighting game combat often features mechanics such as blocking, grappling, counter-attacking, and chaining atta ...
s such as ''
Street Fighter II is a fighting game developed by Capcom and originally released for arcades in 1991. It is the second installment in the '' Street Fighter'' series and the sequel to 1987's '' Street Fighter''. It is Capcom's fourteenth game to use the CP S ...
'', ''
Fatal Fury ''Fatal Fury'', known as in Japan, is a fighting game series developed by SNK for the Neo Geo system. Games Canon * '' Fatal Fury'' – The first game of the ''Fatal Fury'' series allowed players to select one of three characters, Terr ...
'', and ''
Art of Fighting is a fighting video game trilogy that were released for the Neo Geo platform in the early 1990s. It was the second fighting game franchise created by SNK, following the ''Fatal Fury'' series and is set in the same fictional universe as a pr ...
''.


Engine

''Doom'' was programmed largely in the
ANSI C ANSI C, ISO C, and Standard C are successive standards for the C programming language published by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 22/WG 14 of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and th ...
programming language, with a few elements in
assembly language In computer programming, assembly language (or assembler language, or symbolic machine code), often referred to simply as Assembly and commonly abbreviated as ASM or asm, is any low-level programming language with a very strong correspondence b ...
. Development was done on
NeXT Next may refer to: Arts and entertainment Film * ''Next'' (1990 film), an animated short about William Shakespeare * ''Next'' (2007 film), a sci-fi film starring Nicolas Cage * '' Next: A Primer on Urban Painting'', a 2005 documentary film Lit ...
computers running the
NeXTSTEP NeXTSTEP is a discontinued object-oriented, multitasking operating system based on the Mach kernel and the UNIX-derived BSD. It was developed by NeXT Computer in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was initially used for its range of propri ...
operating system. The data used by the game engine, including level designs and graphics files, are stored in
WAD Wad is an old mining term for any black manganese oxide or hydroxide mineral-rich rock in the oxidized zone of various ore deposits. Typically closely associated with various iron oxides. Specific mineral varieties include pyrolusite, lithiophorit ...
files, short for "Where's All the Data?". This allows for any part of the design to be changed without needing to adjust the engine code. Carmack designed this system so that fans could easily modify the game; he had been impressed by the modifications made by fans of ''Wolfenstein 3D'', and wanted to support that with an easily swappable file structure along with releasing the map editor online. Unlike ''Wolfenstein'', which had flat levels with walls at right angles, the ''Doom'' engine allows for walls and floors at any angle or height, though two traversable areas cannot be on top of each other. The lighting system was based on adjusting the color palette of surfaces directly: rather than calculating how light traveled from light sources to surfaces using ray tracing, the game calculates the "light level" of a small area based on its distance from light sources. It then modifies the color palette of that section's surface textures to mimic how dark it would look. This same system is used to cause far away surfaces to look darker than close ones. Romero came up with new ways to use Carmack's lighting engine such as strobe lights. He programmed engine features such as switches and movable stairs and platforms. After Romero's complex level designs started to cause problems with the engine, Carmack began to use
binary space partitioning In computer science, binary space partitioning (BSP) is a method for space partitioning which recursively subdivides a Euclidean space into two convex sets by using hyperplanes as partitions. This process of subdividing gives rise to a represen ...
to quickly select the reduced portion of a level that the player could see at a given time. Taylor programmed other features into the game, added
cheat codes Cheating in video games involves a video game player using various methods to create an advantage beyond normal gameplay, usually in order to make the game easier. Cheats may be activated from within the game itself (a cheat code implemented by ...
; some, such as "idspispopd", were based on ideas their fans had submitted online while eagerly awaiting the game. Adrian Carmack was the lead artist for ''Doom'', with Kevin Cloud as an additional artist. They designed the monsters to be "nightmarish", with graphics that are realistic and dark instead of staged or rendered, so a
mixed media In visual art, mixed media describes artwork in which more than one medium or material has been employed. Assemblages, collages, and sculpture are three common examples of art using different media. Materials used to create mixed media art incl ...
approach was taken. The artists sculpted models of some of the enemies, and took pictures of them in
stop motion Stop motion is an animated filmmaking technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exhibit independent motion or change when the series of frames i ...
from five to eight different angles so that they could be rotated realistically in-game. The images were then digitized and converted to 2D characters with a program written by John Carmack. Adrian Carmack made clay models for a few demons, and had Gregor Punchatz build latex and metal sculptures of the others. The weapons were made from combined parts of children's toys. The developers scanned themselves as well, using Cloud's arm for the marine's arm holding a gun, and Adrian's snakeskin boots and wounded knee for textures.


Audio

As with ''Wolfenstein 3D'', id hired composer
Bobby Prince Robert Caskin Prince III, known professionally as Bobby Prince, is an American video game composer and sound designer. He has worked as an independent contractor for several gaming companies, most notably id Software and 3D Realms. Some of his m ...
to create the music and sound effects. Romero directed Prince to make the music in
techno Techno is a Music genre, genre of electronic dance music (EDM) which is generally music production, produced for use in a continuous DJ set, with tempo often varying between 120 and 150 beats per minute (bpm). The central Drum beat, rhythm is typ ...
and
metal A metal (from ancient Greek, Greek μέταλλον ''métallon'', "mine, quarry, metal") is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electrical resistivity and conductivity, e ...
styles. Many tracks were directly inspired by songs by metal bands such as
Alice in Chains Alice in Chains (often abbreviated as AIC) is an American rock band from Seattle, Washington, formed in 1987 by guitarist and vocalist Jerry Cantrell and drummer Sean Kinney, who later recruited bassist Mike Starr and lead vocalist Layne ...
and
Pantera Pantera () is an American heavy metal band from Arlington, Texas formed in 1981, and currently comprised of vocalist Phil Anselmo, bassist Rex Brown, and touring musicians Zakk Wylde and Charlie Benante. The group's best-known lineup cons ...
. Prince believed that
ambient music Ambient music is a genre of music that emphasizes tone and atmosphere over traditional musical structure or rhythm. It may lack net composition, beat, or structured melody.The Ambient Century by Mark Prendergast, Bloomsbury, London, 2003. It ...
would be more appropriate, and produced numerous tracks in both styles in hope of convincing the team, and Romero incorporated both. Prince did not make music for specific levels, as they were composed before the levels were completed; instead, Romero assigned each track to each level late in development. Prince created the sound effects based on short descriptions or concept art of a monster or weapon, and adjusted them to match the completed animations. The monster sounds were created from animal noises, and Prince designed all the sounds to be distinct on the limited sound hardware of the time, even when many sounds were playing at once. He also designed the sound effects to play on different frequencies from those used for the MIDI music, so they would clearly cut through the music.


Release

With plans to self-publish, the team had to set up the systems to sell ''Doom'' as it neared completion. Jay Wilbur, who had been hired as CEO and sole member of the business team, planned the marketing and distribution of ''Doom''. He believed that the mainstream press was uninterested in the game, and as id would make the most money off of copies they sold directly to customers—up to 85 percent of the planned price—he decided to leverage the shareware market as much as possible, buying only a single ad in any gaming magazine. Instead, he reached out directly to software retailers, offering them copies of the first ''Doom'' episode for free, allowing them to charge any price for it, in order to spur customer interest in buying the full game directly from id. ''Doom''s original release date was the third quarter of 1993, which the team did not meet. By December 1993, the team was working non-stop on the game, with several employees sleeping at the office. Programmer Dave Taylor claimed that working on the game gave him such a rush that he would pass out from the intensity. Id began receiving calls from people interested in the game or angry that it had missed its planned release date, as hype for the game had been building online. At midnight on December 10, 1993, after working for 30 straight hours, the development team at id uploaded the first episode of the game to the Internet, letting interested players distribute it for them. So many users were connected to the first FTP server that they planned to upload the game to, at the
University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...
, that even after the network administrator increased the number of connections while on the phone with Wilbur, id was unable to connect, forcing them to kick all other users off to allow id to upload the game. When the upload finished thirty minutes later, 10,000 people attempted to download the game at once, crashing the university's network. Within hours of ''Doom''s release, university networks were banning ''Doom'' multiplayer games, as a rush of players overwhelmed their systems. After being alerted by network administrators the morning after release that the game's deathmatch network connection setup was crippling some
computer network A computer network is a set of computers sharing resources located on or provided by network nodes. The computers use common communication protocols over digital interconnections to communicate with each other. These interconnections are ...
s, John Carmack quickly released a patch to change it, though many administrators had to implement ''Doom''-specific rules to keep their networks from crashing due to the overwhelming traffic. In 1995, an expanded version of ''Doom'' developed for the retail market, ''The Ultimate Doom'', was released by
GT Interactive GT, Gt or G-T may refer to: Arts and entertainment Games * GT Interactive, an American video game developer * GameTrailers, a video game website * ''Golden Tee Golf'', golf video game * ''Gran Turismo'' (series), a series of racing video games ...
, and contained a fourth episode. By late 1995, ''Doom'' was estimated to be installed on more computers worldwide than Microsoft's new operating system,
Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturi ...
. According to Windows producer
Gabe Newell Gabe Logan Newell (born November 3, 1962), nicknamed Gaben, is an American businessman and the president of the video game company Valve. Newell was born in Colorado and grew up in Davis, California. He attended Harvard University in the early ...
, who later founded the game company
Valve A valve is a device or natural object that regulates, directs or controls the flow of a fluid (gases, liquids, fluidized solids, or slurries) by opening, closing, or partially obstructing various passageways. Valves are technically fitting ...
, " d... didn't even distribute through retail, it distributed through bulletin boards and other pre-internet mechanisms. To me, that was a lightning bolt. Microsoft was hiring 500-people sales teams and this entire company was 12 people, yet it had created the most widely distributed software in the world. There was a sea change coming."


Ports

''Doom'' has been ported to numerous different platforms, though none were by id Software. The first port of ''Doom'' was an unofficial port to Linux, released by id programmer Dave Taylor in 1994; it was hosted by id but not supported or made official. Microsoft attempted to hire id to port ''Doom'' to Windows in 1995 to promote Windows as a gaming platform, and Microsoft CEO
Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of Microsoft, along with his late childhood friend Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions ...
briefly considered buying the company. When id declined, Microsoft made its own port, with a team lead by Newell. One promotional video for Windows 95 had Gates digitally superimposed into the game. Other official ports of the game were released for
Sega 32X The 32X is an add-on for the Sega Genesis video game console. Codenamed "Project Mars", it was designed to expand the power of the Genesis and serve as a transitional console into the 32-bit era until the release of the Sega Saturn. The 32X us ...
,
Atari Jaguar The Atari Jaguar is a home video game console developed by Atari Corporation and released in North America in November 1993. Part of the fifth generation of video game consoles, it competed with the 16-bit Sega Genesis, the Super NES and th ...
, and
Mac OS Two major famlies of Mac operating systems were developed by Apple Inc. In 1984, Apple debuted the operating system that is now known as the "Classic" Mac OS with its release of the original Macintosh System Software. The system, rebranded "M ...
in 1994,
SNES The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), commonly shortened to Super NES or Super Nintendo, is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Eu ...
and
PlayStation is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a di ...
in 1995, 3DO in 1996,
Sega Saturn The is a home video game console developed by Sega and released on November 22, 1994, in Japan, May 11, 1995, in North America, and July 8, 1995, in Europe. Part of the fifth generation of video game consoles, it was the successor to the su ...
in 1997,
Acorn The acorn, or oaknut, is the nut of the oaks and their close relatives (genera '' Quercus'' and '' Lithocarpus'', in the family Fagaceae). It usually contains one seed (occasionally two seeds), enclosed in a tough, leathery shell, and b ...
Risc PC The Risc PC is Acorn Computers's RISC OS/ Acorn RISC Machine computer, launched on 15 April 1994, which superseded the Acorn Archimedes. The Acorn PC card and software allows PC compatible software to be run. Like the Archimedes, the Risc PC co ...
in 1998,
Game Boy Advance The (GBA) is a 32-bit handheld game console developed, manufactured and marketed by Nintendo as the successor to the Game Boy Color. It was released in Japan on March 21, 2001, in North America on June 11, 2001, in the PAL region on June 22, ...
in 2001,
Xbox 360 The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox series. It competed with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generati ...
in 2006, iOS in 2009, and
Nintendo Switch The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a tablet that can either be docked for use as a home console or used as a portable device, making it a ...
in 2019. Some of these were bestsellers even many years after the initial release. ''Doom'' has also been ported unofficially to numerous platforms; so many ports exist, including for esoteric devices such as smart thermostats and oscilloscopes, that variations on "It runs ''Doom''" or "Can it run ''Doom''?" are long-running
meme A meme ( ) is an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme. A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ...
s.


Reception


Contemporary reviews

Although Petersen said ''Doom'' was "nothing more than the computer equivalent of
Whack-A-Mole Whac-A-Mole is an arcade game, originally known as or in Japan. A typical Whac-A-Mole machine consists of a waist-level cabinet with a play area and display screen, and a large, soft, black mallet. Five holes in the play area top are filled wit ...
", ''Doom'' received critical acclaim and was widely praised in the gaming press, broadly considered to be one of the most important and influential titles in gaming history. Upon release, ''
GamesMaster ''GamesMaster'' is a British television programme which originally aired on Channel 4 from 1992 to 1998. In 2021, it returned for a new series on YouTube and E4. It was the first UK television programme dedicated to video games. Dominik Diam ...
'' gave it a 90% rating. ''
Dragon A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often been depicted a ...
'' gave it five stars, praising the improvements over ''
Wolfenstein 3D ''Wolfenstein 3D'' is a first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Apogee Software and FormGen. Originally released on May 5, 1992, for DOS, it was inspired by the 1981 Muse Software video game '' Castle Wolfe ...
'', the "fast-moving
arcade Arcade most often refers to: * Arcade game, a coin-operated game machine ** Arcade cabinet, housing which holds an arcade game's hardware ** Arcade system board, a standardized printed circuit board * Amusement arcade, a place with arcade games * ...
shoot 'em up Shoot 'em ups (also known as shmups or STGs ) are a sub-genre of action games. There is no consensus as to which design elements compose a shoot 'em up; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of charac ...
" gameplay, and network play. ''
Computer and Video Games ''Computer and Video Games'' (also known as ''CVG'', ''Computer & Video Games'', ''C&VG'', ''Computer + Video Games'', or ''C+VG'') was a UK-based video game magazine, published in its original form between 1981 and 2004. Its offshoot website w ...
'' gave the game a 93% rating, praising its atmosphere and stating that "the level of texture-mapped detail and the sense of scale is awe inspiring", but criticized the occasionally repetitive gameplay and considered the violence excessive. A common criticism of ''Doom'' was that it was not a true 3D game, since the game engine did not allow corridors and rooms to be stacked on top of one another (
room-over-room This list includes terms used in video games and the video game industry, as well as slang used by players. 0–9 A ...
), and instead relied on graphical trickery to make it appear that the player character and enemies were moving along differing elevations. ''
Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly throug ...
'' stated in February 1994 that ''Wolfenstein 3D'' fans should "look forward to a delight of insomnia", and "Since networking is supported, bring along a friend to share in the visceral delights". A longer review in March 1994 said that ''Doom'' "was worth the wait ... a wonderfully involved and engaging game", and its technology "a new benchmark" for the gaming industry. The reviewer praised the "simply ''dazzling''" graphics", and reported that "DeathMatches may be the most intense gaming experience available today". While criticizing the "ho-hum endgame" with a too-easy
end boss In video games, a boss is a significant computer-controlled opponent. A fight with a boss character is commonly referred to as a boss battle or boss fight. Bosses are generally far stronger than other opponents the player has faced up to that ...
, he concluded that ''Doom'' "is a virtuoso performance". ''
Edge Edge or EDGE may refer to: Technology Computing * Edge computing, a network load-balancing system * Edge device, an entry point to a computer network * Adobe Edge, a graphical development application * Microsoft Edge, a web browser developed ...
'' praised the graphics and levels but criticized the "simple 3D perspective maze adventure/shoot 'em up" gameplay. The review concluded: "You’ll be longing for something new in this game. If only you could talk to these creatures, then perhaps you could try and make friends with them, form alliances... Now, that would be interesting." Decades later, the review attracted mockery, and "if only you could talk to these creatures" became a running joke in
video game culture Video game culture is a worldwide new media subculture formed by video gamers. As video games have exponentially increased in popularity over time, they have had a significant influence on popular culture. Video game culture has also evolved with ...
. A 2016 piece in the ''
International Business Times The ''International Business Times'' is an American online news publication that publishes five national editions in four languages. The publication, sometimes called ''IBTimes'' or ''IBT'', offers news, opinion and editorial commentary on busi ...
'' defended the sentiment, saying it anticipated the dialogue systems of games such as '' The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim'', ''
Mass Effect ''Mass Effect'' is a military science fiction media franchise created by Casey Hudson, Drew Karpyshyn and Preston Watamaniuk. The franchise depicts a distant future where humanity and several alien civilizations have colonized the known unive ...
'' and ''
Undertale ''Undertale'' is a 2015 2D role-playing video game created by American indie developer Toby Fox. The player controls a child who has fallen into the Underground: a large, secluded region under the surface of the Earth, separated by a magical ...
''. In 1994, ''
PC Gamer UK ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games ma ...
'' named ''Doom'' the third-best computer game of all time. The editors wrote: "Although it's only been around for a couple of months, ''Doom'' has already done more to establish the PC's arcade clout than any other title in gaming history." In 1994 ''
Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly throug ...
'' named ''Doom'' Game of the Year. The various ''Doom'' console ports have received generally favorable reviews.


Retrospective reception

In 1995, '' Next Generation'' said it was "The most talked about PC game ever – and with good reason. Running on a
486 __NOTOC__ Year 486 (Roman numerals, CDLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Basilius and Longinus (or, less freq ...
machine (essential for maximum effect), ''Doom'' took PC graphics to a totally new level of speed, detail, and realism, and provided a genuinely scary degree of immersion in the gameworld." In the same year,
Flux Flux describes any effect that appears to pass or travel (whether it actually moves or not) through a surface or substance. Flux is a concept in applied mathematics and vector calculus which has many applications to physics. For transport ...
magazine ranked the pc version 3rd on their "Top 100 Video Games." In 1996, ''Computer Gaming World'' named it the fifth best video game of all time, and the third most-innovative game. In 1996,
GamesMaster ''GamesMaster'' is a British television programme which originally aired on Channel 4 from 1992 to 1998. In 2021, it returned for a new series on YouTube and E4. It was the first UK television programme dedicated to video games. Dominik Diam ...
rated the SNES version 7th on their "The Gamesmaster SNES Top 10." In 1998, ''
PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games ...
'' declared it the 34th-best computer game ever released, and the editors called it "Probably the most imitated game of all time, ''Doom'' continued what ''Wolfenstein 3D'' began and elevated the fledgling 3D-shooter genre to blockbuster status". In 2001, ''Doom'' was voted the number one game of all time in a poll among over 100 game developers and journalists conducted by
GameSpy GameSpy was an American provider of online multiplayer and matchmaking middleware for video games founded in 1996 by Mark Surfas. After the release of a multiplayer server browser for the game, QSpy, Surfas licensed the software under the Ga ...
. In 2003, IGN ranked it as the 44th top video game of all time and also called it "''the'' breakthrough game of 1993", adding: "Its arsenal of powerful guns (namely the shotgun and BFG), intense level of gore and perfect balance of adrenaline-soaked action and exploration kept this gamer riveted for years." ''
PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games ...
'' proclaimed ''Doom'' the most influential game of all time in its ten-year anniversary issue in April 2004. In 2004, readers of ''
Retro Gamer ''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' soon became ...
'' voted ''Doom'' as the ninth top retro game, with the editors commenting: "Only a handful of games can claim that they've changed the gaming world, and ''Doom'' is perhaps the most qualified of them all." In 2005, IGN ranked it as the 39th top game. On March 12, 2007, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' reported that ''Doom'' was named to a list of the ten most important video games of all time, the so-called
game canon The game canon is a list of video games to be considered for preservation by the Library of Congress. ''The New York Times'' called the creation of this list "an assertion that digital games have a cultural significance and a historical significa ...
. The
Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...
took up this video game preservation proposal and began with the games from this list. In 2009,
GameTrailers ''GameTrailers'' (''GT'') was an American video gaming website created by Geoffrey R. Grotz and Brandon Jones in 2002. The website specialized in multimedia content, including trailers and gameplay footage of upcoming and recently released v ...
ranked ''Doom'' as the number one "breakthrough PC game". That year ''
Game Informer ''Game Informer'' (''GI'', most often stylized ''gameinformer'' from the 2010s onward) is an American monthly video game magazine featuring articles, news, strategy, and reviews of video games and associated consoles. It debuted in August 1991 ...
'' put ''Doom'' sixth on the magazine's list of the top 200 games of all time, stating that it gave "the genre the kick start it needed to rule the gaming landscape two decades later". ''Game Informer'' staff also put it sixth on their 2001 list of the 100 best games ever. IGN included ''Doom'' at 2nd place in the ''Top 100 Video Game Shooters of all Time'', just behind ''
Half-Life Half-life (symbol ) is the time required for a quantity (of substance) to reduce to half of its initial value. The term is commonly used in nuclear physics to describe how quickly unstable atoms undergo radioactive decay or how long stable ...
'', citing the game's "feel of running and gunning", memorable weapons and enemies, pure and simple fun, and its spreading on nearly every gaming platform in existence. In 2012, ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...
'' named it one of the 100 greatest video games of all time as "it established the look and feel of later shooters as surely as
Xerox Xerox Holdings Corporation (; also known simply as Xerox) is an American corporation that sells print and digital document products and services in more than 160 countries. Xerox is headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut (having moved from St ...
PARC established the rules of the
virtual desktop In computing, a virtual desktop is a term used with respect to user interfaces, usually within the WIMP paradigm, to describe ways in which the virtual space of a computer's desktop environment is expanded beyond the physical limits of the ...
", adding that "its impact also owes a lot to the gonzo horror sensibility of its designers, including John Romero, who showed a bracing lack of restraint in their deployment of gore and
Satan Satan,, ; grc, ὁ σατανᾶς or , ; ar, شيطانالخَنَّاس , also known as the Devil, and sometimes also called Lucifer in Christianity, is an entity in the Abrahamic religions that seduces humans into sin or falsehoo ...
ic iconography". Including ''Doom'' on the list of the greatest games of all time,
GameSpot ''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. In addition ...
wrote that "despite its numerous appearances in other formats and on other media, longtime fans will forever remember the original 1993 release of ''Doom'' as the beginning of a true revolution in action gaming". In 2015,
The Strong National Museum of Play The Strong National Museum of Play (known as just The Strong Museum or simply the Strong) is part of The Strong in Rochester, New York, United States. Established in 1969 and based initially on the personal collection of Rochester native Margaret ...
inducted ''Doom'' to its
World Video Game Hall of Fame The World Video Game Hall of Fame is an international hall of fame that opened on June 4, 2015. It is located in The National Museum of Play's ''eGameRevolution'' exhibit; the hall's administration is overseen by The Strong and the Internatio ...
. In 2018,
Complex Complex commonly refers to: * Complexity, the behaviour of a system whose components interact in multiple ways so possible interactions are difficult to describe ** Complex system, a system composed of many components which may interact with each ...
listed the game #47 in their "The Best Super Nintendo Games of All Time." In 2021, ''
Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. Histor ...
'' listed ''Doom'' as the third best game in the series, behind ''
Doom II ''Doom II'', also known as ''Doom II: Hell on Earth'', is a first-person shooter game by id Software. It was released for MS-DOS computers in 1994 and Macintosh computers in 1995. Unlike the original ''Doom'', which was initially only available ...
'' and ''Doom (2016)''. They said that the gameplay "still holds up", but argued it was inferior to ''Doom II'' due to the latter's improved enemy variety.


Sales

With the release of ''Doom'', millions of users installed the Shareware version on their computer and id Software quickly began making $100,000 daily (for $9 per copy).
Sandy Petersen Carl Sanford Joslyn "Sandy" Petersen (born September 16, 1955) is an American game designer. He worked at Chaosium, contributing to the development of ''RuneQuest'' and later creating the acclaimed and influential horror role-playing game ''Call ...
later remarked that the game "sold a couple of hundred thousand copies during its first year or so", as piracy kept its initial sales from rising higher, and Wilbur in 1995 estimated first-year sales as 140,000. id sold 3.5 million physical copies from its release through 1999. According to
PC Data PC Data was an American market research and point of sale tracking firm founded in 1991 and based in Reston, Virginia. Its founder, Ann Stephens, had worked previously as the head researcher for the Software Publishers Association. Initially, t ...
, which tracked sales in the United States, by April 1998 ''Doom''s shareware edition had yielded 1.36 million units sold and $8.74 million in revenue in the United States. This led
PC Data PC Data was an American market research and point of sale tracking firm founded in 1991 and based in Reston, Virginia. Its founder, Ann Stephens, had worked previously as the head researcher for the Software Publishers Association. Initially, t ...
to declare it the country's fourth-best-selling computer game for the period between January 1993 and April 1998. The ''Ultimate Doom'' SKU reached sales of 787,397 units by September 1999. At the time, PC Data ranked them as the country's eighth- and 20th-best-selling computer games since January 1993. In addition to its sales, the game's status as shareware dramatically increased its market penetration. ''
PC Zone ''PC Zone'', founded in 1993, was the first magazine dedicated to games for IBM-compatible personal computers to be published in the United Kingdom. Earlier PC magazines such as '' PC Leisure'', '' PC Format'' and ''PC Plus'' had covered games bu ...
''s David McCandless wrote that the game was played by "an estimated six million people across the globe", and other sources estimate that 10–20 million people played ''Doom'' within 24 months of its launch. ''Doom'' became a problem at workplaces, both occupying the time of employees and clogging computer networks.
Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 ser ...
,
Lotus Development Lotus Software (called Lotus Development Corporation before its acquisition by IBM) was an American software company based in Massachusetts; it was "offloaded" to India's HCL Technologies in 2018. Lotus is most commonly known for the Lotus 1- ...
, and
Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...
were among many organizations reported to form policies specifically disallowing ''Doom''-playing during work hours. At the
Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
campus, ''Doom'' was by one account equal to a "religious phenomenon". Doom was #1 on ''Computer Gaming World''s "Playing Lately?" survey for February 1994. One reader said that "No other game even compares to the addictiveness of NetDoom with four devious players! ... The only game I've stayed up 72+ straight hours to play", and another reported that "Linking four people together for a game of Doom is the quickest way to destroy a productive, boring evening of work".


Controversies

''Doom'' was notorious for its high levels of
graphic violence Graphic violence refers to the depiction of especially vivid, brutal and realistic acts of violence in visual media such as film, television, and video games. It may be real, simulated live action, or animated. Intended limitedly for mature ...
and satanic imagery, which generated controversy from a broad range of groups. ''Doom'' for the 32X was one of the first video games to be given an M for Mature rating from the Entertainment Software Rating Board due to its violent gore and nature.
Yahoo! Games Yahoo! Games was a section of the Yahoo! website, launched on March 31, 1998, in which Yahoo! users could play games either with other users or by themselves. The majority of Yahoo! Games was closed down on March 31, 2014 and the balance was clos ...
listed it as one of the top ten most controversial games of all time. It was criticized by religious organizations for its diabolic undertones and was dubbed a "mass murder simulator" by critic and
Killology David Allen Grossman (born August 23, 1956) is an American author and trainer who conducts seminars on the psychology of lethal force. He is a retired lieutenant colonel in the United States Army. Early life and military career Grossman was bor ...
Research Group founder
David Grossman David Grossman ( he, דויד גרוסמן; born January 25, 1954) is an Israeli author. His books have been translated into more than 30 languages. In 2018, he was awarded the Israel Prize for literature. Biography David Grossman was born i ...
. ''Doom'' prompted fears that the then-emerging
virtual reality Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that employs pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video games), educ ...
technology could be used to simulate extremely realistic killing. The game again sparked controversy in the United States when it was found that
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold Eric David Harris (April 9, 1981 – April 20, 1999) and Dylan Bennet Klebold (; September 11, 1981 – April 20, 1999) were an American mass murder duo who perpetrated the Columbine High School massacre on April 20, 1999. Harris and Klebo ...
, who committed the Columbine High School massacre on April 20, 1999, were avid players of the game. While planning for the massacre, Harris said in his journal that the killing would be "like playing ''Doom''", and "it'll be like the
LA riots The 1992 Los Angeles riots, sometimes called the 1992 Los Angeles uprising and the Los Angeles Race Riots, were a series of riots and civil disturbances that occurred in Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County, California, in April ...
, the Oklahoma bombing,
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
,
Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
, ''
Duke Nukem ''Duke Nukem'' is a video game series named for its main character, Duke Nukem. Created by the company Apogee Software Ltd. (now 3D Realms) as a series of video games for personal computers, the series expanded to games released for various co ...
'' and ''Doom'' all mixed together", and that his shotgun was "straight out of the game". A rumor spread afterwards that Harris had designed a custom ''Doom'' level, known as a "Doom WAD" that looked like the high school, populated with representations of Harris's classmates and teachers, and that he practiced for the shootings by playing the level repeatedly. Although Harris did design several custom ''Doom'' levels (which later became known as the " Harris levels"), none have been found to be based on
Columbine High School Columbine High School (CHS) is a public high school in Columbine, Colorado, United States, in the Denver metropolitan area. It is part of the Jefferson County Public Schools district. In 1999, it became the scene of an infamous mass shooti ...
. In the earliest release versions, the level E1M4: Command Control contains a
swastika The swastika (卐 or 卍) is an ancient religious and cultural symbol, predominantly in various Eurasian, as well as some African and American cultures, now also widely recognized for its appropriation by the Nazi Party and by neo-Nazis. It ...
-shaped structure, which was put in as a homage to ''Wolfenstein 3D''. The swastika was removed in later versions; according to Romero, the change was done out of respect after id Software received a complaint from a military veteran.


Legacy


''Doom'' franchise

''Doom'' has appeared in several forms in addition to video games, including a ''Doom'' comic book, four novels by
Dafydd Ab Hugh Dafydd ab Hugh is an author whose novelette, "The Coon Rolled Down and Ruptured His Larinks, A Squeezed Novel by Mr. Skunk" in '' Asimov's Science Fiction'', was nominated for a Nebula Award in 1990. Simon & Schuster has published eleven ab Hugh ...
and
Brad Linaweaver Bradford Swain Linaweaver (September 1, 1952 – August 29, 2019) was an American science fiction writer, film producer, actor, and magazine publisher. Over a 40-year career, he completed a body of work including novels, short stories, and scree ...
(loosely based on events and locations in the games), a ''Doom'' board game and a live-action film starring
Karl Urban Karl-Heinz Urban (born 7 June 1972) is a New Zealand actor. His career began with appearances in New Zealand films and TV series such as '' Xena: Warrior Princess''. His first Hollywood role was in the 2002 horror film '' Ghost Ship''. Since ...
and The Rock released in 2005. The game's development and impact on popular culture is the subject of the book '' Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture'' by
David Kushner David Kushner is a writer who has contributed to many publications, including ''Wired'', ''The New York Times'', ''Rolling Stone'', SPIN, ''IEEE Spectrum'' and ''Salon''. Career From 1994 to 1996, Kushner worked as a senior producer and writer ...
. The ''Doom'' series remained dormant between 1997 and 2000, when ''
Doom 3 ''Doom 3'' is a 2004 survival horror first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by Activision. ''Doom 3'' was originally released for Microsoft Windows on August 3, 2004, adapted for Linux later that year, and ported ...
'' was finally announced. A retelling of the original ''Doom'' using entirely new graphics technology and a slower paced survival horror approach, ''Doom 3'' was hyped to provide as large a leap in realism and interactivity as the original game and helped renew interest in the franchise when it was released in 2004, under the
id Tech 4 id Tech 4, popularly known as the ''Doom 3'' engine, is a game engine developed by id Software and first used in the video game ''Doom 3''. The engine was designed by John Carmack, who also created previous game engines, such as those for '' Do ...
game engine. The series again remained dormant for 10 years until a reboot, simply titled ''Doom'' and running on the new
id Tech 6 id Tech 6 is a multiplatform game engine developed by id Software. It is the successor to id Tech 5 and was first used to create the 2016 video game ''Doom''. Internally, the development team also used the codename ''id Tech 666'' to refer to ...
, was announced with a beta access to players that had pre-ordered '' Wolfenstein: The New Order''. The game held its closed alpha multiplayer testing in October 2015, as closed and open beta access ran during March to April 2016. Returning to the series' roots in fast-paced action and minimal storytelling, the full game eventually released worldwide on May 13, 2016. The project initially started as ''Doom 4'' in May 2008, set to be a remake of '' Doom II: Hell on Earth'' and ditching the survival horror aspect of ''Doom 3''. Development completely restarted as id's Tim Willits remarked that ''Doom 4'' was "lacking the personality of the long-running shooter franchise".


Mods

The ability for
user-generated content User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), is any form of content, such as images, videos, text, testimonials, and audio, that has been posted by users on online platforms such as social media, discussion f ...
to provide custom levels and other game modifications using WAD files became a popular aspect of ''Doom''. Gaining the first large
mod Mod, MOD or mods may refer to: Places * Modesto City–County Airport, Stanislaus County, California, US Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Mods (band), a Norwegian rock band * M.O.D. (Method of Destruction), a band from New York City, US ...
-making community, ''Doom'' affected the culture surrounding first-person shooters, and also the industry. Several future professional
game designer Game design is the art of applying design and aesthetics to create a game for entertainment or for educational, exercise, or experimental purposes. Increasingly, elements and principles of game design are also applied to other interactions, in ...
s started their careers making ''Doom'' WADs as a hobby, such as
Tim Willits Tim Willits is the former studio director, co-owner, and level designer of id Software, the American video game developer company. As of August 2019, Willits is the chief creative officer at Saber Interactive. He became a Director of 3D Realms ...
, who later became the lead designer at id Software. The first
level editor In video games, a level (also referred to as a map, stage, or round in some older games) is any space available to the player during the course of completion of an objective. Video game levels generally have progressively-increasing difficulty t ...
s appeared in early 1994, and additional tools have been created that allow most aspects of the game to be edited. Although the majority of WADs contain one or several custom levels mostly in the style of the original game, others implement new monsters and other resources, and heavily alter the gameplay. Several popular movies, television series, other video games and other brands from popular culture have been turned into ''Doom'' WADs by fans, including ''
Aliens Alien primarily refers to: * Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country ** Enemy alien, the above in times of war * Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth ** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
'', ''
Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
'', ''
The Simpsons ''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, ...
'', ''
South Park ''South Park'' is an American animated sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone and developed by Brian Graden for Comedy Central. The series revolves around four boys Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormickand th ...
'', '' Sailor Moon'', '' Dragon Ball Z'', ''
Pokémon (an abbreviation for in Japan) is a Japanese media franchise managed by The Pokémon Company, founded by Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures (company), Creatures, the owners of the trademark and copyright of the franchise. In terms of ...
'', '' Beavis and Butt-head'', ''
Batman Batman is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, and debuted in Detective Comics 27, the 27th issue of the comic book ''Detective Comics'' on ...
'', and '' Sonic the Hedgehog''. Some works, like the ''Theme Doom Patch'', combined enemies from several films, such as ''
Aliens Alien primarily refers to: * Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country ** Enemy alien, the above in times of war * Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth ** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
'', ''
Predator Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill th ...
'', and '' The Terminator''. Some add-on files were also made that changed the sounds made by the various characters and weapons. From 1994 to 1995, WADs were primarily distributed online over
bulletin board system A bulletin board system (BBS), also called computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user can perform functions such as ...
s or sold in collections on compact discs in computer shops, sometimes bundled with editing guide books. FTP servers became the primary method in later years. A few WADs have been released commercially, including the ''
Master Levels for Doom II ''Doom II'', also known as ''Doom II: Hell on Earth'', is a first-person shooter game by id Software. It was released for MS-DOS computers in 1994 and Macintosh computers in 1995. Unlike the original ''Doom'', which was initially only availabl ...
'', which was released in 1995 along with ''Maximum Doom'', a CD containing 1,830 WADs that had been downloaded from the Internet. The ''idgames'' FTP archive contains more than 18,000 files, and this represents only a fraction of the complete output of ''Doom'' fans. Third-party programs were also written to handle the loading of various WADs, since all commands must be entered on the
DOS DOS is shorthand for the MS-DOS and IBM PC DOS family of operating systems. DOS may also refer to: Computing * Data over signalling (DoS), multiplexing data onto a signalling channel * Denial-of-service attack (DoS), an attack on a communicat ...
command line A command-line interpreter or command-line processor uses a command-line interface (CLI) to receive commands from a user in the form of lines of text. This provides a means of setting parameters for the environment, invoking executables and pro ...
to run. A typical launcher would allow the player to select which files to load from a menu, making it much easier to start. In 1995,
WizardWorks WizardWorks Group, Inc. was an American video game developer and publisher based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The company was founded in 1980 and, in 1993, WizardWorks opened the CompuWorks and MacSoft divisions. In 1996, WizardWorks was acquired ...
released the ''D!Zone'' pack featuring hundreds of levels for ''Doom'' and ''Doom II''. ''D!Zone'' was reviewed in ''
Dragon A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often been depicted a ...
'' by Jay & Dee; Jay gave the pack 1 out of 5 stars, and Dee gave the pack 1½ stars. In 2016, Romero published two new ''Doom'' levels: E1M4b ("Phobos Mission Control") and E1M8b ("Tech Gone Bad"). In 2018, for the 25th anniversary of ''Doom'', Romero announced ''Sigil'', an unofficial Episode Five consisting of 9 missions. It was released on May 22, 2019, with a soundtrack by
Buckethead Brian Patrick Carroll (born May 13, 1969), known professionally as Buckethead, is an American guitarist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. He has received critical acclaim for his innovative electric guitar playing. His music spans severa ...
. It was then released for free on May 31, with a
MIDI MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and re ...
soundtrack by James Paddock.


Clones

''Doom'' was influential and dozens of new first-person shooter games appeared following ''Doom''s release, often referred to as "''Doom'' clones". The term was initially popular, and after 1996, gradually replaced by "
first-person shooter First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the p ...
", which had firmly superseded around 1998. Some of these were cheap
clones Clone or Clones or Cloning or Cloned or The Clone may refer to: Places * Clones, County Fermanagh * Clones, County Monaghan, a town in Ireland Biology * Clone (B-cell), a lymphocyte clone, the massive presence of which may indicate a pathologi ...
, hastily assembled and quickly forgotten, and others explored new grounds of the genre with high acclaim. Many of ''Doom''s closely imitated features include the selection of weapons and cheat codes. Some successors include
Apogee An apsis (; ) is the farthest or nearest point in the orbit of a planetary body about its primary body. For example, the apsides of the Earth are called the aphelion and perihelion. General description There are two apsides in any ellip ...
's ''
Rise of the Triad ''Rise of the Triad: Dark War'' is a first-person shooter video game, developed and published by Apogee Software (now 3D Realms) in 1995. The player can choose one of five different characters to play as, each bearing unique attributes such as ...
'' (based on the ''Wolfenstein 3D'' engine) and
Looking Glass Studios Looking Glass Studios, Inc. (formerly Blue Sky Productions and LookingGlass Technologies, Inc.) was an American video game developer based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The company was founded by Paul Neurath with Ned Lerner as Blue Sky Produ ...
's '' System Shock''. The popularity of ''
Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
''-themed WADs is rumored to have been the factor that prompted
LucasArts Lucasfilm Games (known as LucasArts between 1990 and 2021) is an American video game licensor that is part of Lucasfilm. It was founded in May 1982 by George Lucas as a video game development group alongside his film company; as part of a large ...
to create their first-person shooter ''
Dark Forces Dark Force or Dark Forces may refer to: ''Star Wars'' *The dark side of the Force *'' Star Wars: Dark Forces'', a 1995 video game and novelization *'' Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II'', the sequel to the 1995 video game and novelization *''Da ...
''. The ''Doom'' engine was licensed by id Software to several other companies, who released their own games using the technology, including '' Heretic'', '' Hexen: Beyond Heretic'', '' Strife: Quest for the Sigil'', and '' Hacx: Twitch 'n Kill''. A ''Doom''-based game called ''
Chex Quest ''Chex Quest'' is a non-violent first-person shooter video game created in 1996 by Digital Café, originally intended as a Chex cereal promotion aimed at children aged 6–9 and up.Thompson, Stephanie. "WatersMolitor Promo Links Chex and AOL." '' ...
'' was released in 1996 by
Ralston Foods Ralston may refer to: Place names United States *Ralston, California *Ralston, Iowa *Ralston, Nebraska *Ralston, Oklahoma *Ralston, Wyoming * Mount Ralston in the Sierra Nevada of California *Ralston Creek (Colorado) *Ralston Hall, Belmont, Califo ...
as a promotion to increase cereal sales, and the
United States Marine Corps The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through combi ...
produced ''
Marine Doom ''Marine Doom'' is a 1996 modification of the first-person shooter ''Doom II'' for the United States Marine Corps, which was later made available for download to the public. In the game, a fireteam, comprising four Marines, is supposed to accompl ...
'' as a training tool, later released to the public. When 3D Realms released ''
Duke Nukem 3D ''Duke Nukem 3D'' is a first-person shooter video game developed by 3D Realms. It is a sequel to the platform games ''Duke Nukem (video game), Duke Nukem'' and ''Duke Nukem II'', published by 3D Realms. ''Duke Nukem 3D'' features the adventures ...
'' in 1996, a tongue-in-cheek science fiction shooter based on
Ken Silverman Ken Silverman (born November 1, 1975) is an American game programmer, best known for writing the Build engine. It was most notably utilized by ''Duke Nukem 3D'', ''Shadow Warrior'', ''Blood'', and more than a dozen other games in the mid- to la ...
's technologically similar ''Build'' engine, id Software had nearly finished developing '' Quake'', its next-generation game, which mirrored ''Doom''s success for much of the remainder of the 1990s and reduced interest in its predecessor (Wolfenstein 3D).


Community

In addition to the thrilling nature of the single-player game, the
deathmatch Deathmatch, also known as free-for-all, is a gameplay mode integrated into many shooter games, including first-person shooter (FPS), and real-time strategy (RTS) video games, where the goal is to kill (or "frag") the other players' characters ...
mode was an important factor in the game's popularity. ''Doom'' was not the first first-person shooter with a deathmatch mode; ''
Maze War ''Maze'', also known as ''Maze War'', is a 3D multiplayer first-person shooter list of maze video games, maze game originally developed in 1973 and expanded in 1974. The first version was developed by high school students Steve Colley, Greg Thomp ...
'', an FPS released in 1974, was running multiplayer deathmatch over
ethernet Ethernet () is a family of wired computer networking technologies commonly used in local area networks (LAN), metropolitan area networks (MAN) and wide area networks (WAN). It was commercially introduced in 1980 and first standardized in 198 ...
on Xerox computers by 1977. The widespread distribution of PC systems and the violence in ''Doom'' made deathmatching particularly attractive. Two-player multiplayer was possible over a phone line by using a
modem A modulator-demodulator or modem is a computer hardware device that converts data from a digital format into a format suitable for an analog transmission medium such as telephone or radio. A modem transmits data by Modulation#Digital modulati ...
, or by linking two PCs with a null-modem cable. Because of its widespread distribution, ''Doom'' hence became the game that introduced deathmatching to a large audience and was also the first game to use the term "deathmatch". Although the popularity of the ''Doom'' games dropped with the release of more modern first-person shooters, the game still retains a strong fan base that continues to this day by playing competitively and creating WADs, and ''Doom''-related news is still tracked at multiple websites such as Doomworld. Interest in ''Doom'' was renewed in 1997, when the
source code In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a program is specially designed to facilitate the ...
for the ''Doom'' engine was released (it was also placed under the GNU GPL-2.0-or-later on October 3, 1999). Fans then began
porting In software engineering, porting is the process of adapting software for the purpose of achieving some form of execution in a computing environment that is different from the one that a given program (meant for such execution) was originally desi ...
the game to various operating systems, even to previously unsupported platforms such as the
Dreamcast The is a home video game console released by Sega on November 27, 1998, in Japan; September 9, 1999, in North America; and October 14, 1999, in Europe. It was the first sixth-generation video game console, preceding Sony's PlayStation 2, N ...
. As for the PC, over 50 different ''Doom'' source ports have been developed. New features such as OpenGL rendering and scripting allow WADs to alter the gameplay more radically. Devoted players have spent years creating
speedrun Speedrunning is the act of playing a video game, or section of a video game, with the goal of completing it as fast as possible. Speedrunning often involves following planned routes, which may incorporate sequence breaking and can exploit glit ...
s for ''Doom'', competing for the quickest completion times of individual levels and the whole game and sharing knowledge about routes through the levels and how to exploit bugs in the ''Doom'' engine for shortcuts. ''Doom'' was one of the first games to have a speedrunning community, which has remained active up until the present day. A record speedrun on E1M1, the first level in the game, was achieved in September 1998, and took 20 years and "tens of thousands of futile attempts" in order to be surpassed. Achievements include the completion of both ''Doom'' and ''Doom II'' on the "Ultra-Violence" difficulty setting in less than 30 minutes each. In addition, a few players have also managed to complete ''Doom II'' in a single run on the difficulty setting "Nightmare!", on which monsters are more aggressive, launch faster projectiles (or, in the case of the Pinky Demon, simply move faster), and respawn roughly 30 seconds after they have been killed (level designer John Romero characterized the idea of such a run as " ust having to beimpossible"). Movies of most of these runs are available from the COMPET-N website. One notable fan of ''Doom'' is
Christoph Schneider Christoph Schneider (born 11 May 1966) is a German musician, best known as the drummer of the Neue Deutsche Härte band Rammstein. Early life Christoph Schneider was born in Pankow, East Berlin, East Germany. He has one sister, who is two years ...
from the German rock band
Rammstein Rammstein (, "ramming stone") is a German Neue Deutsche Härte band formed in Berlin in 1994. The band's lineup—consisting of lead vocalist Till Lindemann, lead guitarist Richard Kruspe, rhythm guitarist Paul Landers, bassist Oliver Riedel, ...
; he uses the stage name "Doom" which was inspired by the video game. Schneider needed a stage name for the German copyright agency, but found there were too many Christoph Schneiders in the entertainment industry. Schneider's band mate
Paul Landers Paul Landers (born Heiko Paul Hiersche; 9 December 1964) is a German musician, notable as the guitarist for the Neue Deutsche Härte band Rammstein, and the punk rock band Feeling B. Biography Early life Landers was born in East Berlin, Eas ...
suggested the name "Doom" because they liked the game. Schneider has said that had he known that name would be on every Rammstein record he played on, he would have chosen a different one.


Notes


References


Sources

* * * * *


External links

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