Doom (1993) - MobyGames (original) (raw)

aka:DOOM 3D Alien Busters,DOOM95,Doom: Evil Unleashed

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Description official descriptions

The Union Aerospace Corporation has been experimenting with teleportation technology on Mars' moons Phobos and Deimos. After early successes, something goes wrong. It seems the scientists have opened a gateway straight to Hell. Phobos base is overrun with demonic creatures, and the whole of Deimos simply vanishes. A squad of marines is sent to Phobos, but all except one are quickly slaughtered. It falls to the surviving marine to grab some guns and strike back at the demons.

id Software's follow-up to their genre-defining Wolfenstein 3D, Doom is another first-person 3D shooter: full-on action as seen from the space marine's perspective. Like Wolfenstein, the game consists of distinct episodes, playable in any order. The first episode, Knee-Deep in the Dead, takes place in the Phobos base and is freely available as shareware. The full game continues on Deimos in The Shores of Hell and culminates in Inferno, the final episode which takes place in Hell itself (the Sega 32x version lacks this episode).

The basic objective in each level is simply to reach the exit. Since dozens of enemies stand in the way, the only way to get there is by killing them. Switches and buttons must be pressed to advance at certain points and often color-coded locked doors will block the way - matching keycards or skull keys must be found to pass.

The game's engine technology is more advanced than Wolfenstein's, and thus the levels are more varied and complex. The engine simulates different heights (stairs and lifts appear frequently) and different lighting conditions (some rooms are pitch black, others only barely illuminated). There are outdoor areas, pools of radioactive waste that hurt the player, ceilings that come down and crush him, and unlike Wolfenstein's orthogonally aligned corridors, the walls in Doom can be in any angle to each other. An automap helps in navigating the levels.

Stylistically, the levels begin with a futuristic theme in the military base on Phobos and gradually change to a hellish environment, complete with satanic symbols (pentagrams, upside-down-crosses, and portraits of horned demons), hung-up mutilated corpses, and the distorted faces of the damned.

Doom features a large weapon arsenal, with most weapons having both advantages and drawbacks. The starting weapons are the fists and a simple pistol. Also available are a shotgun (high damage, slow reload, not good at distances), a chaingun (high firing rate, but slightly inaccurate in longer bursts), and a plasma rifle (combining a high firing rate and large damage). The rocket launcher also deals out lots of damage, but the explosion causes blast damage and must be used with care in confined areas or it might prove deadly to the player as well as the enemies. Two further weapons in the game are the chainsaw for close-quarter carnage, and the BFG9000 energy gun, which while taking some practice to fire correctly, can destroy most enemies in a single burst. The different weapons use four different ammunition types (bullets, shells, rockets, and energy cells), so collecting the right type for a certain gun is important.

The game drops some of Wolfenstein's arcade-inspired aspects, so there are no extra lives or treasures to be collected for points, but many other power-ups are still available. Medpacks heal damage while armor protects from receiving it in the first place. Backpacks allow more ammunition to be carried, a computer map reveals the whole layout of the level on the automap (including any secret areas), light amplification visors illuminate dark areas and radiation suits allow travel over waste without taking damage. Also available are berserk packs (which radically increase the damage inflicted by the fists) as well as short-time invisibility and invulnerability power-ups.

The enemies to be destroyed include former humans corrupted during the invasion, plus demons in all shapes and sizes: fireball-throwing imps, floating skulls, pink-skinned demons with powerful bite attacks, and large one-eyed flying monstrosities called Cacodemons. Each episode ends with a boss battle against one or two, particularly powerful creatures.

Doom popularized multiplayer in the genre with two different modes: Cooperative allows players to move through the single-player game together, while Deathmatch is a competitive game type where players blast at each other to collect 'frag' points for a kill and re-spawn in a random location after being killed.

The 3DO and Sega32x ports lack any multiplayer modes, though the other ports retain the DOS versions multiplayer to varying degrees. The various console ports all feature simplified levels and omit some levels, enemies, and features from the original DOS release. The SNES and Gameboy Advance versions of the game actually use different engines and hence feature numerous small gameplay differences.

Spellings

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Screenshots

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Promos

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Credits (DOS version)

15 People

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 84% (based on 80 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.8 out of 5(based on 784 ratings with 39 reviews)

A legend in the making

The Good
Absolutely EVERYTHING is good in this game - graphics were kick-ass for the time, the monsters looked cool and some even creepy, level design was fun and weapons looked real. The sound was very enjoyable - great soundtracks and sounds of monster roaring made the gameplay impressive. And the gameplay? There's nothing to say about it except that its a perfect 5! Its just an orgasm to play Doom - killing such epic monsters like Barons, Imps, Cacodemons etc. with weapons like the pistol and the shotgun. Except these of course, we have some very powerful weapons like the Rocket Launcher, Plasma Rifle and the famous BFG9000. The game also had a descent story, separated into 3 episodes, which take place on Phobos, Deimos, and Hell itself.

The Bad
If there's anything to not like about this game, than it might be the controls, which weren't too easy, because buttons were quite far away from each other, but there's nothing seriously wrong about Doom. Its Doom for gods sake! And by the way, there are mods for Doom like zDoom or jDoom, which you can download to not only customise your controls, but also to completely change some effects and play the game in a resolution which suits you.

The Bottom Line
I think every gamer out there knows what Doom is and how kick-ass it is, so there is nothing to describe, unless you don't know what Doom is, i'll tell you -, its not just a game, ITS A LEGEND! If you haven't played Doom, you don't know what a really good FPS game is. Enough said.

DOS · by Medicine Man (328) · 2009

Intellectual? Pft. Sometimes the greatest gems aren't mentally stimulating.

The Good
This is the game I grew up on. When I was a little kid, about 5 or 6, my dad took the opportunity to initiate me into the world of D00M. Sure, you hysterical parent types out there may be shouting "Is THIS what you want your kids to learn from?!". Listen, give you kids more credit... somehow, I doubt a virtual simulation of battling demons from hell would cause them to go on killing sprees. If that is the case though... I blame that kids genetics. I've seen some argue that D00M is mindless and therefore of little worth. Listen, sure, games have alot of worth when it comes to challenging a players mind. Chess, RTS games, puzzle games... they all have their places, but don't deny the fact that games like D00M are just as good, but for different reasons. When I want to wrap my mind around something, I'll play Myst. When I want to feel pure adrenaline going through my system, I'll load up D00M.

...I guess I should stop griping and get to the game itself. Well, what is there left to explain? It's D00M. You run around and shoot anything that gets in your way. It's fun. It's damn fun.

The Bad
Perhaps I'm just a -little- biased, being conditioned from childhood to appreciate this piece of software, but I can't find a single problem with it.

The Bottom Line
It's purely run and gun. It's fun. It's also free on the internet these days.

DOS · by Astro Al (1) · 2004

No-Brain, No-Pain. Surgeon General Warning: Doom is hazardous to your brain!

The Good
Well, I'm not going to tell you much about this, as most of the other review have done a great job of doing that.

But I do know this, I was one of the people who got suckered in playing Doom. Back then (my disclamer) I recall having run out of 'decent' games. Coincidence? Maybe, maybe not, considering suddenly the sudden rush of die hard Doom fans. The fact most serious veteran gamers usually fall under the categories of either RPG, Strategy or Adventure games (as most memorable games were usually that) would consider Doom a 'great achievement' in gaming history a laughing matter.

Why so, because those genres above had one thing in common that made them more a genre or more a 'game' (in my personal subjective opinion) than other genre's or games (e.g. such arcade based games). They had a decent storyline you could related with...personalize with...a message from the developers to the players. Now Doom on the other hand...

Hey, Doom is a fun game. No doubt about that...well to a certain extent (tell you the bad stuff later). But the fact is to obviously arrogant SOB's like myself who dare call themselves a veteran (if not elite, muahahaha) gamer. Doom is just a game, comparible and as groundbreaking as...Space Invaders...Mario Bros. Those Kiddie kind of games. Read: K I D D I E Yes, kid's. Kid's love this game. Because practically it's a brainless game. If I were a parent, games like this would concern me. No educational value what so ever. Yes, educational value. Something you learn from RPG, Strategy, Adventure games: Puzzle solving, Logic, History, etc. Anything. What do you learn from Doom? Yes, I can chainsaw a walking beefsteak into a medium rare Big Mac with lots of ketchup. Now is this what you want your kids to grow up with???

The Bad
Hmmm....I think I overdid the don't like part...hehehehe.

Anyway, there is another thing I would like to point out. This is the first game that after a couple of hours playing (note: I ran out of games, justifies me playing Doom...hehehe), Doom was the first game that made me feel sick. Yes, sick...nausea, dizzy, stomach cramps. Why? Something to do with the graphics, a programmer friend of mine once told me. It seems that games like Doom have 'layers' in their graphics, fast moving later. (Notice King's Quest 1, where the key objects show last?). Most First Shooter games don't have that now (e.g. Counterstrike), it's like one screenshot after another. Well, whatever our visual sensors detect, they report it to the brain and the brain signals the body. The fact that your body starts to feel nausea and dizziness, those reports can't be good.

Well, if the body sub-consciously responses negatively to the game, it says a lot about the game itself, eh?

(Disclaimer: Programmers should understand more 'bout the hell I was trying to explain up there...I'm a lawyer not a programmer)

The Bottom Line
I have more respect for Duke Nukem. At least that game had some 'added humor' in it. I'm against violence in games. But I'm all for educated violence. Muahahaha!!

Windows · by Indra was here (20728) · 2006

[ View all 39 player reviews ]

Discussion

Subject By Date
Listing Mods?? Paul Budd (424) Feb 17, 2021
Happy 20th anniversary! Pseudo_Intellectual (67905) Jan 12, 2014
Doom budget? Johan Smedjebacka (5) Jun 26, 2013
Doom95 Rola (8478) Feb 3, 2013
What gameplay features were first in Doom? hribek (28) Aug 2, 2011

Trivia

1001 Video Games

Doom appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

3DO version

The development of the 3DO port was rushed; it was developed in ten weeks, from August to October of 1995. The 3DO release contains exclusive, CD-quality remixes of the PC's background music. According to the programmer, Rebecca Ann Heineman, hiring a band to record the music was necessary because she had no time to port the original game's music driver.

The 3DO version was originally planned to contain FMV cutscenes; Art Data Interactive created a number of still images (depicting actors in monster costumes) in hopes of convincing investors into giving them funds to film the sequences, but ultimately none were created.

The game was originally going to be distributed by Electronic Arts, but the deal fell through.

The source code of this port was released on GitHub by Rebecca Ann Heineman on November 30, 2014.

Administrator tool

DOOM was proposed for use as a tool for systems administrators in Dennis Chow's paper Doom as an Interface for Process Management; in it, through a modified version of DOOM (PSDoom or the Doom Process Manager), processes are depicted as enemies whose share of systems resources can be diminished by attacking them and which are completely terminated when their avatars are killed. (On a loaded system in which all programs' performances are strained, processes may begin attacking each other, aggressively competing - as in Core War - for system resources).

Bugs

Cheats

The SPISPOPD cheat code (no clipping) stands for "Smashing Pumpkins Into Small Piles Of Putrid Debris". It has nothing to do with the band - rather, it's a reference to an Usenet post joking about a possible alternate title for Doom. More detail can be found at the Doom Wiki.

Demo scene

It was the first game to make a head-first mention in a demo (a 64k intro: Cyboman by Gazebo) a couple of days after DOOM was spread. The uptight demo-scene back then actually accepted the game, especially for its amazing graphics and execution. Until that time, most demosceners considered games to be far behind demos in terms of technology.

Development

Doomguy

Although on the box cover of the game the Doomguy carries a weapon in his right hand, in the game, he is left handed - from the first person view, he carries his weapon in his left hand and also punches with his left fist. The hands of the Doomguy, which millions of players believed to belong to themselves, actually are Kevin Cloud's - one of the art developers. In the very early stages of DOOM the DoomGuy's right ear could take damage and turn into flimsy peace of flesh. This was removed in the later versions of DOOM.

Enemies

Eric Harris Levels

Columbine High School shooter Eric Harris is known to have created several levels for the game. A few including Thrasher.wad and RealDeth.wad have resurfaced, but a rumoured recreation in the game of the Columbine High School itself (possibly called Realdoom.wad), which would provide a macabre fascination, has yet to be found

Fake Atari 2600 Port

Many people thought there was an Atari 2600 port of DOOM in development when images of the port started spreading around the Internet, including pictures of the cartridge, a magazine ad and screenshots from the game. These turned out to be the results of a college project rendered on an Atari 800 computer by James Catalano, who for a joke posted them on a Usenet newsgroup.

GBA version

The Game Boy Advance port features green blood and removed splatter effects. Additionally corpses disappear almost instantly and all corpses which were used as part of the level decoration were removed.

Graphics

DOOM had a low-res mode (toggled via F5) that doubled the width of the pixels being plotted by messing with the write mask in unchained VGA mode. That, coupled with the triple-buffering used, made the game majorly fast and quite playable on a 386/40. Carmack was experimenting with a Hi-Color mode that allowed more than 256 colors on the screen, but that mode halved resolution. He wanted to see what it would look like because it got rid of the color-banding due to the diminished lighting, but 160-pixels horizontally looked very bad so they removed it. Up to version 1.1, it was possible to run the game on three monitors at once, giving a 270-degree field of vision.

Multiplayer

DOOM was the first game to include a deathmatch mode, in which up to four players can compete over a network or in split screen. Maps used for deathmatch were the single-player levels, made less linear. In December 1993, Intel issued a company-wide memo banning DOOM from their networks. Many big companies issued similar orders, not just because of lost productivity but because it rendered most networks inoperative. Up until version 1.2, the game sent data through high-level broadcast packets that forced every computer on a net (no matter whether they were running the game or not) to transfer the data.

Music

Much of the music in DOOM (and DOOM II) is likely to be inspired by songs of famous heavy metal bands. For example, the music from E1M1 is similar to Metallica's No Remorse (some also say that it is very similar to Master of Puppets), that in E1M4 resembles Rise by Pantera, and the music from E2M1 is similar to AC/DC's Big Gun.

Novels

Dafydd Ab Hugh and Brad Linaweaver wrote a set of four novels about the DOOM universe. They were published between June 1995 and January 1996 by Pocket Books. You can view the covers on this fanpage.

In May 1996, Tom Grindberg of Marvel Comics made a comic book about DOOM for a gaming convention.

References

References in pop culture

Rocket jumping

DOOM was the first game to include rocket jumping. Only, it worked a bit different from later first person shooters - instead of aiming at the ground (which you couldn't do in the game), you shoot a rocket launcher at a nearby object or wall. The resulting blast can proper the player a quite long distance away, allowing to clear otherwise impossible jumps.

Scrapped Features

SEGA 32x version

This version contains only seventeen maps, taken from the "Knee Deep in the Dead" and "The Shores of Hell" episodes. No maps from the third episode, "Inferno", have been included. Maps present: E1M1-E1M8 and E2M1-E2M7, as well as the two secret levels E1M9 and E2M9 (E2M9, renamed to "Dis", acts as the final level of the game). After the end credits, the game concludes by reverting to a fake DOS prompt if the player activated the cheat codes. This screen cannot be exited without shutting off the system. If the game was beaten without cheating, the prompt will not be shown; rather the player will see a montage of enemies encountered in the game, just as in DOOM II.

SNES version

The U.S. SNES version of DOOM was one of the few releases for the console to have a colored cartridge (Killer Instinct being another one), namely a red one. Besides this, due to limitations of the SNES hardware, the enemies in the game do not have sides or backs, and are always facing the player. All blood and splatter effects were removed.

The source code of this port was released on GitHub by Randy Linden on July 14, 2020.

Source code

On 23 December, 1997, id Software released the source code. You can download it here. Numerous source ports were subsequently created by fans.

Text adventure

In 1996, the first level of the first episode was implemented by Piers Johnson in TADS, resulting in FooM - a text adventure game interface for DOOM. Downloadable with source at http://mirror.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/tads/foom.tar.gz

Version 1.4

With patch 1.4, including all later re-releases and ports, a detail in the "Command Cotrol" level was changed: a few computers laid out into the shape of a swastika were rearranged. Romero referred to this change in a 2013 interview:

[43:11] It was a swastika, but [...] I changed it to this shape because we had people complainin' and really the funny thing is that I wasn't trying to promote Nazism, I was referencing Wolfenstein. [...] [44:21] And we got lots of people, you know, crying over different things about the game, but that was the only thing that we changed. Just because, I think we got a particular, like, letter from someone who was a vet. And so, well, okay, for a vet, we'll do that.

Weapons

Windows 95 Promo

The level E1M2: Nuclear Plant was used for Bill Gates' promo for Windows 95.

Awards

Information also contributed by Adam Baratz,Andrew Grasmeder,Arson Winter,AxelStone,Big John WV,BurningStickMan,chirinea,DarkDante,Echidna Boy,Emepol,IndustrialPope,Jiguryo,John Romero,Kalirion,Maw,Olivier Masse,Patrick Bregger,PCGamer77,Pseudo_Intellectual,ResidentHazard,Roedie,Sciere,Scott Monster,shifter,Silverblade,Steve .,tarmo888,Terok Nor,Ummagumma,WildKard,Zack Green. andZovni.

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by MAT.

Linux added by Hamish Wilson. 3DO added by karttu. Game Boy Advance added by Kartanym. SNES, Windows, Jaguar added by Satoshi Kunsai. PC-98 added by Terok Nor. Windows Mobile added by indimopi. SEGA 32X added by quizzley7.

Additional contributors: Tomer Gabel, Terok Nor, Ashley Pomeroy, Xantheous, Ledmeister, Unicorn Lynx, Frenkel, Guy Chapman, WWWWolf, Sciere, Wormspinal, Peter Berndtsson, Martin Smith, Ajan, Havoc Crow, LepricahnsGold, Cantillon, Medicine Man, Rola, Patrick Bregger, Thomas Thompson, Lugamo, Rik Hideto, FatherJack, SoMuchChaotix, quimes.

Game added June 14, 2001. Last modified May 20, 2025.