Sunday, 24 March 2024

THE ULTIMATE DOOM & DOOM II REVIEW

 




Developer: id Software

Publisher: id Software

Series: Doom

Release date: December 10, 1993 (MS-DOS)

Can it run Doom? YES!!!

Genre: First Person Shooter (FPS)

Mode: Single Player & Multiplayer




 

 

FEAR (noun) - an unpleasant emotion caused by the threat of danger, pain, or harm.

AGONY (noun) - extreme physical or mental suffering.

SUFFERING (noun) - the state of undergoing pain, distress, or hardship.

DESPAIR (noun) - the complete loss or absence of hope.

DOOM – The main reason why hell and the devil are living in constant FEAR, AGONY, SUFFERING and DESPAIR.

 

To be quite honest, I could’ve started off the introduction in a much different way and still wouldn’t make sense, like for example: “The only thing that bring chaos, death and destruction on its path to absolute destruction of all existence. The reason why innocents fear it…” OR “When in the presence of evil, pray to God to get rid of it. Or ask Him to give you a chainsaw to fight it yourself!” The last one is kind of awesome, but couldn’t figure out how to continue it later on.

Or I could’ve just said the following: “DOOM! JUST FUCKING PLAY DOOM!” insert a music track of the game, sign off and call it a day. Even that wouldn’t be wrong since… THIS… IS… DOOM!!!

 

Oh who am I kidding! I love Doom! It’s a video game franchise that I’ve entered relatively recently, but somehow ended up playing every single game released from start to finish, with every item picked up and secret discovered, with all its quirks and stuff performed, and studied the history of the development of these games and the studio behind it like a prayer before bed. It is a video game with a simple premise, simple gameplay loop that not only is it “easy to play, hard to master” but it’s ADDICTING. Everything and everyone has a place in these games. From the plot, all the way to the BADASS METAL SOUNDTRACK, Doom can’t go wrong. If Tomb Raider is my Yun, then Doom is my Yang. If Tomb Raider is a game where I am calm and precise with my actions, Doom is a game where I’m reckless and brutish. Yet, they work together like the aforementioned concept: opposite but interconnected. Also it should be Yin and Yang, but I wanted to add yet another Street Fighter reference to the mix, so I am well aware the pun is shit.

So! What is Doom?

 

Doom is a First Person Shooter game, where you navigate through levels, killing demons, collecting items and reaching the end of the level. That’s it! That’s basically it. I could stop right here, post the links for the games and wish you a day filled with ripping and tearing demons apart, but for all its simplicity, it can be a bit complicated. We will jump over to the PLOT of the game real soon, but I would like to dedicate a portion of this review to give some backstory of the developers that made the games possible: id Software!




 

Id Software is a video game developer founded on February 1, 1991, by a group of 4 young individuals: John Carmack, John Romero, Tom Hall and Adrian Carmack (not related to John, just a funny coincidence). These 4 young men at the time worked for a video game publisher at the time, Softdisk, producing all sorts of games. One day, John Carmack, who is a genius programmer, found a way to make side scrolling possible on PC, something that was impossible to do back in the 90s. With his colleague Hall, they worked one night on recreating the first level of Super Mario Bros. 3 and sent it to Nintendo. Their way of suggesting them a PC port of the popular game. Nintendo politely declined the offer. Instead of being distraught, the 4 guys were more than happy about it, as the possibilities of making a side scrolling video game on a PC was right there in front of them.

After the rejection, they were approached by a CEO of another publisher, Apogee Software, named Scott Miller. His approach was a bit weird, but it worked. They started negotiations and John Romero suggested him a side scrolling game for the PC called “Commander Keen” where you play as a boy who is trapped on Mars and has to fight enemies. The game became a smash hit and sold lots of copies and made lots of money for both Apogee and id Software (who at this point were already created). Then, Romero suggested to remake a rather obscure game from the 80s called “Return to Castle Wolfenstein”. You play as a POW (Prisoner Of War) trying to escape your imprisonment and assassinate Hitler. Instead of making the game stealth based, Romero opted to make the game action-packed. With a new game engine created by John Carmack, John Romero, who was another programmer of id, started working on the game with Tom Hall, the creative director, and Adrian Carmack, the artist of the group. Other people were involved too, but these 4 are the great giants of the studio and gaming in general. Once the game was completed and shipped, it became even more popular than Commander Keen. Gunning down Nazis never gets tiresome, even to this day. This greatness is also accompanied by Bobby Prince, the composer for the game. With hundreds of thousands units sold, fans and journalists kept asking id Software what would the next project be like? And will it be able to surpass Wolfenstein?

“It’s going to be Wolfenstein times million”- id Software replied. And the rest is history.

 

 

PLOT






Our Hero…



 

“You are a marine. One of Earth’s toughest! Hardened and ready for war. Three years ago, your Commanding Officer ordered your unit to fire on innocent civilians, but you refused and beat the snot out of him. As a punishment, you were sent on Mars to do cleaning duty, whereas your Officer’s body was sent to the Pentagon to recover from his injuries. The days spent there were pretty much boring. Dusting off the light bulbs has never been fun. On Mars, the UAC (Union Aerospace Corporation) is in charge. The UAC is a megacorporation that operates on Mars, where they’ve been testing with teleportation to other dimensions. One day, a radio signal from Mars’ moon, Phobos, was received. It sounded like bad news: guns blazing, painful screams, people dying… You and three others hopped in to see what’s going on. Upon arrival, you’re told to wait and guard the gates, whilst your buddies enter the building. Moments later, you hear their agonizing screams of death. Alone and with no backup, your only way out of there is by mowing the unknown enemy down.”

This is more of a short retelling of the story found in the manual of the game. If you want the short version, here it is:

“DEMONS FROM HELL INVADE PHOBS!!! KILL THEM ALL!!!”

Your character has no name, but his face is visible on the HUD (more on that in a bit). Some speculate that he’s an ancestor of the protagonist of Wolfenstein, some say he’s just Doomguy, or the Doom Marine. John Romero jokingly said he has no name and he’s simply just… DOOMGUY. And that’s a badass name. No ifs, no buts.

Not much about the story from this point on. The story progresses as you play more of the game. Which means we move over to the GAMEPLAY.

 

 

GAMEPLAY

 

“YA KILL SHIT!”Caddicarus

Doom’s gameplay can only be described with those simple words. You start off with a pistol and your objective is to reach the end of the stage. Each stage has enemies you need to kill, keys to open specific doors to progress or find secrets, items to pick up, etc. Below are the controls for the game:

ACTION

KEY

Movement

Arrow Keys (MS-DOS), WASD (Standard)

Fire

Ctrl (MS-DOS), Left Mouse Button (Standard)

Interaction

Spacebar (MS-DOS), E (Standard)

Weapons

1-7

Strafe

Alt (MS-DOS only)

Sprint

Shift (can be toggled)

Automap

Tab

+&-

Increases screen size (+ can also act as hiding the HUD)


I will explain more on the controls a bit later, but this all you need to know for now. The game doesn’t have verticality, meaning you can’t jump nor crouch. Despite the game “being 3D”, it’s basically a top down 2.5D video game. John Carmack did some magic with the game engine to allow us to play it in First Person. This explains why you can shoot enemies that are bellow or above us, but we can’t move our vision to see them well.

Speaking of the enemies, there are a bunch of them. They all differ from one another: from their looks, to their attacks and sounds. This makes it easy for the player to know what type of enemy they’re about to slaughter (or to be slaughtered by them) before moving on. So let’s see what kind of denizens from Hell we’re forced to deal with on our war…












ZOMBIE – Maybe you were friends yesterday and hearing their war stories, but not anymore. Corrupted by Hell’s power, now they’re after flesh and blood only. Slow enemies that fire once. Don’t do much damage. They drop pistol clips upon death…

SHOTGUNZOMBIE / SERGEANT – Tougher and meaner than the average zombies. They wield a shotgun and up-close. They drop the shotgun on death…

IMP – Weird looking brown demons that throw fireballs when you’re afar and use their claws when close. Thankfully, no pitchfork attacks. Easy to dodge and kill…

DEMON/PINKY – Pinkish brutes that zigzag when attacking. They use their big mouth to bite you. Not hard to kill…

SPECTRE – Invisible Pinky Demons…

CACODEMON – This giant tomato of a demon may look cute (and is also the unofficial mascot of Doom), but it’s a force to be reckoned with. Like the imps, they throw projectiles from afar using their mouths, and bite you like the Pinkies up-close. Definitely a tough demon to fight…

LOST SOULS – Annoying flying skulls. They dash at you as an attack. They don’t leave their corpse after dying (Game Theory: Some of these are the same bastards that were killed in Nevada by Lara in TR3)

BARON OF HELL – Now we’re playing with the big boys! Strongest non-boss demon of Doom. They can take all the beating and mess you up big times with their green projectiles and hard hitting punches. First boss of the game, where they appear in a pair, with the nickname “The Bruiser Brothers”…

CYBERDEMON – Giant goat-man demon with a FUCKING ROCKET LAUNCHER FOR AN ARM!!! The second boss of the game…

SPIDERMASTERMIND – The big baddie of the game and the orchestrator of the invasion on Mars’ moons. A giant brain on legs, it uses its chain gun to attack the player. Was supposed to have a magic spell attack, but that was removed due to limitations. A good BFG can stomp this beast with 3 shots…



I mentioned a few weapons that can be found and used in the game, so next stop, THE ARSENAL:










WEAPON

DESCRIPTION

FISTS (SLOT 1) - Extremely basic close-range weapon. Never runs out of ammo, but only about as powerful as a pistol shot; normally used only as a last resort or with a berserk power-up.

CHAINSAW (SLOT 1) - Does damage like the normal fist, but four times faster.

PISTOL (SLOT 2) - The default long-range weapon. Almost entirely useless against anything stronger than a Zombieman or Shotgun Guy.

SHOTGUN (SLOT 3) - A good general-purpose weapon capable of dealing medium-high damage, especially at close range. Also works better at longer ranges.

CHAIN GUN (SLOT 4) - Very good against large crowds of small monsters or single large monsters, but its rapid rate of fire can quickly deplete its ammo supply.

ROCKET LAUNCHER (SLOT 5) - Fires explosive rockets. Does a lot of damage, but can also seriously hurt the player if used indiscriminately at close range.

PLASMA GUN (SLOT 6) - Shoots pulses of blue-hot plasma at high speed, which can take down groups of incoming enemies easily, if aimed properly.

BFG 9000 (SLOT 7) - The "Big Fucking Gun." Somewhat counter-intuitive to operate at first, but kills almost any monster in one shot.





No mere mortal is capable of fighting like Hell without being in proper shape and carrying a suit that is able to absorb the damage. Throughout the game, you’ll also find various items that can come of aid, such as tons of healing items, armour sets, light amplification visor, maps that reveal every single known location in the level, invulnerability power-ups… And many others.

After completing a level, you're thrown into a statistics screen, showing how many kills, items and secrets have been found. It also shows the level and total time. This screen has given birth to the gaming phenomenon known as SPEEDRUN.



Before we go over to the EPISODES, you have to select your difficulty. And these are as iconic as the games themselves:

-        I’M TOO YOUNG TO DIE

-        HEY, NOT TOO ROUGH

-        HURT ME PLENTY

-        ULTRA – VIOLENCE (The gentleman’s way of playing the game)

-        NIGHTMARE! (ARE YOU SURE? THIS SKILL ISN’T EVEN REMOTELY FAIR!)

 

EPISODES

Doom is an episodic game. 3 episodes consisting of 8 levels + a hidden secret 9th level that can only be found if you truly want to defeat your foes. Bellow, I’ll give a short description of each episode and its themes, provided with a cover map of where each episode takes place…

 

EPISODE I: KNEE-DEEP IN THE DEAD






The shareware episode, as it was basically the demo for this game when it was first launched back in 1993. It’s not hard nor long. The main objective of the story is to reach the end to see who or what is the cause of this weird invasion of Hell on Phobos. In terms of gameplay, it’s a fast-paced episode that has only 5 demon types and 5 weapon types. The music in these levels is fast paced and adrenaline pumping. “At Doom’s Gate” may even be the greatest video game music track of all time… Oh and I forgot to mention you deal with the “Bruiser Brothers” in the end: 2 Barons of Hell…



 

 

EPISODE II: THE SHORES OF HELL






This episode takes us from Phobos and puts us on Deimos, Mars’ second moon, where it’s a mixture of the installations found on Phobos and Hell’s own demonic structure. As you descend more, the futuristic space stations slowly get replaced with fiery red and blue walls, skulls, beating hearts, chained up soldiers, and more. It’s more horror themed this time around, save it for one moment where you are given the power-fantasy to wreck shit up. You end up fighting the monstrous Cyberdemon in this episode, on the Tower of Babel.

 






 

EPISODE III: INFERNO






The final episode of the game. The location is in the title…HELL! You’re in Hell. The maximum amount of enemies are fought here of all different types and species. Fire and brimstone cover the levels, lava replaces water, and the bloody mountains serve as a reminder the fieldtrip you’re taking at the moment is not a pretty one. But you know what’s pretty? You get to use ALL the weapons in this episode. From your fists, to the BIG!!! FUCKING!!! GUN!!! Oh and the final boss of the game is here, The Spider Mastermind. That bitch and the demons will pay for what they have done… ESPECIALLY TO OUR BUNNY, DAISY!!!




This image alone must’ve scared a lot of people back in the day. All of that fighting… All for nothing…







 

 

MUSIC

Soundtrack inspired by the greatest heavy metal bands of all time. You’d think they composed the music for the game, but you’d be wrong. The maestro for the game’s soundtrack is Bobby Prince.

The legend…




I don’t think I need to explain more about the music of this game. Just LISTEN TO THIS MASTERPIECE…

This is the original SoundBlaster format



And this is the Roland SC-155 format



This is a personal remix of the original tracks by the composer Andrew Hulshult. He has done remixes of other stuff as well. Mainly in the metal genre. Overall a cool dude…



DOOM II

Developer: id Software

Publisher: GT Interactive

Series: Doom

Release date: October 10, 1993 (MS-DOS)

Can it run Doom? YES!!!

Genre: First Person Shooter (FPS)

Mode: Single Player & Multiplayer

 


 

 

Wait! Did you think that id Software were done after Doom released to the public? That they would hit the retire button and not bother making anything every again? Even after creating one of the most important video game in history, that to this day, its engine and assets are USED to make fan-made levels or used in colleges to learn programing?

FUCK NO!!!

After the release of Doom, the bois at id got to work on a sequel. 11 months of hard work and labor, they presented to the world the definitive way to play Doom…

Hell on Earth! Hell for Hell! Time for everyone to pay!



 

 

PLOT

It’s been mere minutes since the invasion on Mars and its moons. The sole survivor, the unnamed Doomed Space Marine, kicked the demons’ asses so hard, they had no other choice but to “surrender” and grant him his “victory”.

Little did he know how mean Hell is.

After returning back home, Doomguy finds that Earth is overrun by the armies of Hell. Billions dead, cities in ruin, demons enjoying the carnage. This is what happens when you let a huge megacorporation in charge with scientific stuff and teleportation experiments.

In the ruins of a nearby station, Doomguy finds his wife and son dead, amongst many others. Some turned into zombies, some dead for good. The despair and tragedy he felt when he saw their bodies is indescribable.

Before entering a fueling station, he stumbles across a rabbit’s head. THE DEMONS KILLED HIS BUNNY!!!

Saddened and distraught from everything he saw, he takes off its paw from its nearby destroyed corpse, as a reminder of innocence lost. And vows to make sure Satan and Hell pay for what they have done to him, his family, and everything else…

 


 

GAMEPLAY

There are barely any changes in the gameplay. The only new change is that the game is no longer in an episodic format, but rather like a normal game. You select new game, select your difficulty and you play from start to finish. You don’t lose your weapons (unless you die and you start the level using only your pistol). The game has 30 levels (2 secret levels with HUGE Easter Eggs), and their visuals change depending on the setting. The first 11 levels are subterranean, levels from 12 to 20 are city levels and from level 21 to level 30, they all take place in Hell, where the final showdown against the big bad guy awaits you.

In terms of demons, new baddies have entered in the Doom Disco Ball Room…












CHAINGUNNER – A commando with a chain gun. The worst type of human enemy, as his bullets will end you before you even finish saying FUCK (this applies on Nightmare! Only)…

HELL KNIGHT – A foot soldier and some sort of an underling to the Barons. They attack the same way their red counterparts do, but have less health and do less damage with their projectiles. They do become a common enemy as the game progresses…

REVENANT – A skelly boi that used to be something before dying. Brought back using Hell magic and UAC technology, they punch up close and fire homing missiles when afar. Fun to fight them, and they have a bit of a reputation because of their looks…

MANCUBUS – BIG!!! THICC!!! AND DOWNRIGHT SCARY!!! These monstrosities have flamethrowers attached on their arms. They’re like a mini-me version of the Cyberdemon. They can take a beating. Their death is the most gruesome out of all entities…

PAIN ELEMENTAL – What do you get when you combine a Cacodemon, paint it brown, attach Imp arms, Cyberdemon horns, and put one giant eye? You get a demon that spits Lost Souls and asks if you have games on your phone. Up close it bites. THANK GOD it has no corpse when it dies. Nope, it releases the remaining Lost Souls that were inside of it. HOW FUN!!!

ARACHNOTRON – Mini-me version of the Spider Master mind. Has a plasma rifle instead of a chain gun. Not a real threat…

ARCH-VILE – NOW THIS IS A SERIOUS THREAT!!! An arch-mage of the darkest pits of Hell, this bastard is rare on the battlefield, but has caused the most PTSD out of all demons. Can resurrect fallen enemies, and when he sees you, he sets you on fire before he blows you up. Break line of sight to avoid being thrown in the air by his dark magic…

ICON OF SIN – The Baphomet. The Demon Gatekeeper. The main source of Earth’s invasion. Summons demons from its exposed forehead. Only way to kill it is to fill its exposed hole with plenty of rockets. Oh and he greets you with a sentence in reverse…




In terms of weapons, only one brand new weapon is introduced in Doom II. The Super Shotgun, otherwise known as the SSG, or known as Lucifer’s Bane, or Archangel Michael’s Flaming Sword, or the gun that sounds a lot like Queen’s “We Will Rock You” if fired on repeat.

In other words… GOD’S CHOSEN WEAPON WHEN BATTLING THE FORCES OF HELL.





MUSIC

Bobby Prince was tasked once more to make the soundtrack for the sequel. Need I say more?





SCREENSHOTS

 










 

VIDEOS

 


Reviews on both Doom games done by the youtuber That Trav Guy. They’re relaxing and good to watch. Also give the guy some watch time cause his content is fun…



Or if you want a more professional take on the doom games, check out Civve 11’s videos on Doom. He also does content on old and retro games alike, and tackles them in a more sassy and grumpy way that is entertaining and educational…







 

LEGACY

Doom has left an unprecedented legacy in the world of gaming, and outside of it. The fact that a simple shooter made 31 years ago can still be fun even today is a testament to its greatness. On top of that, Doom is perhaps the most ported video game of all time. EVEN DEVICES THAT ARE MEANT FOR PREGNANCY CHECKS CAN RUN DOOM! So my initials when I said “Can it run Doom?” was because of this.

The simple gameplay that Doom has cannot be described with mere words. You have to experience it. Each weapon and enemy is like a chess piece, and you have to figure out which weapon fits best for the situation. Shotgun can be devastating up close, but it can serve as a good sniping weapon when your enemies are far away. Chain gun can stun lock enemies, preventing them from attacking, the Rocket Launcher has splash damage, and the BFG can either be used as a crazed psycho to clear out rooms of enemies or conserved for the special moment when you really need it. Or just use the SSG to rip and tear, until it is done.

Multiplayer was also invented through this game. Players could play LAN deathmatch up to 4 players, or play the game via 2 player co-op.

Doom’s source code was released to the public under a non-commercial license in 1997. And to this day, it’s still being used. Thanks to the release of the source code, several source ports have been created to play Doom, making the game more accessible for everyone to enjoy. No need to rely on playing the game through MS-DOS only. Here’s a bunch of these source ports that are easy to download, run, configure and enjoy:

-        Chocolate Doom - A play on the word Vanilla Doom (Vanilla meaning original or default in this case). It’s basically the MS-DOS version, but it doesn’t require that to run the game. It uses the game data files (the .wad file, which basically contains everything) to run the thing. Supports various screen resolutions, an option to enable or disable auto-sprinting, easier way to change the controls, and take screenshots. It’s free to download too…

-        GZDoom – The source port of choice if you want to tweak the game to its maximum potential. Has more settings than Chocolate Doom (and I mean it has A LOT of options to tweak and customise) and is the primary source port for playing Doom with mods. Yeah, after the code was released, mods and total conversion mods soon followed. This source port allows the player to do whatever they want with Doom.

-        Zandronum – If you want to play with or against others online, then this is for you. It’s based on an older version of the GZDoom source port, so its code is not up to date, but it has the best network code that makes multiplayer gaming possible.

-        Or just skip all of these and get the games following one of the links here: Steam (Doom & Doom II) or GOG.com (Doom & Doom II)

 

The game has garnered a lot of controversy over the years, due to its depiction of demons, hell and mass murder. It was also the main target and reason behind the horrible Columbine Massacre in 1999. Although everyone would say otherwise.

On a more positive note, my parents refer to this game as the “chainsaw game”. Never found it disturbing or offensive as they clearly understood what it’s all about. Plus they LOVE the soundtrack of the games.

In 1996, an expansion called Final Doom released with 2 separate campaigns: TNT Evilution and The Plutonia Experiment. The former has brand new composed soundtracks for each level, it’s kind of lacklustre, whereas the latter uses the standard Doom II music, but its levels focus heavily on combat and long exploration. Plutonia is highly regarded in the Doom Community as being the superior version of Final Doom.

Honourable mention goes to Doom 64, a Doom game that’s not a remake or a remaster of the first Doom game, but it’s a continuation of the story from Doom II. Some of you may know what the game is all about, but to those that don’t… It’s a bit complicated. I’ll tell you the story when the opportunity comes.

In 1995, The Ultimate Doom was released for PCs. It’s the first Doom game, but made available to run on Windows PCs rather than MS-DOS only. Features some changes and adds 1 additional new episode: THY FLESH CONSUMED. It bridges the gap between Doom and Doom 2. AND IT’S HARD AS BALLS (at least the first 2 levels. The rest is a cake walk).




 

 

CONCLUSION

 


 

TRIVIA

-        The sprites for the demons and the player were handmade, then scanned, then coloured over.

-        Doom went through a lot of changes during its development. A video documenting the changes can be found here.

-        The title of the game comes from a line in the 1986 movie “The Color of the Money”. Tom Cruise’s character responds with “Doom” when questioned about something being in a briefcase.

-        The chainsaw and the super shotgun are inspired by the “Evil Dead” franchise

-        All of the weapons in the game are based on toys the team bought to use for development.

-        The starting riff of “At Doom’s Gate” is inspired from Metallica’s “No Remorse”.

-        The BFG 9000 was called the BFG 2704 in the beta version of the game. It didn’t fire a single green energy ball, but would spam multiple projectiles. This was a mess for the programs and was ultimately scrapped.

-        The Icon of Sin’s starting line: ".oremoR nhoJ ,em llik tsum uoy ,emag eht niw oT" when put in reverse (quite ironic) spells “To win the game, you must kill me, John Romero." This was a banter between the developers.

-        One of the hanging corpses that act as a decorate object in Doom is rumored to be the hanged corpse of fascist leader Benito Mussolini.

-        The levels in “Thy Flesh Consumed”, alongside the name of the episode, are all taken from specific passages from King James’ Bible.

-        An Easter Egg honoring the music band Nine Inch Nails can be found in Thy Flesh Consumed’s first level.

-        Commander Keen makes an appearance in Doom II. Except this time he’s an enemy to kill.

-        The “Nightmare!” difficulty was added in a later version of the game. Fans that managed to beat the game on UV wanted something harder, so Carmack implemented the difficulty as a joke. Demons attack faster and deal more damage. And resurrect after 30 seconds. People, naturally found ways to break the difficulty and have a great time with the game.

-        Doom is one of the oldest franchises known for their speedruns. The absolute chad of speedrunning Doom is Zero Master.

-        Doomguy is one tough and mean son of a bitch.

 

 

 

Ѓорѓи GioGio“ Илиев


No comments:

Post a Comment

PREMIER LEAGUE 2025/2026 DECEMBER REPORT

  After long and exhausting 12 months of many ups and many, many downs, we’ve reached the end of 2025 and next stop is 2026. The year hasn’t...