Doom is undoubtedly one of the most important games in the history of the medium. It's been over thirty years since the id Software franchise revolutionized video games with a title as technically brilliant as it is fun to play. A monument that continues to shine today with The Dark Ages. Today, we're going back to the 90s, as we tell you about the beginnings of this game that changed everything.
December 9, 1993, 11:59 p.m. In the small studio in Mesquite, Texas, faces betray excitement and fatigue. The six-person team has been fine-tuning the launch of its new game for hours, due to a pesky bug making it unstable on some systems. At the dawn of the Internet and the first downloads, the bet seemed as crazy as it was revolutionary. In one minute, DOOM, the symbol of an entire generation, would invade the University of Wisconsin server. At that precise moment, the designers at id Software didn't know it yet, but they were about to go beyond the simple boundaries of video games. Unfortunately, things wouldn't go as planned...
The grandfather of the first-person shooter
John Romero, co-creator of DOOM, remembers that night. In the Netflix documentary High Score, he jokes: "Everyone started transferring files at the same time, so the server crashed. It was the game everyone was waiting for." This may seem surprising when you consider that the game weighs only 2.2 MB (the average size of a web page in 2016), but we must not forget that modem speeds were very limited at the time, not to mention the popular craze that unleashed crowds in authorized circles. Inspired by Alien, Evil Dead and other films of the genre, id Software's work does not do things by halves. Taking place in a science fiction universe with a predominantly horror feel, DOOM depicts the wanderings of a Marine in an abandoned military base plagued by a demon invasion. More ambitious than ever, the game innovates in many areas compared to Wolfenstein 3D, the studio's previous title. In addition to the far superior production, the content includes a more extensive arsenal and levels composed of several floors, all with their share of secrets and hidden rooms. The incredibly immersive atmosphere is based on punchy music, a surprising bestiary, and carefully designed progression. As with many games, the first level, the one that sets the codes for the adventure, was created at the last minute.
The result? "A slap in the face," as Joystick magazine wrote in its November 1993 issue number 46. Certified Megastar the following month, the game overturned everything in its path, as proven by the 95% rating in Generation 4 a few weeks later. But as you might expect, such a revolutionary game isn't made overnight. It's a chance to go back to where it all began.
Beers, metal, and video games
As young adults, DOOM's two iconic creators, John Romero and John Carmack, met at Softdisk. Having experienced somewhat tumultuous childhoods, the two boys found they had a lot in common and became friends. "I asked John what he wanted to do, what interested him, and he told me it was graphics and game architecture. I told him I'd take care of the game design and the levels, which he didn't like doing," recalls Romero. "We worked in a fluorescent tube factory, and I personally didn't like it. I prefer the dark. But we ended up annexing a room in the offices and transforming it to our tastes. It was like a cave. There was a window, but we always left the blinds down." We had an NES lying around in a corner and we played Zelda or Mario 3. We also had a fridge full of drinks. I had a huge boom box and every day, a different person chose the music, mostly metal." This way of working, which would continue throughout the two friends' collaboration, would play a big role in the creation of their future games. After the Softdisk adventure, the duo decided to fly on their own and founded id Software, their haven of freedom. A little programming genius, John Carmack ported Super Mario Bros. 3 to PC (using the character of Dangerous Dave, a hero imagined by his partner), a hardware very poorly suited at the time for smooth scrolling games. When John Romero discovered this feat, he understood that he had an outstanding duo and that computers could compete with consoles.
The game changer of 1993 and beyond
In 1992, under the name id Software, Romero and Carmack signed a game that has remained in everyone's memory: Wolfenstein 3D. Politically incorrect, the title is a technical demonstration. By optimizing its scrolling process, the little programming genius managed to shape a true three-dimensional universe. Democratizing first-person shooter games, the game overturns everything in its path! Romero remembers: "Players loved the idea of shooting Nazis to escape the castle. It was a 3D game in 70 frames per second, in full color and with digital sound effects. We were at the cutting edge of technology." After this global success, Romero and Carmack decided to change universes in order to respect their line of conduct which consists of renewing the player experience as much as possible. With a leitmotif: to do better than the previous game. Surrounding themselves with several big names, the duo left their stronghold of Shreveport, Louisiana, to settle in a brand-new building, the Black Cube, in Mesquite, Texas. More precisely, on the sixth floor, in a room that Romero would later rename "Suite 666." The duo and their team worked on developing a scary game, set in a dark universe and inspired by the most famous horror films. DOOM, whose name is taken from a line in the film The Color of Money with Tom Cruise (and which means "your demise", "your destruction"), was born.
Started with 5 people and completed with fewer than 10 designers, DOOM literally shook up the small world of video games. "We had incorporated a list of things we wanted in the game and... it was ambitious.," confides Romero. The idea for DOOM was based on several major axes: reduced brightness to create a deadly atmosphere, speed in executing objectives, and the addition of a multiplayer mode. At the time, shareware was not a very widespread process in Europe, but it was widely used in the United States, and for Romero and Carmack, it was the ideal win-win solution. The game was offered for free in an incomplete version, and if players liked it, they could dig into their wallets to get the additional levels. Conversely, if they didn't like it, they moved on to something else. With its graphics created with Deluxe Paint 2 and programming done on a NeXTstation, the game just had to invade the planet.
Also read – Looking for video games to play with others? Here are four fun titles to liven up your evenings with friends… or beat each other up!
Doom Doom Doom, I want you in my room
If DOOM will make an impression, to the point of becoming a central element of digital pop culture, it is because it is at the intersection of several events. In addition to its extraordinary production, its brilliant universe and its atmosphere, it can be played with several people on the Internet and literally dynamites an industry that is looking for maturity. At the same time, it is offered in the form of shareware and not as a complete game payable at full price. Released at the same time as Virtua Fighter in arcades (the one that would democratize the 3D fighting game) and a stone's throw from the PlayStation and Saturn consoles, it would single-handedly sell entire PC boatloads. More than 30 years after its debut, not a month goes by without some clever person trying to adapt this adventure (which would give the name Doom-Like before the genre became the FPS) onto an unusual object. And with The Dark Ages once again breaking all the rules, we haven't heard the last of this series. To our great delight.
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