I first played DOOM back in 1999, a few years’ after its birth and its contribution to the (almost-) death of the Amiga. But, of course, I bloody loved it, and for good reason. Short of dropping a DOOM review on you now, if you’re a fan of DOOM, there is a whole ton of news concerning some new mods and yet another new piece of hardware that the game will run on.
We kick off with a look at a new DOOM mod for Quake, which looks totally awesome…
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DOOM + Quake = DUAKE
Ever wondered what DOOM would be like if it was built in the Quake engine? Wonder no more…
Created by (ahem) Magic Nipples, the release trailer above puts a superb case for trying this out. DUAKE is a mod for Quake that combines the characters, maps, skins, and slides the status bar from classic DOOM into Quake. It is DOOM-heavy in atmosphere, but is unmistakeably Quake.
Of course, what I could have just said is: “it’s everything you want it to be.” I recommend you grab this mod (DUAKE is on ModDB, and you can view the source on GitHub).
It’s absolutely superb. I just wish my nipples could do that.
DOOM III is not DOOM 3
Now this one is interesting: a new mod for DOOM II is called DOOM III, but it is not a remake of DOOM 3.
With me so far?
Boasting two whole chapters, 36 new tracks and 20+ missions, the Doom 3 Mod (by Camixada) offers multiple playable characters (DOOM Guy, DOOM Girl, Wolfenstein’s Blaskowich, and more), achievements, collectables, configurable HUD, it also has a choice of difficulty levels and save points.
DOOM III for DOOM II took 11 years to develop, and finally, it is available. Just as long as you have a copy of DOOM II.Grab this (frankly, unmissable) DOOM III from ModDB.
DOOM runs on a quantum computer(ish)
While you probably don’t have a quantum computer, there might be a time, one day, in the distant future, when you do. Should that time come, you will be pleased to know that you will still be able to play DOOM…
…except, not really, because you’re probably never going to own a quantum computer, and no one has developed DOOM to run on one. But there is a version of DOOM that will run in the QASM simulator, which offers a current-gen processor-based quantum environment.
(Look, I’m sure it has some useful applications.)
You’ll need a copy of QASM (there is an open-source version) and the QuanDOOM files from GitHub to try this particular flavour of DOOM.
Bethesda issues updates for DOOM I and II
The recent re-release of classic DOOM on current gen hardware has kept Bethesda busy in more ways than one. But it’s worth letting you know that some key updates have been pushed out. The main portion are as follows:
Added 21:9 resolution graphics for DOOM, DOOM II, The Plutonia Experiment and TNT: Evilution
Left turn, right turn and strafe keys added to keyboard bindings, allowing playing with old-school keyboard-only tank controls
Added 3D sound option in Sound Menu, allowing more than two speaker setups to be used – this allows individual sound effect levels to be taken into account compared to the original DOOM sound system
Cheats can now be activated from the pause menu. Entering the original game’s cheat codes will unlock them for future use. You can also unlock all cheats from the Gameplay Settings menu
There are also improvements to the mod browser, and tweaks to the game on specific platforms. Check the DOOM updates changelog page for details.
DOOM now runs on AMD GPUs
To clarify, that is on the GPU, not on the CPU, and it’s a bit more tangible than that quantum computing effort, albeit pretty unlikely that you’ll want to try it out.
Rather than rely on the CPU to perform the processing for DOOM, this build – also on GitHub – uses the GPU. As per the GitHub: “This is a port of DOOM that runs (almost) entirely on the GPU using the LLVM C library for GPUs based on the doomgeneric interface.”
The game requires the WAD file of the original game, but if you don’t have it, the shareware version of DOOM should do fine.
Game over!
If I’m honest, I’ve been distracted with DOOM’s reboot of late, but there remains a lot to be said of the original. If anything, it’s the version we keep going back to, I think for a very good reason.
The continual expansion of DOOM, whether the original game or the later versions, demonstrates what a stone cold classic it is.
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Christian Cawley is a writer and editor who covers consumer electronics, IT, and entertainment media. He has written for publications such as Computer Weekly, Linux Format, MakeUseOf.com, and Tech Radar.
He also produces podcasts, has a cigar box guitar, and of course, loves retro gaming.
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