An unnamed space marine is shipped to Mars to act as security for the Union Aerospace Corporation. During an experiment involving teleportation, a device creates a portal to Hell and unleashes demons and evil forces on the Mars base, making Deimos disappear and causing the scientists and security guards to die horribly while the evil revives them as zombies. It's up to the Marine to fight off the demons and zombies, before Earth becomes the next to fall. This premise was very unique at the time, where a space marine must fight off the evil forces of Hell.
Doom is one of my all-time favorites. It, along with Wolfenstein 3D, helped popularize the modern ever-present FPS genre range. The game was (and remains) a controversial product due to its high levels of violence, gore, and Satanic imagery. It has been repeatedly criticized by Christian organizations for its diabolic undertones, and prompted fears that virtual reality technology, then in its earliest forms, could be used to simulate extremely realistic killing; in 1994, this led to unsuccessful attempts by Washington state senator Phil Talmadge to introduce compulsory licensing of VR use. The game again made national headlines in 1999, when it was linked to the Columbine High School Massacre. It's also infamous for, along with Mortal Kombat, helping to create the ESRB rating and launch more mature video games (but it was Night Trap). Since its creation, over 10 million copies of the franchise have been sold. An updated version with an additional episode and more difficult levels, The Ultimate Doom, was released in 1995 and sold at retail.
This game was famously ported to the Texas Instruments calculators, mainly the TI-83 Plus and TI-84 Plus. In fact it has been ported unofficially to numerous bizarre platforms; so many ports exist, including for esoteric devices such as calculators, thermostats, oscilloscopes, printers, a digital pregnancy stick and even on Doom itself.
Many weapons are available to the marine including a rocket launcher, a plasma rifle, a chainsaw, and the BFG9000, the most powerful gun in the game and is the most iconic in the DOOM franchise right with the Super Shotgun. A single shot is enough to turn entire rooms of but the toughest monsters into steaming piles of gore. It uses 40 cells with every single blastnote, but is quite slow to fire, with a long delay between the trigger being pulled and a projectile leaving the barrel. The initial plasma ball can deal up to 800 damage, and after it explodes the gun launches 40 hitscan rays in a cone-like pattern, for a total maximum of 4,280 damage and an average of 2,200. It also introduced multiplayer deathmatch, which would become a staple of multiplayer FPS games to this day.
The soundtrack is great and takes inspiration from heavy metal and hard rock songs from Metallica, AC/DC, Pantera, Slayer, etc.
The PlayStation port is filled with new exclusive details, such as new ambient music, realistic gun sounds, new enemy sounds, much darker lighting for the atmosphere, and even includes Doom II. But it uses a password system instead of being able to save to a memory card.
The PC version has source ports which you can use to play Doom WADS, and you can even easily make your own graphics, sounds levels etc. practically making your own FPS games out of Doom. As a matter of fact, the game is great for mods and has had a modding community that has been going strong since then.
The Atari Jaguar port is the closest of the console ports to the PC original, having a smooth frame rate, great visuals, and great textures, though it doesn't have any music during gameplay.
The graphics feature detail that hadn't been seen in a FPS game at the time. In addition to this, this game introduces the automap feature, meaning that there is now an overhead map that is drawn as the player explores. You can even find a computer map that will reveal unvisited areas, which is helpful when finding secrets. This automap feature would become a staple of FPS games for years to come.
There are many enemy types including demons, zombie soldiers (who shoot guns), flaming skulls, and more. The game even has bosses that are amalgamations of cybernetics like the Cyberdemon and Spiderdemon.
The game has powerups that are hidden in each level:
- Backpack: Two times the ammo capacity.
- Berserk: It brings you back up to 100 health if you're anywhere below that, and boosts the power of your punches.
- Invulnerability
- Invisibility
- Light amplification visor: Allows the player to see in dark rooms.
- Radiation shielding suit: Protects from floor damage.
With the exception of the PlayStation and Atari Jaguar, all of the original console ports like the 32X, Sega Saturn, and SNES versions suffer from a variety of issues including downgraded graphics, worse AI behavior, and framerate issues, with the most infamous being the 3DO port. In addition, all of the console ports are missing varying amounts of levels and bosses.
Armor doesn't work like it does in future FPS games since your armor doesn't deplete completely before your health does, but instead absorbs a set percentage of hit point damage depending on its color: 33% for green armor and 50% for blue. Counterintuitively, this means collecting green armor within a certain range of values can actually make you more vulnerable.
So there you go...my review of Doom, the greatest yet.