Doom turns 18 years of bloodshed, violence and controversy!

Today, one of the bloodiest games of all time comes of age. In day December 10, 1993 reached the shelves doom, one of the forerunners of the genre FPS, which managed to become one of the first games to generate controversy due to its violent content and its diabolical enemies. Remember with us a little of this classic from PCs in sequence!

doom was conceived by John Carmack, one of the founders of id Software. He created virtually alone the entire graphics engine of the game, and although the initial script – written by Tom Hall, who fell out with the team and left the company – has not been fully accepted, was the basis for the development of the plot. interestingly, the game title comes from a dialogue from the movie. the color of money, in Martin Scorsese.

At a time when we didn’t have super CG scenes to develop the script, the interesting plot of doom was relegated to a text in the game manual, with little development in the game itself. Which is a shame, since the game’s story was very cool, mixing science fiction and horror in an exemplary way.

The player assumes the role of an unnamed space marine who has been deported to Mars after contradicting questionable orders from above and shooting his commander. In space, our nameless marine is forced to work for the YOU ACCEPTED ( Union Aerospace Corporation), an organization that is running secret tests involving teleportation portals.

Tests are carried out between the moons of Mars, Phobos and Deimos. Everything goes well, until one of the tests goes terribly wrong, and from one of the portals hundreds of creatures emerge directly from ****. The demons slaughter the humans, take over the base of Phobos and the other moon, Deimos, mysteriously disappears.

As the sole survivor of the Phobos research base, the player’s mission is basically to survive the carnage while trying to figure out what went wrong in the experiment and send back to **** any creatures that come their way.

In this mission, the player will go through a total of nine phases, divided into three chapters (later, a fourth chapter was added): the first chapter takes place at the very base of Phobos. In the second, the player lands at the base of the vanished moon, Deimos, where we discover that the satellite is – literally – floating over ****. The last chapter takes place in **** itself, and only after surviving all of this does the player earn the right to return to Earth.

Did you like the script? Well, it’s a pity that it doesn’t get enough attention throughout the game (as we’ve said, the story was only told in the game manual), which is much more focused on intense action and carnage, with monsters popping up from everything. how much singing and a lot, a lot of blood being spilled.

At the time it was released, doom revolutionized the newly created FPS genre. The game had several improvements compared to Wolfenstein 3D (also created by id Software), as textures across the scene (Wolfenstein 3D it did not have textures on the floor or ceiling) and variations in the lighting of the scenarios (in the previous game, all environments were fully lit).

doom it also innovated with its vast arsenal, which mixed real weapons with futuristic technology. From the starter pistol to the classic rotary machine gun and the super powerful BFG 9000 (BFG = Big ******* Gun!) with their plasma bursts.

To match the game’s heavy mood, the soundtrack signed by Bobby Prince it was striking and very pauleira, inspired by heavy metal classics of the time. Notice how the theme song of the first phase resembles the famous Master of Puppets, from Metallica:

With labyrinthine scenarios full of secret areas, the setting of doom referred to the classic movie alien, with automatic doors and dark, claustrophobic corridors. The objective in each stage was basically to go to the exit, but the path was never so simple, as in addition to the hundreds of infernal killer creatures, the player had to find access cards to open doors and reveal new paths.

doom it marked an epoch for its overt violence and for its so overtly displaying demons and other dark creatures. Like everything that is controversial, the game was a huge success, because everyone wanted to experience such a visceral game. Even years after its release, doom got involved in another controversy when two unbalanced youths (and “assiduous players of doom“) perpetrated the Columbine massacre, in 1999.

doom it was also one of the first games that accepted mods and expansions produced by the players themselves (since the game code was made available by the id), which made it a hit among indie developers as well.

In addition to all this, doom it was also the first FPS to allow multiplayer matches. Using some unique servers, groups of up to four players could participate in cooperative or PvP matches. Even today some nostalgic fans maintain active servers for online matches.

From 1993 until now, doom has already won two official sequels, dozens of cross-platform expansions and conversions, a Hollywood-produced movie, and more.

But for us game fans, what remains is the legacy and the importance of doom in the history of games, after all it was their technology (and their controversial violence) that helped in the popularization of SQUARE games in the 90’s and laid the foundations of modern first-person shooter games that are still successful today!

Congratulations doom, for your 18 years, and congratulations to id Software, for treading with blood and daring his successful track in the genre FPS!