Doom pre-release/promotional screenshots

I've become interested in what screenshots id Software used as official promotional materials after Doom was released. Probably not surprisingly, most of them are pre-release material from doomscn5.zip:

• this box tactfully avoids pre-release discrepancies by not showing the HUD at all, while using D1.PCX, D7.PCX and D10.PCX from doomscn5.zip;
  
• this box (Australian, according to MG), again uses D1.PCX (with an edited HUD), D10.PCX, plus two shots also featured on the other box above, but not included with doomscn5.zip. At this resolution it is not clear if the lives counter was edited out from the status bar face.

What surprised me more are the screenshots that id Software used on their official site. The archived page from 1996 (Wayback Machine link) has three shots: D10.PCX, D1.PCX and another shot, with the HUD edited to resemble the final version of the game. However, the images have some sort of distorted quality, as if they were magazine scans or deliberately processed to resemble such.

The Ultimate Doom page from mid-2000s (Wayback Machine copy) also uses some magazine scan-like screenshots. Only two of them have been preserved completely: full01.jpg and full05.jpg. Both are unfamiliar to me. However, there are also thumbnails for three more shots: thumb-doom-ultimate-02.jpg, thumb-doom-ultimate-03.jpg and thumb04-off.jpg. Numbers 2 and 4 seem to be taken in the same areas as D10.PCX and the third shot from the 1996 page, respectively, although they're not identical. Number 3 seems to show the same area as the one in the bottom centre of The Ultimate Doom's box art.

I wonder if any of these shots ever existed (and were released) in some "raw" form similar to the PCX images. I suspect that many of them may have been made at the same time as the doomscn5.zip shots and later edited to update the HUD image. It also seems reasonable that multiple shots were made for the same areas, such as the bottom-left shot on the Ultimate Doom box and full05.jpg, or thumb04 and D10.PCX.

MobyGames also has two shareware release scans, one from a Gold Medallion Software release and another from MicroStar. Both might have used screenshots that were made in-house though.

Some Googling also found a directory of unofficial Doom screenshots in PCX format (originally on the Doom Companion CD):
http://cd.textfiles.com/doomcompanion/PICS/DOOMUS/

These seem to have been taken in the same version (or very close) as the doomscn5.zip shots, but it is unclear as to who and when did that. The CD in question is, possibly, the same as this one.

What I find most interesting is that one of these screenshots appears to be from E3M2 yet uses the E1 sky. Makes me wonder if that sky texture was originally going to be used for Episode 3 instead.

Necros20 said:

What I find most interesting is that one of these screenshots appears to be from E3M2 yet uses the E1 sky. Makes me wonder if that sky texture was originally going to be used for Episode 3 instead.

Nah, I think it was just a placeholder before the episode structure was actually in place. Same thing in Doom 2 prerelease shots.

The E3 sky was most likely going to be that dark sandy/stormy sky found in the beta, given that you can see parts of it still in the intermission map.

Hexen preview screenshot:
ftp://ftp.fu-berlin.de/pc/games/idgames/idstuff/hexen/hexenscn.zip

There were also some for Quake, somewhere...

Sodaholic said:

Nah, I think it was just a placeholder before the episode structure was actually in place. Same thing in Doom 2 prerelease shots.

The E3 sky was most likely going to be that dark sandy/stormy sky found in the beta, given that you can see parts of it still in the intermission map.

They seem to use placeholders for everything. In the Doom 2 Beta, the Mancubus just rapidly fired Baron of Hell blasts, the Archvile's fire looked like the BFG blast, and the Pain Elemental was literally just a Cacodemon with a different look.

The Doom page at gamers.org has three shots, but no idea if these come from id or not. The same site has an interesting selection of Strife screenshots.