Favorite Source Port? (Multiple Choice Poll)

[Gwarl]

but PrBoom is a fork of Boom, and MBF is a fork of Boom and SMMU is a fork of MBF and EE is a fork of SMMU

[BigBoy91]

DSDA-Doom and GZDoom are all you need, really. No hate to the other talented programmers out there.

[MoreMending]

What do you think draws people in to your favorite source port?

I made this out of sheer boredom.

[Doomkid]

Hmm, the best selling point about my favorite port.. I don't know if I have just one favorite port, I use a bunch of them.

 

I'd say as far as multiplayer Doom goes: The client/server architecture that was laid out by csDoom in 2000 really was and still is important to the MP side of Doom. The old, vanilla Doom way of P2P just isn't good enough for more than about 3 people who live in fairly close proximity. On the flipside you can have comfortable 15 person multiplayer Doom servers, full of people from all over the globe, thanks to the c/s architecture.

 

I think that's the best selling point of Zandronum, ZDaemon and Odamex for multiplayer as opposed to basically any other ports out there!

[Bobby :D]

DSDA-Doom, cause of the commitment to a broad, deep level of compatibility and demo recording ease.

 

Jk it's totally for the rewind

[Egg Boy]

it plays doom

[Lippeth]

I'd say the most immediate selling point for a source port with me is MIDI playback. I often like to change soundfonts, swap out hardware or use my system's native midi synth and it's always a deal-breaker when the only option is emulated OPL.

 

Other than that, as long as the port doesn't mess with the pixel ratio too much when scaling I'm easy to please. A good percentage of ports seem to partially omit the 20% vertical stretch present in the original game, so the statusbar and/or menu text look stretched horizontally, but I can usually overlook that and enjoy the other features.

 

I also like the option for the sound effect pitch randomization, as long as they're somewhat comparable to the original in terms of range.

[Dusty_Rhodes]

There's lots of selling points for lots of source ports. 

 

What I use 90% of the time is PrBoom+/UMAPINFO I'm a turbo nerd so I like all the complevels and whatnot and it works with a lot of what I play. 

The complevels are great for testing my maps too, though the new renderer fixes HOMs and tutti fruttis, so it isn't perfect. 

 

For multiplayer I test with bots on Skulltag, it's the "just works" dm port for me. Currently I'm working on UTWANGO maps, so I test for bugs in Chocolate Doom and test gameplay in Skulltag.

 

For playing multiplayer, I use ZDeamon. Good port for that. I have Crispy Doom, Woof!, ReBoom, and Sprinkled Doom for more specialized things. All great ports. 

[MoreMending]

I use PRBoom+ (most of the time. I DO use GZDoom but only for certain wads) and it's pretty fun to mess around with the options, it's fairly easy to set up, settings are easy to navigate, you can change which audio type you can use, etc. But the MAIN selling point for PRBoom+ would be the fact it can play demos while still being very customizable, lots of source ports can play demos, but can you name one that can play demos and STILL have a lot of options? You probably can and just did but still the options are fun to tinker around with.

My reasoning probably did not make sense.

 

Also press + + f5 to switch the big thingy with doomguy's face to other NEW big thingies but without doomguy's face

Edited January 10, 2022 by MoreMending

[SOSU]

Well Chocolate Doom has a very tasty sounding name :)

[Endless]

• It plays all of my favorite WADs.
• It feels and looks absolutely great.
• Smooth as fuck.
• Vanilla goodness.
• A vanilla console. A godsend.
• Massive customization options.
• Solid customer support.
• Crispy visual look in the click of a key.
• Perfect quality for screenshots and video recording.
• Simplistic.
• Ton of features.
• Ongoing non-stop support for 8+ years.
• It's the perfect balance of modern with retro.
• It's Doom Retro.

 

Shit, that's more than one selling point.

 

 

[Kinsie]

GZDoom: The Gates of Hell have swung right open and all restrictions of sanity and sense have been washed away by tidal waves of the thick, murky blood of a monstrosity never before seen. The Time of Man is over, now is for the Animals to rule!

[SilentD00mer]

Chocolate-doom: the vanilla experience but with easier setup and ported for modern systems :)

[BBQgiraffe]

Neapolitan-Doom: probably going to have lua soon

[Deleted Account]

Crispy Doom: Like the OG exe but not broken

[Pseudonaut]

DSDA-Doom: it's simply an improved version of PrBoom+, which was previously the #1 port for recording demos.

[Astronomical]

Dis-including ports that I use for wad development (If that's the case Chocolate doom is my most used port)

From doom with love fixed the few minor issues I had with the latest version of dsda, so It took it's spot.  Launchers are important to me because I am allergic to draging and dropping so any port that let's me double click has my respect.

 

Doom Retro doesn't care that you broke your elbow, and therefor it introduces features just because Brad Harding wanted to be in the game, and I respect it for that alone.  I also don't need to worry about comp levels that much, if I need accuracy I'll use FDWL but if not Doom Retro is a nice port for what it's worth.

[Agent Slacker]

GZDoom: It's just what most gameplay mods use.
DOOM Retro: It's what I use when I want a mostly vanilla experience with some nifty 90's-esque visual enhancements, such as Build style blood and water effects.
Unity DOOM: The only official port available on my Switch 

[OpenRift]

Woof: Widescreen graphics support, Boom/MBF/Vanilla, modern controller support, very clean.

[CBM]

GZDoom: The list of features is amazing, I especially like the possibility to use MD3 models and 3D floors!

 

[ReaperAA]

GZDoom: Most used Doom source port for good reasons.

• Supports all Doom engine games.
• Tons of graphical options and best modding capabilities among all Doom port.
• Very customizable. You can make the visuals look identical to vanilla or turn on all the Hardware renderer eyecandy.
• Support for various compatibilty options that can be tweaked to make GZDoom behave like near vanilla.
• Optional support for freelook, jumping and crouching.
• Support for Quake-style console.
• Highest number of sourceport-exclusive mods/content are made for it.
• Even some commercial retro FPS games such as Hedon, Selaco(WIP) and Supplice(WIP) use GZDoom. Probably more that I haven't listed.
• As of this date, the only source port to support Vulkan renderer.
• Now also comes with OpenGL ES renderer which means even low end computers can enjoy it.
• +20 years of legacy and still going strong.
• It runs Brootal Doom and Project Brootality

 

DSDA-Doom: The de facto source port for speedrunners and demo recorders

• Being a fork of PrBoom+ means it has all of PrBoom+ features, including all the demo recording/playback features. Makes PrBoom+ totally obsolete
• Only demo compatible source port able to run Doom, Heretic and Hexen with the same .exe
• Most feature rich among all the demo-compatible source ports.
• Unlike most other Demo compatible ports, it actually has support for resolutions higher than 400p.
• Being conservative with modding and having hardware renderer means it usually has best performance among almost all source ports.
• One of the only 2 source ports that have complete MBF21 standard support (other being Woof).
• Only source port as of this date to support Rewind feature

[Skittle]

PrBoom+: The dedication to compatibility while still offering a modern, beautiful, feature rich experience is to die for.

[dmdr]

NUGGET DOOM

 

Woof is awesome and has a fast software renderer that looks great in nicely scaled 640x480 reso, human-friendly -complevels using easily remembered words instead of stupid numbers, supports all those sexy new modern cross-port editing standards (certainly MBF21, DEHEXTRA... not sure about DSDHACKED haven't checked lolololol) and the devs are rad dudes who have (mostly) added features when I've asked for them BUT... it lacks Crispy Doom's new cheat codes (esp. NOTARGET which is amazing for map testing), Crispy's amazing alternate HUD (every other port's HUD is either ugly or obfuscates information from the player), and Quake-style pitch recoil which makes every weapon so much more satisfying (esp the chaingun)...

 

Well, Nugget has everything Woof has PLUS the new codes and a Crispy style HUD. Add pitch recoil and it would be absolutely perfect, but in spite of it's singular lone flaw I still love it.

[liPillON]

seconding NuggetDoom for all the features listed above, plus the "move under/over things" option

 

now if we could have a crosshair too... @Alaux pretty please?

 

 

 

 

 

 

I should also mention GZDoom for all the qol/gameplay mods made by its community thanks to mod-enabling efforts by the dev team

 

 

[valkiriforce]

Endless pretty much covered how I feel about DOOM Retro - all the modern features in an old-school Dooming experience. I love the crunchy pixel work and the contrast of the brightmaps and other cool options available for it. The launcher is also nice and easy to use, which is something I missed from using Doom95 for the longest time back then. I'm happy there are plenty of great options for playing Doom out there though.

[Thelokk]

I'm a simple guy, I like GZDoom because I can load wads one click, no command lines fiddling. Have enough of that with Quake already. 

[Marisa the Magician]

GZDoom: It's like I'm still modding for good ol' Unreal, except with more robust scripting and without the horrendous headaches of constantly hitting walls due to the closed-source nature of the engine and the propensity of its editor to spontaneously combust if you look at it the wrong way.

[Noiser]

I like to eat chocolate.

[thiccyosh]

E x t e n d e d  H U D in dsda-doom, yes I know other source ports have that too so I guess I'm just a Pr-Boom freak. It also showed you how many monsters you've killed in percent but they got rid of that for reasons I cannot explain and am too afraid to ask.

[Teo Slayer]

GZDoom: I really like its features like dynamic lights, freelook, customized colored automap, jumping etc, it allows me to play cool modern mapsets like Unfamiliar Episodes and Spooktober, it can run Mods like Brutal Doom(this mod again lol) perfectly and most importantly, I can play the Classic Doom on a modern PC in the best way possible.

 

I used to be a LZDoom user but after Endless told me about the OpenGL ES in the Wadazine server, I wanted to give it a go. The result is that the OpenGL ES runs way better than LZDoom, thank you Endless for letting me know :)