Was Doom really that fast before?

[Junk]

I've just tried to play the good old Doom after about a five years of break. And damn, it runs so fast! Doesn't matter how I run it: plain, Doom95, ZDoom, Legacy, Chocolate... They all run so bloody fast! So I am curious, was it always like that and I just don't remember? Or is it because of XP, fast computers and all the stuff?

[Mindless Rambler]

It's probably because Doom only needed a 33mhz processor and 8mb of memory to run.

[Junk]

Well, it looks not THAT fast now :)

But still it seems a bit faster than before. Maybe 50% faster. Maybe it just seems to me. I don't really remember and that's why I'm asking.

[Mindless Rambler]

If you want an old-school game that runs ridiculously fast, download the shareware for Descent and play it on XP. The insanely fast vertical bobbing of the Pyro-GX will make you sick.

[Maes]

Classic Doom still has a relatively high player moving speed and reaction times, that's what sets it apart from the hundreds of "technologically superior" shooters that have appeared, although at least the classic Quake titles (1-3) are about as fast.

[Junk]

Well, all I am trying to find out is:

Does Doom run at the same speed under all these new ports as it did before under DOS? (on good hardware of course)

I am still able to play now but it seems a bit fast for me.

Can anyone remember how it was before?

[Enjay]

Yes, it does run at the same speed under ports as it was originally supposed to. At least it certainly should.

Doom was, and is, a fast game and you can make it even faster with command-line parameters. :)

Last time I tried DOS Doom, there was no obvious difference in play speed between it and the ports I was playing at the time.

[Junk]

OK, thanks. Looks like I'm getting old... :)

[Pirx]

Maes said:

Classic Doom still has a relatively high player moving speed and reaction times, that's what sets it apart from the hundreds of "technologically superior" shooters that have appeared, although at least the classic Quake titles (1-3) are about as fast.

with skilled strafejumping / bunnyhopping, especially in q3 cpma. some quake speedruns are quite amazing in this respect. however, when q1 came out and hopping was unknown yet, i remember people bitching "is the quake guy 70 or something", because of the running speed difference.

the original doom.exe runs at a fixed 35 fps rate even on the fastest modern pcs, and ports haven't changed this afaik, even with the frame cap removed. perhaps people just have got used with the running speed of modern "tactical shooters" ;)

[myk]

Torr Samaho said:
the original doom.exe runs at a fixed 35 fps rate even on the fastest modern pcs,

Some have lifted the limit on the frames per second itself, but things still move at the same rates (where 1 tic = 1/35 sec).

[printz]

I rembember Doom running a bit slower in the beginning than today, unless we count today's DOS on XP. I believe the monsters had been calibrated in that frame rate, because under smoothness the player is too agile and makes the monsters too easy. Under Windows 98, for example, Doom.exe is too easy. That's why some times I enjoy playing Doom.exe under XP, or a port under huge resolution and detail -- to make use of the replay value of original Doom.

[myk]

printz said:
to make use of the replay value of original Doom.

It was meant to be played at 35 fps, optimally. But yeah, with a crappy computer (such as a 386 without much memory), it would not play as steadily back in the day. I honestly don't miss that sort of thing at all... especially since the frame rate would vary according to the complexity of the area of the map, like today it may go down by varying degrees in a large hyperdetailed level. Actually, if I do play a level that reduces the fps below 35, I'm prone to stop playing it and move to something else. Under 35 fps it's not DOOM anymore.

Other than that, what makes the game particularly fast paced nowadays is that practically anyone is aware of strafe running and convenient key setups. Early on I remember playing with keyboard only, using the standard key setup, and I was slow and awkward, so DOOM was harder than it is today. In short, we generally sucked back then (some people were good already, though), which made the game relatively difficult.

[Donce]

myk said:
It was meant to be played at 35 fps, optimally. But yeah, with a crappy computer (such as a 386 without much memory), it would not play as steadily back in the day.

Yeah, on my 486/80 I used to run each and every WAD through RMB prior to playing to increase the framerate, and it did wonders on some maps. Most importantly, it didn't affect demos, with a few exceptions.

I'm prone to stop playing it and move to something else. Under 35 fps it's not DOOM anymore.

I still had that 486 well into source ports era, so I had to play some WADs with very low framerate. I'm not already talking about Windows ports, which were unplayably slow on any map (luckily, there was ZdoomDos then), but those limit-removing maps to be played with Boom. Boom used to run slowly, and the best remembered example is Demonized, which ran at about 1 fps and took 3 days to complete on UV (that's the first map). Still I did it from start to finish, without using any cheats. Ah, now The Spire 2 was a breeze in comparison :)

[printz]

myk said:

, using the standard key setup,

I still use the standard key setup, unless the keyboard is sticky or blocky, which is so at my other computer. Moral: watch the keyboard.

[DaniJ]

doom.exe runs at a fixed 35 fps rate even on the fastest modern pcs, and ports haven't changed this afaik, even with the frame cap removed.

Actually, in Doomsday you can adjust the length of a game tic using the console command "settics". Due to the fractional tic timing core everything stays in sync. So "settics 70" would double the speed of the entire game.

Note that game tics are completely decoupled from refresh so you still get smooth refresh with e.g. "settics 5"

[myk]

DaniJ said:
Actually, in Doomsday you can adjust the length of a game tic using the console command "settics". Due to the fractional tic timing core everything stays in sync. So "settics 70" would double the speed of the entire game.

I'm guessing Boom was the first to have a feature like this with its realtic_clock_rate setting.

[Grazza]

Or an early (unreleased) TASDoom-type exe.