Post-Millennials: Why do you play with Doom?

[Jaxxoon R]

I think another thing that caught my attention was the atmosphere and tone of the early game. There was something fascinating about the mysterious, dark corridors of the derelict moon bases, resting beneath a misty overcast sky. From the easy-does-it hums of Dark Halls to the mournful guitar wails of Sign of Evil, it felt like diving deeper and deeper into the someplace isolated and strange. But at no point did it become too dark, too hopeless, or too mean-spirited. Every manner of the game was filled with a tinge of dark humor, from the absurd liquification of monsters in response to explosions, to the grim-but-determined musings of the text screens.

I think for a while it had the same sort of simple intrigue as a game like Metroid. "What was this room for?" "What else is out there?"

"Who were they before they died?"

[Li'l devil]

pritch said:

So I would indeed count you, ChekaAgent and PseudoGold.

What?? So, you're implying that I'm a kid?? You're implying that I'm not old-school?? Well, I guess you're right..

Well, the main reason I play Doom is because I, basically, play everything.. For me it doesn't matter how old the game is, how graphically outdated it is and how simple it is. In fact, Doom's simplicity is it's main advantage - you don't need to learn anything, just pickup shotgun and shoot demons, unlike modern games, which are complicated as hell..
Also, I started playing Doom because I just got tired of playing CoD and wanted something different.. probably like many other people.

Azuruish said:

Same here: why people loves playing such old games if exist mega-ultra trip projects like Uncharted?

What's so fun about those 'Press X not to die' games, anyway? Those games are for 5 year olds.

[Torturephile]

Is it odd that reading this thread makes me feel quite old? I turned 22 in March 1st.

I had no idea there were that many younger ones here, though. I felt I was always the youngest here.

[Danfun64]

I became 21 a couple months ago...yet I still hold on to the somewhat childish username I had since I was 13... :P

[Doomkid]

Danfun64 said:

I became 21 a couple months ago...yet I still hold on to the somewhat childish username I had since I was 13... :P

I'm on my way to 24 but this stupid handle hasn't changed. I've tried, but then no one knows who the fuck I am. (Of the few that do, anyway.)

[dsm]

ChekaAgent said:

For me it doesn't matter how old the game is, how graphically outdated it is and how simple it is. In fact, Doom's simplicity is it's main advantage - you don't need to learn anything, just pickup shotgun and shoot demons, unlike modern games, which are complicated as hell..

That reminds me of last Sunday when I my younger brother and I spotted an arcade with an old game called "Bubble Bobble" that was around when we were kids and someone had left an ass-ton of coins in it so my brother and I started playing it.
Then along came the 6 year-old son of my older brother's girlfriend and my younger brother let him play alongside me.
The kid didn't give a fuck that the game had dated graphics, he learned how to play it in less than five minutes and enjoyed the heck out of it. (It was amusing to see how incredibly fast he picked up on the game mechanics and the controls).

So basically, simplicity and accessibility along with fun, rewarding gameplay seems to be what works.

Is it odd that reading this thread makes me feel quite old? I turned 22 in March 1st.

That's way to early to start feeling old - at 22 you're still just a kid (and I mean that as a compliment).
Hell, I'm still baffled that people born in the early 2000s are teens now - where did all the time go?

[Royal_Sir]

To be honest, I picked it up (18yo) because I saw stuff for Brutal Doom.

A year later a discovered this forum and saw just about everything else.

[Dragonfly]

dsm said:

"Bubble Bobble"

Such a brilliant game. Shame there was only one piece of music as it did get a bit too repetitive. I never beat the final boss either, got fed up of it before I ever had the chance to win.

Would never play this with money on a real arcade unit, I'd be broke!

[Cire]

I'm 28, so I guess I Count as younger middle age here perhaps? I started Dooming when dad bought our first PC in '95 and I downloaded the shareware with a 33.6K modem! Never felt any kind of urge to leave Doom since. I remember trying Quake but the monitor was too dark to see anything and I didn't know what "gamma correction" was back then, lol! I did two maps in 1997 - one simple test map, an octagonal shape with exactly one of each item, weapon, monster etc. The second one was a recreation of my partents house, though it refused to start. Visplane Overflow. I remember naming it "Overflash" based on a Dream I had. Whenever I get inspiration, I usally use my Dreams.
Fun times.

[40oz]

My brother was born in 1997 and he started playing doom again to get pumped for the new doom game. He texted me last night to tell me hes on MAP20 Gotcha on UV, and wants to do TNT and Plutonia next. He doesn't have an account here though.

[sheridan]

I was born in August '94 and have played Doom since pretty much forever -- actually, one of my earliest memories has me sitting on my Dad's lap and using the space bar to open doors while he did the moving and shooting on MAP31 of Doom2. When he bought a new desktop later that I pestered him to install Doom2 on it so I could play by myself (with no monsters and god mode set -- I liked exploring the game's twisted environments but found them pretty threatening without cheat codes)

Anyway, those experiences, along with some others, (like figuring out deathmatch with my brothers a few years later), were extremely formative to me. In fact I tend to credit them with part of my dedication to become a game developer myself, though the game I finally ended up releasing last year only bears a passing resemblance to Doom.

I love Doom though. Honestly love it to bits. A better testament to my interest in the games can be seen in some of my 2.5D engine projects, like this one: https://github.com/SheridanR/BSDL Though I could make one an order of magnitude faster these days!

[Jon]

Just to point out that I registered my DWF account before many of you were born, and that, plus the mere fact that DW existed before many of you were born, blows my mind.

[Linguica]

Jon said:

Just to point out that I registered my DWF account before many of you were born, and that, plus the mere fact that DW existed before many of you were born, blows my mind.

Yeah, old people always have a weird obsession with pointing out that they, and things they recognize, are a lot older than young people.

[Gothic Box]

I was born in '99. I found freedm through browsing the internet while bored, and soon found doom itself. The weapons feel great to fire, the movement is perfect, the monsters are varied, it's difficult, it's easy to mod, and I'll never run out of levels to play. Sure, I play lots of newer games (Bethesda RPGs, Counter-Strike, tactical shooters like Red Orchestra 2 and Insurgency, Battlefield, etc.) but I never get bored of doom. :)

[Jaxxoon R]

Linguica said:

Yeah, old people always have a weird obsession with pointing out that they, and things they recognize, are a lot older than young people.

Fun fact: I am older than most babies.

[Noiser]

I was born in 1991 and I'm feeling old right now.

[Ironhound]

I think Doom stays popular because there is really nothing else like it. Modern shooters all follow Halo and Call of Duty. Look at the new Wolfenstein. A cover shooter seems to be the only shooter.

Doom is fast paced, and it NEVER gets old killing demons. Whereas generic soldier 330 who pops up, shoots, and lobs a grenade gets old FAST.

Doom is also challenging, and a pure adrenaline rush on higher difficulties.


Then again I was born in '89 and raised on Doom so I probably don't count here. :P

[Deleted_Account]

I remember playing Doom when it was first released in 1993, the good old days of shareware. I never expected it to last this long and find a new generation of Doomers. Now that's a testament to id Software.

[Flesh420]

sheridan said:

I was born in August '94 and have played Doom since pretty much forever -- actually, one of my earliest memories has me sitting on my Dad's lap and using the space bar to open doors while he did the moving and shooting on MAP31 of Doom2. When he bought a new desktop later that I pestered him to install Doom2 on it so I could play by myself (with no monsters and god mode set -- I liked exploring the game's twisted environments but found them pretty threatening without cheat codes)

Anyway, those experiences, along with some others, (like figuring out deathmatch with my brothers a few years later), were extremely formative to me. In fact I tend to credit them with part of my dedication to become a game developer myself, though the game I finally ended up releasing last year only bears a passing resemblance to Doom.

I love Doom though. Honestly love it to bits. A better testament to my interest in the games can be seen in some of my 2.5D engine projects, like this one: https://github.com/SheridanR/BSDL Though I could make one an order of magnitude faster these days!

I had no idea you were on these boards. That's awesome. I'm the guy that recently emailed you about a bug, then posted like five on bug tracker. Lol. Nice to see you here!

[PureSlime]

Jimmy said:

As someone born in 1991 I'm sorta in the void between the "millennial" and "90s kid" camps and feel like I shouldn't identify with either. :<

Born in 1994 here. Same sort of deal.

But to answer the thread question, Doom is just fun? When I was a teenager, I started looking more into game series I had missed growing up and Doom was one of those. I guess I like Doom for all the same reasons most people here like it, I just came across it differently.

[Graf Zahl]

Piper Maru said:

I never expected it to last this long...

Me neither. But I'd also never have expected that the FPS genre would degenerate as it did, overemphasizing realism over fun and devolving into more or less interactive movies. Doom survived because the industry failed to develop this style of gameplay and sacrificed it for something many Doomers do not find appealing.

These days I rarely play anything that's newer than Quake 2, after Half-Life nobody bothered anymore to create a shooter, that was about action first and story a distant second.

Seeing all the graphics and computing power available these days, I'd rather see it put into a game with the visual style of the Quake 3 engine but 10x larger levels than this modern, overly realistic stuff that has become so popular but somehow completely turns me off.

[Li'l devil]

Graf Zahl said:

after Half-Life nobody bothered anymore to create a shooter, that was about action first and story a distant second.

Well, you're not quite right, there were plenty of action over story shooters after Half-Life.

But I can agree that after 2010 all shooters (almost) sucked.

[jazzmaster9]

I loved the fact that DooM is so easy to mod, Thanks to advanced ports.
I've been always a creator more than A player of games.

[DoomzRules]

I still play with Doom because of the speed, the adrenaline you get, the satisfying punch of all the weapons (well except the pistol, if it had a slide going back animation, maybe it'd be a bit more satisfying?), I love the overall aesthetics of the first Doom, I also love finding all the secrets in all the levels.

Though there is one thing... I'm a Completionist, so I was driven crazy when I couldn't find that one item which would make me 100% the level... oh boy, at times I just raged and hit the exit button and finished with 100% kills 99% items and 100% secrets...

You have no idea how frustrating it is to not find that one item....

And then spend hours and hours searching for it?

XD

Anyway, I really love Doom so yeah.

[MrGlide]

I'll speak for my son. he's 7, it's an easy concept to grasp, I think he may be a fan just because It's something I'm really into. I'll edit this later when he get's home to put some of his own words into it. (edit) he likes playing doom with me, and he likes watching me play "Hard Maps". he likes all the monsters. It's something we enjoy together. Ya I'll definetly get him into mapping, just not quite yet.

[AD_79]

MrGlide said:

I'll speak for my son. he's 7, it's an easy concept to grasp, I think he may be a fan just because It's something I'm really into. I'll edit this later when he get's home to put some of his own words into it.

Get him into mapping, while you're at it :P

[DoomzRules]

AD_79 said:

Get him into mapping, while you're at it :P

And modding.... you know we might get the next best weapons mod out there.... ;)

[MrGlide]

DoomzRules said:

And modding.... you know we might get the next best weapons mod out there.... ;)

I can only teach him what I know. I do want to get him into scripting or some type of code in the next couple of years.

[DoomzRules]

MrGlide said:

I can only teach him what I know. I do want to get him into scripting or some type of code in the next couple of years.

Well start with the basics. I'd recommend coding alternate deaths for demons. I know that sounds hard, but it's pretty easy if you have SLADE and you teach reverse-engineering of RDND or Smooth Doom and analyze the altdeath coding script.

It's pretty simple actually.

TNT 1 A 0 A_Jump (AltDeath, AltDeath1, etc.etc.etc)

Just slap that in somewhere, code in the sprites and boom it's a piece of cake.

XDeaths do take a bit of work though... =P

Anyway, I'd recommend starting with weapons mods and working up from there.

To be honest, I'm not a weapons modder. I'm more of a monster death guy but hey I guess that's my specialty. ^^

Wish you and your son luck!

It's nice that you and your son play Doom together!

Wish my dad would play Doom with me... =P I'm 16 and he's 50-something.... won't play Doom with me.... =P (still love my dad though.)

[Deleted_Account]

Graf Zahl said:

Me neither. But I'd also never have expected that the FPS genre would degenerate as it did, overemphasizing realism over fun and devolving into more or less interactive movies. Doom survived because the industry failed to develop this style of gameplay and sacrificed it for something many Doomers do not find appealing.

These days I rarely play anything that's newer than Quake 2, after Half-Life nobody bothered anymore to create a shooter, that was about action first and story a distant second.

Seeing all the graphics and computing power available these days, I'd rather see it put into a game with the visual style of the Quake 3 engine but 10x larger levels than this modern, overly realistic stuff that has become so popular but somehow completely turns me off.

I understand where you're coming from, for some reason I really can't play modern shooters. For me I only play games up to and including Half-Life, modern shooters don't really appeal to me. Nothing against them of course, they just don't seem to hold my imagination like the classics. Only some modern games have captured my attention. Naturally I'll be giving Doom 2016 a chance, mostly the single player campaign. I was never really much into multiplayer.