December 10, 1993. I remember the date because it was the last day of fall semester finals, and instead of studying for my chemistry exam, I was huddled in the computer lab watching Jeremy, the RA’s boyfriend who had access to the university’s blazing fast internet connection, download this new game everyone had been talking about. DOOM. The file was massive for the time—several megabytes—and we watched that progress bar crawl for what felt like hours, the anticipation building with each percentage point gained. When it finally finished, he copied it onto four floppy disks for me. “Trust me,” he said, handing them over like contraband, “this is going to blow your mind.”
He wasn’t wrong. I’d played Wolfenstein 3D the year before and thought it was impressive, but DOOM was something else entirely. I remember installing it late that night in my crappy off-campus apartment, the blue installation screen promising digital violence beyond my imagination. When that first level loaded—E1M1, “Hangar”—and that MIDI metal track kicked in, I actually got goosebumps. The moment I picked up that shotgun and fired it at my first Imp, the muzzle flash briefly illuminating the darkened hallway in front of me, I knew gaming had changed forever. I knew I had changed forever.
The DOOM shareware distribution model seems quaint now in our age of free-to-play and digital distribution, but it was revolutionary in 1993. The first episode—nine levels of demon-slaying goodness—completely free to copy and share, with the other episodes available for purchase. It was brilliant marketing, essentially gaming’s first widespread demo, but with enough content to feel like a complete experience. I played through that first episode at least a dozen times before finally mailing off a check for the full version, which felt like joining some exclusive club. The shareware model created this grassroots spread of DOOM that no amount of traditional marketing could have accomplished. My copy came from Jeremy, who got it from some guy in his programming class, who downloaded it from a BBS, and so on.
The technological leap from Wolfenstein 3D to DOOM can’t be overstated. While Wolfenstein had no height variation (every level was essentially flat), DOOM’s environments had stairs, platforms, elevators—vertical space that created new tactical possibilities. Wolfenstein’s lighting was uniform; DOOM introduced dynamic lighting that could plunge sections of a level into near-darkness, creating tension and jump scares that would define the horror-shooter genre for decades. I’ll never forget my first encounter with those light-dimming effects in E1M3 (“Toxin Refinery”), when the lights suddenly went out and I heard the growl of a demon somewhere in the darkness. I literally pushed back from my desk, heart pounding.
The PC system requirements for DOOM in 1993 were considered steep at the time: a 386 processor, 4MB of RAM, and a VGA graphics card. My 386 SX with exactly 4MB of RAM struggled to run it, the frame rate chopping considerably whenever the action got intense. I saved up for three months working extra shifts at the campus bookstore to upgrade to 8MB of RAM, solely to make DOOM run more smoothly. It was the first time I’d ever modified a computer, nervously inserting those SIMM memory sticks while following instructions printed from a BBS, all for the sake of more fluid demon slaying. Years later, I’d build entire PCs from scratch without hesitation, but that first memory upgrade—motivated entirely by DOOM—was my introduction to the world of computer hardware.
The weapons in DOOM formed a perfect power curve that still influences shooter design today. From the humble pistol to the legendary BFG9000, each gun had a purpose and a feeling of impact that was unprecedented. The BFG9000 weapon strategy was something we debated endlessly—the optimal distance to fire for maximum damage, whether the visible projectile was what caused damage or if it was the invisible tracers (this was before GameFAQs and YouTube tutorials, when game mechanics were often discovered through trial and error and shared like oral tradition). The first time I fired the BFG in a room full of enemies and witnessed that screen-filling flash of green destruction, I literally yelled out loud. My roommate Mark, trying to sleep in the next room, banged on the wall and told me to shut up. “You don’t understand,” I called back, “I just found the BFG!”
DOOM multiplayer deathmatch origin story deserves its own chapter in gaming history. This wasn’t the first game where players could compete against each other, but it popularized the term “deathmatch” and established conventions that would define competitive FPS play for decades. My first deathmatch experience came in early 1994, when our computer science department set up a LAN party in one of the labs after hours. The chaotic scramble for weapons, the tense cat-and-mouse in the corridors, the triumphant feeling of a well-placed rocket—it was intoxicating in a way no single-player game had been before.
My friend Chris and I took multiplayer to the next level by connecting our computers via modem. This was… challenging, to put it mildly. We’d have to coordinate by voice phone first, then hang up to connect our modems, hoping the connection would establish properly. The latency was atrocious by today’s standards—sometimes half a second or more—which meant you had to lead your shots significantly, firing where you thought your opponent would be rather than where they appeared. Despite these limitations, modem DOOM consumed entire weekends. My parents were less than thrilled about the monopolized phone line and the occasional long-distance charges that appeared on the bill. “It’s for school,” I’d claim unconvincingly. “We’re studying… physics. Trajectory physics.”
DOOM John Carmack engine technology represented a paradigm shift. While not a “true 3D” engine (it couldn’t do rooms above rooms, for instance), its binary space partitioning (BSP) approach allowed for unprecedented speed and complexity. I didn’t understand the technical details then—I just knew it looked amazing—but years later, when I took a computer graphics course in college, the professor actually used DOOM’s engine as a case study. I sat there with a stupid grin on my face, thinking about how many hours I’d spent inside that engine without understanding how it worked. Carmack was like a magician who could squeeze impossibly smooth performance from limited hardware, and we all benefited from his wizardry.
The mod scene that grew around DOOM was my introduction to the concept of user-generated content. DOOM WAD mod creation became a hobby for thousands of players, myself included. WAD files (standing for “Where’s All the Data”) contained all the level information, and with third-party level editors, anyone could create their own hellish playgrounds. My attempts were amateurish at best—mostly corridors filled with too many enemies and not enough health packs—but I spent countless hours tinkering with those tools. I even managed to create a crude recreation of my dorm building, populating it with demons wearing my professors’ faces (at least in my imagination—the actual sprites remained unchanged). The highlight of my modding career came when I released a space station-themed WAD on a local BBS and received actual feedback from strangers who had played it. Mostly criticism about poor ammo balance, but still—people had played something I created!
Finding DOOM secret areas became an obsession for many of us. The original game was filled with hidden rooms containing powerful weapons, extra lives, or sometimes just inside jokes from the developers. I kept a notebook beside my computer, meticulously mapping out levels and marking suspicious walls that might conceal secrets. Some required pushing on specific wall sections, others involved complex platforming to reach. The satisfaction of finding a new secret area was immense—like being admitted to a club of those who knew. “Did you find the secret chainsaw in E1M2?” became a common conversation starter among my gaming friends. I still remember the vindication when, after insisting there was one more secret in E1M9 that no one had found, I was finally proven right weeks later when someone discovered an almost impossible-to-reach invisibility sphere.
The controversy surrounding DOOM’s violence seems almost quaint by today’s standards, but it was a genuine cultural flashpoint in the mid-90s. My parents, who had largely ignored my gaming habit, took notice when DOOM made the local news as this corrupting influence on youth. My dad actually sat down to watch me play one evening, his expression growing increasingly concerned as I gleefully blasted demons into bloody chunks. “This is what you’ve been doing up here?” he asked. I tried explaining the plot—something about Mars and hellish invaders—but even to my ears, it sounded like a flimsy justification for digital gore. The next day, he returned with a copy of SimCity, suggesting I might want to “try building things up instead of just blowing them apart.” I played SimCity dutifully when he was around, then returned to DOOM the moment he left. Sorry, Dad.
The community that formed around DOOM extended beyond just playing the game. We traded strategies, shared mods, debated the meaning of the cryptic text screens between episodes. The primitive online forums and BBS systems of the era were filled with DOOM discussion. I met some of my closest college friends through our shared obsession. Dave, who lived two floors down in my dorm, knocked on my door at midnight after hearing the distinctive sounds of DOOM through the walls. “Is that E2M8?” he asked. When I confirmed, he nodded approvingly and said, “The Cyberdemon gives me nightmares.” We ended up roommates the following year.
DOOM source port modern options have kept the game alive for decades beyond its technological prime. When id Software released the source code in 1997, it enabled a community of developers to adapt the game for modern systems, add features Carmack and company could only dream of in 1993, and ensure that new generations could experience this pioneering title. I’ve played DOOM on everything from my smartphone to a modified calculator. Each time, regardless of platform, that familiar rush returns—the muscle memory of strafing around fireballs, the instinctive search for secret walls, the satisfaction of a well-placed rocket. The core gameplay remains immaculate, a testament to its fundamental design excellence.
The legacy of DOOM extends far beyond its immediate impact. Every FPS that followed—from Duke Nukem 3D to Half-Life to Call of Duty—owes a debt to what DOOM established. Even games outside the shooter genre borrowed its concepts of fast-paced action, atmospheric tension, and player empowerment. My own gaming tastes were permanently shaped by those nights spent blasting demons. While I still enjoy thoughtful strategy games and narrative-driven RPGs, there’s a part of me that will always crave that pure, adrenal rush that DOOM perfected.
Last year, I introduced my nephew to the original DOOM via one of those modernized source ports. I watched him navigate those familiar corridors of E1M1, initially unimpressed by the dated graphics but gradually leaning forward in his seat as the action intensified. When he found the secret area with the shotgun—the same one I’d discovered nearly thirty years earlier—his eyes lit up with the same excitement I’d felt. “This is actually really good,” he admitted, somewhat surprised. “It’s so fast.” I just nodded, a little lump in my throat. Some experiences transcend their technological limitations, remaining vital and engaging decades later. DOOM is one of them.
In my home office, I still have those original floppy disks Jeremy gave me, carefully preserved though long since unreadable. They’re a reminder of that pivotal moment when gaming shifted beneath my feet, when the possibilities suddenly seemed limitless. DOOM didn’t just change first-person shooters or establish id Software as an industry leader—it changed my relationship with games, with technology, and in some small but meaningful way, with myself. It showed me that digital experiences could be more than just casual entertainment; they could be exhilarating, challenging, social, even a little bit dangerous. In those dark corridors filled with pixelated demons, I found a lifelong passion. Not bad for a shareware game copied onto four floppy disks by some guy I barely knew.
