Been replaying Doom and Doom II. The first Doom is better for exploration making it more fun. Doom II puts a greater emphasis on difficulty, large levels, and an excessive number of ambushes. The early maps have mostly right angle walls, making it less visually appealing, not unlike Wolfenstein 3D. I enjoy Doom II quite a bit, but Doom feels like the better game.
Thursday, October 16, 2025
Everyone is WRONG about DOOM II
Been replaying Doom and Doom II. The first Doom is better for exploration making it more fun. Doom II puts a greater emphasis on difficulty, large levels, and an excessive number of ambushes. The early maps have mostly right angle walls, making it less visually appealing, not unlike Wolfenstein 3D. I enjoy Doom II quite a bit, but Doom feels like the better game.
Wednesday, October 15, 2025
Thursday, October 9, 2025
Ultimate Doom (100%) Walkthrough (E3M6: Mt. Erebus)
2 minutes ago
@BigMacDavis I've been playing Doom II and Doom: Thy Flesh Consumed, on every level of difficulty except Nightmare.
My frustration with Doom II is that you need a roadmap or a script to play some of the really large levels optimally. You've worked out the best way to play these levels, but it goes against my instincts to follow someone else's pattern. I just want to explore each map randomly, which works pretty well in Doom.
One reason this is an issue is that Doom II is loaded with ambushes almost everywhere. I don't have the maps memorized yet, so I never know when I'm about to be ambushed.
I had the original Doom almost completely memorized back in the mid-1990s.
Wednesday, October 8, 2025
Thursday, October 2, 2025
Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Wednesday, September 10, 2025
Pop Flamer/Qix/Quantum
Sunday, September 7, 2025
Doom II From 1994
I was bored with some of the early levels, but midway through the levels got much more imaginative.
If they had broken the game into 3 or 4 episodes, I think that it would have been more rewarding for the player. It would have provided a better sense of progression.
The Super Shotgun is very satisfying. It has enough power that I sometimes choose it over other more powerful weapons.
I definitely enjoyed Doom 1 more. Do I find Doom II interesting enough to play it through on the other difficulties? Probably. The complexity of some levels is discouraging, but players in 1994 got a lot of gaming experience for their money. The game is bigger and more difficult.
I played the game using "Chocolate Doom", which uses the same low resolution as the original game. I didn't mind this at all, but now that I have downloaded both ZDoom and its successor GZDoom, I think that I prefer the game with the higher image quality.
Wednesday, September 3, 2025
Chronologically Gaming Pooyan (Atari 2600)
I wrote a BASIC game similar to "A Pair of Zippy Road Runners" on at least one 8 bit computer. I don't remember which one but it was probably a Timex-Sinclair computer. It started with a wide road that would get more narrow as the game progressed. The road being drawn on the bottom would move randomly left or right on every frame.
I think that my best 8-bit BASIC game was similar to Snake. I filled the screen with blocks as barriers and other characters as food to be gobbled up. The goal is to get all the goodies without running into the blocks or yourself. I know that I wrote this in the late 1970s on a friend's OSI-C1P, but I wrote something similar on my high school's TRS-80.
Tuesday, September 2, 2025
Sunday, August 31, 2025
I Can’t Believe People Still Call Doom 2 a Masterpiece
The level design seems to focus on two main goals:
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Pushing the graphics engine to its limits with larger maps, some featuring incredibly tall structures.
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Increasing the overall difficulty.
I remember beating the game 30 years ago, but there's a reason I haven't gone back to it since. Back then it felt novel, but the experience doesn't hold up as well today.
Saturday, August 30, 2025
Ultimate Doom (100%) Walkthrough (E4M6: Against Thee Wickedly)
Friday, August 15, 2025
The Worst Levels From Doom 1
37 minutes ago
Fortress of Mystery can be quite fun. I started the level with only 5% health and minimal amo, but was able run around enough to avoid getting hit. This encouraged infighting and I was able to pick off the monsters one at a time.
The teleport puzzles in Unholy Cathedral are annoying, but once I got used to the level there was much to enjoy.
Gateway to Limbo is a bit frustrating, but it is different enough from other levels to make it a unique experience.
E2M6, Halls of the Damned, gets my vote for the worst level in Doom 1 because of having to fight a horde of monsters in a large dark maze where you can't see anything. Much of the level doesn't seem to serve any purpose except to make you fight enemies. It can be tricky to get all the secrets because one room will lock you out, or even crush you, if you don't do it correctly.
E4M1, Hell Beneath, deserves honorable mention because it might be the most difficult level to complete in Doom 1. You have insufficient amo to fight all the monsters. If you don't find the secret room with the rocket launcher then it is hopeless. Monsters will teleport right next to you and kill you. Even the difficulty "I'm too Young to Die" is hard to survive. Using Chocolate Doom, there is a bug where you can get permanently trapped in the Red Key area. Despite doing everything I am supposed to, I only get 50% of the secrets. Also, there is a switch that seems to do nothing.
However, I think that Hell Beneath is fun. There is a walkthrough on YouTube that shows a trick to kill the 4 or 5 Barons of Hell. If you know what you are doing, then you can make it through the level, although maybe just barely.
@john2001plus
2 months ago