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How to DOOM: Three Easy Steps
It's a snap to get DOOM up and running on today's computers.
By Benjamin Turner | Dec. 11, 2003

So, you've read a lot about DOOM this week. You heard us sing its praises. And now, you want to play it for yourself. Great! Whether you're an old DOOM veteran or a rank newbie, let me commend you on your excellent taste in first-person shooters. Now, to the business at hand.

Step One: Obtain Yourself Some DOOM

The DOOM Collector's Edition is a nice package in more than one sense.

Contrary to what your shady cousins might tell you, DOOM cannot be legally downloaded for free. It is not abandonware. (Really, most games people classify as abandonware actually aren't, but that's another story.) So, you need to get a copy of DOOM, DOOM II, or Final DOOM from somewhere. Or you could snag the DOOM shareware, if you just want a taste of the game. That is free. The three other products mentioned above are not. If you wanna go with shareware, just skip down to the next step.

Buying a DOOM product should be rather easy, as Activision has been good about keeping it on the market. It may be tricky at this point to find any of the three major releases alone, but you should have more luck if you search for "The Depths of DOOM Trilogy" (D1, D2, Master Levels) or the "DOOM Collector's Edition" (D1, D2, FD). The latter package in particular is an excellent value, and you can probably find it for in the neighborhood of $20.

You can also go directly to id Software's website and purchase the games for $25 a pop. However, that's a pretty weak price compared to what you'll get with one of the collections, and to add insult to robbery these are downloadable-only -- you don't get a hard copy. Unless you just can't wait, I'd recommend seeking out one of the retail products mentioned above. Boxes are fun!

Now, assuming you got one of the newer packages that ships with DOOM 95 on the disc, you can install it and get fragging right now. However, we can do a lot better than DOOM 95, thanks to the magic of source ports.

Step Two: Snag a Source Port

Source what? Don't worry, this part is fun. Here's the deal. In 1997, id generously released the source code to DOOM, and ever since then hobbyist programmers have been cooking up specially modified versions of DOOM. These are called source ports, since they are ports, often to other platforms, based off of the DOOM source code. Every source port has a unique set of features. Some just seek to make DOOM playable on another platform or operating system. Others are more ambitious, and add feature upon awesome feature to id's classic game. That's the type we'll be talking about here. Now, there are tons of source ports, so I'm only going to touch upon the ones I have experience with.

ZDoom: Simple and pure.

First up is ZDoom (Download). This one's been around a long time, and is my most-played port. It adds all the basic modern amenities to DOOM, such as high resolutions, alpha transparencies, mouselook and jumping. It also has some great features for level editors, like sloped floors, BOOM support and extensive scripting. Best of all, the latest version breaks DOOM's old 35 frames-per-second barrier, running at a very nice 60 fps. Now, it isn't 3D accelerated (there is a ZDoomGL, but it's several versions behind the latest ZDoom), so it's not the prettiest DOOM out there. It is, however, a wonderfully complete package otherwise. I turn off the Quake-style bits like mouselook and jumping and it feels just like regular DOOM ... only much higher-res and 60 fps. I like ZDoom. (And it's what was used to take all the shots for this series.)

Next: More Ports, Maps & Mods »
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