On Id Software games

Christopher Bazley, June-September 2020

I don't think anyone can really appreciate the genius of the designers of Doom without trying to replicate it. They invented and used every trick to create interesting environments within the limitations of their game engine. It's all there in the first level. Rather than going mad with millions of polygons, the effect is mainly achieved through texture, light and height variation and the sky projection; the plan view looks deceptively simple. Isn't that art?

I wish that sound editors would stop using the spawn cube effect from Doom 2 in TV and films. (Most recently in the trailer for Greenland.) It's so recognisable that it adds bathos to every scene it appears in. Imagine how interesting it would be to hear new sounds instead of the same ten they've been recycling for thirty years. They wouldn't play all the music on a Casio keyboard or use video game sprites as characters, so why use such cheap sounds?

Id Software's follow-up to Doom, Quake, is a really grim game. Apparently one can now buy the soundtrack on vinyl. Can you imagine sitting down and listening to that? I'd slit my wrists. There is no hope, joy or irony in Quake. I find myself pausing to marvel at stained glass, gobsmacked at the revelation that blue exists in this dimension.

Since the only common enemies that drop ammunition are ogres (and my goodness there are a thousand of those), I find myself forced into using grenades in the most unsuitable situations. Not only that, they are the only thing that kills zombies. I get that the concept of bouncing grenades was a novelty in 1996 but it's really rather wearing. The only weapons that are actually fun to use are the nail guns, and nails are like hen's teeth.

Overall, I'm reminding myself why Doom was superior (not technically — just in every other respect).