Doom II - 25 Years Later: An LGR Retrospective

It’s amazing how “aiming” vertically without really aiming becomes an instinct after a while. We just feel that the shot will go where we want and shoot.

There's something weirdly satisfying about the dying groan of Doom's monsters.

How much can Doomguy carry?   Average weight for ammo if at max ammo: 277 lbs (calculated by some guy on a forum) Weight of weapons (either educated guesses, or weight of real-life equivalent or model inspiration): Chainsaw: 20 lbs Pistol (Baretta 92): 2 lbs Shotgun (remington model 870): 7 lbs Chaingun (Minigun): 85 lbs Rocket Launcher (AT4): 15 lbs Plasma Gun (Uses the sprite of an M60 replica): 23 lbs BFG9000 (I used the Junk Jet from fallout because they're about the same size and shape): 30lbs Total Weapon weight: 182 lbs Doomguy is carrying 459 lbs of gear when he's fully loaded.   How much does a fully loaded Doomguy weigh? Now we have to figure out Doomguy's weight and how much his suit weighs. I used the stats for Blazkowicz from Wolfenstein since they used the same sized sprite for both games to get his body weight weight. Body weight = 245 lbs His suit is a bit trickier for sure. We can tell that it's heavily armored (he survives hell fireballs and shit). A close comparison to his suit is the suit worn by ODSTs in Halo. ODST armor is made mostly out of titanium plating, which gives us a place to start. According to a random guy on reddit, "A typical suit of armor weighs 20 - 25kg". I use 20kg, because suits of armor have overlapping segments and sliding joints that titanium combat armor wouldn't have. I then got the density of steel to find out how much steel is in a suit of armor, and then find out how much an equal amount of titanium would weigh. A suit of combat armor for ODST comes out around 170 lbs from material alone. However, ODST armor isn't nearly as cool as Doomguy's armor, which we see from Doom 2016 gives him super strength and impact compensation, and the ability to breath anywhere without limit, so I estimate that Doomguy's suit weighs around 500 lbs (half the weight of MJOLNIR armor from Halo). Suit weight = 500 lbs Total weight = 1204 lbs How fast can Doomguy run?  Oh boy, this one has been debated all over Doom forums forever. Here's how the numbers worked out. Doomguy's speed in game is measured in map units per tic, or mu/tic. 8 map units is 1 foot (hotly debated but these are the numbers given by ID Software in patchnotes so fuck other numbers). 35 tics is 1 second. In the code, his forward acceleration is listed as 50 mu/tic with a maxspeed of 30 mu/tic So his acceleration works out to 66 m/s2 His measured speed in game is 16.6 mu/tic, which comes out to 49.5 mph. However, his top speed is capped at 30 mu/tic, which is 90 mph.   What these numbers mean Doomguy weighs 1204 lbs and moves around at a speed of 49.5 mph. His energy while he's moving is 132132 joules. At his maximum top speed, he exerts 5739825 joules worth of energy, which is about the same energy as the explosion from 1kg of TNT. If he ran headfirst into a wall at top speed, he'd hit the wall with 9 million newtons of force, which is just a bit south of the thrust generated by the Saturn V rocket on liftoff. Doomguy could put the Saturn V in space by running into it at full speed. Don't fuck with Doomguy. https://www.reddit.com/r/Doom/comments/4nt3fo/i_got_bored_and_did_some_math_on_the_original/

The 90s were such a glorious gaming time. So many hours spent on Doom, Quake, Age of Empires 2, Diablo 2, Command and Conquer and countless wonderful console games.

Hilariously, I used to know Sandy Petersen when he taught at Guildhall in Plano, Texas for awhile. He mentioned at one point that he made a map shaped after his own hand XD

Only Doom II could pull off making up for the lack of new arsenal by introducing only one new gun that is one of the best guns in the history of everything. Oh, and cool new monsters helped too!

My Doom II story: My mom walked in on my father and I playing Co-op together when I was like 8. She said "[My dad's name], don't you think it is inappropriate to teach Matt it is okay to kill people" after she saw me blow away some Zombie. I explain to her "It's okay Mom! He's already dead" because, you know, Zombies aren't alive. They're just imitating life. I had great morals and great aim even at 8.

2:48 "M" rating stood for "Must Have".

25 years old and still kicks ass.

Although I was disappointed at the time how it looked very similar, those new higher tier monsters really changed the flow of the game for the better

PC gaming end cap of the computer game section at a local K-Mart. So many things in that sentence that are no longer around.

"There's also a room with hanging commander keens." Sad LGR noises

I want to let you know, Clint... I cherish these moments. I know the algorithm and your current followers probably don't want content like this, but dangit! I come to Lazy Game Reviews for Lazy Game Reviews, and it's always a joy seeing you talk about games, weather you like them or they are a product of Head Games. I love your game reviews and your retrospectives. I love the reverence you show towards games. I understand why game reviews and retrospectives that aren't Sims 4 only come around once every two months or so, but I wanna let you know there IS an appetite out there for them, even if it isn't as big as your normal stuff. Also, I love me some Doom 2 as someone who snubbed on FPS games in the 90's after feeling like I had bad experiences with Goldeneye and Perfect Dark with my friends leading me to not really care about FPS games until VERY recently.

I mean, on Sandy's defence, he had to make over half the levels of Doom II, so he did the best he could

I remember using my lunch break to go pick this game up when it was first released. I caressed the package and read the manual, dreaming of the contents; I had to work my entire shift before I could install and play it. I could hardly think of anything else all shift, rushing home to install and play this brilliant and fun game. Good times. Thanks for the memories, LGR.

I remember back in the day where I thought if I look at the enemy up there and shoot, it will hit the demon and somehow it always worked. I was like "I control my aiming with my thoughts!" Ah... imagination.

"things can always be fixed with more guns, this was made in Texas after all"

Fun fact: the shotgun in Doom was a scan of a toy.

Doom is my absolute ALL TIME favorite game to play. I still beat it over and over, and yet I never tire from it. Truly a demonic masterpiece.

These were times where graphic quality of video games, strangely conceived level design and cutscenes made of plain text allowed us to use the best hardware we have to experience such a journey : imagination. And accompanied with a depressing soundtrack only high end sound cards could render with the quality it deserve, imagination could leave scars to the soul. Like Dante's depicted journey through inferno, Doom2 is a work of art that probably have a meaning to anyone who had a grip for it on its days. Maybe for the better, as said in the end, one day, rebuilding earth ought to be a lot more fun than ruining it was.