How you discovered the Doom series? / Your first time playing Doom?

[Diamhea]

Some time in 1995. SNES port.

[Job]

1993. Shareware. 14K connection on AOL, an eternity and 6 floppy discs later, a new era of gaming began.

[Maes]

Job said:

1993. Shareware. 14K connection on AOL, an eternity and 6 floppy discs later, a new era of gaming began.

Why 6 floppies? You got it on 5.25" 360 KB disks? O_o

[Job]

Maes said:

Why 6 floppies? You got it on 5.25" 360 KB disks? O_o

We were either bad at allocating the files or my memory sucks, heh. If not 6, it was 4 or 5. I honestly can't remember, but I do recall it seeming like a lot at the time.

[Koko Ricky]

I seem to recall that my dad would occasionally bring home demo discs from Apogee Software, Epic Megagames and of course id Software. He installed shareware Doom on our 386SX and it barely ran the game; this was back in 1994. Thankfully, within a year, my dad had acquired a laptop for work which ran Doom beautifully. However, neither computer could play anything other than the PC speaker sounds, so my initial foray into Doom was a quiet one.

[Job]

GoatLord said:

I seem to recall that my dad would occasionally bring home demo discs from Apogee Software, Epic Megagames and of course id Software. He installed shareware Doom on our 386SX and it barely ran the game; this was back in 1994. Thankfully, within a year, my dad had acquired a laptop for work which ran Doom beautifully. However, neither computer could play anything other than the PC speaker sounds, so my initial foray into Doom was a quiet one.

When you first played Doom with sound, did the audio match what you imagined it to be after playing it silently?

[Avoozl]

Sometime in 2004 (I was 17 at the time) while I was at TAFE during a break I downloaded the roms of GBA Doom 1 and 2 on to my USB flashdrive, and when I got back home I transferred the roms into the emulators rom directory and then I proceeded to play Doom 1.

But if this isn't restricted to Doom 1 then the first actual time I played Doom was Doom 64 on my friends Nintendo 64 while I was at his place in 1997.

[Breezeep]

I first played the xbox 360 port of Doom 2 and No rest for the living.

EDIT: That was a couple years ago (2009 - 2010, I think?) Sorry for the misinformation.

[AD_79]

First played the shareware episode somewhere about two years ago.

[baja blast rd.]

I was one of the original testers of the alpha version when I was an infant.

[LittleInferno]

2007 or 2008. I was under 10. I could barely figure out how to get to the main menu and I tried to play... the DEMO being shown. I don't think I ever got to the first map. Same thing happened with Quake. In 2012, I actually figured it out, got ZDoom, and I think I only played OBLIGE 4.28 maps until late 2013, in which I discovered OBLIGE V6.

Now I play with GZDoom because software rendering is for n00blets.

[Gothic]

My dad gave me a cd full of shareware versions of various games, including Doom. Apparently it was targeted towards kids because of the boxart (a kid screaming is everything I can remember from the picture), even though it had demos from Blood, Duke 3d, Wolfenstein, etc. Unfortunately I lost that cd, which is a shame because had a lot of great games (Descent and Wacky Wheels were there too).

[NuclearPotato]

I believe the first time I played Doom was around 2003-2004, somewhere around the 10th anniversary, since that was the point where I actually noticed Doom (I had the Keen trilogy and the Wolf 3D shareware as a kid, but by the time I started exploring video games by myself, instead of whatever my dad had, Quake was the new hotness). That was the shareware version; I finally played the full game when I got the Xbox collectors edition of Doom 3.

[Tritnew]

Gothic said:

My dad gave me a cd full of shareware versions of various games, including Doom. Apparently it was targeted towards kids because of the boxart (a kid screaming is everything I can remember from the picture), even though it had demos from Blood, Duke 3d, Wolfenstein, etc. Unfortunately I lost that cd, which is a shame because had a lot of great games (Descent and Wacky Wheels were there too).

God, I do not know HOW It would be meant for Kids, specially Blood being In the collection.

[Tritnew]

NuclearPotato said:

I believe the first time I played Doom was around 2003-2004, somewhere around the 10th anniversary, since that was the point where I actually noticed Doom (I had the Keen trilogy and the Wolf 3D shareware as a kid, but by the time I started exploring video games by myself, instead of whatever my dad had, Quake was the new hotness). That was the shareware version; I finally played the full game when I got the Xbox collectors edition of Doom 3.

Heh, Pretty good start to play DOOM I suppose, specially that Collector's Edition of DOOM. Wish I could get It, but sadly I can't right now.

[Koko Ricky]

Job said:

When you first played Doom with sound, did the audio match what you imagined it to be after playing it silently?

I didn't have any expectations because I had become so accustomed to the tinny PC speaker noises. Sometimes I still hear the walking-over-a-power-up noise in my head.

[Captain Ventris]

I first played Doom when it was Chex Quest. My mom saw that the box came with a game, thought "Couldn't hurt" (because who ever heard of a good video game coming out of a cereal box?) and brought it home. After reading into the development of Chex Quest and all, my brother and I began playing Doom and almost immediately got into exploring modding. So, since about 1996, which would have been when I was five.

[Tritnew]

Captain Ventris said:

I first played Doom when it was Chex Quest. My mom saw that the box came with a game, thought "Couldn't hurt" (because who ever heard of a good video game coming out of a cereal box?) and brought it home. After reading into the development of Chex Quest and all, my brother and I began playing Doom and almost immediately got into exploring modding. So, since about 1996, which would have been when I was five.

Yeah, I've met alot of people who played Chex Quest before DOOM, Anyway, Nice way to find out about DOOM!

[Buckshot]

my dad let me play Wolfenstein 3d and commander keen on his desktop his job gave him to use at home, so one day he brought in a magazine that showed off a upcoming DOOM game, so I started following it on bbs and any other means I could (other gaming magazines and stuff)

Asked him to mail order it after the shareware was released that December, and he did. Suprsingly, he didn't touch games too often (just stuff friends had copied for him on occasion), but once that copy arrived in the mail, that pretty much sealed my future into DOOM, computers, networks and gaming. Luckily, his company gave him a shiny new IBM thinkpad 486 laptop just a week after getting the mail order copy, so I didn't have to play it on the 386 desktop anymore. some months later he finally bought me a 486dx2 66mhz Packard bell legend from circuit city since I pretty much sealed myself in the room with his laptop all day. Apparently his company IT team did software scans and found DOOM and he got in trouble, and told me uninstall it when I was done playing it, and reinstall it when I wanted to. Some time after that, circuit city made a newspaper ad typo on the price of said 486 Packard bell, and after some griping, they honored their erroneous ad and he walked out the door with it for some ridiculously low price. Worked out pretty well.

My dad passed away some years after that tragically and unexpected, but my fondest and best memory of him was when he walked through that door with that new 486dx2 desktop and told me "Bad news, you wont be using my laptop anymore to play your game..." and then he pointed over to the new boxes and said "you'll be using that instead. have fun!".

Still thinking about that makes me a bit teary eyed. Maybe that's why DOOM means so much to me.

Think I was, hmm.. 11 or 12 at the time.

[Jaxxoon R]

What a cool dude.

[Buckshot]

Jaxxoon R said:

What a cool dude.

Strangely, one of those guys who really had little interest in gaming... but saw my interest in it and contributed. I think he was amazed at how quickly I was picking up on computers and games, and learning stuff like that, saw the potential and decided to run with it. My entire career and life evolves around the fact I took interest in tech at that age, and he contributed to it heavily, likely knowing that was the path I was going to run with in life.

[Fonze]

That's a good story buckshot. Don't have nothing to do with me and still brings a smile to my face. He sounds like a great dad and I'm sure he's looking down with a big ole smile and tons of pride :)

[kelliegator]

My parents bought a computer. It had a fuckton of games, including Monkey Island 2, which made me fall in love for the franchise.

I was 6 or 7 years old and my english was limited so I didn't always know what I was getting into in the big list of games there was but there was one english word that really stuck out to me, "DOOM". It was such a cool world for a sheltered Swedish kid with a sheltered religious upbringing like me (that I fortunately liberated myself from).

The title screen showed up there he was, the Doomguy and cacodemon and I was like "OH SHIT THIS LOOKS SO COOL, THERE'S A SPACE DUDE WITH A SHOTGUN AND ALIENS AND SHIT".

I started the game and saw... the first person view. This was uncanny and new to me, I had NEVER seen a first person shooter before so I didn't know how to take it. It felt surreal and intriguing, and then there was that creepy face staring at me at the bottom of the screen.

Past gaming experiences had been Nintendo, Sega and shit, kids stuff, so I had never quite seen a violent video game before.

Doom was different. Doom was violent. And I wasn't one of those kids who had the privilege of watching RoboCop at age 4, I was sheltered. So seeing that Doomguy's face transform into something else, bleeding more and more for each hit, it scared the hell outta me and I was so traumatized I never wanted to play that kinda game again and I think my mom actually deleted the damn thing.



That promise, of course, was a short-lived one. Games like Half-Life pushed the envelope, along with some more PG-friendly FPSes like Jedi Knight. Much later, a terrible movie and the mediocre Doom 3 led me to playing Doom again in my teens and that's how I became a fan. Despite being traumatized, my first memory of Doom is a happy one. <3

[Tritnew]

kelliegator said:

My parents bought a computer. It had a fuckton of games, including Monkey Island 2, which made me fall in love for the franchise.

I was 6 or 7 years old and my english was limited so I didn't always know what I was getting into in the big list of games there was but there was one english word that really stuck out to me, "DOOM". It was such a cool world for a sheltered Swedish kid with a sheltered religious upbringing like me (that I fortunately liberated myself from).

The title screen showed up there he was, the Doomguy and cacodemon and I was like "OH SHIT THIS LOOKS SO COOL, THERE'S A SPACE DUDE WITH A SHOTGUN AND ALIENS AND SHIT".

I started the game and saw... the first person view. This was uncanny and new to me, I had NEVER seen a first person shooter before so I didn't know how to take it. It felt surreal and intriguing, and then there was that creepy face staring at me at the bottom of the screen.

Past gaming experiences had been Nintendo, Sega and shit, kids stuff, so I had never quite seen a violent video game before.

Doom was different. Doom was violent. And I wasn't one of those kids who had the privilege of watching RoboCop at age 4, I was sheltered. So seeing that Doomguy's face transform into something else, bleeding more and more for each hit, it scared the hell outta me and I was so traumatized I never wanted to play that kinda game again and I think my mom actually deleted the damn thing.



That promise, of course, was a short-lived one. Games like Half-Life pushed the envelope, along with some more PG-friendly FPSes like Jedi Knight. Much later, a terrible movie and the mediocre Doom 3 led me to playing Doom again in my teens and that's how I became a fan. Despite being traumatized, my first memory of Doom is a happy one. <3

That's a pretty good and funny story along with Buckshot's, Nice to know that everyone has a good history with DOOM!

[VGamingJunkie]

When I was around the age of 6. I wasn't very good at it, I had to cheat.

[Capellan]

1994.

[Lvangundy]

Pretty sure, late 1993, can't remember where I first saw it though. I have a very faint memory but can't put it together. Some neighbor had it, but my Uncle also did too, not sure which was first.

[Lila Feuer]

1999, 10 years old, off a Games for Windows 95 CD with the Doom shareware running on Doom95. Doom would be my second FPS, Hexen was my first.

[Yuki Senmatsu]

When my 2nd big brother got it from his birthday when I was 6 around 96'. It did had DOOM95 however.

I did use cheats and was on I'm Too Young To Die. Dumb right? I know. Cheats on the easiest difficulty.

That was also before I knew and heard about wads too until over a decade later.

Long story short for that long, I did lose DOOM when I was 13 due to behavior issues. Got DOOM back during Christmas bundled with GZDoom 1.0.29 and DOOM 2 via CD-R and was the first time I played DOOM 2.

......I did ask Santa to get me that. I was 18 at the time.

Also,

Tritnew said:

God, I do not know HOW It would be meant for Kids, specially Blood being In the collection.

ikr? If I did play BLOOD when it came out, my behavior issues wouldn't end very well. Gods.

[Blastfrog]

SNES version in an emulator in 2006. Not exactly the best introduction to it. :P