[HN Gopher] Doom3do: DOOM for the 3DO
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       Doom3do: DOOM for the 3DO
        
       Author : tambourine_man
       Score  : 57 points
       Date   : 2022-11-02 17:44 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (github.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
        
       | lordfrito wrote:
       | Wonderful to see this stuff online...
       | 
       | For those of you who don't know the utter sh*tshow that was the
       | 3DO version of Doom, and the full story of Randy Scott and Art
       | Data Interactive, here's an article that's well worth the read.
       | 
       | https://www.badgamehalloffame.com/doom-3do/
       | 
       | TLDR; Randy Scott knew nothing about software development, but
       | that didn't stop him from getting people in his church to invest
       | $100k to start Art Data Interactive and license source code from
       | ID. He told 3DO he could do it, and would add new levels, new
       | weapons, you name it. At the time Doom was a big deal, and 3DO
       | heavily promoted it as the systems flagship title and the best
       | version you could play. Knowing nothing about software
       | development, Scott believed all that had to be done to put a new
       | weapon into a game was to "provide a programmer a picture of what
       | it was supposed to look like". Kept saying it was being worked on
       | and "90% complete" but had nothing to show. As time ticked by,
       | 3DO finally realized the mess they were in, but had to deliver
       | something at launch, with their back against the wall they
       | recruited an outside developer to "finish up some bugs and get
       | the game ready for shipping and get it out in about a month or
       | two". Turns out no work had been done, the programmer had to go
       | directly to her contacts at ID, with many late night heroics to
       | get the game done in 10 weeks for Xmas launch.
       | 
       | All that's missing from this story is having Randy twirling his
       | mustache. Last I heard he was arrested a few years back for some
       | stuff I won't mention here... You can't make this stuff up...
        
       | billyhoffman wrote:
       | This commit from 29 days ago added a ton of behind-the-scenes
       | photos from the shoot for the full motion videos which was going
       | to be included in the game and which were famously cut [1].
       | 
       | https://github.com/Olde-Skuul/doom3do/commit/f3ea056bc9659bc...
       | 
       | [1] - https://www.timeextension.com/features/the-true-story-
       | behind...
        
         | nazgulsenpai wrote:
         | The sad part is the FMV was cut from the retail release because
         | of time constraints. The story of Doom on 3DO is truly a
         | fascinating take of just about everything (except the music)
         | going terribly wrong.
        
       | jonny_eh wrote:
       | > I created two apps, one to draw the 3do logo and the other to
       | show the logicware logo. After they executed, they were purged
       | from memory and the main game could run without loss of memory.
       | 
       | I believe Morrowind on OG Xbox does something similar when you
       | transition from the main menu to the actual game. Very clever.
        
         | bombcar wrote:
         | Didn't an Xbox game actually set it up so the entire processor
         | would reboot and just appear to be loading a level?
        
           | netruk44 wrote:
           | That was also Morrowind. I believe they said it happened when
           | the console was running low on memory, they would just reboot
           | when you transition between areas. You would get the dreaded
           | 'long loading screen' which was the console rebooting in
           | disguise.
           | 
           | You could set an image to display while the console rebooted,
           | so they put up a loading screen and rebooted the console.
           | When the console rebooted, the game knew it was in a
           | "loading" screen, and picked up from there.
        
             | bombcar wrote:
             | I love that they did it, and I love that Microsoft knew it
             | could happen and built in a custom image feature for
             | reboots.
             | 
             | Modern problems require modern solutions, indeed.
             | 
             | The real snazzy way would have been to use an older chip in
             | the HDMI processing pipeline somewhere, and let you play an
             | older game on that chip. I believe Nintendo has used older
             | generation chips as sub-chips now and then.
        
               | jonny_eh wrote:
               | > HDMI processing pipeline somewhere
               | 
               | The original xbox didn't even have an HDMI port.
               | 
               | Plus, I believe at that time Namco owned the patent on
               | "games during loading screens".
        
         | aardvark179 wrote:
         | This was a fairly common technique in the 8 but days with disk
         | based games, and Exile even did it on the cassette version -
         | you loaded the game menu, loaded your saved fame, and then
         | loaded the game.
        
       | VikingCoder wrote:
       | This was the same person "Burger" [1] who worked on The Bard's
       | Tale. I can't even tell you how many hours I spent playing those
       | games as a kid.
       | 
       | > This is the temple of the Mad God. What is thy business,
       | unbeliever?
       | 
       | # [S]peak to the priest
       | 
       | > Only those who know the name of the Mad One are welcome. What
       | wilt thou say?
       | 
       | # burger
       | 
       | > Thou hath uttered the most unspeakable word! Prepare to die!!!
       | 
       | > Now you did it. Before you, you see 99 Ancient Enemies, 99
       | Jabberwocks (20'), 99 Maze Masters (30'), and 99 Gimps (40').
       | 
       | # [F]ight bravely
       | 
       | [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Heineman
        
       | ceronman wrote:
       | If you haven't seen it yet, Rebecca Heineman, the author of this
       | code has a long video explaining how this was made. Highly
       | recommended:
       | 
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBbIil2HPSU
        
       | tappdarden wrote:
       | previous
       | 
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8679060                  85
       | points by joelby37 on Dec 1, 2014 | hide | past | favorite | 18
       | comments
        
       | doublerabbit wrote:
       | I just wished more consoles were successful than the major three
       | we have now.
       | 
       | If Jaguar, 3do were still around we would be in a better
       | universe.
        
       | Aardwolf wrote:
       | This post comes just after Angry Video Game Nerd discussed almost
       | all console ports of Doom, including 3do:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5zyhC11hzQ
        
       | suprjami wrote:
       | I recently made some posts about a couple of other Rebecca
       | Heineman games for DOS:
       | 
       | - Mindshadow (1985). https://www.instagram.com/p/CkbiWcIhM2p/
       | 
       | - Borrowed Time (1985). https://www.instagram.com/p/CkeMZJfhHkK/
       | 
       | She has been making games for so long and made many popular ones!
        
       | brianbreslin wrote:
       | Why do people keep porting DOOM to different obsolete platforms
       | or recreating it in Javascript? Is there some internal "cool"
       | factor for doing this in super niche geeky dev communities?
        
         | hd4 wrote:
         | Try actually reading, it's the original port.
        
           | brianbreslin wrote:
           | When one sees the last commit as 29 days ago, or the previous
           | commit as 8 years ago, one can easily assume it wasn't code
           | from 1995. So again. Why is this even interesting?
        
             | tappdarden wrote:
             | github (and git) wasn't around in 1995
             | 
             | One should read the readme's.
             | 
             | let people enjoy things.
        
             | IntelMiner wrote:
             | Read the readme instead of arguing on HN about it
        
         | tappdarden wrote:
         | This was made over 20 years ago. The 3do never had much success
         | but it wasn't obsolete yet.
        
         | bluedino wrote:
         | It's open source, easy to port, and people that played PC games
         | in the 90's have fond memories of it.
        
         | anyfoo wrote:
         | Niche? Porting DOOM is pretty much the canonical mainstream
         | thing to do to new or newly discovered old platforms.
         | 
         | That being said, this is about the original, and official,
         | commercial DOOM port decades ago.
        
         | gattilorenz wrote:
         | The answer to both is... yes.
         | 
         | I could have tried to port, say, Actua Soccer to SCO Xenix, but
         | I went with DOOM because the source is available, every detail
         | is known, there's a million different ports to learn from,
         | there's a reasonably clear separation of OS dependent and
         | independent parts, everyone loves DOOM, it runs on any
         | hardware, porting DOOM to platform X is almost a meme, ...
         | should I continue?
        
       | lph wrote:
       | > I had no time to port the music driver, so I had a band that
       | Art Data hired to redo the music so all I needed to do is call a
       | streaming audio function to play the music. This turned out to be
       | an excellent call because while the graphics were lackluster, the
       | music got rave reviews.
       | 
       | Wow, no kidding. The music is terrific.
       | 
       | [1] DOOM 3DO soundtrack
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjEx292Ph8M
        
         | lph wrote:
         | ...and for bonus points, play that soundtrack as a background
         | for the AI Herzog-Zizek infinite conversation [1]. It is
         | glorious.
         | 
         | [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33437296
        
         | skocznymroczny wrote:
         | PSX Doom soundtrack is also pretty unique, abandoning the
         | electric guitar in favor of ambient gloomy horror atmosphere.
        
           | dschuessler wrote:
           | The producer's name is Aubrey Hodges. He also made the music
           | for Doom 64. You can find (and buy) both soundtracks on his
           | webpage: http://www.aubreyhodges.com/discography/discography/
        
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       (page generated 2022-11-02 23:00 UTC)