A Visit to id Software

A Visit to id Software is a 32-minutes video recorded in November 1993 by Dan Linton, operator of the. The first third is a tour of id's office (showing id employees and associates Adrian Carmack, Shawn Green, Sandy Petersen, John Romero, Dave Taylor, Jay Wilbur, and Bobby Prince), the remaining two third being gameplay footage. Joe Siegler from discovered a VHS tape with this footage in 2009 and sent it to John Romero, who digitized it and placed it on Vimeo.

The video quality is poor, since the game footage was obtained by filming the monitor. However, it reveals a few things on the development of the game, showing how it was some time between the beta and its final form. The id crew makes many comments about the game and the levels during the demonstration, pointing attention to various map details, engine features as well as bugs not yet fixed.

The game still featured a number of major bugs, such as, when finishing a level, often crashing with a Z_Malloc error message and a helpful notice telling not to worry about the "file not found" error also displayed.

Some of the notable differences include:
 * Interface
 * HUD messages (such as item pickups) are displayed right above the status bar, instead of on the top of the screen. The game displays the last three messages.
 * The ouch face is displayed while walking on damaging floors, but not when taking heavy damage.
 * On the intermission screen, the statistics are aligned horizontally as KILL, ITEM and SCRT. rather than vertically. The level music continues on the intermission screen, instead of it having its own theme ("Intermission from DOOM ", also used for E2M3).


 * Sound effects
 * As a placeholder, the Wolfenstein 3D sound effects are used. All the monsters have the same death scream, and all the weapons have the same detonation &mdash; even the chainsaw which as a result sounds like a chaingun.


 * Misc
 * Bonus items are still treasures instead of health and armor bonuses. However, the demonic dagger already functions as a health bonus, and the skull chest as armor bonus. Unholy bible and evil sceptres, present in the beta, were already removed from the game.
 * Imp fireballs are still using the beta graphics (smaller and with four points, somewhat like a red plasma ball).
 * Health and armor seem uncapped. Picking up skull chests after a blue armor improves the armor rating past 200%. The soulsphere gives 100 points of both health and armor. Picking up one with 147% health and 203% armor resulting in 247% health and 303% armor.
 * Keys are still around in deathmatch. They remain behind when picked up so that another player can also pick them up.
 * Deathmatch uses regular player starts.


 * Level design
 * The exit areas does not feature barrels yet, and the exit room features a nonfunctional door, making it seem like a switch-activated airlock. (The later levels also feature the nonfunctional exit door.)


 * E1M1
 * No bonus items are present.
 * The green armor tower is behind a secret door, and contains a shotgun instead. The green armor and its pedestal is found right in front of the secret door.
 * The computer room is not present. Instead, there is a length of detailed corridor, with a large bay window to the right and an elevated area to the left.


 * E1M2
 * The red key aisle is still accessed by lifts rather than by stairways.
 * The music track is "Dark Halls" (E1M3) instead of "The Imp's Song".
 * The backpack secret in the computer maze area contains a rocket launcher instead of a backpack. (The game crashes after picking it up, so the rest of the level is not seen.)


 * E1M3
 * Music track is "Waiting For Romero To Play" (Doom II MAP18) instead of "Dark Halls"
 * The hidden window opening from the left part of the map to the center room before the secret exit is behind a computer screen showing the "PLANET1" texture. Once opened, visibility is reduced by BRNBIGR+BRNBIGL midtexture combination.


 * E1M4
 * The courtyard is not yet open to the sky. The skylight instead is textured with FLAT9.
 * The northeastern room is still textured with GRAY7 instead of the final STARTAN3. Its "one-time-only" lift raises into the ceiling, triggering a massive HOM from which Romero escapes by no-clipping back into a playable part of the level.


 * E1M5
 * The stairways/corridors circling around the western nukage pit do not have their monster closet traps yet.