WebTV Plus

Doom for WebTV was a commercial port of the original Doom to the WebTV internet set-top box. Plans for this port are known to reach back as far as 1998, but along with a few other games developed for WebTV, was only available publicly for the EchoStar Dishplayer iteration of WebTV hardware in 1999. Though not initially widely known, Doom was also being made for and available on the WebTV Plus unit, although it wasn't meant for public release yet. Hackers discovered the game on an internal section of the WebTV service known as "TestDrive" in late. They were able to download the game at first from a Games settings page on that service and also extracted the download and startup commands, which were then released to the public a year later, supposedly on March 28, 1999. However, due to a combination of factors, such as the lack of knowledge or care to know how the targeted WebTV hardware stored data on their hard drives at the time, WebTV Networks, Inc. (WNI) attempting to remotely wipe the WebTV Plus version of the game and other "unauthorized files" off of subscribers units, and the WebTV hacking scene's lack of regard for properly preserving any critical information or content (if they preserve something at all), especially binaries or overall technical information, untampered archives of the game files have been near impossible to find and before 2014, didn't exist outside of the WebTV service at all.

Doom for WebTV apparently consisted of the shareware version of the game and was made as a demonstration of the WebTV hardware's technological capabilities.

Obtaining the game
It's currently unknown if Dishplayer users had to download Doom from the WebTV service at all, but it could be launched on those units by going to the Games tab on TV Home and selecting Doom as the game to launch.

For users using WebTV Plus during the time the game was still available to download, they had to be connected to the TestDrive service first, which was usually done by accessing the Tricks section of the production service (Tricks was a password-locked area with various internal services meant to test the WebTV hardware and service, which hackers obtained one of the passwords for around the same year Doom for WebTV Plus was discovered) and downloading a firmware build that was designed to connect to TestDrive. At first, users could just go to a Games settings page on TestDrive, download Doom from there, and then launch it through the game's landing page. After the settings page was taken down and the landing page for the game modified to not allow a user to launch it, the WebTV Plus version of Doom could still be downloaded by accessing the WebTV service URL, and afterwards, the game could be launched with a command in the form of a WebTV-specific URI (i.e., ).

Availability outside the WebTV service
Up until 2014, neither the Dishplayer nor the original WebTV Plus versions of the Doom port were archived outside the WebTV service for the reasons mentioned at the beginning of this page. In 2014, the Dishplayer version of the Doom WebTV port was available for play outside of the WebTV service for the first time by being bundled in a customized version of the WebTV firmware made for Dishplayer and WebTV Plus units released by people in the WebTV hacking scene, dubbed "HackTV". Due to the possibility of files being modified for the HackTV release, it's not advised to rely on using the custom build as an accurate source of the Doom for WebTV game files. 7 years later, in 2021, it was announced by notorious WebTV "hacker" MattMan69 that the data for the WebTV Plus version of Doom was found in text files on a 20-year old CD-R backup, which was then used to reassemble the game into a proper format. This also resulted in exclusive releases on the custom "HackTV" build and on a fully fledged WebTV "revival server" operated by scene members, which currently remains private. Sadly, the versions released by MattMan are confirmed to have been modified with no regard to preserve the original game files elsewhere, with the splash screens being edited or replaced to plaster "HackTV" branding in game. The closest we have to proper preservation of the original files for the WebTV port of Doom at the moment are copies of the production and debug versions designed for the Dishplayer hardware that were released in a dedicated WebTV content archive by someone that also operates a WebTV-focused wiki aiming to document any (primarily technical) information on the product and service that prior to the effort had been severely undocumented. The integrity of either copy currently archived is also unclear right now as they were originally sent by a WebTV scene member along with firmware and game ROMs, some of which had been hacked by scene members for their own purposes.

Differences
Not enough documentation has been made on differences between Doom for WebTV and the original PC version, but from what has been covered recently, the WebTV port only offers 4 episodes to play. Controls are also designed for use with WebTV keyboards, with the arrow keys moving the player around, keys 0-9 swapping the weapon, the Ctrl key triggering the weapon, and spacebar for opening doors.