Sony PlayStation



The  version of Doom is a port of Doom and Doom II by Williams Entertainment. It was released on November 16, 1995, and runs on a modified version of the Doom engine used in the Atari Jaguar port. It features 28 levels from Ultimate Doom, 23 from Doom II and 7 original levels.

The game features a multiplayer mode, but lacks split-screen; two consoles have to be together instead. This makes the multiplayer experience truer to the original, but at the expense of accessibility.

John Romero is quoted on the back cover, calling this the "best DOOM yet," and is credited as "Creator of DOOM".

It was followed shortly by a port of Final Doom, reusing the same engine and most custom resources.

Gameplay


The rendering engine has been rewritten to utilize the PlayStation's 3D hardware. This renderer allows enhancements such as higher color depth, alpha blending and colorized sectors.

The original Doom levels are based on the Jaguar version, and therefore, as with all ports based on this version, the simplifications to the map geometry and texturing versus the PC version are carried over. The maps from Ultimate Doom's Episode 4 and Doom II contain similar, although fewer changes. Overall, this means that the number of unique textures per map is lower than in the PC version. Further examples of simplifications would be the omission of crushers in Ultimate Doom and the reduction of large vertical heights. These changes are done mainly for performance reasons; however, there is still noticeable slowdown in certain levels, particularly when playing on the higher difficulty settings.

As a feature unique to the PSX and Saturn ports, monsters from Doom II appear in Ultimate Doom levels when the game is played on the "Ultra Violence" skill level. Also, megaspheres can be found in the exclusive PSX/Saturn Ultimate Doom levels MAP29: Twilight Descends, MAP30: Threshold of Pain and MAP57: The Marshes, with the latter additionally featuring a super shotgun.

Several other exclusive maps are included: MAP54: Redemption Denied, MAP58: The Mansion, and MAP59: Club Doom

Some enemies such as the Baron of Hell, mancubus, cyberdemon and spiderdemon appear less frequently.

Enemies
A tougher type of spectre, the nightmare spectre, has been added. While the regular spectre looks like a partially invisible demon, the nightmare spectre is subtractively blended, and is harder to kill due to having twice the hit points of an ordinary spectre.

There is no arch-vile because the developers felt they could not do him justice on the PSX, because it had twice as many frames of animation as other monsters.

The final boss from Doom II is not in the game.

As the corresponding secret maps are missing, the game lacks the Wolfenstein SS and Commander Keen enemies.

As in the Jaguar port, enemies from Doom do different amounts of damage as compared to their PC counterparts. For example, a Zombieman's pistol shots can inflict up to 24 damage, as opposed to the normal maximum of 15. Some enemies are also referred to in slightly different terminology in the game's manual. Zombiemen, again as an example, are referred to as "former soldiers" rather than "former humans".

This game's version of the revenant is considerably easier to tangle with than its PC counterpart; its running speed is approximately half normal, and is akin to a zombie's or imp's pace. While it only fires homing missiles, the missiles are also slower and easier to avoid.

Levels
Notes
 * 1: ported from Jaguar Doom.
 * 2: exclusive level.
 * 3: entirely different map from PC version.
 * 4: originally titled Tower of Babel in Jaguar Doom.
 * 5: originally titled Dis in Jaguar Doom.

Differences from PC
Generally speaking, The Ultimate Doom and Doom II are different halves of the same game on the Sony PlayStation. They are included on the same disc, playing through as a two-episode game (titled "Ultimate Doom" and "Doom II" on the main menu), beginning in Ultimate Doom's "The Hangar". Monsters and weapons from Doom II appear throughout Ultimate Doom and Ultimate Doom's secret maps are ordered after the final map of Doom II.

Ultimate Doom itself is not split into further episodes, playing instead as 30 continuous maps. Intermission text only appears once the player completes Ultimate Doom and, later, Doom II segments of the game. The intermission text is read out in a distorted and somewhat sarcastic voice.

The Super Shotgun in The Ultimate Doom
The Super Shotgun can be obtained in The Ultimate Doom by cheating to receive all the weapons, or legitimately through the PlayStation-exclusive secret map "The Marshes". Since The Marshes is accessible from the penultimate map of Ultimate Doom, and the super shotgun can therefore only be used in Ultimate Doom maps which are exclusive to the PlayStation port (The Marshes and Threshold of Pain), the impact of this weapon in Ultimate Doom is negligible.

The PlayStation port is the only version of Doom in which the player can obtain the super shotgun in a map in The Ultimate Doom.

Music and Sound Effects

 * New ambient background music for most levels sequenced using a simplistic form of wave sequencing, rather than wavetable/MIDI generated audio. Additionally, Red Book CD audio is used for the title, menus, demos, intermission, finales, and for the main section of the secret level, Club Doom. Aubrey Hodges created the music and reused a slightly modified rendition of the symphonic rock/metal theme in Doom 64. In interviews, Hodges explains that he made "weird noises" into a soft drink carton to create some of the sound effects and he obtained samples for his instruments from a variety of bizarre sources, including a bee trapped in a coke can.
 * Hodges' music creates a darker, more threatening atmosphere than Bobby Prince's tracks for the PC. Playstation Doom's themes include melancholy music, howling wind, the cries of babies, distorted voices and hoarse breathing. Comparison between the soundtracks of Hodges and Prince are difficult due to their widely different natures.
 * The PSX SPU's reverb features are utilized, both for sound effects (mainly in enclosed areas) and soundtrack.
 * PlayStation Doom is the only port with a music track featuring "lyrics" - or at least spoken, distorted words. A somewhat similar idea was later used in the game Duke Nukem 64.
 * Nearly all of the sound effects are different to the PC version and were reused in Doom 64. These sound effects do not appear in any other version of Doom.
 * Sound effects will echo in closed-off parts of the levels (any area with a ceiling).
 * "Club Doom", the port's exclusive super-secret level, is the only map in any version of Doom in which the music changes as you progress through the map. This effect can now be achieved in the PC using modern source ports.

Visual Features and Limitations
◾ Maps generally appear darker on the PlayStation port than the PC and other ports. The PlayStation actually rendered the maps brighter than the PC equivalents, so maps were generally darkened between 33-50%, making them appear generally more shadowy than the PC originals. ◾ To optimize the game for the PlayStation, some map areas were simplified; most noticeably, staircases with large numbers of 8-high steps were modified to have fewer steps of height 16. Sectors with large numbers of vertices were either omitted or had the number of vertices reduced. ◾ Tall sectors generally have their heights reduced to prevent texture tiling issues, due to a technical limitation of the PlayStation's hardware. Zero-height sectors are sometimes used to prevent "glitches" in the display of taller sectors. ◾ Maps are limited to no more than sixteen separate types of flat texture due to available memory. ◾ Maps feature colorized sectors. ◾ There are animated wall textures (malfunctioning computer screen) in the PlayStation version of Doom. However, there is a smaller variety of computer screen textures. ◾ The sky texture used on many maps is an animated fire texture. ◾ Crushing ceilings are not as commonly used in the PlayStation port as they are in the PC version. ◾ Windows affording views of complicated or wide-open areas of the map are removed or shortened, for example in The Ultimate Doom's "Sever the Wicked". However, some maps do feature large, open areas, such as Sever the Wicked, Suburbs, Subterra and the courtyard area of Vesperas. ◾ Some textures were reduced in size. ◾ Some animations, such as firing the rocket launcher, had frames cut. ◾ There are different decorative items, such as a bloody hook (mentioned below). ◾ There are no Nazi-themed textures or music since the secret levels "Wolfenstein" and "Grosse" are not present in the PlayStation port. Every map is Doom-related with no crossovers into other id Software games.
 * Different status bar. The one used in this game has a darker tone (more black rather than gray in the original) and does not feature the listing of the remaining ammo of all types on the right side like the original.

Monster Use ◾ The use of different monster types was limited by available RAM. This primarily affects the larger, more complicated enemies like the Mancubus and Spider Mastermind. These monsters were replaced on certain maps or removed altogether in order to avoid a game crash upon the level being loaded. For example, Mancubi are replaced by Hell Knights in Doom II's "The Abandoned Mines" and there is no Spider Mastermind on the Doom II map "The Factory" (one would appear in the PC version when played co-operatively on Ultra-Violence). ◾ PlayStation Final Doom has some very noticeable changes regarding the deployment of monsters in maps. For example, the Mancubus, Baron of Hell and Cyberdemon only appear in one map each and the Spider Mastermind does not appear at all, due to the above-mentioned RAM limits and the maps selected for the PlayStation port. ◾ The Arch-Vile enemy has a memory-intensive nature (due to a very large number of frames) and therefore does not appear at all in PlayStation Doom or Final Doom, being replaced by the decorative item of a hanging, bloody hook. This hook does not appear in the PC version. ◾ There are also no Icon of Sin or Nazi soldier enemies. ◾ A new monster, the "Nightmare Spectre", was created for this port. It is similar to the original Spectre but dark cyan in color with twice as much health. This monster uses the same sprite set as the Demon and Spectre and therefore does not impose any extra load on the PlayStation's RAM. The Nightmare Spectre may be used as a Hell Knight and Arch-Vile replacement on some maps - for example, Doom II's "The Inmost Dens", in which there are no Arch-Viles. The Nightmare Spectre is essentially a Pink Demon with specific flags to alter its colour, transparency and health. ◾ A transparent Cacodemon appears in the PlayStation version of "The Tenements", due to this monster having the same flag as a Spectre demon. The Caco-spectre appears in a cage above a pit of brown nukage, but since it is very likely the player will kill the creature without approaching it, players are unlikely to notice its transparency. This single Cacodemon is the only creature in the entire PlayStation port - apart from Spectres and Nightmare Spectres - to have the Spectre flag set. ◾ As the player is unable to save their game within a map, the difficulty and tension of each map are significantly increased, since the player must complete the map in one sitting. ◾ There are significantly fewer maps from The Plutonia Experiment included in PlayStation Final Doom than there are Master Levels and TNT: Evilution maps. The Plutonia Experiment was described by its creators as much more difficult than TNT: Evilution or Doom II as it features a significant number of resource-intensive monsters. However, there is no official reason why The Plutonia Experiment was all but excluded from the PlayStation port.

Technical Features and Limitations
◾ Occasionally, minor issues in Doom and Final Doom are corrected in the PlayStation ports. ◾ The frame rate tends to lag somewhat compared to the PC version on larger or more populated maps, leading to slightly slower paced gameplay. ◾ Theoretically, any monster in the game could have flags set to turn it into a "Spectre" (transparent) or "Nightmare Spectre" (transparent, negative colours, increased health) without additional load on the available RAM. However, apart from the single Cacodemon mentioned previously, only some Pink Demons have these flags set. This may mean Nightmare Cyberdemons were possible, for example. ◾ The appearance of the status bar is different. The one used in this game has a darker tone (more black rather than gray in the original) and only lists remaining ammunition for the weapon the player is currently using. It also indicates which weapon is being used. ◾ Weapons must be cycled through since there is no way to directly select a specific weapon. Weapons can be cycled forwards or backwards. The player can cycle through weapons while the game is paused but the weapon will not be drawn until the game is unpaused. ◾ There is an added status bar face gib animation. ◾ Corpses crushed by a door, lift or crushing ceiling make a "gibbing" sound effect. ◾ The Super Shotgun has a different appearence in the North American and European versions of Final Doom. ◾ The Super Shotgun occupies weapon slot 4 on this port, unlike the original in which it shares slot 3. This means that the chaingun, rocket launcher, plasma rifle and BFG occupy slots 5, 6, 7 and 8 respectively. ◾ The I'm too young to die skill level is renamed I am a wimp. ◾ There is no Nightmare! skill level. ◾ There are no -fast or -respawn parameters for the monsters, nor is there any other way to modify gameplay except for choosing difficulty level. ◾ From the start menu, players can start at the beginning of Ultimate Doom in the map "Hangar" or the beginning of Doom II in "Entryway". ◾ There is only one type of Deathmatch; all weapons and most items respawn a short time after collection. ◾ There are different cheat codes, including x-ray vision cheat. ◾ Passwords are used for keeping track of game progress; while they store numbers as map level, skill level, health, armor and ammo, the numbers for the latter three tend to be rounded. This game does not support the PlayStation Memory Card. ◾ Health and armor bonuses are worth 2% instead of 1% (this change remains in place from the Jaguar version).
 * The screen resolution was changed from 320x200 to 256x240, which is stretched to roughly 293x240 via rasterization .  by contemporary television sets, which is variable in nature, would on average show around 224 lines from the middle of the 240 line area, with an 8:7 . New graphics were made for the menu and intermission backgrounds, fonts, and status bar to fit this resolution. The aspect ratios of in-game geometry and sprites are not consistently adjusted, however: architecture appears considerably flattened relative to its PC appearance, while sprites are scaled differently and appear more faithful.
 * Different cheat codes.
 * Passwords are used for loading; while they store numbers as map level, skill level, health, armor and ammo, the numbers for the latter three tend to be rounded. There is no Memory Card usage.
 * Spectres do not "shimmer", but are instead rendered using translucency. This is because the partial invisibility effect is difficult to reproduce using such a renderer.

Secret Levels ◾ PlayStation Doom has a number of secret levels, some exclusive to the console. ◾ PlayStation Final Doom has no secret levels at all. ◾ "The Marshes", a secret level accessible through PlayStation exclusive map "Twilight Descends", is very difficult to reach without two players working in conjunction. There is a significant distance between a switch and the platform it lowers; a single player has only seconds to cross this distance, requiring them to navigate a curved corridor to do so. It is still possible for a skilled player to access the secret exit alone. "The Marshes" is the only level in The Ultimate Doom (in any version of the game) where the player can legitimately acquire the Super Shotgun.

Music
New ambient background music for most levels sequenced using the PlayStation SPU's capabilities. Additionally, Red Book CD audio is used for the title, menus, demos, intermission, finales, and for the main section of the secret level, Club Doom. Aubrey Hodges created the soundtrack and reused certain songs (the symphonic rock/metal theme, most noticeably) in Doom 64.

Technical details

 * The disc contains several WAD files. Each map is in its own WAD file, ranging from MAP1.WAD (which contains MAP01) to MAP59.WAD. An additional archive, PSXDOOM.WAD, contains all resources, including several unused ones. This makes it a total of 60 WAD files.
 * The WADs use the same LZSS-based compression method as the Jaguar Doom port, however they are little-endian files, contrarily to the Jaguar's big-endian WAD.
 * The Doom PLAYPAL is different on multiple points:
 * Color values are stored as 16-bit little endian ABGR values (using the most significant bit for alpha and five bits for each color channel).
 * Index 0 is transparent in all palettes, and none of the other indices are transparent in any palette. Palette colors differ slightly from PC Doom's.
 * There are a total of 20 palettes. The first fourteen are equivalent to Doom's, though the tints are not necessarily identical.
 * Palette 14 is used for the invulnerability effect. Since this port uses a hardware renderer which ignores COLORMAPs, invulnerability is handled as a palette flash instead.
 * Palette 15 is used for the fire sky. Only the first 37 indices are actually used.
 * Palette 16 is quite similar to palette 0, with some odd differences. It is used for interface graphics such as CONNECT, NETERR, LOADING, PAUSE, LEGAL, STATUS, as well as IDCRED2 and WMSCRED2.
 * Palette 17 is used for the TITLE and DOOM graphics.
 * Palette 18 is used for IDCRED1.
 * Palette 19, the last one, is used for WMSCRED1.


 * All textures have power-of-two dimensions. When the image itself was not resized to fit the dimensions, the added areas are filled with black (index #255).
 * Textures are not composited. Instead, they are placed between T_START and T_END markers.
 * The TEXTURE1 lump merely enumerate texture dimensions in sequence. Textures are not identified by their name, instead they are enumerated in the same order as they appear in the WAD. However, each individual texture file already features its dimensions, making the TEXTURE1 lump rather redundant. Textures are not composited from multiple patches.
 * Spectres and nightmare spectres are not separate mobj types, but merely demons with some specific flags set. These flags can technically be used with other things as well.

!Bitmask!!Effect!!Use
 * 50% transparency (B/2+F/2)||Cacodemon on Tenements
 * 100% additive (B+F)||Spectre in the exit room of The Focus
 * 100% subtractive (B-F) and doubled hit points||All nightmare spectres
 * 25% additive (B+F/4)||Usual spectres
 * }
 * 100% subtractive (B-F) and doubled hit points||All nightmare spectres
 * 25% additive (B+F/4)||Usual spectres
 * }
 * }

Bugs

 * A rocket launcher blast originating from a player's rocket launcher shot does not do any damage to him/herself whenever he/she is facing a corner where the walls are aligned in an angle of 90 degrees. The player must also be facing slightly off the corner's edge and be as close to it as possible. A series of images demonstrating the phenomenon in the Final Doom level Crater can be viewed here: [1] [2] [3] [4]
 * 640K of VRAM is allocated for sprites, wall textures and skies. If this limit is exceeded, then the game will crash and a black screen with the text "TEXTURE CACHE OVERFLOW" will appear.
 * Dramatic memory corruption can be triggered by Lost Souls moving outside the normal boundaries of the levels. Linedefs and sectors in the map will become progressively distorted from their normal layouts until the areas become unrecognizable and eventually the game crashes.

Total Conversion
The PlayStation Doom TC is a total conversion created by fenderc01 in 2008 for GZDoom. It aims to replicate the feel and graphics of the PlayStation game and, from 2011, PlayStation Final Doom.