Some notes pertaining to Doom editing history.
Subject: Re: Which Editor is out for HEXEN? From: wnight@vanbc.wimsey.com (William Robert Night) Date: 1995/11/12 Message-ID: <483r6g$dbe@wolfe.wimsey.com> References: <47bv82$me0@ixnews6.ix.netcom.com> <47ecq3$ad4@news1.wolfe.net> <815670144snz@tsys.demon.co.uk> <47onrf$95d@news1.wolfe.net> <47pm5l$ns@ixnews7.ix.netcom.com> <47sui8$bl2@wolfe.wimsey.com> <815933031snz@scss.demon.co.uk> Organization: Wimsey Information Services Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.editing Adam Williamson (Adam@scss.demon.co.uk) wrote: : In article <47sui8$bl2@wolfe.wimsey.com> : wnight@vanbc.wimsey.com "William Robert Night" writes: : > ID talks big, but all they've proven is that they're jerks. : > : JERKS? I admit that's what I think of them after TNT, but this is no grounds. : ID provide the open-ended setup and the specs, and help to some authors, and : the only grounds is that they ASK us not to make money from wads...and you : call them JERKS?!?!?!?! Actually, I don't care about the TNT thing... You and I didn't do any work on it, and didn't pay any money for it, so we have no say in it. BTW: Open ended? From what they say, Quake will be open-ended (because of market pressure only) but Doom was not. The initial specs were reversed engineered out of the wad, and ID tried to discourage any investigation into this. Only when they saw that we keep playing because we have tons of new levels, they relented. And then only with after threatening people with legal action if they tried to make money from it.
Subject: Re: Which Editor is out for HEXEN?
From: Adam Williamson <Adam@scss.demon.co.uk>
Date: 1995/11/12
Message-ID: <816193463snz@scss.demon.co.uk>
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References: <47bv82$me0@ixnews6.ix.netcom.com> <47ecq3$ad4@news1.wolfe.net> <815670144snz@tsys.demon.co.uk> <47onrf$95d@news1.wolfe.net> <47pm5l$ns@ixnews7.ix.netcom.com> <47sui8$bl2@wolfe.wimsey.com> <815933031snz@scss.demon.co.uk> <483r6g$dbe@wolfe.wimsey.com>
Organization: Scientific Software Systems
Reply-To: Adam@scss.demon.co.uk
Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.editing
In article <483r6g$dbe@wolfe.wimsey.com>
wnight@vanbc.wimsey.com "William Robert Night" writes:
> BTW: Open ended? From what they say, Quake will be open-ended (because of
> market pressure only) but Doom was not.
>
> The initial specs were reversed engineered out of the wad, and ID tried
> to discourage any investigation into this. Only when they saw that we
> keep playing because we have tons of new levels, they relented. And then
> only with after threatening people with legal action if they tried to
> make money from it.
>
No, that is completely and utterly wrong. E-mail ID, e-mail Raphael, e-mail
ANYONE. THat is NOT what happened at all.
--
---
Adam Williamson, D1M - adam@scss.demon.co.uk
Terminal Velocity and Wolfenstein 3D FAQ writer
for more details on either FAQ, e-mail me
"There's nothing left for you to say,
soon you'll be dead anyway" - Green Day
Subject: Doom editing history (was: Re: Which Editor is out for HEXEN?)
From: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet)
Date: 1995/11/27
Message-ID: <49c9jd$5m4@erinews.ericsson.se>
Sender: eedraq@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet)
References: <47bv82$me0@ixnews6.ix.netcom.com> <47ecq3$ad4@news1.wolfe.net> <815670144snz@tsys.demon.co.uk> <47onrf$95d@news1.wolfe.net> <47pm5l$ns@ixnews7.ix.netcom.com> <47sui8$bl2@wolfe.wimsey.com> <815933031snz@scss.demon.co.uk> <483r6g$dbe@wolfe.wimsey.com> <816193463snz@scss.demon.co.uk>
Organization: Ericsson Eurolab Deutschland GmbH
Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.editing
In article <816193463snz@scss.demon.co.uk>, Adam Williamson <Adam@scss.demon.co.uk> writes:
|> In article <483r6g$dbe@wolfe.wimsey.com>
|> wnight@vanbc.wimsey.com "William Robert Night" writes:
|> > The initial specs were reversed engineered out of the wad, and ID tried
|> > to discourage any investigation into this. Only when they saw that we
|> > keep playing because we have tons of new levels, they relented. And then
|> > only with after threatening people with legal action if they tried to
|> > make money from it.
|> >
|> No, that is completely and utterly wrong. E-mail ID, e-mail Raphael, e-mail
|> ANYONE. THat is NOT what happened at all.
Sorry Adam, but you are wrong. Before I get too many e-mail messages about
this, I think I should give a public history lesson. :-) And, by the way,
this is my first message on these groups since a long time... So here we
go...
The subjective history of Doom editing
version 0.1 - by Raphael Quinet
When the first beta version of Doom was released, some people started
exploring the EXE and WAD files, trying to find how the game engine worked.
No information had been released by id Software. In December 1993, when
the official version was released, the basic structure of the WAD file was
known, but most of the entries were still unknown. The VERTEXES, LINEDEFS,
SECTORS and THINGS were easy to decode (except that some of their parameters
were not fully understood), but the format of the SEGS, NODES, BLOCKMAP and
other entries was not understood. Nevertheless, it didn't take long for
some editors to appear, since the basic map format was known.
In early January 1994, several THINGS editors were available. Most of them
modified the main WAD file, because they couldn't create PWADs. After some
time, these editors were converted in order to support PWADs (DEU, VERDA,
RG Doom Ed) and they were also able to change the textures on walls and
floors. But it wasn't possible to create new levels or even to change the
shape of existing levels, because all attempts to do so resulted in an
unpleasant effect which was later known as the Hall Of Mirrors effect (HOM).
In February, more and more of the LineDef types were discovered (by trial
and error, since there was still no info from id Software). The meaning of
the individual bits of the Things and LineDefs flags was also discovered.
By that time, the structure of the SEGS and SSECTORS was understood and it
was clear that the NODES were related to them in some way.
At the end of February, the structure of the NODES was discovered and some
editors (DEU 4.0 and VERDA) included a NODES viewer. The BLOCKMAP had also
been cracked and the editors were able to rebuild it (or at least build a
fake one).
During March, I worked on a NODES builder for DEU. Alistair Brown posted
some info about Doom using BSP trees, so I looked for some papers about
computer graphics and BSP trees. I eventually figured out how to create
these objects (with the help of other people on the net) and I added a
Nodes builder to DEU. On the 30th of March, DEU 5.0 was the first Doom
editor able to create new levels. Even if it wasn't perfect, the Nodes
builder was a major breaktrhough.
In April and May, more and more features were added to the editors (DEU,
VERDA, RG Doom Ed and new ones, such as DMapEdit or Geoff Allan's DoomEd).
So far, no information had been released by id Software. The only good
source of information was Matt Fell's document: the Unofficial Doom Specs,
created by Matt and lots of other people who experimented with Doom and
tried to understand how the thing worked.
In May, Jay Wilbur (CEO of id Software) posted a message saying that all
authors of Doom editors had to sign a license in order to be allowed to
distribute their editors (which were illegal, according to Doom's license
which forbids editing and reverse-engineering). This Data Utility License
was intended to protect id Software and prevent anyone from selling PWADs
or modified versions of Doom. I signed this license because I felt that I
owed something to them.
Around that time (I don't remember when exactly), things started to change:
Doom II had been announced and John Romero posted a list of Things and
LineDefs types for Doom on the doom-editing mailing list (most of them had
already been discovered, but it was interesting anyway). As far as I
remember, this was the first technical bit of information from id (apart
from a few answers given by John Romero or Dave Taylor to some technical
questions).
The situation was different for Doom II: it didn't take long before John
Romero posted the updated list of Things and LineDefs types for the new
game, thus speeding up the development of the editors (except for DEU which
was still at 5.21 because I graduated and got a job in the meantime). We
still had to find some of the info by trial and error, but at least id was
more open about it.
Well, that's about it. This year, Heretic and Hexen have been released,
and various bits of info were distributed by id Software and Raven.
I think I can understand and explain id Software's point of view: they were
the first ones to be surprised about the success of Doom and third-party
WAD files. Although the game allowed the loading of external WAD files,
they probably never expected to see so many of them. Since they didn't know
how people would behave (and they were probably afraid of seeing some big
company stepping in and making profit by selling hundreds of third-party
levels), they decided to protect themselves by creating the Data Utility
License. They didn't want to release too much info about the Doom engine,
because this would have helped competitors who were developping their own
games based on the same principle. Now, they don't feel the need to protect
themselves so much for Doom, because the game is a bit old, the Doom
community has behaved rather well regarding their copyrights and trademarks,
and they are too busy working on Quake. :-)
This is my version of the facts. If any of the old timers reads this,
please follow up with more information!
-Raphael
--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| WWW: http://www.montefiore.ulg.ac.be/~quinet |
| E-mail: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se or quinet@montefiore.ulg.ac.be |
| S-mail: Raphael Quinet, 9 rue des Martyrs, 4550 Nandrin (Belgium) |
| --* Read rec.games.computer.doom.editing for info and help about DEU. *-- |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Subject: Re: Doom editing history (was: Re: Which Editor is out for HEXEN?) From: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet) Date: 1995/11/27 Message-ID: <49ch7p$fv3@erinews.ericsson.se> Sender: eedraq@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet) References: <47bv82$me0@ixnews6.ix.netcom.com> <47ecq3$ad4@news1.wolfe.net> <815670144snz@tsys.demon.co.uk> <47onrf$95d@news1.wolfe.net> <47pm5l$ns@ixnews7.ix.netcom.com> <47sui8$bl2@wolfe.wimsey.com> <815933031snz@scss.demon.co.uk> <483r6g$dbe@wolfe.wimsey.com> <816193463snz@scss.demon.co.uk> <49c9jd$5m4@erinews.ericsson.se> Organization: Ericsson Eurolab Deutschland GmbH Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.editing I know, it's a followup to my own article. But I forgot something important: In article <49c9jd$5m4@erinews.ericsson.se>, I wrote: |> [...] |> Around that time (I don't remember when exactly), things started to change: |> Doom II had been announced and John Romero posted a list of Things and |> LineDefs types for Doom on the doom-editing mailing list (most of them had |> already been discovered, but it was interesting anyway). As far as I |> remember, this was the first technical bit of information from id (apart |> from a few answers given by John Romero or Dave Taylor to some technical |> questions). Also in May, id Software released the source code (in Objective-C) for their Nodes builder. I had created the Nodes builder for DEU 5.21 from scratch before that, but it helped several other people and put all editors on the same ground. It also helped the development of external Nodes builders. How could I forget that? ;-) -Raphael -- +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | WWW: http://www.montefiore.ulg.ac.be/~quinet | | E-mail: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se or quinet@montefiore.ulg.ac.be | | S-mail: Raphael Quinet, 9 rue des Martyrs, 4550 Nandrin (Belgium) | | --* Read rec.games.computer.doom.editing for info and help about DEU. *-- | +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Subject: Re: Doom editing history (was: Re: Which Editor is out for HEXEN?) From: Adam Williamson <Adam@scss.demon.co.uk> Date: 1995/11/28 Message-ID: <817543677snz@scss.demon.co.uk> X-Nntp-Posting-Host: scss.demon.co.uk References: <49c9jd$5m4@erinews.ericsson.se> Organization: Scientific Software Systems Reply-To: Adam@scss.demon.co.uk Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.editing So it would appear that we are both wrong. Id came in later than I thought but they weren't exactly throwing lawsuits around :). -- --- Adam Williamson, D1M - adam@scss.demon.co.uk Terminal Velocity and Wolfenstein 3D FAQ writer for more details on either FAQ, e-mail me "There's nothing left for you to say, soon you'll be dead anyway" - Green Day
Subject: Re: Doom editing history (was: Re: Which Editor is out for HEXEN?) From: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet) Date: 1995/11/30 Message-ID: <49l406$l3c@erinews.ericsson.se> Sender: eedraq@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet) References: <49c9jd$5m4@erinews.ericsson.se> <817543677snz@scss.demon.co.uk> Organization: Ericsson Eurolab Deutschland GmbH Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.editing In article <817543677snz@scss.demon.co.uk>, Adam Williamson <Adam@scss.demon.co.uk> writes: |> So it would appear that we are both wrong. Id came in later than I thought |> but they weren't exactly throwing lawsuits around :). They weren't throwing lawsuits around, but Jay Wilbur said that all Doom editors were illegal unless the authors signed the "Data Utility License". I don't know if you have seen this license, but it clearly states that anyone who violates its rather strict rules could be sued for it. Violations included: distributing an editor which works with the shareware version of Doom, modifying the EXE file, using the Doom trademark incorrectly, distributing modified versions of Doom or any part of it, etc. I remember that some of the first few messages posted by people from id Software regarding copyrights and trademarks left the impression that lawsuits could be started soon. But of course, id Software will not sue anyone if it's not worth it. For example, ask Jay Wilbur if you are allowed to use a program such as DeHackEd. His answer will be NO and he will probably add that you could have legal problems if you do it anyway. But he will never add something which is tacitely implied in his message: id Software will not sue you as long as you don't harm them. If you modify the EXE for your personal use and you don't make a business out of it, then fine, they will ignore this. But for legal reasons (if they want to keep their trademarks and their rights on the program), they have to say that it is forbidden. This is, by the way, the reason why the EXE editors and the theme files which require modifications of DOOM.EXE are distributed in a separate directory on the Doom ftp sites, which is not mirrored on ftp.idsoftware.com. -Raphael -- +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | WWW: http://www.montefiore.ulg.ac.be/~quinet | | E-mail: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se or quinet@montefiore.ulg.ac.be | | S-mail: Raphael Quinet, 9 rue des Martyrs, 4550 Nandrin (Belgium) | | --* Read rec.games.computer.doom.editing for info and help about DEU. *-- | +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
From: John Romero <romero@ionstorm.com> To: killough@rsn.hp.com Subject: DOOM Date: Thu, 11 Dec 1997 18:08:24 -0600 ... Regarding the reason why DOOM is an "open" game: the reason is because of Wolf3D -- people figured out how to make maps for it without our help, plus change all the graphics, etc. and we were so impressed that we knew that DOOM just *had* to be modifyable. That is the real reason. We never wanted to sue anyone -- just protect ourselves a little.
I am including the Data Utility License here, for reference:
Data Utility License
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