These are notes and observations made about an "Pre-Beta" version of Doom, dated May 22, 1993. It was the "0.5" version of Doom.
Download this version of Doom (1.3 MB)
Subject: Re: Doom 1.0 or lower?!?! Love to see it! From: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet) Date: 1995/11/30 Message-ID: <49kq0q$l3c@erinews.ericsson.se> Sender: eedraq@eed.ericsson.se (Raphael Quinet) References: <49k2gp$jqp@acme.freenet.columbus.oh.us> Organization: Ericsson Eurolab Deutschland GmbH Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.misc In article <49k2gp$jqp@acme.freenet.columbus.oh.us>, tduffy@freenet.columbus.oh.us (Theodore Duffy) writes: |> |> I read something recently around here, someone was talking about having |> played the original beta release .99 or maybe 1.0 , with no barrels and |> other weird stuff. Anyone know where I could find a copy of it? Just for |> nostalgia's sake, and curiousity... Sorry, I don't have the beta any more (I trashed it when I got Doom 1.1), but I know at least one interesting historical fact (for programmers): in that beta version of Doom, they forgot to strip the executable, which means that the symbol tables were still there and it was easy to do some reverse engineering on the code. They didn't make the same mistake in the first public version of Doom, of course. -Raphael -- +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | WWW: http://www.montefiore.ulg.ac.be/~quinet | | E-mail: Raphael.Quinet@eed.ericsson.se or quinet@montefiore.ulg.ac.be | | S-mail: Raphael Quinet, 9 rue des Martyrs, 4550 Nandrin (Belgium) | | --* Read rec.games.computer.doom.editing for info and help about DEU. *-- | +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Subject: Re: Doom 1.0 or lower?!?! Love to see it! From: robertd@lekera.southern.co.nz (Robert Densie) Date: 1995/12/03 Message-ID: <30c0fc71.4c454b455241@lekera.southern.co.nz> Distribution: world X-Posting-Software: UUPC/extended 1.12p inews ( 7Nov95 23 References: <49k2gp$jqp@acme.freenet.columbus.oh.us> Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.misc Theodore Duffy (tduffy@freenet.columbus.oh.us) wrote: : I read something recently around here, someone was talking about having : played the original beta release .99 or maybe 1.0 , with no barrels and : other weird stuff. Anyone know where I could find a copy of it? Just for : nostalgia's sake, and curiousity... : ForkLord (who still has his Doom 1.2 disks around here somewhere) I have seen and played the 0.99 version of Doom, I think I deleted the 0.99 version having upgraded it to 1.00. BUT ALSO I have here a version here (doom05-1.arj & doom05-2.arj) It's an ALPHA version of doom (I just run it to make sure) called "Doom: Evil Unleashed". Start up screen says Doom Alpha by Id Software. It has the basic Doom engine, but * The imps and pink demons are in the game they don't move or anything just stand there * No barrels (as noted above) * A lot of graphics from wolf is used (eg medic kit, gold treasure cup) * The map key is "a" not tab * The strafe and open door key are both alt * No sounds! * The two weapons you start with are (1) bayonet and (2) rifle * There is no run key (that I could find, so makes getting around really slow) * It is quite easy to recognise some of the structures in the game (so the whole map structure is now over two years old). I can't quote exactly were they are from but I do recognise them * In the screen options there is high, medium, low, <another one>, and HIGH RES, so it looks like there use to be a high res mode that was taken out in the official release. I other thing I did notice while looking through the doom.exe file is that there is reference to "E1M10 E1M11 E1M12 E1M13", so it looks like there was original more than 9 levels per episode The files included in the archives are config.lmp 152 3-12-95 12:43 doom.exe 471452 22-05-93 17:49 doom.wad 3522207 22-05-93 18:00 dos4gw.exe 231179 11-11-92 9:01 ptmbbs02.txt 1474 29-03-93 17:15 I know this version is really really old (as per the dates above), but I am still worried about what could happen if I did post it, It is now over two years old so who would really care it I did. --> What does everyone else think?? <-- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE, just follow-up this article in this news group, don't email me It costs me to send and receive email so I don't want my mail box full of "please post these files" from every Doom fanatic out there ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -- | Robert Densie, Christchurch, New Zealand | OS/2 Warp Supporter | | robertd@lekera.southern.co.nz | STRESS, The confusion created when one's mind | To err is human, to overrides the body's basic desire to choke the | really foul things up living shit out of some asshole who needs it! | requires a computer
Subject: Re: Doom 1.0 or lower?!?! Love to see it! From: fpv@xymph.iaf.nl (Frans P. de Vries) Date: 1995/12/21 Message-ID: <4bcgrb$pq@xymph.iaf.nl> Distribution: world References: <49k2gp$jqp@acme.freenet.columbus.oh.us> <30c0fc71.4c454b455241@lekera.southern.co.nz> Organization: Home Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.misc Robert Densie (robertd@lekera.southern.co.nz) wrote: } It's an ALPHA version of doom (I just run it to make sure) } called "Doom: Evil Unleashed". Start up screen says Doom Alpha by } Id Software. Thanks for posting it (and to Chris for you know what ;-). I had a look at it too, and noted: } It has the basic Doom engine, but } * The imps and pink demons are in the game they don't move or anything } just stand there There are 2 Barons of Hell in E1M12. If you shoot a monster with your rifle, it just disappears, i.e. there are no death frames yet. } * No barrels (as noted above) There are barrels in one level but not as we now know them. Like all things (monsters, treasures, ammo, etc.) they just disappear when shot with the rifle. } * The map key is "a" not tab } * The strafe and open door key are both alt The 'm' key toggles between normal viewing point and a viewing point at floor level. You can continue to run around like this, but I presume this is a preliminary hack at the death players' viewing point. The '[' and ']' keys increase and decrease the viewing area. Full screen mode (w/o status bar) is already implemented. } * The two weapons you start with are (1) bayonet and (2) rifle There is a chainsaw in one level but it can't be picked up. There's a shotgun (using a rough version of the pump-action graphics) and a missile launcher (that uses the shotgun graphics), but you can't shoot anything with these. } * There is no run key (that I could find, so makes getting around really } slow) I found that the diagonal strafe run makes you run quite fast. } * It is quite easy to recognise some of the structures in the game } (so the whole map structure is now over two years old). I can't } quote exactly were they are from but I do recognise them See below for a list. } * In the screen options there is high, medium, low, <another one>, and } HIGH RES, so it looks like there use to be a high res mode that was } taken out in the official release. The keys 'q', 'w' and 'e' switch to the first three modes high, medium, low. } I other thing I did notice while looking through the doom.exe file is } that there is reference to "E1M10 E1M11 E1M12 E1M13", so it looks like } there was original more than 9 levels per episode Most of the levels made it into the final game:(see errata below -- Ed):
alpha level final level
E1M1 not used
E1M2 E2M2
E1M3 E2M3
E1M4 E1M7
E1M5 E3M3
E1M6 MAP10 (DOOM II !)
E1M7 E1M4 (no inverse swastika in the "swastika room" yet ;)
E1M8 E1M2 (rough)
E1M9 E1M6 (rough)
E1M10 E1M3 (partly)
E1M11 E2M7
E1M12 E1M8 (really rough)
E1M13 E2M4
E2M1 crashes too early into the level to recognise it, but I
agree with Alden Bates that it could be E3M7
The engine doesn't allow the player to jump off ledges that are higher than
what the player can climb back on. Thus some parts of the levels can't be
accessed, and there are a lot of moving elevators where different techniques
have been employed later.
The cheat codes don't work, obviously, because these were implemented by
Dave Taylor and he joined id sometime in the second half of 1993, I think.
Every level consists off: ExMy, FLATNAME, POINTS, LINES, SECTORS & THINGS.
FLATNAME lists the floor and ceiling textures, which were of course later
merged into SECTORS. The others are pretty obvious. Structures like SEGS,
BLOCKMAP and NODES were apparently added later to improve performance.
There is something that looks like a "-savepcx" parameter in the .exe, and
messages like "IO_ScreenShot: Couldn't create an LBM" and "Screen saved",
but I haven't found a way to actually produce screen shots. There must be
a way, since the doompix1.exe screen shots are older than this .exe. The
same goes for recording demos, as there are 4 demos included in the .wad.
The frame rate dots (-devparm in the final game) are permanently enabled.
At the start of each level, the four players (all green) are already there,
but of course only one moves.
There are references to "actors" in the .exe, so some terminology from the
Wolfenstein 3D engine was inherited into id's next engine.
And this concludes my nostalgia trip. :-)
PS. Don't email me for a copy, I won't send a 1.3MB file to anybody. Sorry ;)
--
Frans P. de Vries | fpv@xymph.iaf.nl | Rec.Games.Computer.Doom FAQ maintainer
This version of the alpha has 13 levels, selectable by a number 1-13, and this number gets mapped by a lookup table to one of 13 ExMx levels, whose mission numbers do not necessarily correspond to the selection number.
The -run <nnn> command-line parameter selects one of of 13 levels. Pressing 1 through 9 while the Doom menu bar is up, is the same as warping to that -run level.
Here is a corrected table:
Level Lump Final Number Name Level ______________________________ 1 E1M1 ? 2 E1M2 E2M2 3 E1M7 E2M3 4 E1M3 E1M7 5 E1M4 E3M3 6 E1M5 MAP10 7 E1M6 E1M4 8 E1M9 E1M2 9 E1M8 E1M6 10 E1M10 E1M3 11 E1M11 E2M7 12 E1M12 E1M8 13 E1M13 E2M4
The WAD file structure is different than in later versions of Doom:
To run maps 10-13 requires a command-line option, such as:
doom -run 10
The view kinda felt like Wolf3d's, in that it made my eyes tire more easily than the released versions of Doom did, and it could conceivably cause motion sickness if I was predisposed to it -- the BSP based drawing of later versions of Doom caused less of this, because it was faster and smoother.
I've found shift does run -- right shift, that is.
[The episode] is nonlinear!!! Use the arrow keys at the level intermission screen. Right or left is E2M3, up is E1M4, and back is E2M2!!! Everything is destroyable, even the ammo clips and stuff, except for the marines, you cannot walk thru them before you shoot them, but you can after you've shot them. I saw the [Doom II] MAP10 pretty quick, it's cool.