Doomquake, An ID Tech Thread Options

[SubRosa]

Since Doom Eternal was released just a few days ago, I decided to make a topic to talk Doom and Quake games (and any other ID games). Doom Eternal got me in a Doom mood. So naturally I did not buy it! Instead I went back to the original games.

Gog.com has Doom 1 (Ultimate Doom), Doom2 + Final Doom, and Doom 3 BFG edition. Which are all on sale at the moment. I own them all. So I am giving them a try again.

You can play Doom 1 and 2 in high resolution if you use ZDoom or GZDoom. ZDoom is older, and is no longer being updated. GZDoom is newer, and has a few more extras. Use one. You can put the files directly into your Doom folders, or create a separate folder for it. Besides being able to run in 1920 x 1080, they add some options like being able to jump or crouch, or have a visible crosshair, and other stuff. GZDoom has more of this. You can find everything you don't want to know about installing ZDoom or GZDoom here.

To play either, don't use the games' regular shortcuts. Instead start it with the Zdoom.exe or GZdoom.exe. When you do it will give you a list of the Doom games you have installed. Pick one and it will start that game. Sadly, this means you have to install with a regular windows installer. Just copying the Doom folder over means GZDoom won't know its there.

In ZDoom you cannot select your resolution in the game options (it is there but doesn't work). You have to do it via the command line. Create a shortcut for ZDoom.exe and in the Properties -> Target field add in this at the end: -width1920 -height 1080 I am not sure if you need the width and height in GZDoom. I just copied it over from my ZDoom shortcut, and it works.

If you want to use a modded Wad file, this is also where you add that in with: -file [wad name] Put them in the same folder as the executable you are using to start the game. So if you have ZDoom or GZDoom in a their own folder, put it them there, not your regular Doom folder.

I found a female protagonist mod here. Then add it to your command line: -file Doomgirl_01.wad

So my entire Target box for my shortcut looks like this:
E:\GZDoom\gzdoom.exe -file Doomgirl_01.wad -width 1920 -height 1080

I started with Zdoom, and tried GZdoom just a little while ago. That is when I figured out that if you put either in a separate folder, you need to put your modded .wad files in that folder, not the Doom folder. GZDoom does look better, so that is what I am using going forward. I tested both on the Ultimate Doom from Gog, and Doom II with Master levels from there. One nice thing about GZDoom is that it makes the map a lot more useful. You can set it to show the secrets, and you can even make it show the textures of the areas, so you can see poison floors and so on.

This stuff does not work with Doom 3, as it is already a 3d game.

[SubRosa]

I did some experimenting with Quake I.

I found Dark Places, an HD front end that will allow you to play in 1920 x 1080. Plus other visual tweaks. It looks remarkably better from the original game. All you have to do is unzip the Dark Places files to their own folder, then copy over the Quake .pak files into its ID1 subfolder. After that you don't need the original game anymore. Then start it with the DarkPlaces.exe.

I found that yes, the music is not in the Gog version of the game. However, you can download the music files. Here is a topic all about how to get and implement the music. The original campaign music is here. The two expansions have links in that thread as well.

Since I am using Dark Places, all I did was go to my Dark Places folder -> ID1 -> and create a new folder there named Music. Then I unzipped the music files into that folder. That was it, the music was in game after that.

I also learned that you don't need a .wad or .pak file for mods in Quake 1. You can use loose files, so long as they follow the same folder structure they use inside their .paks. Put them all in a new folder off the Quake.exe or DarkPlaces.exe folder. Then in your shortcut's Target line add in the switch -game [folder name]. When the game starts it will add in whatever it finds in that folder.

I also think that you can use mods in .pak files, and simply put them in the ID1 folder alongside the original game files. I think you are supposed to rename them to follow the ID naming scheme, so name them pak2.pak, pak3.pak, etc... But I am not positive on this.

I did a little testing with using loose files in a folder. I am working on creating a female player mod. I started with the player sound files, and replaced the jump sound with Imoen saying "Something up?", and it works. So I can easily replace all the sounds.

The little character face you see in the Hud is a bunch of files stored in the gfx.wad file, which is in turn inside one of the .pak files. The file names in the wad do not have extensions. But I *think* they are .tga files. After a lot of headaches, I discovered that they also work as loose files, so long as the new file is in the .tga format. They have to be 24 x 24 in size, 256 colors. Wow, how small that is in my graphics program!

So it looks like making my female player mod is doable. I just need to find some sound files to use in place of the originals. Maybe I can steal them from the Baldur's Gate games. Or maybe I can unpack the female sounds from Quake II.