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Game Engine Black Book: Doom
It was early 1993 and id Software was at the top of the PC gaming industry. Wolfenstein 3D had established the First Person Shooter genre and sales of its sequel Spear of Destiny were skyrocketing. The technology and tools id had taken years to develop were no match for their many competitors.It would have been easy for id to coast on their success, but instead they made the audacious decision to throw away everything they had built and start from scratch. Game Engine Black Doom is the story of how they did it.This is a book about history and engineering. Don’t expect much prose (the author’s English has improved since the first book but is still broken). Instead you will find inside extensive descriptions and drawings to better understand all the challenges id Software had to overcome. From the hardware -- the Intel 486 CPU, the Motorola 68040 CPU, and the NeXT workstations -- to the game engine’s revolutionary design, open up to learn how DOOM changed the gaming industry and became a legend among video games.
423 pages, Paperback
First published December 5, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews
April 12, 2019
Suffers from all the same problems as the first one. There's more substance to Doom's implementation than there was to Wolfenstein 3D's, so proportionally less of the book is irrelevant filler (there's still a bunch, mostly about NeXTSTEP and some of the consoles Doom was ported to) and technobabble (and I do mean technobabble, not technical jargon), but the main problem—that the central algorithms of the game are very poorly communicated—is actually worse in this one. While a considerable amount of good will and a willingness to experiment might have enabled you to write your own ray-caster based on the fragmentary treatment that got in the Wolfenstein book, there's absolutely no way the contents of Game Engine Black Book: Doom will let you write a Doom clone on their own, and that enthusiasm to implement your own version of things is really exactly what I'm looking for when I read a book like this.
If you just skim the software section for the broadest of impressions, the book still kind of works as a nostalgia piece, but so much has been written about Doom over the years that unless you just played it in the early '90s and then never gave it a single thought afterwards, there's nothing here that you won't already know. And yes, that obviously does describe most of Doom's actual players, but not, I think, the target audience of the book.
If you just skim the software section for the broadest of impressions, the book still kind of works as a nostalgia piece, but so much has been written about Doom over the years that unless you just played it in the early '90s and then never gave it a single thought afterwards, there's nothing here that you won't already know. And yes, that obviously does describe most of Doom's actual players, but not, I think, the target audience of the book.
February 13, 2019
The book covers a lot of material in 400 pages. Very little overlap with "Black Book: Wolfenstein 3D", which was a pleasant surprise. If you played Doom when it was released and thought that it must be some kind of black magic, read this tome to have magic explained to you (and all the dark sacrifices that had to be made to achieve playable performance on something like 386SX25).
February 9, 2019
Excellent book for everybody, who:
- played the original Doom
- is software developer
- is curious about game design
- enjoyed the previous Game engine black book: Wolfenstein 3D
- prefers facts, ideas, mechanisms and pictures
For each of this case, consider one star for the overall rating. This makes 5* for me and I'm really looking forward to read the next one - Quake (hopefully]. If you are interested more in stories, characters and the overall development, I can not recommend anything better than Masters of doom.
- played the original Doom
- is software developer
- is curious about game design
- enjoyed the previous Game engine black book: Wolfenstein 3D
- prefers facts, ideas, mechanisms and pictures
For each of this case, consider one star for the overall rating. This makes 5* for me and I'm really looking forward to read the next one - Quake (hopefully]. If you are interested more in stories, characters and the overall development, I can not recommend anything better than Masters of doom.
July 24, 2022
A love letter and testament to the genius it took to make 3D games at a time when computers were built purely for text processing.
April 13, 2020
Wonderful walk-through of not only DOOM renderer, but the software and hardware landscape it was developed in and for, and to the numerous consoles it was ported to.
September 9, 2019
Ну, такое.
Первый том мне больше понравился: хардвар того времени лучше раскрыт, хаков красивых больше (Linear Shift Feedback Register и компиляцию скалирования текстур я до сих пор помню, жалко применить негде), и движок с, простихосподи, теорией за ним разжеван солидней, IEEE 754 был по-человечески рассказан.
Первый недостаток, правда, можно списать: Sanglard сам пишет, что не очень хочет повторятся, в id Tech number UNO примерно половина заморочек с железом унаследовалось из Wolfenstein 3D (VGA придумали фашисты! извените за каламбур).
По ощущениям вышло поверхностно: всего 140 страниц с картинками на весь движок! На гексагональную, platform agnostic архитектуру, на 3d рендер, на препроцессинг BSP (кстати, нормальная тема), про "драйвер" звука и распространения его в пространстве (рад сообщить, что мой любимый костыль с угоном обработчика тиканья часиков остался на месте), на сетевой код (костыль там мемный), на A.I., на структуру игровых архивов и на оптимизации (на них вообще три страницы). Мне кажется, что вот вырежи филлеры из книги и докинь к главе про движку страниц пятьдесят, то вышло бы лучше!
Амбивалентные эмоции вызвала часть с портами. Про популярные консоли читать интересно (Playstation и SNES). Про SNES вообще былина прохладная: там даже не официальный порт, а риверс инженирнутый порт (!) сделанным одни человеком (!!) -- Randy Linden -- который написал под задачу все тулзы (асемблер, линкер, дебаггер) (!!!) и вел разработку на чуть подхакнутом картридже. А вот порты под дремучие консоли, типа, 3do и Sega Saturn, включая их архитектуру, читать лень. Честно, меня мало волнуют ограничения железок двадцатилетней давности. Лойс можно поставить за проделанные исследования, наверно.
Плюс версия 1.0 страдает от ошибок (грамматических и арифметических), в табличке с эрратами уже больше 150 пунктов. Чувствуется, что английский автору не родной и корректировкой и редактурой никто не занимался.
В общем, жалко, конечно. Это всё равно очень хорошая, нишевая книга. Разбор игровых движков с таким размахом мне не известно кто пишет. Просто она ощущается слабее первого тома. Версия 1.1 с багфиксами уже в производстве, надеюсь, что когда-нибудь и версия 2.0 с более твердым содержанием выйдет.
Первый том мне больше понравился: хардвар того времени лучше раскрыт, хаков красивых больше (Linear Shift Feedback Register и компиляцию скалирования текстур я до сих пор помню, жалко применить негде), и движок с, простихосподи, теорией за ним разжеван солидней, IEEE 754 был по-человечески рассказан.
Первый недостаток, правда, можно списать: Sanglard сам пишет, что не очень хочет повторятся, в id Tech number UNO примерно половина заморочек с железом унаследовалось из Wolfenstein 3D (VGA придумали фашисты! извените за каламбур).
По ощущениям вышло поверхностно: всего 140 страниц с картинками на весь движок! На гексагональную, platform agnostic архитектуру, на 3d рендер, на препроцессинг BSP (кстати, нормальная тема), про "драйвер" звука и распространения его в пространстве (рад сообщить, что мой любимый костыль с угоном обработчика тиканья часиков остался на месте), на сетевой код (костыль там мемный), на A.I., на структуру игровых архивов и на оптимизации (на них вообще три страницы). Мне кажется, что вот вырежи филлеры из книги и докинь к главе про движку страниц пятьдесят, то вышло бы лучше!
Амбивалентные эмоции вызвала часть с портами. Про популярные консоли читать интересно (Playstation и SNES). Про SNES вообще былина прохладная: там даже не официальный порт, а риверс инженирнутый порт (!) сделанным одни человеком (!!) -- Randy Linden -- который написал под задачу все тулзы (асемблер, линкер, дебаггер) (!!!) и вел разработку на чуть подхакнутом картридже. А вот порты под дремучие консоли, типа, 3do и Sega Saturn, включая их архитектуру, читать лень. Честно, меня мало волнуют ограничения железок двадцатилетней давности. Лойс можно поставить за проделанные исследования, наверно.
Плюс версия 1.0 страдает от ошибок (грамматических и арифметических), в табличке с эрратами уже больше 150 пунктов. Чувствуется, что английский автору не родной и корректировкой и редактурой никто не занимался.
В общем, жалко, конечно. Это всё равно очень хорошая, нишевая книга. Разбор игровых движков с таким размахом мне не известно кто пишет. Просто она ощущается слабее первого тома. Версия 1.1 с багфиксами уже в производстве, надеюсь, что когда-нибудь и версия 2.0 с более твердым содержанием выйдет.
December 11, 2018
On the 25th Anniversary of the release of DOOM I bought this book and read it cover to cover. It is that good.
I read this book hoping for a combination of nostalgia and technical interest. I was not disappointed. I found this book less hardware and code specific than the Wolf book and more contextual and interview focused, but enjoyed it for those differences. The book starts with two great forwards from John Carmack and Dave Taylor. What follows is an interesting journey through the technical details and covers a lot of ground. PC's, NeXT computers, id tech 1 followed by the journey onto consoles. At first I thought this was to much to cover and that it at times only loosely related to DOOM. By the end I realized that highlights the significance of DOOM. It runs everywhere and usually better on successful hardware!
I appreciate that Fabien took the time to put such a wonderful adventure together. A brilliant and thorough technical history lesson. Recommended.
I read this book hoping for a combination of nostalgia and technical interest. I was not disappointed. I found this book less hardware and code specific than the Wolf book and more contextual and interview focused, but enjoyed it for those differences. The book starts with two great forwards from John Carmack and Dave Taylor. What follows is an interesting journey through the technical details and covers a lot of ground. PC's, NeXT computers, id tech 1 followed by the journey onto consoles. At first I thought this was to much to cover and that it at times only loosely related to DOOM. By the end I realized that highlights the significance of DOOM. It runs everywhere and usually better on successful hardware!
I appreciate that Fabien took the time to put such a wonderful adventure together. A brilliant and thorough technical history lesson. Recommended.
January 12, 2020
Really good insight on the source code of this game, very intrinsic detailing of each of its engines and how it changed the gaming industry.
Sadly is not very well written and in some parts I wanted to read more about aspects of the game that he doesn't explain very well and some others even I re-read the chapter I couldn't understand the code because it wasn't well explained.
I particularly liked the first chapters where he talks about the game's origins and inspirations and the final ones, where he goes in extreme detail of the game's ports, specially the super nintendo.
Sadly is not very well written and in some parts I wanted to read more about aspects of the game that he doesn't explain very well and some others even I re-read the chapter I couldn't understand the code because it wasn't well explained.
I particularly liked the first chapters where he talks about the game's origins and inspirations and the final ones, where he goes in extreme detail of the game's ports, specially the super nintendo.
February 3, 2019
Okay, this is best tech book I will read this year, and frankly I'm not surprised. I really enjoyed the previous work by Sanglard about wolf3d.exe, and this book is yet another pearl. I actually appreciated this book even more as this book also cover the hardware architecture I grew up with (aka the i486 and the consoles of the 90s).
Hoping that the Quake black book will appear soon ;).
Hoping that the Quake black book will appear soon ;).
February 4, 2020
A great read if you want to know how the game DOOM's code actually works.
I wish it would have gone into more detail about how BSP trees work and are used. There are a handful of paragraphs and a couple of examples, but that simply wasn't enough to communicate the idea across.
I really enjoyed how the book went through the different game console platforms at the end even if the details were light in places. It was enough to give a good feel for how those platforms were architected.
Along with the book on Wolfenstein 3D, highly recommended for software developers.
I wish it would have gone into more detail about how BSP trees work and are used. There are a handful of paragraphs and a couple of examples, but that simply wasn't enough to communicate the idea across.
I really enjoyed how the book went through the different game console platforms at the end even if the details were light in places. It was enough to give a good feel for how those platforms were architected.
Along with the book on Wolfenstein 3D, highly recommended for software developers.
August 4, 2020
It was a very good read. The book covers available hardware and development environments from the early 90's, architectural decisions as well as how a number of performance problems were resolved. It's a quite technical book obviously, but it felt quite easy to read anyway. The authors sense of humor added a lot to the charm.
You won't learn to write your own 3D renderer from this book, but you'll get yourself knee-deep in gaming and PC nostalgia.
You won't learn to write your own 3D renderer from this book, but you'll get yourself knee-deep in gaming and PC nostalgia.
December 30, 2018
A brilliant follow-up on the Wolfenstein 3D book. A large part of the content details the inners of PC, NeXT stations (used respectively as the target and dev platforms) and the architecture of video game consoles where Doom has been ported after the PC release. Of course, the game engine is covered in details, and shows the brilliant software architecture and tricks used throughout the code by idSoftware. A must have for your software book shelf!
December 30, 2018
Another great deep dive on a classic code-base that also gives great background on the context it was developed in - from hardware to the educational resources the team could lean on.
February 5, 2019
An amazing insight in one of the most famous 3D engines ever created. Readers do need a certain tech (software) background to understand the fine points.
There's a lot of info on the console ports which weren't that interesting to me, but they were well written. Good read.
There's a lot of info on the console ports which weren't that interesting to me, but they were well written. Good read.
February 26, 2019
Well written, but somehow not as absorbing as the Wolfenstein book - probably because Wolfenstein was "solving an impossible problem" when Doom was then "solving it even better". Worth a rea but I don't feel like I learned nearly as much as I did from its predecessor
March 2, 2019
Heel diepgaande analyse. Voor persoonlijk soms iets te diep. Ook mooi overzicht van de historische context.
June 17, 2019
Very interesting read that is sadly a bit tarnished by frequent typos and similar, unnecessary but irritating bloopers.
November 14, 2021
La struttura è la stessa per precedente Game Engine Black Book, Wolfenstein 3D.
Ho letto con piacere la prima parte del libro che riguarda la fase creativa del gioco, prima dell’effettivo sviluppo. Inizialmente il team era intenzionato ad adattare il film Aliens (1986), poi decise di non farlo per avere più libertà creativa. Voleva fare qualcosa di spaventoso, ispirandosi a film come Evil Dead o La Cosa. Riguardo all’artwork, i mostri avevano otto pose che dipendevano dall’angolo di vista. I muri, i pavimenti e i soffitti avevano texture. Tutti questi contenuti vennero creati da solo due artisti con Deluxe Paint. Alcuni personaggi vennero creati prima come sculture.
Ogni sviluppatore aveva due PC, uno per sviluppare, l’altro per eseguire il gioco e valutarne le prestazioni.
La parte più interessante riguarda l’engine di rendering dell’ambiente 3D che utilizza l’albero Binary Space Partitioning (BSP) per ordinare pareti e oggetti in modo estremamente efficiente.
Il punto di forza del BSP è che, indipendentemente dalla posizione del giocatore, l’attraversamento dell’albero richiede sempre la stessa quantità di calcolo.
Riguardo ai suoni, i commenti nel codice suggeriscono che i mostri urlando, avrebbero dovuto risvegliare altri mostri. Non è noto il motivo per cui questa funzione non è stata implementata.
Le informazioni contenute in questo libro sono davvero tante, quasi troppe.
Ho letto con piacere la prima parte del libro che riguarda la fase creativa del gioco, prima dell’effettivo sviluppo. Inizialmente il team era intenzionato ad adattare il film Aliens (1986), poi decise di non farlo per avere più libertà creativa. Voleva fare qualcosa di spaventoso, ispirandosi a film come Evil Dead o La Cosa. Riguardo all’artwork, i mostri avevano otto pose che dipendevano dall’angolo di vista. I muri, i pavimenti e i soffitti avevano texture. Tutti questi contenuti vennero creati da solo due artisti con Deluxe Paint. Alcuni personaggi vennero creati prima come sculture.
Ogni sviluppatore aveva due PC, uno per sviluppare, l’altro per eseguire il gioco e valutarne le prestazioni.
La parte più interessante riguarda l’engine di rendering dell’ambiente 3D che utilizza l’albero Binary Space Partitioning (BSP) per ordinare pareti e oggetti in modo estremamente efficiente.
Il punto di forza del BSP è che, indipendentemente dalla posizione del giocatore, l’attraversamento dell’albero richiede sempre la stessa quantità di calcolo.
Riguardo ai suoni, i commenti nel codice suggeriscono che i mostri urlando, avrebbero dovuto risvegliare altri mostri. Non è noto il motivo per cui questa funzione non è stata implementata.
Le informazioni contenute in questo libro sono davvero tante, quasi troppe.
March 9, 2020
I really liked this, but got less out of it than I did the Wolfenstein 3D GEBB. Which is surprising, because Doom is one of my all-time favorite games, and Wolf3D is... not.
It seemed like this had so much to cover that it couldn't go as in-depth as the Wolfenstein book, and I would have been totally lost if I hadn't just finished that one a few days earlier. This book has lots of call-outs and references to that one, and I loved not having to re-read the same stuff in both books -- but it's something to keep in mind if you're starting with this one.
As far as the content, I found the Wolf3D book incredibly easy to understand, and the details of the engine were covered in such detail that I felt like I could build something similar on my own if I wanted to. Maybe I couldn't, but that's the feeling I came away with. This one was amazing in what it covered, but it felt less comprehensive. Like "these are how the most interesting parts of the Doom engine works" and not "This is how the Doom engine works." Even if it wasn't covered in detail, I felt like I was missing the connections between each of these neat pieces. It's long, but one of the rare books where I would have liked it to be twice as long.
Still, both these books are incredible and very much worth reading if you grew up in that era of PC gaming.
It seemed like this had so much to cover that it couldn't go as in-depth as the Wolfenstein book, and I would have been totally lost if I hadn't just finished that one a few days earlier. This book has lots of call-outs and references to that one, and I loved not having to re-read the same stuff in both books -- but it's something to keep in mind if you're starting with this one.
As far as the content, I found the Wolf3D book incredibly easy to understand, and the details of the engine were covered in such detail that I felt like I could build something similar on my own if I wanted to. Maybe I couldn't, but that's the feeling I came away with. This one was amazing in what it covered, but it felt less comprehensive. Like "these are how the most interesting parts of the Doom engine works" and not "This is how the Doom engine works." Even if it wasn't covered in detail, I felt like I was missing the connections between each of these neat pieces. It's long, but one of the rare books where I would have liked it to be twice as long.
Still, both these books are incredible and very much worth reading if you grew up in that era of PC gaming.
May 27, 2019
This book is incredibly detailed and really fun. It's a great compliment to other books about Doom and id Software in the 90s such as Masters of Doom. My only issue with it is that it is positively littered with typos and copy mistakes. Sometimes I'd argue it even goes into too much detail, such as with the system teardowns of each and every console Doom was ported to. Those chapters, where he gets into the interesting idiosyncracies of each system architecture that make that particular port a challenge, would have worked without that stuff, which felt more like a manual than a book.
It's awe-inspiring to hear about the everyday feats of John Carmack, like suspending Doom development for a month so they could rush through an SNES Wolfenstein port, and in the process discovered Binary Space Partitioning just from hoarding academic white papers. It's funny to read Dave Taylor talk about not realizing that he was always going to feel bad for himself because he couldn't appreciate the caliber of engineer he was working with in Carmack.
This book is loaded with interesting stories and is accessible to any nerd who cares about deep-dives. I can't do anything in C or assembly but I can sure appreciate the overviews I'm being presented with.
It's awe-inspiring to hear about the everyday feats of John Carmack, like suspending Doom development for a month so they could rush through an SNES Wolfenstein port, and in the process discovered Binary Space Partitioning just from hoarding academic white papers. It's funny to read Dave Taylor talk about not realizing that he was always going to feel bad for himself because he couldn't appreciate the caliber of engineer he was working with in Carmack.
This book is loaded with interesting stories and is accessible to any nerd who cares about deep-dives. I can't do anything in C or assembly but I can sure appreciate the overviews I'm being presented with.
August 3, 2020
A book full of well-known and not so well-known insights of the nineties gaming industry, with a particular focus on one very special game: DOOM. I especially loved the plethora of photographs. However, as the cover text warns the potential reader, "this is a book about history and engineering", it does not come with a recommended "engineering minimum level" the reader has to have in order to understand everything. Even though I managed to get myself a master in CS a long time ago, I also managed to feel embarrassed not fully grasping whatever Fabien tried to explain. Reading the reviews here, I am not alone - it sometimes feels like a way too deep pummel into the darkness, without the author providing any flashlight. Then, when you think there's a shed of light, we suddenly rush to the next topic.
That said, I still liked it a lot and will probably push myself off the deep end again trying to understand Wolf3D things.
That said, I still liked it a lot and will probably push myself off the deep end again trying to understand Wolf3D things.
June 21, 2020
A lot of nostalgia for someone like me fondly remembering playing Doom ep 1 on my 486 over and over again in the 90’s. Unsure if you could even buy the full game in my country of Sweden, my friends’ full copies were pirated.
Unfortunately I find the flavor content of the book more interesting than the actual technical parts. The buses and memory allocation stuff I don’t get a lot out of. Some of the more higher level programming bits are interesting, stuff like the wall sprites being corrected for distance. But for example the inticracies of the frame buffer just isn’t that interesting.
I would’ve wanted a more game design perspective of it all, because that’s really what makes Doom. Technical perfection will never make a good game on its own. Sadly I think most people will probably be more rewarded by reading Masters of Doom again rather than this book.
Unfortunately I find the flavor content of the book more interesting than the actual technical parts. The buses and memory allocation stuff I don’t get a lot out of. Some of the more higher level programming bits are interesting, stuff like the wall sprites being corrected for distance. But for example the inticracies of the frame buffer just isn’t that interesting.
I would’ve wanted a more game design perspective of it all, because that’s really what makes Doom. Technical perfection will never make a good game on its own. Sadly I think most people will probably be more rewarded by reading Masters of Doom again rather than this book.
March 7, 2019
Questo libro racconta la storia della creazione di DOOM, uno dei pilastri della storia dei videogiochi.
Si comincia con un esame approfondito dell'hardware dell'epoca (il 1993), dei linguaggi di programmazione e degli strumenti di sviluppo a disposizione per passare poi a descrivere, in una storia avvincente come un romanzo, l'immensa sfida tecnologica affrontata da John Carmack e soci per mettere in piedi, nell'arco di 11 mesi, una leggenda.
Si tratta di un libro estremamente tecnico, che pone l'accento sulle geniali soluzioni sviluppate per affrontare problemi computazionali quasi insolubili ai tempi.
Intrigante, dettagliatissimo e a tratti commovente, ma consigliato a pochi nerd e nostalgici.
Si comincia con un esame approfondito dell'hardware dell'epoca (il 1993), dei linguaggi di programmazione e degli strumenti di sviluppo a disposizione per passare poi a descrivere, in una storia avvincente come un romanzo, l'immensa sfida tecnologica affrontata da John Carmack e soci per mettere in piedi, nell'arco di 11 mesi, una leggenda.
Si tratta di un libro estremamente tecnico, che pone l'accento sulle geniali soluzioni sviluppate per affrontare problemi computazionali quasi insolubili ai tempi.
Intrigante, dettagliatissimo e a tratti commovente, ma consigliato a pochi nerd e nostalgici.
March 17, 2019
A truly impressive book. If you‘re even remotely interested in the inner workings of one of the most important computer games of all time then this book is a must-read! Of course it‘s quite the heavy-hitter in the technical department - you should have a bit of affinity to the coding world, otherwise half of the book will be mere gibberish to you. But even in that case the other half, consisting of insightful development anecdotes and highly interesting background information, will get you hooked.
This is the perfect company to „Masters of DOOM“, as that one focused on the human side of DOOM‘s development. This one here shows the technical side, the works on the metal. I truly and utterly enjoyed it!
This is the perfect company to „Masters of DOOM“, as that one focused on the human side of DOOM‘s development. This one here shows the technical side, the works on the metal. I truly and utterly enjoyed it!
October 13, 2019
It was a remarkable book describing software development in the early 90s. As a software developer nowadays the issues devs had to face and problems tackle sound completely insane. I never realized that there were so many nuances and hurdles that had to be solved during its development. I would definitely recommend this book for any software engineer, even if he is not interested in the game engine itself. The only thing that might push away some readers is that it can get quite crunchy, especially when it talks about graphics and their rendering. But if you don't mind just skimming over it I think there is still much to be gained from the rest of the book.
January 4, 2020
This is a very well structured book which, for me, as someone who played the game back in the day for more hours than I care to remember, was incredibly interesting for the first half, when presenting the story behind the formulation and development of the game, and the hardware landscape developing at the time. Alas, the second half of the book descends into code, maths, geometry and game tech that simply broke my brain. However, even just flicking through those latter pages served to convey the obvious sophistication and ingenuity behind a game now well over 25 years old but which defined a genre and still engenders devotion among many.
July 31, 2023
I'm so happy this book was written. Doom was one of the milestones in the game development with multiple ingenious solutions that propelled the industry ahead. The book dives into some of the most interesting parts of the game engine such as: asset management, sound, ai, networking and of course graphics. The key parts of the codebase are presented and explained. The book also covers a lot of behind the scenes of the development of doom mentioning the tooling, the team and state of the hardware in the beginning of the 90's. The final part of the book discusses multiple Doom console ports, which, although the least interesting to me, doesn't affect the overall positive image.
May 22, 2021
It's not really line-by-line analysis of the code, but still a very good and in-depth explanation on how it worked, the limitations of the hardware how it all got put together. It also brought some memories from the CONFIG.SYS/AUTOEXEC.BAT era (which I'm really glad are in the past).
In general, a great book to give you optimization ideas.
In general, a great book to give you optimization ideas.
August 16, 2022
This book goes into details around the design and implementation of Doom including the people and the tools they used to do it. Even if you are not a game developer their are a lot of examples of great system design which are explained really well. I feel that most programmers would walk away from reading this with some great ideas they can use in their code.
December 29, 2020
Definitely technical, but insanely interesting. It amazes me that these guys were able to build the game like this from the ground up. So many working parts, and an insanely creative (if not tedious) endeavor. I loved looking through every little bit of this beloved game being broken down into it's core components.
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