When did Doom first hit shelves?
1825874#17
"Doom"s original release date was the third quarter of 1993, which the team did not meet. By December 1993, the team was working non-stop on the game, with several employees sleeping at the office; programmer Dave Taylor claimed that working on the game gave him such a rush that he would pass out from the intensity. Id began receiving calls from people interested in the game or angry that it had missed its planned release date, as hype for the game had been building online. At midnight on December 10, 1993, after working for 30 straight hours, the development team at id uploaded the first episode of the game to the internet, letting interested players distribute it for them. So many users were connected to the first network that they planned to upload the game to—the University of Wisconsin–Parkside FTP network—that even after the network administrator increased the number of connections while on the phone with Wilbur, id was unable to connect, forcing them to kick all other users off to allow id to upload the game. When the upload finished thirty minutes later, 10,000 people attempted to download the game at once, crashing the university's network. Within hours, other university networks were banning "Doom" multiplayer games, as a rush of players overwhelmed their systems.
Development of Doom
8521#18
"Doom"s original release date was the third quarter of 1993, which the team did not meet. By December 1993, the team was working non-stop on the game, with several employees sleeping at the office; programmer Dave Taylor claimed that working on the game gave him such a rush that he would pass out from the intensity. Id began receiving calls from people interested in the game or angry that it had missed its planned release date, as hype for the game had been building online. At midnight on December 10, 1993, after working for 30 straight hours, the development team at id uploaded the first episode of the game to the internet, letting interested players distribute it for them. So many users were connected to the first network that they planned to upload the game to—the University of Wisconsin–Parkside FTP network—that even after the network administrator increased the number of connections while on the phone with Wilbur, id was unable to connect, forcing them to kick all other users off to allow id to upload the game. When the upload finished thirty minutes later, 10,000 people attempted to download the game at once, crashing the university's network.
Doom (1993 video game)
17990#25
After the unprecedented success of id Software's "Doom", the PC gaming market shifted towards production of three-dimensional first person shooters. LucasArts contributed to this trend with the 1995 release of "", a first person shooter that successfully transplanted the Doom formula to a Star Wars setting. The Dark Forces Strategy guide claims that development was well underway before Doom was released and that the game was pushed back once Doom hit shelves so that it could be polished. The game was well received and spawned a new franchise: the "Jedi Knight" games. This began with the sequel to "Dark Forces", "" released in 1997; this game reflected the changing face of PC gaming, being one of the first games to appreciably benefit when used in conjunction with a dedicated 3D graphics card like 3dfx's Voodoo range. The game received an expansion pack, "Mysteries of the Sith", in 1998 and a full sequel in 2002 with "". 2003's "" can be seen as a spin-off from the series, but was less well received by reviewers, who complained that the franchise was becoming formulaic.
LucasArts
341331#14
In the United States, "Doom II" was the third-best-selling computer game between 1993 and 1999, with 1.55 million units sold during that period. Its revenues in that country ultimately reached $80 million, while those in Europe reached $20 million. Of the latter figure, Kushner wrote that "30 percent [...] came from Germany—a country that had banned the game from its shelves."
Doom II
8521#39
The game again sparked controversy throughout a period of school shootings in the United States when it was found that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who committed the Columbine High School massacre on April 20, 1999, were avid players of the game. While planning for the massacre, Harris said in his journal that the killing would be "like playing "Doom"", and "it'll be like the LA riots, the Oklahoma bombing, World War II, Vietnam, "Duke Nukem" and "Doom" all mixed together", and that his shotgun was "straight out of the game". A rumor spread afterwards that Harris had designed a "Doom" level that looked like the high school, populated with representations of Harris's classmates and teachers, and that Harris practiced for his role in the shootings by playing the level over and over. Although Harris did design "Doom" levels, which later became known as the 'Harris levels', none have been found to be based on Columbine High School.
Doom (1993 video game)
1897332#16
The Steiner Brothers were involved in an angle with Woman who promised "Doom" for the two brothers but never specified exactly what this meant. Woman unveiled her threat at Halloween Havoc 1989, a couple of brawny, hard hitting masked African-Americans. It was obvious to most wrestling fans that Ron Simmons and Butch Reed were under the masks — they had both been on WCW. television shortly before Doom debuted, and they were the only two African-American wrestlers in the company with the same massive physical appearance — but the announcers were made to keep up the storyline (although Jim Ross accidentally exposed Reed's identity on commentary during Starrcade 89: Future Shock). Doom won their debut match against the Steiners when one of the members of Doom pinned Rick Steiner after a headbutt with an illegal object in his mask. Doom followed up on this success by defeating Eddie Gilbert and Tommy Rich at , looking very strong in the process.
Butch Reed
601475#5
The popularity of the book waned and the publisher canceled it. Drake killed off the entire Doom Patrol in the final issue, "Doom Patrol" #121 (September–October 1968). The Doom Patrol sacrificed their lives to Madame Rouge and General Zahl (who pushed the actual kill button) to save the small fishing village of Codsville, Maine. This marked the first time in comic book history that a canceled book ended by having most of its cast of main characters die. Artist Bruno Premiani and editor Murray Boltinoff appeared at the beginning and the end of the story, asking fans to write to DC to resurrect the Doom Patrol, although the latter was supposed to have been Drake. According to the writer, he was replaced with the editor because he had just resigned over a pay dispute and moved to Marvel Comics. He finished the script only out of friendship for Boltinoff. A few years later, three more issues appeared in DC's short-lived attempt to copy Marvel's line of series reprint titles (as opposed to DC's anthology reprint titles). A "Doom Patrol" revival did not occur until 1977, nine years after the original's demise.
Doom Patrol
923002#3
In 1993, just before the release of the second KMD album, "Black Bastards", Subroc was struck by a car and killed while attempting to cross the Nassau Expressway. The group was subsequently dropped from Elektra Records that same week. Before the release, the album was shelved due to its controversial cover art, which featured a cartoon of a stereotypical pickaninny or sambo character being hanged from the gallows. After the death of his brother, Dumile retreated from the hip hop scene from 1994 to 1997, living "damn near homeless, walking the streets of Manhattan, sleeping on benches". In the late 1990s, he left New York City and settled in Atlanta. According to interviews with Dumile, he was also "recovering from his wounds" and swearing revenge "against the industry that so badly deformed him". "Black Bastards" had become bootlegged at the time, leading to Doom's rise in the underground hip hop scene.
MF Doom
601475#1
The first Doom Patrol consisted of super-powered misfits, whose "gifts" caused them alienation and trauma. Dubbed the "World's Strangest Heroes" (an epithet conceived by editor Murray Boltinoff) the original team included The Chief (Niles Caulder), Robotman (Cliff Steele), Elasti-Girl (Rita Farr), and Negative Man (Larry Trainor). The team remained the featured characters of "My Greatest Adventure", which was soon retitled "Doom Patrol" from issue #86 (March 1964) onwards. The original series was canceled in 1968, when Drake killed the team off in the final issue, "Doom Patrol" #121 (September–October 1968). Since then, there have been six "Doom Patrol" series, with Robotman as the only character to appear in all of them.
Doom Patrol
12382062#10
For a final time with Doom on the mound, the Bruins made the 1985 World Series, though Doom lost her first match with the Cal State Fullerton Titans on May 24. The game was notable as Doom surrendered her only career home run to Robin Goodin. Doom rebounded with a shutout over the Nebraska Cornhuskers the next day. With help from Tracy Compton, Doom was able to pitch her third national championship game, a 9-inning win over the Cornhuskers on May 26. She was named to the All-Tournament Team for final time.
Debbie Doom