And now everyone’s remembering why it was so special.
Ah, Doom 64. In the absence of a PC, my console-fuelled video game childhood was left with Doom 64. But, improbably, Doom 64 was great.
This 1997 Nintendo 64-exclusive Doom game was not a port of the original Doom, or any of the other Doom games. Nor was it meant to be the 64th Doom game (although by this point will it be?). Rather, it was a sequel developed by Midway that took place after Doom 2.
I remember Doom 64 looking fantastic to my teenage eyes, and the music was properly atmospheric. You spent a lot of time shooting demons, of course, but there was a real horror feel to the game. It felt like Doom 64 was as good as Doom could get on Nintendo’s console and, as someone who hadn’t played Doom before, it also felt fresh.
As Digital Foundry’s John Linneman put it in a recent DF Retro, Doom 64 is “one of the finest technological achievements for Nintendo 64″… “it takes full advantage of the N64 hardware, enabling effects and techniques never seen before in the Doom engine. It runs at 320×240 and, unlike other versions, operates at a rock solid, locked 30 frames per second”.
Why am I – and others online – talking about Doom 64 all of a sudden? Because it’s popped up in a PEGI rating for PC and PlayStation 4.
PEGI has rated DOOM 64 for PS4 and PC. This was in addition to ratings of DOOM (1993) and DOOM II (Classic). There’s no DOOM 3 rating. pic.twitter.com/5CtEBtV61X
— Gematsu (@gematsucom) July 26, 2019
As Gematsu noted in a tweet that includes an image of the now-deleted listing, when Doom 1 and 2 were spotted on PEGI, only PC and PS4 were mentioned. As we now know, Doom 1 and 2 have launched on Xbox One and Nintendo Switch as well as PC and PS4, so if Doom 64 is heading our way, expect it to come out on everything.
