I've always enjoyed playing old school videogames from my youth. I'm constantly reminded that graphics are nice, but gameplay is the most important factor in a game. Recently I got the itch to play Doom 2. I cranked up my install of Windows XP, installed the game (if you can call it installing) and played it. Unfortunately the game is so old (almost 15 years) that I was unable to use the mouse in the game. After 15 minutes of playing terribly, I looked for a solution. I first found a mouse driver but that didn't work. Next I tried an old school joystick I use to use but that didn't work either. Finally I found on a Doom wikia, a source port called ZDoom.
Back in the 90's Id released the Doom source code for Linux. Some savvy people took this code and converted it for Windows. The next step was to enhance the game to make it playable with modern technology. One of these enhancements was a source port called ZDoom.
ZDoom adds many of the features of modern first person shooters. You can now jump and crouch. The game also lets you define custom controller options (something that was lacking from the original Doom.) Because of this I was able to apply my tried and true FPS controller settings to an old school game like Doom 2. In a way, this made me a super-player and made the game much more enjoyable.
Probably the coolest thing about ZDoom is the modders went back and updated many of the textures in the game for higher resolutions. I can now play Doom 2 fullscreen at 1920x1200 without extremely blurry graphics. The graphics don't look earth shattering but I will say they look good enough that I can once again play the game without being distracted by the blurriness.
ZDoom also comes with an updated network play option that supposedly makes it easier to play against friends. I haven't tried this yet but it would be fun to play with friends.
A few other features the game includes is an updated HUD that is much more useful than the original Doom 2 HUD. The new one shows you your ammo for each weapon along with with other stats like secrets found/total secrets and enemies killed/total enemies.
Overall ZDoom takes a classic game and makes it playable again along with a few modern conveniences we come to expect from modern FPS. I give it a 8/10.
