In the “Doom runs on anything” category, we are breaking records!

Game news In the “Doom runs on anything” category, we are breaking records!

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When DOOM is playable on anything and everything…

It’s been a real running gag for several years on the Internet: the video game DOOM is playable on just about anything and everything, and especially on machines that originally have nothing to do with the video game. For those who are a little behind, DOOM is originally a first-person shooter video game released in 1993. In addition to creating a genre of its own (we called this type of game “doom-like” before moving on to “FPS”), it was best known for offering a dynamic and action-packed experience. Today, while the saga still continues with new episodes like DOOM Eternal or DOOM: The Dark Ages (scheduled for release later this year), the shooter is best known for being able to be played on any what an everyday machine.

For several years, several programming enthusiasts have had fun making DOOM playable on devices absolutely not made for that. Thus, we were able to see DOOM being playable on an old iPodon a Apple Watchon a microwavea washing machineand dashboard car, or even inside other video games like Minecraft or Outer Wilds. But the pompom is especially when it is adapted to be playable on completely ludicrous machines like a vaporizeror worse, a pregnancy test.

DOOM is playable on a PDF file, and you can try it for yourself!

If programmers around the world are having fun making DOOM playable on anything and everything, it is largely thanks to the title’s phenomenal optimization and its ridiculous size of 2.39 Mb. But even knowing this, it is sometimes difficult to imagine how they can achieve such feats. A few days ago, a high school student who responds to the nickname ading2210 on GitHub pushed the envelope even further by making the game fully playable on a simple PDF file.

DOOM, on a PDF

In fact, if you click on this link (guaranteed without malicious content) from a Chromium browser (Google Chrome, Opera, Microsoft Edge, etc.), you will see that the PDF file launches well, and with it the rest of the game. So of course, the experience is necessarily altered. DOOM is then only available in black and white, without any sound and above all with a delay of 80ms per image, which is not entirely ideal for finishing the game. But we still advise you to try to get to the first enemies to kill if only for a good laugh. For the most curious, this feat was made possible thanks to the fact that PDF files are compatible with JavaScript, which makes it possible to obtain a 3D rendering, make HTTP requests and detect the user’s screen. A great achievement, especially for a young high school student to whom we wish an excellent future.