The original Doom from 1993 can now be played almost everywhere. Just in time for Halloween, an American hardware manufacturer thought of something very special: Doom on a chocolate bar. What it’s all about and on which other quirky “platforms” the legendary first-person shooter is running, you can find out in this article.
That the original MS-DOS version of Doom from 1993 feels like it runs everywhere has become a running gag by now. No wonder there is a dedicated meme subreddit called “Will it run DOOM?”, where the most absurd and funniest methods of playing the legendary shooter are shared.
This year’s Halloween sees an American hardware manufacturer likely putting the crown on this highest tradition of gaming and hardware hacking. Adafruit Industries managed to get Doom running on a chocolate bar-like device.
The “Candy of Doom” from Adafruit Industries
The company recently released a video on their Twitter account showing the mentioned bar – fittingly wrapped in a Milky Way package.
Apart from the already entertaining basic idea, it’s also funny that Milky Way chocolate bars are sold as “Mars” outside of the USA. We also know this bar in Germany.
This means you can now “play Doom on Mars” in a double sense. After all, the plot of the first-person shooter also takes place on said planet.
If you want to learn about the first video game console in the world, you can do so in this article:
Can you really play Doom on the chocolate bar?
The manufacturer has so far made no statements about whether the retro game on the bar is actually playable or just an automated video. However, since Adafruit is known for their unique and innovative electronic devices and components, it is quite conceivable that the “Candy of Doom” is indeed playable.
For example, at the beginning of the year, a video on the YouTube channel of Adafruit Industries showed how the company also made Doom playable on one of their extremely tiny development boards called QT Py ESP32. Accordingly, it is quite possible that one of these boards or at least a similar module could be inside the bar.
With caramel and milk chocolate, the device is obviously not powered.
More quirky platforms to play Doom on
Adafruit Industries were by no means the first to get Doom running on a somewhat odd platform. On the contrary: making Doom playable on seemingly every electronic device with a display is among the greatest traditions when it comes to hacking games or hardware. Countless creative minds have already presented their own playable versions of the game on some of the most quirky platforms.
However, as it would be nearly impossible to list all these ports here, we will therefore show you a few particularly absurd examples:
Doom on a printer
A few years ago, a security flaw in the Canon Proxima printer series became known. To prove how easy it was to access the software of the Proxima printers, a security expert uploaded Doom via a firmware update to one of these devices.
The result was a horrifically looking, but at least completely playable version of the classic. Unfortunately, due to the technical limitations of the printer, it did not have any sound.
Doom on an ATM
Typically, the goal of people who hack an ATM is certainly not to get Doom running on it, but rather to quickly access cash.
However, a few Australians made use of the Windows XP operating system of one of these devices to still install a playable version of the game. The group has since also managed to reconfigure the side buttons of the ATM to function as buttons to select the different weapons.
The idea that you first have to complete a Doom level before you can withdraw money is not only incredibly funny but should be the next logical step in the evolution of civilization.
Doom on a Canon camera
Any electronic device with a display has the potential to play Doom on it. This is probably what the YouTuber “raccoon” thought, who got the game running on a Canon EOS RP camera using a code from the “Will it run DOOM?” subreddit earlier this year.
Raccoon is not the first to manage to port a playable version of the classic to a camera. The YouTuber “LGR” made it possible three years ago to play Doom on a digital camera from 1998.
Doom on a pregnancy test
Now it gets really wild. Twitter user “foone” previously published a video showing how a – admittedly – hard-to-recognize copy of Doom runs on the monochrome display of a pregnancy test. At first, it was only a small video of the game, but according to foone, the classic is now completely playable on the unusual “console”.
The fact that this is even possible is due to the 8-bit microcontrollers commonly used in pregnancy tests, just like those in very early PCs. According to foone: “The thing […] is probably faster in numerical calculations and basic input/output than the processor in the original IBM PC.”
Doom in Doom
That’s right! YouTuber “kgsws” actually managed to program a playable version of Doom within Doom. This feels like a scene from the well-known movie Inception, and the whole process behind it was extraordinarily complex.
Anyone who wants to see for themselves how kgsws achieved this should take a look at this short documentary:
Doom on potatoes (!?)
To conclude, this article ends as it began: with something edible.
YouTuber “Equalo” managed to create a playable version of Doom on a graphic calculator using rotten potatoes that generated electricity.
It’s nothing new that potatoes can be used with a bit of zinc and copper to generate electricity. However, using this chemical battery to power a calculator that can run Doom is completely genius.
Those who want to know how many potatoes were needed for this and why they started to rot should watch the following video:
Still haven’t had enough of absurd video game anecdotes? If you want to learn about the quirkiest and sometimes ugliest PlayStation controllers that have been released, we have an article for you:
