DOOM

It seems the scientists have opened a gateway straight to Hell.

Phobos base is overrun with demonic creatures, and the whole of Deimos simply vanishes.

A squad of marines is sent to Phobos, but all except one are quickly slaughtered.

It falls to the surviving marine to grab some guns and strike back at the demons. id Software's follow-up to their genre-defining Wolfenstein 3D , Doom is another first-person 3D shooter: full-on action as seen from the space marine's perspective.

Like Wolfenstein, the game consists of distinct episodes, playable in any order.

The first episode, Knee-Deep in the Dead , takes place in the Phobos base and is freely available as shareware.

The full game continues on Deimos in The Shores of Hell and culminates in Inferno , the final episode which takes place in Hell itself (the Sega 32X version lacks this episode).

The basic objective in each level is simply to reach the exit.

Since dozens of enemies stand in the way, the only way to get there is by killing them.

Switches and buttons must be pressed to advance at certain points and often color-coded locked doors will block the way - matching keycards or skull keys must be found to pass.

The game's engine technology is more advanced than Wolfenstein's, and thus the levels are more varied and complex.

The engine simulates different heights (stairs and lifts appear frequently) and different lighting conditions (some rooms are pitch black, others only barely illuminated).

There are outdoor areas, pools of radioactive waste that hurt the player, ceilings that come down and crush him, and unlike Wolfenstein's orthogonally aligned corridors, the walls in Doom can be in any angle to each other.

An automap helps in navigating the levels.

Stylistically, the levels begin with a futuristic theme in the military base on Phobos and gradually c