Upon its release in 1993, probably nobody suspected just how much of an impact the original Doom would have on the industry. Along with Wolfenstein 3D, it pretty much kickstarted the first-person shooter genre and is still influencing to this day. The fact that Steam has now simplified id Software's classic games into bundles shows that the early ventures of the Doomslayer are still very much in vogue. Perhaps what keeps the beloved FPS in the limelight is not only its timeless gameplay or endless mods, but also the number of ways people can port and play it.
Take hacker Sick Codes as a recent example. As reported by Wired, this Australian coder has managed to jailbreak the computer system of a John Deere tractor, allowing farmers to now modify their own equipment. Shown off at DefCon in Las Vegas over the weekend, not only has this once again brought to the fore the debate surrounding a consumer's right to repair their purchases, but it seems as though Sick Code did what anyone else does when they hack something. They installed Doom onto it. An image shared on Reddit shows the game on the tractor's display.
John Deere tractors feature in the Farming Simulator games and are one of the most well-known brands of agricultural machinery in the world. However, most would probably not think of them as being suitable for running id's influential shooter. However, as many have demonstrated over the course of nearly 30 years, it's entirely possible to get the original Doom to run on just about anything.
More images can be found on Reddit.
There have been so many weird and wonderful devices that Doom has been ported to. Such examples include a treadmill, a smartwatch, a vape pen, an iPod Mini, and the touch bar on a MacBook Pro. There's even been a case of someone bringing the game into Doom itself, and someone has managed to add it into Minecraft. Clearly, there is something about the iconic FPS that makes it ideal for installing on any number of things not officially intended. It begs the question of what else people will port it to in the future.
As for the game itself, it took the team from id Software many attempts before they would eventually go on to have an impact on gaming. In fact, John Romero said Doom was his 90th game, and he had already spent many years putting in the work before helping to get the ball rolling in the first-person shooter genre. There's a lesson here to be learned about how new developers shouldn't give up their dream.
Doom released in December 1993 for multiple platforms and has been ported to many systems.
Source: Wired