Back in 1993, a small team of young developers released Doom, which would go on to not only become one of the biggest FPS franchises of its time, but would continue to influence the genre for decades to come. As a result, there are many fans out there who are always looking for ways to keep things fresh with this classic release. Some may create new mods for it, others attempt record-breaking speedruns, while there are those who find unique ways to play the original Doom. The latest of the latter has even managed to catch the attention of one of the game's creators.
Over the years, fans have discovered odd things that can run the FPS, but recently, someone has managed to make it possible to control Doomguy using the dial on a rotary phone. A brief clip was uploaded to Twitter recently, which shows the user controlling Doom in a rudimentary way, with the phone's numbers relating to specific functions, such as turning, moving and shooting. Not only that, but the game's co-creator, John Romero, made a comment about the amusing video.
Retweeting the clip himself, the famous developer made the following light-hearted comment in response to user Yoshino's post: "Hello operator? I'd like to report a Cacodemon." Others in the thread also commented similar phone-based puns, with others impressed at how the original poster was able to make the game playable through this method. Given that ex-id Software employee John Romero is something of an influential figure, his words have no doubt caused many Twitter users to investigate the original clip.
As ways to play the game go, this is one of the most unique. While there have been many weird things that people have got Doom run on, this one is somewhat different in that it's still the same game running on a normal laptop, just with a rotary phone being used instead of a mouse and keyboard.
As one of the most influential FPS titles in gaming history, Doom is a massive cultural phenomenon, and has been for nearly three decades. While the likes of Doom 2016 and Doom Eternal have breathed new life into the series, it's the original games that many fondly remember, helping to kick-start the first-person genre into gear. Gaming as an industry has certainly moved on since then, but the shockwave of this original id classic still resonates with many, and there will no doubt be new ways of playing it that have yet to be discovered.
The original Doom was released in 1993 for numerous platforms, with subsequent ports throughout the years.