Final Doom

Final Doom brought the work of community mappers to retail. TNT: Evilution came out of TeamTNT’s group effort, while brothers Dario and Milo Casali built The Plutonia Experiment under contract with id Software.

To see where Final Doom fits in the series, browse the Doom games in release order or explore the Doom timeline for the events that lead up to its two campaigns.

Origins and development

The two episodes arrived at id Software by very different routes. TNT: Evilution had been developed independently by TeamTNT with the original intention of releasing it freely to the public. id Software purchased the rights to the project when it was nearly complete, absorbing it into what would become Final Doom. TeamTNT completed the megawad on October 24, 1995, and John Romero brokered the publishing deal on the eve of its planned free release. The last-minute change earned TNT: Evilution a place on Doomworld’s “Top 10 Infamous WADs” list. According to Dario Casali, the initials originally stood for “Trials ’N Tribulations” and later for “The New Technology.”

The Plutonia Experiment began with an eight-level sampler that impressed id Software’s American McGee. The Casalis built the 32-level campaign in four months and submitted it in January 1996. Milo designed 18 maps and Dario designed 14. Dario used DETH to build his maps, and the brothers created custom textures using 3D Studio and Aldus PhotoStyler. Although both Casali brothers were part of TeamTNT and had contributed to Evilution, Plutonia was produced by them independently of the larger group effort.

TNT: Evilution features a largely new original soundtrack with music by Jonathan El-Bizri, Josh Martel, L.A. Sieben, and Tom Mustaine alongside some tracks carried over from Doom II, whereas The Plutonia Experiment reuses music exclusively from Doom and Doom II.

TNT: Evilution

The UAC has established a new base on a moon of Jupiter, once again conducting research into dimensional gateway technology. When the yearly supply ship arrives ahead of schedule, it reveals itself to be a vessel of Hell, unleashing a demonic invasion that overruns the facility. The player character — the marine commander, who was away from the base at the time — returns to find his troops slaughtered or zombified and sets out for vengeance. The campaign ends on MAP30, Last Call, where the marine destroys the Icon of Sin.

The Plutonia Experiment

Following Hell’s catastrophic invasion of Earth depicted in Doom II, the United States takes steps to prevent another invasion. UAC scientists build quantum accelerator devices that can seal invasion gates from a distance. When seven gates open at once, the scientists close six before demons overrun the complex. A demon gatekeeper guards the last open gate. Fearing the demons will destroy the device or turn it against humanity, the government orders all marines to the site. The player’s marine arrives first and enters the complex alone to stop the gatekeeper.

Gameplay and difficulty

Final Doom’s gameplay mechanics are nearly identical to those of Doom II: Hell on Earth, using the same weapons, items, and monster roster. The difference lies in the new levels, textures, and, in TNT’s case, music. Of the two episodes, The Plutonia Experiment is generally considered the more punishing. Plutonia fields strong opposition early and packs large groups of enemies into its later maps. Each episode stands as a full 32-map campaign, presenting its narrative as a sequel to the events of Doom II without the two episodes referencing each other.

Final Doom runs without an existing installation of Doom II. Each IWAD contains most of Doom II’s resources and replaces the rest, meaning the game is fully self-contained. It is, however, possible to use the Final Doom IWADs as PWADs alongside Doom II, and they are broadly compatible with add-ons made for Doom II, subject to minor visual inconsistencies.

Tactics for Final Doom

• Use cover against arch-viles. In Plutonia’s MAP11, Hunted, use the maze’s corners to break line of sight when an arch-vile starts its attack. Fight from a corner you can retreat behind.
• Learn the floor pattern in TNT’s MAP30. In Last Call, stepping onto the wrong platform can kill you instantly. The safe platforms match the torch colors in the hallway you came from: follow the sequence red, green, green, blue, green, blue, green, blue, green, green, red, blue, red, blue.
• Let monsters fight each other in Go 2 It. In Plutonia’s MAP32, use the open space to draw cyberdemon rockets into groups of other monsters, then move behind cover while they fight.
• To jump to a specific map in the PC version of Final Doom, type the IDCLEV cheat followed by the two-digit map number during play. For example, IDCLEV31 takes you to MAP31 in the campaign you’re playing. Our Doom cheat codes guide includes the full level-warp table.

For enemy attack patterns and weapon details, see our Doom enemies database and Doom weapons database.

Engine and technical notes

Final Doom uses the Doom engine, built from the same codebase that underlies The Ultimate Doom. The DOS executable reports version 1.9. The engine is capable of running Thy Flesh Consumed when supplied with the appropriate IWAD, and it correctly detects the Final Doom IWADs to supply the necessary intermission text strings and level names — while retaining the data needed to run Doom II as well. When multiple IWADs are present in a single directory, the engine will prioritize the Final Doom IWADs over Doom II or Doom, and Plutonia over Evilution.

In the original DOS release, teleporters do not move the player to the destination floor height, so the player can arrive in the air or in the ground. Additionally, a minor configuration quirk distinguishes Final Doom’s engine from standard v1.9: setting joyb_speed to 31 does not produce the always-run behavior seen in standard v1.9, whereas a value of 29 works in both.

PlayStation version

Final Doom was ported to the Sony PlayStation using the same engine that powered the original PlayStation release of Doom, with the same team at Williams Entertainment handling the conversion. Rather than including the full 64 levels of the PC release, the PlayStation version draws from a pool of 85 levels spanning The Master Levels for Doom II, TNT: Evilution, and The Plutonia Experiment — but includes only 30 of them. Of this selection, 13 of the 21 Master Levels are present, 11 of TNT’s 32 levels, and just 6 of Plutonia’s 32 levels. The back of the package describes the content as ‘over thirty’ levels.

The PlayStation port carries over the features introduced in the PlayStation Doom, including new sound effects, ambient music, colored lighting, and animated fire sky textures. It also added support for the PlayStation Mouse. Aubrey Hodges — who would later compose Doom 64’s soundtrack — reused most of the music from PlayStation Doom and composed ten new tracks for this edition. Memory limits kept the spider mastermind out of the playable levels, though it appears in the end-of-game cast sequence. Many maps had simpler geometry and adjusted monster placement, but they generally retained more detail than the maps in the original PlayStation Doom. Some run at lower frame rates. The port uses passwords to resume play and has no secret levels.

Release history

The MS-DOS release launched in North America on June 27, 1996. The PlayStation version followed in North America on September 25, 1996. The game was placed on the German index of youth-endangering media (Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Schriften) on April 30, 1997, restricting its advertisement and sale to minors.

Box art

The box art produced by id Software and GT Interactive is modeled on a US military M910 TPDS-T ammunition container — a container for target practice rounds designed for the M242 Bushmaster 25 mm autocannon. The design is rendered in an inverted orientation relative to the container’s standard positioning.

Later releases

The id Anthology compilation, released December 13, 1996, included a revised DOS executable and revised IWADs in some copies. The executable restores the earlier teleport behavior. The revised TNT IWAD restores the yellow key in MAP31, Pharaoh, for single-player and removes unnecessary secret tags from four sectors in MAP10, Redemption. The revised MAP10 also has rebuilt nodes, which can cause demos recorded with the revised IWAD to desync on the original version. The revised Plutonia IWAD adds deathmatch starts to MAP12, Speed, and MAP23, Tombstone. The Macintosh release also contains the revised IWADs, and GOG distributed them when Final Doom became available there in August 2015. Separate IWAD variants were later distributed through PlayStation Network.

Bethesda made both campaigns available as official add-ons for the 2019 Unity re-releases of Doom and Doom II in January 2020, using IWAD builds dated November 27, 2019. In August 2022, Final Doom was delisted as a standalone listing on Steam. Bethesda folded it and Master Levels for Doom II into the Doom II install package.

The August 8, 2024 release of Doom + Doom II includes both campaigns directly in its main menu. Its TNT and Plutonia IWADs exist in two builds, dated August 8 and October 3, 2024.

Source port compatibility

Both IWADs are supported by source ports such as Chocolate Doom, Crispy Doom, DSDA-Doom, PrBoom+, and GZDoom, among many others.