Freedoom Manual
Installing Freedoom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Using the Freedoom Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Starting a new game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Loading and saving the game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Quitting the game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Keyboard shortcuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
How to Play. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A Tutorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
The Status Bar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Ammo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Armor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Keys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Color blind accessibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Special Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Enemies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Using the map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Environmental Hazards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Dying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Tactical tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Playing with fan-made WADs and mods. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Suggested resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Cheats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

1

Freedoom is about freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Contributing to Freedoom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Reusing portions of Freedoom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
BSD 3-Clause copyright licence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Welcome to Freedoom, a complete game that is free and open
source software. Freedoom is made available under themodified BSD license, meaning that anyone is free to share it,
modify it and reuse parts of it.
For more details, see the website at https://freedoom.github.io/.

Installing Freedoom
Freedoom is distributed as three files named freedoom1.wad,
freedoom2.wad and freedm.wad which contain the artwork, levels,
music and sound effects that make up the game.
To actually play the game, you can use one of many adaptations("source ports") of the original Doom program that fans havedeveloped for modern systems.

2

The Doom Wiki source ports page has a comprehensive list ofsuch programs. As a starting point, you can try:
• GZDoom, a modern source port that includes hardware
rendering and extended mod capability.
• Crispy Doom, a more minimalist source port that retains an“old school” feel.
Setup depends on the source port you use, and it’s best to referto the instructions for that source port. Generally though, you
can try one of the following:• Place the Freedoom .wad files into the same folder as thesource port before launching. The source port may be able toautomatically detect them.
• If launching from the command line, try eg. my-favorite-port-iwad freedoom1.wad.
Freedoom is split into Freedoom: Phase 1 (freedoom1.wad) and
Freedoom: Phase 2 (freedoom2.wad). Phase 1 is split into four
separate episodes of eight levels each, while Phase 2 is a single,
30 level campaign. This gives 62 levels to play through, plus thesecret levels — if you can discover how to reach them.
FreeDM (freedm.wad) is a monster-free set of levels, madespecifically for player-versus-player. For how to host amultiplayer game, check the instructions on your source port.

3

Using the Freedoom Menus
The main menu can be brought up at any time by pressing theEsc key on your keyboard.

New game

Start a new game, abandoning the current
game (if you’re already playing).

Options

Brings up the options menu. The appearanceof this menu and the available options
depend upon the source port you’re using.

Load Game

Load a saved game.

Save Game

Save your current game, so that you cancontinue playing later.

Read This!

Brings up a help screen showing the items
you’ll encounter in the game.

Quit Game

4

Exit to the operating system.

Starting a new game
[Shortcut: On most source ports, if you repeatedly hit Enter
after the program has started, you will start a new game on thedefault skill level (in the first episode if you’re playing Phase 1).
You do not need to do this quickly.]
To start a new game, press Esc to bring up the main menu, andchoose New Game.
When starting a new game, you may be prompted to choose
which episode to start playing.

If you’re new to the game, start with Phase 1 Outpost Outbreak,the first episode (and easiest). There is no requirement to play
episodes in order.
After choosing an episode, you need to pick a skill level. Skilllevel affects several factors in the game, most importantly the
number of monsters you’ll encounter.

51 Please Don’t
Kill Me!

The easiest skill level. This iseffectively the same as Will This Hurt?,
except that damage is halved.

2 Will This

Easy skill level.

Hurt?
3 Bring On

The default skill level.

The Pain.
4 Extreme

Hard skill level.

Carnage.
5 MAYHEM!

Not Recommended. This is equivalent
to Extreme Carnage except thatmonster attacks are up to twice as fast,and killed monsters come back to life
after around 40 seconds.

Loading and saving the game
It is a good idea to save the game regularly — for example, at thestart of each new level. You may also want to save the gameafter completing a challenging section of a level so that you do

6not have to repeat it again if you die.

To save the game, press Esc to bring up the menu, select Save
Game and choose a slot to save in. Type a memorable
description for the save game (e.g., “E1M3 - Blue Key Door”) andpress Enter. If there are no free slots, you can overwrite an
existing one, destroying the old data.
To restore your saved game, select Load Game from the main
menu and choose your saved game.
If you find yourself saving the game often, you may want to use
the Quicksave feature. Press F6 during play to quicksave. The
Save Game menu appears as usual; choosing a slot makes thatyour quicksave slot. Pressing F6 again in the future will
overwrite your quicksave slot without navigating the menu.
You can restore your quicksave slot with the menu or bypressing F9.
[Warning: Chocolate Doom emulates an original Doom bug thatmakes it crash when you save a game while too much is goingon in the level. This can be disabled in chocolate-setup under"Vanilla savegame limit".]7

Quitting the game
When you’re finished playing Freedoom, press Esc to bring up
the main menu and select Quit Game to exit. (You may want tosave your game first.)

Keyboard shortcuts
The function keys instantly open some common menu items:
Esc Menu

Bring up the main menu.

F1Bring up the help screen that shows

Help

information about the in-game items.
F2

Save

Bring up the Save Game menu.

F3

Load

Bring up the Load Game menu.

F4

VolumeBring up the sound and music
volume sliders.

F6

Quicksave

Save the game to your quicksave slot.

F7

End Game

End the current game and return to
the title screen.

F8

Messages

Toggles showing on-screen messages
for pickups, keys, cheats, etc..

F9

Quickload

F10 Quit Game

Load the game in your quicksave slot.
Quit the game and return to theoperating system.

F11 Gamma

Cycle through the in-game display
brightness levels.

8

How to Play

Freedoom is a real-time first-person shooter (FPS). You’ll be
exploring a series of levels, in each one trying to find the way tothe exit. An assortment of monsters will try to stop you, andyou’ll need to use weapons to defend yourself. Portions of thelevels may be inaccessible until you find a particular key, or finda switch to open a passage. Gameplay will involve hidden-object
exploration puzzles as well as real-time action puzzles aboutplacing and timing the shots of your weapons.
A table of the core in-game controls follows. Doom's defaults
are widely considered suboptimal; check your source port for
how to reconfigure them. Common alternatives are provided
but no single "best" solution works for everyone — you need toexperiment. At minimum you must be comfortable moving in
any one of the four directions while turning and shooting.

9

Function

Default

Default

Commoncontrol 1

control 2

alternative

Move forward Up/Down

Move mouse

W/S/ backward(or Mouse2 for1

forward)Move ("strafe") ,/.

Alt (orleft/right

Mouse3) +A/D

Left/Right2

Turn left/right Left/Right

Move mouseMove mouse

Fire

Ctrl

Mouse1

Mouse1

Use

Space

Double-click

E

Mouse2 orMouse3
Run
1

3

Shift

<none>Shift

On a QWERTY keyboard the W, S, A and D keys form a second

set of arrow keys for the left hand.
2

If you have a monster, a barrel or a PvP opponent crossing the

middle of your screen when your weapon discharges, the game
will adjust your vertical aim for you. Some source ports will let
you disable this behaviour and aim manually instead.
3

Most source ports have an "Always Run" option where holding

this key makes you go slower instead. Since the player character
does not get tired, going slow only helps for increased precision.

10

A Tutorial

This tutorial will introduce you to every basic action you need toplay and beat all of Freedoom.
Start a new game in Phase 1, Episode 1 on easy and follow thesteps. Skip anything that bores or confuses you, and redo
anything you find challenging as long as you like, before moving
on to the next thing or redoing a previous thing.
1. Try moving forward, backward, left, and right. Trace asquare. Try both directions. Try doing a figure eight. (Don’t
leave the cage yet — there are monsters outside.)
2. Turn around in a circle to examine your surroundings. Go atyour own pace, stopping or reversing to look at anything
whenever you want. Do a second circle, moving a little bit as
you go, and watch how that changes the perspective and11how sideways movement can help you see how long a wallor how far away an object is.
3. Move back to the middle of the cage. Turn to point yourhandgun directly at one of the doorframe columns.
4. Move — without turning — so that your handgun is pointed
at the other column. (Bonus points if you can come to anatural stop on target.)
5. Move a bit left or right, then turn to point at the column
again. Do it again, but start turning before your momentum
wears off. Do this again a few times, cycling through all four
directions and turning sooner and sooner until you arepointing and the moving seamlessly. (Move backwards orforwards to reset if you start running into walls.)
6. Try doing a square (or figure eight, etc.) while pointing at thecolumntheentiretime.

Prioritizesmoothness

over

precision — it’s better to be close most of the time thanperfect some of the time.
7. Move to one of the corners with the beds on them so that thecolumn is no longer in your line of sight. Move in and out ofsight with the column playing "Peek-A-Boo" with it. Messwith distance and timing. Try to stay pointed at the column
even when you can’t see it.
8. Play around with the above for a bit. Try pressing the Fire
key to shoot at the column, both standing still and moving,and note where and when the bullet puffs appear. (Stopshooting before your ammo count goes below 30 or so — youwill need those for later!)
9. Tap the 1 key on the keyboard to switch to your fist, and try
to punch the column and see how far away you can do it.

12Tap the 2 key to switch back to the handgun.
10. Try to do everything while holding down the Run key.
11. Enter the trench and kill a zombie. Try not to get hit.
12. Once you’re safe, look near the zombie’s body to see if it may
have left a clip. If it has, move over it to pick it up.
13. Go back the way you came. Go up to the lift like you’re goingto punch it, then hit Use to call it down. Get on it and it willtake you back up. Pick up the items in the upper area torestore or boost your health.
14. Explore the rest of the area. You will find two doors, which
can be opened with the Use key just like the lift. The lower
door will take you closer to the exit, while the higher one
leads to a more difficult but more rewarding detour.
15. Once you’ve decided which way to go, open the door — andget ready to start playing Gun Peek-A-Boo again…

13

The Status Bar
At the bottom of the screen, you’ll see the status bar, which is
divided into the following sections:

Ammo

Number of units of ammunition
remaining for the current weapon.

HealthIf this reaches zero, you’re dead! See thehealth section for power-ups you canfind to replenish your health.

Arms

Which weapons you’ve found so far.
Check out the weapons section for more
information.

Freedoomguy A quick visual indication of how yourhealth is.
Armor

The more armor you have, the less yourhealth will suffer if you’re injured. See
the armor section for more information.

Ammo counts How much you’re carrying of each of
the four types of ammunition, and the
maximum of each you can carry.

14

ItemsWithin the game you’ll encounter various collectible items:
weapons, ammunition, health, armor, keys and some rarer
power-ups which give you special abilities.
Picking something up is a simple matter of walking over it — anon-screen message and a brief flash of the screen indicate thatyou’ve done so successfully. If you don’t pick it up, it’s likely you
don’t need it right now (for example, you can’t pick up a healthrefill when you already have 100% health). If an item gives you
more than you can carry, the difference is lost.

Weapons
You start the game with only a handgun, 50 bullets and yourfists. Exploring the level will reveal more weapons and ammothat you can pick up and use.
Pressing the number key on the keyboard switches to the given
weapon (if you have it). Apart from the melee weapons, each
weapon consumes a certain type of ammo, which may be foundsomewhere in the level.
Weapon

Key Description

Fist

1

If you have no ammunition, you can always
fall back on punching the monsters withyour bare hands. Ammo: None

Ripsaw

1

Designed for cutting through wood, theripsaw also works well as a melee weapon
for cutting through flesh. Ammo: None15

WeaponKey Description

Handgun2

Your starter weapon. Its main purpose is tolet you fight your way to a better weapon,
and to hit shootable switches without
wasting a second bullet. Ammo: Bullets

Pump-action 3

Shoots seven pellets in a fan pattern, letting

Shotgunyou hit multiple targets or one big one.
Ammo: Shells

Double-3Stronger tolerance for powerful loads

barrelledmeans better projectile fragmentation for

Shotgunalmost 50% more hits per shell across awider spread. Good for short range againstgroups of enemies. Ammo: Shells

Minigun4

A much better use for your bullets than thehandgun. Up to forty seconds of bringing
the pain to keep you safe. Ammo: Bullets

Missile5

LauncherFires missiles that deal a lot of damage on
impact, then explode to take out any
smaller monsters nearby. Be careful not to
get caught in the blast! Ammo: Missiles

Polaric

6

Produces a continuous stream of polaric

Energyenergy projectiles which are very effective

Weaponagainst stronger monsters. Ammo: Energy

SKAG 1337

7

Experimental weapon that launches asingle massive polaric energy ball, thenreleases a secondary energy blast in thesame direction! Slow to shoot, but worth
the wait. Ammo: Energy

16

Ammo
Ammo type

Small

Large

Bullets
ShellsMissilesEnergyBackpack-

The backpack gives one small pickup’s worth of every ammo
type. Once you have one, you can carry twice as much ammo as
normal for the rest of the game.

HealthYou start with 100% health. You die if your health reaches 0%.
Picking up any health item will give you the number shown, up
to its limit. The refills are limited to 100%, but the boosts (1%and 100%) are limited to 200%.
1%

10%

25%

100%

Armor
You start with 0% armor. Picking up a vest will get you up to thenumber shown, while each small boost increases your armor

17until you reach 200%.
1%

100%

200%

Normal armor absorbs one third of damage you receive,rounded down. if you have 100 health and 100 armor and are
hit for 50 damage, you’ll lose 34 health and 16 armor.
The attuned armor has slightly different behavior: in addition to
being worth 200% armor, it also absorbs half of all damage.
Because the small boosts add the same armor type you alreadyhave, it may be good to pick up the attuned armor vest
immediately if you don’t already have one.

Keys

Keys you to open certain locked doors and activate locked
switches. Usually essential to be able to progress, although theysometimes allow access to shortcuts or secret areas.

Color blind accessibility
Freedoom’s keys are designed to be distinguishable not just bycolor but also by shape, to make the game more accessible tocolor-blind players. Each key color has an associated shape:

18

Key color

Shape

Blue

Diagonal crossYellow

Vertical lines

Red

Horizontal lines

These shapes are used consistently in the status bar icons, thekey sprites and on walls indicating keyed doors.
For the skeleton keys, pay attention to the direction that thehorns point. For example, here is how the different key icons
appear in the status bar:Special Items
You may also encounter any one of these while exploring:
Low-Light

Let you see in the dark.

Goggles

Lasts 2 minutes.

19

Area Survey Reveals unexplored areas of the map,
Map

including some secret areas that may not
be immediately visible.
Lasts the entire level but effective only forthe current level.

RescueProtects you from heat, toxins andOperations

radiation from damaging floors.

Suit

Lasts 1 minute.

Strength

Increases your health back to 100%, andSymbioteenhances your fists to do ten times theirnormal damage.
Health lasts until removed by damage;enhanced fists last only for that level.

Invisibility

Makes you almost invisible. Monsters still

Cloak

detect your presence, but they’ll find itmuch harder to aim.
Lasts 1 minute.

Negentropic Maxes you out to 200% health+armor.
Surge

Lasts until removed by damage.

Vanguard

Makes you immune to all damage,

Deviceallowing you to get past overwhelming
defences and unavoidable traps.
Lasts 30 seconds.

20

Enemies
The levels are filled with monsters who have no goal apart fromstopping you from completing your mission. Here’s a selectionof some of these monsters who you can expect to encounter.
ZombieThese brain-dead workers of iniquity arearmed with a handgun and intent on yourdestruction. Drops a bullet clip when killed.

Shotgun Zombie
These guys traded their handgun for a
shotgun and pack far more of a punch.
Drops a shotgun when killed.

Minigun Zombie
As soon as you’re in sight of one of these,
he’ll lock on with his minigun and keep on
firing until you’re dead. It’s best to takecover quickly or take him out. Drops aminigun when killed.

21Serpentipede
Rank and file footsoldiers of the alien
invasion. Let them get close and they’ll tear
you to shreds; at a distance they’ll insteadrain down fireballs.
Flesh Worm
Tough and fast-moving, these worms attack
at close range and take several shotgun
blasts to take down. It’s best to keep back.

Stealth Worm
Some flesh worms can bend light aroundthem, making them nearly invisible indarker and noisier environments.

Hatchling
Ionized alien larvae that bodyslam you forsurprising amounts of damage.

22

Matribite
What sick mother sends her own babies tofight? Thus is the duty of empire.

Trilobite
These flying orb-like things spit plasma andbite if you get too close.

Pain Bringer
These guys take at least three rocket blasts totake down, and while you’re trying they’ll
shower you with energy projectiles.

Pain Lord
If the Pain Bringer wasn’t tough enough, thisone can take five rocket blasts.

23

Octaminator
Fast moving, tough, and fires homing
missiles. Do not get into a boxing match with
one of these guys.

Necromancer
If he’s not setting you on fire, he’s undoing
all your hard work by bringing his friendsback from the dead.

Combat Slug
These genetically-engineered living,slithering tanks have been fitted with long
distance flame throwers.
Technospider
These cybernetic creatures fire high-capacity
polaric energy support weapons, making
them a deadly challenge.
Large Technospider
This tank on legs is equipped with a rapidfire minigun and will take a lot of effort tobring down. Immune to explosions fromrockets and barrels.

24

Assault Tripod
The ultimate blend of military technology
and genetic engineering, these three-legged
creatures are fast-moving, heavily armoredand equipped with a missile launcher thatyou’ll want to avoid. Immune to explosions
from rockets and barrels.

Using the map
When exploring Freedoom’s levels, it is sometimes possible toget lost, especially if the level is particularly large or complex.
Fortunately, the map is available to help you find your way.
Press the Tab key during play to bring up the map.

Your current position and orientation are shown by a whitearrow. Areas of the map are usually color coded as follows:

25

Red

Walls (or possibly secret doors)

Yellow

Changes in ceiling height,
including doors.

Brown

Changes in floor height (eg.
steps)

Grey

Undiscovered areas (notnormally shown, but may berevealed if the Tactical Survey
Map item is discovered).

While using the map, the game continues as normal. Controls
work as usual, in addition to the following:
Tab

Toggle map.

-

Zoom out.

+

Zoom in.

0

Maximum zoom out.

F

Toggle whether the map follows theplayer. When turned off, you can use
the cursor keys to pan the view of the
map around independent of yourcurrent position.

26

G

Toggle map grid.

M

Add map bookmark at your position.

C

Clear all bookmarks.

Environmental Hazards
If the monsters weren’t enough, the environment itself poses
hazards which can hurt or even kill you!
Barrels

These exploding barrels litter
many of the levels. Several
shots with a handgun areusually enough to make themdetonate, damaging anything
in their immediate vicinity.
Make sure when engaged incombat to never stand too
close, or a stray shot from anenemy may cause one to
explode in your face! Be aware
too of the potential for chain
reactions when several barrels
are clustered together.

Damaging

Red-hot lava and radioactive

Floorssludge are just two of the typesof damaging floor you can
encounter in Freedoom’s
levels. If walking over it isnecessary, try to find yourself a
rescue suit, a shorter paththrough the area, or way to
run over the area without
touching the floor.

27

Crushing

Many of the levels have been

Ceilings

rigged with traps and this isjust one of them. These moving
ceilings are often placed above
tempting-looking items. Bevery careful not to get caught
beneath one, or it will quickly
crush you into a paste!

Dying
Eventually you will get into a situation you can’t handle andyour player avatar will be killed. You can take this as a sign totake a break from playing, or reload your last saved game, orpress Use to restart the level with full health but no gear except
your handgun and 50 bullets. (Some source ports don’t do thislast one, but instead save your game at the start of every leveland pressing Use loads that game instead.)
There is no lives limit.
In multiplayer pressing Use will reset your health and inventory
and put you at the starting position, but the game itself
continues normally. It is possible to pick up ammo and die
without using it so many times that your team is forced to finish
the map using only handguns, dying in order to reload.

Tactical tips
If you’re struggling with the difficulty of the game, it may be
worth looking into some of these suggestions:28• Put time into setting up your controls — both button/key
assignment and mouse/joystick turning sensitivity. No one
configuration is best for everyone and it is a good idea toexperiment: whatever helps you dodge projectiles and pop
in and out of cover while keeping your weapon pointed at
the enemy, and provides the least distraction as you move
about the map looking for things, is good.
• Play with headphones. The game’s stereo separation can give
helpful audio cues about the positions of enemies and alert
you to incoming projectiles. Headphones give you a more
precise way to pick up on these cues.
• Do not button-mash! Nearly every weapon has a slight
cooldown period when you let go of the Fire key, costing you
time and giving your target more opportunity to return fire.
Holding down Fire will let you shoot any weapon
continuously until your ammo runs out or you let go.
• Take cover! Monsters only attack when you’re in their line ofsight. You’ll want to find hard cover (most opaque things thatshow up on your automap without cheat codes) that you can
put between yourself and any enemy you’re not actively
hitting with your own weapon. Cover is particularly
important when facing certain monsters which can “lock on”
to you (minigun zombie; necromancer) and finding cover
may be the only way to get them to stop shooting longenough for you to return fire. Monsters with guns are also
not any better or worse at hitting you whether you are
moving or standing still, so you can’t continuously dodge on
open ground the way you can against visible projectiles.
• Many of the levels are littered with exploding barrels. Whilethese can pose a danger to you, they’re equally dangerous to29

your opponents. A single, well-timed shotgun blast aimed ata barrel can take down several enemies at once. One barrel
explosion can trigger another, so it can sometimes set off achain reaction that takes down a whole crowd — but be
careful that doesn’t include you!
• If a monster gets injured by another monster, it’ll retaliate
against the one that injured it (this is called monster infighting). If faced with a crowd of enemies, an effective
strategy can be to stand in just the right place so that those at
the back shoot those at the front. Do it right and they’ll spend
more time fighting each other than fighting you, and thesurvivors will be significantly weakened. Be aware though,that a monster cannot be injured by a visible projectile
launched by another of the same species.
• Sometimes you’ll face crowds of monsters, which can be
overwhelming and also drain your ammo supplies. Learn tomaster crowd control. The primary instinct of all monsters is
to

move

towards

you.

Circlearoundthecrowdcontinually — this encourages them to cluster in a single spot
that’s easier for you to target. It also encourages monster infighting; if done effectively, they’ll spend their energy killingeach other and you’ll save on ammunition.
• If you encounter flesh worms or stealth worms and are not
at immediate risk of being surrounded, the ripsaw is a great
way to conserve ammo and avoid taking damage. Worms
can’t attack while being sawed, and if you back into any
corner that is roughly as wide as or narrower than a rightangle, they can only come at you one at a time.

30

Playing with fan-made WADs
and mods

Figure 1. Scythe MAP09 playing with Freedoom.

One of the nicest features of Freedoom is its compatibility withthe catalog of thousands of fan-made levels made for the classic
Doom games. Most popular mods and levels for Doom and DoomII can also be played with Freedoom.
For mods designed for the original Doom, use Freedoom: Phase
1 (freedoom1.wad); for others designed for Doom 2 or Final Doom,use Freedoom: Phase 2 (freedoom2.wad). If you’re using thecommand line, use the -file parameter when you start thegame. For example, to load the file scythe.wad:31

my-favorite-port -iwad freedoom2.wad -file scythe.wad
If you’re not using the command line, you can try dragging anddropping the .wad file onto the source port icon in your file
manager — several source ports support this.

Suggested resources
Over more than two decades, literally thousands of Doom levels
have been made, and there are so many that it may seemdifficult to know where to start. The following are somesuggestions for where to look for the best content:• Doomworld’s Top 100 WADs Of All Time was written in 2003
and aimed to list the best works from the first 10 years of
fan-made mods. It’s still a great list of classic mods.
• The Cacowards are Doomworld’s annual award ceremonythat recognizes the best releases from the Doom community
over the past year. This is a great way to find out about more
recent developments, including some of the more unusualmods that people are releasing.
• The Doom Wiki’s List of notable WADs contains an extensive
list of fan-made WADs and includes screenshots, maps andper-level statistics.
• Doomworld’s interface to the idgames archive includes theability to list the top levels based on five star rankings byvisitors to the site.

32

Cheats
If you can’t get through a spot regardless of skill level, or if you
just want to experiment with game mechanics, try typing any ofthese ingame (case insensitive, do not use any console):
IDDQD

God mode. You take no damage otherthan telefrags.

IDFA

Gives all weapons and ammo.

IDKFA

Gives all weapons, ammo and keys.

IDCLIP

Noclip mode. You are not stopped bycollisions with walls or actors.

IDDT

Reveals full map; type twice to reveal
all enemies and items.

IDCLEVxy

Starts a new game (which resets
everything) on ExMy (Phase 1) or
MAPxy (Phase 2).

IDMUSxy

Change music to that of ExMy (Phase1) or MAPxy (Phase 2).

IDCHOPPERS

Gives the ripsaw weapon.

IDBEHOLDV

Gives the vanguard device powerup.

IDBEHOLDS

Gives the strength powerup.

IDBEHOLDI

Gives the invisibility powerup.

IDBEHOLDR

Gives the rescue suit powerup.

IDBEHOLDM

Gives the area survey map.

IDBEHOLDL

Gives the low-light goggles.

33

Freedoom is about freedom
When people hear about Freedoom, they often assume the namerefers to price — that the only thing this project aims to do is toprovide an alternative to Doom that can be obtained without
paying money. But this is not the case.
The word "free" has two different meanings in English. We say"free" to mean that something costs nothing, but we also use it torefer to freedom — like "free speech" or "the free press".
Freedoom is about the latter. That might sound confusing. What
does it mean?
Imagine a world where artists could only buy paints from asingle company. A monopoly like that would mean paints would
probably be more expensive, but the price wouldn’t be the mainconcern. The bigger issue would be the power that it would
grant to that company. The freedom of those artists to express
themselves would depend on the company supplying them theirpaints.
For over 30 years now, the Doom modding community has
produced thousands upon thousands of levels, mods and evenentirely new games built upon the original Doom games. These
are works of art and ought to be recognised as such. Doom is an
art scene. The raw material these works of art are made from is
not paint or ink, but the original game itself — endlessly
modified, reused and remixed into new variations.
The authors of Doom, id Software, have historically been very
generous to the Doom community. From the time of the game’s
release they went out of their way to share technical details with34

fans, and they later released Doom’s source code under a free
software license — something that was unknown in the games
industry at the time and should be commended. But despite thisbenevolence, they have always held a position of power. Today,rather than being a small independent studio, they and theDoom franchise are owned by a large multinational corporation.
Everybody deserves to be able to experience the wonder that is
Doom and take part in its vibrant modding community that hasendured for so many years. But that community also deserves
its freedom and independence. By providing a free alternativethat anyone can play, share, modify and reuse, we hope that’s
something that Freedoom can help to provide.

Contributing to Freedoom
Freedoom is a free content project contributed to by many users
around the world. It is available as both free in cost (free as infree beer) and in modification and redistribution rights (free asin free speech) to end users, provided that the original software
license is included and/or viewable by users of modified or
redistributed versions.
If you’d like to contribute to the Freedoom project, please checkout the following community hubs:• Freedoom’s source repository:
https://github.com/freedoom/freedoom• the Freedoom discussion forum on Doomworld:
https://www.doomworld.com/forum/17-freedoom/• the Discord guild:35

https://discord.gg/9DA3fut
For more information on how to submit an addition, please see
the following pages on how to use GitHub:• How to use Git version control for contributions:
https://help.github.com/en/github• How to fork a project and create a pull request with Git:
https://guides.github.com/activities/forking/Reusing portions ofFreedoom
Since Freedoom is free, some other projects have used
Freedoom’s assets. We think this is a great use of the project andshould be encouraged. If you use portions of Freedoom in yourproject, please let us know by filing an issue or pull request on
Freedoom’s

websiteproject

page

athttps://github.com/

freedoom/freedoom.github.io.

BSD 3-Clause copyright licence
Copyright © 2001-2023 Contributors to the Freedoom project. All
rights reserved.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with orwithout modification, are permitted provided that the following
conditions are met:
• Redistributions of source code must retain the above
copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following

36

disclaimer.
• Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above
copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following
disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials
provided with the distribution.
• Neither the name of the Freedoom project nor the names of
its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products
derived from this software without specific prior written
permission.
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS
AND CONTRIBUTORS “AS IS” AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIEDWARRANTIES,INCLUDING,

BUT

NOT

LIMITEDTO,THEIMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESSFOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENTSHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
FOR

ANY

DIRECT,

INDIRECT,

INCIDENTAL,

SPECIAL,

EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT
NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS ORSERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESSINTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR
TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN
ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF
ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
For a list of contributors to the Freedoom project, see the file
CREDITS.

37