WOLFENSTEIN 3D: HOW THE FIRST MODERN FPS WAS BORN
For me, the year of 3D in video games remains and will remain 1992. You will certainly oppose it by bringing to my table numerous illustrious examples dug up even from the 80s or 70s. I, however, will remain firm in my position by answering that yes, certainly 3D has existed for much longer, but 1992 remains the year in which three-dimensional graphics forcefully entered our home computers with a graphic design that is now quite solid and understandable to be appreciated by a wider audience.
1992 is the year of Ultima Underworld, Robocop 3D, Virtua Racing but above all Wolfenstein 3D. In this article I would like to focus on this last title. id Software's shooter had the merit of inventing an entire genre: that of first-person fps. It all began with the work of a small group of developers named John Romero, John Carmack, Tom Hall and Adrian Carmack.
In the early 1990s the guys in question worked for the Softdisk company and were mainly involved in family-friendly games with the 2D platformer series Commander Keen. The bold young people also tried to propose to Nintendo their personal conversion of Super Mario for PC. The work impressed the managers of the Japanese giant, but they were refused based on the desire not to let their mascots leave the consoles of the big N. Not that today the policy of the parents of the red-blue plumber has changed.
Once the contractual obligations with Softdisk were over, some things were now clear for the guys at id Software: the shareware distribution was working well, it was time to abandon Commander Keen and furthermore the power of the PC finally allowed them to embrace a new dimension. The shareware policy consisted of making part of the game available for free and making subsequent content available for a fee. From the series: “do you want more? Pay!"
The 3D of the time instead consisted either of large colored polygonal blocks as in the case of Virtua Racing, or in a mix of two-dimensional sprites appropriately oriented based on the player's position in space. The latter was the path chosen by Romero, Carmack and companions for their new game: Wolfenstein 3D.
Another point of view
The camera was placed right at the protagonist's eye level and the environment was generated in real time only in correspondence with the player's gaze thanks to a technique called Ray Casting. The setting was obviously simplified and consisted of a geometric grid where each element corresponded to a block. The visualization of textures was limited only to the walls while the ceiling and floor were represented by simple single-color surfaces.
From an audiovisual and playability point of view, Ultima Underworld was significantly more complex but Wolfenstein 3D had that something extra in its arcade, fast and frenetic playability that made it immediately establish itself as a classic. And to think that so much novelty would never have existed without a game developed in the early 80s by Silas Warner: Castle Wolfenstein. A soldier had to escape from a 2D German prison complete with stealth sequences and recorded audio. It was a great success and the guys at id Software remembered it as a classic from their childhood. On the one hand they wanted to take back that masterpiece, on the other to transform it into something completely new and modern.
Wolfenstein 3D used the original brand, purchased at the time for just $5,000, eliminated the stealth sequences for tighter gameplay, and added a new dimension to the formula. The success was notable and paved the way for expansions, sequels, mods and obviously an entire genre, that of first-person shooters, which continues at a rapid pace even today.
Doom, Duke Nukem, Quake, Unreal Tournament, Half Life, Far Cry, Crysis, Medal of Honor, Call of Duty, Battlefield and more. Do we want to talk about it? It all basically started from there, when a group of ambitious young developers made Wolfenstein 3D available for purchase on the morning of May 5, 1992. The rest is history!
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