Id-Software
Doom

In 1993, Id Software is a small Texan software house consisting of a handful of people. Among them are two geniuses: the first is a technical talent, named John Carmack, destined to create the most advanced graphics engines in the years to come. The second is a creative talent, named John Romero, who will give birth to monsters and settings that will forever mark the collective imagination of a generation. The team has published a few games, has had some success with Wolfenstein 3D, and is finally about to take the big step.

At the time, connections weren't great; half the world operated with 28 or 33K modems, while the other half enjoyed 56K. The custom was to release demos of games in development, in order to receive some feedback from consumers; Id does more, and releases a shareware version of its creation, which actually comprises a third of the total game. They could not yet imagine that servers would be flooded with requests, and that within a year over ten million people would have downloaded the game.

The impact on the community is one that leaves a mark: "Doom" is visually the most impressive game ever, requiring a powerful 486 at 33 MHz to be played decently, but the graphics engine offers things never before seen: entirely in 3D (or so it seems, in reality, it's what we would call 2.5D today), every surface is rendered in real-time and everything is mapped from top to bottom, there are lighting effects and non-perpendicular walls of different heights. Apart from the technical exploit, it is the gameplay, so immediate and visceral, that conquers the audience, and upon its official release, it is an instant worldwide success. Its graphical and interactive violence earned it some fierce criticism, partly due to certain satanic symbolism (many levels are set... in hell) but since players essentially massacre hordes of disgusting monsters, the controversy is short-lived; nonetheless, the game will often be cited as an instigator of violence for fragile young minds, so much so that its name will be revived even six years later during the Columbine massacre.

Anyway, Doom soon becomes synonymous with FPS, so much so that most first-person shooters that follow will be labeled as Doom-like for a long time. The game is also a pioneer of multiplayer over the internet, despite staggering pings by today's standards, the term deathmatch was coined at that moment. Additionally, it is with Doom that the first mods developed by enthusiasts will appear, which will be exchanged online, significantly extending its life cycle. Id will publish numerous map-packs and an official sequel will see the light the following year, doubling the success of the first chapter. However, the intellectual property will be put on hold by the Texans for about a decade, and the Quake project related to the explosion of multiplayer will take over until the late '90s. In 2004, with Id having now become an entertainment giant, the controversial third chapter will be released, and the announcement of a fourth installment in the saga is very recent.

It's hard to explain what "Doom" has represented for the video game world: at the same time innovation, technique, avant-garde, and style, that laid the foundations on which all FPS that we might call "old school" today are built. We would have to wait until 1997 and the release of Half-Life to talk about modern shooters, but that's another story.