Doom 64

Doom 64's gameplay is similar to that of earlier Doom games. The player must advance through 28 story levels (and 4 secret levels) by battling demons, collecting weapons and keys, and activating switches to reach the level's exit while surviving deadly ambushes and traps. The Doom engine and gameplay elements were customized, and all visual assets such as weapon and monster graphics are unique to Doom 64.

All the weapons from Doom II are present, but with new sprites and sound effects. The chainsaw has two blades instead of one, the fists have bloodstained gloves instead of brass knuckles, the plasma gun has an electric core that emits a sparking sound, the rocket launcher has a small kickback, the shotgun's priming handle is at the grip instead of under the barrel, and the double-barreled super shotgun reloads faster and causes kickback.

C. research installations with apocalyptic levels of radiation. For years, the installations stood abandoned, until a barely-functioning satellite monitoring one of them sends a message back to Earth. This message indicates that a "single entity with vast rejuvenation powers" was masked by the radiation and escaped detection.

The entity was able to resurrect the demons by altering "decaying dead carnage back into corrupted living tissue". As the only experienced survivor of the Doom episodes, the Marine is sent in alone to exterminate them.

Doom 64 was developed by Midway Games at its San Diego studio. id Software, the primary developer of the Doom franchise, supervised the project. Development began in late 1994. Its tentative title of The Absolution was changed to Doom 64 for brand recognition, and reused as the name of the last level.

Midway wanted to include every demon from the original games into the final product, along with extra levels. However, deadlines and storage size constraints of the Nintendo 64 Game Pak cartridges led them to them exclude the levels and a few demons. Midway stated that a multiplayer mode was not included because Nintendo did not provide the necessary resources for multiplayer programming. Midway justified the decision based on alleged slowdown during split-screen multiplayer in other games on the console and the competitive nature of the mode.

By the time Doom 64 was released, the original Doom had been converted to nearly every platform capable of running it. Critics agreed that Doom 64 was by far the best-looking Doom to date, exceeding even the PC version. They were enthusiastic about the level designs, deeming them imaginative and much more challenging than those of the original Doom. A Next Generation critic remarked that "even the most skillful Doom fans will have their hands full. And pushing door switches often causes whole rooms to rearrange and fold out into new shapes."

However, most reviewers said that the new graphics and levels were not enough to keep the game from feeling like yet another port of the original Doom. Peer Schneider of IGN concluded, "Make no mistake about it, this is the best update to Doom so far—but if you've played the PC, PSX, SNES, Mac, Saturn, etc versions to death, you can do without this one." GamePro disagreed with the majority on this point, stating that "Doom 64 pumps the tried-and-true corridor-shooter formula full of life, with another challenging, intense experience that showcases the system's capabilities." 0 out of 5 in all four categories: graphics, sound, control, and fun factor.