Anybody wanna feel old? Wolfenstein 3D turns 20 today

**Grimmlok** · May 11th, 2012, 09:36 AM

It has been 20 years since Wolfenstein 3-D changed the course of “shoot’em up” games forever.

For those of us who remember getting jumpy in front of our PC computers, the 1992 precursor to Doom and many other games since is a first-person shooter classic. And to celebrate two decades since its inception, Bethesda Softworks, the company that now owns the property, has released a browser-based version of the game.

One of the first to present a true “3-D” view for the player, id Software’s Wolfenstein 3-D pitted a captured American spy against that most expendable of enemies, the pixilated German Nazi soldier. The game’s moving walls and secret passageways came to life in visceral ways that earlier birds-eye view-style shooting games didn’t, and helped establish a kind of game play perspective that has been used ever since.

So while Call of Duty and others are far more realistic, don’t be surprised to see some desktops showing Wolfenstein’s sharp corners this week—it’s the game that launched a thousand shooters.

Wolfenstein 3-D: A Seminal First-Person Shooter Turns 20

Oh man. I remember downloading this off of a BBS (an online bulletin board, a thing before the world wide web, on a nascent internet) and it took 6 hours at 14.4k. I was 14 years old too.

Ugh.

**LynnieD** · May 11th, 2012, 09:45 AM

Hey, wanna feel even older?? That happens when you've never even heard of this because you were still playing Donkey Kong on Atari.

**MohandasKGanja** · May 11th, 2012, 10:03 AM

Originally Posted by Grimmlok

Oh man. I remember downloading this off of a BBS (an online bulletin board, a thing before the world wide web, on a nascent internet) and it took 6 hours at 14.4k. I was 14 years old too.

Ugh.

YOU feel old? How about this? I remember playing it on an Apple IIe with a green monochrome screen, and it was the SH*T!

I was working at an IT company when Castle Wolfenstein 3D came out, and I was totally blown away. A paradigm shift in what a game could be. And before I knew it, a coworker who programmed in UNIX was playing a development version of DOOM on his NextStep station. Although the screen was only 640x480. When the game was finally cross compiled for the PC, every geek was rushing to get make sure they either got a 480 DX Intel processor, or a math coprocessor for their existing station.

**Grimmlok** · May 11th, 2012, 10:05 AM

LOL y'all are a bunch of geezers

**whitetigeress** · May 11th, 2012, 10:07 AM

Originally Posted by Grimmlok

LOL y'all are a bunch of geezers

*smacks gums, pulls up depends*

**BoogsBun** · May 11th, 2012, 10:08 AM

My most favorite days in elementary school involved this....

**Grimmlok** · May 11th, 2012, 10:39 AM

Died of dysentery

**MohandasKGanja** · May 11th, 2012, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by BoogsBun

My most favorite days in elementary school involved this....

Oh, yeah? I played Santa Paravia and Fiumaccio! Top that, LOL!

**greysfang** · May 11th, 2012, 10:58 AM

WTF are you talking about? Never heard of this.

**MohandasKGanja** · May 11th, 2012, 11:02 AM

Originally Posted by greysfang

WTF are you talking about? Never heard of this.

Which one?

**BoogsBun** · May 11th, 2012, 11:15 AM

Originally Posted by MohandasKGanja

Oh, yeah? I played Santa Paravia and Fiumaccio! Top that, LOL!

Hehehe...ok...here...

**MohandasKGanja** · May 11th, 2012, 11:20 AM

Originally Posted by BoogsBun

Hehehe...ok...here...

The first time I played Pong, it was at a restaurant arcade console at my best friend's bar mitzvah. Shortly after that, the local Sears had about 10 TV sets on display, all set up to play Pong. It was amazing. It looked like a giant daycare center for teens.