Editing Wolfenstein 3D (section)

==Development==
[[File:Simple raycasting with fisheye correction.gif|thumb|300px|right|A simple [[ray casting]] rendering similar to the ''Wolfenstein 3D'' engine. The red dot is the player's location. The orange area represents the player's [[field of view]].|alt=A rotating view of a complex 3D area, with an overhead view on the right showing the raycasting area as the view rotates]]
In October–December 1990, a team of employees from programming studio [[Softdisk]] calling themselves Ideas from the Deep developed the three-part video game ''[[Commander Keen in Invasion of the Vorticons]]'', the first game in the ''[[Commander Keen]]'' series. The group, who worked at Softdisk in [[Shreveport, Louisiana]], developing games for the ''Gamer's Edge'' video game subscription service and [[disk magazine]], was composed of programmers [[John Romero]] and [[John Carmack]], designer [[Tom Hall]], artist [[Adrian Carmack]], and manager Jay Wilbur. After the release of the game in December through [[shareware]] publisher [[3D Realms|Apogee Software]], the team planned to quit Softdisk and start their own company. When their boss, Softdisk owner Al Vekovius, confronted them on both their plans and their use of company resources to develop the game—the team had created it on their work computers, both in the office after hours and by taking the computers to John Carmack's house on the weekends—the team made no secret of their intentions. After a few weeks of negotiation, the team agreed to produce a series of games for ''Gamer's Edge'', one every two months.<ref name="MOD6676"/>

Ideas from the Deep, now formally established as [[id Software]], used some of these to prototype ideas for their own games.<ref name="IGNid"/> Adrian Carmack used them to push his preferred, dark art style, while John Carmack began to experiment with [[3D computer graphics]], which until then was largely the purview of [[amateur flight simulation|flight simulation games]] such as ''[[Wing Commander (video game)|Wing Commander]]'' (1990) or [[wire-frame model|wireframe]] 3D in games on [[mainframe computer]]s. Carmack found that this was largely due to the limitations of [[personal computer]]s of the time, which had difficulty displaying a fast [[action game]] in 3D due to the [[rendering (computer graphics)|number of surfaces]] it needed to calculate, but felt that the increasing computational power of PCs meant that it may be possible.<ref name="MOD6676"/><ref name="AM386"/> During 1991, he experimented with limiting the possible surfaces the computer needed to display, creating game levels with walls designed only on a flat grid rather than with arbitrary shapes or angles. He also took the unusual approach of creating the displayed graphics through [[ray casting]], in which only the surfaces visible to the player were calculated rather than the entire area surrounding the player. After six weeks of development, Carmack had created a rudimentary 3D [[game engine]] that used animated 2D [[sprite (computer graphics)|sprites]] for enemies. Id Software then used the engine for the April 1991 Softdisk game ''[[Hovertank 3D]]'', in which the player drives a tank through a plane of colored walls and shoots nuclear monsters.<ref name="CarmackComm"/><ref name="MOD6676"/> In the fall of 1991, after the team—sans Wilbur—had relocated to [[Madison, Wisconsin]], and he had largely finished the engine work for ''[[Commander Keen in Goodbye, Galaxy]]'', Carmack decided to implement a feature from ''[[Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss]]'', a [[role-playing video game|role-playing game]] in development by [[Looking Glass Studios|Blue Sky Productions]].<ref name="MOD7786"/> ''Ultima Underworld'' was planned to display [[texture mapping|texture-mapped]] 3D graphics without ''Hovertank''{{'}}s restrictions of flat walls and simple lighting.<ref name="MOD7786"/><ref name="UU"/><ref name="UU2"/> Deciding that he could add texture mapping without sacrificing the engine's speed or greatly increasing the system requirements as ''Underworld'' was doing, Carmack enhanced the engine over six weeks from ''Hovertank 3D'' for another Softdisk game, the November 1991 ''[[Catacomb 3-D]]''.<ref name="CarmackComm"/><ref name="MOD7786"/> Upon seeing it, [[Scott Miller (entrepreneur)|Scott Miller]] of Apogee began to push the team to make a 3D shareware action game.<ref name="MOD7786"/>

[[File:John Romero - Jason Scott interview (6951215353) (cropped).jpg|thumb|upright|left|[[John Romero]] in 2012|alt=Face of a smiling man with long black hair and glasses]]
In November 1991, with the second ''Commander Keen'' trilogy of episodes nearing completion and their contractual obligations to Softdisk almost finished, id Software sat down to plan out their next major game. Designer Tom Hall, who initially wanted to do a third ''Keen'' trilogy, recognized that Carmack's programming focus had shifted from the 2D [[side-scrolling video game|side-scrolling]] [[platform game]] series to 3D action games. After an initial proposal by Hall of a sci-fi project, "It's Green and Pissed", Romero suggested a 3D remake of the 1981 ''[[Castle Wolfenstein]]''. The team was interested in the idea, as Romero, Hall, and John Carmack all had fond memories of the original title and felt the maze-like shooter gameplay fit well with Carmack's 3D game engine, while Adrian Carmack was interested in moving away from the child-friendly art style of ''Keen'' into something more violent. Encouraged by the reception to his idea, Romero expounded on it by proposing a "loud" and "cool" fast action game where the player could shoot soldiers before dragging and looting their bodies. The core of the gameplay would be fast and simple, for Romero believed that due to the novelty of a 3D game and control scheme, players would not be receptive to more complicated, slow gameplay.<ref name="RomeroComm"/> He felt the game would occupy a unique place in the industry, which was then dominated by slower simulation and strategy games. Adrian and John Carmack were excited by the prospect, while Hall felt that it was enjoyable enough, and that since he was the company's designer that they could return to his ideas at a later date.<ref name="MOD8793"/>

Initially the team believed that they would be unable to use the ''Wolfenstein'' name due to trademark issues, and came up with multiple possible titles.<ref name="MOD94104"/> They contacted ''Castle Wolfenstein'' developer [[Silas Warner]], but learned that [[Muse Software]] had shut down in 1986, with all rights to ''Wolfenstein'' sold.<ref name="DawnFPS"/> The rights last belonged to someone in [[Michigan]],<ref name="IDInterview"/> and the team was able to purchase the trademark around mid-April 1992 for US$5,000.<ref name="WolfensteinRights"/> Thus they were free to use the name ''Wolfenstein 3D''.<ref name="lombardi199407"/> The game concept met with immediate approval from Scott Miller of Apogee, who considered id Software his star developer, and he guaranteed id a US$100,000 payment on the project.<ref name="MOD7786"/> [[Mark Rein (software executive)|Mark Rein]], who had been brought on a few months prior as id's probationary president, also sold the idea of doing a retail ''Wolfenstein'' project to [[FormGen]], which had published id's December 1991 ''[[Commander Keen in Aliens Ate My Babysitter]]'', overcoming the publisher's concerns over ''Wolfenstein''{{'}}s proposed content. This put id in the unique position of selling simultaneously to the shareware and retail markets.<ref name="MOD94104"/>

[[File:John Carmack E3 2006.jpg|thumb|[[John Carmack]] in 2006|alt=Black and white photo of the head and shoulders of a man wearing glasses]]
The project officially began on December 15, 1991.<ref name="IDInterview"/> Romero and Hall designed the gameplay and aesthetics. Romero wanted the goal to be "to mow down Nazis", with the suspense of storming a Nazi bunker full of [[Schutzstaffel|SS]] soldiers and Hitler himself, as well as dogs, blood "like you never see in games", and straightforward, lethal weapons. He also composed the general storyline for the game.<ref name="Wolf3D-JagDev"/> Hall designed the levels while also adding collectible objects in the form of treasure and food for health items.<ref name="MOD94104"/> He also did sketches for the bosses and the title screen.<ref name="Gamasutra-CKTech"/> Carmack programmed "the core" of the game's engine in a month; he added a few features to the ''Wolfenstein 3D'' engine from ''Catacomb 3-D'', including support for doors and decorative non-wall objects, but primarily focused on making the game run smoother and faster with higher-resolution graphics.<ref name="CarmackComm"/><ref name="MOD94104"/><ref name="Wolf3D-Jag"/> The game was programmed chiefly in [[ANSI C]], with its scaling and ray casting routines written in [[assembly language|assembly]].<ref name="IDInterview"/> The graphics for the game were planned to be in 16 color [[Enhanced Graphics Adapter|EGA]], but were changed to 256 color [[VGA]] four months before release, which also enabled the game to have higher resolutions.<ref name="GSMillerInt"/><ref name="Gamasutra-EduFeature"/> Romero in turn worked on building a game with the engine, removing elements of the initial design, like looting enemy bodies, that he felt interrupted the flow of fast gameplay.<ref name="MOD94104"/> The sprites for the enemies and objects were hand drawn at eight different angles by Adrian Carmack using [[Electronic Arts]]'s ''[[Deluxe Paint|Deluxe Paint II]]''.<ref name="Gamasutra-EduFeature"/><ref name="Wolf3D-BitTech"/><ref name="DeluxePaintII"/> Initially the team had an external artist who assisted him and created animated wall textures, but the team felt that the quality was poor and did not use it in the game.<ref name="GamasutraWalls"/> The level design, by Romero and Hall, due to the grid-based level design, took some inspiration from ''[[Pac-Man]]'', and paid homage with a hidden ''Pac-Man'' level.<ref name="Pacman"/> Romero later said in 2017 that making the levels was uninteresting compared to those from ''Commander Keen'' and had to prompt Hall to finish the maps with the promise of being able to buy himself a brand new car.<ref name="BoringLevels"/><ref name=“PCGamer-Wolf3DHistory”/> The team was going to include some anti-fascist references and Nazi atrocities, but left them out to avoid controversies.<ref name="WaysideIdeas"/> They ensured that the presentation of the game created the atmosphere that they wanted, adding violent animations by Adrian Carmack for enemies being shot and music and sound effects by ''Keen'' composer [[Bobby Prince]] to make the guns sound exciting.<ref name="MOD94104"/> Prince took some inspiration from his days as a platoon soldier in the US Army.<ref name="PrinceArmy"/> With the aid of a 16-bit sampler keyboard and cassette recorder, he composed realistic sounds from a shooting range in addition to [[Foley (filmmaking)|Foley]] sounds. The development team along with Scott Miller did the voicing for the enemies.<ref name="SFXGamasutra"/> Some of the enemy shouts were based on the original ''Castle Wolfenstein'' game.<ref name="DawnFPS"/>

As development continued, id Software hired their former Softdisk liaison [[Kevin Cloud]] as an assistant artist, and moved the company out to [[Mesquite, Texas]], near where Apogee was located.<ref name="MOD94104"/> Scott Miller of Apogee was pleased to have his star developers nearby, and agreed to not only increase their [[royalty payment|royalty]] rate to 50 percent, but have Apogee create their next game for Softdisk, ''ScubaVenture'', so that id could focus on ''Wolfenstein''. The game was intended to be released using Apogee's shareware model of splitting it into three episodes and releasing the first for free, with ten levels per episode.<ref name="MOD105112"/> The level maps were designed in 2D using a custom-made program called Tile Editor (TEd), which had been used for the entire ''Keen'' series as well as several other games.<ref name="TE5GameUltra"/> Upon finding out that the team was able to create a level in a single day using the program, Miller convinced them to instead develop six episodes, which could be sold in different-sized packs.<ref name="CarmackComm"/><ref name="MOD105112"/> Around the same time, the team changed members and structure: id fired probationary president Mark Rein and brought back Jay Wilbur, who had stayed in Shreveport, to be both their CEO and business team; Bobby Prince moved into the office temporarily to record sound effects, while Adrian Carmack moved out of the office to get away from the noise.<ref name="MOD105112"/>

As the game neared completion, FormGen contacted id with concerns over its violence and shock content. In response, id increased these aspects; Adrian Carmack added skeletons, corpses, and bloody wall details, and Hall and Romero added screams and cries in German, along with a Death Cam that would show a replay of the death of the final boss of an episode. The team also added "[[Horst-Wessel-Lied]]", the anthem of the [[Nazi Party]], to the opening screen. John Carmack, meanwhile, added in walls that moved when triggered to hide secret areas, a feature that Hall had been pushing for months but which Carmack had objected to for technical reasons. Hall also added in cheat codes, and wrote a back story for the game. The team did a month of playtesting in the final stage of the game's development.<ref name="IDInterview"/> In the early morning of May 5, 1992, the first episode of the shareware game was completed and uploaded by Apogee and id to [[bulletin board system]]s. The other episodes were completed a few weeks later. The total development time had been around half a year, with a cost of around US$25,000 to cover the team's rent and US$750 per month salaries,<ref name="MOD113117"/> plus around US$6,500 for the computer John Carmack used to develop the engine and the US$5,000 to get the ''Wolfenstein'' trademark.<ref name="DawnFPS"/>

The following summer, most of the id Software team developed ''Spear of Destiny''. The single-episode game was a prequel to ''Wolfenstein 3D'' and used the same engine, but added new audio, graphics, and enemies. It was created in two months, and was published commercially by FormGen in September 1992.<ref name="SOD-Doom"/><ref name="SOD-Romero"/><ref name="SOD-5YearsDoom"/> The publisher was concerned that the material would be controversial due to holy relics associated with World War{{nbsp}}II, but Romero felt it was similar to the ''[[Indiana Jones]]'' films.<ref name="ShootNazisInWolf3D"/> Instead of working on the game, John Carmack experimented with a new graphics engine that was licensed for ''[[ShadowCaster]]'' and became the basis of the [[Doom engine|engine]] for id's next game, ''[[Doom (1993 video game)|Doom]]'' (1993).<ref name="SOD-Doom"/>