Ah yes, my namesake. Many fond memories.
My memory of “Doom” is that it threatened you with various tortures if you selected “Quit”. It was supposed to be humorous, but one time the message was so blasphemous against the Lord, so offensive I can’t even repeat it. I stopped playing the game after that.
Yeah, I know the one you’re talking about – it’s not featured in the release version. These were unused “development-only” messages that were discovered in the game’s “source code” (the working materials used to construct the game’s engine) when it was released in the late 90s. I have never seen them used anywhere, but supposedly a Shockwave Flash version used them many years ago. This is likely where you saw it. The release-version messages are fairly innocuous and feature no cussing and certainly no blasphemy.
The “not for final version” messages feature copious amounts of the “F” word and graphic references to male and female anatomy, as well as in-jokes to staff, and were written by John Romero, lead designer. Romero was, at the time, known for being extremely proud of his success and boastful. He had long hair, was into heavy metal and thought Christianity was for losers. He was actually adamant that no Christian be hired to the design team due to Doom’s content – until he met Sandy Petersen, a devout Mormon who contributed heavily to Doom and Doom 2. Funny how things work out. Romero is much more humble now, after his career crashed when he insulted gamers in an ad for one of his games, circa 2000.
In short, Doom is a game that you can tell was made largely by irreligious guys save for Sandy Petersen, but I stress that nothing so offensive that it is a mortal sin to play it is found in the game. It’s a game where you shoot cartoon monsters with shotguns and sci-fi laser weapons. That’s all you do – unless you play deathmatch, then you’re shooting your friends. There are no Virgin Mary statues you must desecrate or anything like that. There are no innocents you kill; no angels or holy figures you fight. The worst it gets is some pentagrams that appear on the floor, and an upside-down cross – which is a Catholic symbol that Satanists have tried to co-opt, by the way.
It’s true that Doom was shocking when it first came out; this is because nobody had ever seen such a mix of strong violence and dark imagery in any kind of computer or video game outside of Japan. Nintendo of America had a ban on religious imagery (even Christian), violence, nudity, etc. Sega was more lax but also avoided heavy controversy until the Senate dragged them to Capitol Hill for a hearing on video game violence. In other words, id accomplished their goal of stirring up controversy and scaring people, while also making a great game that has had a lasting effect on video games.
Many people have played Doom, even us here at Catholic Answers; although some may suggest avoiding it due to the Satanic imagery and violence.
GBU
I don’t think it’s a “sin” to play. But I think there’s more concern with the binging aspect. Are these games taking up most of your free time? If so, you probably need to find more healthy things to do.