Catacomb 3D: The Forgotten FPS That Spawned Wolfenstein 3D – A Deep Dive
If you're a seasoned gamer with a passion for the history of id Software, you likely know how 1992’s Wolfenstein 3D revolutionized the first-person shooter genre and cemented the company’s legacy. However, a lesser-known title, Catacomb 3D, often gets lost in the shuffle. Released before Wolfenstein 3D, this pioneering first-person adventure game directly inspired the development of id Software’s future hits, including Doom and Quake. Now, after nearly 35 years, id co-founder John Romero has reunited the original team for a fascinating retrospective video detailing the creation of this often-overlooked gem.
The Genesis of a Pioneer: From Gauntlet to 3D
Catacomb 3D wasn’t born in a vacuum. It followed id’s earlier title, Catacomb, a simplified clone of the arcade classic Gauntlet. As John Carmack recalls, this earlier iteration retained a “quarter-eating” mentality, a design philosophy less favored in the burgeoning PC gaming market. “It didn’t have the kind of overarching story and depth that PC gamers were starting to expect,” Carmack explained. “But we were determined to prove that fast-paced, action-oriented gameplay still had a place.”
Building on Hovertank One: A Technological Leap
Technologically, Catacomb 3D aimed to build upon the success of Hovertank One, a fast-paced first-person game released just months prior. The key graphical breakthrough was the implementation of texture-mapped walls. Carmack had been captivated by the idea since seeing a texture-mapped cube on the cover of The Fundamentals of Computer Graphics, a book he frequently referenced.
Romero credits Paul Neurath, who was successfully using texture mapping in his work on the then-unreleased Ultima Underworld, for sparking Carmack’s interest. After hearing about Neurath’s progress, Romero relayed the information to Carmack, who famously responded with a confident, “Yeah, I think I can do that.”
The Challenges of Texture Mapping and EGA Tricks
Achieving fully general texture-mapped surfaces was, at the time, limited to high-end SGI workstations. However, Carmack devised a simplification that allowed for relatively fast performance on the home PCs of the era. This was partially achieved through an ingenious EGA graphics trick that enabled programmers to write multiple columns of graphics data simultaneously.
“When the walls are really tall, you could slap down as many as eight pixels at a time in some cases,” Carmack detailed. This optimization was crucial for delivering a visually compelling experience on the hardware available at the time.
First-Person Immersion: A Design Decision
The decision to adopt a first-person perspective in Catacomb 3D, rather than a third-person over-the-shoulder view, was largely driven by technical constraints. As Tom Hall, another id Software co-founder, explained in the retrospective video, “It was very costly to draw large things [like the player character] on screen.” However, the first-person perspective also offered significant advantages in terms of aiming and immersion.
“This is me,” Hall said, emphasizing the impact of the perspective. “It really changes how you feel about things.” He also shared anecdotes about sketching out incredibly simplistic character concepts – “6-year-old child-like drawings” – and handing them off to Adrian Carmack for transformation into “majestic art pieces that stand the test of time.” Adrian Carmack, in turn, described his process of interpreting Hall’s sketches within the game’s 16-color, 320x200 resolution framework.
Animation on a Budget: The Undo Key as a Tool
Adrian Carmack also recalled the limitations of animation software available at the time, relying heavily on DOS’s DeluxePaint II. To create the illusion of movement, he ingeniously used the program’s undo command to rapidly flip between two different “frames” of animation, effectively previewing the final result. “If you use the undo key [like that], you learn really rapidly that you need to save often,” Carmack quipped.
A Fork in the Road: Commander Keen vs. The Future of FPS
While id Software’s eventual focus on fast-paced, action-oriented first-person games seems inevitable in hindsight, the retrospective reveals it was a difficult decision. Catacomb 3D generated a modest $5,000 (approximately $11,750 in December 2025 dollars) through a contract to deliver bi-monthly games for Softdisk’s Gamer’s Edge magazine-on-a-disk. In contrast, each episode of the Commander Keen series of run-and-gun 2D games was still earning “10 times that amount” at the time, according to Romero.
This made continuing with Commander Keen the seemingly logical business choice. The team even began work on a seventh Commander Keen game, featuring parallax scrolling and full VGA color support, immediately after Catacomb 3D’s release. At the time, Catacomb 3D felt like “just like a weird gimmick thing that we did for a little bit because we wanted to play with a different technology,” as John Carmack put it.
However, that perception began to shift. Carmack’s brother, Adrian, experienced a moment of revelation while pivoting towards an in-game troll in Catacomb 3D. “It automatically sucked you in,” Adrian Carmack said. “You’re trying to look behind walls, doors, whatever… you get a pop-out like that, and it was just one of the craziest things in a video game I had ever seen.”
The Birth of Wolfenstein 3D: A Pivotal Moment
This reaction from a key member of the team ultimately convinced them to abandon two weeks of work on Keen 7 and focus on what would become Wolfenstein 3D. “It kind of felt that’s where the future was going,” Carmack said. “[We wanted to] “take it to some place that it wouldn’t happen staying in the existing conservative [lane].”
Romero further elaborated on this pivotal moment, recalling a late-night conversation in 2024 with GearTech. “Within two weeks, [I was up] at one in the morning and I’m just like, ‘Guys, we need to not make this game [Keen].’ ‘This is not the future. The future is getting better at what we just did with Catacomb.’ … And everyone was immediately was like, ‘Yeah, you know, you’re right. That is the new thing, and we haven’t seen it, and we can do it, so why aren’t we doing it?’”
Legacy and Influence: A Forgotten Foundation
Catacomb 3D may not be a household name, but its influence on the first-person shooter genre is undeniable. It served as a crucial stepping stone for id Software, paving the way for the groundbreaking success of Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, and Quake. The game’s pioneering use of texture mapping, combined with its immersive first-person perspective, laid the foundation for the modern FPS experience. The recent retrospective video serves as a valuable reminder of this often-forgotten chapter in gaming history, highlighting the ingenuity and vision of the id Software founders.
The story of Catacomb 3D is a testament to the power of experimentation and the importance of following one’s creative instincts. It’s a reminder that even seemingly minor projects can have a profound impact on the evolution of an entire industry. For those interested in delving deeper into the history of id Software and the birth of the FPS genre, the retrospective video is a must-watch. It offers a unique and insightful glimpse into the minds of the pioneers who shaped the gaming landscape we know today.