Development
John Carmack's technical achievements with the Catacomb 3-D game engine were a strong starting point for the game concept. The game's development began in late 1991 after id decided on a vastly reworked Castle Wolfenstein. The team was able to use the Wolfenstein title as Muse Software had let the trademark name lapse. Id Software pitched this concept to Scott Miller, founder of Apogee Software, who promised the id team $100,000 in funding to deliver a shareware title. Carmack also bought a NeXT machine to aid development.
The early concept of the game included some innovative stealth concepts—dragging dead bodies, swapping uniforms with fallen guards, silent attacks, etc., like in the earlier Wolfenstein games, which focused more on stealth than action. These ideas were dropped however, since they drastically slowed the game down and made the controls complicated. Secret walls, which were sections of the wall a player could push to reveal a hidden area, were similarly debated in development. Designers Tom Hall and John Romero pushed repeatedly for this feature on the grounds that secrets were integral to a good game. Carmack initially resisted the idea, but succeeded in implementing push walls to his satisfaction late in development.
Visually, Wolfenstein 3D was originally designed to the same 16-color EGA graphics palette as prior 3D titles such as Hovertank 3D and Catacomb 3-D. At the suggestion of Scott Miller however, the team moved to the 256-color VGA graphics palette. Adrian Carmack drew each sprite frame on computer by hand. Wolfenstein 3D for the PC supports PC speaker, AdLib, Disney Sound Source and Sound Blaster sound effects and Adlib and Sound Blaster for music. The game marks id's first use of digital sound, composed by Bobby Prince.
Read more about this topic: Wolfenstein 3D
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