While almost every consumer electronic device got a port of DOOM, these ports are not always enjoyable or even playable. Until now, the PSVita’s port wasn’t the best (as it was just a port of the PSP’s port, a good one at that) but now that’s changed and we have a port of Chocolate Doom!

What is Chocolate Doom?

As the name implies, it’s a source port of DOOM that aims to be as compatible as possible with the original version of DOOM. This means that Chocolate Doom doesn’t have the mind-boggling features that other source ports such as Zandronum and GZDoom have achieved with mods but don’t worry, it still has some extras!

Like many source ports, Chocolate Doom doesn’t only support the legendary DOOM but it supports:

• DOOM, DOOM II, Final DOOM and Ultimate DOOM (4th episode of the original game). These games really don’t need an introduction!
  

  The PSVita finally gets a much more robust DOOM port with Chocolate Doom!

• Chex Quest. The cereal box version of DOOM for kids 😉
• Heretic
• Hexen and its “Deathknights of the Dark Citadel” expansion pack
• Strife
• “Hacx” and “The Master Levels for DOOM II” expansion packs

Chocolate Doom for the PSVita has the following features:

• Sound and music support through OPL3, PC Speaker emulation and OGG files.
• A great integrated launcher that lets you choose between the different games it supports, if you have them installed that is.
• Support for custom files such as PWADs (user-made maps and limited modding), LMPs, DEHs and others. Not all mods will work and the 2 I tried, which are supposed to work with stock DOOM II, didn’t.
• Support for almost all Chocolate Doom features, which I can’t really find much information about as Chocolate Doom is shockingly close to original DOOM by id Software.

The included launcher will let you easily choose between the different games that this port supports!

What Chocolate Doom will and won’t get you

I played through E1M1 and E1M2 on my PSVita and I can safely say that it works in satisfactory manner with good frame rates. Fortunately or unfortunately, Chocolate Doom is a source port that’s very close to the original so you won’t be getting:

• Upscaled graphics so the game will look somewhat blocky as it’s being rendered at 320×200 and being blown up to the Vita’s screen.
• A good deal of mods, such as Brutal Doom (one of my personal favourites), that require Zandronum or GZDoom
• Any fancy lighting, effects (dynamically moving toxic matter and whatnot), 32-bit colour or any other ‘fancy’ features.
• Other features like 3D floors and custom shaders that are available in other ports.

While Chocolate Doom is very good port in its own right, it won’t give you any of those new flashy features that could make Doom more worthwhile for you. That being said, it’s still an excellent port to play on the PSVita.

No Brutal DOOM for us yet but our great developers always find some way to please us all 🙂

Hopefully, we’ll get a port of DOOM with some great mod support, such as Zandronum or GZDoom, and then we could brag about running Brutal Doom on our awesome portable! 🙂

Conclusion

To get Chocolate Doom, simply open  VHBB on your PSVita and install it from there as it’s available on VitaDB. You also get shareware files for Doom and Heretic included so you can start playing straight away. If you have the files for the full games, simply copy them to ux0:/data/chocolate

Wololo /talk thread (more information + download link): https://wololo.net/talk/viewtopic.php?f=116&t=48973

The LiveArea screen featured in the article’s front-page image has been modified by myself because I can’t stand very basic LiveArea screens!