Nintendo’s Alarmo has been hacked to run the classic game DOOM, just days after it was modified to display cat pictures. The hack was done by GaryOderNichts, a well-known Wii U reverse engineer. He’s now added Alarmo to the list of devices that can run the iconic 1990s shooter, a thing called the “Can It Run DOOM” meme.
The DOOM meme is all about how the game can be played on all sorts of weird and wonderful things, like a fridge or calculator. It was only a matter of time before Alarmo joined this quirky group.
In his announcement, GaryOderNichts said, “After my last post, it was pretty clear what everyone wanted to see on the Alarmo.” He showed off DOOM running on the device, and everyone was thrilled.
But there are a few things to keep in mind. The current version of DOOM on Alarmo doesn’t have sound. To work around the memory limits, the game’s .wad file needs to be compressed before booting and then decompressed to external memory. But GaryOderNichts says it’s still possible to load the shareware version of DOOM entirely from a USB device without messing with the Alarmo itself.
If you’re interested in trying this out on your own Alarmo, GaryOderNichts has shared all the technical details on his blog. He even tells you what’s inside the Alarmo. This whole thing is a great example of how creative people in the gaming world are. And it shows how much DOOM still means to gamers, even after all these years.
