Poom

Poom is a compact, pixel-art reinterpretation of the original 1993 Doom, built in the PICO-8 environment to mimic the look and feel of 1980s games. It suits long-time Doom fans, retro enthusiasts, and players who enjoy straightforward, arcade-style shooters on Windows.

Retro Doom distilled into an 8-bit shooter

Poom reimagines Doom as an 8-bit experience, keeping the familiar setup intact. You play as a space marine stationed on Mars, working for the Union Aerospace Corporation. After a scientific experiment opens a portal to hell, the base is overrun by monsters and you are left as the only human survivor.

Each level tasks you with fighting through hostile corridors and rooms until you find the marked exit area. The entire campaign recreates six of the original Doom levels, now rendered in intentionally coarse pixels that recall home computer and console games from the 1980s. The visual style is deliberately low-fi and highly stylized, which enhances its nostalgic feel if you grew up with that era of graphics.

Short campaign with familiar Doom difficulty levels

The game is structured around six stages of intense shooting, with enemies standing between you and the exits. You rely on your guns to clear the way, much like the classic game it is based on.

Poom also mirrors Doom’s well-known difficulty names. You can choose between four options: "I'm too young to die", "Hey, not too tough", "Hurt me a lot", and "Ultra-Violence". These roughly map to easy, standard, hard, and very challenging modes. Newcomers to the Doom universe are better off starting with the gentlest setting, while veterans can jump straight into the higher tiers for a tougher run.

Flexible keyboard and mouse controls

Although Poom originates from the PICO-8 console for mini games and small programs, the Windows version still gives you a fair amount of control customization. Movement can be mapped either to WASD or ESDF keys, and you can incorporate the mouse as well.

You decide how keys and mouse buttons behave. Commands can cover moving, strafing, turning left and right, and firing, with shooting assigned either to a keyboard key or to a mouse button. This lets you tune the control scheme to your habits, whether you prefer more keyboard-focused play or mouse-centric aiming. The developer, freds72, specifically recommends using ESDF together with the mouse, which places your hand in a comfortable position and frees nearby keys for extra actions.

The overall control setup supports the game’s pick-up-and-play nature. With only a handful of inputs you can move, shoot, and interact with the environment, which matches the minimalist philosophy behind PICO-8 creations.

Solo survival and arcade-style tension

Poom leans heavily into the fantasy of being a lone marine trapped in a base overrun by creatures from hell. You are always outnumbered, so the tension comes from needing to react quickly, manage your movement, and keep firing until the room is safe.

For fans of shooters and arcade games, this setup offers a mix of nostalgia and fast action. Long-time Doom players can enjoy spotting how familiar areas have been reinterpreted within strict 8-bit limits, while newer players get a compact, focused shooter with a clear objective in every stage: stay alive and reach the exit.

Verdict

As a reinterpretation of Doom, Poom succeeds in shrinking a classic FPS into a bite-sized, 8-bit package without losing its core identity. The six-level structure, original difficulty names, and recognizable premise create a strong link to the 1993 game, while the pixel-heavy art and simple controls give it a distinct personality.

Its strengths lie in nostalgia, tight focus, and flexibility in controls, rather than depth or modern production values. If you want a quick, retro-flavored shooter that pays sincere tribute to Doom, Poom is a charming option, as long as you are comfortable with its limited scope and intentionally old-school presentation.