DOOM Retro v4.9 is now available to download as either a 32 or 64-bit Windows app. Here’s a list of what’s changed since the last version:

• DOOM Retro is now built using v17.5.3 of Microsoft Visual Studio Community 2022.
• DOOM Retro now uses SDL v2.26.5.
• Several optimizations have been made to further improve the overall performance, stability and memory usage of DOOM Retro.
• Several changes have been made to text that is output to the console.
• When the m_pointer CVAR is on:
  • The mouse pointer may now be used to move:
    • The sliders in the options and sound volume menus.
    • The text caret when entering a savegame description in the save game menu.
  • Selecting menu items using the mouse pointer is now accurate when the vid_widescreen CVAR is off.
  • The mouse pointer is no longer shown on the help screen if the mouse is moved.
• The positions of ON/OFF and HIGH/LOW in the options menu have been fixed in some instances.
• A bug is fixed whereby when changing the r_pickupeffect CVAR in the console, the r_damageeffect CVAR would be changed instead.
• The player’s health, armor and ammo in both the status bar and widescreen HUD now animate when they change. This can be disabled by the new animatedstats CVAR, which is on by default and off when vanilla mode is enabled.
• These changes have been made to the alternate widescreen HUD:
  • The position of the player’s health is now fixed when 0% and the negativehealth CVAR is off.
  • Every part of the HUD is now black, silhouetted against the bright background, when the player has an invulnerability power-up or the r_textures CVAR is off.
  • The vertical positions of some of the weapon silhouettes have changed.
  • Minor improvements have been made to the armor bar when the player has blue armor.
• Crashes no longer occur when:
  • Changing the health CVAR to 0% or less.
  • Using the take CCMD to take more health from the player than they have.
• A bug is fixed whereby widescreen mode wouldn’t be restored correctly when turning vanilla mode off using the vanilla CCMD.
• NEXT and SECRETNEXT now work as intended in MAPINFO lumps.
• Partial translucency effects when the r_sprites_translucency CVAR is on, and smoke that trails rockets when the r_rockettrails CVAR is on, now appear again if a custom PLAYPAL lump is loaded.
• The player’s “Health picked up” stat now updates correctly when the player picks up a soul sphere.
• A bug is fixed whereby the number of monsters in the map may have been wrong after loading a savegame in some instances.
• Blood splats are no longer overly bright when the r_textures CVAR is off.
• Masked midtextures with a brightmap specified in a BRGHTMPS lump now display correctly when the r_brightmaps CVAR is on.
• Bound controls are now grouped by type when saved in doomretro.cfg and in the output of the bindlist CCMD.
• The triangles in the automap that represent every blood splat, displayed when using the IDDT cheat, are now slightly larger.
• Blood is now shown when shooting a lost soul and the r_blood CVAR is red.
• The movement of some sectors is now smoother when the vid_capfps CVAR is not 35.
• A bug is fixed whereby pressing a key or mouse button while a controller is rumbling could cause the rumble to continue indefinitely in some instances.
• These changes have been made to the fuzz effect applied to both the player’s weapon when they have a partial invisibility power-up, and to spectres:
  • A crash no longer occurs if the sprite of a spectre touches the top of the screen.
  • The effect is no longer frozen when freeze mode is on.
• The vid_borderlesswindow CVAR is now on by default.
• The vid_vsync CVAR is now off by default.
• Minor improvements have been made to translating certain words when the english CVAR is international.
• Thing triangles no longer move in the automap when the IDDT cheat has been entered and freeze mode is on.

DOOM Retro v4.8.1 is now available to download as either a 32 or 64-bit Windows app. Here’s a list of what’s changed since the last version:

• DOOM Retro now uses SDL v2.26.4.
• Minor optimizations have been made to further improve the overall performance and stability of DOOM Retro.
• Minor changes have been made to text that is output to the console.
• A bug is fixed whereby if the alwaysrun CVAR was on, the CAPSLOCK key wouldn’t always turn off as intended when quitting DOOM Retro.
• A bug is fixed whereby a wrong player message would be displayed each time the player picked up an item in some instances when the messages CVAR was off.
• Minor improvements have been made to the color of some elements in the alternate widescreen HUD.

DOOM Retro v4.8 is now available to download as either a 32 or 64-bit Windows app. Here’s a list of what’s changed since the last version:

• DOOM Retro is now built using v17.5.1 of Microsoft Visual Studio Community 2022.
• DOOM Retro now uses SDL v2.26.3, SDL_mixer v2.6.3 and SDL_image v2.6.3.
• Extensive optimizations have been made to further improve the overall performance, stability and memory usage of DOOM Retro.
• When DOOM Retro is run for the first time, the WAD launcher will now also look for the IWADs included with installations of DOOM Eternal.
• The id Software logo has been removed from the title screen to be consistent with the latest rereleases of DOOM and DOOM II.
• Extensive changes have been made to text that is output to the console.
• Many additional characters, including those with diacritics, have been added to the font set used in the console.
• Alt codes may now be entered in the console.
• These changes have been made when opening and closing the console using the ~ key:
  • A subtle sound effect now plays.
  • The console now scrolls to and from the top of the screen, rather than fading in and out, when on the title screen.
  • The console’s scrolling animation is now slightly faster.
  • The scrollbar now displays correctly when the r_screensize CVAR is less than 7.
• Minor improvements have been made to the text that can be autocompleted in the console by pressing the TAB key.
• Each press of the TAB key to autocomplete text entered in the console can now be undone by pressing CTRL + Z.
• Pressing the HOME key in the console no longer scrolls past the top of the console in some instances.
• Scrolling up and down in the console using the PGUP and PGDN keys now gets faster the longer the keys are held down.
• Thousands-delimiting commas may now be used when changing the value of certain CVARs in the console.
• The toggle CCMD now only works with boolean CVARs.
• When the m_pointer CVAR is on:
  • The mouse wheel may now be used to scroll among menu items again.
  • If the mouse pointer is hidden, pressing a mouse button without moving the mouse now opens the menu from the title screen, or selects the currently highlighted item if the menu is open.
• The fade effect when opening the menu is now slightly faster than closing it when the fade CVAR is on.
• Minor improvements have been made to the menu’s background when the r_detail CVAR is low.
• Two additional savegame slots are now available in the load and save game menus.
• A random sound effect now plays when quitting the game by entering the quit CCMD in the console or pressing ALT + F4.
• Improvements have been made to parsing BRGHTMPS lumps.
• These changes have been made to the playerstats CCMD:
  • The number of times the player loads a savegame is now displayed.
  • The number of monsters gibbed by the player is now displayed.
  • The number of cells the player has picked up is no longer displayed when playing DOOM (Shareware).
  • The number of times the player has died is now corrected when they are resurrected using either the resurrect CCMD or the IDDQD cheat.
• These improvements have been made to the support for DEHACKED lumps:
  • Cheats that have been changed are now also able to be entered in the console.
  • Specifying a weapon name will no longer cause a crash.
  • A bug is fixed whereby par times wouldn’t be changed in some instances.
• These improvements have been made to the support for UMAPINFO lumps:
  • The finale’s background will now display correctly if interbackdrop specifies a larger patch rather than a 64×64 flat texture.
  • secretnext now works as intended.
• DOOM’s stimpacks and medikits no longer appear in Chex Quest.
• Minor improvements have been made to the support of REKKR.
• The player’s health, armor and ammo are now displayed better in the status bar and widescreen HUD if they start with a 1.
• The widescreen HUD is now brought in from the left and right edges of ultra-wide displays.
• Many changes have been made to the alternate widescreen HUD:
  • The position of the player’s health is now fixed when 0%.
  • Improvements have been made to the display of the armor bar when the player has blue armor, and also when the player has a blue keycard or skull key.
  • An empty ammo bar is now displayed if the player has their fists or chainsaw equipped.
  • The number of notches in the ammo bar no longer doubles when the player has a backpack. Instead, if the player has more than the usual maximum amount of ammo for their currently equipped weapon, a second bar overlaps the first to show the difference.
  • Several elements have been moved slightly.
  • Several elements are now slightly less translucent.
  • A bug is fixed whereby the silhouette of the player’s currently equipped weapon wouldn’t be displayed in some rare instances.
  • When the r_hud_translucency CVAR is off:
    • The player’s health, armor and ammo now flash when they change.
    • The white elements of the HUD are now not as bright.
    • The armor icon is now a darker gray when the player has no armor.
    • The armor bar is now a darker green when the player has 100% armor or less.
    • The power-up bar now updates when depleting.
• The truncation of player messages when the vid_widescreen CVAR is off has improved in some instances.
• The position of player messages, and the map’s title in the automap, has improved in some instances.
• The vertical positions of the monsters’ shadows in DOOM II’s cast sequence have improved when the r_shadows CVAR is on.
• The position of text displayed in the top right of the screen has improved in some instances.
• The correct map now opens when entering map phobosmissioncontrol or map techgonebad in the console.
• Minor improvements have been made to translating certain words, as well as the status bar, when the english CVAR is international.
• The fuzz effect applied to both the player’s weapon when they have a partial invisibility power-up, and to spectres, has been redesigned to be more pixelated.
• Certain partial translucency effects when the r_sprites_translucency CVAR is on are no longer applied if a custom PLAYPAL lump is present in a PWAD.
• When the r_rockettrails CVAR is on:
  • The smoke trailing behind rockets fired by the player and cyberdemons is now a lighter gray.
  • Smoke now doesn’t trail behind rockets fired by the player and cyberdemons if a custom PLAYPAL lump is present in a PWAD.
  • The smoke trailing behind homing missiles fired by revenants is now the same as the smoke behind rockets fired by the player and cyberdemons, but not if a custom PLAYPAL lump is present in a PWAD.
• The LEDs on DualShock 4 and DualSense and DualSense Edge controllers now turn red again when connected.
• When the vid_fullscreen CVAR is off:
  • The status bar and widescreen HUD are now displayed better when the window is resized to be very narrow.
  • The mouse pointer is now displayed while the console is open.
• The mouse pointer is now hidden before the screen goes black at startup when the vid_fullscreen CVAR is on.
• A crash no longer occurs when displaying patches taller than 200 pixels.
• The disk icon displayed in the top right of the screen when the r_diskicon CVAR is on is now double the size when the r_detail CVAR is low.
• The player’s view no longer bounces once they land after a fall if either no clipping mode or freeze mode are enabled.
• The player’s health, armor, ammo and weapon are no longer reset by the resetall CCMD.
• The kill CCMD can no longer be used to kill the player if either god mode or buddha mode are enabled, or if they have an invulnerability power-up.
• The BOOM-compatible line special of 251 (“Scroll floor according to line vector”) now works correctly if used with a liquid sector and the r_liquid_current CVAR is on.
• The underscores in the message displayed by entering the IDBEHOLD cheat now always align correctly again.
• The shadows cast by the corpses of monsters spawned at the start of the map are now positioned better when the r_shadows CVAR is on.
• If the ammo CVAR is changed in the console to be greater than the maximum ammo for the player’s currently equipped weapon and they don’t have a backpack, they are now given one.
• The console no longer closes when the ammo, armor or health CVARs are changed, unless necessary.
• When the autouse CVAR is on:
  • The automatic use of doors and switches is now more responsive.
  • The player no longer grunts repeatedly when standing in front of a locked door that they don’t have the key for, or a reusable switch that has just been turned on.
  • A player message now only appears once when the player is standing in front of a locked door that they don’t have the key for.
  • The player may now still use the +use action.
  • The automatic use of doors and switches no longer occurs when no clipping mode is enabled.
• The randomization of decorations that animate in a map has improved in some instances when the r_randomstartframes CVAR is on.
• When the pistolstart CCMD or -pistolstart command-line parameter are used:
  • Games are now still autosaved if the autosave CVAR is on, and autoloaded if the autoload CVAR is on.
  • A warning is now displayed in the console at the start of each map indicating the player now has “100% health, no armor, and only a pistol with 50 bullets”.
  • The 100% health and 50 bullets can no longer be changed in a DEHACKED lump.