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Quake on an oscilloscope

pekkavaa · 2.5M views · 2014-12-28 · 3:28

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Overview

A demo of Quake's E1M1 rendered as vector graphics on a Hitachi oscilloscope. A laptop generates the audio signal that the scope draws.

On Hacker News

Cited as the canonical example of Quake running on an exotic display, usually in 'will it run Doom' threads.

Discussed on HN; no positive recommendation is recorded in this export · HN mentions 2016–2025

Topics

Speedrunning, glitches & game hackingEmbedded systems & DIY electronicsGame history & retro gaming
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quakeoscilloscopevector graphicshardware hacks

What people said

dspillett · 2025-11 · Reference

> to extract vector data directly from the engine That got me thinking “I wonder if anyone has done this on an oscilloscope” and oddly I can't fine anyone who quite has. That DOOM objects are sprites and not actual 3D objects would limit the fidelity, but the scenery could be rendered at least. There are several examples of managing to use a high-speed scope as a low-res monochrome raster device (scanning like a CRT monitor does and turning the beam on & off as needed). I did find an example of Quake being done on a scope the way I was imagining: [VIDEO] - as all objects are actual 3D models in Quake that even manages to give them some presence & shape. EDIT: then I read the second half of this post and saw ScopeDoom! I'm surprised there are no earlier examples that are easy to find.

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daveslash · 2023-02 · Reference

Vector Display you say? Now... the next logical step is to make it play Doom (or Quake)..... with an extremely low framerate. [VIDEO]

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MayeulC · 2020-05 · Reference

I like this guy. I thought this was going to be a more introductory video: [LINK] (holy c *, he published a lot of these since 2014, they're pretty good :) ) This has been done with quake: [VIDEO]

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Sources

Video by pekkavaa, played through YouTube.

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