Home
Yesterday, I was doing a speedrun playthrough on Episode 6 of the original Wolfenstein 3D, playing through DosBOX and with no saving/loading.
On Floor 7 (E6L7), I had a death just moments after I had pushed the wall that grants access to the silver key. It was still in motion when I died. Since I was playing without saves/loads, I simply continued when the level restarted. Then I noticed something odd: when I opened the gold key door, that pushwall to the silver key was already in its pushed position despite the fact I hadn't touched it yet!
I finished the speedrun, but I knew from the start I was going to find out what was going on! First I reviewed the video to make sure it actually did happen (i.e. I didn't just run into the room, push the wall, run back to kill the enemies, and forget I had pushed it). Indeed I had NOT pushed the wall. So my first idea was that a bug might exist in the game in which if a pushwall is in motion when you die, that pushwall will already be pushed when the level restarts.
I did a quick test, waiting near a pushwall on another level for my health to run really low from an enemy that was shooting me. Then, just before I was about to die, I pushed the wall. (Obviously this process of getting killed just after pushing a wall was deliberate to test for the presence of such a bug.) And indeed my suspects came true: when I came back to that secret after the level restarted, it was already opened! No other secret I had previously opened was open though, just that one.
So, at least in the original EXE played through DosBOX, a bug exists where if you push a wall and die when it is moving, that particular wall will already be pushed when the level automatically restarts! I never thought I'd just discover a bug that I had never heard of before in a 20-year old game by complete accident, but I just had.
As such, my main question is - has anyone else known/heard of/experienced this bug before? If not, does its presence surprise you?
On Floor 7 (E6L7), I had a death just moments after I had pushed the wall that grants access to the silver key. It was still in motion when I died. Since I was playing without saves/loads, I simply continued when the level restarted. Then I noticed something odd: when I opened the gold key door, that pushwall to the silver key was already in its pushed position despite the fact I hadn't touched it yet!
I finished the speedrun, but I knew from the start I was going to find out what was going on! First I reviewed the video to make sure it actually did happen (i.e. I didn't just run into the room, push the wall, run back to kill the enemies, and forget I had pushed it). Indeed I had NOT pushed the wall. So my first idea was that a bug might exist in the game in which if a pushwall is in motion when you die, that pushwall will already be pushed when the level restarts.
I did a quick test, waiting near a pushwall on another level for my health to run really low from an enemy that was shooting me. Then, just before I was about to die, I pushed the wall. (Obviously this process of getting killed just after pushing a wall was deliberate to test for the presence of such a bug.) And indeed my suspects came true: when I came back to that secret after the level restarted, it was already opened! No other secret I had previously opened was open though, just that one.
So, at least in the original EXE played through DosBOX, a bug exists where if you push a wall and die when it is moving, that particular wall will already be pushed when the level automatically restarts! I never thought I'd just discover a bug that I had never heard of before in a 20-year old game by complete accident, but I just had.
As such, my main question is - has anyone else known/heard of/experienced this bug before? If not, does its presence surprise you?
