• Ambitious developer showcases slick triple-level Quake-like game stored in tiny 64KB executable - every game asset tucked inside what could be a ‘rounding error’ in modern app payload terms And id Software’s Qtest multiplayer-only demo of Quake was released exactly 30 years ago today. • Get Tom’s Hardware’s best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox. • You are now subscribed Your newsletter sign-up was successful Developer Daivuk has released QUOD, a 64KB ‘boomer shooter’ with an uncanny resemblance to id Software’s seminal FPS title, Quake. • Astonishingly, this tiny executable delivers a Quake-like 3D gaming experience with “3 levels, 1 boss fight, 4 unique enemies, 4 weapons, and a handful of power-ups.” Moreover, it doesn’t call on any external resources; the whole caboodle of textures, sounds, music, levels, models, animations, and code is compressed into that minimal 64KB download. • Above, you can see Daivuk present his own tiny FPS masterwork, in a nicely structured step-by-step video, which touches on topics such as optimizing the textures, maps, models & animations, audio, code, and even creating a virtual machine for a further 2KB of file size savings. • The developer starts by explaining that the QUOD project has been about 10 years in gestation, but has only really been worked upon in the last year.

Article Summaries:

  • Developer Daivuk has released QUOD, a 64‑kilobyte “boomer shooter” that emulates the classic id Software title Quake. The executable contains all textures, sounds, levels, models, and code, compressed into a single file that runs on modern PCs without external resources. QUOD offers three levels, a boss fight, four enemies, four weapons, and several power‑ups, and even includes a custom virtual machine to shave an additional 2 KB off the size. The demo highlights extreme optimization techniques, such as action‑based texture recipes and a bespoke programming language. The release coincides with the 30‑year anniversary of id Software’s Qtest multiplayer‑only Quake demo.

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