Doom Timeline Theory

Doom and its story

The Doom games are known more for their fantastic gameplay with the Doom guy shooting up endless hoards of Hell than they are their story and world building. But that's not to say there isn't a story because there is. It's just hidden under the surface. Doom 1, 2 Final Doom and Doom 64 used a small text crawl after each chapter as well as a set up in their manuals to convey their story. Doom 3 took the most traditional approach with dialogue and cutscenes. Then Doom 2016 included more backstory and lore than any game before it but the player character actively ignored most of it. If you were to dig through the in-game database and audio logs then you would find the story hidden there.

So now that we've set up how the story has been told in each game we get to the question of how all the games are connected. On the surface of things, there doesn't appear to be much of a connection between classic Doom, Doom 3 and modern Doom. A few theories exist such as Doom 2 being a sequel to Doom 3 instead of Doom 1 and so on. These are interesting so I would recommend looking them up online. But I have my own theory and that's what we will be looking at today!

In which order do the game go?

In my theory the games are set in this order:

Doom > Doom 2 Hell on Earth > Doom 64 > years and years later (let's say around 2100) > Doom 3 > Doom (2016) > Doom Eternal

The Story of Doom according to my theory

Doom 1 on the Gameboy Advance

We start with the Doom Marine being ordered to shoot civilians by his CO and refusing, punching the officer in the face. After being contained the Marine is sent to Mars which is deemed to be a dull boring assignment as it's just babysitting scientists. However, these scientists open a portal to Hell on Phobos. The Doom marine and his squad are sent to the moon to investigate. Upon arriving at the base the Marines decide to leave the Doom guy outside as they enter the base. Due to being abanded outside with only a pistol the Doom marine is the only survivor. After a while, he enters the base, makes his way to Hell and kills the Spider Mastermind which opens a portal back to Earth. The details of this are told via the first Doom game's episode end screens or the manual.

Doom 2 starts after Hell's forces have invaded Earth killing most of the population. The Doom Marine makes his way through the UAC's Star-port and aids the remaining population of Earth in escaping to orbit. As the Doom marine thinks all is over and prepares to die from his injuries the survivors inform him that the Hell portal spilling Demons out is in his home city and so he sets out to once again close the gates of Hell. The Doom marine is able to battle his way through the city and into Hell ultimately defeating the Icon of Sin. This leads to the Hell portal closing and the Doom Marine returning to Earth. The survivors in Orbit also return to the surface of the planet and the effort to rebuild the destroyed Earth begins. Similar to the first game these details can be found via the episode end screens or the manual.

A new Hell portal opens up on Mars and the Doom marine is once again sent into the now destroyed Mars base to close the portal. This starts the events of Doom 64 which ends with the Doom marine closing the portal from inside Hell. He remains in Hell to endlessly battle the demonic hoards and protect mankind from the evil around him. His hatred of Demons fuelling this never-ending slaughter. We know he remains in Hell from the ending of Doom 64 and his endless slaughter can be implied from the audio logs in Doom 2016.

Doom 2016 on PC

Seeing as most the human population was killed and the planet almost wiped out the year is reset to 0 to mark the beginning of a new age. Meanwhile, in Hell, the Doom Marine endures years of endless fighting. At some point, the Doom marine is gifted with immortality and superhuman abilities by a being known as the Seraph. He started to fight alongside the Night Sentinels in order to protect the city of Argent in the realm of Argent D'Nur. Eventually the realm fell. One of the Sentinels made a deal with a Hell priest after losing his son in battle. In exchange for his son being returned, he would betray his brothers in arms and lead the priest to their home. The Hell priest that made this deal killed the Sentinels in their sleep and merged the realm of Argent together with Hell and returned the betrayer's son to life as the reborn Icon of Sin. Argent D'Nur became the part of Hell known as the Well that we see in the final level of Doom 2016. It's here that Samual Hayden finds the near unlimited energy source known as Argent energy. The Betrayer of the Sentinels, now a demon himself forged the Doom Marine's new armour from the fires of Hell so the Marine could get revenge for him. Based on the Marines old armour but now able to draw power from any defeated Demons the Doom marine takes on the Praetor Suit and becomes the Doom Slayer. While battling the forces of Hell alongside the souls of the Sentinels the Doom slayer is lured into a trap set for him by the Hell Priests and entombed in a cursed sarcophagus.

Meanwhile back on Earth, around 2100 years have past and the events of Doom 1, 2 and 64 are ancient history long forgotten about as mankind strives forward making great progress in technology. This is all lead by the reformed UAC that now uses a different Logo and has a base on Mars. Upon discovering the artefacts of the last UAC base from over 2000 years ago a new portal to Hell is opened and the events of Doom 3 take place. Thanks to the efforts of a rookie marine and the discovery of the Soul Cube the invasion is stopped. The UAC is once again fully aware of Hell and the Demons within it. These events can be observed during Doom 3.

Doom 3 on PC

Samual Hayden, cyborg and head of the UAC begins to mount missions to Hell. They find a few very rare artefacts including the Doom Slayers sarcophagus, the Well and the Helix Stone. Earth is low on Fuel after years of exploiting the planets natural resources and hydrogen fuel is proving not powerful enough. The UAC begins to use the Well for it's near endless source of Argent energy. At the same time, they begin to research new weapons based on the Demons from hell forging new breeds of Demon such as the new Remanent and the Possessed Soldiers. Eventually, Oliver Pierce makes a deal with the Spider Mastermind using the Helix Stone beginning the cycle anew. She opens a portal to Hell from Mars and the events of Doom 2016 begin. The doom marine is woken up by Hayden and closes the portal using a powerful demonic artefact known as the Crucible. Upon returning to Mars the Marine is betrayed by Haden who takes the Crucible from him and then sends the Doom Slayer to an unknown location. Possibly to the arena from Quake Champions but most likely not as this is not confirmed canon. This all leads into the events of the upcoming Doom Eternal.

The Evidence

The events of Doom 1, 2 and 64 play out as they do in the games so the only evidence needed for the opening of this theory are the games themselves. The first bit of this timeline I have to prove is also the weakest so bare with me.

The tablets mentioned below.

No where in the games does it say that after Doom 64 the year is reset to 0 in order to mark a new age. However, in Doom 3 there is a lot of evidence to suggest that the ancient Martian civilisation was the old human base from 2100 years ago. First of all, we have stone tablets that tell the stories of a battle between them and the forces of Hell with a lone soldier leading the fight. If we look at these tablets then we see a figure that looks very familiar to us. It's very clearly the Doom marine from the box art of the First doom game. He's holding the soul cube from Doom 3 which is a bit of a mystery as this is never really used in the classic Doom games. However, it does bear a strange resemblance to the spawn cubes that are used by the Icon of Sin to summon demons into battle. This could be one of those spawn cubes brought back from Hell by the Doom Marine and used by the scientists trapped within the abandoned UAC base to hold their souls similar to the way it held the souls of the demons it summoned. The tablets were most likely forged by the same trapped scientists without any real source of power seeing as the base was destroyed. On top of this evidence, we also have the following audio log from a scientist in Doom 3 that readily admits that by researching this ancient base they are researching their own history.

Now, this is why I think after Doom 2 and 64 the year was set back to 0. Doom 3 is set in the year 2145 but Doom 1, 2 and 64 were also set around 2100. The year would need to be reset for their base and civilisation to be ancient and also allow for the eons that the Doom slayer was fighting demons in Hell.

The Soul Cube in Doom 2016

Super Turbo Turkey Puncher 3 in Doom 2016

Evidence that Doom 3 is connected and set prior to Doom 2016 can be found within Doom 2016 itself. It's possible to find both the Soul Cube from Doom 3 in Oliva Pierce's office area. The Turbo Turkey punch arcade game found in Doom 3's base can be found in storage during Doom 2016. These clearly show that the games are connected and that Doom 3 is set before Doom 2016.

Doom 2016 mentions that the Doom slayer has been battling Hell for thousands of years so this fits in with my timeline perfectly.

The rest of the evidence can be found throughout Doom 2016 via the Database and Audio logs.