What happens if you remove randomness from Doom?

For some reason, recently I have been thinking about Doom. This evening I was wanting to explore some behaviour in an old version of Doom and to do so, I hex-edited the binary and replaced the random number lookup table with static values.

Rather than consume system randomness, Doom has a fixed 256-value random number table from which numbers are pulled by aspects of the game logic. By replacing the whole table with a constant value, you essentially make the game entirely deterministic.

What does it play like? I tried two values, 0x00 and 0xFF . With either value, the screen "melt" effect that is used at the end of levels is replaced with a level vertical wipe: the randomness was used to offset each column. Monsters do not make different death noises at different times; only one is played for each category of monster. The bullet-based (hitscan) weapons have no spread at all: the shotgun becomes like a sniper rifle, and the chain-gun is likewise always true. You'd think this would make the super-shotgun a pretty lethal weapon, but it seems to have been nerfed: the spread pattern is integral to its function.

With 0x00 , monsters never make their idle noises (breathing etc.) On the other hand, with 0xFF , they always do: so often, that each sample collides with the previous one, and you just get a sort-of monster drone. This is quite overwhelming with even a small pack of monsters.

With 0xFF , any strobing sectors (flickering lights etc.), are static. However, with 0x00 , they strobe like crazy.

With 0x00 , monsters seem to choose to attack much more frequently than usual. Damage seems to be worst-case. The most damaging floor type ("super hellslime"/20%) can hurt you even if you are wearing a radiation suit: There was a very low chance of it hurting whilst wearing the suit (~2.6%) each time the game checked; this is rounded up to 100%.

Various other aspects of the game become weird. A monster may always choose to use a ranged attack, regardless of how close you are. They might give up pursuing you. I've seen them walk aimlessly in circles if they are obstructed by another thing. The chance of monster in-fighting is never, or a certainty. The player is either mute, or cries in pain whenever he's hurt.