A maker has used a database to run a simplified version of the game Doom, modelling the entire game world state within the database and using SQL to render the player’s view and define in-game events.
The web assembly version of analytical database software DuckDB was employed to create the Doom-lite clone, with Javascript used to handle sprite z-buffer checks and keyboard input, but the heavy lifting of the game loop performed by the database.
The maker suggests that while the project is not at all practical, it was educational, showing the potential for using domain-specific languages in unorthodox ways to solve other problems, as well as offering insights into how a game could be modelling within a database.
The project is available on GitHub for others to experiment with and learn from.
