DOOM now runs on a vape — and yes, your calculator too
Three decades on, the most enduring thing about DOOM might be the internet’s obsession with making it run on absolutely anything with a screen. We’ve seen the classic shooter pop up on oscilloscopes, fridges, power supplies, and even a digital pregnancy test. The latest party trick takes the cake: DOOM on an electronic vape.
Two eye-catching projects recently made the rounds on Reddit. First up is a nostalgia hit—DOOM running natively on a scientific Casio calculator. Calculator ports have become a rite of passage for tinkerers, with thriving communities trading tips, mods, and full-blown homebrew apps. Beyond DOOM, you’ll find Minecraft-style projects and an NES emulator turning study companions into stealthy pocket consoles.
The real curveball, though, is the vape. A developer managed to stream live DOOM gameplay to the Aspire PIXO’s tiny 323 × 173 LCD using custom firmware and a USB connection. It’s not a native port yet, but seeing a budget-friendly vape double as a micro display for demon-slaying is the kind of tech absurdity the internet lives for.
Under the hood, the PIXO is more capable than its price suggests. It’s built around a Puxa PY32F403XC ARM microcontroller, paired with 64 KB of RAM, 256 KB of onboard flash, and an extra 16 MB SPI flash chip. The developer even shared firmware backups and a browser-based tool called VapeCloudStreamer to make screen mirroring straightforward.
Is it practical? Not even a little. Is it hilarious and impressive? Absolutely. The big question now is whether the PIXO could eventually run a stripped-down, fully native build of DOOM without streaming. With a functioning display and a programmable MCU, the idea isn’t as far-fetched as it sounds.
If there’s a moral to this story, it’s simple: give the modding community a programmable device with a screen, and it’s only a matter of time before DOOM finds a way onto it. From calculators to vapes, the legend lives on—one unlikely port at a time.
