KiDoom – Running DOOM on PCB Traces
I got DOOM running in KiCad by rendering it with PCB traces and footprints instead of pixels. Walls are rendered as PCB_TRACK traces, and entities (enemies, items, player) are actual component footprints - SOT-23 for small items, SOIC-8 for decorations, QFP-64 for enemies and the player. How I did it: Started by patching DOOM's source code to extract vector data directly from the engine. Instead of trying to render 64,000 pixels (which would be impossibly slow), I grab the geometry DOOM already calculates internally - the drawsegs[] array for walls and vissprites[] for entities. Added a…
KiDoom – Running DOOM on PCB Traces launched on November 25, 2025 with 362 votes, #50 of 9,796 launches that month and more than 99% of that year's launches.
In plain words
KiDoom renders the classic game DOOM within KiCad's PCB design software by converting game geometry into circuit board elements. Walls appear as PCB traces while enemies, items, and the player are represented as electronic component footprints of varying sizes. The project extracts vector data directly from DOOM's source code and pipes it to a Python plugin in KiCad, bypassing traditional pixel rendering. It is designed for those interested in unconventional software implementations and creative uses of PCB design tools.
written from the facts on this page · September 2026
From the sources
Blog & Portfolio - Electronics & Embedded Systems Engineer
A 3.16M-parameter INT4 transformer running entirely in the on-chip memory of a Xilinx Kria KV260. Zero DRAM in the token loop, 59,965 tok/s on the fabric, bit-exact. Chat with it live. The FPGA decoded a reply in 6.6ms. It landed in the browser in 100. The gap was one unmeasured loop, and the fix was the Gumbel-max trick. The datapath of a 3.16M-parameter transformer living in FPGA fabric: wide-word GEMV, the dual-port split-brain, and the proof that 16 streams is a hard wall. Browser to transistor: a Cloudflare tunnel, a serving box, a Tailscale link, and the trick that lands a reply the instant you press Enter. Bit-honest before fast. Where iverilog lies, why silicon beats the timing…from mikeayles.com
In the maker’s words, at launch
I got DOOM running in KiCad by rendering it with PCB traces and footprints instead of pixels. Walls are rendered as PCB_TRACK traces, and entities (enemies, items, player) are actual component footprints - SOT-23 for small items, SOIC-8 for decorations, QFP-64 for enemies and the player. How I did it: Started by…
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