Romero's Head



Romero's head is a thing that looks like the severed head of John Romero impaled on a pole. It appears in Doom II MAP30: Icon of Sin, where it must be damaged with the rocket launcher to finish the level. It is located in a room that cannot be reached or looked into from the outside; the only way to see it is to use the idclip cheat code and go behind the face of the final boss.

The head has less health than a revenant (250 vs. 300), but each rocket will do only partial damage, so it takes at least three rockets to kill the head. When the head dies, the sound BOSDTH is played, explosions are spawned and the level ends. The explosions are created 320 units south from the Romero's head at heights between 128 and 640 units (absolute, not relative).

The head alone is harmless, but usually with these heads come spawn shooters. The head roars in pain when damaged, but it is the spawn shooter, not the head, that initially speaks backwards in Romero's voice. (It says is "To win the game, you must kill me, John Romero.")

Romero's head has a sprite prefix of BBRN, and is also known as the Boss Brain, or Big Brain (an interpretation by the DeHackEd author before the Doom source code was released). The former name can be taken as part of an insider joke, as the "boss brain" of the level would be the head of one of the bosses at id Software.