Minecraft competitor "Hytale" shows off playable DOOM inside its game engine — should Mojang Studios be concerned, or is this just a harmless alternative?

Hytale is set to release today, January 13, 2026, and it has already sold enough copies to cover two years of development. That makes it an extremely successful launch before early access has even begun.

Modders are also arriving in droves. Despite the game not being publicly released yet, the top five Hytale mod videos are already appearing online as creators get their hands on the tools and start pushing what the engine can do.

And like so many strange places before it, from fridges and pregnancy tests to PDF files, Doom now runs inside Hytale too.

Hytale’s first big modding flex is Doom running fully inside the game

Modder tr7zw on YouTube has been showing off several Hytale mods and has even managed to get Doom running inside the game before it is released to the public. It is a genuinely impressive technical feat.

Hytale is shaping up to be an explosive launch. It could be enough to push Minecraft to pick up the pace and deliver updates faster, rather than the smaller releases that tend to arrive once or twice a year.

That is not to say Minecraft is in trouble. It is a multiplatform behemoth, while Hytale is launching on PC only, but it is clearly following the Roblox and Minecraft model of becoming a long-term service game that’s focused on community-driven content.

On the subject of Doom running inside other games, this is far from the first time modders have pulled it off. Doom has even been made to run inside Minecraft before.

Still, seeing it working inside Hytale before the game has even been released is an impressive showcase, and it gives me real confidence that the community is going to do some incredible things with it.

Hytale’s built-in support for mods and tools like CurseForge also lowers the barrier for creators to experiment. If that ecosystem takes off, it could give players a reason to stick around long after launch, which is exactly what has helped Minecraft stay relevant for more than a decade.

What do you think about Doom running inside Hytale and what it says about the game’s future. Drop your thoughts in the comments and let me know if this kind of modding makes you more interested in trying it.

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