Ideal Consequences.

               

                 Half Life changes everything. Everything about First Person Shooter design. Everything about video game design and it changes how you use real time rendered poly games and the medium to tell a story. The rampant arms race of FPS game design along with a very broadening creative and consumer scope has been well documented in this blog. Enjoying and giving context to the footsteps the genre made since DOOM II's release as been as academic as it has joyful. It's allowed me to enjoy and more importantly marvel at stunning release after stunning release. The genre has truly exploded with a fever inciting technological and game design leaps only the creative few saw coming.  With Half Life, Valve changes the fundamental do's and don'ts of game design to be based around the maximum potential video games as a medium can deliver. Half Life is a culmination of everything done up until now in November 1998. 

              Half Life is Valve Software's debut first person shooter that only uses genre established tropes when they seemingly are the best solution to service the design need. Every other design principal we seemingly take for granted has been scraped in favor or refitting game design around immersive high fidelity 3D environments. I don't want to over complicate or risk making Half Life sound more alien than it is, Valve starts off with something we are all familiar..an id tech powered FPS game. Half life is a FPS game with a large array of weapons based around close, medium and long ranges. The standard melee, fist/axe of DOOM or Quake, is here represented with a more personal weapon the crow bar. Half Life's crow bar is symbolic for a lot of things. In the aftermath of a "resonance cascade" that you the player started, the Black Mesa facility is in shambles with monsters teleporting in. Picking up the first thing you see to swat at aggressive aliens is a crow bar. Again that intuitive and natural placement.
The crow bar swings out and interacts with the environment.

Killing things of course but breaking glass and wood. The crow bar does a lot to get you through the environment and that rarely changes as the game expands its' scope towards it's end. Traditional military weapons in Half Life feature a lot of recoil and bullet shells flying out and bouncing around physically in the environment. The Shot gun, SMG and Python Revolver where savagely satisfying to use.  Being the unwilling nerd hero of Black Mesa Gordan's arsenal also includes some really fun heavy weapons akin to Duke 3D but in Half Life's more grounded tone. The Tau Cannon is essentially a high powered rapid laser gun that kills even the bigger aliens and helicopters with ease. I felt over powered and loved it after struggling with near death long before getting it then becoming a one man army. The Gluon Gun is like a radioactive Ghost Buster's backpack and that alone made it a blast. The game's weapon balance and enemy dynamics didn't give me the joy Quake I/II did or Unreal but its really fun while being much more immersive.

                     Immersive. I haven't used that term much in this blog until Valve made a FPS game. I think it's because Half Life is the first game on this blog to really suck me into. To totally transport me to Black Mesa. To be in the virtual world and feel like it was all being simulated around me and possible to interact with. Sure the trance and visceral graphics of games like Quake and Unreal had really made immersion in virtual art and spaces possible for me but here it captivates me. Half Life doesn't reset the visual bar like Unreal or Quake II but like SIN it looks amazing, and in their own unique way, Valve  does with this game engine what I  largely didn't know was possible in video games until now. SIN gave a preview into the power of set pieces in video games.
These slightly interactive yet highly scripted moments in the game the player witnessed without being taken out of the action.  My favorite use of this is the subway monster chase in SIN which I go on about in that corresponding blog entry. Valve uses this to constantly move the player through Black Mesa without hard level cut offs. Its similar to Quake II's approach. However here much like the SIN chopper ride Valve uses set pieces to often move the player about while retaining player presence. Be it a humbling tram ride into work as the game starts or an elevator ride with head crabs falling down on you Half Life organically gets you from point A to point B. The game completely relies on scripted set pieces in conjunction with linear level design. Valve obviously saw set pieces as a way to make sure things flowed and felt as natural as they could as they needed to move the player or wanted the player to experience something exciting or interesting. Half Life is built around video games' ability to have you interact and experience a moment instead of watching it on film or reading about it in text.

                   Valve immediately ditches most other FPS genre tropes or even video game tropes for that matter. What makes Half Life a landmark video game titles is it is perhaps the first video game to so well and viscerally leverage the experiential element of video games as a medium and incorporate it into story telling. Half Life's world feels like it is completely absent of a director, that the player is facing constant reactionary events. Aside from the sublime use of set pieces often cleverly subtly repositioning the player, Valve has managed the most diegetic level design I've seen in a FPS or any video game.   I didn't even really notice it because it felt so natural. I mention in my blog after playing Quake I that the game had a zen like flow state where you just go into and through both enemy encounters and levels naturally without thinking about it. The player practically moves along on impulse. Valve however wasn't happy at just making ramps, hallways and pointing red arrows. The vision for Half Life required immersion, level design and goals had to appear naturally not implicitly. This overall notion of introducing information relevant to the player about the virtual world using the virtual world. The game has no pop ups or text boxes to explain things for you. Things are communicated through walking talking characters in the game world or the way the game world looks. Half Life gives you a very interactive and reactive virtual world that I felt part of. It really is the vision I think the FPS genre has been striving for for so long up until now.

                  

                 Taking advantage of the human eye's attraction for colors and shapes Valve built Half Life's levels to invisibly guide the player's path and it is remarkable how well Valve managed here. Unlike every other FPS on this list I almost never got lost. With the large majority of the game taking place in the labyrinth of Black Mesa Research facility I somehow always knew where to go even as an interdimensional portal storm and alien invasion happened. Using id Tech 2.5's colored lighting and rich amount of unique textures Valve's artist have done a superb job here.Black Mesa is an advanced 1998 research lab in the United States' desert. Lots of start office space, accompanies impressive sci-fi engineering and terrifying aliens. The lines, surface detail and coloring of this environment render a great looking game though it rarely looks as good as SIN did in my opinion, its clear the artistic direction of Half life and the way it communicates both story and direction is far superior to anything in FPS games before it. Need to crawl through a vent? Good thing there is a little red light or something interesting happening there. Entire character's like the Gman are introduced subtly in the environment with no real story introduction other than that. Valve also tends to teach you how to solve many of the games rather simple puzzle segments. Borrowing from other genres with games like Resident Evil on PS1 but much simpler and smaller scale puzzles. Puzzles often change up the tempo in the game in a way Quake sorely lacked from it's pure unrelenting adrenaline. I found the puzzles in Half Life allowed me to have a moment to breathe while also being easy dopamine dumps.  Usually the player will come across a simple version of a way to solve the puzzle with the solution somewhat obvious and near and then later using that learned knowledge of game mechanics have the player employ the learning experience in a bigger scale puzzle. 

                       The intuitive and immersive flow of gameplay is incredibly important here as the rest of Half-life's game design hinges on the player not being jerked out of the experience artificially or because they became a frustrated in a 3D cage with no quick way out. Puzzle's aren't fun if you don't know your playing a puzzle and often due to Valve's level designers and artist you almost always know what needs to be done even if the method needs to be figured out. Interacting with the game is another design pillar that hinges on this diegetic approach to playing with the gaming experience like you would a real world object. Through various quick implied learning moments and clever art the boundaries of this virtual world begin quickly to be clearly defined while a loose almost at times comic freedom is left in the hands of the player in this world.

Valve makes frequent use of first person platforming in Half Life. We've seen it some before and largely it still falls short of Turok but it can be a sensible and fun way to traverse a falling apart Black Mesa or astral alien world. Residue Processing is where this becomes extremely enjoyable, going through one of the games most incredible looking environments trying not to die as you jump around giant machinery. Platforming at times it can be a bit annoying and in Xen even a hindrance but overall I welcome it in Half Life.

          Another means of giving direction, gate keeping and giving story exposition are the non playable characters in Half Life. Gordan Freeman isn't the only human in this world unlike the vast majority of games I've played on here. Detailed and aware scientist and security guards inhabit Black Mesa. Often giving brief clues to the broader narrative situation Gordon faces or  unlocking doors even adding fire support. While SIN was a big jump up in the ability to tell a story, it's cinematic scenes didn't integrate well with the playable parts of the game. Like Dark Forces II's FMVs or even DOOM's Chapter Text exposition, these methods have always felt very separate of the player interactive video game experience. Here it's all completely integrated into both how friendly and enemies react to Gordan and the world around them as you play the game. Designing Half Life like this is fundamentally different than any FPS on this blog before but much like the flow and control of pace the game has, the design was so organic it took me awhile to notice such a massive shift in game design. Valve's choices here just work so well you immediately start taking it all for granted.

I find that a big testament to how well these choices work in a FPS game. Again here Valve expresses the desire for Half Life to leverage all it can with the experiential element of video games because everything moves and reacts according to the player therefore your actions and choices are connected with in game consequences the entire time.  Of course Half Life is full of plenty of good FPS shooting though instead of DOOM hordes of monsters it's more in the vain of Unreal where you face a select few potent opponents in an area though these enemies and environments rarely lead into predefined battle arenas like id Software and 3D Realms tends to do but more realistic environments and enemy numbers much like what I saw recently in SIN.  I found the friendly and enemy interactions in Half Life unique, interesting and even horrifying. The presentation allowed from such design creates some of my most memorable moments in gaming. 

                    My astonishment with Half Life comes with how all these diegetic elements culminate into the entire experience start to finish. The game opens slow, humbling and grounding. A completely contrast from anything else on this blog. Unreal comes the closest but already starts you off a lone survivor.  In Half Life I was taken on a tram ride where I got to whiteness the cool scientific and military complex that was Black Mesa. The Half Life tram ride is a brilliant set piece that properly through the environment tells me so much about where I am and who I am. The finishing touches of who Gordan Freeman is happens when the security card reminds you your late and talks to you as any one would but you don't hear Gordan speak. I've made it no secret I'm a big fan of DUKE or even John Blade. But Half Life's hero isn't the 80's action hero take, and the game isn't filled with punchy colors or edge.

It's grounded. A massive tonal shift for the genre and the only game to attempt it so far on this blog has been Rainbow Six a very different kind of FPS game. Gordan Freeman is a vessel for the player. It is clear here that Valve desired to remove all the perceptual layers between the player and the player's virtual form. I think this is a novel and incredible choice given the FPS perspective. Naturally there has to be some context for your existence in this world and that's where Gordan Freeman's shell comes in to play. Like most things Half Life it was so immersive that I didn't feel like it stuck out much at all. I often reply or made quips in my head more with this game and felt more me in a FPS than I ever have. It's almost tongue and cheek that Gordan Freeman is a heavily relatable 90's nerd. This is my favorite take on a protagonist in an FPS game yet. 

                        This newfound immersive positioning is instantly rewarded by letting the player explore an safe area with no combat, plenty of non playable characters and a linear area that gives a much larger impression. Followed up by setting the game in motion by causing a "Resonance Cascade". Making me directly responsible for some of the events and trouble happening in Half Life really gave me an interesting investment in the virtual world I had not had with an FPS game until now. I never really cared if I saved the babes I just wanted to kick ass. But Half Life constantly enjoys shoving the theme of unintended consequences around and I found it had a big effect on how actions in the game came across to me. From launching a rocket to putting Xen in control of the whoever the Gman works for I felt like an invest participate in the narrative events of Half Life. As much as I love SIN's subway chase previously mentioned it's the culmination of these systems into Half Life's Blast Pit level that took SIN's concept and pushed it light years ahead. The monster's terrifying in a violent set piece along with bleeding out scientist and scared security guard set the tone for the hurried and fearful trek through puzzles and narrow ledges I would soon endure. Blast pit in combination with We've Got Hostiles was when I knew that Half Life was not just better but a paradigm shift in the design and quality of FPS game experiences.

We've Got Hostiles shows you the military is not here to save you a brilliant new threat against you. See combining the advanced AI and set pieces a scientist runs ahead of you to be saved only to be gunned down in front of you at the bottom of the stairs. Then hearing the guilty soldier on his radio mentioning how they are covering up the Black Mesa incident. I was stunned. It really shocked me as I had zero expectation for a FPS game to throw that out there and it happen in the design and technical way it did. It also gave whimsical yet outraged reaction to see this happen in my virtual world. I opened fire on the solider and then exchanged fire with his buddies. The animations, the way soldiers ran between covered and called out to squad mates. This wasn't what we had seen in FPS games before. 

                        These soldiers where smart and moved like real human beings. This combat gun play also exist totally different and ins stark contrast to than alien beast fought earlier,which very much move and act like wild animals with the exception of the slaves who seem to lack human combat tactics. Half Life's aliens largely feel like beast from another world trapped here and your just the prey, they move organically and are small in number,  only the aggressive slaves and their lighting blast seem to be humanoid in shape and intelligence though lacking human combat tactics. The Marines don't. This incredible life like simulation was brought full bare as the Alien's and Marines have all out war in Forget about Freeman. Where the player linearly navigates a battlefield, often having to engage in it. I was truly awe struck playing this part of the game. DOOM II tried to give the impression of a big area and horde but Half Life's battlefield feels like the realization of that impression. Its all here. Again Valve takes a rather linear area with selective combat moments but makes it feel far bigger and grander in scope than the design actually is. I very much had the impression this was a virtual battlefield that I was naturally finding my way through. Leading the giant alien in Power up to it's death felt like I had came up with the plan and led it there. It just happened. Not without difficulty and tension. Valve had their finger on the pulse of what was just enough freedom so that I felt I was in control when really I was being guided along and teased with hints. That immersion and environmental story telling kept reinvesting me in the game just when I'd start to get over the shock of what Half Life does. I think in Questionable Ethics Valve created the best narrative FPS experience yet. Early on this manifested in the way the game presented the Head Crab and the Head Crab Zombie. Having the small set piece of a guy twitching as it takes over his body in front of his flashing monitor in a dark room? To see the gross mangled detail of their body or witness the various real time take overs of allies. It was presented in a gross and disturbing way BLOOD could have only dreamed of doing.

        Sure there are interesting enemy encounters but witnessing the environmental story telling of how I'd been lied to and how this maybe wasn't all my fault again albeit whimsical caused slight emotional pulls of betrayal and outrage over the situation and the characters I have been interacting with. Valve lets you know that you too can be manipulated in this virtual world. Many different times when playing Half Life I didn't just have big reactions I stopped and was surprised how sucked in I was and how a video game let alone an FPS game could give me these nuanced reactions. 

                   The best part is I found this roller coaster and investment just kept growing and growing until maybe the best ending in a FPS game yet. While I'm familiar many have not liked the Xen levels I found ditching Black Mesa for an alien world to briefly get some retribution and save mankind the rare bombastic moment Half Life had needed and often abstained from until now. But the ending had my jaw on the floor, bewildered, confused and incredibly satisfied. Half Life ends by both in design and thematic themes wrapping up the incredible experience. I was whisked away by the mysterious Gman I had been chasing and catching glimpses of the whole game. By now I have had plenty of time to wonder why he's there and for who. I find the Gman is Valve's equivalent of Gordan. Gman is your dungeon master. The one guiding your fate in this virtual world. He is the vessel for Valve to close the curtain and bring you into their fandom. I am quickly surprised by his Alien like speech and demeanor. Valve takes along an interdimensional ride not much different than the tram ride at the start just throwing in my face the violent devastation and consequences of Gordan, I mean my actions in this virtual world. Then offered a choice, basically to die and go out fighting and work for whatever cosmic force Gman represents. I step off the tram and join him. So many questions unanswered. Anything other than the immediate and interpersonal consequences of my actions go left unknown. No text bubble, no cinematic scene. However I survived, got retribution on aliens, managed evade the military hunting me all the things I needed to do had a direct result in the game ending yet I was still curious. Valve's experience was truly brilliant start to finish. 

            The best parts of Half Life inspire the wonder video games give us. I started this blog to give historical context to some of the moments I was too young for back in the 90's. To travel the FPS genre and appreciate and learn about FPS game design more. Half Life is the ultimate reward for such an endeavor. I have had nothing bad to say about it and that isn't to say it is a perfect game. On a Rail is a terrible level in my opinion and really messes up the otherwise great pacing of the entire game. Xen leans far to heavily on Half Life's platforming moments and they never get as good as Turok to begin with. But the minor downsides have largely been brief and rare. I have played Half Life before I wrote this blog. But my 1998 30 year old persona would have truly appreciated Half Life for being something specail and different. Having endured the long road of idTech 1 and Build Engine games just to see things get absurdly beautiful while largely remaining the same. The limiting and largely horizontal combat of DOOM II to the non existent narrative in Quake I or SIN's poor but technically impressive real time cinematic scenes paint a long and rocky road to what is a very different video game and FPS game experience. Being a time traveling blogger I can say there is a distinct modern feeling to Half Life still that nothing on this blog has come close to before. But my 1998 self this is my favorite game of all time. I cherish many of the games on this list but Half Life enraptured me in a way I didn't think was possible in games before. If I had been into FPS games and design before this would be what made it a life long fever. Half Life is a looking glass into the full potential of video games as a medium not just FPS games. I find it fascinating that while Valve has done a lot of work to it, Half Life uses idTech2.5. An engine that has appeared already twice on this blog since it came out late last year. In 1996-97 I saw a lot of the games on this blog try interesting and worthwhile new things. But Valve feels like it took those years of creative process and treated it like a constructive think tank and created a new experience based on the cumulative knowledge of FPS games until this point. From its innovation and magic to being a part of its' conspiracy sci-fi story while jamming to some great late 90's techno Half Life is the best FPS game ever made circa 1998. 

                                                                 

                   

Original SIN

                     Ritual Entertainment went straight for all the reasons I love this genre with it's debut game SIN. A bombastic cast of stereotype heroes and villains drenched in late 90's cyberpunk edge allow the game to stand toe to toe with Duke and Lo Wang in over the top presentation. In fact the core DNA of the SIN experience owes as much to Duke Nukem 3D as it does Quake. Ritual Entertainment leverages idTech 2.5 for a highly interactive and movie like environment delivering the one of the best looking shooters yet.
SIN is a love letter to what we've come to expect out of 3D Realms and id efforts while for better and worse innovating on it. As we get towards the end of 1998 I am still surprised with every title just what FPS games can accomplish now on screen and through design. SIN feeds this astonishment as much as any other. 

                      SIN took no time to get familiar with though it has plenty of shock value that left me extremely excited for the first hour, with that feeling coming and going for me the rest of the game. The game starts with a highly impressive in engine cinematic! Yes this game has in game cinematics for a shooter. While the animation and story telling possibilities of FMV's are far better it's pretty cool to have a more seamless transition to the game. This in game cinematic cleverly and impressively transitioned into me playing as Blade, the loud, funny action hero with a strong dash of Mr.T. After having Duke and Lo Wang it does feel like Blade fits by covering all the stereotype bases a wild action hero could have. Some of the action hero cliches are a bit over played as film moves quickly past them and the majority of FPS games take this approach in some way. I still managed to find the characters and atmosphere interesting enough though thanks to the evil villain being a massively endowed dominatrix and Blade having a rather amusing hacker friend on coms often. The color pallet and art of the game flow and look great in my opinion with teals, golds and blue, it captures the rather popular cyberpunk style of the late 90's. SIN's approach is tried and true and fun enough but there is a sense of fatigue in it for me at this point though that permeates throughout many aspects of the game beyond it's setting and characters. 

             

Transitioning from a rather impressive in game cinematic to Blade allowed me to rain down hell from a mounted machine gun in the chopper before my character repelled down into the bank and full player control was given to me. The machine gun segment worked similarly to arcade style light gun shooters or segments in Golden Eye which shared a lot of light gun elements. It honestly looked phenomenal and had my jaw on the floor. Incredibly fun and satisfying. Video games are finally getting to where you really feel like you are the action hero in a movie, with little imagination required. These "set pieces" are new to the genre and largely games as a whole in 1998. One of the many purposes of role playing my current self in 1998 for this blog is to try and understand these moments I was too naive for or missed at the time. I'm truly blown away with the intro to SIN. There's nothing like it that I've played in the genre until this point. However being hunted by a mutant and taking a subway was the best use of this new design. 

                 These set pieces are intertwined with some fantastic NPC behavior. Characters act and move realistically and according to your presence. This is made full use of when a Mutant through one of the early levels attacks and nearly kills you only to run away. As you make your way through the subways and even taking subway carts to other parts of the level these scripted attacks from the mutant and its quick retreats happened several more times. It gave me a real sense of being hunted by a character that was largely designed to spawn and appear but that intertwined with the sub carts moving and realistic environments made from one of my favorite experiences on this blog. SIN to great effect uses these kind of moments throughout the game and keeps the player grounded with its frequent use of in game cinematics for story. At this point in the blog I have drawn plenty of direct comparisons to SIN with multiple other games on this blog. While the game has it's own unique merits and takes it largely is based around id and 3D Realms work. The shooting at it's best feels extremely similar to Quake II. Naturally using the idTech 2.5 frame work similarities are inherit in a technical sense but here Ritual Entertainment has purposefully built off of them and I think it's a great move, after all Quake II is still my favorite playing shooter to date. (*98). 

              The weapons and enemy types are largely ripped right from Quake II. Because of this at it's best the enemy and weapon dance of Quake II comes through strong. It's a lot of fun. However Ritual Entertainment have decided to add reloading to many weapons. While I actually enjoyed this in Rainbow Six, it makes little sense here and plays poorly. Every time your getting a good combat rythem down most weapons either need you to reload or hit the use key to reload ahead of time. There's no indication that I am aware after my long time with the game that even lets you know when a "clip" is low. This creates a pausing or stutter in the combat of the player. Reloading looks and sounds cool but isn't fun as enemies seem to be just as aggressive as Quake II or any other traditional FPS since DOOM II.,The flow of combat and enemy encounters is further hampered by having to search enemy corpses for ammo and health.It's common that this pause reminds me of how Duke or Blood would play when I'd be low on health. Pushing forward only to fall back over and over until you make a break in the line usually staying around a corner. SIN makes this a tad more interesting since the NPCs will chase you to a large degree.

I didn't even known I needed to do this for the first couple hours of the game until it literally became unplayable. This would have been something my 1998 self would have had told to him through friends or coworkers. The game is about the same speed as Unreal though so having to stop, look down and search while being shot at or running through the level destroys the pacing. This in tandem with the reload mechanic create SIN's biggest problems for me, every time I'm getting my groove down the game stops me.  The weapons do look awesome though. Particularly loved the chaingun and how Blade holds the feed with his left hand. Even the basic pistol looks awesome with tons of detail and constantly moves and animates. The shotgun kicks pure ass and feels great along with a very satisfying and unique silenced sub machine gun.The great weapon animations and constant movement give an immersive aspect to the first person view point while mitigating id Tech 2.5's famous polygon wobble.

                  

            SIN's better aspects are its destruction and interactivity in levels. It's largely in line with what I saw with the Build Engine over the last few years* and I'm ecstatic it's back. I'm a huge sucker for things blowing apart or walls exploding in games. Being able to open cabinets and shelves or interact with things that aren't even important to the game's design add to the immersive grounding of the world and do the most to feel like a real place your interacting with. Shelves and cabinets open in SIN like you'd expect in Duke Nukem 3D. Flush the toilets in you want. Open useless doors to useless rooms. Fire fights let glass and banisters shatter into pieces. Even bullets and associated sparks have some realistic simulated bounced that looks incredible, easily some of the best effects work I've seen watching it bounce around and around itself. 3D Realms did have a hand in helping Ritual Entertainment with SIN and it leaves me wanting for what a proper return of Duke. 3D Realm's influence extends beyond interactivity into the actual level design. Like any of the Build Engine games, SIN build's complex real world like levels. The office buildings, labs, bank, sewers etc are full of natural looking architecture and elevator lefts and over lapping ramps. id Tech 1 couldn't do this and Build Engine could hence why it became such a staple over the last few years. id Tech 2. 5 clearly has no such limitations as we've seen in Quake and it's sequel. SIN probably leverages this just short of as many complex ways as Blood did which I think pushed this design the farthest. Often I got lost or confused about what objects where required to be placed where for the story or for health. Its often just not initiative at all a problem id still faces in their recent FPS games.There is even drivable vehicles and much more freedom than what was seen in Golden Eye. I was able to use an ATV to not only run some enemies over in one place but hit them hard enough to splatter them into blissful Quake style giblets.

                 Realistic level design often leaves the lateral and vertical moment of the player and enemies more restricted. Like 3D Realm's games I find myself stuck in naturally occurring bottle necks that are not advantageous to moving around and shooting. Missing are Unreal or Quake's slopping ramps and interesting jumps or intersecting vertical leverage. While it's not always the most appealing to look at thing it's much better for game play. SIN doesn't really benefit in any ways from this aside from the visual presentation or grounded look of some environments while the rest of the game relishes in being self aware it's a FPS video game. The enemy types where a source of mild complaint in Quake II and I find the variety and pacing of when new enemy's are introduced to be crippling for SIN. It takes a couple hours to introduce heavy enemies. Enemies. I did enjoy in SIN where the difficult but fun spider bots. The leap from side to side that Spider bots employ compliments well the player's abilities to jump. but there isn't much I haven't already seen in plenty of games until now. I still find Quake 1 to have the most satisfying enemy types of any FPS.  SIN's impressive set pieces are not the last thing to stun me. Introducing a stealth section in a FPS game took me completely by surprise and is the one part of the game that only felt familiar in the sense that it reminded me of last year's action stealth game Metal Gear Solid. Having to crouch and walk or take out scientist before alarm's are triggered was a unique and wild thing to experience in a shooter. Here the realistic level design compliments well the stealth gameplay of sneaking around these secret bio labs SINTEK runs. Here is a video game all about running and gunning and telling you not to do either! It broke my FPS 1998 brain. The stealth segment required me to restart as much as a hard combat section would, exponentially less rewarding with each restart. Still despite the common hang ups in pace with this game I found SIN's stealth segments to blow my mind and it does help break up the majority of the game which is pure id style running and gunning. 

         

                 I really enjoyed just how far SIN takes its more "simulated" aspects. Most of the computers Blade interacts with allow the player to not just select things on them but give them proper text prompts. This mechanic is even essential for  solving some security related puzzles which take things a step beyond the classic DOOM card system. It's crazy to be interacting with a computer within a computer game. 3D polygon games have changed everything possible. Just last year in this blog a large portion of the games I played used 2D sprites but here we are with set pieces, in game cinamatics, destructible props, colored lighting and high geometric detail, id Tech 2.5 has never looked better. While it doesn't have the impressive massive areas Unreal showed off or the fancy effects and lighting the set pieces, interactivity and cinamatics in SIN are features that impress me just as much if for different reasons than Unreal. It makes me wonder if this kind of thing is possible in Unreal and how that would look.  Video add in cards have really completely changed PC gaming and their usefulness and progress are happening at an incredible rate. A construction site literally floods and lifts the player up in 3D. The lifts and ramparts all connect and intertwine. I'm shocked at whats happening and it didn't even take a new id Tech or Unreal to do it.

                    

                       It is here I have to address,albeit for very different reasons I love the presentation and style of SIN as much as I do Blood. The games massive focus on massive boobs and a dystopian cyberpunk world with a not give a fuck Mr.T is sinful in how much I enjoy it. Sex sells and not only does SIN push this hard it pushes the limit of what it can do with it. In game boobs have their own physics when characters walk. Not to mention the massive amount of polygons afforded to them. Elexis Sinclaire is my favorite villain of any FPS. Literally slapping men around in her skin tight leather outfit as her breast basically explode. It doesn't get more silly and absurd than SIN. Even by Duke Nukem 3D standards. At times it's so on the point that I feel it'd be best suited for 13 year old boys than grown men but I do find it amusing and funny all the same. Like Shadow Warrior there where some moments even my 1998 self would cringe but all the same the boobs and setting of SIN are some of it's best features. 
I mean if anyone has to be stopped its Elexis. FPS game's have never really delivered much of any story and this game probably over tries with details but I like the whimsical approach to set dressing SIN embodies here. Ritual Entertainment chose Quake and Unreal as it's focus while heavily dressing SIN in Duke Nukem 3D trimmings. Even borrowing from arcade light gun games, stealth games like Thief or MGS. Some of these design innovations like the stealth and especially the set pieces and in game cinamatics are brilliant and great additions to the FPS genre. The genre is ever widening and even traditional id style FPS games can have big new changes. I admit I am starting to feel some fatigue at the root of these types of games. SIN falls short of Unreal and Quake in both gunplay and level design but in terms of quality I put it close to Shadow Warrior. While Ritual Entertainment's contributions are often highly interesting others like reloading really drag the experience down and none of this fundamentally changes how id style this game feels. SIN and Rainbow Six exist in stark contrast of each other and a mile marker where the genre is. While it forks off into sub genres the id style back bone of the genre narrows down it's potential in trade for more polished and subtly varied entries. 

                          I enjoyed Ritual Entertainment's debut FPS SIN to a large degree. It out right shocked me at it's best times and often was a lot of good standard FPS fun. It was good to get back to running and gunning after Rainbow Six's slow and tactical gameplay. In many ways it feels like Duke Nukem 3D 1.5. Overall SIN lacks the fluidity and sublime shooting bliss Unreal and Quake embody but I fell in love with its innovations and breast. 

                 

                

Patriot Games

 

          Eight people clad in the best urban combat military gear carrying silenced sub machines guns quietly and slowly approach in formation. Splinting into two teams they both taking varying positions around the exterior of the house. Quietly the enter. Gun fire is methodically and often quietly exchanged as they check corners clearing the house one by one. A flash bang is thrown in the room blinding the enemies and hostages alike. The enemies are dropped. The hostages are escorted out and the first mission is over. Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six exist in contrast to it's FPS counter parts. The loud, brazen and invincible characters set in unbelievable fantasy world's we often see are contrasted with a chillingly real world game.

             Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six is a game that heavily takes from the sim genre extremely popular on PC and incorporates them into an FPS. Tom Clancy's intentions come through in Red Storm's grounded and hyper real presentation through the use of modern* real time polygon driven 3D graphics. The controversy today* about video game violence intersecting with reality does creep into my mind as I play. Rainbow Six is the first FPS game I've played where I feel like its incredibly realistic, deviants might have trouble not taking it too seriously.

           The graphics are a notch below Quake II, let alone Unreal but it still looks fantastic and better than most. But it's Red Storm's attention to detail in both presentation and through a plethora of complex game mechanics that makes Rainbow Six brilliant. High value spec ops missions across the globe including a terrorist filled play house make for memorable moments. Red Storm was founded in part by Tom Clancy himself who is also launching a book by the same name as the game this year*.  I've seen other non gaming franchises enter the FPS genre like Golden Eye and the Dark forces games, however those games tended to adopt already existing FPS mechanics into them. Golden Eye adopted a lot of arcade light gun style elements into it's FPS approach while Dark Forces took after the standard bearing id model. Rainbow Six however completely rewrites the approach to the FPS genre based around it's non gaming franchise roots. 

         I was shocked how much they did new and unique for the game.  A primary weapon and side arm like real life are the only guns you can go into a mission with. This is the first game I have played for this blog where I had to reload my gun or hold down a button to run faster which is very, very slow. All non player characters and the player die in a few hits. When playing DOOM II and describing Quake I mention how FPS games make you feel like your controlling some kind of vehicle in 3D."You feel like some UFO fighter jet constantly, thrusting and lurching in and out. Its fast. Real fast."this is thrown out the window with the game Red Storm designed. It is like your controlling a person. A slow, weighted, limited and easy to die human. Its a whole new pace and intensity to the game. I found it really enjoyable given the setting and military themes. Learning the level and enemy placement are often heavily beneficial however the planning phase offers a ton of insight into these things.

              The heavy sim like qualities of the game from pre mission planning, load outs and AI behavior are impressive but I found them tedious and overwhelming. I "get" the appeal of these sim systems but its just not for me. The preloaded plans often fail and I found myself loosing interest in Rainbow Six extremely quickly as a result of all this. The game takes a lot of time and I find that interesting and beneficial to it's cause but I'd rather get my time sunk in with Unreal or Quake. Tom Clancy's Red Storm game studio has done a remarkable job though at reinventing the wheel and I find that highly impressive despite my more personal taste driven reservations. 

                 It is shocking how real games are getting and the visuals produced. While it's not totally my cup of tea Rainbow Six is an extremely impressive game yet again forging another completely new sub genre into the FPS genre. The variety of experiences you can get in 3D FPS games now * is hard to believe after playing the games for this blog up until now. The entire fundamentals of the genre can be rewritten and the Rainbow Six still be familiar and fun to experienced FPS players albeit feeling extremely different. While design had been rather rapidly expanding last year *97, the rise of these new*98 powerful real time graphics engines are changing whats possible with not just games but the genres video games have created. Games like Rainbow Six are exciting and wildly innovative. Seeing games like this validates this blog in a big way. 

           

Voodoo

     

            The most important point of this blog for me is to give myself proper appreciation and knowledge of my favorite gaming genre through historical context that may have been lost to me at the time and/or without this exercise.I had difficulty articulating the massive, yet now almost expected jump Quake II gave over other 1997 releases in such a short time. It's not hyperbole yet the quality standard for games was the expectation of technological marvels one after the other by 1998 and that expectation was reinforced by the reality of the 1990's tech boom. id Tech 2 impressed as much as id Tech 2.5 while having what Rare or Iguana Entertainment did impress in different ways in between. Unreal embodies more than anything the era to which created it. Unreal is as we all know the name suggest is unbelievable. Coming right after Quake II on this blog and roughly 6 months from id Tech 2.5's debut in late '97, Unreal astonishes me. 1998 was here and with it Epic Games debut FPS Unreal to show us video games could truly have no limits. 

                     Unreal and Epic Game's Unreal Engine feel like the watershed moment for video games that every medium experiences where technology is serviceable enough for neigh any vision.  Playing this blog and hosting games of a wide range of quality has shown me limitations in both design and approach that the technological canvas imposes on the creators. Unreal Engine is the living life blood of what makes Unreal the game it is. There's a time old discussion of game play and graphics and how the lion share of creative effort and engineering should be split between the two. However it's very important to understand that the vision for Unreal the game is made possible with the Unreal Engine. 

        The game features massive levels unlike that of any FPS I've played before with vistas going off for what feels like forever with no fog to mask the lack of rendering like seen on N64 games. Loading screens in Unreal ,unlike Hexen or other idTech based games, don't have to hide behind doors but let the player clearly see where they are going as the game takes a moment to load.  The effects work though boggles the mind and really flexes the kind of things Video Add In Cards can accomplish. Glass and water distort in creative and translucent ways I've not seen an FPS game until now. Bullets and explosions are either rendered with polygons or have the best sprite effect use I've seen. Physics make chunks of meat float in the water, bounce the player like Quake does with explosions or to my great surprise have rope like elements bounce at times. Bloom lighting and colored lighting look much better than what was seen in id Tech 2.5 and still have a dramatic effect on me with the presentation simply not possible in even simple scenes without it. The dynamic lighting however in Unreal Engine is what gives the game atmosphere, tense game play areas that are free to play with light and darkness like I could only dream of when playing DOOM II. The lighting is incredible and completes and already incredible visual package. It seems the lighting effects more surfaces and smaller details in both color and dynamic ways than seen with id Tech 2.5.

           The tech impresses and ignites my love for realtime rendering. While the games that would do that for me in real life came much later if I was who I am now in 1998 it would likely be Unreal that would be my "Crysis" moment. It wasn't long ago I was blown away by the level of interactivity, lighting and texturing available in Build Engine games like Duke Nukem 3D. However some 1.5 years later Unreal is a jump so large I lack the worlds to describe. The thing about this era is clear to me is that there was no singular "Crysis" moment. DOOM II, Hexen, Duke Nukem,Quake, Golden Eye, Turok, Quake II and now Unreal all felt like the entire expectations and reality in which games are created and played fundamentally shifted in expectation and quality. 

            Unreal's beauty however is not just skin deep. Unreal has left me with awe in my impressions and memories with the game. Moments that are truly timeless and will always stick with a gamer.  Crawling out of a typical post Quake FPS level with awesome dynamic lighting to suddenly walk out and find yourself in a valley with a water fall that you jump down to. Its a monumental moment for the genre. Some of these moments are serene and beautiful existing to only breathe life into this living world the player is part of. Some offer to heighten the incredibly tense combat moments playing with light sources and darkness in a way that forces the player to adjust their senses. The introduction to Skarrj using dynamic lighting and a great sound track to near through the player into a panic attack as they fight for their lives.  Some other moments just make your jaw drop and heart race for other reasons such as a slith being smart enough to follow you after pushing you off into the water where it sims faster and attacks stronger. Easily one of my favorite and most surprising moments in the game. These kind of enemy surprises or environmental immersion haven't really came across in an FPS game before on this of quality, interactivity but also just immersion and drawing the palyer into a believable world which may be Unreal's only ironic part when it comes to naming. This isn't to say Unreal isn't short on charming gimmicks. A health plan that the longer it grows the more health it gives you shows off the engines geometry transformations well but also gives the world a little charm. Natives smart enough to guide you to hidden treausre should you keep them alive are neat ways of just seeing how Epic Games had the freedom to really toy with these actors and elements while structuring a level. Unreal is far less rigid feeling that past FPS games because of this and has an almost more simulated feel to it in place.

       While immersion and scope are clearly where Unreal stands apart, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and Epic Games largely borrows from the id design bible. Its very a "Quake Clone" as much as Dark Forces or Duke Nukem where "DOOM Clones".  The game is fast paced falling in the same speed bracket as Quake II though still not as extreme as Quake I or Blood. A large host of weapons fit the typical roster with attempts by Epic Games to make Unreal's Quake like arsenal more unique unto itself. Some of the attempts are fantastic and match the similar efforts of 3D Realms in differing the arsenal of the FPS while not straying too far from the golden design standard of id Software. Guns like the Flak Cannon are wholly unique and possibly my best take on "what can we put in the shotguns place" problem. The spread and range along with using physics to bounce the shrapnel around an area and blast enemies into chunks is one of the most satisfying weapons I've played in an FPS game. The rail gun is a straight Shadow Warrior rip off and I'm fine with as its extremely useful and rewarding on Unreal's fast and highly animated targets something neither Shadow Warrior or Quake II gave you. 

                        

       Aside from the stand outs though Unreal's weaponry is pretty lack luster especially coming onto the stage after Quake II or Blood. The Stinger is a poor and less satisfying machine gun that largely works on damage sponge enemies as crowd control is rarely a thing in Unreal's combat loop. Enemies tend to appear in few numbers and move around areas more than games before it. The dispersion rifle does cool things with its upgrades and changing form, again technically very impressive, however it simply stays useless much like the coolly named enforcer pistol. The Rocket launcher functions like Quake however another oddity exist the 6 barreled fire stick weapon. It shoots basically short range motors with its alt fire function showering the enemy with all 6 of them albeit much less accuracy. It's cool however largely useless as campaign maps rarely give you the room to attack highly mobile targets with blast rate weapons. All in all Unreal is not up to the standard id Software or 3D realms has set in gun play. It's fun and excited at its best times and rather mediocre the rest of the time. 

                          Much of the gun play shortcomings in Unreal are due in part to the less than stellar level design. While these areas are beautiful and fun to explore they are met with several short comings and less than stellar qualities about them. The most egregious problem with the level design its break the expected rule of having an fast paced FPS  giving the player plenty of movement options. I found myself all too often caught on geometry when fighting enemies or just lacking space to use various weapons on such a consistent level I wondering why they gave them to be to use in the first place aside from suicide. In fact because of the high mobility of enemies the rail gun became my go to weapon and was so much better suited for combat I had a hard time switching for reasons other than ammo. It's also worth noting that the single player pacing of this game is very slow with a slight Turok focus on getting around large levels, pressing buttons and soaking things. This approach helps Unreal exploit its best qualities however the choice to very slowly trickle out new additions to the arsenal of the player severely killed in interest in a way Quake II did not by albeit still too slowly feeding me more weapons and enemy types. 

            While the gun play loop of Unreal is fairly mediocre It's enemy design shares the same mixed bag approach. It's here I feel Epic Games thought this was more clever than how it worked out in actuality. See there's little enemy variation and they appear in about the same frequency as Quake II. It creates for a quickly stagnant combat progression as the game goes on these elements age the fastest. Again I have to mention the slow roll out of fun weapons to the player as that would have mitigated the problem. Quake II's weapon set for instance seems in part response to a similar enemy variation problem Unreal faces. It makes me wonder playing all these games together if its a design trend or lack of 3D processing capabilities because nothing has reached DOOM II levels of throwing enemies on screen and I miss mowing down a hoard. While being blow to bits and blood flying and floating is very nice in Unreal I still give the carnage and brutality edge to id Software and this comes down to a personal blood lust preference if you will not that Unreal is a lesser game because of it. Much like how Virtual Fighter or Dead or Alive of the time didn't need to be Mortal Kombat. 

                           

        Immersion is a tricky and usually toxic word to use in game discord. Often immersion is used as a marketing gimmick or a hot take critique about some picky rendering or design choice. Unreal has humbled me and brought warmth back into my jaded opinion on the use of that word however. As I am about to use immersion to praise Unreal a great deal and while its highly subjective in its own right to assert immersion as being a quality of a game I can focus on the objective ways in which it accomplishes this for me. Unreal easily has the best use of music in a FPS game. The ambience and wonder it creates breathes so much life into this physically large and densely detailed digital world. It seems to contextually play tracks based on encounters and locations and really gives this alien world exploration impression that is haunted and beautiful while full of life and wonder. Luckily Epic Games seemed to be keen on their prowess here and built large parts of the level deigns and game play loop around simplistic puzzle solving that forces the player to for a brief moment soak it all in while still being challenged. Turok did this well mechanically and maybe even a littler better but seeing it all together in Unreal Engine is a step far above what was possible on N64 in mid '97.Breaking character here I will say this is an obvious major inspiration for Halo Combat Evolved and what would be the crashing onto Halo and the ambience of that game while on the ring, including a dynamic sound track that wouldn't be for 3 more years though. 

                              Unreal has this massive connected world and it's the closest I think a FPS game has came to a truly load free open world. Sure there are loading screens but where they are placed and how far apart the player must see them is truly wild to see especially coming off of Quake II which handled that much worse in id Tech 2.5 despite going for the now trendy Hexen II take on connecting shooter levels. We are seeing the industry at this point have a keen move away from the more arcade mentality that DOOM II set out and a more cohesive set and set of actions akin to Gold Eye or RavenSoft's games. Epic Games had a big challenge that Raven, Iguana and others had also encountered, that was how to make these massive labyrinths intuitive and navigable. Quake I did this likely the best one by having much smaller levels, an easy out, but adopting a more roller coaster mentality where the player literally just had to keep walking into trouble to find his way out. Quake II and Hexen II used a lot of text updating the player with a small focus on visual clues. Visual Clues to guide the player in the right way in a massive area with multiple ways by sometimes changing the environment from the way it looked on a previous pass through or having interesting lightnings and objects or more directly offering a carrot to the player in the form of ammo or health. These games all clumsy struggled with this problem and while I found Quake II the most intuitive its interesting to see how Unreal does what I feel a worse job overall while doing many of the individual elements better. Unreal easily grabs the players attention with visual ques much better, things are just more interesting to look at the the art direction of the game is a large step up over what id Software last put out, Epic is able to do this with much larger scenes with more complex environments to allow objects to exist purely to be interesting to look at. The design and combat carrot mechanic work really well. Much better than Blood and with far less pace breaking and disorienting platforming Turok gave us. However again it's Epic Games lacking level design that allows areas to easily get extremely confusing, switches and goals not always easy to track and some down right hard to do so. It's more a pain akin to Hexen II though the pace and style of that game fit a slower less intuitive design and in some ways would could argue RavenSoft wanted that challenge to exist. No such clever trade offs or intentions are found in Unreal.

        Going into Unreal has been such a pleasure. Its a very well made game that always steps out on its best foot first. Immersion, world building, a few wacky guns and some stellar enemy engagement. All these strong characteristics earn it, its spot among the greats. In 1998 this game was astounding and I'd say its still awe inspiring even to this day blog or not. I found the gunplay and game play while having great high moments largely unsatisfying compared to 3D Realms or Id Software as well as the all too frequent mediocre combat areas and level design. Epic Game's Unreal however still creates plenty of mind blowing magical gaming moments both for the industry and the genre. Gaming memories that last a life time because they impressed, sparked joy, or wow'ed you like DOOM did back in the day. Its the most immersive and beautiful FPS game to date ('98). The bright colorful alien world mixed with grimy temples and broken off world tech created a much needed fresh top notch experience for the genre. Unreal astounds and drops jaws but it also creates a magic world to be a part of and I'm filled with memories and love of it. Move over id Software, as of this day Epic Games had earned the right to sit beside you. 

Circa 1998

                       

              

      1997 itself justified the conextual nature of this blog entirely on it's own. 97' was a year so pivotal and important for the genre it's certainly not lost through a historically lens but the year's perception shattering effect has to truly be experienced first hand. The parallels of the technological and cultural revolution the 90's hosted expressed itself fully in video games and particularly the FPS genre as of late. Technology had been integrating itself into daily life for some time however now it was accessible, programmable, and affordable in ways just dreamed of years earlier. This era was the platform of creativity and why the past "year" of this blog hosted the most diverse, large and high quality spread of FPS titles by an almost unfathomable magnitude. In a few short years we've went from 3D Realm's explosive use of interactive environments married with the genre pioneering movement efforts of id Software only to have the perceptions of what is possible in a video game changed by both console releases like Turok and Rare's GoldenEye and later year PC releases, by Lucas Arts, Raven Software, even with contributions by id Software besting itself at its own game. 

                                  The visceral nature of the genre has always attracted both fans and skeptic DOOMs day preachers. By this time in the blog id Software had already become the major source of controversy and violence from video games was certainly on the lips of many politicians, pulling the genre into a cultural blood bath with lasting stigma far beyond to present day 21'. Graphics had become unbelievable in months. Just in a 12 months we went from Quake I to Quake II and the jump is stunning. The mix of pixel art powered Build Engine games like Blood and Shadow Warrior stood just as tall in their more traditional design choices as the new pioneers such as GoldenEye or Hexen II. The gulf visually and in interactivity however staggering in a way the present world of tech and rendering could never show. It's a phenomenon unto itself that all these drastically different approaches to the same video game genre, with just as varied choices of technological canvases to work with, existed in the same 12 months. While the take away in knowledge and appreciation of these individual titles is precious the context of what a stunning year unfolded and changed the FPS genre forever is the lesson that must be brought across in this blog. Because 1998 for gamers at the time started in a state of pure shock. 

                           1998 would be unreal. 1998 meant nothing was off the table. Nothing was impossible for both Video games as a medium and FPS as a genre. The bringing of advanced and portable technology would soon bring us into the sci-fi future dreamed about for so long. It's important to realize culturally much of this technology was new and not viewed as need or complementary to every life style. Something even the best game engines like id Tech 2 and Lucas Art's in house engine had to deal with. Home computers where often extremely limited in their rendering prowess and machines built more in line with the needs of gaming prohibitively expensive. However by this point in the blog (98') PC's had exploded in power and the rampant spread of the "video add on card" market played a key role in allowing experiences like idTech 2.5 powered Quake II or drastically better versions of games like Dark Forces II. Even a console like the Nintendo 64 proved it was a capable in home 3D FPS machine. The proliferation of capable realtime 3D hardware was going to allow content creators to do things unimaginable, I mean just look at Quake II. Hardware wouldn't be the only major thing to change gaming this year as Microsoft would release one of the most important OS releases as of yet with Windows 98.

                The major design shifts start appearing. Hexen II and Quake II showed off level design where each level felt physically connected to the other. Movement had evolved to take into account physics with rocket jumping and more. The genre had clearly not just evolved but expanded. Rare had introduced a more cinematic flare that we would see id Software bring to a more fast paced traditional formula. I think this point in the genre really does feel like limitless possibility. Tech was growing and being accepted at an unfathomable rate and with it flexibility of design. While the entries in this blog get scale upwards in work they also continue to yield much joy and appreciation for the times. I'm very much interested in reliving 1998. Through he lens of a now 29 year old gamer who was then just 7 playing Pokemon on his N64. Google would be founded in 1998. The Titanic would create movie history. MP3 players would start to take off as portable music devices along with the iMAC's debut. Brittany Spears and Nsync ruled the charts. 1998 is here.

Ozymandias

           With Quake and DOOM, id Software pioneered their own brand of game play and created a video game genre. First Person Shooters by the end of 1997 and the release of Quake II had become a somewhat wide genre filled with comic relief, pop culture references, fantasies, a variety of game play and visuals. This competition and variety of choice on the market however did nothing to temper id Software's thirst to push the genre and their own game play brand forward. Quake II certainly does this however it also has a delicacy id Software games lacked before when it comes to refinement. Quake II is a well oil, smooth running, great sounding machine of a video game. It is the id Software game play brand started in DOOM  in its most balanced and precise form yet. This blog's chronologically linear path give me an appreciation for these watershed moments like Quake II. It may seem almost cliche both in this blog and in 1997 to say id Software has done it yet again. It may sound repetitive to say Quake II looks unbelievable visually and the awe of its visceral feedback is just as much shock as any other id release so far. However all these things are true. Quake II embodies everything this genre has worked for up until the end of 1997 and it feels good. 

                   If there was ever a "blockbuster" video game until now it was Quake II. DOOM had its cult following termed phenomenon, and Quake felt like it achieved that as well but Quake II feels like a full on polished, massive budget, expected to be awe inspiring kind of product. The game stuns with a full motion video of sci fi marines in drop pods invading an alien planet setting the stage for your war of revenge after an previous unexpected attack on earth. It has nothing to do with Quake I and depending on the level of information access I had at the time in 1997 this may have been confusing to me though I quickly adjusted to the fantastic gritty sci fi story that reminds me very much of Star Ship Troopers in premise. The addition of this in an id game is welcome and really feels that blockbuster feel and expectation I had for a game of this caliber after the "year" this blog has had with 1997. My war with the Strogg quickly felt personal from the botched landing of the marines in the intro video. 

          Id Software's calling card is fast ground breaking rendering. Throughout the past year of 1997 in this blog I've seen some incredible examples of real time rendering for FPS games and video games as a whole, a welcome refreshment after so many sprite based games. Despite id Tech 2 being just a year old these new technological improvements in both software and hardware in the PC space where not lost on id. Quake II's version of id Tech 2 heavily focused on the user having a discrete 3D accelerator card to assist the CPU in rendering complex 3D games. This hardware was new yet quickly became extremely popular and common enough. With this id Tech 2 now has colored lighting! Walking past different colored lights now cast a light the correct color onto the player or enemy. The dynamic lights in general are significantly improved over Quake I. A tremendous increase in polygon count makes it by far the most detailed game I've seen ('97) including the best textures. Quake II and the improved hardware 3D accelerated id Tech 2 is a tremendous leap for video games in visuals and stuns as much as any of id Software's previous releases. If it's cliche its because John Carmack earned it by now. Because this jump is  so big I will refer to this version of the engine as the id Tech 2.5 Engine. Id Tech upped everything including the violent visceral feedback id is known for with enemies having chunks of meat and metal fly from them as you shoot away their health. The depth the colored lighting allowed and the freedom artist had with so many polygons creates environments unrivaled in Quake II.

                                

             Visuals aside the bedrock of Quake II to me and what really stuck with me is how smooth and well functioning all it's game play mechanics work with one another. It really is harmonious in a way I don't feel id Software had achieved with their trade mark game play formula. What I mean by previous statement is that the game play of Quake II, all the weapons, enemies, ammo, and movement feel like they work together and off one another in a practical and rewarding way that serves the game play. Everything has a purpose and feels like its there to compliment everything else mechanically. Blood is probably the only other game on this list I would hold is such regard when it comes to such a refined game play formula. Refinement in Quake II comes at the cost of some of my favorite things Quake I did. Qualities such as Quake I's breakneck speed and chaos that often could result in a less that satisfying death but fascination all the same. One fault I find Quake II with is it's power fantasy rarely allows for frustration from the player and its something that brings life to id encounters I severely missed from previous games. Not to say however that the "feeling"  of Quake and id Software games isn't alive and well but it lacks that always near death tension previous DOOM and Quake games gave us. 

                                                Quake II's symphony relies more on its weapons set than it does it's enemy encounters. DOOM II in this blog is praised for such a great set up of enemy and weapon dynamics. Quake II unlike Quake I and DOOM, offers a weapons heavy balance over enemy variance however the gain of this trade off is each weapon is very unique and has its specific purposes. Its more inline with the 3D Realms approach and I feel its the most enjoyable yet balanced weapons set id Software has presented in a game though Quake II does not satisfy in enemy variety like Quake I and not in enemy encounters like DOOM II. Quake features a pistol much like DOOM however it's dynamic light is a first for video games and cool to see its largely a useless weapon and I fault the game for using more for a graphics gimick than anything else. The shotgun in addition to the pistol is pretty much useless. Again once the incredibly satisfying super shotgun is found its never used again, the super shotgun however being incredibly satisfying in effect and sound across the variety of situations the game gives the player, its an id Software Specialty. The machine gun is fun with it's upward fire overtime but again largely useless after the chain gun is acquired though not completely. The chain gun is where Quake II's arsenal becomes more unique and satisfying to use, an expect in crowd control and going faster and faster until it runs out of bullets the chain gun is a pleasure. Hand grandees work as a slow and physically projected object of explosive quality and only exist for any real purpose because the grande launcher now sadly does not explode on impact a severe set back from Quake I and while the grenades often become satisfying with the tighter areas of level design Quake II offers they are not the most satisfactory. As I get to the toned down rocket launcher of Quake II  you may wonder why I even enjoy its weapon set and its because so far the balancing changes create for a more, if less chaotic, enemy encounter than the first game and I feel that flow is ultimately more satisfying in its accomplished pace and compromise. The rain gun however is a new and incredibly precise and powerful weapon. Used even more than my rocket launcher it feels like the rapid precise and powerful weapon a fast game like Quake II has been dying for. Its fits the game and encounters well and is a joy to use. The hyper blaster essentially is the plasma rifle from DOOM and is a poor replacement for the nail gun in Quake I. The BFG 10k. Now a id Software brand item the BFG is as insanely satisfying. The BFG 10k excels at its purpose which is last minute critical crowd control. 

       I go into such depth on Quake II's weapon set cause it really is the meat of the game play sandwich and where most of the joy of playing the game stems from. Quake II is a harmonious symphony of butchering your enemies in elegant yet enjoyable ways that tantalize the player in a manner the FPS genre was made to do. Id Software at the end of 1997 was not concerned with watering itself down with the times as much as embracing itself and its brand of violence as part of the times. The Strogg of Quake II present a satisfying, and by this point in history ('97), very id Software brand of horror and game design fun. The Strogg are human and cybernetic monstrosities controlled to destroy humans. Using the parts of your fallen comrades in machines and literal meat grinders, the Strogg are gruesome and fit the id Software tropes. The strogg also fall into the id Software design mold mostly set by Quake I and DOOM II before it.  Though the enemy set while enjoyable and cool is one of the less satisfying elements of Quake II over time.

                                     The enemies of Quake II really hone in on the strengths of the FPS encounter that has been established in the genre across multiple studios. Some enemies fly and suppress, some charge, some tank, some heal or shield yet all are made to be blow to bits by certain weapons belonging to a specific category or in Quake II's example a specific weapon itself. While DOOM II, DUKE,  or even Turok had enemies with particular weaknesses, Quake II centers itself around a rock, paper and scissors game play mentality between enemies and weapons in the game. Quake II's combat loop is not only rewarding but satisfying in the sense a rhyme game or timed thing would be. 2+2 always equals 4 in Quake II and you can always stitch together these different combat rhymes for an extended good time in the game. Moments of this kind of satisfactory height and fulfillment in power fantasy aren't rare while not being all too common. If anything Quake II's biggest fault is that the game is almost too well paced. The ramp up of combat and intensity is present but it lacks the ability to just adjust you quickly to chaos as Blood did or to learn a complicated yet rewarding system as DOOM II. Quake II takes it's time giving the player the full arsenal and presenting them with a full set of enemies, this was so egregious that found the pacing to be borderline boring at first especially in comparison with what I expect from id Software and Quake. When Quake II gets it's legs and speed about it, Quake II soon joins id Software's other efforts in terms of carnage though I miss the funneled rapid chaos of the first game the more tempered approach of the sequel was more satisfactory long term when realizing how cohesive the overall game felt instead of being divided into individual levels. Quake II takes a note from id Software's kin Raven Software. Like Hexen II, Quake II using id Tech 2.0+ has a conjoined over world. Each level and area is joined by the player physically traversing the area even if through gated load screens. Some areas of Quake II are only joined in more or less cinematic form yet much of the game is physically joined in a very impressive manner. Quake II's level design while never reaching the lows of the worst parts of DOOM II or Quake I, rarely hit the heights of Quake I. Quake II instead focuses on presenting a stage and grounding the player though the new geometry density can be hard to navigate and the speed run  race feeling of levels all but eliminated. I can't help but feel a little tired of the setting as well. While traversing across the planet Strogg the environments largely look the same and grow a bit samey despite the luster of id Tech 2. 5.

         Overall I found Quake II to be a huge departure in feeling from previous FPS games because of its more linear and constricted approach to what are still very much Quake levels. Because of Quake II's updated objectives, connected levels and item collection borrowed from the likes of Hertic and Hexen the shooter aspects feel more grounded in this set stage. Quake II feels like a proper adventure you'd find in a Hollywood war movie and I think that is what id Software was going for. The design choices and changes in Quake II are not just from the id Tech 2.5 engine. The new weapon placement on screen, conjoined level design, slower paced enemy encounters and player speed all are deliberate in taking the player on a top notch action adventure FPS video game. This set stage along with an near perfect weapons set makes for not just a super fun and visceral game like id Software is known for but also for immersion which I don't think we've seen on this level in the FPS genre ('97). Quake II pulls away from the arcade influence carried in from DOOM II. Its a pretty big change up and I welcome it. For the genre it's huge. I think id Tech 2.5 is the first engine that's had the ability to create and FPS like this with a cohesive story and world. In late 1997 this would have been enough to astound me all while setting a new pipe dream expectation of having a cohesive world to enjoy a start to finish grounded FPS campaign. Quake II isn't just remarkable in being a very polished and extraordinary product on its own right but because of the implications the game and id Tech 2. 5 have for what can be achieved by not just video games but the FPS genre specifically. Shooters may be able to tell more than just an 80's action movie premise after all? Maybe not as despite all this, this is what Quake II does. The implication of it's more safe narrative roots doesn't make it any less ground breaking especially from a company that brought us the demon killing simulator. 

                Quake II as a sequel is a mixed bag and as a FPS game innovative and incredible. While I miss the chaos and fastness of Quake I paired with it's speed run mentality the welcome trade off is having a coherent story, setting and game to play with Quake II. On this blog i criticized the fist game's mixed bag of confused settings and somehow even less coherent story than DOOM II. Quake II may play slower and be more "cinematic"  but Quake II is still a farcry from Golden Eye or being anything other than a product of the id Software DNA. Quake II provides the most satisfactory and engaging while immersive campaign of any shooter on this blog yet including id Software's own best of the bunch. Backed by the best weapon set and balance yet from the studio and Quake II is a FPS genre lover's dream. While there are clear things I'm interested in seeing from the genre presented in narrative with games like Dark Forces II or with platforming level design like Turok or with cinematic movie magic like Golden Eye, Quake II stands alone as the undisputed king of genre relying only on tropes from it's own medium to create an enriching and full FPS experience. 

                       Quake II is incredible and edges its way despite its trade offs as being my favorite game on the blog yet. As cliche as it may be to say id Software struck gold yet again and that is a joy I'm not ashamed of. Id Software is second to none when it comes to honing in the serotonin releasing elements of a genre they themselves crafted. Id Tech 2.5 Engine shows the incredible leaps hardware and software of the late 90's was offering. By the end of 1997 the genre, games and real time rendering had changed and Quake II embodied the best of all these traits.