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SIGIL (John Romero/id Software, 2019)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Tue, 15 Oct 2019 19:35:28 +0000

Recently, John Romero released a fifth episode for the original, legendary 1993 DOOM. I hope you’re ready to face hell again, because it’s packed into this one tighter than rancid sardines. You will be hurt… plenty. John Romero is notorious among veteran DOOMers as the architect of some the most devious and downright cruel environments in the series. He has come back after more than 25 years to hit us with an uncompromisingly brutal series of maps that will test the living HELL out of you. You may think you’re bad. But Sigil’s packing infernal heat. You’re in for a faceful, Marine. Gear up.

Here is the story, according to John himself:

“After killing the Spiderdemon at the end of E4M8 (Unto the Cruel), your next stop is Earth — you must save it from hellspawn that is causing unimaginable carnage. But Baphomet glitched the final teleporter with his hidden sigil whose eldritch power brings you to even darker shores of Hell. You fight through this stygian pocket of evil to confront the ultimate harbingers of Satan, then finally return to become Earth’s savior.”

Sigil’s opening screen. KVLT ANTI-HVMAN BLACK METAL

I am a pretty well-seasoned DOOM player, and can usually handle the original 3 episodes on Nightmare or at least UV. This shit is turning my guts inside out on Hurt Me Plenty. You will not see health much at all. You will need to be extremely careful. Yes, there are horrible monster traps everywhere. Inescapable pits too. You will die. You will know death again, Marine. You can never truly rest. But Space Marines are made for this shit. Let’s hit it.

E5M1 is a true gauntlet-run involving the elevation of platforms in order to find your way through a winding path of hitscanners and imps. The maps are very dimly lit, and instead of switches, Romero has us shooting the demonic eye symbols to activate/open things. I’ll save you the five or so seconds it’d take to puzzle it out. Sheol (E5M2) continues to incline the difficulty in a steady fashion. Breaking a sweat yet? You often find yourself with little room to move one way or another, measuring moments and shots, clinging to cover while whittling away at potentially deadly ambushes. I hope you like seeing barons and cacodemons up close, because you fucking will be. E5M3 is called Cages of the Damned, and it looks slightly more “conventional” as a map when you first start blasting through. Vaguely castle-like, with great run-and-gun action and a few open spaces (finally!) to use in combat. I’d even call E5M3 “classical” because of how true parts of it are to the original feel of the trilogy. You’re still, however, finding very little health. And yes, you’re still in horrible peril on a constant basis. Paths of Wretchedness (E5M4) is another hectic rim-grabber over pools of magma as you battle your way through a shooting gallery with you as the turkey. Movement is again limited, and you find yourself getting pummeled in bottlenecks – sometimes caught with your fucking pants down – and perishing if you’re not on your LeBron “Leatherface on Mars” James A-game. This level has a splash of that old alien-mechanical feel to it reminiscent of Knee-Deep in the Dead. Probably another of my overall favorites of the episode. While health is scarce throughout this episode, you will find enough ammunition if you are thorough, frugal, and keep your eyes open.

Pictured: One scrub (yours truly), pre-tenderized.

Abbadon’s Void (E5M5) hits us with the sound of a cyberdemon right out of the starting gate, and we don’t clearly see it, but we know it’s aware of us and it’s pissed off. Great. More indoorsy, wood-paneled infernal décor, peppered with monster closet ambushes and tense high-wire acts. I particularly enjoy the MIDI OST track for this map (more on the music below); it’s atmospheric and rich and it reminds me a little of Blood’s great theatrical-style music. E5M6, Unspeakable Persecution, has the exit to the secret level E5M9 (Realm of Iblis). I’m not going to spoil where the door is or what the secret level is like; if you want that shit you can find it easily online. (I admit that I had to look it up. My skills have gotten mad rusty.) I will say that E5M9 is as hot and nasty as you’d expect Sigil’s secret map to be. Buckle up, buttercup. E5M7 is the Nightmare Underworld, and it was originally meant to be the fifth map, but it belongs here in spot #7. It is an expansive and adventurous map, and it pounds me into hamburger at an embarrassing rate. John’s work in Sigil is the work of a man who intimately understands the tools he is using to engage the player. It is the work of a methodical, gifted, calculating psychopath. E5M8, Halls of Perdition, presents the final obstacle in Sigil. Like E4M8, it is not just a straight boss fight; you must find your way through one last intense firefight against the full host of DOOM’s baddies intent on beating you down. The finale has a marathon-like feel and is almost joyful (I only beat it once using equipment cheats on Hurt Me Plenty).

decino’s entertaining and thorough playthrough of Sigil. He is a much better player than me. Props.

Hi. <3

Let’s talk about the absolute fucking banger soundtrack. If you don’t know who Buckethead is, you should, and he wrote the CD soundtrack for Sigil. Apparently, he’s a long-time DOOM fan. Who’d have thought a dude like the immortal Buckethead would have good taste. It is busy, atmospheric, haunting, and it fits Sigil’s gloomy theme of desperation perfectly. The episode also features a fantastic MIDI soundtrack written by James Paddock. It’s a little more action-themed but fits the game every bit as well as the Buckethead score. E5M1 and E5M7 stand out to me as highlights, and you should have a listen.

Ol’ Johnny R. goes hard in the paint with Sigil, reminding us longtime Space Marines that while our blood may smear every hallway and elevator from Phobos to Mt. Erebus, we can never die. Besides, who the hell else is going to keep the demons down? You know they’ll just be back . They always come back.

Sigil gets a 9 out of 10 from me. It’s difficult, but that’s not a complaint at all. It’s a brutally refreshing shot in the arm for a game that’s been loved for over twenty-six years. Devastatingly crisp, well-executed, and effective. John Romero has given us more to love about DOOM… and a new way to get our asses kicked and GET GOOD.

See you later for more articles in October. Stay spooky as hell… and Stay Retro.

BONUS: Of course there’s a Zero Master speed run of 9:32 for it already. Hallelujah.

Heretic (Raven Software, 1994)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Fri, 06 Oct 2017 13:14:53 +0000

It’s October, and I believe I promised you RetroFiends some spooky shit. Well, let’s ease into it, since it’s so early on in the month… we’ll start with one of the creepiest FPS games of the 1990s, one that took good advantage of the legendary Doom Engine – a tale of magic, evil, destruction, and revenge.

Here’s the absolutely sick-nasty box art by Gerald Brom again… Corvus’s eyes are mad with rage as he hurls ruin into some trick-ass skeletons in the dark. Everything Gerald Brom draws looks like it’s channeled right out of Robert E. Howard’s id. I love it.

Heretic was first released in December of 1994, and was published by id Software through GT Interactive. The game used a modified (one could say “expanded”) version of the Doom engine, featuring advances such as ambient sound, an inventory system, and the ability to tilt the player’s view up and down. Though they published Heretic, id didn’t make it… that credit falls to Raven Software.

Raven has become a big name in modern gaming, having worked on games for Marvel as well as the Call of Duty series. Their first title, an RPG called Black Crypt, was released in 1992. Raven garnered more attention with the following year’s ShadowCaster, a first-person adventure game that utilized an engine somewhere between Wolfenstein 3D‘s and Doom‘s in terms of capability. John Carmack of id wrote the engine and licensed it to Raven, establishing a working rapport that led to the production of Heretic a year later.

1992’s Black Crypt, Raven’s first game. I’ve never played it, but this is making me want to. It looks metal as fuck, just like Heretic and Hexen. Nothing wrong with sticking to a formula.

Heretic tells the story of a doomed world called Parthoris. Three entities called the Serpent Riders have possessed the kings of this world and corrupted its people. Only a clan of elves known as the Sidhe have dared to stand against the Riders, who have retaliated by declaring the entire race “heretics” and waging brutal war on them. In the end, the Serpent Riders’ grip on Parthoris is weakened… but at the cost of many elf lives. The Sidhe retreat, but one remains, intent on vengeance – Corvus, the character controlled by the player. Corvus is intent on destroying D’Sparil, the weakest of the Riders who has stayed behind to rule Parthoris. To reach the evil overlord, Corvus must make his way through three episodes (plus two in the expansion) of fantastic horror. Lucky for him, he’s not some soft-ass Keebler bitch. Forget all you know about the stereotype… this elf is a streetwalkin’ cheetah with a heart full of napalm, to quote one of the world’s purest poems.

The “barrels” in Heretic grow back when you destroy them, crowding tight areas and presenting just as much of a hazard to Corvus as they do to anything else. One upside to them is that you can move them around by pushing them, if you’re willing to risk a stray shot ruining your day.

While gameplay is very similar to Doom at the ground level, Heretic boasts additional capabilities not present in the original game format. You can fly, look all around, and save powerups for careful use when needed. Heretic has an extra layer of play that is a solid improvement on an already legendary engine. Instead of boomsticks and rocket launchers, Corvus blasts his way through the evil armies of D’Sparil with potent spells and relics. You start out in a dockyard with nothing but a simple wand and the butt of your staff to defend yourself, but do not despair – enchanted crossbows, jolting gauntlets, and fireball-hurling staves can be found and used to wreak havoc on the enemy. Most of these implements are noticeable analogs of their Doom counterparts; for instance, the electrifying gauntlets behave very much like Doom‘s chainsaw, while the Phoenix Rod is clearly a rocket-launcher wearing a different skin. Corvus also picks up items along the way that he can carry with him and activate later on, as inventory. These tools include wings for flight, masks that render the wearer temporarily hazy and near-invisible, and even rings that give you a few moments of indestructible invulnerability. Learning to conserve these relics and not waste them is a key part of the game’s strategy… and strategy you will need.

Beatdown in Spookytown. Unlike you, the forces of evil never run out of ammo. These guys in particular hit unreasonably hard… who am I kidding? Everything hits hard in Heretic.

The rank and file monsters you encounter range from the bizarre to the downright terrifying. Mummies, skeletal warriors, scorpion-men, mutant reptiles, and ghostly enemy warlocks hound your every step. Not only are these creatures visually impressive, but the sound effects for Heretic bring them to ghastly life as they shriek and howl for your blood. The soundtrack is pretty middle-of-the-line, but E1M1’s music stands out, as well as the tracks for the boss fight levels. The boss-type monsters are also impressive; perhaps the most visually striking are the Iron Liches (hovering steel skulls bedecked in grand helmets, spitting elemental ruin from their mouths) and the Maulotaurs (think minotaurs, but fucking huge and armed with hammers capable of launching flame). Even the environment itself will work against you – not just in the familiar ways (lava, etc), either. In Heretic, you take damage from falling too far, and rushing water and push you into such chasms as well. The walls can crush you in new ways, and gaseous puffballs the size of a human being fill certain areas (behaving much like Doom‘s barrels but respawning rapidly after their destruction). Parthoris is not a safe world, not in the clutches of D’Sparil.

The Maulotaur and an Iron Lich. In true video game tradition, the huge terrible asshole boss monsters become regulars after their first climactic appearance. Happy Birthday. (click to enlarge.)

An expansion, Shadow of the Serpent Riders, was released in 1996, the game’s first actual retail release (the original full version was available only by mail after registering the shareware demo). The expansion adds two more episodes as an epic epilogue to the defeat of D’Sparil, packed with even more peril and adventure. The game’s formal sequel, Hexen, was released in 1995. Hexen features non-linear gameplay and in-depth puzzle solving as well as multiple player-character choices. Both of these titles would receive numerical sequels in the latter part of the 1990s, more conventionally 3D with polygon-based graphics running in an engine based off of Quake II‘s.

I give Heretic a solid 8 out of 10. It’s a solid improvement on a game engine that had already shocked the world, its dark fantasy theme is a novel flavor for an FPS, and it packs an addictive challenge. If you’re into classic FPS games and you’ve never played it, please treat yourself.

Rastan (Taito, 1987)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Mon, 16 Jan 2017 22:59:25 +0000

I’ve been reading a lot lately about the video game developers who were active in Japan in the 1980s and early 90s, and I’ve learned some of interesting stuff. A lot of it has to do with these companies’ origins and beginnings – some of which differ greatly from what one might assume. Taito, for instance? You know, the very Japanese corporation that gave us Bubble Bobble and Operation Wolf? That company was founded in 1953 by a Russian Jewish immigrant named Michael Kogan. What began as a distributor of amusements during post-war Japan’s recovery would grow into one of the most prolific developers of 1980s and 90s gaming. Kogan had proved that being adventurous can really pay off.

In 1987, Taito hit the world with a truly badass barbarian who would heartily agree with that sentiment. Rastan Saga (or simply Rastan outside Japan) was released to arcades as a kit; existing cabinets could be converted with a little bit of work into Rastan cabinets. Taito released the game this way not only to save money, but to hedge their bets; by not using a dedicated cabinet, the company stood to take less of a hit if Rastan failed to take off.

The marquee slide from the conversion kit, featuring Rastan enjoying one of his favorite hobbies: choking the shit out of pterodactyl-men.

This skepticism, while wise in theory, proved unnecessary in practice. Rastan did well domestically and in America, but took surprising hold in Europe’s market. It spawned a truly prolific set of ports for nearly every European home system of the time. Rastan was ported to the Apple IIGS, the Amstrad, C64, IBM/DOS, the Sega Master System, the MSX2, and even the garishly-hued ZX Spectrum. Later on, it even received a Japan-only port for the Sega Game Gear.

A badass poster promoting the MSX2 version, which depicts Rastan, to quote McCartney, “comin’ down fast from miles above you.”

In the long and noble tradition of 1980s pop culture barbarians, our protagonist in this hack-and-slash adventure tale is Rastan, a ripped dude in a loincloth who bears an absolutely uncanny resemblance to Robert E. Howard’s legendary Conan character. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, I suppose. The storyline exposition is left out of the Western version of the arcade game, but Rastan is out to slay himself a dragon. See, he made a deal with the princess of the land of Ceim: dispose of the dragon, and get paid ALL OF THE KINGDOM’S TREASURE. Either Rastan is one hell of a bargainer, or the Princess could use some work at it.

100% absolute clone of Conan the Cimmerian. Well, except for the fact that his vertical leap is about thirty feet.

The game begins with Rastan dropping from an unreasonable height into the first level, where you can immediately begin slashing through monsters and making your way across the game world. Rastan is pretty athletic, not to mention acrobatic; his prodigious leap is an essential tool for getting around and can also be used to get the drop on enemies while minimizing the risk of reprisal. Clever combat is worth considering, since the variety of enemy monsters in Rastan looks like someone held a Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual over this world and shook it until everything fell out. Lizard men, undead wizards, an astounding volume of dog-sized chimaeras, and gargoyle swordsmen make up a small sliver of the creatures trying to end your quest with a trip to an early grave. Thankfully, in addition to being a huge badass, Rastan also has periodic access to some power ups found throughout the game’s environments. While most of them only work for a limited amount of time, all of them are worth having. Armor (something Rastan should should have thought about while getting dressed for this trip) can help absorb some of the punishment you’ll take. There are three different weapons, too: a mace, an axe, and the sword you start with. There are also potions, but beware – Taito decided to be shitheads and make some of them deplete your health instead of restore it!

I was gonna think of some joke to crack, but I’m at a loss. This shit just may be too awesome to joke about. Rastan is a murderer born. These three screenshots speak for both the game and the character.

One look at any screenshot or video of the arcade version will tell you that Rastan was well ahead of its time in 1987. The level of detail and the color depth are astounding, and animation is very smooth. Rastan‘s movements are especially fluid, which really enhances the playing experience. Most ports don’t reproduce it fully (or at all), but the weather even changes over time in the arcade original. This is done very smoothly and gradually, and adds a subtle but noticeable layer of visual richness to outdoor levels. The sound effects, while far closer to average for the time, are still well done. Rastan‘s soundtrack isn’t very populated, but this shit is definitely barbarian music! The soundtrack gets faster as you get closer to dying, which is another little touch that makes the game more intense.

In addition to its above-mentioned ports, Rastan was eventually released as part of Taito Legends Vol. 1 for the PS2, Xbox and PC in 2006. There were also two proper sequels; Rastan Saga II (Nastar in North America) was released in ’89, While Warrior Blade: Rastan Saga Episode III came out in 1991 and was more of a scrolling beat-em-up.

The unbelievably epic flyer art for Rastan Saga II.

I gladly grant Rastan an 8 out of 10. It’s really fun to play, visually impressive for an arcade title of its era, and there’s nothing like playing as a barbarian who hacks up monsters.

See you at the end of January!

Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold (JAM/Apogee, 1993)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Fri, 06 Jan 2017 21:14:13 +0000

In the years between 1989 and 1997, the earliest strong attempts at 3D “first person” games were being fired at the wall. As 1992-93 rolled on, this fire reached a machine-gun rate due to the success of Wolfenstein 3D and Doom. Even now, in the year 2017, I set out on the Internet to research this stuff and unearth titles I’ve never played (or even seen) from that era. Some were surprisingly good, but escaped notice for some reason or another. As can happen all too often, poor timing or not enough publicity may have nailed them to the floor; in other cases, they are simply eclipsed by other releases that blow all competition out of the water.

Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold fell victim to all three of these blights, but is still a solid example of the early first-person shooter template put to creative use. The game uses the same engine as Wolfenstein 3D, notable for its orthogonal game-spaces and its ray-casting technique of point-of-view rendering. The game was conceived and developed by JAM productions, a short-lived enclave formed in 1993 by Jim Row and Mike Maynard. Apogee (developers of the engine used) published Blake Stone, and also lent JAM the services of their legendary music man, Bobby Prince.

The game even came with a little comic book! It wasn’t incredible but it was at least cool.

In Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold you play as the titular character, recruited by British Intelligence in the year 2140 after distinguishing himself in the Navy. Your assignment is to scuttle the operations of an insidious organization known as STAR, which is led by the nefarious Dr. Pyrus Goldfire. Goldfire plans to conquer the world using an army of expert soldiers combined with a heavy complement of his own genetically engineered monsters… and things are looking like that might not be a pipe dream.

Thanks, Dr. Goldfire. You asshole.

Just like Wolfenstein 3D, the game has separate episodes, played one at a time. Each has 10-11 levels in it, usually representing some building or compound belonging to STAR. Blake begins with a simple sidearm when he steps in the door, but can find all kinds of futuristic weapons to beef up his offensive capability. In addition to health items lying on the floor, Blake can also pop tokens into vending machines for a small pick me up. All of this will prove to be extremely necessary, since each level of each episode is crawling with security officers, as well as a taste of Goldfire’s genetic engineering “miracles.” There are also robots, both ceiling-mounted and mobile, that await the chance to shred you with their integral weapons. One cool thing about Blake Stone is the element of ambiguity among the scientists you encounter; some of the men in lab coats are spies who will offer you info or food tokens, and some will just call for help and start shooting you.

Gallery 1

Gallery 2

At the end of each episode, you face off with Dr. Goldfire briefly. Each time, he has new tricks up his sleeve, but eventually teleports away before you can finish him off. He’s nice enough to drop the keycard you need to get to the actual boss of that episode, though… and let’s just say they’re locked up for a reason. The end of the final episode lets you finally bring down Pyrus Goldifre, but it’s then that you discover what he really is…

One of the end-of-episode bosses. Apparently just some creativity applied to bread mold. Mix in one part ugly and two parts angry and voila! Run for your life!

The game’s graphics are about on par with those of Wolfenstein 3D, but they are very colorful and varied. Nothing technical was stretched in terms of visuals, although you can tell a lot more creativity went into them, likely by necessity since this game offers mutants and aliens instead of Nazis as antagonists. A mix of 16 bit and digitized sound is used, with the digitized bits being mostly combat and enemy sound effects. As with most of his work, Bobby Prince borrowed a hook here and there from a rock song but produced a masterful soundtrack of very fitting music. The intro theme and Mission Music #6 are two favorites of mine, but the whole thing is very good. It’s very rich for a SoundBlaster-16/AdLib soundtrack.

Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold was released only a week before id Software released Doom in 1993. As one may guess, Doom completely covered it and most similar games with a mighty shadow, and Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold sold poorly after a good start. It was received well when it was reviewed, however, and was praised especially for its additional gameplay elements and its sound. JAM released a sequel, Blake Stone: Planet Strike, in 1994, and then closed its doors. Its three members found work at other software companies. 3D Realms owns the rights, and has included the game in a couple of compilations as well as a standalone version on their site. It has a gently improved HUD but is otherwise true to the source.

I give Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold 7/10. In hindsight, it stands toe to toe with its peers, and it has a kickin’ soundtrack. It fell victim to poor timing and the shadow of a giant, but it can’t be called a bad game by any means.

See you around the next corner, kiddos! So much planned for 2017!

Bio Menace (Apogee, 1993)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Sun, 18 Dec 2016 22:06:15 +0000

Lately I’ve been playing all these old games using DOSBox. It’s been like a time warp back to one of my formative experiences as a video gamer. I can still remember playing my first PC games when I was 8 or 9 years old in the early 90s. My dad worked for a company that contracted long-term network projects for airlines and airports, and he worked with the kind of dudes who always had some shareware (or more) sitting on bootleg floppies waiting to be spread like a plague. One of the cooler software companies back then was Apogee, who eventually split into id Software and 3D Realms… but when they were all still on the same team, they made some great games. Duke Nukem actually made his first appearance in an eponymous side scroller, and most people have heard of the Commander Keen games, at least second- or third-hand. Apogee developed several other titles, less well-known now but every bit as good. My mind wanders to one particular strain they developed… one called Bio Menace.

“Scores of hideous mutant turds leering at me and groping me? I love it. This is my kind of night. Now hold still.”

Bio Menace is a platformer when you look at it from orbit, but up close, I prefer to describe it as follows: It’s a lot like Contra, except you’ve got a life bar and a lot more shit to do than just shoot things. You control Snake Logan (whose name is pretty obvious in its inspirations), a CIA agent who crash landed in Metro City while doing recon to confirm reports of it being overrun by mutant monsters.

Well, let’s just say you’ve confirmed them. The thing is, now you’re stuck here, so you figure you might as well see who’s behind the plot and give them a good machine gun spanking, right?

Gore abounds as you explore various locales looking for survivors and vengeance.

The levels are part action/survival, part puzzle, as you navigate the ruined and mutant-flooded parts of the city looking for a way out of each one. Many times, this involves finding some kind of crystal or keycard to free a survivor stuck behind a forcefield. For some reason, these people usually hold the key to the level’s exit. In the spaces between, you’re usually either blowing bad guys apart or opening doors that contain items. Sometimes the item inside is even the key you need! Snake can also find power ups for his gun, as well as different kinds of explosives and even a flask that makes him impossible for monsters to kill.

“Hey. Talkin’ to you over here. Yeah… now I see how a guy like you could get caught in a forcefield and seem surprised about it.”

And the monsters will definitely be trying to kill you. There’s an alarming variety of mutant creatures; from little blobs to big dino-men to little horned acrobats on fire, you’ll see enough different kinds to keep you wondering what’s around the next corner. The bosses of each episode are no joke either, and in fact are as dangerous as they are visually impressive:

It looks… irritated. Is it because I’m in here, or because its legs have been fucking de-fleshed? Maybe both.

The graphics, for their time, are a really fun compromise between detail and cartoony fun. It’s especially cool that even though most of the game is represented in a low-resolution VGA comic-book style, the gore you see is fairly on-the-spot. Some of the larger things (like some boss monsters) have a surprising amount of detail. The music and sounds are 16-bit (AdLib/SoundBlaster of the time period) but the soundtrack is pretty addictive.

Once all the mutant blood is hosed off the streets, I give Bio Menace 8/10. Some of that’s out of nostalgia, but some of it’s just a hand up to a great DOS game that not enough people hear of. It will hook you once you get into it, though… you’ll want to get to the bottom of the evil plot.

I got a top ten list and one more article coming in 2016, plus some videos! Stay tuned!

OH, ALSO… If you want to play Bio Menace, 3D Realms made it freeware a while back. Here is the link. Consider it a holiday gift from me, because I was too cheap to get you anything!

Dark Seed (Cyberdreams, 1992)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Tue, 18 Oct 2016 18:47:45 +0000

I’ve got another one for you Retro Fright Fans this October, a cult favorite for the PC. Dark Seed is one from back in the DOS days, although it saw release for the Amiga as well. Released in 1992, the game is a point-and-click graphical adventure, and features the artwork of none other than HR Giger. I’ve included my usual wealth of images and links, but don’t expect a rainbow of colors, folks… Dark Seed is more of a shadowy rollercoaster ride through the macabre and the unearthly.

Mike has a killer dream and wakes up with a headache to match.

The story follows Mike Dawson, a well-to-do man who purchases a mansion whose previous owners are now deceased. His first night there, Dawson has a dream that something shoots an embryo into his brain. Mike wakes up with a monster headache, but explores his new home after doing his best to set himself straight. He finds several clues that reveal not only the fate of the previous owner, but something more sinister (and unbelievable)… a second world accessible from within his house. Mike uses the mirror in his living room to travel to this place, called the Dark World. It’s in this bizarre realm that Mike finds out his dream was real… and has dire implications for humanity. An entity known as the Keeper of the Scrolls tells him he must destroy the power source of the Ancients who rule the Dark World.

You’ll notice a lot of things that look vaguely like dicks. That’s… that’s Giger for you, rest his soul. The man was extremely talented, but you always knew what was in the back of his mind. Weird robot sex stuff. There but for the grace of Mario go I.

All of this strangeness is brought to creepily vibrant life by the art of Giger, who insisted that the developers use a higher resolution than was normally employed for DOS games at that time. The proposed plan by Cyberdreams was to use Mode 13h, a low-detail but color-rich display setting for VGA graphics during this time period. By using a higher resolution (640×350 instead of 320×200), the developers of Dark Seed lost color depth, in fact reducing it by a factor of 16 to just… 16 colors. What ensued was a low-key conflict between the dev team and the art team as they were given access to nearly all of Giger’s work to assemble the macabre visuals seen in the game. Six extra months, in fact, were spent hand-coloring the scanned art after the dev team said the images weren’t adequate for use.

To be fair, they really did a lot with so little. Sure, the end result was drab, but that ended up working really well for Dark Seed’s overall tone.

The controls in the game aren’t unlike Willy Beamish or other click-adventure games of the era. You simply click around to move Mike from place to place, and see how the cursor will let you otherwise interact with things. As you hatch your clever plan to save humanity from within the Dark World, you’ll want to leave no stone unturned, but be careful… there are things (and beings) down there that you may not wish to see…

Oh, this oughta be good. Making friends down here seems like a great idea.

The game was received pretty positively, getting a little bit of flak for a clumsy control interface but making up for it with an incredible story and a rich (terrifying) game environment. The graphics and sound were steadily praised, and Dark Seed’s horror factor was touted as first-class skin-crawl. In fact, in 2006, GameTrailers ranked Dark Seed the seventh most frightening game of all time. There isn’t much music, but I did find a rip of the Amiga version… it’s a good set of atmospheric tracks, but sometimes a bit too busy or over-the-top to be truly scary. It’s still worth a listen, and I’ve included it below.

Dark Seed was ported to the Mac, and Japan received ports for the PlayStation and Saturn. There’s even a Famicom bootleg from China, with surprisingly decent graphic detail (but only half-assed translation into English, at least that I found). Dark Seed 2 was released in 1995, and was also very well-received.

I would like to stress “surprisingly decent,” as in “pretty good for a bootleg 8-bit muzzle load of a VGA DOS game.” I’d label the pictures, but I’m sure you’re observant enough to tell which one’s from the Famicom version.

See you around Halloween for one more, RetroFiends… keep it spooky and Stay Retro.

NRW Gaming… Welcome to Your Doom!™

The Elder Scrolls: Arena (Bethesda Softworks, 1994)

bryan.eddy@newretrowave.com — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 02:50:19 +0000

For the past couple of years, all I hear about from my friends is how great Skyrim is.

I mean, they’re right. It’s a graphical and gameplay masterpiece. It outshines the previous two installments in the Elder Scrolls series, and even screenshots of it are breathtaking. It inspired me to buy Morrowind again recently, off of Steam, and play it through from the start. I was glad I did; It seems that Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls saga is consistently incredible.

But did you ever play the first one?

A modest beginning for what would become one of fantasy video gaming’s iconic franchises.

In 1994, 3D and first-person were really hitting their stride. These concepts were being applied with a wide brush, and all kinds of games were being developed to exploit the new jump in technology. It only stood to reason that someone would develop an RPG using the scope popularized by games like Doom and Quake; First-person 3D worlds simply begged for exploration. Bethesda Softworks, then a small company in Maryland, decided to tackle the task. Though they’d been around since 1986, Bethesda’s biggest notoriety up until then had been developing the first physics based sports simulator, Gridiron, for the Atari ST. They had also made DOS and NES games based on the first Terminator film, and the DOS version contained some 3D elements.

Some kickin’ box art, in the glorious tradition of classic fantasy. Babes, wizards, knights… you knew you were in for a fantasy epic when you grabbed this off the shelf.

Elder Scrolls: Arena is an oft-overshadowed ground breaker in terms of both first-person RPGs and the “open world” concept. The player creates a customized character using the now-familiar races and classes, and can pursue the game’s main plot while also doing side quests. There is also the (then) novel option of just poking around the land of Tamriel and seeing what turns up. But first… you must make it out of the initial dungeon.

Hunting MacGuffins, hobnobbing with royalty, battling wizards and skeletons… welcome to Tamriel.

Arena‘s plot involves the betrayal of the Emperor by his battlemage Jagar Tharn. Tharn imprisons the Emperor in a pocket dimension, and uses magic to assume his form. Tharn also kills his apprentice, Ria Silmane, because he knows she cannot be corrupted. Silmane sends her spirit to you as you languish in the dungeons beneath the Imperial City, and sets you free by helping you find a key to open your cell. You find a smattering of helpful equipment and progress through what seems to be a set of sewers, slaying rats and goblins as you seek the exit. You then emerge (if you are lucky) in a random part of the Empire… and the story begins. The objective is to assemble the parts of a magic staff that can be used against Jagar Tharn, and confront him in the Imperial City once you have become powerful enough to stop him. There are many other quests you must undertake in the meantime: rescuing people, delving into ancient ruins, and other typical (but exciting) fantasy adventures.

Arena presents you with literally the entire Empire, and you can visit each province. While the graphics are understandably limited, it is a vast game for its time. A great deal of information is packed into one game world, and while the taverns and shops all look the same, everything is worth exploring and there are tons of unique locales dotting the world of Tamriel.

All this could be yours… well, not really, but you do get to explore it all.

And they are full of monsters. Orcs, skeletons, monstrous hounds, minotaurs… there are even vampires and undead wizards (called liches) running around in some of these forsaken places you’ll discover. And of course, you’ll occasionally run into rival adventurers and agents of Jagar Tharn. Tharn himself will occasionally harrow you in your dreams, once he knows you’re assembling the magic staff.

You can also steal things from people and generally be an asshole, if that’s what you’re into. That’s kind of what I’m into.

Almost all of the well-known class choices are available for you during character creation, and while the Argonians and Khajit look far more human than you may be used to, the only race missing is Imperial. You can go for stealth, magic, brawn, or a combination thereof. I had the most success as a melee bruiser, but it’s fun to throw around magic fireballs and float in midair too. It also helps to be able to pick locks. Finding good loot is half the fun when poking through the places your quest will take you; gold can only buy so much, and everyone knows the best toys are lying undisturbed for centuries in the ruins.

Blue means it’s probably magical. Sometimes it behooves you to mismatch armor, or wield a sword that looks like it’s made from uranium. Just do it. Heroism is never easy.

The game’s soundtrack, while a far cry from its sequels’ scores, is still rich and appropriate. It is a little repetitive, but one hardly notices. The graphics are perhaps more grainy and pixelated than something like Doom; with so much to pack into a game world (and a disc), the detail had to be a point of compromise. Nonetheless, you’ll find that the textures and sprites are adequate. The only other point to pick at is that Tamriel, in its first incarnation, is quite a flat realm. No inclines, hills, or soft curves exist. Again, one must remember that this is the grandpappy of what became a legendary set of games. Some gentleness must be shown in judging what really is a stellar release for 1994. Besides, the cinematic cut scenes are obscenely cool. Especially the ending.

I give Elder Scrolls: Arena 8 out of 10. I do so through the gilded lens of hindsight, and to acknowledge that its genetics are very much alive in games like Skyrim. I spent many an hour plugging away at the Quest to assemble the Staff of Chaos, and while I never finished that mighty undertaking, it was worth all the time invested. As a man who adores the fantasy genre, it has always stood out in my mind as a game all too easily forgotten. Especially since it spawned such incredible sequels and helped jump start a now monolithic company!

And thankfully, there were many more. Thanks for reading, RetroWizards!

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