a second wind review

FBT plays the gaming equivalent of Stranger Things

Ahh, the 90s. It was a high-watermark in gaming. Huge advancements in graphics and PC power, the PlayStation, Online gaming … it was a new era – seminal titles like The 7th Guest, Gran Turismo, Diablo, Tekken, Broken Sword, Monkey Island and Myst brought a more cerebral, complex element to gaming, while franchises like Tomb Raider, Fallout, GTA, FIFA, Resident Evil and Elder Scrolls defined gaming genres; the decade was gaming gold but … what really kicked it in the balls was id. Wolf, Doom, Quake; id’s FPS trilogy caused such an impact, gaming’s balls were never the same again.

While the FPS genre has evolved to include a lot more emotional investment when we shoot people in the face, there’s always been shooters that reject that and try to return to id’s kill-for-keys ethos. Good on’em for trying but the intensity, the overwhelming odds, the plotless tone of the Doom era fails in ‘old school shooters’ because what it took to get that feel can’t be replicated in modern engines; idTech and Build might have been bleeding edge back then but they were still limited – those devs had to sweat those engines to create the games and that sweat, the ingenuity is on the screen. Modern shooters don’t have to sweat so when someone calls a game ‘old school’, it’s just a modern game without cut-scenes – they take less work than the more simplistic-looking Doom clones. At best they’re just copying Doom’s homework. New old school is like remaking Jaws with a CGI shark. Jaws wasn’t just about the shark.

And to prove me right, is Dusk. Some 90s game on the Quake engine I missed the first time, right? Nope. Released in 2018 this is as modern as they come. But unlike the other recent retro throwback, Ion Maiden, this isn’t on an old engine, it’s on Unity, which knows how to make a game fly. But Dusk looks like the 90s. What is this? This is an Old School Shooter.

This isn’t one of the golden-era games rebooted like the recent Wolf and Doom remakes. Dusk is our memories of the Quake era pulled together in one kickass retro dream. It is its own game, own world, own reality, but it’s steeped in every shooter you played between Wolf and Quake; and to recreate those memories so completely in a modern engine, you can see the sweat onscreen. So what’s all the sweat about?

Apparently, Dusk is a farming town where mysterious “ruins” were uncovered. The military and scientists descend, and things go unsurprisingly wrong. And that’s where our arm comes in. We’re an unknown treasure hunter who scales the quarantine zone to scavenge the secrets uncovered, and naturally winds up fighting for their lives against the otherworldly creatures and zombified/possessed/mutilated locals, military and scientists.

Initially we’re belting through environments like farmlands and swamps calling to mind the unfairly forgotten Redneck Rampage, while also taking cues from Blood and Heretic, while the second episode is more industrial and surreal/demonic, feeling more Doom and Quake-like. And inhabiting the levels are the in-bred cousins of everything you shotgunned in the 90s; nothing you’ve not seen before, but everything you miss and this time done pitch perfect. This is the 90s. You don’t even regenerate health.

You do occasionally pause and say to yourself “what am I doing?” – here I am, having paid to play a modern game, on a modern engine in a game that’s spent all it’s time trying to appear out of date; low-res texture, samey colours, repetitive designs, illogical levels, zero plotting. But that’s exactly what we wanted – not a modern game trying to drag 90s style into this decade, but a loved-up homage to the era played entirely straight. No winks to camera, no 4th wall breaking, no irony. Dusk is like going to see your favourite band play live and being transported back to your teens; it’s like flicking through an old photo-album. The kids on The Facebook wouldn’t understand.

Dusk isn’t perfect. Just like the good ole days, some of the levels drag, you get stuck, run out of ammo when facing bosses and occasionally just get fed up with it. There’s often no rhyme or reason to it, but that feels intentional; that’s the games and how we used to play. Just charging about tapping everything and backtracking.

Dusk is gaming’s Stranger Things – when you watch it, picking up 80s homages and yelling “I had that!” every time there’s a scene in one of the lads’ bedrooms, you realise it’s not just a collection of memories, it’s also a really good show in its own right; Dusk couldn’t exist without the Doom era, but you realise it’s a ripping-good shooter too; fast, clean, unforgiving, Dusk pisses on any of those bloated CoD’s you’ve wasted your life on. It’s underselling it to say ‘if you’ve played Quake you know what to expect’. This isn’t just a homage, it’s a killer shooter that’s set in a world where Doom, Heretic, Blood and Quake (don’t forget Redneck) actually happened.

Currently there’s two episodes available on Steam, with the third incoming. It feels like Shareware; about the only way this game could be cooler is if it was released only on DOS. The good news is Dusk’s publisher New Blood Interactive isn’t stopping here. They’ve cracked what is missing and the games they have lined up look insane. When’s the last time you got excited at a CoD trailer?

Companies like New Blood are supporting one-man-bands who are building the kind of games they liked to play and we want to too; games they sweated over, games free of corporate publishers and focus-groups and customer feedback, released on Steam Early Access and GOG in episodic formats; those guys are disrupting the way of things just how 3DR and id did 20-years ago. Leave the big publishers to their ‘old school’ shooters. We’ll stick with the new bloods doing it the old way.

2018 | Developer David Szymanski | Publisher New Blood Interactive

Platforms; Win (Steam)

a second wind review

FBT chokes back tears as he gets to play on the Build engine again in

Ion Maiden’s ‘shareware’ preview.

Shelly ‘Bombshell’ Harrison has the kind of convoluted history only 3DRealms could come up with. Conceived in the mid-nineties alongside Duke and Lo-Wang, Bombshell was an ultra-sexualised Barb Wire meets Tank Girl shooter hero – without a shooter.

Shelved while 3DR fannied about with Prey and Duke Nukem, Bombshell was eventually downgraded to sidekick status and bunged into an early version of Duke Nukem Forever. Although it’s good Bombshell was spared the DNF debacle, a female sidekick kicking Duke into the next century might have been just what that game needed. Homeless again, Bombshell went through various school-boy fantasy iterations before losing the Jenna Jameson look and becoming a more typical ‘sexy but fatal’ type. And then was benched again.

Meanwhile, as Gearbox polished the DNF turd, Interceptor Entertainment were busy on Duke Nukem 3D Reloaded. When Gearbox shut it down (allegedly out of fear it would eclipse DNF), Interceptor refused to learn a lesson and along with 3DR, began work on another DN title, Mass Destruction. When Gearbox killed that too, Interceptor and 3DR weren’t about to sack off the work yet again, and set about reskinning it. All they needed was a kick-ass, takes no shit hero.

Oh hai Bombshell. It might have been a hand-me-down, but Bombshell had her game.

And it was awful. Bombshell herself was great; now an ex-bomb disposal expert with a robotic arm and a DGAF ‘tude, but the game was beneath her; it was mauled by critics and avoided by gamers. But Bombshell wasn’t going down without a fight.

As part of Bombshell’s marketing campaign, 3DR created a mini prequel game, Ion Maiden – in the Build engine for old-times’ retro-savvy sake. The response was ballistic. Suddenly 3DR had something. Currently being expanded into a full game, Ion Maiden is a two-level, early-access demo game, with the full game to be released before the end of the year.

I can’t wait that long. A cool kickass female lead in a Doom-clone from 3DR (and indie devs Voidpoint) on the Build engine? I am home. Please be good please be good please be good.

Set in ‘Neo D.C.’ in a near future, Bombshell works for the Global Defence Force who send her to investi – oh hell it doesn’t matter this is Doom-era! Some mad scientist-type has invaded the city using nasties he’s cooked up (ranging from various bad guys to heads on spider-legs…) for reasons explained in a text backstory we won’t read.

Ion Storm, sorry, Ion Maiden, is … pixelated beauty. It’s not simply because it’s on the Build engine. That doesn’t make it automatically cool; just try Extreme Paintbrawl. Not every game from that era stood the test of time, even Duke and Lo-Wang are fairly cringe now, and it’s not like this is the first time I’ve seen Build in 20 years. So what makes IM so special?

Playing something genuinely old school instead of pseudo-retro like Hard Reset, suddenly everything that’s wrong with modern shooters is exposed. This is how shooters are supposed to go. Mad, frantic, confusing, so much fun; kicking dismembered heads, 2D Sprites, keys to progress, baddies hiding in random secrets and slightly messy level design. We’re running through offices or streets, using vents, tapping everything for secrets, finding weapons in odd locations. No level-ups, add-ons, moral choices, there’s no over-complication to it – realism doesn’t matter. It’s just here to show me a good time.

But it’s not just a throwback, it’s a reminder of why the Doom era is the Golden era; modern games can do pretty much anything, and devs nowadays do stuff just because they can, but this is retro in reverse; the id and Build engines might have been bleeding edge at the time but they were still restrictive. Those devs found creative ways to get around the engine’s limits, imaginative ways to get across what they wanted to achieve – and you too had to use imagination to fill in the gaps; that’s what made the Doom era so good – a meeting of imaginations. You don’t get that with modern games; they may look photo-realistic but you don’t make a connection, a feeling that us and the devs are on the same page. It’s a game that’s been freed by its limitations rather than freed of it’s limitations only to become a samey shooter.

Hang on. What does any of that mean?! Did I really start the review by describing Ion Maiden as ‘pixelated beauty’? What? Do I really believe this game, built on a 20-year-old engine and memories is really all that? I’m clearly blinded by Build. If this had been built on a modern engine, would I be Rage Qutting it as an unimaginative rip off?

It’s a question I don’t want to answer, and thankfully, I don’t have to. Right now, I’m having more fun in Bombshell’s two demo levels than I have the last four or five modern shooter releases and that’s all that matters. But the real test will be when the full game comes out. It’s possible I got suckered; I did just pay top-dollar for what is in essence a 20-year-old game. But it’s the essence that I enjoyed so much; it’s our era. Ion Maiden isn’t a nod to the Doom era, it’s from the Doom era; a game you missed the first time around. I can’t wait for the rest of it.

I am so pleased they dropped Bombshell from DNF and eventually unleashed her to show the big boys how it’s done. Duke Nukem should be her sidekick.

2018 | Developer Voidpoint | Publisher 3D Realms