It’s pretty much a fact that games that are esentially good games, but are somehow flawed, are the most interesting ones to discuss. As an example, i’m pretty sure there’s a lot more to talk and discuss about DOOM II rather than the first DOOM, because the first one is simply perfect, and that’s it. It’s even more interesting when the game, despite it’s flaws, is somehow visionary, ahead of it’s time.

Strife was released in 1996, a few months before Quake, and it’s famous for being one of the commercial games designed with the Doom engine, the other two being Heretic and Hexen. Heretic is the one that remained the closest to the original Doom gameplay, while Hexen and Strife were the ones that tried to push things a bit further.

In many ways, you can say that Strife does some of the things that Hexen tried to do, only that a lot better: Both of them had a level design based on hubs, both of them have massive maps, and both require you to go from one point of a maze to the other, in order to flip a certain ammount of switches. And of course, just like in Hexen, Strife’s maps can get really confusing at times. But despite the lenght of it’s maps, the main difference is the sense of freedom you get while playing Strife, wether in Hexen, on the opposite, you end up feeling pretty much oppressed. Strife, just like Hexen, tried to incorporate some narrative into the game. This is another area in which Strife largely surpases Hexen, because of how much the game relies on the story, and for good, which was probably something hard to imagine in earlier FPS games. Not just that: The game could be completed through, essentially, two story branches, leading up to three different endings.

But there’s also many aspects in which Strife was innovative for it’s time and genre, and that’s basically the inclusion of many RPG elements. You could interact with NPC’s, buy supplies, increase your stats, and even take some optional sidequests. The game always rewards you for being as explorative as you can, and that is by providing you with items or gold, which you can use to buy items such as weapons, health packs, or armor. The sense of freedom and constant exploration is a core element of the map design, and each section can be completed in different ways. Map design here, while hub-based, is not the average Hexen hub: There are many ways in which many different areas can be connected, so it kinda goes even beyond the classical hub notion.

The gameplay? That’s where Strife failed to achieved what it tried to do. The game pretends to incorporate a stealth gameplay which is just laughable, really inapropiate for the doom engine, which is mostly based on a reaaaaally poor AI on the enemies. I suppose they were kinda aware of how bad that system turned out to be, and because of that, the game doesn’t punish you for not being stealthy. Most of the times you can just enter an area and start shooting everything like in any average classic fps. And there’s another reason why being stealthy just doesn’t work here: you are given with only two weapons that are actually useful for that purpose. And even if you tried, some enemies will still try to kill you even if you didn’t make a single noise, and since you’ll probably have no other choice than fighting them, you will alert the whole of the other enemies that haven’t noticed you.

Even if you let that flawed stealth idea aside, the combat is not as good as it should. The enemies are probably the worst cast of any classic fps game. When they are not dumb, they are just simply annoying. And aesthetically, i think their sprites didn’t had enough work honestly. Remember that joke about Quake being too brown? Well, all of the enemies in Strife are just too grey. It get’s boring. And then there’s the weapons. I think those weapons are very good in intention, very well thought and actually original for it’s time, every single one of them has it’s specific functions and, just like in Quake, you’ll use the rocket launcher as your main weapon during the second half of the game. Yet, somehow, the weapons are not that good when executed. They are not thrilling, they fail in giving that pleasure of killing just like Doom does.

The other bad part of the gameplay is strictly related to the map design: I know that i praised earlier the freedom and the way the areas are connected, and how it favoured exploration and such, but there are too many moments where maps can be way too confusing. This is, thankfully, not the entirety of the game (and for sure, not at the confussing degree of Hexen), but still a considerable part of it. On the other hand, i think the texture work is just amazing, quite the opposite as the sprites for the enemies: You have a lot of variations, different colors, and they all create this unique aesthetic for strife, which is kind of a blend between medieval architecture but with lots of futuristic sci-fi elements. If there’s something in which Strife largely succeeds, is in creating an entire world of it’s own.

Oh, and the music is just awful. Worst soundtrack ever in my opinion. The sound of the enemies can be pretty annoying too.

In conclusion, despite it’s flaws, this is still a very underrated game, one that proved to be ahead of it’s time. So ahead, that the proper tools weren’t still available. Yet, it is a memorable experience, and it’s definitely a must play for every classic FPS fan.