Probably the best pre-DOOM, WOLFENSTEIN 3-D-like anyone ever made, prefiguring games like ... what's that? This came out in 1994? Same month as DOOM II? Oh. Well ... okay.

Anyway, yeah, it's ... primitive, but it's damn good! Takes the very simple grid-based, flat-planes-and-doors FPS framework and does about as much as you possibly can with it, essentially making what might be better classified as a survival horror game. That's in Marine mode, at least. The other two playable races both have distinct mechanics that give very different rhythms to their campaigns - the Alien must use a risky special move on living Marines to cocoon them and earn themselves extra lives/spawn points to eventually wear down the humans with overwhelming numbers (appropriate), and the Predator can run around invisible but must kill uncloaked to earn honor points and unlock the weapons they'll need to take on bigger game. I don't think either is as compelling as the human campaign (which is just a well-structured, surprisingly open FPS world map with a well-designed flow of objectives and areas) but they make for nice add-ons.

The lo-fi look and feel (no music! just ambience!) works great for the subject matter. Despite this thing's limitations and playing it on my laptop in the middle of the day, I couldn't help but find myself riveted and little creeped out. I honestly kind of want to buy a Jaguar now, just to play this on hardware.

Well, it's iD's precursor to WOLFENSTEIN 3-D, which essentially makes it the great-grandfather of all FPS games. As you might imagine, that means it's pretty rudimentary. But it's still playable enough. Low enemy type count, low 'weapon' count, the perspective doesn't quite work right sometimes, and it gets mighty tedious, but there are some fun levels (suprisingly not TOO too maze-y!) and a little bit of game-spanning puzzle-solving to be done.

A respectable test run, but even the boys knew back in the day that that was pretty much all it was. Fun to try if you're curious.

Not sure what the deal is but I found this quite a bit harder than every subsequent game in the series. And this isn't my first rodeo ... I 100% perfected FEVER, okay? I'm not used to seeing anything but "Superb" on my first runs, THANK you very much. Seems like maybe the timing window overall is tighter? Also the songs/challenges just aren't designed as well or with as clear feedback as in the later games. Many feel rushed and awkward. Their overall design ethos isn't exactly locked down yet - some of the songs definitely just require light memorization, and that's not something that I can ever say for anything else in the series after this.

Anyway, the joyous infinity that is RHYTHM HEAVEN's charm is present and accounted for in its debut, definitely. A game of constant smiling and rocking out to what has to be the best collection of music on the GBA. Just not nearly as good as any of the later ones.

Another glow-up of an ancient Apogee game in the vein of MONSTER BASH HD, but in this case, the base game is a fair bit weaker, so there's really no way to make it some kind of masterpiece after the fact. SECRET AGENT was one of those computer platformers that actually functions more like a puzzle game in that every level has all the same elements and once you've beaten one of them, you've seen literally everything the game has to offer, and all the rest is just how they configure things in more interesting and/or difficult ways. By definition, this is going to grow a bit tedious over three episodes with sixteen levels apiece, and it definitely does. The outfit that made this remake (and the other Apogee ones) made the tactful decision to add new weapons, enemies, items, etc. to the game, but only in their all-new added fourth episode. A wise compromise from a remastering perspective. On top of that, there's achievements, QOL stuff, and, as in MONSTER BASH HD, a very impressive level editor.

Not sure what else they could have done with it. I do wish the game was more exciting, but that's on Broussard and the other two guys who made the original, not the remasterers. The new episode shows that the new guys were champing at the bit to make a more interesting game than the one they were assigned. Makes me wonder what they did with their HD version of CRYSTAL CAVES, which I haven't gotten to yet. Unlike the other two, that original game just plain sucks, so I guess we'll see.

This is a game that I have more or less been avoiding for the better part of twenty years. Despite being a big fan of the first two games back in their day, I saw the switch in art style and the move to console and gave it a hearty 'no thanks' that I have staunchly upheld ... until now.

So, finally playing it has proven to me once again that, yep, my instincts are actually pretty good! It is hideous and stupid almost beyond words. If you tried the original SERIOUS SAMs and thought, hey, they should chop these big, impressive levels up into tiny missions and then put the most unbearably cringe in-engine cutscenes in the long, sad history of in-engine cutscenes in between each one, brother, this is the game for you. Along with the new Jimmy Neutron-ass character designs, Croteam's lolrandom wackiness has been cranked up into the stratosphere to match, and man. I usually enjoy these goofy Croats and their funny little stunts and gags, but we're somewhere in RISE OF THE TRIAD-by-way-of-Shrek territory with this shit, and - again - no thank you.

The big surprise for me here was how close the actual gameplay was to the two previous games. For some reason, I was expecting it to feel as different to play as it is to look at, but it's so similar it really seems more like an expansion than anything. Most of the guns and enemies appear to be straight reskins, and all the newest stuff is just bolted on, like turrets and vehicles. None of it is any good, and basic stuff like encounter and level design is flat out worse than before. Given that SERIOUS SAM was always famously the game with huge, wide-open spaces where you just ran backwards and held the fire button down forever, I didn't really think you could do that notably worse, but lo and behold!

Maybe in a different frame of mind I would be a little bit kinder to this, but given how similar this is to them, I would rather just play the previous games over again than suffer through this cringe nightmare for more Sam action.

Quite an oddity. An adaptation of an unpopular movie three years too late that goes well beyond the average cash-in game, but ends up as what might charitably be described as 'an ambitious mess'. I played it briefly as a kid and it stuck in my mind long afterwards as this expansive, exciting, impossible-to-fully-grasp thing. Finally returned to it now and there is ... definitely ... a lot going on.

It sounds great on paper - a light strategy/space sim frame over a non-linear progression of immsim-y FPS levels starring the entire TNG cast and giving you the ability to alter the events of the movie by doing better or worse on individual missions. Mountains of Trek goodness in cute little details (Data being able to walk underwater, Troi being called upon to once again go undercover as a Romulan) goofy easter eggs (Picard bumping his head if you stand up in a Jeffries tube after bragging about his familiarity with the ship, a la Scotty in The Final Frontier) and fun non-standard mission outcomes and Game Overs (like blowing yourself out into space and needing to be emergency-transported back onto the Enterprise if you're dumb enough to open an airlock that you're standing in. (This can be literally the first thing you do.)). All the makings of a Trekkie's dream!

Sadly, the problems are manifold and quickly evident. For starters, the game looks ancient for '97. The FPS mode is somewhere behind DOOM in fidelity and the controls are impossibly clumsy, especially given allllllll the stuff you're asked to do, from platforming to stealth to item puzzles to pitched phaser battles. There isn't even mouselook! There is a lot of detail in the design (just look at the whole goddamn HALF of the screen taken up by the HUD) but it's far behind the times in every way.

Levels are huge and there's tons going on (including SHENMUE-level optional digging through drawers for pointless inventory items) but the mission design/objectives are so convoluted and the interface so unintuitive that it's a miracle if you can beat the first level without a guide. Oh, and the less said about the space combat, the better. It's somehow worse than the Game Boy games.

It's a shame that this, to put it mildly, didn't really come together. There are worse sins than a dev's reach exceeding their grasp, but this is pretty rough. It seems akin to how everyone desrcibes the first SYSTEM SHOCK - interesting but beyond clunky, and requiring a massive amount of patience to get any enjoyment out of. But I could be off base there, I haven't actually played that one (yet). Unfortunate that this didn't have a follow-up to get it right!

It's bigtime abandonware now, and almost impossible to get running on modern Windows, so if you want to give it a try, The Collection Chamber made a launcher for it that works great. But consider yourself warned, only the truest of heads need apply.

It seems to me that, at this point, when setting out to make a retro FPS, you need to ask yourself two questions - can I make this game (i.e. do I have the design chops to pull it off - make levels, weapons, enemies, etc.) and - as I think this game proves, more importantly - should I make this game (i.e. do I have any interesting ideas at all for what to put in it). Functionally, this game is perfect and the look and feel are as good as anything on the Build Engine could possibly be, but unless you're just looking for more shooting gameplay to pass the time, you're probably gonna find this pretty boring. Lifeless, lame one-liner voice acting and every basic-bitch reference you can possibly imagine being in something like this crammed into every corner and repeated to death doesn't cut it.

Given that, my rating for this might seem high, but other than being dull, it's so overwhelmingly well done that I can't bring myself to rate it lower. The feel is fantastic, everything works right, and the levels are for the most part very clever. Just wish there was someone on the team with a little more creativity! Feels a bit like a waste of potential.

Using the 'interactive museum' format of ATARI 50 as a template, Digital Eclipse is starting a series of smaller releases focusing on single games, and this is the debut. I love this idea, and there's no better proof that it's a good one than me being totally into this despite not caring at all about KARATEKA previously.

Standout features in this newest DE effort are full-length commentaries from the original creators over gameplay and a neat interactive overlay where you can directly compare the different elements of developing the character animation, from video reference to sketches to rough sprites to final graphics. Little hiccups like some slightly amateurish production in the interviews (overwrought original music throughout, and the lion's share of content with Mechner and his father coming from a single interview seemingly captured by someone with vertigo who had never held a camera before) can be excused and will presumably be improved upon as the series continues.

Even though this is a cheaper, smaller scale release, I was a bit surprised to see it stop where it did, featuring only the three major computer versions of the game. No NES version? I feel like a little more exploration of the game's legacy might be warranted.

But again, this is a great start to something. Can't imagine how hype I will be if they announce that they're doing, like, DOOM next or something else I actually like.

(original Apple II version)

Impressive? Yes. Influential? Very. A decade plus ahead of its time? Absolutely. Fun and/or entertaining? Not really.

Important to try to remember what other games looked and played like in 1984 when trying to evaluate this, but still, it is what it is.

Loads and loads of original Star Trek charm with the entire cast returning, authentic writing, and a fun mission structure that emulates episodes of the show.

Sadly, as a classic-style point-and-click adventure game, it's pretty shaky. Clumsy controls make doing pretty much anything a massive chore, and the puzzles are either dead simple or so goofy and precise there's no way you'd ever figure them out without following a guide to the letter. I even soft-locked myself three-quarters through the (long) final mission by - of all things - doing exactly what Spock told me. And there was no way to tell that I did it without looking it up online to find other people complaining about it. Still, there's something about even this by-the-book, technical, somewhat vexing experience that feels very Trek. You defintely feel like you're sifting through technobabble and following Starfleet regulations while you fumble around and fail missions repeatedly. You do even very, very amusingly have the opportunity to get a different anonymous redshirt killed in each mission if you screw something up. Delightful.

I would be rating this waaaay lower if it wasn't just so darn comfy to hang out with our old space buddies, and am actively restraining myself from going higher despite how unforgivably broken it is - at its best moments it really does feel like you're playing lost episodes of the show. I haven't delved too far into the long, weird history of Trek gaming (yet), but for me, that's ideally what they should be shooting for.

Ugly, cringe, amateurish, and insulting to anybody who ever played and enjoyed its predecessor. Oh, and it runs like shit.

Normal difficulty is an utterly impossible hitscanner nightmare where you will be shredded instanteously upon rounding any corner, and on easy difficulty all enemies do 1 damage and your weakest gun instagibs any normal mook. They thought that made sense.

This has to be the nadir of early-3D shooters, or close to it. I find it extremely difficult to believe that DAIKATANA is worse than this.

Highest thumbs-down I can give, but boy, I really don't like how this game works. Having to guess whether or not you've found everything possible before triggering the end of level countdown and then being forced to explore the rest under a time-limit thing rubs me the wrong way. First time I was running back and forth on a stage looking for some stupid last chest I may or may not have locked myself out of and never found it, I was done, done. Nothing about this game is appealing enough to me to make me play one of these levels more than once.

Just not at all I want out of a platformer. Happy to be in the minority on this one.