SMALL THOUGHTS: DOOM 3 FLASHLIGHT

I've recently been playing through the Doom 3: BFG Edition, which added a shoulder-mounted flashlight instead of forcing players to switch from flashlight to weapon.  This "corrected" what many people viewed as one of the huge problems with Doom 3.  There were many jokes about there "not being any duct-tape" on Mars and mods appeared shortly after release that added a flashlight to many of the weapons.

To be honest, though, the flashlight/gun switching was something that never bothered me about the original Doom 3.  While yes, it does seem kind of strange that none of the weapons have lights, I've never gotten the argument that the doomguy should have duct taped the flashlight to one of his weapons.  Under the suspension of disbelief that he can carry a pistol, 5 two-handed weapons and a chainsaw all at the same time, I think it makes sense to not want to duct-tape the light to only one of the weapons.  The flashlight is small and can easily be used and put away while still allowing quick access to any of the other weapons.  Strapping it to any of the other guns would remove this property.
I guess it all comes down to what breaks your suspension of disbelief.  For me, the flashlight never did, and while playing the BFG Edition I miss being able to bash corpses into nothingness rather than waste pistol ammo on them.

DooM 4 Gameplay Trailer Impressions!

I have been a fan of Doom for a very long time. I'm not sure exactly when, but at least since 2002 if not before. Yes, I know that was nearly ten years after its original release, but the computers we had at my home growing up weren't very powerful. Even at that time, it blew me away. I love this game and I love this franchise. Its without a doubt my favorite shooter and my second favorite video game of all time.

For those who don't yet know, a nearly nine minute long segment of gameplay was shown at E3 this year. It actually took me a little bit of reading about E3 before I even found this out. Bethesda has made such big headlines with Fallout 4 that Doom seems to almost be an afterthought. One I found out about it, though, I was interested and more than just a little excited. Doom 4 was announced on my birthday quite a long while ago, and having only gotten a teaser last year since then, its fair to say that there were a lot of questions and a lot of expectations going into it. So what are my thoughts on it? (I'm assuming you want to know the answer to that since you're reading this) Well, truth be told, I'm optimistic, but very cautiously so, and I'll explain why.

The reactions overall to Doom 4 seem to be relatively muted. There have of course been a few people trying to stir up controversy over the violence levels, but overall these don't seem to be getting very much attention at this point. Given the content of games these days, the ultra violence of demons and zombies getting ripped to shreds just doesn't generate the same kind of controversy that it did even fifteen years ago. Its coverage in most gaming articles and personalities that I follow seem to be pleased about the levels of violence and gore, but otherwise have little to say about it. Fans of the franchise have voiced various opinions, both positive and negative. It has drawn comparison to Sergeant Mark IV's “Brutal Doom” mod, which is both potentially good and bad, but we'll get into that later on.

Remember the first time you saw one of these guys?

First off, lets start with some of the things I liked about what I saw. For starters, the enemy design looks pretty good to me. The imps are back to being their old brown, spiny selves flinging fireballs and generally dying under a steady stream of shotgun fire while the revenant and cacodemon are both colored a little more like their original game counterparts. I actually really liked Doom 3, but I did feel as though the monsters all looked a little too similar. The design here seems to be a step in the right direction.

I was also generally pleased with the way the player character moves around the environment. Climbing up onto obstacles looks both easy and fun without becoming too much of a distraction. The game's weapons also seem to be about what you'd expect from a Doom game. The shotgun and super shotgun are back with a predictable presence as well as an old (and mislabeled) favorite, the chaingun. I will say that I was slightly disappointed with the Plasma Rifle. The original Doom's plasma rifle had that peculiar but awesome sound effect to go along with its unique design while the Doom 3 iteration is one of my favorite video game weapons of all time. Something about its design, sound and coloring just really work for me. This version looks almost like a Nerf version of the Doom 3 one, and the sound is so stock-standard that its practically forgettable.

The game environments themselves look great, although I am slightly concerned that they might not really be all that unique. The environments and textures that I saw populating the backgrounds in the gameplay trailer look pretty standard. Only the familiar UAC logo and throwback door opening sound remind you that you're looking at a Doom game.

Programs like DoomBuilder keep a two decade old game fresh.

Another huge positive, though not shown in the footage, is that the game looks to ship with a robust and easy to use map editor. This is a wonderful sign. The original game remains popular to this day due to the ease and accessibility of creating mods. The speech given when SnapMap was introduced shows that the developer is aware of this fact. While I am excited about the editor, I also hope that in addition to SnapMap that Id will choose to follow in the tracks of Skyrim and lead and release their more advanced development tools as well. Being able to edit assets, add monsters and textures and other such things would be a step over the top and a potentially more worthy successor to the franchise title.

Ok, so now we'll get into some of my concerns. The game that we have seen so far has drawn many comparisons to the 'Brutal Doom' mod, which I mentioned previously. For those who don't know, Brutal Doom is a modification for the original game that adds huge amounts of blood and gore as well as melee combat and the ability to literally rip enemies apart with your bare hands. It also changes the pace of the game, making it much more difficult but justifying the incredibly amped up firepower. Its not surprising to see this comparison given that multiple former and current Id employees have mentioned Brutal Doom on their twitter feeds. The melee combat seen in the demo also obviously lends credence to the comparison.

The problem I have with this is that, while Brutal Doom is itself an incredibly well made mod and quite fun to play, its not what I think of when I think of playing Doom. Brutal Doom is a great experience in itself, but it isn't pure Doom. Melee combat as it was shown looks out of place to me. For some reason it doesn't seem right to me to see these ultra powerful demons getting their jaws ripped off and their legs kicked apart by a mere human. It always strikes me as strange in video games when a punch is more powerful than a single handgun round. As if any of us would rather get shot in the head with a pistol rather than punched. Of course one might argue that a human capable of carrying nine weapons at a time would be strong enough to do this, but that begs the obvious question of why a human capable of carrying nine weapons at a time would need to use his hands. It works in Brutal Doom, but I'm actually worried that it doesn't really work here. Doom and Doom 3 had their moments of hand to hand ripping and tearing, but the temporary effects of the berzerk pack were used as an explanation. It was never an integral part of the game. In fact, in the original Doom, even the highly powered berzerk fists were not as useful as any of the weapons including the chainsaw.

This brings me to my other concern, that being the story and overall feel of the game. Its been said numerous times over the seven or eight years since Doom 4's announcement that all it needs to be successful is a shotgun and some demons to shoot with said shotgun. While that's true to an extent, I think its over simplifying a little bit. Id has never been known for their storytelling, but that hasn't ever stopped them from putting a story into the game anyway, and honestly, I like it that way. The story never gets in the way of the game, but its still there anyway for those of us who like having some reason for shooting the things we're shooting at. On a more significant level, I think the presence of even a flimsy and predictable story lends a certain quality to the game. Even for those who skip the cutscenes and don't care about the story can at least appreciate the environments and areas. If the game is just a collection of arenas for shooting monsters, it will be forgotten quickly.

As an aside, I was also disappointed to find out that it's once again an origin story set on Mars. Doom 3 already told us that story, and it did so very well. I can understand not wanting to set the game on Earth, as I think was the original plan, but why not choose something else? I know that reboots and throwbacks are what's been going on recently, but a title like Doom deserves better. It should also be called Doom 4. Or something other than just 'Doom'.

Ten points if you can name the level pictured here.

The previous concern brings me to another one: Level design. Once again, fans of the game love to say that its all about the shooting, but honestly that isn't true. It wasn't true even for the original game. Of course the frenetic action is probably the most important aspect of the original game, but it was far from the only aspect of it. Doom's levels were a remarkable conflagration of open areas and tight corridors, with each of the monsters placed so as to maximize the effect and challenge of the encounter. More and more I have come to appreciate just how incredible well the nine levels of Knee Deep in the Dead are constructed. John Romero took full advantage of the Doom engine's capabilities, making light and dark areas and open and closed spaces a joy to explore. The presence of secrets and bonus areas only made the experience all the more enjoyable and memorable. I'm pretty sure I know the layout of most of Knee Deep in the Dead's levels better than I do my workplace. If all the focus of the new game is on combat and weapons, it'll lack that remarkable quality that made the original so enduring.

Speaking of John Romero, its significant (to me, at least), that the last surviving member of the team t

hat founded Id Software and created Doom is no longer with the company. (John Romero being the first to leave, John Carmack being the last). Of course John Carmack's tech is what powers the game, and I am aware that he wouldn't have any significant effect on level design even if he were still there. All the same, its sort of like having your favorite book series being turned over to a different author. It might still be good, but you can't help but realized that its in new hands. In addition, there have been some rather troubling statements from Id's parent company, Zenimax. For example, there was a

Please, Id.  Please to justice to this franchise.

rumor a while back that Zenimax wants Doom 4 to sell as many copies as Bethesda's Skyrim. Seriously? I know Doom is a well known franchise, but Skyrim could arguably be the most significant game to be released in the last decade. To put an order like this on the developer means that they must do everything they can to give the game mass appeal, and this worries me. The best games are made by people who are just creating something that they would want to play. That's what gives the best games their unique souls, what separates a game like Skyrim or the original Doom from the cookie cutter committee-driven games that populate the market today. The presence of things like Brutal Doom elements make me worry that the developers are trying to give us what they think is going to be popular, not necessarily what will be true to the heart of the franchise.

Now of course all these concerns have to be tempered a little bit. What we've seen so far may not even be actual gameplay. To me its difficult to tell if this is just a pre-rendered video. Even if it isn't, what we saw is not likely an actual level in the game. It seems to have been designed specifically to show off the weapons, enemies and graphics. The story, level designs and more nuanced elements like surprise encounters and ammunition distribution were not shown. Furthermore, the game is still nearly a year away, which means that there's plenty of work to be done on it. There are enough good things to be seen in the gameplay trailer to believe that Doom 4 could be a great game and a worthy entry into one of gaming's most legendary franchises. For the time being, we'll just have to wait and see.

TUESDAY TIDBIT: Mobile Games, Multiplayer and Microtransactions

I recently moved myself into the twenty-first century by finally upgrading from my old-school cell phone to a smartphone. For me, the choice between iphone and android was not a difficult one for one simple reason: I've wanted to play Doom Resurrection ever since it was released and the game is only available on ios. This now gives me the dubious distinction of having played every Doom game that id software ever released. (Doom, Doom II, Doom 3, Doom 3 Lost Mission, Final Doom, Doom RPG, Doom II RPG and Doom Resurrection).

Is it as fun as the original?  No.  Is it still fun?  Absolutely.

I may do a full review of Doom Resurrection sometime, but for now lets just go with a summary. For the uninitiated, its a rails-on first person shooter. What that means is that you the player don't actually control where you go but instead must just kill enemies as they approach. Its like those light gun games at the arcade. This game games advantage of the iphone's motion sensors to allow you to move the phone around to aim, while the touchscreen is used for reloading, ducking under cover and picking up items such as ammunition and health packs. Overall, I really enjoyed it. While some might find this type of gameplay restrictive, I can appreciate a game that's specifically tailored to the strengths and weaknesses of its platform. It was fun, easy to play and not at all crowded on the small screen.

Having now beaten Doom Resurrection, I've been out looking for new mobile games to play, but have so far had pretty limited success. The mobile game market today is booming with business, but unfortunately not really the sort of business that I want to get into. Today's mobile releases are all riddled with two things that I have never wanted to be a part of: Microtransactions and a focus on online multiplayer.

These two concepts go hand-in-hand, but we'll start with microtransactions. Anyone who pays attention to video game news will be familiar with this phrase. Also known as in-app purchases, this is where a game allows you to purchase additional features or content once you're already playing it. The use of microtransactions is controversial in the console and PC gaming industry, but in mobile games it seems to be pretty common practice. In fact, the most successful mobile games today are usually free to download but then make their money off of these in app purchases.

Its definitely a successful business model, and in a way its pretty easy to see why. Gamers can download the game for free and then decide later on whether or not it is fun enough to be worth spending money on. It makes perfect sense, although unfortunately the trend seems to be less and less on giving players content for their money and more on just selling these microtransactions.

For example, I was recently looking at the new Mortal Kombat X game on the app store. Its a card-based fighting game based around characters from the game universe. I was interested, primarily because I am a huge fan of Mortal Kombat. A mobile game using the characters with some gameplay elements tailored to the platform. Then I looked at the list of in-app purchases offered by the game.

Every purchase available is in the form of some in-game currency. The smallest is called a Heavy Pouch of Koins, which can be purchased for $1.99. These kinds of offers continue up in price, each with a more exciting sounding name, all the way up to the Ancient Elixer of Dragon Souls, which costs a whopping $99.99.

I am assuming that this currency is earned by achieving accomplishments in the game, but that spending real money will obviously allow the player to move ahead much more quickly. Since it allows for challenging opponents around the world (more on this in a bit), I suspect that these purchases also provide an edge in that department as well.

So what's the problem here? Well, there's a few things I take issue with. First of all, let's consider that $99 price tag. A hundred dollars? That's nearly twice the full price of a newly released console game. That's a lot of money, and for what? That's the other problem. All these purchases do is grant you things that you could earn via gameplay. To me, this implies that advancing through the game will be a chore rather than a joy. I don't want to pay to advance through my game, I want to enjoy it.

To play, or to spend money on?

Of course there's more to it than that, and this brings us to the next element common in today's mobile games: Multiplayer. Don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with multiplayer, but I don't want it to be the focus of my game. Unfortunately, this seems to be the craze that has hit mobile gaming, and boy does it seem to be quite a profitable craze. Take Game of War, for example. Anyone who watched sports this last NFL season surely saw the constant live action commercials with Kate Upton in them advertising the game. Kate Upton! Not only that, but Liam Neeson was in a Clash of Clans commercial that ran during the Super Bowl! I remember a few years ago being impressed when games like Skyrim and Call of Duty were able to advertise during professional sports. Now we have free to play games that can not only advertise during professional sports but hire A-list actors and supermodels and advertise in the most expensive slots possible.

The fact is that microtransactions and free to play games are incredibly profitable for developers. By making the game focused on multiplayer competition, players are more and more encouraged to do whatever they can to get better and better. The best part for the publishers is that there is really no limit to how often a person can buy these things, nor is there a reason for a devoted player to stop spending money on it.

Obviously games like Clash of Clans are really popular and I'm not about to criticize a business for making money. There are plenty of independent games journalists who decry free to play games as “not real games” or “only for casual gamers.” I don't think that's fair. Just because something isn't what I prefer doesn't make it any less legitimate as a medium. I just think its unfortunate that this type of game has so thoroughly taken over the mobile market. Its not that I want free to play games to go away, its just that I wish there were more options available.

For example, although I think Doom Resurrection did an excellent job of simplifying the gameplay to fit the mobile platform, mobile games can still be serious. Nintendo proved over and over that portable games can be engaging and fun, and there's no reason for ios games to not be equally high quality. Turn-based strategy games like Advance Wars would translate gloriously to the mobile platform. In fact, Uniwar is a rather good knockoff of the aforementioned Advance Wars, but a side by side comparison of the two is no contest whatsoever.

Of course, there are some obstacles for mobile games to overcome. Uniwar costs $2.99 while Nintendo DS games retail at $40 upon release. An ios game that costs more than five dollars to download is generally considered overpriced. This limits how much time and money can be put into developing these gam

es.

Civilization Revolution does mobile gaming right.

However, there's a right way to do things on the mobile market. Take Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution. The game has a free demo version which allows you to play it, but a full version with all the civilizations and the ability to save your game costs around three dollars. Multiplayer and unique units can be purchased later on as well. All in all, the full game costs roughly sixteen dollars if you get all the in-app purchases, but then that's it. I'm not necessarily thrilled about the game dividing up its content like that, but at least the three dollar version is fully functional and the total version can't possibly break my bank.

Mobile games have so much potential. Turn-based strategy, action/adventure and role playing games are all perfect candidates for mobile games. Even ports of existing games would probably be very well received. And I'll admit that there are plenty of good games out there that I'm sure I haven't played yet. Its just that I could wish there were more.

TUESDAY TIDBIT: User Generated Content

One of my favorite books recently was 'Masters of Doom' by David Kushner, which is essentially a biography of Id Software from its formation all the way through the early 2000's. There's a story in there about something that occurred shortly after the release of Wolfenstein 3d. Mods or alterations to the game began to circulate around the internet. Some of the guys at Id were worried that people would stop buying their games and instead just play all these modifications. After all, why pay money for what you can play for free?

The reason I write about this is that seems to have been the mindset behind many game companies both in the past and now. Especially in today's world of downloadable content and microtransactions, the idea of modifications must be abhorrent to companies who would rather be able to charge for any additions to their product.

This mindset is not restricted to large corporations, either. Companies like EA and Ubisoft take a lot of well deserved flak for their money-grubbing policies, but independent developers have been occasionally guilty of heavy handed censoring and monitoring of their content usage. Its a widespread practice and not necessarily bad. Companies and small devs alike rely on their products to make money, so while it might be nice that people appreciate their work, it stands to reason that they might be upset about not getting paid for it.

Still, while it is an understandable concern for the developers, it is in my opinion a flawed one. Multiple instances have shown that opening the door for user created content is in fact beneficial for developers in the long run. Allowing players to modify and add to the game after its release extends the lifetime of the game, generates goodwill toward the developer and makes players even more excited for future releases.

For example, I'll start with Id software. Against the fears of some of the other members of the then-small company, John Carmack and John Romero were in favor of user-created mods. Carmack from an almost moral stance derived from the “hacker ethic” and Romero because he knew how much hype could be generated based on user content. As a result, John Carmack designed their next game to be geared towards modifications, making it easier rather than harder for players to edit the game's content.

Of course, Id's next game was Doom, one of the greatest video games of all time. One of these days I'll do a review (Spoiler alert, it's going to get a very high score), but in the meantime, suffice to say that Doom was an absolute sensation. More than that, though, the amounts of mods that began to surface helped extend the game's shelf life. The levels, monsters, sounds and music could all be edited and changed, opening the door for “Total Conversions” or games that were almost entirely different from the source material and free to play for anyone who owned the full game. The primitive internet message boards of 1994 were more excited about the release of the Aliens Total Conversion for Doom than they were about the upcoming release of Doom II!

Yet, did any of this hurt Doom's sales? Not in the slightest. Doom II went on to sell millions of copies in spite of being just 32 more levels with one new weapon and a few new enemies. Not only that, but now its levels could be edited and creators were given a whole new set of textures, enemies and options to make levels with. If anything, the promise of endless free content after the campaign might have served as a reason for people to buy the game.

A shot from one of my creations for Doom II

Of course Doom has something else going for it as well. Not only did Id make the game easy to modify, but John Carmack made certain that each new game engine release saw the old engine sent to open source. This means that programmers are able to use the engine for their own games, although these must also be open source. It also opened the door for the numerous source ports that Doom now has, allowing people to play on modern systems with a few slightly more modern upgrades. Freelook, the standard WASD control scheme for shooters and higher resolutions are just some of the benefits that retro gamers can reap from Carmack's generosity.

As a result, Doom has a legacy unmatched by any game its age save perhaps the Mario and Zelda franchises. New content is still being produced at a steady rate, some of it remarkably high quality. Programs like Doom Builder have allowed even those with limited programming knowledge like me to design and play new levels.

Another prime (and more recent) example of the benefits of user created content is the Elder Scrolls series. Starting with Morrowind, Bethesda began releasing the Elder Scrolls Construction Kit with it. That is, they gave the players the exact same design tools that they themselves used to create the game. Given the size and scope of Elder Scrolls games, that is rather impressive. Especially as Oblivion essentially took the gaming world by storm with its popularity. The sheer number of Oblivion mods is remarkable, some of them nearly as big or bigger than the original game. Anyone who has ever played Oblivion will certainly appreciate just how impressive that is.

And yet, in spite of enough free content to keep gamers pleased for a dozen lifetimes over, what happened when the Elder Scrolls V was released? It became perhaps the largest gaming sensation of the decade, and that's saying a lot. Call of Duty might have sold more copies initially, but Skyrim remains far more relevant. As with Oblivion, Bethesda released the construction kit for Skyrim and the amount of new content just continues to grow. There can be little doubt that their next release will be followed by an equal amount of enthusiasm and sales in spite of all the free content available for previous titles.

Heroes of Might and Magic 2 has a robust scenario editor

I could go on and on about this. There are plenty of other games out there that provide scenario editors or other such utilities. All of them are good, and I believe that they all allow the games to have a greater and more lasting legacy than they otherwise would have had. I wish more games would be like this. To me a game mod is like fanfiction. Its an amateur or semi professional trying to show appreciation for a story or experience that they enjoyed. J.K. Rowling hasn't (to my knowledge) attempted to stop or censor any of the fans who want to add their person contribution to her universe to be enjoyed by other fans for free. I don't believe it hurts the developer or the game at all and instead allows those of us who love the games to enjoy them even more.

RETRO GAME REVIEW: CAESAR II

The Sierra city-building games have always had a special place on the shelf for me. They aren't my favorites by any measure, and in fact aren't even close to my favorite genre. However, there's something very unique about these games, and when I'm in the mood for playing a city-builder, there's nothing else that can serve as a substitute. As an avid fan of ancient and especially Roman history, these games capture a certain grandeur that other real-time strategy games can't match.

While I am willing to bet that most fans of the series would argue that Caesar III is the best of the series, the second installment is the one with which I am the most familiar. Its also my personal favorite for a variety of reasons. I'll admit that nostalgia is certainly a factor. The visual design and overall complexity of the game might not appeal to me as much as it does had I played some of its more recent incarnations first. However, there's more to it than just nostalgia as Caesar II has some features that have not been seen in any city-builder that I'm aware of since.

OVERVIEW: Caesar II is one of those older games that almost feels less like a computer game and more like a really complicated board game that you just play on a computer. The array of tables and graphs that are at your disposal when it comes to looking at your city are presented in an almost businesslike manner. Not that this is a bad thing. The fact that so much information is so well streamlined makes it so that these things aren't overwhelming, and I'll be getting into the specifics of some of them a little later on.

As you might expect, the goal of Caesar II is to build a prosperous and populous city from the ground up. This involves constructing neighborhoods and making sure that they have access to all the sorts of amenities that Roman cities would have. The more amenities that a house or neighborhood has, the more quickly the houses will upgrade to hold more people and pay higher taxes. However, this can require some pretty careful planning. Bathhouses and fountains also have to be placed near enough to a reservoir to remain filled, which means that any neighborhoods far away from the river that runs through each map must have a reservoir nearby that is connected by costly aqueducts.

The process of building up your city is both the heart and soul of Caesar II and one of its greatest joys. Watching neighborhoods rise from simple huts into the larger and more impressive dwellings is both challenging and at the same time rewarding. Simply right-clicking on a house will let you see what things the place has or doesn't have, and this will give you an insight into what you need to do to improve it. However, this is not always an easy task. Certain buildings like markets and prefectures are essential to a thriving neighborhood. Put them too close to a dwelling, though, and the residents will not like it and will not advance past a certain stage. This can be frustrating at times, but watching an area rise from almost nothing into a vibrant and wealthy community is certainly rewarding. As in many city-builders, you can right click on the citizens wandering around the streets to see what they have to say. There are no voices to accompany the text and the responses are fairly limited, but it can be a fun way to pass some time while waiting for the next month to arrive.

In addition to the city mode, Caesar II has a couple of unique features that I found to be noticeable absent in the later games that I've played. The first one of these is the province mode. In province mode, you have the option of building roads to connect the various other settlements in your area. Additionally, resources can be found in province mode, and it is here that you build mines, workcamps and warehouses in order to harvest these resources and in turn sell them to your citizens to provide a healthy profit to the treasury. Finally, barbarian towns are scattered throughout some of the provinces. You'll usually have to conquer these in order to get a high enough peace rating to achieve a promotion. Invading armies are also seen on the campaign map, although these will be covered later on.

The other unique feature that I haven't seen replicated in any other game is the forum. This is a simple screen that gives you access to all of your advisers and allows you to manage the various aspects of your empire. For example, there's a plebian adviser who allows you to allocate your laborers to different aspects of the city. If you don't have enough workers, you'll have to decide what you can afford to allow to fall into disrepair. The forum screen also can show you the scenario objectives and how close you've come to achieving them as well as things like taxes, trade, favor with the emperor and your legion.

The combat system in Caesar II is also an incredibly strong point. Although it doesn't play a very large role in the game itself, the combat is both simplistic but at the same time excellent. Battles will occur in one of two ways. The first and most common is when you are attacking a barbarian town. The second is when a barbarian army invades and you fight it on open ground. This does not happen very often, and usually is not encountered until the far later stages of the campaign. Either way, once your army has engaged the enemy, you'll be transported to a separate battle screen. Here you have the option of organizing your troops in whatever formations you wish before beginning. The battle itself takes place in real time and is sort of a massively scaled down version of the battles in the Total War games. There's no terrain and your formation options are somewhat limited, but where you place your troops and how you commit them to the battle can have a drastic effect on the outcome.

Though I could sing the praises of this game for hours on end, it is not without a few flaws. Chief among these is that it is a surprisingly difficult game. Once a neighborhood begins to wither away, there's almost nothing that can be done to stop it, and while old-school purists might say that this just increases the challenge, I find it frustrating. There are few things more obnoxious than having every possible amenity surrounding a neighborhood and watching it sink into the lowest level of housing before disappearing. This is, in fact, a fairly well known problem called 'population dip', and even online manuals list no solutions to it other than to avoid it at all costs.

VISUALS: As I mentioned above, Caesar II in some respects feels more like a computerized board game than a true computer game, and it visuals are a testament to that. The almost grid-like structure of the city and province modes would lend themselves nicely to physical media. However, I honestly don't have a problem with it at all. The art style is consistent throughout, and I prefer the understated style of these cities to the more beautiful artwork in later games. Though of course the game looks as old as it is, at no time during gameplay do I find myself wishing that it looked better

OTHER THOUGHTS: There were two releases of the game, one on dos and the other a Windows 95 release. I have found the dos version online for free and that's the one that I use for playing the game now. It runs just fine on dosbox. The windows version adds a pretty nice soundtrack as well as some different layout options, but you'll probably have to buy a used cd. Also, with the old cd version, I've had some trouble getting it to work on more modern versions of windows, so dos is the one that I'd recommend.

FINAL VERDICT: 8/10 This is a great game, and certainly one of the finest of its kind ever made. When compared to games like Zeus, this one might come up a little short, but underneath its fairly modest exterior is one of the most fun and rewarding experiences that this type of game can offer.

RETRO GAME REVIEW: BLAKE STONE: ALIENS OF GOLD (Shareware)

Blake Stone is one of a few games that had the misfortune of being released near the same time as Doom. Being a first-person shooter, and using the Wolfenstein 3d engine, it was fated (doomed, if you will) to fall into almost complete obscurity.  However, here on the retro game review, I like to take these games based on their own merits.

From the outset, Blake Stone bears a lot of resemblance to Wolfenstein 3d, from the self-imposed PC-13 rating for violence to the title card to the way its difficulty settings show the title character with an increasingly more confident expression on his face as you ramp it up. However, Blake Stone trades in the World War II setting of Wolfenstein for a sort of futuristic James Bond – like atmosphere. The title and selection screens are all in the green on black screen lettering like you'd see on old computers, and the tech-base theme of the first level looks like something out of Star-Trek.

GAMEPLAY: Gameplay in Blake Stone is almost identical to Wolfenstein 3d. Each episode is made up of nine regular levels and two secret levels. The player's goal on each level is to find the red keycard and get to the elevator to move up to the next floor. These floors are populated with enemy scientists, soldiers and monsters. Additional weapons, health and ammo can be found scattered throughout the levels. However, Blake also adds vending machines which can be used to purchase additional health packs using tokens found throughout the levels.

Blake Stone also adds in some elements not found in Wolfenstein. For example, some of the scientists are actually spies who will help the player out by giving information, ammunition or tokens to use in the vending machines. It adds a dimension of depth to the game when approaching a scientists and wondering whether or not he's going to try to shoot you. Of course, its possible to just kill them all, but I found it to be sort of depressing when the game told me that I'd accidentally killed an informant.

The level design in Blake Stone is pretty good as well. There's a decent variety of textures to be found as well as some interesting and unique locations that keep things from getting too repetitive and make it easier to navigate around. There are also some interactive environment puzzles like electric fences that turn on and off via wall switches and cages which release monsters. Also of note are the ceiling-mounted turrets which can be a pain, but they do add some tension to otherwise enemy-free areas. The game also features an automap function, which can be very helpful given the maze-like structure of all Wolfenstien engine games.

All good science fiction guns have to be colorful.

Blake Stone's enemies are a sort of standard variety of humans, science fiction soldiers and alien style monsters. None of them stand out particularly much, although the game's mad scientist who serves as the main antagonist does periodically beam into a level and then teleport out again after taking a few shots. Its weapons also look like something you might see on an episode of Star Trek, although I did find them quite satisfying to use. The assault rifle in particular is very fun to use in spite of being remarkably similar to its Wolfenstein 3d counterpart. In fact, that might be why its so fun.

However, the gameplay of Blake Stone is not without its problems. I had some difficulty getting the game to run properly under DosBox, and it took a few minutes of adjustments before I was able to get going. Even once the game is running, it has what I can best describe as a sluggish feel to it. Where Wolfenstein 3d is fast and smooth, Blake Stone is fast but somewhat jerky. The problem is compounded when there are multiple enemies on the screen.

VISUALS: The Visuals in Blake Stone are very bright and colorful, as befits its setting. Even the weapons feature a wide palette of reds, blues and oranges splashed liberally throughout. It might not be the most appealing art style in the world, but it is at least coherent and consistent throughout. Likewise, the textures on the walls and ceilings may look a little dated when compared even to Wolfenstein's graphics, but they are nevertheless pleasant.

The enemy design is also decent, but I found it to be a little bland. The enemies don't all look the same, but none of them struck me as particularly unique or frightening. This can make the game a little less fun later on when you come across enemies that don't really look any tougher than the monsters you've already been killing but which can absorb and dish out substantially more damage. It doesn't break the game or make it not fun to play, but in some ways it feels like a missed opportunity.

FINAL VERDICT: 6.5/10 Blake Stone is a decent game and it adds some things to the simple Wolf3d formula. However, in spite of these additions, it ends up being a fairly unremarkable experience. Not necessarily bad, but there are several other Wolfenstein 3d – engine games that are superior.

RETRO GAME REVIEW: CATACOMB ABYSS (Shareware)

Wolfenstein 3d is often erroneously credited as being the very first of its genre (this sentence being constructed in order to avoid repeating the word 'first' one right after the other). While Wolf3d may have been the first successful first-person shooter, it was not the very first. That honor belongs to a different Id software game: Catacomb 3d. Made for and published by Softdisk, Catacomb was therefore unable to gain the fame and popularity that Wolfenstein did due to it only being available to subscribers to Softdisk. Nevertheless, it gained a considerable following and has its place in gaming history.

It should be noted that this is a review of Catacomb Abyss, which was the sequel to Catacomb 3d.

I first encountered Catacomb Abyss on an old CD-ROM filled with shareware games that included some of my all-time favorites: Wolfenstein3d, Doom and Heretic, along with quite a few other games from that era, all of which have been almost completely forgotten. (Reviews of games like Corridor 7 and Blake Stone are coming). Nowadays, the shareware of Catacomb Abyss can be downloaded almost anywhere, and using a program like DosBox makes it run just fine on almost any computer. The question is, is it worth your time?

From the moment you boot it up, its clear that this is an Id software game. The status bar showing the player's face, the icons indicating ammunition, health and other essential stats are all present. There are, however, some key differences. First off, Catacomb is a fantasy style game rather than the traditional gun-based shooter. The environments are all bricks, graveyards, dungeons, caves and even an almost hellish demon-wold (foreshadowing, anyone?). Likewise, the enemies range from zombies to skeletons to goblins and more bizarre monsters.

Don't think for one minute, though, that this is an RPG. Catacomb Abyss moves and acts just like Wolfenstein 3d. The movement is crisp and given how old the game is, the animations are smooth. Like later id games, it has secret areas with loot to be gathered.

GAMEPLAY: As mentioned above, Catacomb basically plays like Wolfenstein 3d, although there are some key differences. First off, there is almost no weapon diversity here. The player has an unlimited supply of fireballs which have to serve for most enemies throughout the game. There are also two alternate modes of fire which are supplied through little spheres picked up throughout the game. One is a rapid stream of fireballs, the other one shoots them in all directions, which can be useful in later levels when hordes of enemies abound. In addition to these spells, the player can also find treasures which just raise the player's final score and potions which can be used to restore all health. The presence of what essentially amounts to a primitive inventory system is pretty unique.

Like all shooters of the early '90's, the levels of Catacomb Abyss revolve around finding keys and eventually finding an exit. The level design is roughly equivalent to that of Wolf 3d, which means that it is entirely made up of rooms of equal heights and areas defined by ninety degree corners. Early games like this didn't have a lot of options in terms of making areas easily recognized, and so it is pretty easy to get lost. That being said, it doesn't take too long to find your way around.

VISUALS: Because it uses EGA graphics, the game looks pretty dated. Not that one would expect a game that's over twenty years old to look new, but the switch to VGA for Wolfenstein3d was a huge upgrade. That being said, the artwork is of course good and the bright colors lend themselves to the fantasy styles. Not only that, but the shareware episode offers a wider range of environments than other games of the time period. With castles, graveyards, caves and the hell dimension, its easy to get engaged with the levels in order to see what the next one will look like.

FINAL VERDICT: 7/10 Fans of old shooters ought to enjoy this one. Its bright and colorful visuals combined with smooth and classic gameplay are pretty darn fun, especially when one wants a fantasy style game but isn't in the mood for a full-sized and complicated RPG. That being said, like all pre-doom shooters, it suffers from crowded and sometimes confusing level design.