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213-693: Descent II is a 1996 first-person shooter game developed by Parallax Software and first published for DOS by Interplay Productions . A version for the PlayStation was released under the title Descent Maximum . It is the second installment in the Descent video game series and the sequel to Descent . The player controls a spaceship from the pilot's perspective and must navigate extrasolar underground mines to locate and destroy their reactors and escape being caught in their self-destructions, while engaging and surviving infected robots, which will attempt to destroy

426-410: A FPS game engine as well as a customizable HUD , an auto-map , jumping, swimming, flying, shapeshifting with each metamorphosis featuring its own characteristics to adapt to each situation. Then it got enhanced with redbook audio narration , voiced dialogues which replaced the text boxes, two new levels, and 3D rendered cutscenes , then re-released on CD-ROM in 1994. ShadowCaster started

639-489: A Windows 95 upgrade that supports 3D accelerated graphics, contains The Vertigo Series add-on, and the original DOS game patched to support accelerated graphics. The Vertigo Series , which could be purchased separately, contains 22 new levels (to be played sequentially), a new multiplayer game mode, new music and enemies. The add-on is also bundled with the Mission Builder, a level and robot editor that can also convert

852-416: A deathmatch mode called Anarchy and Capture-the-Flag , in which two teams compete against each other to capture opposing flags. Conditions for ending the level such as maximum time limit, how long the reactor will remain invulnerable before it can be destroyed, and the number of kills to reach can be set, as can which power-ups to allow and whether players may drop surveillance cameras. The game also features

1065-427: A periscope viewfinder similar to submarine shooting arcade games such as Midway 's video game Sea Wolf (1976) and Sega 's electro-mechanical game Periscope (1966). Battlezone became the first successful mass-market game featuring a first-person viewpoint and wireframe 3D graphics , with a version later released for home computers in 1983. MIDI Maze , a first-person shooter released in 1987 for

1278-438: A sci-fi setting about a British secret agent named Blake Stone pursuing a mad scientist through his facilities like a sci-fi James Bond , a similar Wolf3D's gameplay of exploring mazes while battling various foes to find keycards required to unlock doors to reach each floor's exit all while searching every wall for secret areas filled with treasures for a higher score until each episode's last floor's boss but with

1491-405: A skin which is an arbitrary graphics model but that operates on the same set of movements as the base model. A human player's character and computer bot's character features the same set of physical properties, initial health, initial armour, weapon capabilities, the same available character maneuvers and speed—i.e. they are equally matched except for the actual controlling part. For a novice player

1704-598: A thesaurus to search synonyms for the word " construction ", and named his new game engine "Build". Apogee Software wanted Build since id Software went their own way and didn't want to license their new Doom engine (yet). Both Epic MegaGames and Apogee Software attempted to contract Ken Silverman who chose Apogee Software which he never explained his reasons however Epic Games expressed no regret since not relying on Ken Silverman motivated them to develop their own technologies, which paid off. Most shooters in this period were developed for IBM PC compatible computers. On

1917-563: A SNES by itself which is why the SNES game cartridge was actually an adapter cartridge which required another licensed SNES game cartridge to be inserted into it in order to get Super 3D Noah's Ark to work despite being unlicensed. Star Wars: Dark Forces was released the 6th of February 1995 after LucasArts decided Star Wars would make appropriate material for a game in the style of Doom . However, Star Wars: Dark Forces improved on several technical features that Doom lacked, such as

2130-480: A certain number of lives (or just one, in the case of battle royale games), and lose these as they die. Players who run out of lives are eliminated for the rest of the match , and the winner is the last and only player with at least one life. See the "Fundamental changes" section in the "Last Man Standing" article for more insight. Any arbitrary multiplayer game with the goal for each player to kill every other player(s) as many times as possible can be considered to be

2343-557: A character. Medal of Honor , released in 1999, gave birth to a long running proliferation of simulative first-person shooters set during World War II. Valve 's Half-Life was released in 1998, based upon Quake ' s graphics technology. Initially met with only mild anticipation, it went on to become a commercial success. While most of the previous first-person shooters on the IBM PC platform had focused on visceral gameplay with relatively weak or irrelevant plots, Half-Life placed

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2556-476: A co-operative mode that allows up to four players to work together to complete single-player levels. A player can send messages and predefined taunts, handicap their ship's shields they begin with after respawning, and in Capture-the-Flag drop and pass flags to their teammates. Descent II ' s multiplayer was designed for modems , null-modems , and local area networks , but an alternative then widely used

2769-646: A compilation containing the full versions of Descent , the Levels of the World mission pack, Descent II , and Vertigo mission packs, and a mission editor. Besides a choice of the original Descent II levels (subtitled Counterstrike ), or the Vertigo Series levels, the first Descent levels (subtitled The First Strike ) can be started in the Descent II game UI where robots adopt the Descent II sounds and improved AI. There

2982-496: A cult following; 1UP.com called it the "first multi-player 3D shooter on a mainstream system" and the first "major LAN action game". Id Software's Hovertank 3D pioneered ray casting technology in May 1991 to enable faster gameplay than 1980s vehicle simulators; and Catacomb 3-D introduced another advance, texture mapping , in November 1991. The second game to use texture mapping

3195-416: A deathmatch mode in a first-person shooter was Taito 's 1992 video game Gun Buster . It allowed two-player cooperative gameplay for the mission mode, and featured an early deathmatch mode, where either two players could compete against each other or up to four players could compete in a team deathmatch , consisting of two teams with two players each competing against each other. The phrase death match

3408-419: A different map—based on a map list kept on the server—or it might always be on the same map if there is no such rotating map list. Common in many games is some form of message broadcast and private message system; the broadcast message system announces public events, e.g. if a player died it will often be informed who died and how, if fragged, then often by what weapon; the same system will also often announce if

3621-407: A durable close friendship between id Software and Raven Software as id will always share their technologies with Raven who will continuously use and upgrade them. Apogee Software , the publisher of Wolfenstein 3D , followed up its success and released another FPS game based on its engine titled Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold from another developer Jam Productions 5 December 1993 which featured

3834-433: A dynamic light-sourcing scheme by which the environment could be lit with flares, while newly added in Descent II is the ability to shoot out sources of light which will darken rooms as well as a headlight powerup which can continuously illuminate the space in front of the player. The game's directors, Mike Kulas and Matt Toschlog, explained they upgraded the game's artificial intelligence to contain instructions mimicking

4047-401: A dystopian 3D first-person dungeon shooter, has been argued to be the first true FPS. This is due to the combination of a fully perspective-shifting 3D maze with enemies ahead, and what may be the earliest representation of weapons appearing in perspective in front of the player. A slightly more sophisticated first-person shooting mainframe game was Panther (1975), a tank simulator for

4260-477: A far bigger focus on strong narrative; the game featured no cut scenes but remained in the first-person perspective at all times. It capitalized heavily on the concepts of non-enemy characters (previously featured in many other titles, such as the Marathon series and Strife ) and wider in-game interactivity (as first introduced by the likes of Duke Nukem 3D and System Shock ) but did not employ power-ups in

4473-606: A far more believable 3D environment than Wolfenstein 3D 's levels, all of which had a flat-floor space and corridors. Doom allowed competitive matches between multiple players, termed "deathmatches", and the game was responsible for the word's subsequent entry into the video gaming lexicon. According to creator John Romero , the game's deathmatch concept was inspired by the competitive multiplayer of fighting games such as Street Fighter II and Fatal Fury . Doom became so popular that its multiplayer features began to cause problems for companies whose networks were used to play

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4686-435: A far wider diversity of enemies, and added textured floors and ceilings, switches to find and to press to open new areas, traps, an auto-map , stats tracking, a grenade launcher, limited-use vending-machines , teleporters , enemies spawners, back-tracking to previous levels as well as some friendly NPCs in the form of scientists who would give the player hints and supplies provided the player didn't kill them. The game

4899-522: A first-person perspective in zero gravity. It differs from standard first-person shooters in that it allows the player to move freely across three-dimensional planes and rotate on three axes, often termed pitch, yaw, and roll . Besides the keyboard, Descent II features a wide range of supported hardware configurations with which to play it, including the Gravis Gamepad and certain brands of joysticks, some of which support force feedback —making it one of

5112-406: A form of deathmatch. In real time strategy games, deathmatch can refer to a game mode where all players begin their empires with large amounts of resources. This saves them the time of accumulation and lets hostilities commence much faster and with greater force. Destroying all the enemies is the only way to win, while in other modes some other victory conditions may be used (king of the hill, building

5325-407: A forward airborne flight by moving backwards, or even jumping around a corner. Other notable concepts derived from the physics of FPS game engines are i.a. at least bunny-hopping , strafe-jumping and rocket-jumping —in all of which the player exploits the particular characteristics of the physics engine in question to obtain a high speed and/or height, or other attribute(s); e.g. with rocket-jumping

5538-427: A frag or time limit a new session will start briefly after the current session has been concluded, during the respite the players will be allowed to observe the score list, chat and will usually see an animated pseudo overview display of the map as background for the score list. Some games have a system to allow each player to announce they are now ready to begin the new session, some do not. The new sessions might be on

5751-504: A futuristic missions-based FPS game called CyClones . The name referred to Cybernetic Clones , the minions of aliens who had ravaged and devastated Earth . The game was in first person 3D , as was most other Raven games, so reusing the ShadowCaster engine and its tools was a natural choice. But within a short time, the team found that they wanted to do more with the game and engine than they had done before. A new, 100% in-house engine

5964-533: A game of Bi-Planes, a 1981 Intellivision release in which multiple players control fighter planes with the primary purpose of repeatedly killing each other until a limit is reached. Once killed, a player would be respawned in a fixed location, enjoying a short period of protection from attacks. The contest was referred to, at that time, as a deathmatch. In a team deathmatch , the players are organized into two or more teams, with each team having its own frag count. Friendly fire may or may not cause damage, depending on

6177-458: A greater emphasis on narrative, problem-solving and logic puzzles. In addition to shooting, melee combat may also be used extensively. In some games, melee weapons are especially powerful, as a reward for the risk the player must take in maneuvering his character into close proximity to the enemy. In other games, instead, melee weapons may be less effective but necessary as a last resort. " Tactical shooters " tend to be more realistic, and require

6390-402: A headlight if the latter has been picked up, at least three measures can be used to prevent getting lost in the mines, two of which are using a wireframe automap that documents all explored areas of the mine and dropping markers in certain locations. The markers are displayed on the automap. Along the way, the player may also find and free a Guide-Bot, a commandable scouting assistant that guides

6603-478: A large scale by Doom . While its combination of gory violence , dark humor and hellish imagery garnered acclaim from critics, these attributes also generated criticism from religious groups and censorship committees, with many commentators labelling the game a "murder simulator". There was further controversy when it emerged that the perpetrators of the Columbine High School massacre were fans of

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6816-448: A little bit, make no mistake, there is something wrong with you." Next Generation opined that a few sequels "can boast the improvements like those made on Descent II ", citing the SVGA graphics, the story sequences in full motion video, and the new items. It forgave the same simple mission formula because of the improvements. Computer Gaming World compared the gameplay and enhancements of

7029-452: A medieval-themed/dark fantasy game using a modified version of id's Doom engine . Raven considered themselves as typical D&D fans and initially drafted the game with role-playing elements. They then took instruction from id programmer John Carmack to simply "do it like Doom , and add the fantasy flavor." Raven Software then used and upgraded the Doom engine and released Heretic

7242-575: A nearly fully destructible environment since the flamethrower could set people and environments on fire, which could make movement extremely hazardous for the player, especially since the fire randomly spread, and the grenade-launcher too could destroy any wall (with some hard coded exceptions). OBC also featured textured floors and ceilings and an auto-map like Blake Stone however, unlike BS , OBC featured more than one floor texture per level although its floors and ceilings' graphics were partially parallax meaning that they appeared to "warp" as

7455-483: A new mission or forfeit his reward and face legal action. The Material Defender consents, and as Dravis tries to convince him that he is merely embarking on a reconnaissance mission, his ship is fitted with a prototype warp core. He is then sent to clear out PTMC's deep space mines beyond the Solar System. The Material Defender teleports to Zeta Aquilae and five other, fictional star systems and destroys their mines. In

7668-458: A new standard for first-person-shooter video-games widely emulated, improved, and still applied to this day. Tom Hall originally designed it to be a first-person infiltration game including stealth, hiding dead bodies, disguises and alarms, following the legacy of its predecessors, and the game engine does include these original features, however John Romero and John Carmack wanted a simple shooter and Tom Hall had to fight hard to even include

7881-417: A newly designed aiming system that allowed players to aim at a precise spot on the screen. Though not the first of its kind, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six started a popular trend of tactical first-person shooters in 1998. It featured a team-based, realistic design and themes based around counter-terrorism , requiring missions to be planned before execution and in it, a single hit was sometimes enough to kill

8094-807: A particularly potent power-up . These match types may also be customizable, allowing the players to vary weapons, health and power-ups found on the map, as well as victory criteria. Games may allow players to choose between various classes , each with its own strengths, weaknesses, equipment and roles within a team. There are many free-to-play first-person shooters on the market now, including Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory , Apex Legends , Team Fortress 2 , PlanetSide 2 , and Halo Infinite Multiplayer . Some games are released as free-to-play as their intended business model and can be highly profitable ( League of Legends earned $ 2 billion in 2017), but others such as Warhammer 40,000: Eternal Crusade begin their life as paid games and become free-to-play later to reach

8307-402: A player joins or leaves the game, and may announce how many frags are left in total and other important messages, including errors or warnings from the game; instant text messages from other players are also displayed with this system. The private message system, in contrast, only prints messages for individual players, e.g. if player A picks up a weapon, player A will get a message to confirm that

8520-538: A protagonist who delivers regular one-liners , commenting upon the situation at hand. Much of the humor is derived from over-the-top, stereotypical portrayals of Asian culture . Based on the James Bond film , Rare 's GoldenEye 007 was released in 1997, and as of 2004 it was still the best-selling Nintendo 64 game in the United States. It has been the first landmark first-person shooter for console gamers and

8733-451: A realistic and tactical approach aimed at simulating real life counter-terrorism situations. GoldenEye 007 , released in 1997, was a landmark first-person shooter for home consoles , while the critical and commercial success of later titles like Perfect Dark , Medal of Honor and the Halo series helped to heighten the appeal of this genre for the consoles market, straightening the road to

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8946-581: A rifle, or even limiting the players to only one weapon of choice at a time, forcing them to swap between different alternatives according to the situation. In some games, there's the option to trade up or upgrade weapons, resulting in multiple degrees of customization. Thus, the standards of realism are extremely variable. The protagonist can generally get healing and equipment supplies by means of collectible items such as first aid kits or ammunition packs, simply by walking over, or interacting with them. Some games allow players to accumulate experience points in

9159-435: A role-playing game fashion, that can generally be used to unlock new weapons, bonuses and skills. First-person shooters may be structurally composed of levels , or use the technique of a continuous narrative in which the game never leaves the first-person perspective. Others feature large sandbox environments, which are not divided into levels and can be explored freely. In first-person shooters, protagonists interact with

9372-554: A secret door. It also included vertical aiming, jumping, various missions objectives as well as one of the first training modes in a FPS game. Apogee Software 's Rise of the Triad: Dark War , released the 21th of December 1994, began as a sequel to Wolfenstein 3D , but was soon altered and became a stand-alone game . The game included "ludicrous" gibs, bullet holes persisted, and sheets of glass could be shattered by shooting or running through them. Bungie Software released

9585-506: A settlement after the former lost a court battle regarding its product add-on for the first Descent game, which Interplay alleged infringed its trademark —setting a precedent for how companies can sell add-ons for protected games. Interplay's division specified in Macintosh games, MacPlay , published it for Macintosh in August 1996. Descent II: Destination Quartzon was a truncated version with

9798-598: A short extension for Wolfenstein 3D titled Spear of Destiny released the 19th of September 1992 to tease the players with the Hell to come in Doom as Spear of Destiny concluded into Hell, then two years later, Doom 2 included two secret levels featuring Wolfenstein in Hell while re-using Spear of Destiny 's Hell final level's music to close the loop. Ken Silverman decided to develop his own game engine after he played Wolfenstein 3D in 1992. His first game , that he named Walken as in "Ken's Walking simulator",

10011-429: A similar genre with a first-person perspective which uses dedicated light gun peripherals, in contrast to the use of conventional input devices. Light-gun shooters (like Virtua Cop ) often feature "on-rails" (scripted) movement, whereas first-person shooters give the player complete freedom to roam the surroundings. The first-person shooter may be considered a distinct genre itself, or a type of shooter game, in turn

10224-488: A still active community. Many sci-fi games both from Bungie themselves and from other studios have cited the Marathon trilogy as a huge influence on their stories and settings such as the series Halo , Destiny , Mass Effect and Warframe . After having provided a modified Wolfenstein 3D engine to Raven Software for ShadowCaster and being impressed by the final result, id Software requested that Raven develop

10437-488: A subgenre of the wider action game genre. Following the release of Doom in 1993, games in this style were commonly referred to as " Doom clones "; over time this term has largely been replaced by "first-person shooter". Wolfenstein 3D, released in 1992, the year before Doom , has been often credited with introducing the genre, but critics have since identified similar, though less advanced, games developed as far back as 1973. There are occasional disagreements regarding

10650-488: A team of American scientists which opened a portal and connected Earth to another world from which an alien invasion started into the research facility . Corridor 7 added animated textures such as computer screens, distant shading which darkened distant areas to limit the player's sight's distance, dark areas and night vision mode to see into them, some invisible aliens and traps which could only be seen through infrared vision mode, some energy stations to recharge

10863-426: A time limit, a frag limit, or no limit at all. If there is a limit then the player with the most frags will eventually win when the session ends. The health variable will determine if a player is wounded; however, a wounded player does not entail reduced mobility or functionality in most games, and in most games a player will not bleed to death. A player will die when the health value reaches equal to or less than 0, if

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11076-476: A variety of pulse lasers and plasma bolts, and all of them consume energy in varying increments, except for two rotary cannons whose ammunition consists of explosive shells instead. Secondary weapons include many types of missiles, and mines which are dropped behind the player's ship to slow pursuing enemies. Ten new weapons have been added for Descent II of which some are upgrades from the original Descent weapons which are all present as well; new weapons include

11289-513: A varying number of enemies. Because they take place in a 3D environment, these games tend to be somewhat more realistic than 2D shooter games, and have more accurate representations of gravity, lighting, sound and collisions. First-person shooters played on personal computers are most often controlled with a combination of a keyboard and mouse . This system has been claimed as superior to that found in console games, which frequently use two analog sticks : one used for running and sidestepping,

11502-436: A wider audience after an initially disappointing reception. Some player communities complain about freemium first-person-shooters, fearing that they create unbalanced games, but many game designers have tweaked prices in response to criticism, and players can usually get the same benefits by playing longer rather than paying. The earliest two documented first-person shooter video games are Maze War and Spasim . Maze War

11715-595: A wonder...) The first-person shooter version of deathmatch, originating in Doom by id Software , had a set of unmodifiable rules concerning weapons, equipment and scoring, known as "Deathmatch 1.0". Within months, these rules were modified into "Deathmatch 2.0" rules (included in Doom v1.2 patch). These rules were optional, the administrator of the game could decide on using DM 1.0 or DM 2.0 rules. The changes were: Notable power-ups that are featured in most consecutive games include

11928-450: Is 0 score, full (100%) health, no armour and a basic firearm and a melee weapon. After a session has commenced, arbitrary players may join and leave the game on an ad hoc basis. In this context a player is a human operated character in the game or a character operated by a computer software AI —a bot . Both the human and computer operated character do have the same basic visual appearance but will in most modern games be able to select

12141-537: Is a sci-fi story revolving around a neural drug named Tek and the Matrix, a virtual reality (four years before the first Matrix movie ). The video-game featured FMVs, digitized live-actors and actresses, a stun gun to neutralize people in a non-lethal fashion , and gibs and dropped the player into a lively open-world future Los Angeles , making it the first FPS game which featured an open-world modern city, full of civilians, cops and enemies where civilians panicked if

12354-500: Is also a preview for the upcoming Descent 3 . In 1998, the Descent II source code , like that of Descent before it, was released to the general public under a copyrighted proprietary license, leading to community source ports . It was later ported to RISC OS by R-Comp Interactive, and the port debuted at the annual Wakefield Acorn RISC OS Show on May 19, 2001. Descent II entered digital distribution when it appeared on GameTap on September 7, 2006. It subsequently became one of

12567-486: Is an evolution of competitive multiplayer modes found in game genres such as fighting games and racing games moving into other genres. In a typical first-person shooter (FPS) deathmatch session, players connect individual computers together via a computer network in a peer-to-peer model or a client–server model , either locally or over the Internet. Players often have the option to communicate with each other during

12780-402: Is linear and is mostly provided for the introductory and concluding full-motion video cutscenes. After the "Material Defender" (voiced by George DelHoyo ) has destroyed all of the Solar System's mines in the original game, he stops in the asteroid belt to dock. He is then contacted by Post-Terran Mining Corporation executive Dravis, who exploits a loophole in a contract to coerce him to accept

12993-422: Is never experienced as a weight issue by the player. The lost equipment (usually not including the armor) of a dead player can usually be picked up by any player (even the fragged player, respawned) who gets to it first. Newtonian physics are often only somewhat accurately simulated, common in many games is the ability of the player to modify the player's own vector to some degree while airborne, e.g. by retarding

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13206-405: Is often challenging to retrieve their previous ship's weapons. New to Descent II is the ability to drop weapons, so a player can stockpile surplus weaponry in safe locations in the event of a respawn. Failing to escape the mine during the self-destruct sequence will also cost the player a life, as well as their power-ups, and any hostages embarked, although having destroyed the reactor or boss robot

13419-417: Is replenished by picking up shield power-ups, and like energy is limited by a capacity of 200 units. If the shield is fully depleted and the ship takes any additional damage, the ship will explode, costing the player one life and killing any hostages on board, leaving most of its weapons where it was destroyed. A respawning player has to start at the level entrance with a ship having only minimum armaments, so it

13632-463: Is the "Tome of Power" which acts as a secondary firing mode for certain weapons, resulting in a much more powerful projectile for each weapon, some of which change the look of the projectile entirely, then Raven added two more episodes and re-released it as Heretic: Shadow of the Serpent Riders the 31st of March 1996. Super 3D Noah's Ark , developed on Wolf3D engine and published by

13845-444: Is to use third-party software such as Kali to play the game on the Internet. It is possible to have DOS and Macintosh versions of the game play on the same server, providing a cross-platform experience. The PlayStation version has a two-player mode that requires a link cable used to connect two consoles running the same game. It contains the same game modes as found in the original DOS version, except for Capture-the-Flag. The plot

14058-451: The Halo and Destiny series which took a lot from the Marathon trilogy which is no more exclusive to Mac since Bungie Software open-sourced it in 2000 then released the original trilogy as freeware in 2005, some fans have source-ported it to Windows and Linux as well as remastered them using the open-source engine Aleph One and have even been developing many new scenarios, total conversions, and multiplayer maps sustaining

14271-503: The PlanetSide series allow thousands of players to compete at once in a persistent world . Large scale multiplayer games allow multiple squads, with leaders issuing commands and a commander controlling the team's overall strategy. Multiplayer games have a variety of different styles of match. The classic types are the deathmatch (and its team-based variant) in which players score points by killing other players' characters; and capture

14484-511: The Atari ST , featured maze-based gameplay and character designs similar to Pac-Man , but displayed in a first-person perspective. Later ported to various systems—including the Game Boy and Super NES under the title Faceball 2000 —it featured the first network multiplayer deathmatches , using a MIDI interface. Despite the inconvenience of connecting numerous machines together, it gained

14697-535: The Build engine for MS-DOS , but was later spun off into releases for Sega Saturn and Sony PlayStation using developer Lobotomy Software 's in-house SlaveDriver engine. While the PC version is a traditional linear first-person shooter, the console versions feature non-linear progression and unlockable player abilities reminiscent of a metroidvania . Strife , developed by Rogue Entertainment and published by Velocity Inc.

14910-643: The Doomsday engine and completely remastered by its modding community . The 12th of March 1994, the Japanese company Exact released Geograph Seal for the Sharp X68000 home computer. An obscure import title as far as the Western market is concerned, it was nonetheless an early example of a 3D polygonal first-person shooter, with innovative platform game mechanics and free-roaming outdoor environments. CyClones

15123-530: The LAN multiplayer mode for the video game Doom . Romero commented on the birth of the FPS deathmatch: According to Romero, the deathmatch concept was inspired by fighting games . At id Software , the team frequently played Street Fighter II , Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting during breaks, while developing elaborate rules involving trash-talk and smashing furniture or tech. Romero stated that "what we were doing

15336-573: The Macintosh side, Bungie released its first shooter, Pathways into Darkness in August 1993, which featured more adventure and narrative elements alongside first-person shooter gameplay. Pathways had been inspired by Wolfenstein 3D , and born out of an attempt to take their previous top-down dungeon exploration game Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete into a 3D setting. ShadowCaster , developed by Raven Software and published by Origin Systems

15549-540: The PLATO system . Atari's first-person tank shooter arcade video game Battlezone (1980), modeled closely after PLATO Panther, was released for arcades and presented using a vector graphics display , with the game designed by Ed Rotberg. It is considered to be the first successful first-person shooter video game, making it a milestone for the genre. It was primarily inspired by Atari's top-down arcade shooter game Tank (1974). The original arcade cabinet also employed

15762-420: The PlayStation console, called Jumping Flash! , which placed more emphasis on its platform elements. Witchaven , developed by Capstone Software and published by their parent company IntraCorp the 20th of September 1995, was the first commercial game licensed on Apogee Software rebranded 3D Realms ' Ken Silverman 's new Build engine to rival id Software 's John Carmack 's Doom engine and

15975-445: The SNES version was itself a mere reskin from Wolfenstein 3D's SNES version as well however the PC version did upgrade some things upon Wolfenstein 3D such as textured floors (like Blake Stone ) along with higher resolutions graphics and MIDI music, and added a new gameplay feature such as quizzes which tested the player's religious knowledge whose rewards were more ammo to keep playing

16188-466: The christian video-games company Wisdom Tree (formerly named Color Dreams ) the 1st of January 1995, was the first non-violent FPS game along with being the first religious FPS game ( Doom was already based on christian mythology as well since the enemy was christian's Hell however unlike Super 3D Noah's Ark , it merely used it as a setting and didn't attempt to teach religion) which featured Noah from Abrahamic mythology 's Noah's Ark as

16401-428: The crosshair was not fixed at the center of the screen on which it could move freely as opposite to nowadays standard fixed aiming, CyClones 's aiming was comparable to Metroid Prime ' s years later. CyClones used the mouse not only for aiming but also for picking up objects and interacting with the environment such as doors and switches and even revealed secret doors since the crosshair changed color upon pointing

16614-416: The protagonist and re-used Wolfenstein 3D 's gameplay and level-design while replacing enemies' death animations by seemingly friendly animals falling asleep upon being hit by the player's weapon which was a slingshot shooting food to feed the unresting hungry animals aboard goats filled Noah's Ark made of the recycled original maps from Wolfenstein 3D including the same items' placements and even

16827-423: The quad damage . Although the name and/or graphics may be different in other games the concept and feature of the power-up remains the same in other games. With the game Unreal (1998, by Epic ), the rules were enhanced with some widely accepted improvements: This game's approach to combat achievements tracking is different from Unreal Tournament . In deathmatch, the player might be rewarded with awards for

17040-420: The sci-fi FPS game Marathon the 21th of December 1994 still exclusively on Mac , which streamlined concepts from their previous game Pathways Into Darkness by eliminating role-playing elements in favor of the shooter action spurred by Doom 's success. Marathon was highly successful, leading to two sequels Marathon 2: Durandal released the 24th of November 1995 then Marathon: Infinity released

17253-601: The soul spheres . Although the name and/or graphics may be different in other games the concept and feature of the power-up remains the same in other games. Corridor 7: Alien Invasion released by Capstone Software in 1994. Rise of the Triad was first released as shareware in 1994 by Apogee Software, Ltd. and honed an expansive multiplayer mode that pioneered a variety of deathmatch features. Hexen: Beyond Heretic released by Raven Software in 1995. Notable power-ups that are featured in most consecutive games are i.a.

17466-448: The "adventurous" style of the levels. While calling the levels innovative, PC Gamer found there to be too many "claustrophobic" and labyrinthine levels. The latter view was disputed by PC Zone , who described the levels as being more "complex and overlapping" compared to the original's, which it described were focused on "winding tunnels, tiny chambers, huge caverns which lead to micro alleyways, long cramped corridors [etc.]". However,

17679-560: The 15th of May 1996, was the last commercial game which used and modified the Doom engine before id released the new Quake engine the following month and it introduced some RPVG 's features into the standard FPS formula such as an actual lively open-world filled with NPCs , dialogues with choices of answers, some of them were even voiced, trade, reinforcements who engage the enemies in battle, mandatory and optional quests, character's evolution of his abilities, an intriguing plot branching into different routes and conclusions according to

17892-506: The 15th of October 1996 to form the Marathon Trilogy , and becoming the standard for FPS games on Mac which pioneered or was an early adopter of several new gameplay features such as default freelook , ammo clips and weapons reloading though not manually, forcing the player to keep an eye on their ammo clips to anticipate the next reloading, dual-wielded and dual-function weapons, a motion sensor to detect both enemies and allies in

18105-425: The 17th of March 1995 ), a game in which the player pilots a spacecraft around caves and factory ducts, was among the earliest truly three-dimensional first-person shooters. It abandoned sprites and ray casting in favour of polygonal models and allowed movement through all of the six possible degrees of freedom . The 28th of April 1995, the Japanese company Exact released the successor to Geograph Seal for

18318-414: The 23th of December 1994 which introduced larger maps , vertical aiming, flying, gibs , randomized ambient sound effects, interactive environments such as rushing water and winds which push the player along, an inventory system to store and select many different items which range from health potions to the "morph ovum" which transforms enemies into chickens and one of the most notable item that can be found

18531-567: The 27th of October 1993, used a heavily modified version of Wolf3D engine made by John Carmack during summer 1992 who offered it to Raven Software after he was impressed with their first RPVG Black Crypt because he was curious about how Raven would use his game engine to make a RPVG instead of a FPSG. ShadowCaster was the first commercial game released with classic "2.5D Doom engine " improvements such as distance fogging, non-orthogonal walls, textured ceilings and floors, etc before Doom itself came out. It introduced some RPG elements into

18744-546: The 3D engines that powered the games of that period, such as the iconic id Tech 2 , the first iteration of the Unreal Engine , or the more versatile Build . Other seminal games were released during the years, with Marathon enhancing the narrative and puzzle elements, Duke Nukem 3D introducing voice acting, complete interactivity with the environment, and city-life settings to the genre, and games like Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six and Counter-Strike starting to adopt

18957-402: The 5th of May 1992 in which the player had to explore mazes while battling Nazis to find keys required to unlock doors to reach each floor's exit all while searching every wall for secret areas filled with treasures for a higher score until each episode's last floor's boss and was an instant success because of its first episode's distribution and spread as shareware whereas the second and

19170-457: The 6th of May 1996, was a sequel to the first Witchaven which set the knight from the first game onto an even more perilous quest to rescue the princess abducted by the witch 's sister seeking vengeance, still licensed on 3D Realms ' Build engine , it added dual weapons wielding or wielding a shield in the place of the second weapon as well as a map editor to let players create and share their own maps , however Capstone didn't fix

19383-657: The Hill, Kill the Man with the Ball, and cooperative campaign) and a map editor for players to create and share their own maps for the games. The Marathon games also had a strong emphasis on storytelling in addition to the action, which revolved around evolving relationships between the human player's character and some AIs during a surprise invasion and subsequent war against a hostile alien Empire which already conquered and enslaved some other alien species, much like Bungie's future projects such as

19596-423: The PC version's improvements included in the port, but the former reported an average rate of ten frames per second that would drop even lower with the cockpit displays disabled, and the latter believed that the frame rate drops cost an otherwise straight port of the PC version the opportunity to become a PlayStation hit. Rubenstein disputed the criticisms of the frame rate, which he called smooth, and GamePro said

19809-628: The Phoenix cannon which fires energy orbs that rebound off walls, the Omega cannon which fires electrostatic discharge , and the Guided Missile which can be remote piloted by the player. The player can also collect equipment items which grant special abilities. For example, a converter exists for converting energy in excess of 100 units into shields, whereas the afterburner allows the player to temporarily fly forward twice as fast. Levels may contain energy stations

20022-467: The ability to crouch, jump, or look and aim up and down. Dark Forces also was one of the first games to incorporate 3D-designed objects rendered into the game's 2.5D graphics engine. The game's success launched the Star Wars: Jedi Knight series, beginning with the direct sequel Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II the 9th of October 1997. Descent (released by Parallax Software

20235-488: The action directly through the eyes of the main character . This genre shares multiple common traits with other shooter games , and in turn falls under the action games category. Since the genre's inception, advanced 3D and pseudo-3D graphics have proven fundamental to allow a reasonable level of immersion in the game world , and this type of game helped pushing technology progressively further, challenging hardware developers worldwide to introduce numerous innovations in

20448-569: The action had to take place in enclosed areas, such as corridors and small rooms. During the 1990s, the genre was one of the main cornerstones for technological advancements of computer graphics, starting with the release of Quake in 1996. Quake was one of the first real-time 3D rendered video games in history, and quickly became one of the most acclaimed shooter games of all time. Graphics accelerator hardware became essential to improve performances and add new effects such as full texture mapping , dynamic lighting and particle processing to

20661-408: The additional support and encouragement for game modifications attracted players who wanted to tinker with the game and create their own modules. According to creator John Romero, Quake ' s 3D world was inspired by the 3D fighting game Virtua Fighter . Quake was also intended to expand the genre with Virtua Fighter influenced melee brawling , but this element was eventually scrapped from

20874-493: The appearance of a rat running through a maze. Another crucial early game that influenced first-person shooters was Wayout . It featured the player trying to escape a maze, using ray casting to render the environment, simulating visually how each wall segment would be rendered relative to the player's position and facing angle. This allowed more freeform movement compared to the grid-based and cardinal Maze War and Spasim . Among PLATO games, Witz and Boland's 1977 Futurewar ,

21087-429: The area, gravity alterations, swimming, interactive environments such as healing stations, oxygen stations, save points , teleporters , many computer terminals spread all around the levels as plot devices which provided messages, informations, various objectives and maps to the player's character as well as friendly defense drones and non-player characters (NPCs), versatile multiplayer modes (such as King of

21300-480: The atmosphere was gripping, the aliens were more appreciated than the stereotypes of Arabian people, the AI was improved with some enemies patrolling routes and some others camouflaging into environments or being invisible and not attacking until the player was close enough to ambush them, providing an actual challenge to players, and the game was considerably more evolved than Wolfenstein 3D and Blake Stone , however it

21513-444: The camera, ending with the words "to be continued..." being displayed. Parallax Software began Descent II ' s development as an expansion pack for the original Descent game using a CD's storage, but it later evolved into a separate project lasting about one year. Descent II ' s graphics were upgraded to operate at Super VGA standards, and can also take advantage of 3D acceleration graphics cards . The MIDI soundtrack

21726-433: The case of Portal , the 'gun' the player character carries is used to create portals through walls rather than fire projectiles). Some commentators also extend the definition to include combat flight simulators and space battle games, whenever the cockpit of the aircraft is depicted from a first-person point of view. Like most shooter games, first-person shooters involve an avatar , one or more ranged weapons , and

21939-628: The character they are controlling (usually from behind, or above). The primary design focus is combat, mainly involving firearms or other types of long range weapons. A defining feature of the genre is "player-guided navigation through a three-dimensional space." This is a defining characteristic that clearly distinguishes the genre from other types of shooting games that employ a first-person perspective , including light gun shooters , rail shooters , shooting gallery games , or older shooting electro-mechanical games . First person-shooter games are thus categorized as being distinct from light gun shooters,

22152-416: The construction of complex cinematic storylines with a well defined cast of secondary characters to interact with. Furthermore, certain puzzle or platforming games are also sometimes categorized as first-person shooters, in spite of lacking any direct combat or shooting element, instead using a first-person perspective to help players immerse within the game and better navigate 3D environments (for example, in

22365-431: The context, other first-person shooters may incorporate some imaginative variations, including futuristic prototypes, alien-technology or magical weapons, and/or implementing a wide array of different projectiles, from lasers, to energy, plasma, rockets, and arrows. These many variations may also be applied to the tossing of grenades, bombs, spears and the like. Also, more unconventional modes of destruction may be employed by

22578-425: The cube the player ship is in and the areas of other cubes the camera can see through their portals, and the process is repeated as the player enters a different polyhedron. Cubes can be deformed so long as they remain convex . Respectively, these prevent overdraw and accelerate portal rendering , making the engine practical to run on even inexpensive personal computers of that time. The precedeing Descent introduced

22791-452: The current tendency to release most titles as cross-platform, like many games in the Far Cry and Call of Duty series. First-person shooters are a type of shooter game that relies on a first-person point of view with which the player experiences the action through the eyes of the character . They differ from third-person shooters in that, in a third-person shooter, the player can see

23004-482: The developers royalties on their sale since 2007. As a result, Parallax terminated the 21-year sales agreement, revoking from Interplay the permission to distribute the trilogy. Later, the games were also removed from Steam. The trilogy returned on Good Old Games for sale in November 2017 and later on Steam. Upon release, Descent II received very positive reviews from video game critics. Citing its replay value, GameSpot commented: "If you don't like Descent at least

23217-474: The difference (i.e. experience, not taking into account the actual skill) between a human opponent and a computer controlled opponent may be near nil, however for a skilled player the lack of human intelligence is usually easily noticed in most bot implementations; regardless of the actual skill of the bot—which lack of intelligence can be at least somewhat compensated for in terms of e.g. extreme (superhuman) accuracy and aim. However, some systems deliberately inform

23430-584: The earlier platformers Duke Nukem and Duke Nukem II ), released as shareware the 29th of January 1996, which ran on the then new Build engine developed by Ken Silverman with the support of John Carmack . Duke Nukem 3D won acclaim for its humour based around stereotyped machismo as well as its adrenalinic gameplay and graphics. However, some found the game's (and later the whole series') treatment of women to be derogatory and tasteless. Witchaven 2: Blood Vengeance , developed by Capstone Software and published by their parent company IntraCorp

23643-399: The earliest PC games to support force feedback. Virtual reality and stereoscopic graphics are also officially supported. In the game's single-player mode, the player must complete four levels in each of six differently themed star systems where different types of robots attempt to hinder the player's progress. In each level, the player must find and destroy the mine's reactor and then escape

23856-444: The enemy attack dogs with giant rats to allow it to be released on SNES because of their anti-violence policy. id Software released a map editor to let players create and share online their own home-made maps for the game which started the players' modding communities who blossomed with Doom and maintain their games alive continuously sustaining new content for them. During Doom 's development, id Software quickly developed

24069-832: The environment to varying degrees, from basics such as using doors, to problem solving puzzles based on a variety of interactive objects. In some games, the player can damage the environment, also to varying degrees: one common device is the use of barrels containing explosive material which the player can shoot, harming nearby enemies. Other games feature environments which are extensively destructible, allowing for additional visual effects. The game world will often make use of science fiction, historic (particularly World War II ) or modern military themes, with such antagonists as aliens , monsters , terrorists and soldiers of various types. Games feature multiple difficulty settings; in harder modes, enemies are tougher, more aggressive and do more damage, and power-ups are limited. In easier modes,

24282-413: The field of graphics processing units . Multiplayer gaming has been an integral part of the experience, and became even more prominent with the diffusion of internet connectivity in recent years. Although earlier games predate it by 20 years, Wolfenstein 3D (1992) was the highest-profile archetype upon which most subsequent first-person shooters were based. One such game, considered the progenitor of

24495-580: The final game. Shadow Warrior , developed and published by 3D Realms the 13th of May 1997, introduced 3D voxels instead of 2D sprites for weapons and inventory items as well as weapons' secondary firing mode, climbable ladders, true room-over-room situations, transparent water, some vehicles to drive, and a brand new Asian hero named Lo Wang into a brand new Asian setting in contrast to its predecessor Duke Nukem 3D's occidental atmosphere and Shadow Warrior, just as its predecessor, features deliberately immature and politically incorrect humor, as well as

24708-421: The first Descent and six of ten weapons from the full Descent II . The Descent II demo featured the first three regular levels of the game (the teleporter to the secret level was disabled), after completing the third level the player moves from Zeta Aquilae to a new star system with the story to be continued. The full release (see below) adds a fourth regular level (with a boss in lieu of the reactor) as well as

24921-544: The first eight regular levels and two secret levels (constituting the first and second star systems, "Zeta Aquilae" and "Quartzon"). Not compatible with the Descent II full release, Destination Quartzon was bundled software with hardware such as the Logitech WingMan Extreme joystick and Diamond Multimedia video cards with the Voodoo Graphics chipset. In November 1996 came Descent II: The Infinite Abyss ,

25134-424: The first game's issues and it was their last game before going extinct as they were developing a Build-based sequel to their previous Wolf3D -based game Corridor 7 when their parent company IntraCorp went bankrupt . Witchaven 2 was open-sourced in 2006 then source-ported into BuildGDX by its community which fixed most of its original issues in 2018. The game PowerSlave was initially designed using

25347-420: The flag , in which teams attempt to penetrate the opposing base, capture a flag and return it to their own base whilst preventing the other team from doing the same. Other game modes may involve attempting to capture enemy bases or areas of the map, attempting to take hold of an object for as long as possible while evading other players, or deathmatch variations involving limited lives or in which players fight over

25560-430: The floor, and Ken himself voiced the protagonist and filled his game with pictures of himself which hurt the player if they dared to shoot them, which made his game personal. Epic MegaGames , then Wolfenstein 3D 's publisher Apogee Software 's main competitor, noticed it, saw potential, then signed a commercial agreement with Ken's father, as Ken was still minor. However, the original Advanced Systems' Ken's Labyrinth

25773-495: The form of up to 12 players' deathmatch and team deathmatch modes (believed to be the first FPS game to allow that many players) and 8 additional maps made specially for it. In deathmatch, the player could choose among 12 of the game 's characters both humans and aliens who had different speed and health stats, however all characters used the same weapons though. Corridor 7 was a significant improvement after Capstone's previous FPS game Operation Body Count (read above),

25986-560: The frame rate only drops when the action is at its most intense. He praised the additions to the original Descent such as the FMV cutscenes, the Guide-Bot, and the Thief-Bot. Next Generation was also pleased with these elements, summarizing that the game "features just enough improvements to the aging series to make it a welcome addition to the fold". However, it judged that the Descent series lacked

26199-523: The full version while leaving the existing shareware files intact including player saves, the Descent II demo was a self-contained program that was not upgradable to the full version. Like the original Descent the demo version of Descent II presented the story as still screens with text and also uses the in-game engine for the mine escape sequence; while the full version replaces all of these with full-motion video pre-rendered cutscenes incorporating voice acting. The demo features eight of ten weapons from

26412-412: The game along with some score 's points. This is not what Wisdom Tree had originally designed though, since they originally designed a FPS game based on the horror movies Hellraiser themselves adapted from Clive Barker 's novels , until they realized that this was in contradiction with their christian social image then designed Super 3D Noah's Ark instead. A popular rumor has it that Wolf3D engine

26625-424: The game and the rules used — if it does, players that kill a teammate (called a team kill) usually decrease their own score and the team's score by one point; in certain games, they may also themselves be killed as punishment, and/or may be removed from the game for repeat offenses. The team with the highest frag-count at the end wins. In a last man standing deathmatch (or a battle royale game ), players start with

26838-407: The game but contain many power-ups, and can be revisited provided that their reactors have not been destroyed and the teleporters are discovered. Players cannot save the game in a secret level, and have to teleport back to a regular level in order to save their game progress. The player's ship is protected by a shield which decreases when incurring damage from attacks and collisions with force fields,

27051-437: The game by using microphones and speakers. Deathmatches have different rules and goals depending on the game, but an example of a typical FPS-deathmatch session is where every player is versus every other player. The game begins with each player being "spawned" (starting) at random locations—picked from a fixed predefined set. Being spawned entails having the score, health, armor and equipment reset to default values which usually

27264-418: The game to eventually name his black metal band after it. Witchaven was open-sourced in 2006 then source-ported into JFBuild by JonoF and into BuildGDX by its community which fixed most of its original issues in 2018. William Shatner's TekWar , developed by Capstone Software and published by SoftKey Multimedia Inc. the 30th of September 1995, barely ten days after Witchaven (read above),

27477-500: The game's code with him to Massachusetts Institute of Technology , where with help from Dave Lebling to create an eight-player version that could be played over ARPANET , computer-run players using artificial intelligence, customizable maps, online scoreboards and a spectator mode. Spasim had a documented debut at the University of Illinois in 1974 on the PLATO mainframe system. The game

27690-498: The game's potential to induce motion sickness , but ultimately recommended it. The PlayStation version received rather mixed reviews. Most of the critics praised the artificial intelligence. The most negative reviews came from Glenn Rubenstein of GameSpot and Shawn Smith of Electronic Gaming Monthly , both of whom said they disliked the entire Descent series and its basic concept of 3D navigation in levels which have no clear "up" or "down", as well as GameFan , which lambasted

27903-409: The game, causing frequent bandwidth reductions. Doom has been considered the most important first-person shooter ever made. It was highly influential not only on subsequent shooter games but on video gaming in general, and has been made available on almost every video gaming system since. Multiplayer gaming, which is now integral to the first-person shooter genre, was first successfully achieved on

28116-491: The game; the families of several victims later unsuccessfully attempted to sue numerous video game companies - among them id Software - whose work the families claimed inspired the massacre. John Carmack explained how he designed his Doom engine to Ken Silverman that he considered his only equal which inspired Ken who was in the process of developing his Build engine . Operation Body Count , developed on Wolf3D engine and released by Capstone Software on 1 January 1994,

28329-400: The genre's mainstream acceptance and popularity, was Doom (1993), often cited as the most influential game in this category; for years, the term "Doom clone" was used to designate this type of game, due to Doom ' s enormous success. Another common name for the genre in its early days was "corridor shooter", since processing limitations of that era's computer hardware meant that most of

28542-461: The graphics and the fluidity of the animations, its only criticism being the complexity of controlling the ship using only the keyboard and not a joystick. It thus highly recommended using one, and also suggested that a direction indicator would have helped beginners become adjusted to the controls. Macworld judged the graphics to be "extremely detailed and well rendered", but noted that some smaller robots resembled origami . MacADDICT wrote that

28755-482: The habitual inferiority of PlayStation ports of good PC games. Smith and his three co-reviewers all criticized the choppy frame rate, though Crispin Boyer noted that the problem is largely eliminated when playing with the cockpit displays on. Both Boyer and Dan Hsu praised the additions over the original Descent , such as the Guide-Bot and the new lighting effects. Both GameFan and Dmitry Reznikov of GameLand lauded all of

28968-403: The inclusion of the Guide-Bot, a scouting robot that guides the player to their objectives. The PlayStation version's reception was rather mixed, with critics often disagreeing in their evaluations of its frame rate . A sequel, Descent 3 , was released in 1999. Like its predecessor, Descent II is a six-degrees-of-freedom shoot 'em up game in which the player pilots a fighter spaceship from

29181-455: The intensity and mood of competitors such as Doom and Quake . These views were echoed by Roger Burchill of Ultra Game Players , who felt that the Doom -styled gameplay became dated, though he did welcome the link cable-based multiplayer mode. Descent II was a finalist for CNET Gamecenter 's 1996 "Best Action Game" award, which ultimately went to Quake . The editors wrote that " Descent II offered even more insane vertigo action than

29394-403: The item. In some deathmatch modes power-ups will not respawn at all. Certain power-ups are especially powerful, which can often lead to the game rotating around controlling power-ups —i.e. all other things being equal, the player who controls the strongest power-ups (collecting the items most often) is the one that will have the best potential for making the best score. If the session does have

29607-509: The launch titles of the Good Old Games beta on September 8, 2008, and on February 19, 2014, it was re-released on Valve's Steam digital distribution service. However, the Descent trilogy was withdrawn from Good Old Games in December 2015 after its creators, Mike Kulas and Matt Toschlog, alleged that Interplay, who owns the Descent trademark but not the copyright of the trilogy, had not paid

29820-410: The magazine considered to be previously unparalleled. Later in 2000, the same magazine ranked it No. 90 on their list of the top 100 games of all time, calling it the best of the Descent series. First-person shooter A first-person shooter ( FPS ) is a video game centered on gun fighting and other weapon-based combat seen from a first-person perspective , with the player experiencing

30033-573: The market as 3D Realms thanks to Ken Silverman and some personality. Doom , released the 10th of December 1993, refined Wolfenstein 3D's template by adding support for higher resolution, improved textures, variations in height (e.g., stairs and platforms the player's character could climb upon), more intricate level design ( Wolfenstein 3D was limited to a grid based system where walls had to be orthogonal to each other, whereas Doom allowed for any inclination) and rudimentary illumination effects such as flickering lights and areas of darkness, creating

30246-450: The market while a challenger Captone Software persisted at attempting to be original and compete with them and failed every time for diverse reasons where another challenger LucasArts succeeded and Bungie Software made FPS games featuring a complex plot, the modding communities who sustain life into their games blossomed starting from Doom, 2D sprites were replaced with 3D polygons starting from Descent then Quake and Apogee Software returned on

30459-524: The market, with Apogee Software/3D Realms and Epic MegaGames being their main competitors. This technological race, monopoly, and three-ways rivalry started during the Wolfenstein 3D's era from 1992 to 1993. Wolfenstein 3D was the first episodic FPS game developed by id Software , as a successor to the successful 1980s 2D infiltration video-games Castle Wolfenstein and Beyond Castle Wolfenstein from Muse Software , and published by Apogee Software

30672-428: The mine through an exit door before the mine self-destructs. Every fourth level has a boss robot that takes the place of the reactor. Each level is composed of rooms separated by doors, most of which can be opened by shooting or bumping into them. Some other doors are colored blue, yellow, or red and require a key of the corresponding color to be opened. In addition to brightening passages by shooting flares or turning on

30885-455: The music when played on a stereo system as a "veritable sonic maelstrom." Reviews for the Macintosh version iterated many critical points found in those for the DOS version. Making similar comments about this version as the ones about Descent II for DOS, Next Generation noted it as an unusual case of a Macintosh port releasing shortly after the DOS version. GameRevolution enthusiastically lauded

31098-463: The only way to get rid of some invulnerable enemies, water fountains which slowly restored health (much like in Duke Nukem 3D three years later), changed the goal from the original's merely escaping the labyrinth to rescue the player's abducted dog Sparky and save the world, added the requirement to have Sparky follow the player to the exit of each floor to be able to reach the next floor, which made

31311-509: The original Descent ' s levels for this game. The PlayStation version of Descent II , known as Descent Maximum , was launched on May 15, 1997 in North America and in mid-1997 in Europe. Instead of a straight port, it had 36 new levels, textures and full-motion video over the PC version of Descent II . On October 29, 1997, Interplay published Descent I and II: The Definitive Collection ,

31524-466: The original game". Conversely, PC Review felt the Guide-Bot ran contrary to the disorienting character of the series and that the Guide-Bot diminished the need to use strategy, but did write that using the robot was optional. Computer Game Review liked the AI of the new cast of robots in general and other measures taken to prevent getting lost, such as plotting map positions with markers. The multiplayer mode

31737-414: The original, plus an added bonus that set the tone for computer gaming in 1996--a multiplayer mode". In 1996, Computer Gaming World declared Descent II the 123rd-best computer game ever released. It was also ranked No.  46 on PC PowerPlay ' s list of the 50 games of the century, due to the game's "schizophrenically devised" maps, robots' artificial intelligence, and atmosphere whose intensity

31950-439: The other for looking and aiming . It is common to display the character's hands and weaponry in the main view, with a heads-up display showing health, ammunition and location details. Often, it is possible to overlay a map of the surrounding area. First-person shooters generally focus on action gameplay, with fast-paced combat and dynamic firefights being a central point of the experience, though certain titles may also place

32163-416: The physics implementation as is as such also game dependent. Most modern deathmatch games features a high level of graphic violence ; a normal modern implementation will contain high quality human characters being killed, e.g. moderate amounts of blood, screams of pain and death, exploding bodies with associated gibs are common. Some games feature a way to disable and/or reduce the level of gore. However,

32376-403: The playable character, such as flames, electricity, telekinesis or other supernatural powers, and traps. In the early era of first-person shooters, often designers allowed characters to carry a large number of different weapons with little to no reduction in speed or mobility. More modern games started to adopt a more realistic approach, where the player can only equip a handheld gun, coupled with

32589-524: The player can choose to instantly respawn or remain dead. The armor variable affects the health variable by reducing the damage taken, the reduction in health is in concept inversely proportional to the value of the armor times the actual damage caused; with the obvious differences in various implementations. Some games may account for the location of the body injured when the damage is deduced, while many—especially older implementations—do not. In most games, no amount of armor causes any reduced mobility—i.e.

32802-441: The player can fly through to recharge their ship's energy level while in motion, as well as generators that spawn more robots. Shooting out certain control panels causes a variety of events, such as doors opening, walls being removed, or force fields being deactivated. In a few levels, behind some hidden doors are teleporters that warp the player to the current star system's secret level. These secret levels are not required to complete

33015-495: The player can succeed through reaction times alone; on more difficult settings, it is often necessary to memorize the levels through trial and error. First-person shooters may feature a multiplayer mode, taking place on specialized levels. Some games are designed specifically for multiplayer gaming, and have very limited single player modes in which the player competes against game-controlled characters termed "bots". Massively multiplayer online first-person shooters like those in

33228-537: The player drew a weapon who they begged to not shoot while holding their hands up and ran away for their life whereas cops drew their gun onto the player and ordered him to drop their weapon and enemies shot him on sight from everywhere without the cops ever reacting whereas they shot the player if he dared to shoot back at the enemies, which is the main issue with this game: everyone is allowed to shoot you but you are not allowed to shoot anyone. Some civilians were actually kamikaze androids who self-destructed when close to

33441-409: The player experience the game less real as the game contains highly unreal and unrealistic elements. All normal maps will contain various power-ups ; i.e. extra health, armor, ammunition and other (more powerful than default) weapons. Once collected by a player the power-up will respawn after a defined time at the same location, the time for an item to respawn depends upon the game mode and the type of

33654-468: The player have to pay attention to another character beside their own, and commercialized Ken's Labyrinth v2 still as shareware the 21st of March 1993. All versions of Ken's Labyrinth got to be source-ported many times and even onto Nintendo Switch by a fan. As soon as id Software showed off some previews of Doom in the middle of its development, Ken Silverman started to develop his own game engine to rival with John Carmack once again, used

33867-563: The player is an unnamed mercenary (sometimes referred to as the Strifeguy) who joins the Front to fight the Order's oppressive rule while being remotely assisted by a Front's radio operative woman nicknamed Blackbird who occasionally comments with humor the situations that the player encounters. However despite all of its innovations, Strife went relatively unnoticed because it was released right between

34080-466: The player moved around. Despite some of its original ideas , it was badly made, the terrorists were stereotypes of Arabian people, the AI was not smart enough to make nor the enemies pose any challenge nor the squad's teammates be actually useful, and being based on Wolf3D engine after Doom was released made it already technologically outdated and "doomed" from the start as opposite to Blake Stone which did enjoy one week of glory before Doom

34293-400: The player though. During the Doom & Quake's era from 1993 to 1997, FPS games were still all about their game engines as original and innovative games were ignored for the only reason that their game engine was outdated. FPS games were simplistic shoot them all without any complex plot however their gameplay started to evolve and the combo id Software & Raven Software still dominated

34506-430: The player to a specified objective or powerup. Additionally, many stages have human hostages that award an additional point bonus if they are rescued before completing the level. Within each level, the player may find and collect power-ups scattered throughout the mine or dropped by dying robots. Many of the power-ups expand the ship's weaponry, which is divided into primary and secondary weapons. Primary weapons range from

34719-531: The player to find other weapons and save the strongest weapons for the strongest foes, evolving stats from earned experience where each level up unlocked new spells and abilities such as lockpicking in the form of an unlocking spell as well as dual wielding some weapons. The campaign involved a knight on an epic quest to defeat a witch who cast a curse of never-ending darkness onto his land. In order to complete this quest, he had to battle hordes of minions with both medieval weapons and magical spells to reach

34932-450: The player when inspecting the score list which player(s) are bots and which are human (e.g. OpenArena). In the event that the player is aware of the nature of the opponent it will affect the cognitive process of the player regardless of the player's skill. Modern implementations allow for new players to join after the game has started, the maximum number of players that can join is arbitrary for each game, map and rules and can be selected by

35145-406: The player will jump and fire at rocket at the floor area immediately under the feet of the same player, which will cause the player to jump higher compared to a regular jump as a result of the rocket blast (at the obvious expense of the health variable being somewhat reduced from self-inflicted injury). The types of techniques available and how the techniques may be performed by the player differs from

35358-496: The player will still advance to the next level. If the player loses all lives, the game will end, and their high scores are recorded. Points are gained for destroying robots, rescuing the hostages, and end-of-level bonuses based on the player's performance with score multipliers for escaping the mine; scoring enough points results in an extra life. Descent II also features a multiplayer mode whereby two to eight players can compete against each other in several game types, which include

35571-425: The player's approach, weather effects, some destructible objects, scripted environmental changes such as earthquakes, different character classes to allow different playstyles as well as interconnected maps through hub maps instead of the standard linear succession of maps which granted a taste of open-world in a FPS game. Apogee Software , then renamed 3D Realms , followed up with Duke Nukem 3D (sequel to

35784-492: The player's choices and actions, some burning effects as well as some infiltration gameplay such as stealth, disguises and alarms. The plot takes place in a medieval world struck by a comet which released a virus which wiped out almost all life on the planet and corrupted most of the remaining people who created a high-tech theocratic new world order known as "The Order" whereas the few remaining free people organized into an underground resistance known as "The Front" and

35997-459: The player, taking them into their explosion . Half of the game also took place into the Matrix. William Shatner's TekWar was the worst of Capstone's FPS games however it still got to be source-ported into BuildGDX. Raven Software upgraded the Doom engine further and released Hexen: Beyond Heretic the 30th of October 1995 which added jumping, more immersive environments with effects such as swirling leaves or scattering bats upon

36210-583: The players to use teamwork and strategy in order to succeed; the players can often command a squad of characters, which may be controlled by the A.I. or by human teammates, and can be given different tasks during the course of the mission. First-person shooters typically present players with a vast arsenal of weapons, which can have a large impact on how they will approach the game. Some games offer realistic reproductions of actual existing (or even historical) firearms, simulating their rate of fire, magazine size, ammunition amount, recoil and accuracy. Depending on

36423-446: The range of all weapons at once, also replaced the original final boss with Ken himself, added diverse monsters, temporary power-ups such as reflecting enemies' projectiles, kill enemies on contact, and invincibility, as well as treasures for buying these power-ups from vending-machines and for paying doors' toll, slot-machines to win coins instead of finding treasures in secret areas, death-traps such as holes in floors which were

36636-437: The release of Duke Nukem 3D , id Software released the much anticipated Quake the 22nd of June 1996. Like Doom , Quake was influential and genre-defining, featuring fast-paced, gory gameplay, within a completely 3D game environment, and making use of real-time rendered polygonal models instead of sprites. It was centered on online gaming and featured multiple match types still found in first-person shooter games today. It

36849-441: The same color within the floor whereas some computers were traps which triggered an alarm which attracted nearby enemies to the player. Capstone Software released Corridor 7 first as floppy disks , then as a CD-ROM the 6th of May 1995 which featured a different soundtrack , randomization of placements within floors, and added 10 more levels into the alien homeworld with new weapons and alien types along with multiplayer in

37062-609: The same in Catacomb 3-D . Catacomb 3-D also introduced the display of the protagonist's hand and weapon (in this case, magical spells) on the screen, whereas previously aspects of the player's avatar were not visible. The experience of developing Ultima Underworld would make it possible for Looking Glass to create the Thief and System Shock series years later. From Wolfenstein 3D to Quake, FPS games were all about their game engines. id Software & Raven Software completely dominated

37275-399: The secret areas. Despite its violent themes, Wolfenstein largely escaped the controversy generated by the later Doom , although it was banned from Germany due to the use of Nazi iconography which is a sensitive topic there where Wolfenstein has been forbidden until 2022 and Nintendo too required id Software to remove blood , gore, and all Nazi iconography as well as replace

37488-526: The secret level to the Zeta Aquilae system, making it in line with the next five star systems (each has four regular levels plus a secret level), for a total of 30 levels. The full base Descent II game was published for DOS by Interplay in the United States on March 13, 1996, and in the United Kingdom on March 29, 1996. It was co-distributed by LaserSoft Imaging , whom Interplay gave the rights as part of

37701-403: The sequel to those of Doom II , but complained about the graininess of the textures, and the two magazines warned that players who did not care for the original might not care for the sequel either. The addition of the Guide-Bot was well-received. In a very positive review, PC Magazine considered it to be a valuable addition to the game "because the automap is just as confusing as it was in

37914-484: The server. Some maps are suitable for small numbers of players, some are suitable for larger numbers. The goal for each player is killing the other players by any means possible which counts as a frag, either by direct assault or manipulating the map, the latter counts as a frag in some games, some not; in either case—to attain the highest score—this process should be repeated as many times as possible, with each iteration performed as quickly as possible. The session may have

38127-414: The setting of the game is usually that of a fictional world, the player may resurrect in the form of mentioned respawning and the characters will usually have superhuman abilities, e.g. able to tolerate numerous point blank hits from a machine gun directly to the head without any armour, jumping extreme inhuman distances and falling extreme distances to mention a few things. These factors together may make

38340-413: The ship. Unlike other first-person shooters, its six-degrees-of-freedom scheme allows the player to move and rotate in any three-dimensional space and direction. Descent II started as a project intended to expand the original using a compact disc 's storage, and later became a standalone product. The game received very positive reviews from video game critics, who widely lauded the multiplayer mode and

38553-487: The sixth system, the last mine seems to run all through a planetoid, which is revealed in the final cutscene to be a large spaceship. After the spaceship breaks apart, the Material Defender alerts Dravis to his return home, but his warp drive malfunctions and he teleports to an unknown location. The camera then fades to that location and the ship appears, heavily damaged and crackling with excess radiation drifting towards

38766-534: The specific design elements which constitute a first-person shooter. For example, titles like Deus Ex or BioShock may be considered as first-person shooters, but may also fit into the role-playing games category, as they borrow extensively from that genre. Other examples, like Far Cry and Rage , could also be considered adventure games , because they focus more on exploration than simple action, they task players with multiple different objectives other than just killing enemies, and they often revolve around

38979-474: The tactics they saw players use in multiplayer mode, such as dodging behind walls and sneaking up from behind. The C -written code composing the AI was expanded to about 4,000 lines, a task the two described as being difficult. The Descent II demo was released in December 1995, becoming one of the most downloaded PC games in January 1996. Unlike the preceding Descent whose shareware release could be upgraded to

39192-413: The third available after registration; and the three last prequel episodes available as a separate mission pack, to the point that it has since been credited for having single-handedly invented the concept of first-person-shooter as a genre of video-games. It was built on John Carmack 's ray casting technology already experimented into id's previous games Hovertank One and Catacomb 3D to create

39405-442: The traditional sense, making for a somewhat more believable overall experience. The game was praised for its artificial intelligence , selection of weapons and attention to detail and "has since been recognized as one of the greatest games of all time" according to GameSpot. Its sequel, Half-Life 2 , (released in 2004), was less influential though "arguably a more impressive game". Deathmatch (video games) The deathmatch

39618-447: The two magazines agreed that the levels were too hard on easier difficulty settings. PC Zone also praised support for virtual reality. Maximum wrote that the levels retained the 3D sensations and "ingenious structural design", but asserted the game's difficulty was made less frustrating because of the abundance of shield orbs, the inclusion of powerful weapons, and the ability to transfer energy to shields. Total Games Network described

39831-456: The two other overwhelmingly popular games Duke Nukem 3D and Quake which made the Doom engine already outdated by then. Still, players who discovered it many years after its original release appreciated its originality for its time and even compared it to Deus Ex and Marathon . Doom 's modding community source-ported Strife into GZDoom to update and upgrade it from its original version to modern standards. Shortly after

40044-455: The use of animated textures by the levels' new settings brought about a realistic alien world. It also put forth criticisms specifically for the Macintosh version, such as the high system requirements for the Power Mac and freezes that can lead to corrupt player files, which can be prevented by turning off all of the nonessential system extensions . The two aforementioned reviewers cautioned about

40257-417: The value is reduced to a very low negative value, the result may be gibbing depending upon the game. In most games, when a player dies (i.e. is fragged), the player will lose all equipment gained and the screen will continue to display the visible (still animated) scene that the player normally sees, and the score list is usually displayed—the frags. The display does not go black when the player dies. Usually

40470-435: The visor's battery, some aliens who camouflaged into the environments (like Blake Stone: Planet Strike released half a year later), screen jumpscares whenever the player was idle for 10 seconds, body armors , limited-use healing chambers, force fields which hurt the player if they walked into them, mines to trap corridors, maps of the floors, and replaced keys with security computer screens which unlocked all doors of

40683-418: The weapon was picked up. Even before the term deathmatch was first used, there existed games with a similar gameplay mode. MIDI Maze was a multiplayer first-person shooter for the Atari ST , released in 1987, which has been suggested as the first example of deathmatch gameplay. Sega 's 1988 third-person shooter arcade game Last Survivor featured eight-player deathmatch. Another early example of

40896-504: The witch on her volcanic island . It featured digitized graphics , however the characters made of clay didn't appeal to everyone and the environments were empty, as well as adjustable level of gore, the same Corridor 7 's trick to spawn a screen jumpscare whenever the player is idle, and it is known for game logic issues, dumb AI , hazardous map triggers and game physics that cause slippery player movement, sudden deaths, and faulty hit detection. That didn't stop an original fan of

41109-454: The world's first deathmatch with Snipes , a text-mode game that was later credited with being the inspiration behind Novell NetWare , although multiplayer games spread across multiple screens predate that title by at least 9 years in the form of Spasim and Maze War . Early evidence of the term's application to graphical video games exists. On August 6, 1982, Intellivision game developers Russ Haft and Steve Montero challenged each other to

41322-467: Was Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss , a March 1992 action role-playing game by Looking Glass Technologies that featured a first-person viewpoint and an advanced graphics engine. In October 1990, id developer John Romero learned about texture mapping from a phone call to Paul Neurath. Romero described the texture mapping technique to id programmer John Carmack , who remarked, "I can do that.", and would feel motivated by Looking Glass's example to do

41535-521: Was Capstone's first FPS game, was all about a terrorist attack on the UNO tower, and was an early attempt at making a tactical FPS game since the player was in command of an anti-terrorist squad that they could order around and even switch to any of their body at any time as long as they were not dead and featured some digitized graphics , transparent textures such as breakable glass, randomization of enemies and items' placement, body armors , booby-traps , and

41748-446: Was a medieval fantasy First Person Slasher game as in a melee -focused FPS game, reminiscent of Raven Software 's Heretic including an inventory system, both a single-player campaign and multiplayer, but far harder as it was far more tactical , making use of environmental hazards such as magma and traps against enemies, while implementing more of a RPG gameplay such as weapons' durability which broke after many uses, requiring

41961-498: Was a rudimentary space flight simulator for up to 32 players, featuring a first-person perspective. Both games were distinct from modern first-person shooters, involving simple tile-based movement where the player could only move from square to square and turn in 90-degree increments. Such games spawned others that used similar visuals to display the player as part of a maze (such as Akalabeth: World of Doom in 1979), and were loosely called "rat's eye view" games, since they gave

42174-433: Was also widely lauded. Computer Games Magazine called the Capture-the-Flag mode "intensely enjoyable", but expressed concerns about the lack of outdoor levels (these were added in the game's sequel, Descent 3 , released in 1999). Other critics differed in how they analyzed the level design. PC PowerPlay strongly praised the scenery and the combination of maneuvers, including shooting while strafing and turning , with

42387-455: Was begun in February 1994 and published by Raven Software the 1st of November 1994, marking the beginning of a new period for Raven who split into two groups: One which worked with id 's new DOOM engine to create Mage , a fantasy action game, which would eventually evolve into the game Heretic . The other team started on a project that was to use the engine from ShadowCaster to create

42600-662: Was close to Wolf3D engine . Then he improved his game with his friend Andrew Cotter, added narration to each floor , renamed it Ken's Labyrinth , and released it on Internet as shareware under his brother's company Advanced Systems on 1 January 1993. The game was about escaping a bizarre dream labyrinth full of people shooting projectiles at the player while projectiles were more balls than bullets, meaning they had limited range and were slow enough to dodge them as opposite to Wolfenstein 3D whose weapons were hitscan firearms , some walls reflected projectiles, killed enemies vanished without any death animation nor remnant body on

42813-417: Was composed by Dan Wentz, whereas the included redbook features industrial metal contributed by notable musicians such as Type O Negative and Ogre of Skinny Puppy . It cost $ 500,000 to produce the game. Descent II ' s portal engine remained fundamentally unchanged; it operates on the premise of adjacent cubes or polyhedra whose sides connecting them form portals. The scenes that are drawn are

43026-480: Was created that could handle moving platforms, catwalks, sloped areas, and transparent textures. The engine, by Carl Stika, was nicknamed STEAM. A small budget was granted for full-motion video sequences to be created for the game, to be presented between missions as briefings. CyClones allowed to use the mouse to aim without moving, as opposite to other FPS games from the time which bound the mouse to both aiming and moving simultaneously, and without turning either, as

43239-467: Was given to Wisdom Tree by id Software as a kind of " revenge " against Nintendo for all the censorship that Wolfenstein 3D had to go through to be on the Super Nintendo. However, there's no proof of this, and Wisdom Tree bought a license for the game engine like everybody else instead of having it "given" to them. The SNES version was not licensed by Nintendo and therefore couldn't be played on

43452-457: Was highly acclaimed for its atmospheric single-player campaign and well designed multiplayer maps. It featured a sniper rifle , the ability to perform head-shots, and the incorporation of stealth elements (all of these aspects were also included in the game's spiritual sequel, Perfect Dark ) as well as some Virtua Cop -inspired features such as weapon reloading, position-dependent hit reaction animations, penalties for killing innocents, and

43665-481: Was initially well-received but sales rapidly declined in the wake of the success of id's Doom , released a week later. It still got a sequel Blake Stone: Planet Strike the 28th of October 1994 which integrated the auto-map into the HUD as a rotating mini-map which revealed secret doors at the cost of consuming auto-mapper charges and added some enemies who camouflaged into the environment or were cloaked to surprise

43878-404: Was made from Ken and Andrew's limited resources to the point that Ken made the sound effects with his mouth, therefore Epic MegaGames made use of their resources to revamp the game, replaced the projectiles balls with bubble gum balls , starbursts which bounced off walls, and homing missiles , while collecting more of the same weapon increased their range and collecting thunderbolts increased

44091-414: Was originally developed in 1973 by Greg Thompson, Steve Colley and Howard Palmer, high-school students in a NASA work-study program trying to develop a program to help visualize fluid dynamics for spacecraft designs. The work became a maze game presented to the player in the first-person, and later included support for a second player and the ability to shoot the other player to win the game. Thompson took

44304-469: Was originally used in wrestling, starting in the 1950s, to denote certain brutal hardcore wrestling fights. The term "death match" in this sense appeared in the 1992 fighting arcade game World Heroes , where it denotes a game mode taking place in an arena with environmental hazards. The term deathmatch in the context of multiplayer video games may have been coined by game designer John Romero , while he and lead programmer John Carmack were developing

44517-484: Was released. OBC still got to be source-ported into GZDoom and remastered by its modding community eventually though. Corridor 7: Alien Invasion , developed and published by Capstone Software the 1st of March 1994, was their second attempt to make a FPS game. Still based on Wolf3D engine , the plot reminds strikingly of Half-Life 's, four years later, since it was about scientific experiments with gamma beam on an alien artifact brought from Mars by

44730-502: Was something that invented deathmatch " and that "Japanese fighting games fueled the creative impulse to create deathmatch in our shooters." Some games give a different name to these types of matches, while still using the same underlying concept. For example, in Perfect Dark , the name " Combat " is used and in Halo , deathmatch is known as " Slayer ". It has been suggested that in 1983, Drew Major and Kyle Powell probably played

44943-414: Was still based on the then outdated Wolf3D engine after Doom was released and therefore was "doomed" from the start too even if it did better than its predecessor, it was still not technologically on par with Doom and Capstone moved onto another new game engine after this game. Still, Corridor 7 was so appreciated that it got to be source-ported only five years after its original release into

45156-462: Was the first FPS game to gain a cult following of player clans (although the concept had existed previously in MechWarrior 2 ' s Netmech , with its Battletech lore as well as amongst MUD players), and would inspire popular LAN parties and events such as QuakeCon . The game's popularity and use of 3D polygonal graphics also helped to expand the growing market for video card hardware; and

45369-452: Was the second commercial game licensed on Apogee Software rebranded 3D Realms ' Ken Silverman 's new Build engine to rival id Software 's John Carmack 's Doom engine and was a FPS game adapted from William Shatner 's TekWar novels and TV series who personally contributed to the video-game to the point of live-acting the player's boss during briefings and debriefings. William Shatner's TekWar , both novels, TV series and video-game,

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