1. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (Switch)(Adventure)2. Final Fight [Japanese Version] (Switch)(Beat 'Em Up)3. Ziggurat (PC)(FPS)
4. Magrunner: Dark Pulse (PC)(FPS)
5. The King of Dragons [Japanese](Arcade)(Beat 'Em Up)6. Captain Commando [Japanese](Arcade)(Beat 'Em Up)7. Knights of the Round [Japanese](Arcade)(Beat 'Em Up)
8. The Witcher (PC)(RPG)9. Tenchi wo Kurau II(Arcade)(Beat 'Em Up)
10. Dark Sun: Shattered Lands (PC)(RPG)11. Lichdom: Battlemage (PC)(FPS/RPG Hybrid)
12. Star Wars: Republic Commando (PC)(FPS)13. DOOM 64 (PC)(FPS)
14. Half Dead 2 (PC)(Adventure)DOOM 64I used to thrill to playing this in a darkened bedroom as a teenager. My palms would get sweaty, and I'd glow an unhealthy pallor from the various sickly hues emitted from the TV screen. Yet every scream of a demon, every painful cry of a dying shotgun guy would push me onwards. I actually never got that far in DOOM 64 though, mainly because I could never quite get the hang of doing what I needed to do with an Nintendo 64 controller. Well, now that problem is officially rectified.
The DOOM 64 port to Steam to coincide with the release of DOOM Eternal is a thing of beauty. It gives me back the gloriously violent and addictive gameplay while also providing a modernized PC control scheme. I installed the game and within 48 hours had bested its levels, cracked open its secrets, and buried my face in its guts. The weapons include reskinned updates of your DOOM II favorites, with some tweaks in a few cases for better or worse, as well as the brand new Unmaker, a laser weapon that becomes absurdly boss-meltingly powerful if you manage to seek out the Demon Artifacts that power it up. The double-barrel shotgun was most often my work horse, though I also would swap to the chaingun, plasma rifle, or rocket launcher as needed. Most weapons in DOOM 64 stay relevant and useful, and even the basic pistol is useful for triggering shootable switches. The one weapon that falls away is the base shotgun, but admittedly that was also a trend in DOOM II.
If there is one downside to the guns, it's that there is no longer a reload animation for the double barrel, which means instead you simply have to wait and listen for when the weapon will be ready to fire again. That feels like a small price to pay, and in emergencies, I'd fire off a blast and swap to the chaingun to quickly put more bullets downfield as needed anyway. Hell, even melee got retooled to stay useful; berserker packs are no longer a time limited affair. When you find one, your bare hand is now the fist of an angry god for the rest of the level. This means even the most basic melee attack is still useful, though the double-bladed chainsaw can instead stunlock lesser enemies in place to shred them and use their bodies to block passageways and corridors, making both workable choices depending on your situation.
The level design in DOOM 64 is also usually masterful. There are shades of DOOM II's Hell levels as well as even Duke Nukem 3D's earthquake-prone canyons, some great puzzles mixed in, and some excellent layouts that give both open spaces and narrow corridors for combat. Each level feels unique, and with few exceptions, they're all fun. I only found one specific level that I'd consider a clunker, and it has to do more with a puzzle and a unique trap that felt out of place than anything else. While the kick ass music tracks that pumped us up in the previous installments have been replaced with ambient noise, what you do hear is unsettling, creepy, and at times even nightmarish. It feels more like Hell, and when mixed in with some of the storyline tidbits offered up at key points or at the start of secret levels, it really helps set the mood.
Yes, the modern conveniences do include achievements, but don't be mad about them. The Steam achievements for DOOM 64 mostly focus on exploring the game and the secret levels. There are a lot of things hidden in the level list that you don't know are there until you unlock the ability to dig through them, and this is what these achievements try to push you to do. They want you to find the hidden campaign and the secret 'fun' levels. Don't complain; this is where this system is done right, to help reward players for truly diving into the game.
Do I have any complaints? Yeah, a couple, but they're little things. Bethesda's logo pops up as a weird loading icon at the start, and the number of unskippable opening splash screens is annoying. That's all I dislike though, and when my major complaint is the length of a couple of logos at the beginning, that just shows how good the product is.
DOOM 64 may now officially have moved into top-tier DOOM status for me. Go play it. Hell awaits.
Half Dead 2Yeah, I beat this last year. This is more to declare that I managed to unlock all the achievements and come to a better understanding of a game built for multiplayer that is based heavily on a movie which deserved to have a game made about it while also parodying a variety of other games. If you want an easy definition of Half Dead 2, it's the movie Cube done as a video game: you come in, you throw shoes into rooms to avoid lethal traps, you dodge other traps, and you try to find your way out. Of course, it's not nearly as complex as the moving mathematical genius of the movie Cube, and while it has some references to Cube 2, it won't screw with your head the way that movie does. Also, it's clunky, repetitive, and at times it's just flat out silly. Hey, what did you expect from a game by some Russians who decided to parody Half-Life 2 in the title?
Basically you have two gameplay modes: co-op and competitive. In co-op, you avoid traps and try to help navigate various floors of the cube to escape. Working together, flagging locations of certain kinds of rooms, healing items, or spare shoes, this is how you survive. There is far less equipment in this mode and far more instant death rooms, as well as references to things like Demon Souls with ghostly spirits sometimes appearing. There are also rooms with lethal traps such as a Fahrenheit 451 book bonfire, flying ball bearings, the film Resident Evil's laser wall, and so forth. Make t to the end though and you're golden. Competitive is a last man standing rush on a giant square that is steadily becoming smaller as timers force you to press on. Get stuck in a room when the timer ends, and you die. There are fewer instant death rooms, but now you can find a lot more gear as well as armor and weapons, because eventually you have to make sure the other players are dead. You do this either by knocking them into traps, using hurled objects, or fighting in incredibly, stupidly janky combat. You can also throw your shoes at them, though I don't think this hurts.
Look, this is at best something to goof off with friends in and enjoy the idea of a Cube video game, because Cube was a brilliant idea that did deserve the video game treatment. While this is a knock off, it's still an entertaining one to waste some time in with a few buddies online. It's like the game Blood & Bacon. Buy it on sale and have some fun with it.
