Rise of the Triad: Dark War

The Good
Originally conceived as the sequel to Wolfenstein 3D, the production shifted into a unique project some way through. Although it uses an exponentially-enhanced Wolf3D engine, you'd never be able to tell -- the graphics were some of the best of their time, beating Doom in a lot of regards.

The gameplay featured several playable characters, each part of a super-elite A-Team type of task force assigned with eliminating a cult of Nazi-like crazies. The AI was world-class for its time -- enemies duck, roll, play dead, and steal your weapons. The sheer array of destructive weapons is enough to keep anyone entertained -- heat-seeking missiles, firewalls, fire-and-forget energy balls, and several others make this one of the best shooter arsenals ever created. Campy humor permeates the games: fantastic gore and exclamations of "Ludicrous gibs!" reward the player for well-aimed missile attacks; the characters dress in costumes for different holidays; psychedelic mushrooms are featured as a power-up, causing the player to become disoriented and see colors.

Where other games of the time took themselves seriously, Rise of the Triad made the FPS seriously fun.

The Bad
The overall campy tone of the game meant that it lacked suspense in some areas where it would have benefited. A lot of the levels start to get repetitive, and considering the sheer number of them, it gets a little boring. Although there are five playable characters, there is no discernible difference in playing one over the other. The textures can be bland at times, and some of the sprites are altogether too cheesy (see end boss El Oscuro's grimace of pain).

The Bottom Line
One of the many legitimate games that fell victim to the "Doom-clone" curse; it's been done before, but never this fun and this destructive.

The Good
First and foremost, ROTT is an extremely fun game. It's a straightforward first-person shooter with a lot going for it. Many of its weapons are very original and generally fun to use. Humorous touches are everywhere, especially in the sound effects. The game's 40 or so levels are usually longer than those in most other first-person shooters released in the early '90s. The music, while not always completely fitting, is well composed. I have not had a chance to try out the multiplayer mode, but with the wealth of game types and levels available to choose from, I'm sure it's a blast. Plus, there's just something about this game that makes it terribly addictive...

The Bad
The ROTT engine can best be described as a mix of Wolfenstein and Doom, with some strange results. While the levels are more interesting and memorable than those in Wolfenstein, they're a lot less interesting and memorable than those in Doom. "Level" would be a better description for these than "area" or "place". On the other hand, they do play pretty well. The color pallette is pretty drab, and the game doesn't include a huge number of textures. Also, some of the enemies are pretty easy, while some are much too tough (for example, the grenade-throwing, machine gun-toting officers who can take 10 times the damage of most other enemies). While there are a large number of weapons at your disposal, you'll end up using the dull machine gun most of the time because of its unlimited ammunition capacity. Too bad.

The Bottom Line
Most people have forgotten about Rise of the Triad, which is a shame, because it's so much fun to play. It's not Doom, but it's almost as addictive. The shareware version is available all over the web- give it a shot.

The Good
If you like bizarre, off-the-wall humor, ROTT is one of the funniest FPSes ever made. With features like Ludicrous Gibs, Dopefish Mode, the suicide-themed game exit dialogues, the "Crezzy Man" difficulty, secret levels like "This Level Causes an Error!", and items like Dog Mode and Shrooms Mode, you can tell The Developers of Incredible Power had a blast making this game.

There are only three types of gun (one of which is just akimbo starting pistols), but a massive variety of rocket launcher-type weapons, ranging from plain-vanilla bazookas to outlandish death dealers like the Firewall, Drunk Missile, and Excalibat. With so many explosive weapons available, the game quickly becomes a bloodbath, with gore that beats out even the mighty DooM. ROTT also introduced a seldom-seen FPS feature, where the player can't lug a gigantic arsenal around on his back... you can carry two pistols and a submachine gun (all with unlimited ammo), a single "heavy" weapon, and that's it.

ROTT also features the most robust multiplayer of its time, with support for 11(!) players using a client-server system. Tons of multiplayer-only maps are provided, and aside from standard Deathmatch, there are special modes like Capture the Triad and Score More. The action tends to be more frantic and less skill based than DooM's (it's not uncommon to die immediately upon respawning multiple times in a row during particularly chaotic games), but it's hard to beat for a pure adrenaline-addled rush.

The Bad
ROTT caught a lot of heat back in the day since it came out a year after the legendary DooM and honestly, some of it is justified. While Apogee added some fairly impressive effects such as fog and light sourcing, this is still the old Wolfenstein 3D engine, which means no changes in floor elevation and 90 degree walls. This leads to a lot of levels that feel the same, which is definitely a bad thing considering how many of them there are. The enemies are also pretty dull, as nearly all of them are machinegun-equipped human soldiers of some type. The end result is a single-player game that begins to resemble a dreary slog about halfway through.

The multiplayer, while still excellent, suffers from a few too many maps that are only suitable for the full 11 players, due to their size. Co-op play (rare in modern FPSes, but a common feature in 1994) is missing, which is a let-down because it could've made completing the main campaign a lot more enjoyable. And despite its use of a client-server system, it doesn't support dynamic joining and leaving of games. So, if you go out of sync (which happens with maddening frequency in 11-player LAN games), everyone else will have to exit out and the server will need to be restarted before you can get back in. Come on, Apogee... Descent came out the same year and it let you join games in progress, why couldn't you do the same?

The Bottom Line
Rise of the Triad may not have been on the technological cutting edge, but it kicked the FPS genre up a notch with its frantic, explosive gameplay, and set the multiplayer bar so high that it took 2 years before it was finally bettered by id's Quake (and that was only with the help of user modifications).

The Good
It has a lot of bizarre things which you won't find in any other FPS - tell me, have you ever seen a dog-mode (you transform into an immortal dog), poisonous mushrooms or Excali-bat in any other game? Rise of the Triad (or simply ROTT) has many bonuses, i. e. Adrenaline Bonus for 100% kills and Supercharge Bonus for collecting all power-ups, and Bonus Bonus - for achieving every possible bonus.

Your weaponry mostly consists of various types of rocket launchers - heatseekers, drunk missiles and many more. You can also use pistols (holding one in each hand) and MP-40, both with infinite ammo, or mentioned earlier Excali-bat. Your enemies look like Nazi guards from Wolfenstein 3D, however now they can throw a web to fetter you or even pretend being dead!

Sounds are good, music is much better than soundtrack in Wolf 3D, and multiplayer is outstanding - it has more gameplay types than Doom. There's even Capture the Flag (it's called here "Capture the Triad")! Keep in mind that it was few years before releasing a CTF mod for Quake.

The Bad
The engine - it's the same engine used in Wolfenstein 3D. It's modified, however flaws from Wolf 3D still exist in ROTT:

• maps are one-leveled (it's partially solved by anti-gravity pads);
• some of them are enormous mazes;
• they aren't so realistic as Doom levels;
• forget about floors and ceilings which differ in different rooms. Floor, celling, level height and brightness change only when you progress to next level.

The Bottom Line
Well, ROTT has a lot of interesting features and lousy engine. However, it's still fun to play this game, just forget about engine issues and don't take this game seriously ;)

The Good
Rise of the Triad was originally being made by Apogee(now more well-known as 3d Realms) as a followup to the game that really began the FPS genre(though itself wasn't the first), Wolfenstein 3d. However, the development soon changed and Rise of the Triad was changed to become it's own game...and that was a great thing!...where as today, Wolfenstein 3d simply isn't really much fun anymore, being far too repetitive, Rise of the Triad is done with just the right amount of imagination, surreal atmosphere and lack of seriousness that it still is a fun game even today, if you don't mind the dated graphics.

One of ROTT's more "popular" features was an un-equaled amount of gore for it's time. However, the gore is done in a delightfully cheesy way, with such features as blowing an enemy up causing blood 'n an eyeball to fly at the screen followed by a comment at the top such as..."Ludicrous gibs!" However, if anyone is disturbed by this cartoonish by today's standards violence, they can easily turn it down.

Despite the fact that this game is too old for actual jumping to be a possibility, Rise of the Triad could almost be considered by me as a first-person shooter that doubles as something of a platform game. This is because of a variety of circular pads that jumped you up, floated or acted as either elevators or "trains", referred to as "gads". Fun features from this are splattering enemies(who can use the gads too) by falling on them, and the fairly unknown REAL origin of "rocket-jumping".

As said before, Rott's humorous and surreal atmosphere really adds to the game, and you can just see the fun the designers had, even using their voices and likenesses for some of the game's enemies, yelling strangely funny things such as "Eat lead!" But seriously, what other computer game can you not only fire a variety of guns, but also use a baseball bat, and not only have a power-up for GOD-mode, but also DOG-mode?...Any it is a very...different...god-mode, where you become 10 ft. tall and emit entity-like groans as you throw power-balls!

The Bad
Rise of the Triad actually uses the same, but much more advanced, technology as Wolfenstein 3d. This means that while there is now many areas where you are under the sky instead of the same old ceiling height all through, a larger "pallet" of colors, and some more interaction with the environment...there is NOOOO tilted or angled walls. This is the only really major thing that kept ROTT from the fame it deserved. Damn...

The Bottom Line
Even with limited technology, Rise of the Triad is still a very unique and fun game that should be highly suggested to fans of the classic older first person shooters...if they haven't played it already...

The Good
The game had revolutionary effects such as 11 player network support, masked walls (allows you to make bullet holes in walls), transparency, different playable characters and dynamic lighting.

Multiplayer is were this game truly stood out from the crowd. It had 11 player network support and 9 multi player game types. It had microphone support so you could shout insults at the people you were playing. Remote Ridicule was also supported in the game, press a function key and you could insult your opponent without a microphone.

Weapons, weapons and more weapons, that lead to gibs, gibs and more gibs! This game had truck load of weapons which included dual pistols, MP40 machine gun, firewall (not of the Zone Alarm type LOL), drunken missiles, heat seeker, dark staff, Excalibat and more.

The Bad
The game used a re-written Wolfenstein 3D engine and because of that there were limitations such as the 90 degree walls seen in Wolfenstein.

The graphics weren't the greatest and neither was the sound but other things make up for that.

The Bottom Line
A FPS with revolutionary effects, a solid multiplayer, great music and it's just plain fun!

Anyone who calls themselves a games fanatic should have this game in their collection!

The Good
There's one thing ROTT is famous for: GORE! Tons of it! Buckets of blood and gore! There's also highly destructive weaponry! In short: the sadists will LOVE this game!

Anyway, ROTT has one simple goal: as a member of a task force called the HUNT (get it?), it's your job to stop a mad cult led by El Oscuro (The Dark) from destroying the world with nuclear warfare and black magic. For that task, you get a ton of highly destructive toys to use on them. Drunk missiles, heat seekers, firebombs, the FLAMEWALL!! (my favorite!), and more weapons are at your disposal. And for even more fun, there's whole squadrons of enemies to blast, and it's just too cool to shoot a firebomb into a crowded room and see random body parts go flying everywhere immediately afterward! It's all about the raw white-knuckle blasting, I tell ya!

Great graphics (albeit a little dark and dingy, though), LOUD as hell explosions and other sound effects, and some excellent music round out the whole package. And let's not also forget the wacky sense of humor this game can have. I mean, where else do you see a roving wall intentionally escape a stage and yell "I'm FREE!!" just before the game crashes? ^^ Or grab a God Mode Power-Up and start making a bunch of goofy moaning noises for 30 seconds? Or even funnier...Dog Mode? Woof woof!

The Bad
Doesn't run in Windows 2000...damn!! ><

The Bottom Line
DOOM may have been gory and violent in its own right, but the sheer gore and violence factors here will make DOOM look like My Little Pony...

[email protected] was a scary thought...eep!

The Good
ROTT is a great game. I don't care what others say about it.

Gameplay is similiar to Doom but it looks more like Wolf3D but without the roof restrictions. You basically run around and shoot people. In fact, the level of gore can be changed, depending on whether or not you want your kids to see exploding people :)

Control is mostly with the keyboard. Basic controls and easily customizable.

The sound is pretty good, although listening to the enemies go "Argh!" every time the are shot is annoying.

The level layout is very good. Probably easy to do, but I haven't designed levels... yet :)

Another excellent idea built into the game is swappable weapons. Unlike the other 3d Shooters, you can have only 4 different guns. You keep a pistol, dual pistol, and machine gun (with unlimited ammo). The fourth weapon is swappable, meaning that if you pick up another weapon, you drop the one you have. It's an excellent way of evening out the game, especially during deathmatching.

The Bad
The bouncers. The little pads on the ground that toss you up a level. They are just plain annoying, even though they good put a good twist on gameplay.

The Bottom Line
This game is a great introduction to 3D shooters. If you are timid about the Dooms and the Quakes, this will be and easy "stepping stone" into the more advanced games.

The Good
One of my favorite first person shooters, Rise of the Triad went somewhat unnoticed in the gaming community, despite having a better engine than Doom (faster and looks better) and excellent gameplay.

The 3D engine is fast and fluid and looks very good, especially when compared with other so-called 2.5D games. The sound effects are well rounded and the gameplay is simply fun, fun, fun.

Not to mention the ingenius God- and Dog-modes, the awesome weaponry and seemingly infinite gameplay.

All and all, this is a great game.

The Bad
It may not be the best game on Earth, but it's damn near flawless.

The Bottom Line
A great first person shooter you shouldn't miss.

The Good
The graphics (mainly the gore :) and net code were amazing -- the LAN play was some of the best I've ever seen, they held nothing back. The parental control thing was cool, too. Although I had no use for it, it made the game appeal to a broader audience.

The Bad
Its popularity. It surpassed DOOM in quality, but the DOOM name totaly destroyed any chance of sucess for ROTT.

The Bottom Line
A blood-fest. A nothing-held-back war. Kill everything or be killed.

The Good
The game play along with the multiplayer features with modem and network support.

The Bad
The range of weapons is a little limiting.

The Bottom Line
A great starter game for first - person perspective enthusiasts.