Last week’s post was all about real time strategy (RTS) games. Today, since the alignment of Jupiter and the moons are right, let’s talk about that other computer game genre, the FPS (that first person shooter, not frames per second).
My very first FPS was undoubtedly the very first one released, Wolf 3D. I even played the sequel (more like extra levels, really) called Spear of Destiny. And of course, following Wolf 3D was the big one, Doom. I’ve you can’t imagine how it’s like, it’s worlds away from the realism of Counter-Strike and Halo 2.
Doom was such a hit game that until today, all FPS are called Doom-clones. What made Doom a refreshing new approach to games was the ability freely move around in 360 degrees, not to mention up and down. But of course, the graphics were still in VGA and if you wall close up to another character or the wall you can see the huge ugly pixels. Some of my friends complained they got nauseous from playing it too much, what do you expect if you’ve been playing static screen games like Lode Runner and Aztec all these years?
Before Doom and Wolf 3D, home computers weren’t powerful enough to render 3D sprites in real time, some games used were static step-by-step movement. Doom also introduce the BFG, a kickass weapon (yeah, guess what it stands for).
Soon after the two games came the hanger-ons, like Duke Nukem, Quake, Unreal, each subsequent getting more realistic by taking advantage of the quantum leap in PC processor speed and graphic accelerator cards.
These days, the latest FPS games (like GoldenEye, Call of Duty) are really nifty, almost like Hollywood movies. But really, it’ll still probably take a few more years before gamers and strap on VR goggles, load up a Wii-mote like controller, and play a FULL 3D FPS, like on the Holodeck of the Enterprise…
[tags]PC, games, FPS, doom, wolf 3d[/tags]
6 Comments
thatJames
Hahahh… I’m not really a gamer but I played this ages ago!!! Isn’t this the one where the big finish is a showdown with ze fuhrer himself?
JoeC
yes, played wolf3d back in the old old pc dos days, but my best experience was with Doom, posted here,
http://cameldmz.blogspot.com/2005/10/doomed-me-baby.html
I kinda get a lil headache after all that spin around, so did not play anymore 🙁 Cheers!
simon
thatjames – yep that was the one! didn’t really look like hitler but hey…
joeC – i didn’t really fancy the movie… most game tie-ins were poor anyway.
mypapit
yes, I played Wolf3d as my first FPS too. Wolf3d is the direct ancestor of most modern FPS.
This is because Wolf3d->Doom->Quake->Quake2->Quake3
and most FPS uses code derived from Quake2 and Quake3 engine, and w00t it is really indeed a direct ancestor
Zer0
Wahh..doom!. BFG..oh yess the BFG..
I remember Duke Nukem too!. with all those nude girls inside..lolz..
Silencers
My first FPS, huh… that’s gotta be Doom. Wolf 3D follows after that, and then it was quake, only for a few weeks.
And then came half life, and then CS.
Hahah I’ve been playing shitloads of diff FPSes since.