Game Review: Rise of the Triad (PC, 2013)

I'm not feeling it. Confused design goals. Identity crisis. Here are my thoughts and what I might have done differently if I could have been involved as a designer.

I get that Rise of the Triad is a game that doesn't want to take itself too seriously, but it really just seems like serious stuff undermined by gimmicky, way too non-serious elements. Giant floating coins and weird little alien platforms in the middle of a blood-splattered rocket scorched WW2-ish dungeon. The logo looks really serious, like this is going to be a gritty action experience, and so does the UI of the first menu--I'm really getting into a dark mood. But as soon as I click on a menu item, the sound of the click is a very cartoony "pop". The mood was just ruined, and now I'm not really sure what to feel. In that context it's not funny or non-serious--it's just out of place.

I also understand that it's trying to carry that philosophy from the wolfenstein age of video games into today. But instead of using the same philosophy that conceived the first ROTT (or at least made it great) to conceive a NEW ROTT, it seems like they just made the old ROTT prettier. I don't think they understood that since the medium has changed and the cultural context is different, it will have to be different from the original to provide the same experience and be appreciated by this generation.

Ex: Old ROTT, you collect pixellated cartoony coins floating in midair in an pixellated cartoony world of guns, henchmen, and crazy enviros. New ROTT, you collect perfectly rendered coins floating in midair in a perfectly rendered world of guns, henchmen, and crazy enviros. It's like, are we still playing Mario? Before, with the old graphics, the floating coins and coin-collecting didn't seriously conflict with anything. But now it does. Now it looks weird against a backdrop of realistic gore and henchmen. Ideas about what should have been done to carry this theme through: Just put the coins in nazi war chests on the sides of your paths, or scatter realistically-sized coins around the ground. Now you have your coin element, but it doesn't interfere with the tone and experience of the rest of the gameplay.

Now that's just a band-aid fix to use as an example. The real design problem is more over-arching. Because I don't think that band-aid fix I just suggested would necessarily serve this game if it's high concept were more fleshed out and went in a more contextually conscious direction. The game doesn't have a unified identity or gameplay experience. So let's make one as an example. I'm literally thinking of this as I write it.

What drove our decision to make the old ROTT the way it was? It was intended to be a Wolfenstein sequel, but was cancelled in the middle of development. So we took the pieces we had and tried to just make a fun shooter that didn't take itself to seriously, had fun, and just explored the space of what 3d video games can be.

What did people love about the old ROTT? Didn't take itself too seriously. Just about the action and mayhem. Crazy FPS obstacle course.

Since we didn't really design the original game from scratch to be the game it became, let's go with what the people like and make a game for the modern era that doesn't take itself too seriously, lets you have fun with the mayhem with gratuitous violence and action, and some crazy fps obstacles.

The problem is, that game I described has been created a million times since the first ROTT, and many probably got some inspiration from it. So the landscape is different. You can't just make another one. Serious Sam is the first game that comes to mind. Goofy, gratuitous action that's not trying to be any more than a video game. Duke Nukem, same thing. But what happened when they released the new Duke Nukem for the modern age, in the same style? It bombed. They didn't adjust for context. So the question is, what are we going to do differently to establish ROTT again as an inspiration for further video games of this style in this era? What are video games NOT doing? What are they afraid to do? What's really popular and why?

Here's what I would have gone with and built off of: over-the-top violence and action. GTA mayhem is so much of a thing, youtube is littered with "let's play" videos of it daily. Get some really good physics, particle physics, explosions, bullet and gun effects, etc, and record replays of every match so people can edit and post up videos. Make it so you can throw your tons of guns AT enemies when you're out of bullets, and use everything in the environment as a weapon, even punching through or taking chunks out of walls if you get enough power-ups or hit bonuses. Or, if you're going the infinite ammo route, make the player invincible, and make it all about creating as much destruction, death and chaos to the enemies and critical components within a certain time frame, like Crash Mode in the earlier Burnout racing games. Maybe if you shoot rockets in certan places, it can undermine a building's foundation, collapse the building, and kill everyone inside. Like Battlefield Bad Company. Take the best of all these games, and take it all to a new level. Beseige has also recently taken the world by storm for it's entertaining violence and ease of sharing replays. (I think it came out after the new ROTT, but it's an example about the success available to those kinds of games). Maybe if you use one of your sniper rifles, you can shoot a button on a panel or an explosive barrel from across the map that creates an awesome chain reaction. Just build your levels and environments in a way that caters to this gametype. Have some Agent Smith style situations where there are tons of guys in one place and a few grenades send them flying all over the place. Make heads explode like watermelons and arms fly off and impale other NPC's. Get nuts with it. I wanna fly through a replay of a level I cleared and find eyeballs splattered on the walls and badges stuck in the sides of crates like throwing stars. You could even do this with the player model, showing the aftermath of the fight on his body--a piece of shrapnel shoved in his eye, hair missing, his hand in a container on ice, brain or skull matter clinging to the barrel of his gun.

The best thing about it: NOBODY IS DOING THIS. It could've been all yours.

And debug the game. It doesn't matter how great the design is if the game doesn't function. I can't help you with that. All I can say is, the bar has been set, and you absolutely have to clear it if you want to make a great game. The screen flickers in the menu, it won't save any of my video or controller settings, and it's easy to get physically stuck in nooks of the environments.

But the most important thing was the high concept design. There's little to no tension in this game, and where it does exist, it seems out of place. I have infinite ammo, I run super fast, and there's all this wacky stuff, but I still have a pretty standard health situation to mind, but I'm not supposed to take cover? It just seems confused. It's not giving me a clear reason to continue playing.

The community involved in this game is great, but I think they could've done a lot better.

I hope this review was enlightening and inspiring to you. I am available for design consulting.