Die Hard Trilogy
Description official descriptions
Die Hard Trilogy lets players guide New York cop John McClane through three arcade-style games based on each of the three Die Hard movies. Each movie is represented through a totally different style, making this a "3 games in 1" style package.
Die Hard is a third person action/adventure through thirty floors of the Nakatomi Tower high-rise. Terrorists have interrupted the company's Christmas party and taken hostages. As McClane, the player must search for hostages through computer, construction, maintenance, and executive levels. McClane's default pistol holds infinite ammo, and the player can collect limited-ammo machine guns and grenades inside the levels. Walls turn transparent when they intersect the camera, allowing players to follow McClane through hallways and rooms with ease. After all the hostages on a level have been rescued, the player has 30 seconds to locate a bomb sent down by elevator, then use that elevator to move to the next level.
Die Hard 2: Die Harder is a first-person arcade gun game, nearly identical to Virtua Cop. Terrorists have attacked Washington/Dulles Airport. The player automatically moves through the airport and surrounding areas "on rails," shooting bad guys that appear from behind the scenery. Weapon upgrade icons can be shot to be collected, and either use limited ammo, or are retained until the player is hit (identical to Lethal Enforcers). Players can also destroy parts of the environment by shooting it, which can be used to take out nearby terrorists (with explosions, or by shooting overhead items to drop on them). This game supports pad controls, or any of the PlayStation's gun controllers.
Die Hard With A Vengeance has players racing through New York City streets in a variety of vehicles, trying to locate bombs before they explode. A strict timer ticks off the next explosion, and the player is guided only by a direction arrow and the vocal suggestions of their co-driver. Bombs are hidden inside everyday objects (like phone booths and benches) and are defused by ramming them, which activates the timer on the next bomb. Occasional "bomb cars" must be chased and rammed until their life bar is depleted. Powerups can be collected by running over icons in the streets, and include extra time, turbo boosts, and jumps to rocket over obstacles.
All three games are exaggeratedly bloody (players can run over pedestrians in Die Hard 3 and wipe the blood away with windshield wipers). Each of the three games also uses a combination of textured polygons and sprites to generate their worlds, resulting in warping textures and some quirky "paper doll" effects.
Spellings
- ダイハード・トリロジー - Japanese spelling
- 纽约大劫案三部曲 - Simplified Chinese spelling
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Credits (Windows version)
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Reviews
Critics
Average score: 77% (based on 37 ratings)
Players
Average score: 3.4 out of 5 (based on 82 ratings with 6 reviews)
The Good
When I was younger I had a Sega Saturn and a Sony Playstation so I had the best of both worlds.
I did however, only have Die Hard Trilogy for the Playstation and not the Sega Saturn. I remember sitting for hours dropping terrorists in Nakatomi Plaza, blazing through Dulles Airport and rampaging around Manhattan and Central Park in a cab.
Being older now I can appreciate how much effort Fox Interactive put into their first forays into the world of licensed gaming and gaming in general. Alien Trilogy is one of the best FPS titles on either system and of course, there is Die Hard Trilogy. When I became a rabid collector I became aware of the Saturn port of the game and hunted it down like a man possessed for my favourite system. What I found was an interesting, but all to familiar experience in terms of multi-platform ports between the Playstation and Saturn.
Die Hard Trilogy is similar to Alien Trilogy in so far as the game seeks to condense the entirety of three films into a single video game experience. Whereas Alien Trilogy had Ripley going from location to location from the Alien films in an entirely FPS style Die Hard Trilogy eschews one particular style for three very distinctive ones. The game boots to a nice little menu on a spinning CD that lets you decide which game you want to play; Die Hard, Die Hard 2 or Die Hard with a Vengeance. The first is an almost top down shooter where McClane is tasked with freeing hostages and blowing away terrorists while climbing ever so gradually to the top of Nakatomi Tower. The second game is a light gun shooter using the same engine that is similar to Virtua Cop. The third game is more about arcade driving wherein you must race around New York city trying to dispose of bombs.
The three distinctive play styles of each game was, and still is pretty ingenious. While being a cohesive package each of the three "games" included on the Die Hard Trilogy disk could have easily been released on separate discs. They each stand out so well from one another and are so polished that this seems like a sort of greatest hits 3 pack of different games.
Die Hard appeals to the more visceral, action orientated player. You get McClane, an allotted amount of terrorists that must be killed to move on and a bomb that must be reached before it explodes and you die. The abject simplicity of this format is what appeals to me so much. It isn't convoluted, there is no unnecessary clutter, you simply shoot bad guys and save the day. While the simplicity could have been a disadvantage it keeps a furious pace up and despite the straight forward nature of the gameplay environment are packed with incidental detail like explosions and shattering panes of glass. The graphics in this section of the game are well rendered and feature interesting character models built from individual 2D images. It's a little strange at first but carves the game a humble aesthetic niche. McClane's "sound-a-like" dialogue in this portion of the game is fairly well acted and the background music is a collection of electronic compositions that don't come off as too abrasive.
Die Hard 2 (or Die Harder depending on what you like to call it) is, as mentioned before, purely a light gun game. If you don't have a light gun or are playing on a projection or LCD Television the digital controller does a good enough job of making the gameplay as pain free as possible. You, as McClane must fight your way through the Airport, tunnels, the church and even the famous snow mobile fight while racking up points and avoiding civilians. There are alternate routes to take, weapon power-ups like an explosive shotgun and rockets and grenades to through at your enemies. This portion of the game is far shorter than Die Hard, but is a lot longer than your typical light gun shooter, it also offers more variety in the way it is played.
Finally, Die Hard with a Vengeance. Personally, this is my least favourite part of the whole experience, but is the most technically accomplished of all 3 games. You are tasked with hunting down bombs in New York city. The relatively free form nature of the driving is pretty impressive considering when this game was developed and the level of detail in the buildings and hilarious blood splatters of rammed pedestrians give Vengeance its own particular charm. The music is a little cheesy in retrospect featuring some really cringe worthy hip hop stereotypes of the mid-90's ("Yeeeeah Booooi") but that and the random exclamations uttered by McClane add to that charm I mentioned earlier. You don't just rampage around New York City either, you also get to drive recklessly around Central Park, underground and in a dockyard. The variety of the levels and the clever design therein lends to Vengeance being a pretty addictive portion of the game. The graphical competency of this portion of the game cannot be denied and it goes to show how a little effort on the Saturn can turn out graphics that can match and in some cases exceed that of the Playstation.
When all is said and done and you want to pack away your Saturn for the day you can save your game at any point (in any of the games) to your console memory. This is, of course, after inputting your name using the hilariously presented high score table full of cameos of burning bodies, skeletons and other poor souls blown up, driven over and just plain maimed during your exploits.
The Bad
There is a lot about Die Hard Trilogy I didn't remember upon booting the game up. The original copy I had for my Playstation was long since gone when I got my Saturn copy not long ago so I had no basis for comparison. All I had where my memories, and we all know how accurate childhood memories are.
The biggest issue I seemed to have pushed into the furthest recesses of my mind was that of the frame rate. The frame rate in Die Hard and Die Hard 2 is atrocious. It doesn't render the game unplayable however the frame rate will often dip to around 20-12fps depending on the level of activity on screen. I didn't remember this problem on the Playstation so I did a bit of research and surely enough I found some comparisons that showed the discrepancy in frame rates between the two versions of the game. It looked like Fox had done a quick and nasty port of the game to the Saturn, something the console seems to have somewhat of a reputation for. It shows in the lack of transparency effects, bogged down frame rate and lack of extra graphical treats that Playstation owners were given.
In Die Hard and Die Hard 2 the frame rate and awkward controls mean you'll often miss shots, get caught in cross fires or accidentally shoot hostages. The bonus stages in Die Hard are almost impossible due to your inability to get to hostages before they are killed and the necessity for a speedy cursor in a light gun shooter is rendered moot by the lethargic response of your reticule. Again, the games are NOT unplayable, they just don't have the same frenetic feel they had in the Playstation original.
The FMV sequences in this port of the game are decidedly pixelated and only fill a small portion of your screen.
The Bottom Line
If you haven't played Die Hard Trilogy before you're missing out on a game that gives hope to movie licenses. It exudes a level of creativity, charm and gameplay depth that so many others lack.
The agreeable inclusion of 3 distinct styles of play, detailed graphics and rock solid gameplay lend to Die Hard Trilogy transcending perception of movie licenses as nothing more than cheap, badly coded cash-ins.
The issue is, the Saturn port just can't match the Playstation in many areas. This was obviously a cheap and nasty port and it doesn't use the Saturn hardware to produce a comparable experience. While it looks good the frame rate is atrocious and while it doesn't become unplayable the frenetic, exciting gameplay is compromised by the feeling of seeing everything through the eyes of a dope user. The imprecise shooting mechanics caused by trying to compromise for the sluggish frame rate puts you at a frustrating disadvantage.
Either way, if you've never played Die Hard Trilogy before you could do worse than grabbing a copy for the Sega Saturn. It's a port of the game that works and that's all I could have asked for.
SEGA Saturn · by AkibaTechno (238) · 2010
"Three maximum adventures, one explosive package!"
The Good
DIE HARD
The Good:
+ Addictive gameplay
+ Great soundtrack
+ Great controls
DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER
The Good:
+ Great soundtrack
+ A sheer of action on-screen, complete with excellent explosions
DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE
The Good:
+ Quick handbrake turns work well
+ Decent soundtrack
The Bad
DIE HARD
The Bad:
- Can get repetitive
- Minor oddities
DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER
The Bad:
- Aiming with the D-Pad is unfriendly and adds fake challenge
- Some items are hard to shoot with the D-Pad
DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE
The Bad:
- The time given on some bombs can be too strict
- Normal steering is ineffective and rather slow
The Bottom Line
DIE HARD
Graphics: 80/100
The graphics would look crude and simplistic by today's standards, but they do look nice. The environments are 3-dimensional, with plenty of lighting and lots of transparencies. In order to prevent the camera from zooming in, the walls near the edges of the screen will turn transparent. It may seem weird looking at first, considering that you can see what's in the rooms on the sides, but it makes the gameplay smoother. The character models are okay, they somewhat resemble 2D sprites illusioned to look 3D, which does work, but it can look quirky at times. The framerate is decent, but later on, the game can slow down when there are a sheer amount of enemies onscreen.
Audio: 93/100
The soundtrack is well done and the enemies sound decent. John McClane is voiced by an imitator which sounds surprisingly almost like Bruce Willis.
Controls: 90/100
The controls are smooth and are slightly slippery. L1 and R1 strafes, L2 and R2 does evasive rolls, X fires your gun, Circle switches grenades, Square throws a grenade and Triangle jumps. Moving in this game works well and doesn't have the "invisible walls" issue. The only issue with the controls is that McClane cannot move forward or backward and strafe simultaneously, and he move and turns in a slightly slippery speed, but these two problems are very minor nitpicks.
Difficulty: Challenging but manageable
Die Hard has a decent challenge, even when the AI has its faults. The terrorists will fire upon you just fine, but they won't bat an eye when they see a hostage escaping. The amount of damage you take depends on the gun the terrorist is using.
Gameplay: 90/100
Die Hard is an early example of a third-person shooter. Third-person shooters weren't common back then, but Die Hard pulls it off quite well. You can move anywhere, shoot at the bad guys, rescue hostages and even save hostages from being executed, which grants you an extra life. Getting extra lives are important as they extend your health. Unlike most games, the lives combine your health, therefore making it one long life. Die Hard is an arcade-type of game, which means that it keeps score. You can gain millions of points in this game, but it doesn't penalise you so much for killing a hostage; all you get is a small drop of points. Die Hard is pretty violent with lots of blood sprays, throw a grenade into a group of bad guys and they'll literally dissolve into a rain of blood.
Score: 90/100
DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER
Graphics: 80/100
The graphics are the same as Die Hard, but now the characters are seen even closer, because the perspective is through McClane's eyes, as this is an on-rails shooter. Like in Die Hard, the environment is in 3D, with 2D-looking sprites illusioned. Unfortunately, the closer perspective reveals the quirky animations of the terrorists and hostages.
Audio: 92/100
Die Hard 2 uses the same sound bytes as Die Hard, with only a little more lines to add. The soundtrack is still great, with each level having their own tracks.
Controls: 70/100
Die Hard 2 is meant for a lightgun and a PlayStation mouse. I own none of those, so I have to deal with using a controller. The button controls are fine, but moving the cursor with the D-Pad is a pain. There are instances where I'm trying to shoot a box that's far away, but I can't because one tap on the D-Pad seems to only move it so far. Also the framerate will occasionally drop, screwing up your aim even further. The sensitivity can be controlled, but the digital D-Pad doesn't seem to make the changes very effective. However there is a manual button that speeds up the cursor, which is ideal if the sensitivity is low.
Difficulty: Somewhat tough
While shooting the bad guys are simple, aiming them is simply more of a challenge. Also there are lots of hostages running around, which sometimes doesn't make sense; for example, why are there so many hostages in an airport runway? A hostage would sometimes end up being in your line of sight, which leads to shooting them by accident. Whenever you get shot, a "SAFE" indicator appears, which serves as temporary invincibility, like in Super Mario Brothers whenever you get touched. There are also powerups, such as shields, health, weapon pick-ups and more.
Gameplay: 85/100
Die Hard 2 is an on-rails shooter, meaning your movement is predetermined and you can aim your crosshair anywhere on screen. The idea is like in Die Hard; you shoot terrorists and try not to shoot hostages. This game also keeps score and it works the same way. This game is incredibly violent, as shooting terrorists will cause lots of blood sprays, and using rockets can turn a terrorist into a skeleton.
Score: 80/100
DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE
Graphics: 80/100
The graphics are well done with large sizes of New York being on each level and the pedestrians are decently animated. Since this is a driving game, you'll be seeing lots of cars on screen. The cars look decent, but the physics can be a bit quirky.
Audio: 90/100
The soundtrack is great with music matching well for each district, such as Harlem with rap music. John McClane still sounds great, but what I'm disappointed is that Zeus doesn't sound like Samuel L. Jackson.
Controls: 78/100
Die Hard With a Vengeance is the typical driving controls, but what I like about the controls are the quick handbrake turns, L2 and R2, which allows you to instantly make 90° turns; if you let go of the gas and press one of the handbrake buttons, you'll make a 180° turn instead, which can come in handy. The flaws with the controls is that the steering is rather slow and ineffective for sharp turns and crashing into objects can bounce you back, which can get annoying, especially when you have little time left, getting you killed.
Difficulty: Very challenging but gets frustrating much later
Die Hard With A Vengeance is a tough game. While it gives you a reasonable difficulty at the start, some bombs are given too little time, either due to the car or the lack of time pick-ups.
Gameplay: 87/100
As obvious, this is a driving game, like in the movie, there's a whole lot of driving. The idea is that you are suppose to disable bombs, which can be found on your radar as a red arrow; the blue arrows lead you to switch cars, such as switching from a taxi cab to a police car. There's also a time limit on each bomb, and if you don't get to the bomb on time, New York will go up in flames and you lose a life. How do you disable the bombs? Have you ever tried crashing into them, having them explode and counting it as disabling them? Illogical, but still fun. While not as violent as Die Hard 1 and 2, Die Hard With a Vengeance has its fair share of extreme violence, such as how you can run over a pedestrian at will; if you run over them in first-person view, you'll end seeing a red sea of blood on the windshield, complete with McClane automatically using the windshield wipers to wipe out the blood stains. But no matter how many times you run them over, they can't permanently die.
Score: 80/100
Die Hard Trilogy:
Overall: 92/100
Movie-based games are notorious for being lukewarm to bad, but Die Hard Trilogy isn't one of them. Die Hard Trilogy is like what it says, "Three maximum adventures, one explosive package!" While they probably won't go as well as stand-alone titles, but combining them somehow makes it greater than the sum of its parts. This trilogy-in-one pack is one of the most memorable games for the PlayStation, also considering that the game was released back in 1996, when the PlayStation was still a new console. This game is a definite must-have, especially as a Christmas gift.
"Yippee-ki-yay motherf_ _ _er!"
Score: 92/100
PlayStation · by Deleted (167) · 2017
The Good
Well, this game is really great. Actually it's more like 3 games, one for each movie. Each one plays differently as well. Die Hard is a chase-view shooter through Nakatomi plaza. The graphics here are fairly nice, although the characters a pretty blocky. Die Hard II plays like the Time Crisis games and is very entertaining. You get lots of weapons, tons of explosions and very good action with this mode, although it's pretty darn hard. Lastly, Die Hard with a Vengeance takes you to the streets of L.A. which look and sound great- you can see for miles down the street as you tear through a distressed city. It's funny when you hit people while in 1st person view in this mode!
The Bad
Some bad AI by the enemies, blocky graphics in some parts. Some of the voice-quotes are annoying.
The Bottom Line
Cool! Definitely worth your money. You can't beat the value of 3 games in one. If you liked the movie you'll probably like the game too, but not as much.
PlayStation · by Ben Fahy (92) · 2001
Trivia
Controls
The PlayStation version of this game has an undocumented feature: plug a Namco NeGcon controller into the system while the game is running. It will detect the controller and automatically select Die Hard With A Vengeance, allowing the player to use the controller for this game. The driving sequences are much easier as the pad's twist control feature is used to steer the car.
German index
On 28 June 1997, Die Hard Trilogy was put on the infamous German index by the BPjS. More information about this topic can be found in the game group.
Toilets
The game manual credits Guy Mills for drawing the toilets in the game.
Awards
- Electronic Gaming Monthly
- March 1997 (Issue 92) - Action Game of the Year (PlayStation version)
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Contributors to this Entry
Game added by Benjamin Tucker.
SEGA Saturn added by skl. PlayStation added by Grant McLellan.
Additional contributors: Alaka, ケヴィン, CaesarZX, Cantillon, Patrick Bregger, Karsa Orlong, Plok, Victor Vance.
Game added January 5, 2000. Last modified November 10, 2024.