Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold

The Good
Poor Blake Stone. How he tried. Although the game features a decent engine (an enhanced Wolf3D engine), with cool effects like light sourcing, texture mapped ceilings and floors, and switches you can actually flip, there was just a punch that it lacked...don't get me wrong! The game isn't all THAT bad! It is fun for a while to grab a few weapons and blow a few hundred alien beings to Kingdom Come, but...something's just....WRONG.

The Bad
Maybe this is what's wrong with this game: for the most part, it just tried TOO hard to be the so-called "DOOM killer", and ended up flat on its face. It tried creeping us out with eerie alien and mutant designs, but most of these "mutants" and "aliens" look more like they belong in the "Captain Action" or "Zapf Brannigan" crowds. They tried giving us ambient music with a low, slightly mysterious feel, but most of the music is rather dull and uninspired. They tried creating a cool futuristic environment with metallic walls, blood splattered organic tiles, and other touches like alien holding tubes and such, but the graphics look (at times) even worse than those of Wolf3D. They tried making smart enemies that would chase you, steal ammo, and maybe go jibaku (suicidal) on you, but most of these enemies just do one thing: stand there and let you kill them. If not that, they'll just fall into a predictable pattern of move, fire, move, fire...you get the idea. They tried making everything that would kill DOOM, but what this all did in the end was kill the game itself.

The Bottom Line
It's so sad...Blake Stone is the tragic tale of engineering a DOOM killer gone terribly wrong. The creation went mad and tried having itself sold for love and attention. But no one cared. Being stuck between Wolf3D and DOOM didn't help, either. If you wish to adopt this little freakish creation, be warned: it may one day snap. Get the cattle prod ready...