Hardcore Gaming 101: Rise of the Triad

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by Bobinator - April 17th, 2009

Rise of the Triad: Dark War - IBM PC, iOS (1994)

American PC Cover

Back in the heyday of DOS prompts and floppy discs, one of the most popular games prowling around shareware sites and demo CDs was a mega-hit known as Doom. It took the gaming world by storm in 1993 with its amazing graphics, great gameplay and rocking soundtrack. The popularity of the game made other DOS developers take notice. Hoping to get their own piece of the action, they made their own "Doom clones" - what people called FPSes before that term was invented. Most of these weren't very good, but one company made a little-known gem that still plays well today. Apogee, the shareware giant, took the plans from a scrapped Wolfenstein 3D sequel and turned it into its own game - Rise of the Triad, affectionately referred to by its fans as "ROTT". The game pioneered several interesting ideas into the genre, including rocket jumping and enviromental destruction, but it never received the popularity of Doom. It does, however, have an over-the-top cheese factor that's somehow endearing, despite the incredulous violence.

The plot, like most games of its type, isn't terribly important, and is more of a reason for your rampage. You are part of a five man military task force known as HUNT (High-risk United Nations Taskforce.) Each member has slightly different abilities. You are sent to spy on an island home to a cult seeking the destruction of Los Angeles, led by the evil El Oscuro. You are spotted, and your boat is destroyed. The only way out...is through. The shareware version is called "Rise of the Triad: The HUNT Begins", which consists of ten levels which aren't even technically part of the full game. However, the ROTT CD release contains the shareware as well as the full version, subtitled "Dark War".

Characters

Taradino Cassat

The only character playable in the game's demo. He's balanced, with average health, speed, and accuracy.

Thi Barret

Thi is another balanced character, and is slightly faster than Taradino.

Doug Wendt

Doug has the most hit points of all the characters, but he's the slowest out of all of them, with only average accuracy.

Lorelei Ni

The fastest out of the all the characters, with the best accuracy, but has a very low amount of hit points.

Ian Paul Freeley

A medium between Taradino/Thi and Doug, with more hit points than them, but slower, although he's faster than Doug. Gotta dig the stupid name.

Some sources claim that ROTT's engine is a heavily modified version of the Wolfenstein 3D engine, which would make sense, considering its roots. The game world is very angular and boxy, consisting mostly of tight hallways and huge open spaces, and the level designs are very, very basic compared to Doom. All of the characters are clearly digitized images of the development staff wearing Nazi-ish uniforms, robes and other rather silly outfits. The texturing is also horribly repetitive, and it's clear that it's not really on the technical level as some other games.

To its credit, there's a lot more vertical action, with floating pads that are frequently used as stairs and moving platforms. There are also bounce pads that can fling you high into the air, although strangely there's no manual way to jump. The environments in the game, although also not as pretty as Doom, contain a lot more destructible objects than most other FPS titles at the time. Tables and pots can be blown to pieces, panes of glass can be shattered, and the lights can be destroyed, darkening the room. There's something an of 80s arcade game aesthetic to the whole thing, which is strangely pleasant.

ROTT is also extremely violent, to an excessively hilarious degree. If an enemy suffers a particularly damaging attack, there's a chance that they'll explode into a gory mess, complete with an improbable rainfall of limbs and eyeballs, and the proclamation "Ludicrous Gibs!" appearing on screen. A cheat code makes this happen with any enemy death. However, there are several levels of blood to choose from, with a password system for any children playing the game.

The weapon system is pretty odd. You can only carry four weapons at a time, the first three being bullet weapons - a pistol, dual pistol, and a MP40 machine gun - all with unlimited ammo. The fourth slot is reserved for more powerful weapons, like missile and magic-based (!!) weapons. These run from standard weaponry like bazookas, to more powerful kits like the Firebomb. This weapon can actually be used to fling yourself into the air, if you have the Absestos armor, which absorbs fire damage. Drunk Missiles simulatenously fire seven missiles which bounce semi-randomly around the corridors, completely splattering anything they connect with. Even more satisfying is the Flamewall, which creates a huge blast of fire that spreads as wide and as far as you can see. One of the sillier weapons is the Excalibat. Up close, it can be used as a melee weapon, or, if the fire button is held down for long enough, it can throw a deadly wave of exploding baseballs. One of the coolest cheats is the "Missile Cam", which will give you a first-person perspective of any given projectile before it collides with its target.

Not only that, but there's many different powerups to find, as well. The game uses a lives system, so collecting 100 Ankh coins will grant you an extra life, lending a particularly unique arcade/console style feel to the game. The God Mode power up temporarily turns you into an actual god - in addition to the standard invincibility, you can fling balls of light that disintegrate enemies for as long as the powerup lasts. In a slightly clever bit, there's also Dog Mode, which turns you into a dog. (No, this is not a joke.) You are also invincible while this powerup lasts, and you can crawl into some areas you can't reach in your human form. You can maul enemies, or you can hold down the fire button to unleash a Barkblast, which makes everything explode. Mercury Mode allows you to fly as long as the powerup lasts. There are a variety of food items, each will obviously restore health, but if you fire a missile weapon near them, it'll cook them and thus restore more life when eaten. There's also a strange shroom powerup (more of a "powerdown", really) that makes your vision swirl around as everything flashes different colors.

The levels are also filled with an interesting array of traps. Fireball shooters, obviously, shoots fireballs, while spinning blades can be found twirling around or popping out of the ground. Thankfully, these can also damage enemies stupid enough to wander near. There are also "wanderwalls", moving walls that can crush you and your enemies if they get in the way. Something amusing is that if a Wanderwall escapes the map's boundaries, the game will crash, showing a drawing of a Wanderwall with a big smile on its face bursting through a wall, with the words, "I'm free!" There's actually a hidden level explicitly designed to show this off. There are also other obstacles to be aware of, like lava walls, fire jets, and spears that pop up through the ground.

The enemies range from armed guards, to life-draining monks, to robots. A few of them are particularly interesting, however. The Lightning Guard can steal your own weapons and use them against you if you get too close, and there's a random chance he'll drop to his knees and beg for mercy on death. If you spare him, he'll collapse. If you leave him alone, however, he'll stand back up and start shooting again. The Overpatrol can fire nets at you. If you have a knife, found on some statues, you can cut your way out easily. Oddly, this is the only purpose the knife has. If you don't have one, however, you'll have to rapidly shake left and right to escape. There were plans for the game to randomly place female versions of the enemies in the map, but these had to be cut due to technical reasons. Stills of them can be seen in the credits, however.

If the excessive violence and silly powerups weren't enough , there's a lot of other goofy humor in ROTT, much more than any of its contemporaries. Starting ROTT from the DOS prompt with the command "dopefish" (an enemy from Commander Keen) will start the game with an introduction of Scott Miller's head burping. (His head can also be found as a hidden item that awards the player 2,764,331 points if found, a reference to Apogee's then phone number.) This makes the sounds in the main menu change to a man saying "Oh." "K." and "Boy." It also makes all the names of the levels goofier, with names like "This game, like, rules and stuff." Like Doom, there are half a dozen random messages that pop up when you try to quit, like "Press Y to activate electric chair" or "signal firing squad" or "release cyanide gas", each accompanied by an appropriately morbid sound effect.

For the time, ROTT had a very extensive multiplayer, which nine different playable mods. Apogee released a few map packs as freeware on their website, like the "Reject Map Pack", made with mutltiplayer maps cut from the game, and the "Ohio RTC Pack", with for levels from a ROTT tournament. There are nine different modes to play, from things like deathmatch, to more creative ones like Score More, where more difficult kills earn more points. There's also Capture the Triad, possibly the first FPS incarnation of Capture the Flag. Multiplayer is heavily customizable, from deciding whether to allow character attributes or not, the level of gravity, and whether health, traps, and missle weapons are spawned in levels. The bounce pads in particular make for great fun, especially when you have numerous characters bounding chaotically around the level, which gets even crazier when they each have Drunk Missile weapons. Also included are several goofy predefined soundbites to communicate with and/or taunt the other players.

The guys behind all of this wackiness term themselves The Developers of Incredible Power was a name created by Tom Hall, the game's lead designer. Other members of the team were William Scarboro, Jim Dose, Mark Dochtermann, Steve Humback, Chuck Jones, and Susan Singer. ROTT was the only game they released by the team, although they came up with the original concept for Prey, which was canned and later reimagined years later in 2006.

Apogee continued to support ROTT for a few more years after its release, with an add-on level pack called Extreme Rise of the Triad. It came with several goodies on the disc, like user-made level editors, a random level generator, and the game's music as MIDI files. It had a very short shelf life, with the levels released as freeware in 2000, and the remaining materials released as a goodie pack in 2005.

ROTT's dated looks may make it seem like a cheap ripoff, but there's an unabashed sense of madcap zaniness permeating throughout the entire game. It's clear the developers had a ton of fun putting this little game together, and that definitely reflects back onto the player. It also helped Apogee start their mega-hit, Duke Nukem 3D. The Apogee name was disbanded in 1996, after the release of Stargunner, and the company continues to use the name 3D Realms today. The game can still be purchased for $10 on 3D Realm's official site.

In 2010, Rise of the Triad was ported to iOS.

Links:
3D Realms Official Website - ROTT Includes plenty of downloads.
The Hunt: Rise of the Triad An excellent fan site that was on Classicgaming, now archived on Kontek.