On that fateful day, I took a 60-100 foot fall off Greenan Castle.
In under five minutes, I changed from an average 13-year-old boy, to a person who's life is hanging by a thread in an intensive care unit, and the Glasgow's Southern General Hospital the preceding nine months of that date was the beginning of a long and hard fight back against adversity. 16 years later, 2020. That battle was still continuing. As you can tell, it is an extremely emotional day of the year for me and my family.
This year, with an honours degree in Business Technology from UWS under my belt, this is probably the most emotional I have ever felt in a long time.
To continue the tradition of reviewing games I remember playing before my accident, I have decided to review a game that I remember playing the last day of school before the nine-month long, extended summer vacation for all the wrong reasons. Is this game truly the best first person shooter game of all time?
Let's find out!
(Best enjoyed with headphones on!)
It was the mid to late 90s, 3-D first person shooter games were all the rage, mostly thanks to Texas-based game development studio Id Software, with the original doom, released in 1993, and later Quake, released in 1996. Valve software's half-life also cashed in with that trend, using a modified version of the Quake engine.
North Carolina-based games development studio, Epic games was developing their own engine for their own video game, similar to half-life. Instead of licensing the quake engine and modifying it, in the same way that Gabe Newell did with half-life, Tim Sweeney, and Jazz Jackrabbit designer, Cliff Bleszinski, and various other employees began working on a game engine of their own.
The fruits of that labour – Unreal Engine, even today the Unreal Engine is recognised to be the de facto engine which is actively used in both the gaming and film industries (although that is mostly used for motion capture and computer generated effects).
This engine is actively used in numerous blockbusters. These include one of the biggest games of the Xbox 360 generation, Gears of War, the indie game that is currently taking the Esports scene by storm, Rocket League, Most importantly, the game that is becoming the embodiment of the Battle Royale game, Fortnite.
The first game to be developed using Unreal Engine was Unreal, a first person adventure game that was similar to half-life. One of the most attractive features of that game was the ability to play simulated multiplayer matches against AI players, commonly known as "bots".
Obviously, Epic Games caught on to that trend, and decided to begin the development of additional content that was focused around that feature. Obviously, the decision was made to take that additional content which originally intended to be released for free, and turn that into a standalone product.
Taking centre stage, Unreal Tournament! Recent the public in 1999. This game's focus shifted from being a primarily as single player focused experience, this game was focusing a lot more on the multiplayer.
The story of unreal tournament goes a letter like this –
"In 2291 in an attempt to control violence among deep space miners the New Earth government legalised and no holds barred fighting Liandri Mining Corporation, working with the NEG, established a series of leagues and bloody public exhibitions.
The fight's popularity grew with their brutality. Soon Liandri Discovered that the public marches were thier most profitable enterprise. The Professional League was formed, a cabal of the most violent and skilled warriors selected to fight in a grand tournament. Now it is 2341, 50 years has passed since the founding of Death Match profits from the tournament number of the hundreds of billions.
You have been selected to fight in the Professional League by the Liandri Rules Board. Your strength and brutality are legendary. The time has come to prove you are the best. To crush your enemies. To win the tournament.
The accessibility scores are as follows-
Visibility 7
in traditional Death Match mode, everyone in the game but you are foe! But, all the other modes in this game are team based. Similar to Halo, the team colours are red and blue.
As I have said, time and time again red and blue are not the hardest hit when it comes to colour blind people, it still needs addressing nonetheless!
Audibility 8.5
Similar to all traditional deathwatch games, for example Quake, you are reliant on audio cues to get a rough idea as to where your opponents are. For a hearing-impaired player, this can cause quite an issue.
However, when the majority of events were to occur, for example if a player were to go on a killing spree (five kills without dying) and a certain teams flag, or a control point gets taken (these vary on game type, of course!) On-screen notifications should appear in the centre of the screen. This will allow hearing-impaired players to keep tabs on what's going on during a match.
Also, with the standard radio chatter, for example "enemy flag carrier is here!" Or "incoming!" Is displayed on the game's chat window.
So, despite the setbacks, this game is quite accessible for a player with a hearing impairment.
Mobility 10
although you'll be stuck using a mouse and keyboard (or a controller if you are playing on a DreamCast or PlayStation 2) the keyboard and mouse controls can be fully customised via the options menu. So you should be able to tailor the controls to suit your impairments. So in terms of playing with a mobility impairment, you'll be able to load up, and start kicking @$$ in next to no time!
Gameplay 10
This game, my friend is a classic! As I have said before, I remember playing this game before my accident, still do to this day! What I really like about this game is you can play this game for hours and hours on end, but never gets boring!
As I have said before, this game has the perfect mix between single player and multiplayer content. This game, along with other classics signalled the beginning of the traditional arena-based shooter.
In summary, Unreal Tournament is an all-time classic that still holds up, even to this day! it's this game, along with other classics, for example Jazz JackRabbit is what gave the Epic Games the reputation that it had, and still maintains to this day!
The sheer amount of maps, and modes will keep you playing for a very long time! I remember playing this game when I was in my local pub's karaoke night, waiting for my turn to sing! But, hey this was before lockdown started.
In terms of system requirements, this game is extremely low spec friendly, Even a laptop can run it!
OVERALL SCORE-88.75%
One word of advice though – if you are planning to get this classic, best to go for the GOG version as it is the most compatible version with Windows 10 as the required fixes are included.
See you guys in the next review!
SpartanCommander1990 out!
Roll Out Spartan Company!
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