Reviving the old school 3D shooters simply can’t be done. Pixel art adventure games, point and click stories even old school styled platformers still seem to be able to work and be innovative in this modern day. Shooters in the vein of the original Quake or Duke3D however have just never really been that great, with notable examples like the Rise of the Triad¹ reboot and the recent Kickstarter disappointment STRAFE. I had thought that AMID EVIL might be different in that regard, seemingly having some small influences from the modern day in it, but they are unfortunately not enough to save the dreary and simplistic combat that was the 3D shooters of old. So I don’t blame the developers for the game they’ve created, no it is the idea that these kinds of games are still good when they are simply not.
Each level of AMID EVIL has its own little story, told through little nuggets of text that are scribed on the walls. It’s nothing particularly deep or meaningful, mostly just a kind of flavour text that gives you some insight into the various enemy types and the boss of the particular level. There might be more to it but honestly I don’t think it’s worth chasing down. If the devs really wanted you to engage with the story they would’ve done something more with it like, say, voice the lines or something like that. Still you’re not going to be playing AMID EVIL for the story so I’m not going to count that against it too heavily.
The graphics try to strike a balance between being old school and modern which makes it end up feeling more dated than anything else. The old school style UI elements overlaid on a low poly environment that has decidedly modern lighting effects removes any illusion that this was an old school game that never saw the light of day. Instead you know that it’s a modern engine (Unreal 4, although that’s easy enough to tell from the way it handles specularity) and it’s been implemented deliberately this way. If you’re trying to make me think I’m playing an old school game then you’d better try your darndest to avoid any cues that remind me I’m playing this in 2019.
As you’d expect the combat is pretty straightforward, you’ve got half a dozen weapons each of which is reminiscent of similar archetypes from games of yesteryear. AMID EVIL’s spin on the traditional shooter mechanics is the overdrive system whereby each enemy you kill fills up a meter that, when unleashed, changes the secondary fire of each of the weapons into a horrendously overpowered version of itself until the meter runs dry. That’s fun enough although after a while you’ll find yourself saving it up “just in case” and then find yourself rarely needing to use it at all.
Each episode has different enemies but they’re dumb as rocks, walking directly at you for the most part and not having more than a couple different attacks. The old circle strafe strategy works far too well here which, depending on what you’re looking for here, is either an extremely faithful rendition of what these old school shooters were like or simply a lazy way of implementing an AI. The bosses do exhibit some more novel behaviour but even then it only took me a couple tries to get past the first boss, his only real challenge being that you needed to DPS him as fast as you could before he had a chance to fill up the room with thousands of projectiles for you to dodge.
Similarly the game also has many opportunities for emergent gameplay, some of which are fun but others are clearly not intended by the developers. Like the games it’s inspired by quite often you can skip large parts of levels or find secrets by exploiting parts of the geometry. Indeed there were a couple sections with certain kinds of angles that allowed you to jump off them when you clearly weren’t supposed to be able to do so. Again if you truly are seeking an experience like the shooters of old then that’s going to be what you’re after but frankly I’ve come to appreciate my games working as intended more than I have come to want to exploit them. I leave all that up to the speedrunners.
Depending on which side of the fence you’re on you’ll either love AMID EVIL for its rather faithful recreation of the shooters of the early 90s or hate it for the exact same reason. If it isn’t already painfully clear I’m very much in the later camp, not really finding any enjoyment in revisiting that part of my gaming history. You might be different however, as are numerous people over on the Steam page who are loving the experience that AMID EVIL provides. So if all the issues I’ve been bellyaching about sound like a good time for you then please, be my guest, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Rating: 5.0/10
AMID EVIL is available on PC and Nintendo Switch right now for $28.95. Game was played on the PC with a total of 68 minutes play time and 22% of the achievements unlocked.
¹ Upon reading the Steam page I see that the people behind this are also the ones behind the Rise of the Triad reboot. I really should have read further before I hit the buy button…
