Nitemare 3D
Nitemare 3D is a first-person shooter PC game with a horror theme, released by Gray Design Associates in June 1994 on DOS and Windows 3.x platforms. It consisted of three episodes, the first of which was released as a demo.
Graphics were very similar to those used in id Software's Wolfenstein 3D games, with perpendicular walls, and no texture on the floors or ceilings. The object of the game was to free the player's girlfriend Penelope from the house of the evil Dr. Hammerstein.
N3D, as it is affectionately known, did not enjoy commercial success, mainly due to the fact that the technologically advanced (for the time) Doom had been released the year before. Instead, N3D utilised the basic raycasting seen previously in Wolfenstein 3D and the numerous clones which followed.
N3D followed the story of Hugo, from the acclaimed Hugo Trilogy, a series of text-and-graphic-adventures consisting of Hugo's House of Horrors, Whodunit? and Jungle of Doom. Hugo's girlfriend Penelope has been kidnapped by the evil Dr. Hammerstein for use in heinous experiments. The player must battle through Hammerstein's bizarre mansion, underground caverns complete with prisons and laboratories and finally though a twisted alternate dimension of demons and aliens in an attempt to save her.
Rather than the fast-paced action of Wolfenstein, Nitemare 3D has a slightly slower, more puzzle-oriented style of play. The four different weapons (plasma gun, magic wand, silver bullet pistol and auto-repeat plasma gun) have different usages – for example, magic blasts were especially useful against magical creatures such as vampires, whereas robots were practically immune to them. Each level in the game had numerous secret panels, some of which were purely for bonuses, but others were essential to completing the level. To make this task easier, the player could collect magic eyes, which would reveal a mini-map on the screen and give hints as to the locations of panels, and crystal balls which would show enemy positions on the map.
The game had a schlocky b-movie feel to it, helped by the admittedly cartoony graphics. The sprawling haunted house populated by skeletons, mummies and Frankenstein's monsters, and a secret underground laboratory run by a mad scientist all melded together into something you'd expect from a 50's horror flick.
External links
Categories: 1994 computer and video games | First-person shooters