Gore: Ultimate Soldier

Gore: Ultimate Soldier
Developer(s)	4D Rulers
Publisher(s)	DreamCatcher Games
Engine	AMP Game Engine
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows
Genre(s)	First-person shooter
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer

Gore: Ultimate Soldier is a first-person shooter video game for Microsoft Windows, released on June 5, 2002. It was published by DreamCatcher Games and developed by 4D Rulers.

Story

In the mid-21st century, massive overpopulation and consumption caused irreversible resource shortages over most of the planet. All supplies of fossil fuels were completely decimated by 2031. The agro-mosaic virus outbreak of 2042 triggered the global food riots of 2043 by causing the extinction of all agricultural plant species. Five billion humans, almost half of the earths population, died of starvation

With most cities falling into ruin in a perpetual night of low fuel and no power, street gangs grew into terror patrols, controlling neighborhoods and sometimes entire cities. These terror patrols grew larger and larger, falling under the control of ever more powerful dictators.

All government officials became targets for assassination, the global system of government was getting weaker by the day. As the governments began to fall and chaos began to be a way of life, all governments united and focused on the continuing search for a new energy source. Finally, in 2079, government scientists discovered a new energy source, created from anti matter chemical reactions between the grinding forces of the planets tectonic plates, a new energy source was mined, called ORE. ORE, though not energy producing itself, was able to catalyze nearly any chemical reaction and also amplify any electrical power fed into it. Because of the density of the ORE found, when energy passed through the ORE atoms were sped up to a speed never seen before, increasing energy passed through the ORE as well as creating distortion in time and the known field.

After the ORE became common knowledge, the fighting factions used all means to gain access to the ORE's power. Using the ORE's power to bend time and fold space the MOB left earth in search of more ORE, in the process creating a war between worlds as well as on its own. Deep in the bowels of UMC research and development, secret experiments have led to the creation of the advanced massively parallel bio-computational neural network, with the ability to emulate higher-level thought processes and simulate the nonlinear processing of computations and complex algorithms. This advanced bio-computational neural network has created a perfect artificial environment, this new system avoids failures from the past and jerkiness caused by computational spasming in older non bio based artificial environments.

One of the first practical uses of this new technology was the development of an advanced combat training emulator. This emulator is a virtual reality where the UMC weeds out the mentally weak and trains the best of the best to be even better. It is so realistic several level 5 marines who first tested it died of cardiac arrest.

The "Meat Machine" termed by the first wave of Marines tested on the neural network, takes the Marine where they have never been, shows them enemies they have never faced, and trains them with existing UMC weaponry, plus weaponry that are yet to be made in the real world.

Gameplay

The player's ability to move quickly and jump high is affected by the stamina system. Stamina is usually lost when running or jumping, but being injured by weapons also does a toll on it. How much stamina lost is affected by several factors, such as the player class being used or the weapon currently being held. Smaller classes can move quicker and regenerate stamina faster, but they cannot run with heavy weapons or they will tire quickly. Larger classes, although much slower and bigger targets, can move with heavier weapons with more endurance. Players show signs of fatigue by decreased movement speed and heavy breathing, which clearly indicates to enemies nearby where that player is and his lack of stamina. If a player's stamina goes below zero, he will black out completely and fall to the ground unconscious for a short period of time. Certain weapons such as gas grenades are designed to do only stamina damage, as opposed to health. Stamina can only be regained by resting, obtaining a stamina powerup, or by being healed by the Light Infantry class's health grenades. Stamina normally regenerates to a maximum value 100, but by using stamina powerups or health grenades, a player can reach 200 stamina, allowing them to sprint for a short period of time.

Instead of protecting the entire player universally, Gore's armor only protects specific areas of the body and must be destroyed before damage can be done again to the person in that area. The individual armor pickups consist of head armor, body armor, and right and left thigh leg armor which come together. There is also a gas mask which provides more protection than the regular head armor and also prevents the player from taking stamina damage from gas grenades.

There are five classes on each team: Light Infantry, Medium Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Snipers, and Mechanized Infantry, as well as the VIP class used only in Tactical modes. However, instead of each team having mirrored skills and appearances, each class has their own distinctive characteristics, including different abilities and weapons completely different from the other team's .

All health, stamina, weapon, and ammo pickups, either as part of the map's item layout or weapons dropped by slain players, can be shot and destroyed. The resulting explosion will damage anyone nearby.

Gore places the camera from which the player views directly on the character model, thus giving true perspective from the player's point of view such as emulating the arch of the back when looking up and down. This perspective creates many new tactics for battle, for example allowing players to accurately judge which parts of their body are exposed. This also lets players to see their own feet.

Multiplayer game types

• Deathmatch — Players fight in a free for all battle to gain the most kills.
• Team Deathmatch — Team-based variant of deathmatch.
• Capture the Flag — Each team must defend their flag while trying to steal and capture the enemy flag. If a team steals the enemy flag but has also had their flag stolen, they cannot score until their flag has been recovered.
• Tactical — Each team spawns with a set amount of weapons and ammo in their own base and must eliminate all other players on the other team. If a player dies, he must wait until the beginning of the next round before he can respawn. The round ends when all the players on one team have been killed or an objective in the current mode of Tactical has been completed. There are four modes of Tactical.
  • Extermination — The most common Tactical mode. Each team must simply kill all other players on the opposing team.
  • Assault — One team starts with target in their base which they must prevent from being destroyed. The opposing team spawns with a bomb satchel which, when planted and detonated, is capable of destroying the target in one large blast. However, the bomb satchel has a 30 second timer, which all players in the map are capable of hearing when armed, and the player with the detonator, which emits a loud ringing noise that easily draws attention, cannot switch to a regular weapon or the timer will stop. The target can also be destroyed by normal weapons, but this is mostly an impractical method as it is strong enough to withstand a great amount of damage.
  • Escape and Infiltration — One team starts with a VIP who must be escorted to a designated location within the map. If the VIP is killed, his team loses. The VIP class is very weak, spawning with no armor and incapable of using any weapons aside from the pistol. He also cannot be healed above 100 health points like all other classes.
• Co-operative — Players join together as a team to play through entire single player campaign against the enemy AI. This mode was added in the 1.48 patch.
• Duel — Two players fight in a 1on1 deathmatch while the others in the server wait and observe from a queue. When the round is over, the loser of the duel is sent to the end of the queue and the next player in line joins to play the winner. This mode was coded in by Gore player and programmer Red Daly and was subsequently included with the 1.50 patch.

Reception

GameSpot UK awarded 6.3, highlighting the exploding power-ups and their anti-camping effect on gameplay, but otherwise rating it as an average old-school shooter. The game was also given along with the Greek magazine PC Master in 2003 which awarded it 84% a year before calling it a "great old school shooter". Gore sold 60.000 copies according to 4D Rulers website.

Special Edition

On the 4th of July 2008 Gore: Special Edition was released free to the public. The special edition includes graphical and gameplay tweaks, and an automatic patch updater.

Notes

• Gore: Ultimate Soldier manual. 4D Rulers, 2002.

External links

• 4D Ruler's Official Gore website
• Dreamcatcher's Official Gore website

http://4drulers.com/invest/