Blood

Blood is a first-person shooter game released in 1997 by Monolith Productions. The game is often compared to Doom due to their similarities as 90s FPS games, but Blood stands out with its unique gameplay and level design. Blood is more reminiscent of the original Castlevania or even F-Zero rather than Doom. One of the game's appeals is the challenge it presents to players, which requires them to remember enemy placement, map layout, and strategies to overcome the game's difficulties.

Playing Blood feels different from playing Doom, as it offers a more challenging gameplay experience. Blood's difficulty is not simply about being able to shoot accurately or quickly; it requires players to think critically and use strategy. Players must remember the enemy placement and be able to adapt their strategy accordingly. Additionally, the map layout is crucial to success in Blood. Players must take the time to explore and memorize the level design to progress in the game.

Despite being released over two decades ago, Blood still holds up as a great game. It offers a unique gameplay experience that separates it from other 90s FPS games. The game's challenging nature and focus on strategy make it a must-play for fans of the genre. Overall, Blood is an excellent game that is sure to provide hours of challenging and enjoyable gameplay for players who are willing to put in the effort to master it.

The best thing about Blood is that it's very much what you would call a "doom clone", which means the flow of combat is pretty solid. But back in the day this denomination could be seen as negative since this was the time in which FPS started moving away from being just doomlikes, mostly thanks to games like Goldeneye 007, Quake II, Unreal and Half-Life, which also had fully 3D graphics.

So even back then a game with pseudo 2D graphics and a combat system that's very much based in Doom would have been seen as a kinda outdated. This strong influence can mostly be seen in the basic enemy composition, which is very reminiscent of the classic Doom games. Although that doesn't apply to some of the most annoying enemies like the small rats and crawling hands.

What makes Blood interesting is its arsenal of weapons, all of which feel good to use and do tons of damage to enemies. The downside being either that the strongest weapons can do damage to the player, such as the dynamite and the flares; or can run out of ammo quickly, which is mostly the case with the shotgun and the tesla gun.

One big downside is in the balance, and the main problems here are related to the most common enemies. The melee zombies are very easy to deal with, so the game constantly spawns them right behind you, which gets annoying and repetitive. The other annoying enemy are the cultists that have hitscan weapons, which can do huge amounts of damage as soon as you enter a new room or corridor.

The other major issue is the level design, which is trying to mix Doom's non-linear dungeons with the more realistic-looking levels of Duke Nukem 3D, and for some reason it doesn't work very well. Navigating the levels is often confusing and annoying, probably because these levels are maze-like and interconnected, so it's easy to end up walking aimlessly. In Doom the levels are far more simple and linear than they seem, while in Duke Nukem the visual design was much more memorable.

The bosses are also not good, although this was a time in which boss design was often pretty flawed. The best use of the bosses is when they show up as regular enemies, but it's possible that many people would just walk past them since they do consume a ton of ammo. In the end, Blood has a pretty solid combat flow, but it's also pretty flawed, and I think most people would find it frustrating and annoying, especially if they attempt to play it on the harder difficulties.

One of the few games i can admit is a masterpiece but also hate.

Arguably the best game made with the Build engine, at least technically. It's certainly the most challenging as even at the lowest level of difficulty, there are monsters and situations that are taxing.

By today's semi-exacting standards, it's pixelated nonsense, but at the time it was enormous fun, and just remember folks - there's no business like show business like...

This is the best shooter from the classic 2.5D era of shooters but the only thing keeping it from being practically perfect is the behaviour of a few enemies, including the hitscanners having reaction times comparable to Nightmare enemies in Doom.

the pinnicle of classic fps for me. the artstyle, level design, humour, writing, one liners, theyre all awesome. the game just reeks of badassery. the weapons are super memorable and really fun to use, and beating every level feels rewarding. cool game.

8.5/10

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