Posts Tagged ‘activision’
Know This Developer: Radical Entertainment
It was announced on June 28, 2012, that after careful consideration Activision decided to disband most of Radical Entertainment (on a recent episode of Giant Bombcast it was discussed that the rumored remaining staff was 12) and basically close the studio. Granted, although the logo may appear on future games and thus be an argument to the fact that the studio is still open, Activision states that Radical remains a support studio with no ability to develop its own games. Cynics want to blame Activision for setting inappropriate goals for the Prototype developer and we all tend to believe that the remaining Radical staff will be assigned to a Call of Duty in the future, but that’s a different discussion for a different forum. Instead, I want to touch on how Radical Entertainment came to be and the games it has contributed to the industry.
River Raid (Activision)
Shortly before the video game crash of 1983, a little company by the name of Activision, formed to give programmers credit for their properties and hard work, released a game called River Raid on the Atari VCS/2600. Released in 1982, this game was a basic scrolling vertical shmup where you control a little plane and blast enemies that appear. Your plane remains at the bottom of the screen, but you can increase the scrolling (plane) speed and move left and right. I know that seems like a basic version of most shmups we’ve seen this month, but when you consider it was an early 80s home video game – on Atari’s limited space, no less – River Raid is an achievement.
Review: Quake 4
Console: Xbox 360
Released: 2005
Developer: Raven Software, id
Publisher: Activision
Value: $4.99 (360) $4.44 (PC) $10.19 (Mac) (pricecharting.com)
Price: $5.99 starting (ebay) $4.99 (GameStop used) $19.99 (GS Digital)
Also Available On: PC (recommended), Mac
Watch For: Copies on PC that have the bonus DVD of content and copies on 360 that have a bonus DVD containing the same content as well as Quake 2.
Round IV
The Quake series is quite an interesting one, especially when you consider its legacy and creation. Developer id, of the Wolfenstein and Doom series and bascially responsible for the first person shooter (FPS) genre, finally created a true 3D FPS with the original Quake. Unlike games before it, the engine didn’t ignore things like height and depth when calculating shots or movement, Quake understood the 3D plane. As the series progressed in Quake II marine Matthew Kane was introduced as a strong protagonist to help fight off the alien race known as the Strogg. I don’t want to discredit the plot completely, but there are striking similarities to the Quake series and Doom series in every way. Continuing that similar trend, Quake III was an arena-only shooter that took the online PC gaming community by storm whereas the plot-heavy game belonged to none other than the revamped demonic classic Doom 3. It is for this reason that Quake 4 marks an interesting place in the id universe given its continuation of Kane’s story from Quake II and drastic visual similarity to Doom 3.
Gaming History 101 