DUSK: Something Went Wrong, Better Kill Everything. Something Went Wrong: Better Kill Everything it says on the back of the dark red box that’s decorated with looming fiend-like skeletons called Wendigos guarding a dangerous looking cathedral. What a promising start! Better kill everything indeed: DUSK is a retro-inspired shooter where fluid constant movement is a requirement to survive the swarms of horrifying enemies, just like the nineties shooters you know and love. DUSK doesn’t beat ...| jefklakscodex.com
DOOM + DOOM II: Why Choose If You Can Have Both?. I’ve always considered 1994’s DOOM II to be more of an expansion to 1993’s DOOM—a very necessary one, that is: who would want to play DOOM without the double barrel shotgun? I can live without that chainsaw, but the super shotgun, no way. It’s not only packing a punch, rapidly becoming my favourite weapon to put holes though Pinkies, but also inspiring future (retro) shooters to have keyboard slot 3 reserved for that double buckshot ...| jefklakscodex.com
What’s there left to say about the grandfather of shooters that started it all back in May 1992? It’s technically not the first of its kind but it’s more than certain the most popular one and generally accepted as the forefather of what some would call the boomer shooter genre. Which brings me to my reason for revisiting the game after finishing Heretic: to take a step back from the DOOM engine and see how the iconic Wolf3D lives up to its name in 2024, together with the DOS Game Club P...| Retro Gaming on Jefklak's Codex
Heretic: a thin-veiled DOOM clone? is printed as a provoking heading on multiple game review magazines of 1994. One of Raven Software’s first games is undoubtedly firmly entrenched in DOOM’s legacy: it’s using the same engine, its weapons are (a bit too) heavily inspired on DOOM, and the gameplay remains largely the same. But let me ask you this: is riding on the wave of one of the best shooters of all time a bad thing? I don’t think so. So grab your magic wands and cast a Wingardium ...| Retro Gaming on Jefklak's Codex
Project Warlock: a Modern Wolf3D. I played through Project Warlock in June of 2020 but forgot to collect screenshots and add a review here, so after being done with Nightmare Reaper, I picked it back up to see how similar or different both retro-inspired shooters were, since both games gave me heavy Blake Stone and Wolfenstein 3D feelings. Via Jefklak's Codex| jefklakscodex.com
Nightmare Reaper: Pixel Gore Galore. Have you ever had a true nightmare, complete with flying guts, blood spattering, and things exploding? No? Perhaps then it’s time to try out Nightmare Reaper, a retro-inspired pixelated roguelite shooter (a what?) that, once you get your hands on the better weapons, invokes exactly that. Until you run out of ammo, fail to dodge projectiles or that mad zombie dash, or get pushed into lava. Luckily, dying in a bad dream means you just get to wake up, rise,...| jefklakscodex.com
Quake (2021 Remaster). After playing Outlaws, I felt the need to go back one more year to id Software’s 1996 seminal shooter title, Quake. But what is there left to say about one of the very first fully 3D polygon-rendered shooters that further propelled the shooter, multiplayer, and modding community to the heights they are now? Everyone has heard of Quake, and without it, we wouldn’t have Half-Life, the birth of story in FPS, or the Team Fortress mod, the birth of char- and team-based m...| jefklakscodex.com
Ion Fury: the Spiritual Successor of Duke3D?. Time to kick ass again - and don’t forget to chew bubblegum! Does Shelly and the Build engine stand a chance anno 2020? Via Jefklak's Codex| jefklakscodex.com
Void Bastards: Scrapheap Scrounging. Void Bastards is as weird as the title suggests—but in a delightful way. In it, you board spaceships, shoot stuff, watch “foomp”, “whizz” and “mumble” comic effects, loot even more stuff, and get the hell out of there. Chances are also high of dying from radiation, oxygen shortages, or just a hail of missiles. Not to worry in that case: there’s always another anonymous captive convict (against their will?) waiting in line to rinse and repea...| jefklakscodex.com