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Retro Blazer
Retro Blazer is an aggressively old-school 90s shooter that feels like a cross between Wolfenstein 3D and Mega Man X. It is a Quake total conversion running on the darkplaces engine. The first playable version is now available.

http://www.retroblazer.com/
 
I played this a little last night.... fairly fun for the first 2 levels, not sure when the novelty will wear off. The art is really consistent and evokes the feel of early nineties 2D arcade games. Gameplay is fairly fun, but simple (as intended, I'm sure.) 
 
I agree with metlslime. It's very much like Wolf3D. Only horizontal aiming. The alpha had much more levels than I though, and it gets pretty repetitive. I'd like to try some speed runs though. 
 
i love the 80's sidescroller look with the flashing enemies for pain and the way they are animated. 
Bit Neon 
oh god my eyes, the colours! 
A Couple Of Criticisms... 
- the visual language of the game is a bit muddled, as everything is equally flashy and colorful, which looks rich and fun, but it means that doors and other important features don't really pop out at you when looking at a room. The consistency also makes it easier to get lost since only a few rooms have obvious landmarks.

- the game doesn't come with any reasonable key bindings (it seems like it is just the standard quake 1 default bindings) so there are some custom impulses you will need to bind to play with all of the features of the game (for example, I think impulse 100 is alt fire, which i found out from the help screens.) 
 
The alpha was a lot of fun. It was frustrating to see enemies that I couldn't attack, though, on account of the no vertical mouse movement.

I too got lost, and not just in the maze, because of how similar each room looked. Maybe in a later version there will be more textures, and thus more variation. 
 
the elevated enemies seem to get auto-killed when all of the ground-level enemies have died, which solves the problem but is not very intuitive at first. 
 
Just looked at the video only. Graphics look quite cool. The POV and walk speed is crazy! But the copy/paste rooms like Wolfenstein doesn't look too good. It doesn't need to be crazy vertical castles like Quake, but a little variety instead of level design from the 80s is needed, imo. 
 
im impressed, i like the retro style a lot. mapdesign too, its okay to have it simple. hopefully there are more enemys and textures in the future. im not sure if a possible free mouselook give anything to the game. the same goes for a possible mini map. what i dont like in games is to jump against the seiling (warsow, quake 4). 
Yea 
it brings that oldskool feel with it. rather nicely done game. and i agree with metlslime's points. 
 
i send a message to bluenews. its just a cool game.
http://www.bluesnews.com/s/129245/retro-blazer-alpha 
 
I like it.

The simple level design is OK.
Classic platformers often have nicely hand drawn backgrounds, gives the setting - I would suggest similar here. Maybe just skyboxes can cut it otherwise some architecture + skybox, to be seen out of windows/over barriers from time to time.

Give it a bit more setting and even more personality. 
What Makes This So Special? 
I'm really impressed, by I can't quite put my finger on it. Can we try to analyze why this is awesome? 
Awesome! 
Fast, crazy and beautyful - I love it!

Only two moments.
I can't play without mlook, so I turned it back via m_pitch 0.022, +mlook and sv_aim 0.
And I'm not sure that sprites instead of models is the best idea (but it works!) 
Blazing! 
This is the first quake mod/tc I've actually wanted to play in a long time. Does a great job of not looking or feeling anything like quake. Only giveaway was the menu screen, otherwise I would've thought it was a custom engine probably. Agree with most points made about map design. I think an automap system and a little variety in rooms / corridors would go a long way to help the levels. Keeping an eye on this one though! 
 
It looks very promising... the bright style, use of sprites etc. But I'm concerned about the level design being so damn flat. At least make it Doom/Duke 2.5D kinda thing :E

Also, holy shit having to repeatedly tap to fire the first gun can fuck right off. I hate shit like that :( 
I Like It 
it's part of that whole megaman thing 
 
made it to level 4 -- looks like a remake of wolf3d map 1.

Also noticed the players' bullets don't go very far... so in a large room you could be wasting ammo on far off guys until you realize this. Enemy bullets have unlimited range, though (it seems.)

Door opening sound sounds like an enemy growling at me. 
 
Zqf - I agree with you on the flat levels somewhat but think you're missing the point slightly. It's trying to be wolf3d on steroids as opposed to doom on steroids so I think the sprawling maze like designs suit it. I'm sure some slight height variations wouldn't do it any harm but you risk it ending up looking like quake again the more you push it towards looking like newer games. /end waffle 
Nice Game 
Great demo.
Have completed all levels.

To enable free mouse look type "m_pitch 0.022" in console.

Atgorithm for getting out of mazes really helps in this game.

Textures (sprites) should be more detailed. 
Very Cool 
I love the "horizontality", speed and sprites, music is great too. I think that developers should stick to this horizontality and use classic platformer enemies and obstacles like turrets, pits, traps, moving platforms to enhance gameplay. I'm sure some people will abandon their Sega Genesis emulators for some time.
Also give +1 for taping the button to shoot the first gun, i like shit like that :). 
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