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It's Time For the Descent Games Return
An anonymous reader writes "Gamers of a certain age will probably remember Descent, a game that combined first-person shooters with flight sims in a way that has never really been replicated. GameSpot has an article calling for a new entry in the Descent series, and it reminded me of all the stomach-churning battles I had as a kid (when the game wasn't bringing my 33MHz 486 to its knees). 'Here's where modern gaming innovations make Descent an even more tempting reboot. From the two-dimensional mines of Spelunky to the isometric caves of Path of Exile, procedurally generated levels help deliver fresh experiences to players in a number of genres. The mines of Descent would be perfect candidates for such creation, and they wouldn't have to be limited to the metallic walls and lunar geology of past Descent games.
Imagine exploring organic tunnels carved by some unknown alien creature, or floating past dazzling crystalline stalactites in pristine ancient caves. Perhaps the influences of Red Faction and Minecraft could also come into play as you bored your own shortcuts through layers of destructible sediment. All of Descent's dizzying navigation challenges could be even more exciting with the immersive potential of a virtual reality headset like the Oculus Rift or the Sony Morpheus. Feeling the mine walls close in on you from all sides could get your heart racing, and turning your head to spot shortcuts, power-ups, or delicate environmental details could greatly heighten the sense of being an explorer in an uncharted land.'"
Imagine exploring organic tunnels carved by some unknown alien creature, or floating past dazzling crystalline stalactites in pristine ancient caves. Perhaps the influences of Red Faction and Minecraft could also come into play as you bored your own shortcuts through layers of destructible sediment. All of Descent's dizzying navigation challenges could be even more exciting with the immersive potential of a virtual reality headset like the Oculus Rift or the Sony Morpheus. Feeling the mine walls close in on you from all sides could get your heart racing, and turning your head to spot shortcuts, power-ups, or delicate environmental details could greatly heighten the sense of being an explorer in an uncharted land.'"
I loved playing Descent. We had our first LAN party back in the day with that game.
It already has, it is called Retrovirus.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Doom had a ~2x speed movement bug along North-South walls when moving forward and right and looking at a 45 degree off axis.
Descent had it it 3 dimensions. (Look, down, right, move up, left and forward)
Part of the charm of older games were the glitches that made the difficult to master but took gameplay to a whole different level.
in VR.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
Except was always lost, having no sense of up and down has scarred me for life.
So bring on a modern GPU powered rift version.. always assumed someone would go there and I would buy it.
Speaking for all of us old fogies who got left behind by modern gaming due to our less than stellar reflexes and spatial awareness ... absolutely no to this.
I'd probably hurl within about the first two minutes, Descent used to make me dizzy as it was. In a VR headset? It would get messy real fast.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
For those of us who still have the binaries around, the D2X-XL project (http://www.descent2.de/d2x.html) has ported the game engine to OpenGL and has added a number of great things to the project. It supports more players, TCP/IP, and tons of additional features. As with any community project (or commercial project recently) there are bugs, but some of the builds have been quite good. I encourage fans to check out and contribute to the project :)
I would absolutely play it more if there were a community of descent players ready to go online against (a matchmaking system, for example).
Have you heard the good news that is Star Citizen? Would you like to know more? :D
http://www.robertsspaceindustr...
I played through Decent and Decent 2. Decent 2 had the helper that would help you navigate through the mazes. (Find power-up, find key, find goal, find boss). I like the idea of a end-boss that chips away at the environment around you as you try to fire and dodge. I also played both Decent:Freespace (1 and 2) games and thought they were the best PC space fighter games created.
Calvin:Do you believe in the devil? Hobbes:I'm not sure man needs the help.
20 years and I can still recall that annoying screech followed a moment later by an instant hit from those vulcan-carring robots.
Still wait for decent games to make a comeback.
As a Star Citizen purchaser...It'll be a while.....a long while and before you say anything...A dog-fighting module is not a game and provides no story or incentive to keep playing like Descent.
With all of the Descent love, I can't believe nobody has mentioned Heretic yet. I only played either of them a handful of times (I was more of an RTS guy than an FPS guy, so Starcraft/Red Alert/Warcraft II was more my thing), but my buddies played both. Ahh, the good old days, when Windows 2000 was fresh and new.
"Murphy was an optimist" - O'Toole's commentary on Murphy's Law
Others have already mentioned Retrovirus (which look quite much like Descent):
http://store.steampowered.com/...
(Damn that was expensive, guess I saw it in some cheapish bundle.)
The game I'm thinking off though is Strike vector:
http://store.steampowered.com/...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
This was in the $10(?) third tier in the Humble Daily Flying Bundle.
Personally I've never enjoyed Descent even though it looked cool. Just annoying.
This game however looked cool, fun and somewhat new.
(I have no idea whatever it's possible to move around upside down in natural selection, isn't shown here at least: http://store.steampowered.com/...)
... but the real problem was that Descent 3 was not as good as the prior 2. Descent really shined in multiplayer over LAN/Kail/Kahn. Back when I was playing with friends Descent was eclipsed by quake and other first person shooters because they were easier to play and the single player portion of the game always had serious issues.
I don't have confidence any reboot would understand why Descent 3 failed in terms of single and multiplayer. The developers of the original descent didn't even understand what made descent great then that doesn't bode well.
Was a great game.
It would be fantastic if the Descent game engine could be open source, if it isn't already.
Uh, Linux geek since 1999.
A cross between Descent and Tron, with procedurally-generated levels. Haven't had time to try it yet, but it looks worth checking out.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
A buddy and I had the game on our playstations, and it was one of the few the supported the Link cable on that system.
Two CRTs placed near each other, two PSXs , two copies of the game and the link cable made for awesome afternoons.
Played and controlled well enough, especially since the dual[analog|shock] hadn't been released yet.
Karma: Can only be portioned out by the Cosmos.