RISE OF THE TRIAD

I've learned about ROTT somewhere in 1999 I think? When I've borrowed the full release of Duke Nukem 3D from a school mate and found on the disc not only the first two games of the series, but also a shareware version of an odd game, that looked a lot like Wolfenstein 3-D with ton of engine enhancements and some really abstract level design. I learned more about ROTT much later.

Nowadays this game probably isn't as semi-obscure as it used to be - a weird stepping stone between Wolfenstein 3-D (it started as a direct sequel for this game) and Doom, headed by head weirdo and ex-id dev Tom Hall, with a weird, pulpy story about elite unit fighting a cult which took more than one page from the Third Reich book of thought and design. ROTT has a ton of cool little features that help make it stand on it's own - you can select a player character from the 5 guys and gals avaiable, each of them having different maximum health points and speed, but also height (!). There are of course the weapons, with all the various rocket launchers and flamethrowers (too bad you don't get some kind of heavy machine gun...), and the ridiculous power-ups - deep in the design, ROTT is an arcade game, possibly the last one from the first wave, which goes all the way with points, lives, traps, end level bosses, guts flying everywhere and having no pretense on being just a big old mayhem.

My interest in ROTT was rekindled mostly by old Let's Play by Psychedelic Eyeball (and that was started... more than 10 years ago, fuck!), when the game was still not that well known but you could already buy it on GOG, back when they were "Good Old Games" and not whatever fucked up trend they are chasing right now. Since then, we got a neat little GZDoom TC "Return of the Triad" and the unfortunate sequel/remake from Interceptor Software... Civvie11 said it best, the game has the heart in the right place. But everyone can see that something went REALLY bad in the development.

When I am writing those words, another "remaster" is in the works, by the fuckfaces from Destructive Creations. Real good partners you have nowadays, 3D Realms, real good.

ROTT is also one of those games that is clearly a passion project of some excellent devs who had a blast while making it. Joe Siegler, the "janitor" of Apogee/3D Realms and custodian of their history, released a ton of photos and fun bits from the development of the game. It has it all - small models of the bosses, photo sessions for the enemy soldiers, weird in-jokes and goofy ass secrets... The game had a ton of heart poured into it.

You bet those fucks from Gleiwitz who are currently desecrating the memory of ROTT will shit out some pretentious edgy garbage for terminally memefied morons.

I really like ROTT, I really do. It's quirky beyond belief and not always well designed (some of the later levels are infuriating), it was heavily overshadowed by Doom, it STILL has no proper source port (WinROTT is old and bad) and it will probably always have irredeemably stained reputation by being one of those games that really didn't age well, and is resistant to being modernised. Oh well.

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