"Nice giant ant, who's a good giant ant? OHMIGOD!!!"

I love monster movies, so it caught my eye some years back when I was reading this issue of Gameplayer's magazine that did an article about a game called It Came From the Desert about giant ants attacking a desert town. It looked pretty cool, but it wasn't until just recently that I managed to lay my hands on it.

You're geologist Greg Bradley, investigating a fallen meteor outside the nowhere town of Lizard Breath. Strange things have been going on since the meteor landed, like the people have been hearing funny noises at night, and farmers been finding livestock with their head bitten off...Obviously, danger is afoot, and you've got about two weeks game time to find out exactly what (although the manual makes it pretty clear) and doing something about it.

This being a take-off of 50's monster movies, Greg is an all-around he-man type, meaning that he's as good at leading military operations and having knife and gun fights as he is at geology. This is kind of cool, but it can also be a little disconcerting at times as I'll get to in a bit.

The long and short of the game is that you need to follow up on clues of strange activity, collect evidence that mutations resulting from the meteor are on the loose, and convince the authorities of what's going on in time to save the town. Of course, easier said than done, but the great thing about It Came from the Desert is that the game is completely non-linear, allowing you to have a different experience every time you play, depending on where you are at any given time of the day. The game feels like an interactive version of a big bug movie, as well, with everything you'd expect from one, like the finnicky mayor who doesn't want to scare the town what with their one holiday coming up.

My one complaint about the game is that there's numerous different kinds of action sequences in it, since there's also a gang of knife-toting hot rod punks to contend with as well as the mutants running around the desert. When you suddenly find yourself commanding a tank battalion or having a knife fight with a greaser, it all happens very suddenly and you're required to adapt very quickly. I would've appreciated a mode that let you practice in the various modes of combat before plunging into the game proper. Also, there's just one save game slot, keeping you from doing much experimenting as you play. And really, cool as it is, It Came From the Desert isn't really a game I want to be starting from the beginning a hundred times.

This is one for all the b-movie fans out there, as long as they're willing to take action, strategy and adventure-type gameplay in equal doses. I would've liked more time to practice with the different action modes, but overall this is an excellent game that's worth any PC gamer's time to track down.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/07/04, Updated 07/15/04