Ice and Fire

"Worst FPS I have ever played..."

Wow,when I first saw this game lying on a shelf at Pick'N Save for about $4.99,I thought I was going to get a bargain. The screen shots on the back of the box looked pretty cool,and the graphics seem good at the time. It was made by the makers of Tetris,so I thought ''Hmmm,they made Tetris so this must be good''. Well,I was wrong...

Graphics,4/10

The only good thing about this game. They look pretty cheesy now,with very blocky character models and chunky FMV. The floating monsters,or,''Spherids'' as the game calls them,have just a mean looking face,and a bunch of colored clouds as a body. Everything looks very pixilated,with little to no texture on the surfaces of walls or ice. The surface of the asteroid looks okay though,and is quite interesting to just wonder the whole thing and goof off. Oh,and unlike most good FPS,you can't even see the gun that is being fire,it's just like a ball of fire appeared out of your body,and the helmet interface is just stupid and not very realistic.

Story,2/10

Wow,being the makers of a game that had no story or plot,I can see why this game has an extreme lack of it. The whole point of the game is to find out why the alien spherid's invaded the IF-1 asteroid base. The whole game seems to be based around Ice And Fire. Gee,I wonder why...

Sound,2/10

Ugh,the sound is crap. Plain and simple. The limited voice acting is even cheesier than that of Resident Evil on the Playstation. The monsters all sound exactly the same,and the sound effects are very dull. Worst of all there is almost no in game music. At all. When you already kill/freeze a Spherid,there isn't anything else left to do but wander around aimlessly looking for a way out in total silence. Becomes very boring and repetitive.

Gameplay,1/10

Speaking of being boring and repetitive,that's exactly the the gameplay is in this. The only thing slightly innovative about the game is that instead of jumping from level to level,you must return to your little space ship type vehicle and look for it yourself among the large canyons and valleys of the asteroid. Which can take hours of pointless flying about. And since you're on a fixed track,the freedom of movement is very low. Once you get to the actual level,the only objective is to free all the personal and escape. That. Is. It. If you go into an environment that is too cold you freeze into an ice cube,but you have the ability to thaw yourself,and when you go to an environment too hot,well,you just die from extreme heat. This also apply's to when if the spherid is an Ice or a Fire spherid. The only weapons you get in the game are an Ice gun and a Fire gun. And what do ya know,an Ice missile and a Fire missile. And guess what! The only enemies in the whole game are Ice monsters and Fire monsters! Wow,so THAT'S how they came up with the title! Bah.

Controls,2/10

Meh,the usual use mouse to aim and fire and use arrow keys to move setup. But then when it comes to switch between weapons it becomes very hard to remember which key does what. And when you do push the right key,it is very slow and sometimes nothing happens until after around 15 seconds. And trust me,I can run Delta Force 2 flawlessly on the highest resolution without any slowdown,so it is not my computer that's slowing down.

Well that's about it. If you ever see this game in a garage sale,or in a bargain bin store,ignore it all all costs. Even at $4.99 I still feel ripped off. In fact,now I now WHY it was sitting in a Pick'N Save in the same year it came out...

Reviewer's Score: 2/10, Originally Posted: 11/10/02, Updated 11/10/02