SERIOUS SAM: THE SECOND ENCOUNTER

SERIOUS SAM: THE SECOND ENCOUNTER
Posted:2002-05-10 By Master Chief Number of View:9377
SERIOUS SAM: THE SECOND ENCOUNTER By :Master Chief Posted:2002-05-10 xtreview is your : Video card - cpu - memory - Hard drive - power supply unit source Serious Sam: The Second Encounter Publisher: Gathering of Developers Developer: Croteam Genre: Action ESRB: Mature System Requirements  Minimum: PII 300, 64MB RAM, Win9x/ME/NT/2000/XP, 3D graphics accel. Recommended: PIII 650, 128MB RAM |       Most of us love to see an underdog come out of nowhere to become a smashing success. Such was exactly what happened when little Croteam from Croatia released Serious Sam last year, only to find it quickly become both hugely popular with consumers and applauded by critics. It was a fun, whimsical old school first-person shooter that captured the hearts of most who played it. Now less than a year later, Croteam has released Serious Sam: The Second Encounter -- can the little guy win again?   The plot of the second episode begins right where the first one ended -- early in the 22nd century -- and an introductory video links the two together. After vanquishing untold numbers of foes under the control of a powerful being from the planet Sirius known as Mental, our hero Sam Stone boards an alien spaceship to confront the arch-villain. Unfortunately, he loses control of the craft and it crashes back on Earth in the South American mountains. Now surrounded by an even stronger array of Mental\'s minions, you play the role of Sam as he makes yet another valiant effort to save the world   Serious Sam: The Second Encounter dwarfs its predecessor, encompassing 12 levels spread over three gargantuan environments. As before, you move seamlessly between amazing indoor and outdoor settings, although you bypass ancient Egypt this time. You visit, in sequence, the Mayan city of Teotihuacan in Mesoamerica, the grandeur of Persepolis in Babylon, and a spooky medieval European village. As I passed through these three worlds, I liked each better than the last, with the final setting -- containing quaint homes, snowy mountains, and haunted graveyards -- being the most special and differing from the South American and Middle Eastern environments both in physical appearance and in the nature of the challenges presented. Unfortunately, this final locale is also where you spend the shortest amount of time.   In addition to the lovable crew of monsters from the first episode of Serious Sam, such as the memorable Kleer Skeleton and Sirian Werebull, this second episode introduces seven impressive new foes. My favorite is Cucurbito the Pumpkin, a giant redneck wearing overalls and toting a chainsaw with a jack-o-lantern for a head. Other impressive additions include the Fiendian Reptiloid Demon, a mammoth crimson alien throwing fireballs, and the Zorg Mercenary and Commander from Beelmez IV, rapid-moving alien officers armed with laser weaponry. The bosses are not disappointing and present quite interesting challenges, with the most impressive being the awesome and grotesque one after the second world; but at the same time, they do not blow you away with their innovation or overwhelming power. While none of the added enemies dramatically alters the gameplay from the original, their inclusion makes it considerably more entertaining. Similarly, three new weapons spice up the action. Specifically, the Bonecracker Chainsaw, XOP Flamethrower, and Raptor Sniper Rifle significantly change your tactics in confronting your numerous foes. The high-caliber sniper rifle allows you to pick off even the most powerful monsters at a long distance, often with a single blast before they can fire a shot; it sports an 8X magnifying scope allowing you to obliterate enemies from miles away and deliver an instant-hit. Frankly, I have not seen as nice an implementation of the sniper rifle since its original use in Shiny\'s MDK. The flamethrower permits you to disable huge numbers of attacking creatures at close range; it sets them on fire until they die, but you have to be careful because they still can hurt you as they burn to death. While the chainsaw is not as functional as the other two in combat, you can not only slice up opponents but also cut down trees and anything else in your way. The ultimate weapon is the Serious Bomb, which is just awesome as it demolishes every enemy in sight. The new arms simply expand the range of already satisfying combat action. Augmenting the Backpack and the more powerful SeriousPack are four new power-ups. These are Serious Speed Boots, allowing you to run at twice normal speed; Serious Damage, supercharging your weaponry; Invulnerability, keeping your armor and health intact; and Invisibility, cloaking you from the gaze of your enemies. While all present you with only temporary advantages, they do save your skin in tight situations. Moreover, their presence induces you to not just use a rapid run-and-gun approach to the action, but rather to pause on occasion in order to see if you can spot and use pickups unrelated to guns and ammunition.   Beyond the usual switch pulling and item collection, there are surprisingly lots of interesting physical puzzle elements in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, far more than in its predecessor. During the game\'s early sequences, for example, you encounter a series of dropping walls blocking your path through which you have to carefully time your movement; then you enter a room where a huge crushing block descends rhythmically, and you have to jump across indentations in the floor to make it through; finally, you have to hop on a series of moving circular platforms to get safely from one embankment to another. Later, you find a disappearing light path you have to follow, a room where strong wind makes it tricky to get to the exit, and lots of areas with moving floors. Although the platform jumping is tiring after awhile, these obstacle-based puzzles provide a pleasant diversion from the combat and fit nicely into the overall motif of this release.   What truly sets Serious Sam: The Second Encounter apart from its first-person shooter competition is its zany sense of humor. While titles such as Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Alien vs. Predator 2, and Clive Barker\'s Undying have largely somber and dark themes with a few restrained comedic touches, Croteam has intentionally gone way over the top exposing us to quite a bit of unabashed goofiness amidst our nonstop destruction. Aside from the hysterical comments blurted out by Sam himself, even the text descriptions of the game\'s weapons, enemies, and scenarios often leave you chuckling uncontrollably. The designers clearly let it all out in this regard, and the secrets and hidden levels are all crack-ups. Plays on words abound -- including some related to the planet Sirius itself, even though this title never takes itself seriously.   Graphics: The visuals in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter rank among those in the top-tier of first-person shooters, incorporating significant improvements over its predecessor. The look of this release continues to be much more colorful than the drab palette of many of its competitors, and the offering is even much more vibrant than the relatively barren, yellow-toned Serious Sam as well. Majestic panoramic vistas that are just gorgeous to look at appear repeatedly. The depiction of grass and foliage in the jungle setting, paintings on the walls in the Babylonian setting, and spooky castles in the European setting gives the combat a whole new textured flavor from the original, encompassing an amazing level of detail. While the character models are not the best, as even Sam himself looks pretty crude, they are more than serviceable given the number of them on the screen at any one time and the distance at which you normally encounter them. The special visual effects are wonderful. I would single out the ambient lighting and lens flares as well as the magnificent reflective floors, for praise. Toward the end of the gameplay, it\'s nice how a storm emerges during the fighting and then the sky clears up when the combat ends. While the flamethrower in Return to Castle Wolfenstein is visually superior to the one here, it\'s nice that using it in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter ignites not only attacking foes but parts of the surrounding environment as well.   The graphics are a product of an improved version of Croteam\'s 3D Serious Engine, permitting you to face more enemies in larger settings than ever before possible. Even on non-state-of-the-art computers, the animation is smooth; on my machine I run the game at 1600x1200 with 32-bit color and all the graphics settings maximized, and it speeds along flawlessly; in addition, this high resolution allows you to see clearly just how much intricate detail is incorporated into each of the stunning structures depicted.     Interface: Serious Sam: The Second Encounter employs standard first-person shooter controls combining the keyboard and mouse. These controls prove to be both smooth and responsive. The menu screens are intuitive and easy to follow despite the presence of innumerable configuration settings that not everyone will comprehend. You may save at will, can disable blood and gore if you wish, and can load mods and new levels. There is even a helpful custom option on the menu allowing you to begin any game level again after you have managed to get through the entire offering. The play screen gives you all the information you could want without overwhelming you.     Gameplay: The gameplay in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, much like that of its predecessor, is more similar to that of video arcade classics from the early 1980s than to the spate of post-Half-Life first-person shooters. Indeed, the single recent title I am most tempted to compare this Croteam series to is Microprose\'s X-COM Enforcer. You end up in frenzied fights against overwhelming odds without ceasing, making those who love an emphasis on hand-eye coordination be in absolute heaven. The intensity of the adrenaline-pumping action is simply indescribable and is largely unparalleled in the first-person shooter genre. Admittedly there is a certain repetitiveness in the action, with those who have mastered the art of battling enemy wave tactics having to demonstrate their standard counter-strategies over and over again; nonetheless, it\'s all splendid fun thanks to highly creative level design, and you certainly do not have even a moment of breathing room where you could become bored. The level design and the differences in the settings make the experience of playing this second episode different enough from the first for it to be highly worthwhile.     Multiplayer: Serious Sam: The Second Encounter allows up to 16 players to engage in multiplayer action over a LAN and the Internet. In addition, there is split-screen support on a single computer for up to four players. The primary multiplayer modes are cooperative, deathmatch-scorematch, and deathmatch-fragmatch. Without question, the outstanding multiplayer option is cooperative gameplay, where you and your cronies gang up against the multitude of enemies in any of the single player levels, evening the odds a bit. Version 3.0 of the Seriously Warped Deathmatch multiplayer mod is included, allowing over 20 deathmatch modes and several new styles of play including Capture the Flag and King of the Hill. The wide-open nature of the combat arenas gives people a lot of flexible possibilities for devising creative strategies. The increased efficiency of the code makes the multiplayer competition even more fluid than in the original release, minimizing lags problems along the way.     Sound FX: The sound effects in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter are excellent. Your dread of approaching enemies is as much due to the unique noises each makes, instantly recognizable from a distance, as from any visual cues. The designers of this title were quite clever in making several of the ambient environmental sounds very close to those made by the various monsters, leaving you often in a position of apprehensive uncertainty about whether your foes are nearby. There are almost always some unnerving noises occurring in the background. The weapons effects are right on the mark, particularly the rumble of the chainsaw, which sounds so authentic you think it\'s in the room with you. Sam\'s voice is just perfect, with the individual performing it deserving an acting award for just the right tone of delivery. The 3D hardware sound, so important in a gem of this type, is extremely well implemented, with full support for Creative Labs\' EAX standard.     Musical Score: Serious Sam: The Second Encounter\'s musical backdrop is perfectly suited to the tone of the title, with occasionally familiar tunes present to lighten things up. Each of the three worlds has its own score, increasing in volume, intensity, and tempo when you are engaged in frenzied combat, and mellowing out again when your foes are vanquished. Rather than the ponderous epic-wannabe soundtracks common to many first-person shooters, this release makes sure the audio supports rather than overwhelms the action. The only drawback is the occasionally repetitive nature of the tunes.     Intelligence & Difficulty: The five levels of difficulty available -- tourist, easy, normal, hard, and serious (along with a hidden extra-hard "mental" level) -- allow players with the full range of abilities to achieve success. The lowest level is almost like a cheat mode, as your health slowly restores itself up to a level of 200 percent; the highest levels present a daunting challenge even to experienced shooter fans. While combat in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter gets tougher faster than in the original, in the end the overall difficulty of making it all the way through to the end is not substantially different.   There is not much subtle artificial intelligence in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, as every adversary simply runs straight at you, or targets you from the front, rather than engaging in collaborative offensive strategies or sophisticated indirect attack moves to keep you off-guard. This limited design can be enjoyable for awhile, but it substantially limits your need to devise a wide and adaptable range of counter-strategies.     Overall: With Serious Sam: The Second Encounter being a new episode in the saga, it\'s important to recognize from the outset that this release is more like an add-on pack than a full-fledged standalone sequel. Taking the best elements of first-person shooters that preceded it, what we have here is a magnificent homage to the genre rather than an attempt to introduce significant novelty or redefine its boundaries. Explicitly rejecting the recent intellectually demanding twists in first-person shooters injecting complicated storylines or subtle stealth, this new offering returns us to the classic arcade roots of combat action with equal quality evident in single-player and multiplayer modes. Insistent on taking a lighthearted approach to the action rather than a hyper-realistic attempt to immerse you in a convincing real-world setting, this title succeeds in drawing you as far away from the constraints of real-life as possible. Clearly superior to its predecessor, with bigger environments, more weapons and enemies, and improved graphics, Serious Sam: The Second Encounter is more than worth the bargain bin asking price it commands. Despite its very minor limitations, this is about as close to pure, silly fun as you will find on the personal computer. xtreview is your : Video card - cpu - memory - Hard drive - power supply unit source we would be happy to answer for your question . if you have suggestion or comment regarding this review our support would be glad to help just join our forum and ask u will get the best answer to discuss check our forum section :-) RATE THIS REVIEW 1 2 3 4 5    / 5   View Stat

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