Realms of the Haunting

Developer: Gremlin Interactive

Release Date: Early 1997

Time Played: A little less than 90 mins

Troubleshooting: There’s some tomfoolery you can do to revert the version that’s on Steam and GOG to the US version of the game, which lets you remap keys and change difficulty, but is it honestly worth it? No. I know this because I did this.

Dubiosity: 4 out of 5

Puzzle Difficulty: less difficult than a game of Nine Men's Morris

Would I play more? Nah, there are videos on Youtube I can watch and get a better experience from

Realms of the Haunting is a pretty straightforward amalgamation of pretty much every mid-90s PC game trend, which is to say it’s a weird hybrid between FPS and Adventure game that also features several CDs worth of Full Motion Video. Like, I’m genuinely surprised Vinny Caravella hasn’t checked it out at any point, because this is premium FMVinny content. As Adam Randall (played by a guy who cannot act and whose only IMDB credit is this video game) you investigate your father’s mysterious death via exploring spooky mansion, solving puzzle, reading notes, and generally engaging in weird, clumsy first person shootemupping.

Honestly outside of the magic that is Full Motion Video of actors against a green screen, I think the greatest problem with Realms of the Haunting is that it’s neither a particularly good shooter (even of the era) nor am I enthused with its putting items into places in order to progress. I think I might’ve also fucked up my ability to progress by trying to mess with fan patches, so, uh, maybe just accept the way it works out of the box. Outside of Fire Warrior, whose run time was truncated because it literally wouldn’t work, this is the one I’ve spent the least amount of time on, and it’s probably going to stay that way. Not a whole lot to say about this one, to be quite honest. There are only so many ways I can say “I did not find the act of clicking a mouse to fire a gun especially satisfying” Next please.

PowerSlave (DOS)

Developer: Lobotomy Software

Release date: June 30, 1996

Time Played: A little more than 90 minutes on stream, about an hour off-stream

Troubleshooting: Used Build GDX, which it turns out is very easy to set up.

Dubiosity: 2 out of 5

Not to be confused with:PowerSlave (Saturn/PSX)

Would I play more? Ehhhhhh. There are better retro and retro-inspired shooters out there worth more of my time

While Ken Silverman’s Build Engine is, in fact, host to many fine specimens of the First Person Shooter genre, it’s hard to avoid the general feeling of *jank* coming from many of the titles that used it. For this feature I’ve very intentionally avoided the most egregious examples, if only because I would have to think long and hard about my life choices were I to ever spend actual time and/or money on Redneck Rampage or William Shatner’s Tekwar. Don’t worry though, because PowerSlave (also known as Exhumed) is just very middle-of-the-road and not especially exciting. It’s also not the worst Build Engine game on this wheel, so please look forward to my eventual stream of Witchaven.

What’s left is the kind of video game one might generously call a “doom clone” back when such a phrase meant anything. Sure, there are spooky Egyptian monsters, maybe an anubis or two to shoot. For the most part, however, it’s just a very standard game of its era that is neither egregiously bad or egregiously good. It has a fun CD-ROM soundtrack and some decent weapons, but even writing this I’m struggling to come up with any superlatives other than “competent.” It's decent! It's not a bad time at all, and given that I played more of it off-stream, voluntarily, I think one would not have a bad time with it if they so chose to play it. It's just... there? But my friend, Blood is also right there. Duke Nukem 3D is right there. Heck, original racist-ass Shadow Warrior, which is a horrific hell nightmare of a video game, has more going on than PowerSlave. Truly this game is the diet soda of this dubious FPS wheel.

Of course, the biggest problem with PowerSlave is this is not the version people care about. The console version, which is way more of a non-linear Metroidvania sort of deal, is the one people actually have nostalgia for. Night Dive is working on a remaster of that, apparently combining the best aspects of the Saturn and PSX ports. That’ll probably come out at some point next year, and I'm looking forward to seeing it in action. Here's hoping it's a more interesting game than this one, because there are a *lot* of throwback FPSes I'd rather spend time with. Maybe Wrath: Aeon of Ruin and Prodeus will come out to 1.0 in 2022? We're spoiled if you would like old-style shooter shoot games; a veritable cornucopia of bunny jumping, low poly environments, and extreme speed.

Oh, uh, by the way. There's a special "bonus" game in the VOD around the 90 minute mark. It's a little spicy and a tad NSFW, but also you get to hear the luxury of me getting roasted by my podcast cohort because I played a titty game. Anime was a mistake. Video games were a mistake.

Now, with both of my Game of the Year blogs needing to go into production, this'll probably be the last Dubious FPS stream for 2021. It's been a good time, and I hope you'll continue to join me on my Dubiousventures. I'm not planning on stopping anytime soon, and you can expect some more high quality ("high quality??") titles and wheels in the future. Consider following and/or subscribing to my twitch channel if you'd like to watch it live (I tend to stream in the evenings US time, and I will try and have a more regular schedule come 2022) or following my youtube if you'd like to keep up on the VODs.

I played a fair amount of Powerslave when I was younger but literally remember nothing about it other than it was another FPS of that era and really not great.

Realms of the Haunting left me saying "what am I even looking at here" to myself. Yikes.

Your next two should be really freaking interesting haha. Two games I played but never finished when I was younger, one that scared the complete bejesus out of me and one that I genuinely mostly liked but have never gone back to. I don't recall either being all that dubious...at least, not on the level of these two!

When I watched the stream, one thing that I was thinking about Realms of the Haunting is how that very initial part, where you are just exploring the house, looked kind cool for the time period, and maybe in another game could work better.

I suspect Realms of the Haunting would've been considerably more tolerable if it had not looked to Hexen for it's level/puzzle design. What a convoluted maze that catacomb was. Did your fanpatch break something, or was that level complete dogshit? I think that deep down, we know the answer.

I always mix up Powerslave & Slave Zero. Never played it but it seemed like a good 7/10 game.

Man, next week is looking like a banger episode. Shogo still lives rent free in my head.