The Mire (Wrath Early Access)
4Wrath: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1000410/
Doom 64 Discord: https://discord.gg/Ktxz8nz
Wrath is built in the Darkplaces Quake engine under the 3D Realms development umbrella. Change ups behind the scenes has resulted in Wrath being in early access for three years, but development has been steady. Wrath has fantastic graphics and sound design which really shows what a Quake engine can do in modern times. The enemy roster is very reminiscent of Doom 2016, where there’s flying projectile monsters, bulky charging monsters, slow prodding zombies, and plenty of other similar enemies. The weapons match classic shooters with a double shotgun, pistol equivalent, a rapid fire weapon, and explosive types (all with alternate fires). But what stands out is the melee “ruination blade”. This wrist-blade will allow you to dash forward through weaker enemies and across crevices; it’s quite fun. And since it’s 3D Realms, there is an inventory system where you can choose when to use power ups. Interestingly the save system is also a power up. Sure there will be autosaves between levels and there’s altars which can save progress, but to save at any time you will need a Soul Tether power up. There’s plenty of them around, and it's an interesting way to tie saving into the lore, but it might drive players up the wall who like saving without having to worry about being limited.
Levels are organized by hubs in perhaps a homage to Quake community projects. Thus levels can be played at any order during an episode and interestingly the difficulty will scale according to path. This means that different paths through levels will have different enemy encounters. The levels are quite long, over an hour each, and are non-linear. They generally do a good job helping the player to navigate through levels of such sizes and classic Turok players might find some similarities here. Players who rush through will be punished, but patient players who like to explore will be rewarded. Sometimes enemies will teleport in surrounding you which is kind of annoying, but it's not a big deal to reload a Soul Tether. Ultimately the goal for each hub is to collect a key/symbol from each level and once all are obtained you have access to the next hub. So it isn't as puzzly as Hexen and pretty straight forward.
I really enjoy the core gameplay of Wrath, but there can be some improvements. I do find its controls a bit bloated. The weapons have alt-fires, but I don't find them all that different than the main fires; many result into being a burst fire mode. I think it would be a bit more fun if instead of an alt fire, the ruination blade was permanently wielded. Imagine shooting and dashing across battles at the same time? Heck if the initial use of the ruination blade was a slash then a charge up, it could be used to flip switches too, eliminating the use button. At first I wasn't so keen on the inventory system either, but I do like how it encourages secret hunting and also is a good buffer to get through hard battles (good for accessibility). I do find the Soul Tether saving system unusual. On one hand I understand quicksaving useful for accessibility, but also it can be abused and put players in a bad position. If it was me, I probably would just have more of those checkpoint shrines around, then have them refill some health and ammo too. But in early access you have at least a good 10 hours of fun gameplay and for $20 that's a good deal!
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