Merger 3D is a homage to the age old shooters of the early 1990’s, such as Wolfenstein 3D (1992) and it’s follow up Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold (1993) and of course the original Doom, (released a week after Blake Stone: Aliens of gold in ’93) so if you’re the type of player that heavily relies on auto-saves or hand holding with the use a mini map/radar, then skip this game and take it off your wishlist this instant.
Merger 3D is hard, just like it used to be, and it also includes your own ability in saving the game by going to the pause menu and saving manually as when death comes you’re either gonna be restarting the level again or at the last time you saved, so be prepared to do it frequently.
The back story is a simple one,
“2048 AD – the year in which humanity was faced with bio-terrorism. The desire to reach the next stage of evolution, which ran contrary to the facts of nature, formed the study of illegal modification to human cells. Because of this, a special unit was formed by mercenaries who opposed human experimentation. One of the major terrorist groups created a secret base in the jungle and started the project “Confluence”, combining plant cells with human cells. The group of scientists that worked on this experimental process also raised an army of soulless bio-soldiers to guard the project. But during the final experiment, “Confluence” went out of control and began taking over its surroundings. You, as one of the best mercenaries, will have to stop the project in the only way possible: break into its epicentre and blast it to smithereens!”
But then again, who really needs an excuse to go all out in an action packed FPS? Just make sure that you search around a lot as ammo and health kits are rather tricky to find, and with the levels being quite big and these pick ups being to far from the start, the enemies start shooting, so thinking about who, or what you shoot at, and who you use your basic attack (electric hand with unlimited “charge”) is a must.
Yes, it is a thinking man/woman shooter, but there’s no aiming down flashy scopes or peering round corners, or even stealth or anything really, there’s nothing that’s helped us in “shooters” for the past 20 or so years, as the original Unreal (1998) had a scope or two if I remember correctly, so don’t expect an easy ride in this.
After 2 hours of playtime on Merger 3D, I managed to finally get past the first level, so expect some hair tearing and shouting at your monitor, but getting that little bit further definitely makes you feel great about it, a sense of achievement, but as I mentioned further up, just be prepared to save often.
The graphics are exactly what they look like from the screenshots. The screenshots are taken from Steam because for some reason, I was unable to take screenshots of this title with the Steam hotkey. Anyway, the graphics are big, chunky, and pixelated and exactly what you’d remember from the bygone age of shooters. Heck, I don’t even think you can rebind your keys to something a bit more suitable in-game, but one thing the dev’s did was let us use a no-mouse method, handy because when you do turn using the mouse you do so very slowly, and using the keyboard only method improved things ten-fold.
The audio side of things are one of the only settings that can be managed in-game, but it’s pure homage to “that” era of the 90’s, so if you had fond memories then keep it nice ‘n loud, if not turn it down or just simply mute what you don’t like, but personally I kept it loud.
Regarding the weapons, there are “lots” but watch out for the ammo count in the bottom right of the screen, you’ll need to be clever and conserve it as I mentioned earlier, thinking about how you’re gonna dispatch of the next bunch of baddies. Fear not though, the amount of weapons shouldn’t faze you as you can carry them all, and there’s no need for bigger bag-packs, or whatever like you do in today’s shooter titles, but as-long as you enjoyed the likes of the original Doom, you’ll be in safe hands in this one as the 15 big levels on hand are fun, fast, and very frantic. Just be sure (yet again) to be prepared to save the game often.
For £1.99 without a Steam sale it’s a steal go grab it.
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