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Quake. The pinnacle of PC gaming. Look anywhere on the Web, and you'll find hundreds upon hundreds of sites devoted to this game. Quake has, like Doom, became one of the biggest phenomena in PC gaming. This, of course, nearly guaranteed that conversions to consoles would be imminent. However, the big surprise is that Quake has hit the Saturn first (an N64 version is also on the way.) So just how did this top of the line PC smash make it in the transition to the Saturn?

I'll be honest-- I was quite skeptical at hearing Sega's intentions to make this for the Saturn, especially after seeing the pathetic attempts at corridor games in the past (Saturn DOOM, etc.) However, when I heard Lobotomy was doing the conversion, I gained hope. Then I played Lobotomy's conversion of Duke3d. That fabulous conversion gave me more hope, but I was still wondering how Lobotomy would pull off the polygonal enemies and complex architecture that Quake possesses.

Well, it's finally here, and it's clear-- this is an acceptable version of Quake, with a great conversion by Lobotomy. The graphics are impressive-- you'll be wondering how the programmers pulled it off. I'd compare the graphics to, oh, say, a P100 running Quake, except with better lighting effects. The frame rate, while not as high as Duke3d or Powerslave, is high enough to minimize the effect of dropped frames. The lowered resolution causes the textures to occasionally be grainy, but it's not a distraction from the gameplay. Overall, Quake has better graphics than you'd expect on Saturn, but is nowhere near at the level of a top-end Pentium (I recently played the PC version on a Pentium Pro 200 at 800 x 600 resolution. The differences are VERY noticeable.)

The sound in this game is great. All of the sound effects set the perfect mood, from the explosions to the death cries of the enemies. However, what's more noteworthy is the soundtrack, produced by Trent Reznor of NIN. Most of the music is atmospheric, and it fits in with the mood of the game perfectly. Many people I know hate the soundtrack because they say it's "not music", but I think it's perfect. To give you an idea of how well the soundtrack is done, this is the only first-person shooter I've played where I've left the music ON. Most of the time, I shut it off because it's a distraction, but here, it works perfectly.

As far as control is concerned, I didn't really have any problems. I didn't have a chance to try analog control, given that my analog thumbpad is on the blink, but the digital controls worked well for me. The only minor complaint I have is that occasionally your character seems to move slightly slow, but you'll adjust to the slower speed quickly. Anyway, I feel that the gameplay in this game surpasses Duke3d. One of the main problems I had with Duke3d is the cheap hits and kills, and therefore the extreme level of difficulty not due to game design but cheapness. Quake is by no means easy, but the balance of the levels is better, and the game offers a more well-rounded challenge.

Now we come to the major sticking point, and that is replay value. You see, Quake's popularity on PC is based on its multiplayer aspects, not its one-player game. The Saturn version has no multiplayer mode and no Netlink support. This automatically lowers the replay value, because as enjoyable as Quake is, the 27 or so levels offered isn't much, and lose their enjoyment over time. Therefore, Quake on Saturn is a waste of time for all PC owners who own it or have played it.

Basically, Quake is a fun, exciting corridor game which unfortunately has no multiplayer modes. Therefore, I have to recommend Quake to new players or those gamers that want to play the game but don't own or can't afford a PC (like me!) If you're a veteran Quake PC player, you wont find much here to interest you,

Ratings (out of ten):

Graphics: 8.0
Sound/Music: 9.0
Control: 8.5
Replay Value: 7.0

OVERALL SCORE 8.25

Comments? Email me at gdunnwld@memphis.edu