Amiga Tribute: The Chaos Engine

The Gentleman from The Chaos Engine.


Part 4/24 of my Amiga tribute project >3

This month is a game some might recognize, namely The Chaos Engine
Whew, now what could I say about this title.... well, quite a lot actually.
For one, it's one of THE most stempunk games you'll ever come across, it's set in Victorian England, year 1800, so yeah, I'd say that's pretty steampunk'ish, and trust me, it really shows once you start playing >3
To get to the "scondly" part, I should mention the story, the whole game revolves around the titular Chaos Engine, a new energy source reactor prototype tested on a remote island, which turned out rather catastrophic, as it started emitting a strange reality/dimension bending power, which mutated humans and animals into grotesque monsters. The governments of the world feared the effects might spread further, yet didn't want to loose their own forces while trying to shut down the machine, hence they set a price for shutting it down, attracting various vigilantes. (also worth mentioning is that the story was loosely based on William Gibson's and Bruce Sterling's novel, "The Difference Engine")
That's when the "secondly" part comes in >D you see, in this game, you didn't get any sort of "main character", what you got instead, were 6 classes to choose your character from, two balanced ones, The Brigand and The Mercenary, two strong yet slower ones, The Navvie and The Thug, and two fast yet less powerful, The Gentleman and The Preacher, each with their own set of advantages and disadvantages as well as special items, skills, etc. that only a certain class could use. This was something unseen in action games back in the days (only in RPGs), making the game very unique, not only that, due to the differences between the charas, you actually got to chose yourself a partner, best chosen so that he would cover up for the flaws of your own character class. And yes, whether you played single or multiplayer, you always HAD TO have a 2 character team, hehe, good thing the AI was a pretty smart one and didn't go to it's death like a lemming (though it did steal your power ups from the ground a little to often at times |D), making the gameplay very deep. And all that on only 2 1,44mb floppy discs, I'd say that was quite an accomplishment >3
One other thing worth noting, due to some limitations of the hardware, it would be pretty difficult to make a very detailed map filled with items and enemies and load it all in one go, yet the developers used a pretty interesting method, not all was loaded at once, some items and enemies only loaded once you activated certain security gates (which you had to to progress in the game), and the best part it actually made sense in-game, since it was explained as an effect of the reality-bending radiation from the engine, that's creative developer thinking for ya >D

Hehe, and while I am aware that multiple character classes instead of just one main chara and mandatory co-op aren't anything that uncommon nowdays, and many games like Army of Two, Resident Evil 5, Borderlands, etc. have either one or both, do remember it's a game from 1992 we're talkin' about

And like I said earlier, some of you might recognize the game, as it was ported to various other systems, yet was renamed "Soldiers of Fortune" for some reason, well, of course it also had it's share of completely pointless and idiotic "censorship" when ported to such systems as the SNES, for instance, The Preacher was renamed as The Scientist and had his priest collar removed, also, the enemies were no longer mutated humans and animals, but monsters that came from another dimension via a dimensional rift caused by the Chaos Engine... 'tis sad really |D
Also, I heard it also got a mobile release not long ago, so if it's available for your phone, buy all means give it a try ^^

Okay, now about the art itself, well, I drew The Gentleman because quite frankly, he was my favourite class from the game. For one, his in-game description should say it all - "A lean and clever character. He is a dapper chap without a doubt. What he lacks in muscle he makes up with wit" if the description and design weren't awesome enough, he was a speedy character, which is always what I prefer in this type of games, his pistol (which looks more like a miniature cannon |D) wasn't too powerful, but it was very fast (and easier to hit with than The Preacher's laser gun), and was easy to redirect if you'd miss the enemy (yeah, The Navvie's wall of rockets from his fully upgraded weapon did decimate anything in it's path... unless something would move out of it's path and rip you apart before you could fire again |D), and first of all, had arguably the best special item in the game... a map... yes, he is the only character class to bring a map with himself, which helps out A LOT at times
As for the art, well, I did experiment on a few things, for one, the perspective... damn, why does perspective have to be such a bitch whenever someone wants to try out something new with it |D I wanted to give it a badass kind of feel and all, hence the "walking-towards-the-screen" like pose and the windswept coat and all, heh, and yeah, I personally like how it turned out, but would love to hear what you guys think ^^

Other parts of the project - Shadow Of The Beast, Shadow Fighter, Zool, The Chaos Engine, Superfrog, Skeleton Krew, The Speris Legacy, Flashback, Agony, Brutal: Paws of Fury, Fightin' Spirit, Ruff 'N' Tumble, SwitchBlade, Lionheart, The Lost Vikings, Brian The Lion, Wolfchild, Gods, Entity, Franko: The Crazy Revenge, Hired Guns, Turrican, The Killing Game Show, Yo! Joe!


The Gentleman (c) Bitmap Brothers