I.M. Meen: Based off of Doom and/or Wolf3D?

[Gaeole]

(did a search beforehand, just got one post in passing from six years ago; also best-guessing where this would fit...If it fits better elsewhere, feel free to move it!)

Okay, so I was watching this video of a remix to the intro of a game called I.M. Meen. It's a edutainment game, yeah.

Anyways, the intro and all cinematics in the game are done by the same guys who did the animation for those Zelda games (it's much better here that in those games, however). Intrigued by the game somewhat, I decided to take a looksee at what the game looked like in actual gameplay, and to my surprise I noticed it looked rather familiar...

Seriously, just look at the gameplay for a few minutes and you'll see the animated face that looks around, punching (like Doom punching, mind you) and even the freaking Automap! This is either Doom or Wolf3D under a new game, just like Chex Quest series and the Heretic/Hexen series!

Judging by the looks of the map itself, I'd take a good guess and say the engine is specifically Wolfenstein 3D, due to the ceilings and walls being of the same height and perfectly square. However, unlike Wolf3D (to my knowledge of it), you can hold items (ala Heretic) and even have a compass, which could actually be worth something (I'm still contemplating it's usefulness).

My question is, if the game does indeed run on WADs or whatever Wolf3D runs on, would anyone be able to do things with it, or convert it to Doom or something?

[EarthQuake]

It seems to use a raycasting engine similar to Wolfenstein 3D's, but I doubt they both use the same engine, as the techniques used to build such renderers are well-understood. Judging from fluidity of the movement and use of transparent doors and such, I'd say it's clone done mostly from scratch, although it's really hard to tell otherwise. It's definitely not based off of Doom, though.

[kristus]

Looks very similar to Shadowcaster.

[SaladBadger]

heh, I remember an old thread releating to this...

Interestingly, there it is called Doom Jr... I wonder if they actually were thinking doom at the moment, but got lazy and went with a raycaster instead of the BSP rendering model Doom used

EDIT:And I appearantly am a mini-member now. That's kind of odd, considering I'm a 6 foot 5 tall person. I don't consider that very mini :P

[Patrick]

This doesnt seem very much like Doom or Wolf3d, but I'd be curious to figure out what this is.

InsanityBringer said:

EDIT:And I appearantly am a mini-member now. That's kind of odd, considering I'm a 6 foot 5 tall person. I don't consider that very mini :P

That would be a penis joke.

[SaladBadger]

Patrick said:

penis joke.

Are those still even intended to be funny? Because by now they seem really stupid.

[Patrick]

InsanityBringer said:

Are those still even intended to be funny? Because by now they seem really stupid.

Post more. Get a custom status. My custom status isnt a penis joke. Its an insult. And I love it.

[Technician]

I'm still waiting on mine.

[Maes]

To be honest, the interface looks much more like Ultima Underworld II, however the engine or at least the levels look simpler (UU II had non-orthogonal walls and allowed looking up & down already from 1992). Of course it could just be a generic Wolf3D/Blake Stone hack.

[Super Jamie]

Maes said:

To be honest, the interface looks much more like Ultima Underworld II, however the engine or at least the levels look simpler (UU II had non-orthogonal walls and allowed looking up & down already from 1992). Of course it could just be a generic Wolf3D/Blake Stone hack.

I was just about to say, it looks very much like a simplified Underworld interface with the Wolf3D walky engine.

I expect it is from scratch, or at best a reverse-engineering of Wolfenstein. It came out in May 1995, so would have pretty much been forgotten amongst the actual Doom/Doom2/Heretic hype.

[kristus]

I don't think so Maes:
Shadowcaster:
http://www.abandonware-paradise.eu/Gifs/Abandonware/Shadowcaster.png

Ultima Underworld:
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20070411/Ultima-Underworld-Combat.jpg

[leileilol]

It is its own engine. It's not like wolf3d-type engines were a secret in 1992+. There are tons of Wolf3D wannabes with various 3d engines of ability.

[Super Jamie]

Shadowcaster actually was an id Software engine though, written by Carmack in his development between Wolf and Doom.

leileilol said:

Wolf3D wannabes

Rise of the Triad. God I hate that game. Even Blake Stone and Corridor 7 were better.

[arrrgh]

Super Jamie said:
Rise of the Triad. God I hate that game. Even Blake Stone and Corridor 7 were better. [/B]

Why was Rise of The Triad so bad? The graphics were ugly but the gameplay is very good.

[kristus]

ROTT was boring because of the boring levels because of the limitations of the boring Wolf3d engine.

[Super Jamie]

ROTT was so hyped up, and was nothing but Wolf3D with jumping and a worse implementation.

The graphics were so amateur and it tried to be too realistic (Tom Hall syndrome). The game ended up looking like a bunch of too-bright sprites drawn by a child, with little thought given to scaling or detailing properly for their size. The game seemed reliant on a weak and irrelevant storyline, and the whole thing just highlighted the weaknesses in the engine.

Rise of the Triad had no atmosphere. At all.

Especially when compared side-by-side with Doom, I still don't understand why would anyone want to play cruddy old square-walls ROTT.

[chungy]

ROTT was a completely over-the-top FPS before Duke3D. It was great, every moment of it.

[Super Jamie]

No way, Duke3D was a great game.

Short on storyline, but gets the point across. High on fun fast action and cheesy gimmicks that were actually funny. The locations were (mostly) real enough to be believable, but obtuse enough to encourage good gameplay. And the built-in editor was great!

I easily spent more time playing Duke in 96-97 than I did playing Doom.

[lupinx-Kassman]

Hey...I thought ROTT was a really crazy and fun game! Realistic was the last thing it was trying to be IMO.

[arrrgh]

Agreed. It wasn't trying to be realistic or pretty or anything like that, it was just fun, which is the important thing.

[Gez]

kristus said:

Looks very similar to Shadowcaster.

It was my thought as well.

Also, those portcullis sounds must be from one of those overused sound banks. I remember them from, for example, TES1: Arena.

[kristus]

Super Jamie said:

The game ended up looking like a bunch of too-bright sprites drawn by a child, with little thought given to scaling or detailing properly for their size.

The sprites were actually photographs of the people working on ROTT. The final boss was Tom Hall iirc.

[Gez]

The level scripting, the automap and the dynamic music system are three other points that make this look like the Shadowcaster engine.

[Steeveeo]

Why do I want to go dungeon crawling in Daggerfall suddenly?