Unlockable Content 10.11.06: The History of the FPS
Posted by Will Scott on 10.11.2006
Another history lesson, tracing the line from killer smiley faces to Gordon Freeman's glasses.
Welcome back to Unlockable Content, the column with a name one hundred percent cooler than Game Rants. Last week, we covered the History of Platformers, figuring out where they've come from and where they're going. This week, we'll take a look at the history of another genre - the First Person Shooter. But first...we've got a reader who brought up a good point.
Reader Responses
Clever1 writes:
I enjoyed reading your article. Most of the article is correct. I emailed you for something you missed on your article.
You forgot to mention pitfall, the first successful platform game in console game sales with pitfall selling over 4 million copies for the Atari 2600. I am pretty sure that in the early 80's that Pitfall was as familiar as Donkey Kong was. Pitfall came out in 1982 and Donkey Kong was in 1981. Besides pitfall being the 2600, it was on different game consoles and computers in the early 80's. In game sales in the early 80's, the only game that passed it was Pac-man for the 2600 and possibly Donkey Kong with Doney Kong on the amount of systems it was on and a launch title for the Colecovision. In popular in the early 80's the first games in popular before the industry completely collapsed was pitfall, pac-man, mrs. pac-man and Donkey Kong. Here is a link to pitfall's history: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitfall! While you collect gold, You have to go through all the screens pitfall has to finish the game under 20 min. You have to jump over enemies, you move from one screen to another, avoid tar pit, and water. Pitfall was a different type of a platform game then Donkey Kong. Pitfall was a side scrolling platform game that paved way for games like Super Mario Bros.
This one was a pretty glaring mistake on my part - Pitfall is one of the first video games I ever played (in a car wash, actually), and a pretty big contributor to the genre. It's actually famous for being the first platformer to originate on a console. Pitfall is also a franchise in its own right - it spawned sequels on every generation of platforms except the present, and even had a craptacular Saturday morning cartoon based on it. It was bad...like the Donkey Kong cartoon bad.
Anyway...without further ado...
The History of First Person Shooters
The Early Years
The first person shooter, unlike the platformer, started nowhere near its present form. Because of the difficulties in rendering environments and the sheer amount of power necessary to create what we think of as the modern FPS, the first person shooter is actually derived from a series of closely related games.
According to Wikipedia, Spasim is the first documented first-person perspective shooter, though it is perhaps more closely related to X-Wing than Doom. A closer fit, though undocumented, is Maze War, which followed the standard formula of walking through a maze and being able to shoot opposing players.
Regardless, first person games would follow Spasim's format from 1973 to 1991, with games like Tailgunner, Tau Ceti, and Driller focusing on vehicular first person combat and exploration. Notable exceptions include Faceball 2000 (which I proudly owned for the Gameboy), which is best described as the game where smiley faces killed each other with impunity. I kid you not.
The 1990s, pt. 1: The Classics
Nothing pegs the FPS genre as a relatively modern genre more than pointing out that id Software, the company responsible for three of the most notable franchises in the genre, didn't produce its first major shooter until 1991. This was actually Hovertank 3D (another beloved game of mine), and it set some benchmarks in terms of world creation. However, it was their next major product that would bring the genre in to its modern format.
This, of course, is Wolfenstein 3-D. First person Nazi shooting at its most primal stage, Wolfenstein added much of the realism and violence that has come to define the FPS, though in retrospect it's remarkably tame. However, it laid the groundwork for the next genre defining game: Doom.
Do I even need to tell you what Doom was about? I think not. Let's suffice to say that Doom brought about the beginning of the modern age of the FPS - the multiplayer age. Though it had a superb single player format, Doom would become much more notable for its ability to let multiple players engage in computer to computer combat.
The rest of the early 90s would see many familiar names: Rise of the Triad, Marathon (notable, really, for being the fledgling effort of Bungie), System Shock, and of course...Doom II.
The 90s, pt 2: Redefining the Genre, Again
The "Doom Clone" market of the early 90s was quickly replaced with more sophisticated variations of theme in the second half of that decade. Star Wars: Dark Forces would be the first licensed FPS (and lead to its more popular sequel, Jedi Knight in 1997), Descent would add the Z-Axis to the genre, and Duke Nukem 3D would add a well-needed dose of humor.
There is also, of course, the matter of Quake. Quake broke away from the pack with gaming over the internet, not simply through LAN. As a member of the id family, it also added another notch in the belt to the genre's domination of the market. In fact, if not for the emergence of two games, it is likely the id could have had a true stranglehold on the market.
The first of these games, released in 1997, was Goldeneye for the N64. Quite frankly, it gave validity to the idea of having non-PC ported FPS games on those consoles. Its popularity was (and is) unprecedented - many considered it the killer app for the Nintendo 64. It certainly helped out Rare, who would go on in the genre to make Perfect Dark and Perfect Dark Zero.
The other game, which truly redefined the genre, was Half-Life. With the advent of this game, it can be argued that character and plot became just as important as cool weapons. It also gave birth to a series of impressive mods, including the ultra-popular Counterstrike, the first true threat to Quake (and Quake Arena's) audience.
Of course, the 90s were rounded out with Thief (which introduced stealth) and Tribes (a massive multiplayer experience), as well as Quake-competitor Unreal Tournament.
The 2000s: Further Growth
The 21st century has been notable not for the novelty of the genre's applications, but for the enormous growth of the franchises. The Battlefield franchise (including 1942, Battlefield 2, and Vietnam) came to prominence, offering military themed massive multiplayer action. Halo (and Halo 2) would become killer apps for the X-Box and redefine multiplayer on the consoles. Other notable new entries would include Far Cry (more detailed environments), FEAR (horror elements), and the slew of WWII themed games including almost any game with the name words Company, Brother, Band, or Hero in the title. Prey, a recent release, has also added a further element (gravity) to the genre, though the applicability of the element is yet to be seen.
The older franchises have also continued on. Doom 3 and Quake 4 have pushed both the stories of the games and the technology of gaming forward. But nothing has caused quite the stir of Half-Life 2. With a very advanced physics engine and a focus on the plot, Half-Life 2 is the current standard of PC shooters.
The Future
First Person shooters will naturally be around for some time. The fact that they can be applied to almost any setting is certainly a point in their favor. However, as time goes by, the genre will grow stale if new innovations are not brought forth.
There are two ways to go at the moment: more realistic or more fantastic. Games like Half-Life 2 and the various WWII shooters have naturally stepped up the expectations in terms of in-game physics and the realism of enemy and allied actions. More perfect AI and better technology could lead to a growth in this area, though the advent of perfect realism would bring the genre to a dead end.
On the other hand, games based on fantasy have unlimited potential. Any and all possibilities, from gravity switches to alien ray guns, from the ability to alter time to perceptions of ghosts and demons can bring more variety. But without the necessary steps to ensure good stories, not just good concepts, and the technological superiority of the realistic games, this strategy could be just as doomed to failure.
That's it for this week. You know where the feedback goes.
