Posted on: May 6, 2021
Obviously
Verified ownerGames: 222 Reviews: 21
A weird game from a weird time.
Corridor 7 was the first attempt by the infamous Capstone Software to cash in the FPS mania generated by the release of Doom. At the time id Software was happy to license out their old Wolfenstein 3D engine to anyone who wanted it since Doom had completely blown their previous work out of the water. What followed was a solid attempt at trying to make a more Doom-like game in the aged ray casting engine with some misguided attempts to innovate in a few places like adding invisible forcefields that are more irritating than entertaining. On the positive side some of the enemies are genuinely kind of cool looking but most are uninspired. The levels themselves are bland even for the limitations of the engine and most are amateurishly designed mazes though unlike Wolfenstein 3D you are given a tiny, almost useless map to help you navigate. Most of the weapons feel awful but they do get the job done. Enemies tend to be extremely dangerous and since they're hitscan like Wolf 3D the game is full of cheap and unavoidable deaths. Still there's something really appealing about this scrappy little game that keeps me from giving it one star. It feels more earnest than most of Capstone's cash-in titles and an RVGFanatic interview with programmer Les Bird reveals that they really did put a lot of effort into it. It feels like a Wolfenstein 3D fan game in a lot of ways and while the end result certainly isn't a good game it's definitely a playable one provided you like Wolf 3D style gameplay. In a post Doom world though, Corridor 7 never stood a chance. I can't really recommend this game unless you're obsessed with retro FPS titles and nostalgic for them like me, especially when the Blake Stone duology that's also available on GOG is a vastly superior sci-fi take on Wolfenstein 3D's gameplay. It's still an interesting piece of FPS history that I'm glad to see preserved and it's way better than Capstone's ugly follow-up, Operation Body Count.
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