Another day, another cult classic 90’s first person shooter that gets brought back to modern systems – once again, it’s by Nightdive Studios, who brought us some sensational remasters throughout the years. It’s time to revisit Rise of the Triad, this time in its Ludicrous Edition!
90’s? Again?
As I often like to do with such games: it’s history lesson time! It’s 1995. id Software’s Wolfenstein 3D already practically created the first person shooter genre a few years back, with Doom in 1993 mastering it, bringing a level of complexity, variety and depth that nobody thought were possible with the technology of the times. Many so-called “Doom clones” then flooded the market, such as Raven Software’s Heretic in 1994 or the much acclaimed Star Wars: Dark Forces, that is coincidentally also soon getting a remaster by the very same team that remade Rise of the Triad and many other shooters before that: Nightdive Studios. Amid all that came this game, which started development as a Wolfenstein 3D follow-up by outside developer Apogee, which was then eventually spun off into its own IP altogether when id Software canned plans for a sequel as the much more revolutionary Doom was about to come out. Rise of the Triad was no “Doom clone” – to be called in such a way, it should have taken inspiration from the myriads of improvements to what has been later dubbed the first person shooter formula of id Software’s 1993 masterclass. But this game is an evolution of the much more linear and limited Wolfenstein 3D, which already has it compete with a severe handicap, though it does share some Doom DNA via the team that built it – most notably, Tom Hall of former id Software fame who penned the notorious Doom Bible, which was initially used as a rough plot and design document for Doom, before getting scrapped in favor of a much simpler lore and virtually no plot. With him being one of the masterminds behind Rise of the Triad, it is no surprise that various similarities can be found between the two projects.
Yet, this is a cult classic that keeps being discussed and played to this day, and this remaster is definitely something many people asked for. How so? In short, Rise of the Triad feels like a fever dream of a shooter, combining the relatively simple and outdated level geometry of Wolfenstein 3D with a surprising verticality based on flying drones players can walk on, with some weapons, power-ups and game mechanics that have pretty much never been seen before – or since, for that matter. The plot is rather basic, with the special forces of the HUNT (High-rish United Nations Task-force) unit being sent to investigate a cult on the San Nicolas Island. What this means for the game though is that players can choose between each of the 5 members as playable character, each with their pros and cons. There’s for example Doug who packs massive health but slow moving speed, or on the opposite spectrum Lorelei who’s faster and more accurate but also lower on health. If in doubt, pick Taradino: he’s an all-rounder without any real weak spots, but also no outrageously high stats anywhere.
Heroes of their time
In truth, which character is picked only matters to a certain extent, as the levels play out in the same way either way. These are very reminiscent of a more open Wolfenstein 3D: rooms feature flat terrain and walls and are based on square blocks, with the era’s “2.5D look” prevailing, yet with some more modern aspects like being able to look and down, something that not even Doom or its sequel did at the time. Expect the usual barrage of secrets, doors to open and whatnot, but the most noticeable change from Wolf3D’s ground level rooms is the sudden verticality of Rise of the Triad, obtained by placing disc-based stairs, flying drones and magic trampolines that allow players to traverse different paths at different heights on these otherwise, on paper, simplicistic level designs. But they are certainly not easy to navigate, with Wolf3D’s iconic mazes being brought to new levels thanks to the added verticality, moving drones and more. The game also features a ludicrous amount of trap doors, moving walls that can crush players, deadly flames, lethal electric traps and more, on top of featuring open areas where if the player falls off the terrain they’ll fall down to a frankly quite hilariously represented death, with the first person view quickly zooming into the backdrop as if they were falling down, followed by a quite comical death soundbite.
I’d describe Rise of the Triad’s gameplay as… quite chaotic. Very fast movement speed, lots of enemies with all kinds of attacks from the distance, and the aforementioned traps and power-ups keep changing the game. The power-ups range from useful to a flight mode, to hilariously overpowered like a God mode where we obtain divine powers and can turn any enemy into dust with the sole movement of the hand, with even pure meme pickups like one that makes you bounce back and forth between the room’s walls like a gum ball, or the funny yet surprisingly useful Dog Mode that turns you into… a dog. The weapons, too, start quite standard with pistols, machine guns and so forth, but before long we’re wielding a Drunk Missile that launches 7 rockets in random direction, or the aptly named Excalibat which is… a literal baseball bat that shoots explosive baseballs. Combined with the many traps, the verticality of the levels, the amount of enemies and the game speed, it’s quite an overwhelming experience at times, but a quite exhilarating one at that. And to make matters better (or worse, depending on your feelings), enemy behaviour too is quite unpredictable, with enemies often surrendering and then possibly backstabbing us if we spare them, or even staying on the ground to feign death only to then hop up and, again, backstab the player. With the amount of projectiles and enemies it’s often hard to even keep track of which enemy is which, so these twists introduce even more madness to an already wild formula.
Sounds good
While the game’s visuals are rather outdated, given they don’t even have 1993’s Doom visual and design tricks and featuring a much more sterile and repetitive look, the same can’t be said for the audio department. The soundtrack is a MIDI explosion of energetic yet quirky and experimental tunes, with all songs also accessible from the menu via a handy jukebox mode. There was a fairly controversial remake of the game back in 2013, but one thing it certainly did well was the blasting metal soundtrack – that, too, can be toggled for those who prefer mauling nazi-like enemies to the sound of riffs instead. Enemies have various voicelines, main characters have voices, and with so much action in each level there’s plenty of wacky in-game sounds at just about any given time, making for a quite messy but peculiar audio experience too. Of course, this remaster brings a much higher resolution than before, optimized controller inputs, and fortunately also supports Quick Resume on Xbox Series X and S, which made the title a mainstay in my tray for quite a while now.
This remaster features a quite stellar amount of content: 4 enormous campaigns such as a brand new one made for this remaster, the 5 main characters you can choose from, the aforementioned jukebox, several options and settings to tweak the gameplay in never seen before ways, with even the title’s classic cheats being available to use at your own leisure. While the PC version’s old school level editor missing from consoles isn’t surprising, there is also no multiplayer or co-op modes in here – something that’s present in the PC versions. Odd omission for sure.
Triad members, rise up
Ultimately, Rise of the Triad: Ludicrous Edition is an excellent port to modern systems of a game that, however, has not aged as well as some other classics. A lot of interesting ideas clash with severely outdated level designs and game mechanics even compared to the original Doom released a whole year earlier, making it more of a Wolfenstein 3D follow-up with more verticality and variety than something modern and truly elaborate. The nostalgia factor is high, and the meme weapons and power-ups remain hilarious to this day, so I can still recommend getting this version of the oddity that is Rise of the Triad to fans of the game back in the day or just those who, like me, can’t stop revisiting boomer shooters from the 90’s; as, indeed, the controls are great on Xbox, the amount of content is stellar, and there’s plenty of options to play with too. Shame it lacks the co-op and multiplayer options present on PC. Many better shooters from the time may exist, but few are as crazy as Rise of the Triad, which is probably reason enough to visit or revisit it – though perhaps it’s better to do so on PC.
Rise of the Triad: Ludicrous Edition
Played on
Xbox Series X
PROS
- Crazy power-ups
- Brilliant double soundtrack
- Tons of levels
CONS
- Very outdated in many ways
- Repetitive combat
- A lot of confusing maze-like levels
- Lacks the co-op and multiplayer that are present on PC
