Blade Runner

It's unfortunate that the only negative comment on the Blade Runner game is the one featured on IMDB.

While the game is now 6 years old, and it's technology is certainly not the 'latest, greatest', I found it to be one of the more enjoyable games I've played. In fact, it's one of the few games I've played repeatedly!

The ending sequence DOES provide choices which lead to several different endings. And it follows the film closely enough to make you want to watch it again.

(Now, what happened to the rumored "20th anniversary" DVD we've been waiting for??)

Like in movie, this game is telling a story about a Blade Runner. A special police unit/man that tracks down and exterminates illegal replicants who arrive on Earth from Off-World. First thing which struck me like a lighting from the clear sky was visuals of this game. Although they are pre-rendered 3d backgrounds, they deliver the mood and this noir-like feeling which was present thorough the film right down to your PC screen. You can and will recognize many places that were in the original Blade Runner (1982) movie. The voice acting... well, it's just perfect. William Sanderson, an actor, who was J.F Sebastian in the Blade Runner movie, is one of the voice-actors of this game. A really valuable effort from Westwood to hire on of the originals. As is actually whole plot which gives you some kind of options of how the game ends and how other characters react to you. It is interesting to notice how this game takes everything from the original concept and adds couple of it's own ideas, which are, fully suitable for this kind of product. Joseph D. Kucan did a great job on this game (the man most of us gamers will recognize as "Kane" from the Command & Conquer game series (he also provided voice-acting for Crazylegs Larry)) when he wrote whole plot. As the game advances, a Blade Runner fan will be caught in it. Certain aspects of drama are also present in this game, which is, very rare in game industry overall.

I must recommend this to all those players out there who want a kinda once-in-a-lifetime gaming experience. And also, full recommendation goes to Blade Runner fans. Trust me, this is the game worth the Blade Runner license. The music, overall, is awesome. Thanks goes for Vangelis for their original score. In the last scene where everything is suddenly made clear to you... You will find out. This game is relatively old, made back in 1997 by Westwood Studios, but the age hasn't affected this one so much just yet. This is solely action/adventure game. With maybe a couple RPG elements in it. Kudos to Westwood for this. And no-thanks to EA for shutting down Westwood.

This game didn't get a whole lot of attention, but Westwood Studios certainly gave it plenty. Several original Blade Runner cast members supplied their voices for this game, which contributed a great deal to the game's capturing the original feel of th movie. The kind of poignant, revealing detail you saw in the movie was also present in the game; each element contributed to a clear sense of this world.

I will never forget the first time I had Ray step out onto the balcony of his apartment. I was so impressed by the scenery and music that I sat there watching for several minutes.

The game is also different each time you play it, depending on your choice of persona and answers to questions and a couple of moral dilemmas.

It can get boring at times, especially when you have not yet realized that you've missed an important, time critical event (the game is pseudo-real-time), and occasionally this means you must start over. This is the only major flaw, but it is pretty easily overcome.

It isn't particularly action-laden, but you do get to shoot stuff up as well as sort of put clues together, although the clues are pretty obvious signs as to what you have to do next. If your machine can still play it and you are a Blade Runner fan, I highly recommend it.

The "Blade Runner" game is an excellent adventure game, that succeeds in recreating the style & atmosphere that made the original movie so great in the first place. In keeping with the movie's visual qualities, the game features an incredibly detailed, almost organic environment, featuring a decaying futuristic city, complete with spinners flying about, airships flying around, advertising the qualities of the Off-World colonies, background noises from busy little shops in shady neighbourhoods,...

Unfortunately, the game sprites also tend to look very blocky, especially when close to the screen. A minor flaw in an otherwise excellent looking and sounding game.

Also, again in keeping with the movie it is based on, Vangelis' powerful score was used (with added music emulating the style of Vangelis' tracks)

The game quite good voice-acting; the actors themselves were filmed and rotoscoped, resulting in very realistic moving character sprites. Also, several of the original movie's actors returned to play their movie characters, which is an added bonus for anyone who has seen the film.

As for gameplay, the story itself tends to be relatively short and a bit too easy, but you do have multiple endings (maybe up to 13, maybe even more) since the game has certain variables that may be different in each new game. So there should be plenty of replayability here.

By the way, it is not necessary to have seen the movie to play this game, but it does help. Besides, the film is a classic, one of the best SF movies ever made, so you *could* do worse with your time... :-) also highly recommended (and helpful in understanding the world this game presents) is the novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?", by Philip K. Dick, on which the movie was based. A nice touch in the game is the references both toward the movie *and* the book. It's often the little touches that make life great.

Highly recommended.

This is how games really should be made, back when gameplay was more about atmosphere and storyline and less about pushing your graphics card to the limits of its capability. Though the graphics are clumsy and dated by todays standards, in 1997 it was more than passable, (If you are going to whine about this games graphics go back and play Doom2 then get back to me)in fact the overall atmoshpere is incredibly well done and stays very true to the vision of the film. Dark, rainy, film noir-esquire confused hero detective in a trenchcoat with a glass of scotch? It has the whole deal, and I thought it looked as beautiful as it played. I've slung an old PC together and loaded this up for the nostalgia value more recently, and its still a great game. The soundtrack and voice acting especially make it stick out. Alongside Fallout this must rate as perhaps one of the greatest, most atmospheric adventure games of all time.