Quarantine (MS-DOS)

Hmm, perhaps it's about a government team working to manage a viral outbreak, making tough choices to try to save as many people as they can with time against them and constant risk of a breach that could threaten the whole planet.

Or, more likely, zombies.

This seems to be our protagonist. This is going to be set in a mid-nineties Johnny Mnemonic style cyberpunk future isn't it?

Okay, maybe more Mad Max than cyberpunk maybe.

Wait, why are we trying to get INSIDE the quarantined city in the loading screen? C'mon, it's on fire, that is never a good sign!

Okay I'm in a modded hover taxi, it's a bleak dystopian future outside, and I have guns. I guess I should go shoot someone.

This thing doesn't quite handle like a car, it slides around more and doesn't have much weight to it. Which probably helps for dogfighting, but doesn't do much to make me feel like I'm really driving in a city.

Another kill, this is too easy! They're barely even fighting back.

Aw crap, now I'm entirely out of ammo. Well obviously I'm doing something wrong here, but what?

This must be the outer wall of the arena, there are turrets all down this road shooting anything that drives down here.

Okay, that's a weird poster. What could that possibly be advertising?

I've got to admit though, overall this does a better job at making me feel like I'm travelling around a futuristic city than some other 1994 games I've played. Like Doom II for instance.

Wait, is this guy trying to hail my cab? Seriously? Does he not see the guns and blood?

This... is new. I'm starting to think this game might not actually be arena deathmatch with taxis.

Damn, that map is fucking huge. Okay, second right, then third left...

Right, I'm here and with time to spare! But this time my car took a real beating. Maybe I'm just imagining things, but it seems like people on the streets got a lot more belligerent when they saw me picking up a fare.

Awesome, a repair bay. And there's ammo shops too? Excellent.

The car has a robot arm just to buy stuff from vending machines? Can't I just swipe my id card, or use my thumb print or something?

Cool, it turns out I made more than enough money to get my car fixed up. I just need some ammo now and I'm back in the game.

The writing style on that logo seems familiar somehow. This reminds me of going to the pay and spray in the GTA games all the time. Except there's no cops in this.

Just give the ammo, I don't need anything fancy. Yet.

Every single time I pick someone, they always want to go somewhere behind me.

Also, I'm sure this person looked like a guy in a coat when I was driving up.

It was all going well until I ran out of time, then drove through a mine field.

Minefields, a walled off city, a taxi... I've got it now! It's Escape from New York.

Hey, my guy has a name! Well, had a name. Those pictures seem to hint at there being some kind of story to the game.

Actually, I kinda like this game. There's no weight or realism to it really, I never feel like I'm actually driving around a city, but it's playable enough. It's a long way from this to the 3D GTA games though.


Next game.