Forsaken - PC Games

Forsaken is one graphically intense game, with colorful lighting effects and bedazzling pyrotechnics (note that you'll need a 3-D accelerator card to get the most out of this title). The sound effects are also well done and appropriately loud. Once we customized our control setting we found roaring through the cramped levels a breeze. However, this is not a game for claustrophobes. Picture the Podrace scene from Star Wars: Episode I, The Phantom Menace or Lando's race for the Deathstar core in Return of the Jedi.

Forsaken was a lot of fun for the first few levels, but things became a repetitive in a hurry. The presence of other "bikers" in the tunnels occasionally makes for some tense moments, but the standard enemies in the game just don't have a lot of bite once you are familiar with their hunting patterns. We did have a lot of fun trying out the various weapons in the game. The bottom line? If you are a fan of any of the Descent games, or just first-person action games in general, be sure to check out Forsaken. Just don't expect too much innovation from the gameplay. --T. Byrl Baker

Pros: Spectacular 3-D accelerated graphics Complete freedom of movement adds to the excitement Several hoverbikes to choose from Cons: Gameplay can get repetitive, thanks to predictable enemies

Amazon.com Product Description
The Terran System, once proud birthplace of humanity, now lies forsaken, utterly abandoned and up for grabs. Only decades before, the Earth had rested smugly in the knowledge that no alien force could possibly penetrate its staggering armada of defense satellites, orbital minefields, and computer-controlled attack systems, all of which patrolled the space ways vigilantly. Invasion from an alien race was inconceivable. Ironically, though, the end did not come from without, but from within. In the year 2113, humanity destroyed itself when it sought to harness the universe's most powerful and dangerous energy source.

For many years particle physicists on Earth had been delving deeper and deeper into the mysteries of matter itself. Unraveling layer after layer of subatomica, they finally discovered the means by which they could manipulate matter at its most basic level. Tragically, their first experiment created an uncontrollable fusion reaction, which ripped apart the planet, sending an irresistible shock wave through the entire Terran System. When it was over, the Earth was devastated.

Torn from its orbital axis, the fragmented planet was now a lifeless, hulking husk, devoid of atmosphere and bathed in the searing radiation of the sun. Within a few agonizing days, all human life had perished. News of its extinction spread quickly through the universe, reaching the High Senators of the Imperial Theocracy, the ruling body of the multi-verse. A thorough investigation into the mind-boggling disaster began. Anything considered valuable on Earth was shipped out of the system. Robotic military personnel were then deployed to watch over the dead world.

Months later, the solar system was declared "Condemned." Now, every bounty hunter, mercenary, space pirate, and free-booting scum of the earth in the galaxy has the unwritten right to raid the system and take anything that the Theocracy didn't want. The worst cutthroats have converged on this blackened corner of the universe to engage in a desperate game of interstellar cat-and-mouse. Astride roaring antigravity pioncycles with deadly arsenals, they will battle to the death against each other and the dead world's ruthless robotic sentinels. For the one who emerges victorious, the lost glories of a dead civilization await. For the rest, only agonizing death.