Wolfenstein 3D is the granddaddy of the modern first-person shooter, so it’s great to see a retro inspired game based on the those sort of early shooters. The game’s were so simplistic yet incredibly fun thanks to the solid shooting and movement controls. Merger 3D looks the part with a killer retro soundtrack and look, but instead of building upon ideas in a modern way, it holds on to the very issues that make going back to play those old shooters a real pain in the ass.
When you boot up the game Merger 3D cuts right to the chase. No fancy loading screens or fancy graphics, just a simple layout with very few options. It’s all an exciting start, but the game quickly goes fubar as soon as you start playing. The problem is that instead of being inspired by those old shooters Merger 3D is built upon a Windows 95 like platform. I don’t know the exact engine, but the Steam forums seem to suggest the same old tools from back in the day were used to create this game.
Retro inspired games can work, but that’s only because they ditch the limitations of yesteryear. I point to Shovel Knight in this respect as that game was a retro inspired side-scroller in the vain of games on the Nintendo Entertainment System. The magic was that while it looked like an old NES game, you knew it could never actually run on the system. It also learns from the past and avoids the mistakes and limitation imposed on developers back then.
Merger 3D really does seem like it was plucked out of time. It comes with everything someone like me wants in retro FPS, but also all the crap that we’ve long ago addressed. A game of this nature lives and dies by its controls and Merger 3D screws the pooch as soon as it starts. It’s incredible in this day and age to not have controller support, but too not at the very least give you the option to re-bind keyboard controls is inexcusable.
The game forces the keyboard and mouse combo, which doesn’t seem all that bad, but the mouse simply does not work right. If you move it too fast the game will stutter about and if you go slow you become a tank like target. This becomes even more a problem when enemies attack you and slow you down as they attack you. It’s not uncommon to be attacked from behind and lose half your health simply due to poor controls. If the game gave the option to bind all the controls to the keyboard this would be an issue. I’d be impressed with anyone that get’s past the first few levels.
What’s strange is that you can control everything via the keyboard using WASD and the arrow keys, but as far as I can tell there isn’t a key to shoot. The game was a single key away from being a solid game. Merger 3D is fatally flawed, but it really shouldn’t be. Hopefully this issue is addressed with a patch as the game deserves better than the current form it’s in. I feel bad about knocking Merger 3D not because it’s bad (I do that all the time), but because I was rooting so hard for a game like this.
But that’s not all the problems as I think many people won’t ever be able to even play the game. When you start the game it loads by giving you a brief rundown of the story and shows of the world map. It’s all good, but for whatever reason the game will crash to desktop if I sit on it and let it load. If I cancel it out by hitting escape quickly the game loads fine, so I have no idea what the problem is. This happens every time a level loads so make sure you remember to skip the loading screen as soon as you can.
Merger 3D is a real shame because it has so much going for it. The team behind the game were so nearly there to having something special. The music is bloody fantastic, the characters are fun, the weapons are wild and the world is quite colorful. The graphics are also perfect for the genre and everything overall looks great. The game hits all the right points on paper, but is simply betrayed by its controls.
I’m not sure about the development cycle, but Merger 3D would have benefited by going into early access on Steam so players could make note of the issues. On a positive note the developer is quite active on the Steam forums and is taking the criticism of the game very well, saying he is working on fixes to a number of issues.
Merger 3D will is listed for $1.99 which is an amazing price for a game of this magnitude on Steam, but those controls means you probably won’t ever finish it as the difficulty ramps up. Control is key and Merger 3D has you fighting against it the entire game. It’s on sale so you won’t feel cheated, but I say wait until a patch comes out before thinking of picking this on up. If a patch does come around in the future I’d be more than happy to check it out again, but until then Merger 3D isn’t ready for prime-time.
“Control is key and Merger 3D has you fighting against it the entire game.”
1.5/5
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