*NAZIS WIN WWII* History gets put totally upside down in Mortyr. Rather than the Allied, the Nazis won the second World War! The thought alone is sickening. It's a big mystery to everyone how the Germans succeeded in getting the victory. They were clearly on the losing side... Over 50 years later the Nazis are still sitting on their throne. Life hasn't exatcly improved in the meantime. Tornadoes flog the coasts, forsts burst into flames, and chaos broke out in many cities. The German general Jurgen Mortyr suspects the Nazi bosses are causing the climate to worsen on purpose. Then, when he coincidentally stumbles upon a big Nazi-fort near a time machine (Barbaras brand), a twisted plan forms in his head. Mortyr decides to send his son, a trained soldier, back to 1944. He'll have to change history by slaying as many Germans as possible, and unravel the secret behind their big win.

*NAZI-MECH* In Mortyr, it's mostly about the shooting, booming, and throwing grenades, and all of that in a way which hasn't been done before, in my opinion. The game has at least thirty stages, all of which taking place in and around a massive fortress, transformed to a castle. I'm purposefully writing "at least thirty stages" here, because there's several hidden stages throughout the game. The fortress is a party for the real shooter freaks. It's truly bursting with stormmen, rottenfuhrers, and bloodhounds, and is equipped with a station, launch base for V2s, and a bay for U-boats. You start the game in 1944. In the first stage you have to try and get into the forstress. Whereas other shooters will start a little more calmly, the troble starts frame 1 in Mortyr. Immediately, the entrance is very hard to find (hint: go for a swim). And then, when you're at the entrance, you'll have to manage to kill the first Nazis with your commando knife. And that's damn hard. Killing Nazis stays difficult throughout the entire game, by the way, but more on that later. The first fifteen stages all take place in 1944. While fighting, you'll find yourself in a beautiful cathedral, a giant tunnel system, a funeral, a train station, and a hangar with a zeppelin, among others. At the end of the fifteenth stage, the Germans are all wiped and you're flashed back to the future thanks to the time machine. What you see then in the sixteenth stage seems like deja vu. Don't get it twisted though, the fortress looks the same from the outside, but is completely different on the inside. The enemies, which are all Mech-warriors this time, have all moved around to different spots. The party starts from the beginning.

*KILLING IS KILLING* I told you earlier how it was hard to defeat the first Germans with a commando knife, and that's not that surprising, in Unreal you won't get far with just a knife, either. But even halfway through the game I still had to put in a horrible amount of effort to kill a Nazi, and at that point I had the big guns (MP-40 Schmeizer, Mauser and MG-42, among others) sitting in my inventory. This incapability to kill Germans (or Mechs), has two causes. First off, you have to hit the enemy where it hurts. If you hit a German in the legs, he'll keep shooting. And that's something you'd best avoid, because your health in Mortyr runs out quick. Basically, every soldier will cost you at least two shots. Only with the Mauser, a sniper rifle, is it possible to kill in one shot.

*STEALING AMMO* Second off, the AI is sophisticated, maybe even moreso than in Half-Life. The soldiers try co-ordinate their attacks. For example, if they notice your health is almost empty or you don't have a very strong weapon, they'll go in for the kill. In other situations, they're more careful. Besides this, they can also follow you (they even open doors), they'll run fi they're injured, listen to your footsteps, and wait for reinforcements if they've suffered too many losses. And it gets even worse, as your opponents aren't afraid (and I've never seen this before) to steal your ammo and power-ups! That fucking sucks, as the game's not exactly filled with them. Attacking like crazy won't pay out well in this game. Crawling around and sneaking delivers a lot more results. As a side effect, this careful approach causes stages to take a long time. The fact /one/ stage took me over 15 minutes in Godmode shows that.

*HITLER POSTER* So the gameplay is unique, but the graphics aren't bad either. On my copy it wasn't possible to use the 3Dfx-card yet, but regarldess I got to see some wonderful scenes. Mortyr takes place outside 25% of the time, while the other 75% takes place in the familiar halls and tunnels. The outside stages are especially atmospheric, with occasional rain or snow. The halls and tunnels look very polished, but the highlight is the cathedral. I have never seen such a beautiful space in a video game. Keep an eye on the reflective floor and and the wonderful stained glass windows, which you can also shoot to break, much like the Hitler posters. Very nice. The little men sometimes looked a bit angular, however they're sharp and clear. When it comes to the light- and explosion effects, Mortyr is a real competitor to Unreal. Bullets light up a dark tunnel, explosions guarantee a sea of flames, and torchlight really flickers. Noticably, the soldiers' shadows aren't pre-rendered, but are all calculated in real-time, making them move around. Beyond that, the surroundings are interactive; bullets stay visible and corpses stay around, even if you [come back nine stages later]

------- tl notes "mof" (said in "killing is killing") is sort of a derogatory term for nazis. doesnt get used anymore considering wwii ended a long time ago. i couldnt find an equivalent word in english, so i just went with nazi health is in 'these things' in the same paragraph, im guessing because theres not a good equivalent for the word in this context? you could say "gezondheid" but thats not health as a stat, but as a concept, if that makes sense the final parts in brackets are in brackets because the scan is a low quality one, and i couldn't clearly make out what it said -------