"If the original DOOM had a hot sister, Supplice would be her." — IMDB
Supplice is an action-packed, gorn-loaded First-Person Shooter developed by the indie studio, Mekworx, paying homage to old-school, 90s FPS.
Beginning as a Doom megawad, way back in 2009, the game was later retooled into a retraux-style game that instead pays homage to the original Doom. It still uses a version of the ZDoom/GZDoom engine, originally created as a modern 3D-accelerated source port for Doom. Influences have also been drawn from Bungie's Marathon, in that mission objectives and the overall story are relayed to the player through text communications on computer terminals found throughout the game world.
In 2207, the alien planet Metheusalah has been terraformed by a MegaCorp called the Phoebus Technology Conglomeration (PTC), with a mining outpost installed on Metheusalah for harvesting plasma energy from the sun as the world's main source of energy. But when the Flux Gate technology, developed by PTC on the same outpost for re-inventing space travel, accidentally opens a portal to another dimension, monsters began pouring in en-masse.
Zorah Null (with a likeness is loosely based on actress Shaina West), an engineer on Metheusalah, was stranded behind the monster-infested outpost during the evacuation, and needs to fight her way out and figure how to shut down the portal. Luckily, there's an armory just nearby.
An Early Access was available in 2023, with an Expansion Pack expected later on.
"The Flux Gate technology indulges humanity's lust for cosmic expansion... but at what cost?"
- Action Bomb: Phlogis are a new enemy introduced in Episode 2 whose only means of attack is running up to you and exploding in your face.
- Action Survivor: Zorah is just an engineer with no indication of having previous combat training, yet she proves to be quite the One-Woman Army.
- AI Is A Crap Shoot: Charon, your A.I. Mission Control, is only in charge of fighting the invasion because the actual security A.I. responsible for protecting the colony has been destroyed. As they were never programmed for anything more complex than calculating weather patterns and plant growth, they lack the ability for sophisticated or creative thinking required for such a situation. At one point they get a large portion of the remaining survivors killed because they are unable to distinguish between human survivors and hostile converted former humans, opening the bunker doors to a horde of monsters.
- And That's Terrible: One of the logs Zorah comes across states that Methuselah has been completely overrun by monsters, and cannot mount an effective resistance against the invading alien force. It ends with a "This is Not Good".
- Apocalyptic Log: Every so often, Zorah can come across video logs of unfortunate survivors who didn't really escape the monsters. Notably, there's one from a scared worker forced to kill a mutated colleague before (unsuccessfully) trying to hide from the monsters.please come and find me
take me away from here
i cant breathe... - Blatant Item Placement: While the outpost has been completely besieged without any survivors, the game also tends to be quite generous with ammo and supplies Zorah can help herself to. The final area takes this to the extreme where Zorah is fighting a massive wave of monsters - in a large room where every wall has an alcove containing ammunition.
- Body Armor as Hit Points: Zorah can collect armor, which functions like the ones from Doom - absorbs part of the damage inflicted on her, with it's own meter displayed near her health's.
- Captain Ersatz: Owing to the game's origin as a Doom megawad, many of it's enemies should look somewhat... familiar to Doom fans.
- There are gun-wielding zombie ex-soldiers who attacks the hero on sight, not unlike the low-level zombified Doom marines.
- Zorah also encounter humanoid creatures looking suspiciously similar to the Imps.
- The Ophanions, the floating hearts with a metallic ring around them, are a stand-in for the Cacodemon.
- Hiveteeth, the Langoliers looking floating mouths are very similar to Lost Souls.
- Cave Behind the Falls: The mining outpost has an indoor waterfall that turns out to be quite shallow if Zorah wades through it. Walk through the cascading water and it turns out there's a secret area behind containing extra ammo.
- Degraded Boss: The Trepidon, the boss of Episode 1, starts appearing as a rare Elite Mook in Episode 2.
- Distaff Counterpart: Zorah Null can be seen as one to the Doomguy, also she's black (not too visible in-game, but it's clear from the cover art).
- This Is a Drill: Zorah's first weapon is a rock drill, taken from the abandoned mining outpost. Its ammo regenerates automatically and when upgraded it chews through hordes of low-level enemies turning them into plenty of red stuff - it even has a Pile Bunker that extends the drill for extra damage. It's secondary fire is also a concussive blast that can kill groups of weak enemies in one shot and deal decent damage to stronger ones.
- Exploding Barrels: Just like in Doom, with their explosion radius wiping out plenty of enemies. They have a flammable logo on their sides for good measure.
- Expy: Charon seems to be 50% Durandal and 50% Wheatley; they're a support A.I. designed for mundane tasks who ends up recruiting you as their physical proxy for fighting an alien invasion, and also proves to be dangerous to the human survivors as well as the alien invaders. Unlike Durandal and more like Wheatley, the human casualties they cause are more due to incompetence rather than megalomania or sacrificing the few for the good of the many.
- Gender-Inclusive Writing: The text logs emphasize that Charon is gender-neutral due to being an A.I. without a specific gendered personality; at one point a programmer corrects an engineer who misgenders the A.I. as "him".
- Guns Akimbo: Late into the game, Zorah can obtain and use two weapons at the same time. Including dual machine-guns so she can slay twice as much enemies, twice as fast.
- Hold the Line: The Early Access' final stage concludes with Zorah killing waves and waves of enemies emerging from a portal, non-stop, for around 10 minutes until there's nothing left to kill.
- Kill It with Fire: The Cyclomortar is a Grenade Launcher which can blast incendiary rounds on enemies with fiery results. Episode 2 introduces the Cremator, a flamethrower that excels at roasting groups of enemies at close range.
- Ludicrous Gibs: Just like Doom, enemies easily falls apart into chunks of red giblets on the slightest provocation, notably after getting hit from close range by the triple-barreled shotgun, caught by grenade explosions, or chewed by by the drill. Then there's the final area where Zorah fights over a hundred enemies emerging from a portal, one wave at a time, painting the floor red.
- Oxygen Meter: One appears whenever Zorah is underwater or in areas with no oxygen, the later being quite frequent in Episode 2.
- Space Station: Episode 2 takes place in one of these orbiting Bellerophon, a gas giant planet. By the time Zorah arrives, the station is falling apart and everybody is dead.
- Theme Naming: The A.I.s introduced in each episode.
- The Methuselah A.I.s are named after gods from Roman Mythology: Charon, Neptune and Juno.
- The Bellerophon A.I.s are named after Dwarf Planets: Eris, Ceres and Sedna.
- We ARE Struggling Together: Before the invasion, tensions in Methuselah were high between the corporate administration and a local worker's union group. The two groups continue to be at odds even during the invasion, with some members even taking the opportunity to bump off members of the opposing group with some not-so-friendly fire, further escalating tensions between them.
- Things were even worse in Bellerophon, where a full scale riot among the workers had erupted when the alien invasion hit.
