It Came From the Desert
Encyclopedia
It Came from the Desert is a 1989 computer game
by Cinemaware
. It was originally released for the Amiga
, but later ported
to other systems, as well as released in distinctly different forms to consoles
.
Like most of Cinemaware's titles, It Came From the Desert takes its inspiration from Hollywood. This game is undoubtedly inspired by dozens of 1950s "B" movies
, especially the 1954 mutant
-ant
classic Them!, It Came From the Desert is one of Cinemaware's most innovative creations. The original It Came From the Desert was nominated for SPA Game of the Year in 1990.
The game is a fairly non-linear combination of dialogue boxes and several types of action scenes, typical of contemporary Cinemaware releases. The game is set in 1951. When the rural American town of Lizard Breath witnesses a meteor
fall, town geologist and player character Greg Bradley has to discover the source of some strange occurrences. His role as a young man of science in a 1950s movie setting also gives Bradley the ability to operate aircraft, heavy machinery and several types of firearms, and to suffer no injury worse than a flesh wound unless he's committing a heroic sacrifice.
s, mines
, an airport
, and even a drive-in theater
. Since time ticks away quickly at one minute per second of real time, quick decision is key to success.
Once the investigation begins, the player soon realizes there are large, mutant ants roaming around the outskirts of town. These ants are dangerous, and to survive the player must fight them using a handgun
, grenade
s, dynamite
, and pilot a crop duster
to spray the ants with insecticide.
The most important part of the game is to prove to the townspeople that the giant ants are real and convince the mayor to call upon the national guard
to fight the ants. Only in using every resource available in town, from workers to the tanks and fighter jets of the national guard, will the player be able to take the fight to the giant ants.
A number of minigames were activated in certain scenarios, such as playing chicken
, a knife fight
, shooting the antennae off ants, and a top-down perspective on the player used in hospital escape missions and moving around the town on foot or in the air to attack or escape from ants.
As mentioned above, time is in short supply. Players must find and eradicate the queen ant and her lair in a mere 15 days, before the ants make an all-out attack on Lizard Breath (on June 15th). It is possible to fend off the first ant attack, which will give players a last chance, so they can counter-attack and destroy the lair with the remaining few hours. Should players fail again, however, it's impossible to stop the second attack. Lizard Breath will be lost unless the lair is destroyed before night falls on June 15th.
to several other popular systems of the era. In early 1991 Cinemaware released a version for DOS
. The latter was a last attempt of Level 9 Computing
to stay in business, still the firm closed in June of that year. These versions were, apart from minor palette differences, identical to the original.
Note that the Sega version was never actually offered for sale; it was distributed as a ROM image
(see console emulator) from the Cinemaware website after the turn of the 21st century. Despite the similarity of camera perspective, the Sega version did not appear to reuse any of the graphical elements created for use in the computer-based versions.
with recorded sequences of live actors. There were also action sequences that used drawn graphical elements (not captured, as seen in games such as Mean Streets
by Access Software). The side-scrolling action sequence consisted of the player battling ants in tunnels. The TurboGrafx CD version did reuse the graphical elements from the computer version for the overhead battle sequences, but not for any of the character conversation segments.
Unfortunately, this version was marred by poor quality of the video playback of the system, and the limitations of the game console hardware that resulted in side scrolling arcade sequences that were tacky in terms of gameplay. The acting in the video sequences was of B-movie
quality by intention, keeping in-line with the source material that served as an inspiration for the game.
called Antheads: It Came from the Desert II in 1990. Antheads was made available in the United States
through mail order
directly from Cinemaware, and on store shelves in Europe
.
Antheads was not a standalone game; it required ownership of the original chapter in order to play. It won game of the year honors from Computer & Video Games magazine.
The story of the game takes place 5 years after the previous and expands on the possible second Ant Queen mentioned in the first game's ending. The protagonist is an Army Officer named Brick who has stolen a detonator
for an atomic bomb as his kid brother is a tester for the weapon and fears that the Army's then-ignorance of radiation
will cause his brother and other testers to die. Brick tries to find Dr. Wells who has since died and is ambushed by surviving soldier ants who steal the detonator to rouse their dormant second queen. Brick must find Dr. Wells' notes that prove radiation is fatal as well as help the town fend off the new ant army.
Personal computer game
A PC game, also known as a computer game, is a video game played on a personal computer, rather than on a video game console or arcade machine...
by Cinemaware
Cinemaware
Cinemaware was a computer game developer and publisher that released several popular titles in the 1980s based on various movie themes. The company was resurrected in 2000, before being acquired by eGames in 2005.-Cinemaware Corp...
. It was originally released for the Amiga
Amiga
The Amiga is a family of personal computers that was sold by Commodore in the 1980s and 1990s. The first model was launched in 1985 as a high-end home computer and became popular for its graphical, audio and multi-tasking abilities...
, but later ported
Porting
In computer science, porting is the process of adapting software so that an executable program can be created for a computing environment that is different from the one for which it was originally designed...
to other systems, as well as released in distinctly different forms to consoles
Video game console
A video game console is an interactive entertainment computer or customized computer system that produces a video display signal which can be used with a display device to display a video game...
.
Like most of Cinemaware's titles, It Came From the Desert takes its inspiration from Hollywood. This game is undoubtedly inspired by dozens of 1950s "B" movies
B movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
, especially the 1954 mutant
Mutant
In biology and especially genetics, a mutant is an individual, organism, or new genetic character, arising or resulting from an instance of mutation, which is a base-pair sequence change within the DNA of a gene or chromosome of an organism resulting in the creation of a new character or trait not...
-ant
Ant
Ants are social insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from wasp-like ancestors in the mid-Cretaceous period between 110 and 130 million years ago and diversified after the rise of flowering plants. More than...
classic Them!, It Came From the Desert is one of Cinemaware's most innovative creations. The original It Came From the Desert was nominated for SPA Game of the Year in 1990.
The game is a fairly non-linear combination of dialogue boxes and several types of action scenes, typical of contemporary Cinemaware releases. The game is set in 1951. When the rural American town of Lizard Breath witnesses a meteor
METEOR
METEOR is a metric for the evaluation of machine translation output. The metric is based on the harmonic mean of unigram precision and recall, with recall weighted higher than precision...
fall, town geologist and player character Greg Bradley has to discover the source of some strange occurrences. His role as a young man of science in a 1950s movie setting also gives Bradley the ability to operate aircraft, heavy machinery and several types of firearms, and to suffer no injury worse than a flesh wound unless he's committing a heroic sacrifice.
Gameplay
Gameplay centers on the player choosing what they want to do by selecting an option on the multiple choice screens that pop up. There are several buildings in town, as well as farmFarm
A farm is an area of land, or, for aquaculture, lake, river or sea, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food , fibres and, increasingly, fuel. It is the basic production facility in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single...
s, mines
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
, an airport
Airport
An airport is a location where aircraft such as fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and blimps take off and land. Aircraft may be stored or maintained at an airport...
, and even a drive-in theater
Drive-in theater
A drive-in theater is a form of cinema structure consisting of a large outdoor screen, a projection booth, a concession stand and a large parking area for automobiles. Within this enclosed area, customers can view movies from the privacy and comfort of their cars.The screen can be as simple as a...
. Since time ticks away quickly at one minute per second of real time, quick decision is key to success.
Once the investigation begins, the player soon realizes there are large, mutant ants roaming around the outskirts of town. These ants are dangerous, and to survive the player must fight them using a handgun
Handgun
A handgun is a firearm designed to be held and operated by one hand. This characteristic differentiates handguns as a general class of firearms from long guns such as rifles and shotguns ....
, grenade
Hand grenade
A hand grenade is any small bomb that can be thrown by hand. Hand grenades are classified into three categories, explosive grenades, chemical and gas grenades. Explosive grenades are the most commonly used in modern warfare, and are designed to detonate after impact or after a set amount of time...
s, dynamite
Dynamite
Dynamite is an explosive material based on nitroglycerin, initially using diatomaceous earth , or another absorbent substance such as powdered shells, clay, sawdust, or wood pulp. Dynamites using organic materials such as sawdust are less stable and such use has been generally discontinued...
, and pilot a crop duster
Agricultural aircraft
An agricultural aircraft is an aircraft that has been built or converted for agricultural use - usually aerial application of pesticides or fertilizer ; in these roles they are referred to as "crop dusters" or "top dressers"...
to spray the ants with insecticide.
The most important part of the game is to prove to the townspeople that the giant ants are real and convince the mayor to call upon the national guard
United States National Guard
The National Guard of the United States is a reserve military force composed of state National Guard militia members or units under federally recognized active or inactive armed force service for the United States. Militia members are citizen soldiers, meaning they work part time for the National...
to fight the ants. Only in using every resource available in town, from workers to the tanks and fighter jets of the national guard, will the player be able to take the fight to the giant ants.
A number of minigames were activated in certain scenarios, such as playing chicken
Chicken (game)
The game of chicken, also known as the hawk-dove or snowdrift game, is an influential model of conflict for two players in game theory...
, a knife fight
Knife fight
A knife fight is a violent physical confrontation between two or more combatants in which one or more participants is armed with a knife...
, shooting the antennae off ants, and a top-down perspective on the player used in hospital escape missions and moving around the town on foot or in the air to attack or escape from ants.
As mentioned above, time is in short supply. Players must find and eradicate the queen ant and her lair in a mere 15 days, before the ants make an all-out attack on Lizard Breath (on June 15th). It is possible to fend off the first ant attack, which will give players a last chance, so they can counter-attack and destroy the lair with the remaining few hours. Should players fail again, however, it's impossible to stop the second attack. Lizard Breath will be lost unless the lair is destroyed before night falls on June 15th.
Cast
Here are some of the more notable personalities residing in the desert town of Lizard Breath, U.S.A., as of June 1951.- Bert Lamont
- A reporter for the local newspaper, Lizard Breath Star.
- Biff
- A student currently studying at Lizard Breath's local university, Platt University. He occasionally assists Greg with his geological research.
- Ben
- Greg's neighbor.
- Billy Bob Morse
- The head of a local cultCultThe word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
-like club, the Neptune Society. Most of the residents of Lizard Breath consider this man to be an eccentric, but harmless, con artistConfidence trickA confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group by gaining their confidence. A confidence artist is an individual working alone or in concert with others who exploits characteristics of the human psyche such as dishonesty and honesty, vanity, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility,...
. He is also the father of Jackie Monroe.- Mr. Cook
- The owner and manager of Cook's Stud FarmStud farmA stud farm or stud in animal husbandry, is an establishment for selective breeding of livestock. The word "stud" comes from the Old English stod meaning "herd of horses, place where horses are kept for breeding" Historically, documentation of the breedings that occur on a stud farm leads to the...
.- Dusty
- A young woman who works as an announcerAnnouncerAn announcer is a presenter who makes "announcements" in an audio medium or a physical location.-Television and other media:Some announcers work in television production , radio or filmmaking, usually providing narrations, news updates, station identification, or an introduction of a product in...
at KBUG Radio, the local radio station.- Elmer
- The gas station attendantGas jockeyA gas jockey, or gas station attendant, is someone who works at a full service gas station performing services other than working the register. Their jobs include pumping gas, wiping windshields, checking your oil, and in the past, cranking your car to get it started...
and manager of Elmer's Service Station. He stutters when frightened or under stress.- Festus Bartlett
- The mayor of Lizard Breath. A selfish politician, Festus seems to be more concerned with his public reputation than with managing the town's problems.
- Geez
- An elderly prospectorProspectingProspecting is the physical search for minerals, fossils, precious metals or mineral specimens, and is also known as fossicking.Prospecting is a small-scale form of mineral exploration which is an organised, large scale effort undertaken by mineral resource companies to find commercially viable ore...
. When not out prospecting, Geez can usually be found drinking at O'Riordan's Pub. He has a pet muleMuleA mule is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse. Horses and donkeys are different species, with different numbers of chromosomes. Of the two F1 hybrids between these two species, a mule is easier to obtain than a hinny...
named Gertrude. Greg sometimes hires Geez to find and bring back interesting mineral samples.- Greg Bradley
- An out-of-town geologist who has come to Lizard Breath to study local mineral samples and, more recently, a radioactive meteor that recently crashed nearby. He is the player characterPlayer characterA player character or playable character is a character in a video game or role playing game who is controlled or controllable by a player, and is typically a protagonist of the story told in the course of the game. A player character is a persona of the player who controls it. Player characters...
of the story.- Dr. H. G. Wells
- A brilliant scientist and theoretician known for his work on the atomic theoryAtomic theoryIn chemistry and physics, atomic theory is a theory of the nature of matter, which states that matter is composed of discrete units called atoms, as opposed to the obsolete notion that matter could be divided into any arbitrarily small quantity...
. Despite being ridiculed as a crackpotCrank (person)"Crank" is a pejorative term used for a person who unshakably holds a belief that most of his or her contemporaries consider to be false. A "cranky" belief is so wildly at variance with commonly accepted belief as to be ludicrous...
by the general populace, Wells is well-regarded by the scientific communityScientific communityThe scientific community consists of the total body of scientists, its relationships and interactions. It is normally divided into "sub-communities" each working on a particular field within science. Objectivity is expected to be achieved by the scientific method...
, including Greg. He is named after the science fiction author, H. G. WellsH. G. WellsHerbert George Wells was an English author, now best known for his work in the science fiction genre. He was also a prolific writer in many other genres, including contemporary novels, history, politics and social commentary, even writing text books and rules for war games...
.- Ice Morgan
- A troublemaker and the leader of the Hellcats, a local gang of young hoodlums. He enjoys daring drivers to a game of chickenChicken (game)The game of chicken, also known as the hawk-dove or snowdrift game, is an influential model of conflict for two players in game theory...
and can often be found at Beverly's Drive-InDrive-in theaterA drive-in theater is a form of cinema structure consisting of a large outdoor screen, a projection booth, a concession stand and a large parking area for automobiles. Within this enclosed area, customers can view movies from the privacy and comfort of their cars.The screen can be as simple as a...
. Ice has a mercurial temper and often gets into knife fightsKnife fightA knife fight is a violent physical confrontation between two or more combatants in which one or more participants is armed with a knife...
with those raise his ire.- Ida
- A fortune tellerFortune-tellingFortune-telling is the practice of predicting information about a person's life. The scope of fortune-telling is in principle identical with the practice of divination...
.- Jackie Monroe
- A young, beautiful woman who has turned the heads of many men in Lizard Breath.
- Louie La Rue
- A pilot who speaks with a thick French accent and runs a small charterAir charterAir charter is the business of renting an entire aircraft as opposed to individual aircraft seats...
business from Hilbers Field, a small local airfieldAerodromeAn aerodrome, airdrome or airfield is a term for any location from which aircraft flight operations take place, regardless of whether they involve cargo, passengers or neither...
.- Nurse Judy
- A nurse working at the Melville Memorial Hospital.
- Rafe Johnson
- The chiefChief of policeA Chief of Police is the title typically given to the top official in the chain of command of a police department, particularly in North America. Alternate titles for this position include Commissioner, Superintendent, and Chief constable...
of the Lizard Breath police.
Ports
It Came From the Desert was portedPorting
In computer science, porting is the process of adapting software so that an executable program can be created for a computing environment that is different from the one for which it was originally designed...
to several other popular systems of the era. In early 1991 Cinemaware released a version for DOS
DOS
DOS, short for "Disk Operating System", is an acronym for several closely related operating systems that dominated the IBM PC compatible market between 1981 and 1995, or until about 2000 if one includes the partially DOS-based Microsoft Windows versions 95, 98, and Millennium Edition.Related...
. The latter was a last attempt of Level 9 Computing
Level 9 Computing
Level 9 was a British computer text adventure game company which produced some of the most advanced games of the 1980s. Founded in 1981 by Mike Austin, Nicholas Austin and Pete Austin, the company produced about 20 games for BBC Micro, Nascom, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Oric, Atari, Lynx 48k, RML...
to stay in business, still the firm closed in June of that year. These versions were, apart from minor palette differences, identical to the original.
Other versions
Then there were two console versions distinctly different from the versions released for computer platforms, in terms of gameplay and presentation.Sega Genesis
The unreleased Sega Genesis/Mega Drive version was going to be released in 1990. It is an overhead shooter with the main protagonist running around on foot, and able to walk in all directions, rather than being constrained such as in games like Commando. Among the differences in play mechanics, the Sega version allowed the player to create powerups that were fashioned by collecting machinery pieces and joining them together in different combinations.Note that the Sega version was never actually offered for sale; it was distributed as a ROM image
ROM image
A ROM image, or ROM file, is a computer file which contains a copy of the data from a read-only memory chip, often from a video game cartridge, a computer's firmware, or from an arcade game's main board...
(see console emulator) from the Cinemaware website after the turn of the 21st century. Despite the similarity of camera perspective, the Sega version did not appear to reuse any of the graphical elements created for use in the computer-based versions.
TurboGrafx CD
The TurboGrafx CD version was released in 1992. It was a CD-ROM based game that made use of full motion videoFull motion video
Full motion video based games are video games that rely upon pre-recorded TV-quality movie or animation rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models to display action in the game. In the early 1990s a diverse set of games utilized this format...
with recorded sequences of live actors. There were also action sequences that used drawn graphical elements (not captured, as seen in games such as Mean Streets
Mean Streets (computer game)
Mean Streets is a dystopian cyberpunk noir adventure game that was released in 1989 for MS-DOS, Amiga, Atari ST, and Commodore 64. It was developed and published by Access Software...
by Access Software). The side-scrolling action sequence consisted of the player battling ants in tunnels. The TurboGrafx CD version did reuse the graphical elements from the computer version for the overhead battle sequences, but not for any of the character conversation segments.
Unfortunately, this version was marred by poor quality of the video playback of the system, and the limitations of the game console hardware that resulted in side scrolling arcade sequences that were tacky in terms of gameplay. The acting in the video sequences was of B-movie
B-movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
quality by intention, keeping in-line with the source material that served as an inspiration for the game.
Antheads: It Came from the Desert II
It Came From the Desert was followed by an expansion packExpansion pack
An expansion pack, expansion set, or supplement is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game or video game. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, and/or an extended storyline to a complete and already released game...
called Antheads: It Came from the Desert II in 1990. Antheads was made available in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
through mail order
Mail order
Mail order is a term which describes the buying of goods or services by mail delivery. The buyer places an order for the desired products with the merchant through some remote method such as through a telephone call or web site. Then, the products are delivered to the customer...
directly from Cinemaware, and on store shelves in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
.
Antheads was not a standalone game; it required ownership of the original chapter in order to play. It won game of the year honors from Computer & Video Games magazine.
The story of the game takes place 5 years after the previous and expands on the possible second Ant Queen mentioned in the first game's ending. The protagonist is an Army Officer named Brick who has stolen a detonator
Detonator
A detonator is a device used to trigger an explosive device. Detonators can be chemically, mechanically, or electrically initiated, the latter two being the most common....
for an atomic bomb as his kid brother is a tester for the weapon and fears that the Army's then-ignorance of radiation
Radiation
In physics, radiation is a process in which energetic particles or energetic waves travel through a medium or space. There are two distinct types of radiation; ionizing and non-ionizing...
will cause his brother and other testers to die. Brick tries to find Dr. Wells who has since died and is ambushed by surviving soldier ants who steal the detonator to rouse their dormant second queen. Brick must find Dr. Wells' notes that prove radiation is fatal as well as help the town fend off the new ant army.