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Loaded (video game)
Encyclopedia
Loaded is a science fiction
-themed top-down
shoot 'em up
video game that was developed by Gremlin Interactive
and published by Interplay
. Loaded was released in late 1995–early 1996 (around New Year time) on both the PlayStation and Sega Saturn
. The game had origins in DC comics
and more notably the more adult-orientated Vertigo Comics, and there was a small graphic novel
based on the game. The six playable characters
of the game are a combination of villains, anti-heroes, psychopaths, perverts, mutants, and flamboyant murderers. They are, however, the last hope to stop the intergalactic supervillain
code-named F.U.B. and save the universe. The characters were created and designed with contributions from Garth Ennis
of Vertigo Comics and Greg Staples
of 2000AD.
Later in the same year the game spawned a sequel
using almost entirely the same characters and the same game engine
, albeit one with mildly improved graphics, named Re-Loaded. Re-Loaded was released on the PlayStation and PC
at the end of 1996. Although it did not enjoy as good sales as its predecessor, it did however have an acclaimed soundtrack, this time entirely written and recorded by Neil Biggin.
A third game in the series entitled: Fully Loaded was partially developed, but never released.
The game discs of both games could be played as audio CDs. Both games were notorious for their macabre sense of humour, over-the-top violence and extreme gore.
software house
based in Sheffield
which had previously had a successful run in developing games. Loaded and its sequel Re-Loaded would be among the last games developed by Gremlin Interactive, before it was acquired by French giant Infogrames
for £24 million, and the studio in Sheffield closed. The game was internationally published by American
-based Interplay
.
(of 2000AD fame). The games publisher Interplay
collaborated with DC Comics
(Batman
, Superman
, Doom Patrol
) to create a small 12-page novella
illustrated with the game's artwork to promote it and introduce the characters and the game premise. The book was published bundled with DC's works at the time and DC signed adult-orientated Vertigo Comics star Garth Ennis
(Preacher
, Hellblazer
, Hitman
, Judge Dredd
, etc.) to write it. The novella is now considered a collector's item.
flight
and has since colonized
most of the inhabitable worlds
across the galaxy
. F.U.B. was once a pretty uncultured and incapable catering officer with questionable sanity in the Sector Marines, often screwing up the field kitchens and dropping jars of Plusgrial fnart jiz powder into the cooking pot. F.U.B. (which stands "fat ugly boy", a name he was never able to escape) finally lost his mind on a barren desert front during a relatively minor skirmish of the last 40 years. Not wanting to let "the boys" down and unable to find any meat, F.U.B. amputated his own legs, cooked them and served them up to the soldiers in a hot broth. Despite it being the best dish he had ever created, F.U.B. was given an unconditional discharge and asked never to show his face again. Vowing to get revenge on the worlds of man for his banishment and exile, F.U.B. replaces his legs with mechanical, hydraulic-powered replacements and becomes a feared and egotistical space pirate
, attracting other fragile minds to his cause. He undertakes a dramatic, bizarre and insane appearance; wearing furry dice, smoking Havana cigars and tattooing a target on his portly belly.
The six playable characters
have notable differences and derangements, but what they have in common is that they are all psychotic mercenaries
who have been framed
for crimes actually committed by F.U.B. and are now serving life sentences on an inhospitable maximum security prison planet, the planet Raulf. F.U.B. has even taken on a new secretive identity, joining the intergalactic prison system and working his way up the ladder by murdering his superiors and taking their positions, and F.U.B. is now the warden of Raulf. F.U.B. has done this so that he can pin his crimes as a space pirate on other people, usually those who are psychotic anyway so as nobody will notice.
The player (or two of the game's six characters, in two player mode) must escape Raulf, chase F.U.B. and engage on a bloody odyssey across the strange worlds of the galaxy to exact revenge on F.U.B. The supervillain
however is merely excited by this, seeing it as a challenge and a game, and to this end he steals the most advanced machine in existence - a machine which can toy with the very fabric of the universe, manipulate matter and even open doorways to other dimensions. With this machine F.U.B. plans to hold the universe to ransom, and sets up a prison break on Raulf to set things in motion. If he can defeat a group of the most feared individuals in the galaxy who are armed to the teeth and wanting revenge, he figures he can defeat anyone.
sequence. Loaded's gameplay is similar to that of Gauntlet
, which requires the player to move room to room killing everything in sight, everything of which will try to kill the player also. Score can be increased by looting the bloodied remains of enemies. There are some puzzle and exploration elements, and power-ups and ammo can be found. The levels progress by collecting keycards capable of unlocking doors. The player can zoom in to their character by pressing R2, or zoom out by pressing L2. At the end of each level, the game tallies the player's greed factor, accuracy and body count on a 0%-100% scale in order to give the player's career prospects (ranging from as low as "social worker" to as high as "genocidal maniac", etc.) and final score.
(Kick to Kill and RSVP). The game was specially designed so that it could be placed inside a CD player and used as an audio CD (skipping Track 1 which contained the code for the game). This would then enable the listener to play the full soundtrack - including many hidden tracks. There are 25 audio tracks in total on the CD, the hidden tracks were brief demos and were never used in-game.
website. However the general consensus was positive and Loaded currently has an 82% rating on MobyGames
.
, Mamma's real name is unknown and wears a diaper, baby bonnet, woolly hat and bunny slippers. However, both the guards and prisoners of the Raulf prison planet are all terrified of him, due the fact he has a tendency to crush to death anybody who comes near him in a mammoth, bone-crunching, organ-bursting bear hug
, which to Mamma is an innocent gesture of friendship; he then believes the crushed bodies are asleep and he will go off looking for his next "cuddle". Mamma was abandoned as a babe in the busiest star port in the galaxy, a place where nobody has any time for anybody else. He is totally without education, manners and most of all the other things which are generally regarded as "civilized". He blunders through life using his very limited vocabulary to get him through all manner of circumstance. The only word he knows, and the only thing that keeps him going is the word "MAMMA!", lending him his name. Obviously he missed something as an infant. His lineage is therefore something of an unknown quantity, but one thing is certain - his mother was friendly with something large and simian
. Quite a scary and unpredictable man to have around, even if you are scary and unpredictable yourself. Mamma's weapon is the Plasma Gun and his bomb is the Ripple Grenade, used when Mamma creates a wave through the ground that instantly kills a large amount of foes around him. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Mamma has a very good armour rating but a slow speed.
. Almost child-like in demeanour (although not so much as Mamma), he has a notable lisp
, which causes him to mis-pronounce words (Rs are substituted with Ws), providing his nickname. Fwank killed his parents, and his "pwobation officer
", when he was young, and the graphic novel explains that he was lobotomised at age six, although his true name is never revealed. His body is described as "that of a steroid
-eating wildebeest
who doesn't shower". Fwank looks upon other lifeforms as toys for his amusement or worse, expendable cardboard targets at a fairground attraction. The only things he cares about is his collection of teddy bear
s, especially the one he calls Percy, and keeping his weapon well oiled. Fwank makes one concession to his fellow lifeforms; he ties a mood balloon to his back pack indicating the general ballpark of his demeanour (green for "chuckly", yellow for "I need space", and red for "I wouldn't ask if I were you"). Fwank's weapon of choice is a cannon that fires Neutron
Spheres, and his bombs are Homing Teddies, a floating armada of teddy bears containing explosives that eviscerate nearby foes. This attack can kill enemies stationed directly behind a door, but cannot travel through walls and doors. However, the teddies can follow Fwank and stay in use longer to attack incoming enemies. Fwank has stats almost similar to Mamma; Fwank has a good armour rating but a slow speed.
-wearing Bounca is nonetheless a mammoth of a man and still towers over most other lifeforms. He has spent his adult life as a security guard, personal bodyguard, and mostly as a bouncer
. Certainly one of the most widely travelled and employed organisms in the history of the galaxy, he has seen amazing sights that even the most intrepid galactic explorers would go green at; hidden planets, lost continents and the like. Bounca has a slight problem though; he is incredibly thick. Not just a bit thick, enormously thick. All of his experiences amount to a big fat zero, because the only thing he finds interesting is "slappin some innocent geeza about a bit". You might as well have sent a baboon around the galaxy and then questioned it about its experiences, as it is probably more perceptive and definitely less likely to kill you for asking. He lost his lower jaw fighting an alien monster twice as big as him, who was trying to enter a doorway Bounca was watching over; Bounca won the fight, but had to have his lower jaw replaced with a giant, metallic, serrated
muzzle
. His weapon is a Missile Launcher and his bomb is the Frag Missile, a randomly-moving burst of shrapnel. This attack can not travel through walls and doors. The all-rounder of the group in stats, Bounca has a medium armour rating and a moderate speed.
, and glamour model, often called "The Siren" due to her mixed beauty and extremely sharp tongue and temper, and overall devastating sexy countenance. Vox uses modified sound and music technology to kill foes in the game, self developed with the aid of Gabbist Monks, an order who take the vow to never have a second's peace and quiet and are masters in the art of amplification. The device they collaborated on is slung across her back and has a number of "Rapmaster" microphones channelling sound to it via boom mikes on her visor. The sound waves created act as shock wave
s and are capable of turning Vox's enemies into bubbling pools of protoplasm. Her weapon is the Hail Flail and her ultra bomb is the Sonic Blast, an extremely potent and charged burst of lethal sound waves. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Vox is small and light, with a poor armour rating but is the fastest character in speed, making it easy for her to even dodge bullets.
named the "Flaming Queen", and his bomb is the Explosive Ring, the release of fireballs in all directions within Butch's radius. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Instead of splattering enemies into a bloody heap, the Flaming Queen and the Explosive Ring actually chars enemies' bodies on contact. He has a medium armour rating and fast speed, although not as fast as Vox, making him the second fastest character in the game.
hat and an exposed ribcage. Cap'n Hands has been around for centuries and nothing is known of his origins, although the rumors range from being a pirate who was operating in the Caribbean
during the Golden Age of Piracy
of the late 17th century, or even a cowboy from the Old American West of the 19th century. Up until recently, before he was captured by the authorities, Cap'n Hands was a leader of the feared and despised "Cirates", a group of cybernetically-enhanced space pirates. Only his head is an original part of his human body and that too is rotten to the core. The rest of his powerful frame is an old and out-of-date cyborg
design which he could have replaced over 200 years ago when technology took a giant leap forward, but he likes it. Another reason he keeps this ancient and obsolete skeleton is for its amazing array of original art and engravings which decorate the majority of its panels, showing his numerous exploits and stories through space. He has kept the inmates of Raulf prison amused and beguiled for hours on end with stories of how he acquired them, and with his famous "dancing bare lady" design (only his close friends and people who are about to expire horribly generally get to see that though). The truth is, Cap'n Hands cannot remember who he was before he became a cybernetic, skeletal pirate, simply because it was so long ago, and his mind isn't what it used to be. His weapons are a pair of old flintlock muskets which he has customized for rapid energy fire, although he has made sure they still retain their trademark sound of old. His bomb is the Vortex Bomb, a curtain of dark energy that shreds enemies to pieces. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Cap'n Hands has an average armour rating, and moderate speed, being the third fastest character behind Vox and Butch.
was released also for the PlayStation and the PC
entitled Re-Loaded, developed and published by the same companies. It featured the same game engine, and even the game menus are the same, although it is a game engine with slightly improved graphics. Four characters from the original game are also in Re-Loaded, such as Mamma, Bounca, Butch, and Cap'n Hands. Vox, however, is not present in the game and is replaced by two new female characters: a pink-haired, cannibalistic sex symbol
named The Consumer, and a malfunctioning android nun
named Sister Magpie. Via cheat code, Sister Magpie can unlock hidden character Fwank from the previous game for use in Re-Loaded. If unlocked, Fwank is the best character in Re-Loaded, with the most speed and best armour. All of the returning characters have new weapons and/or variations of their costumes. There are twelve blood-soaked new worlds to annihilate, much bigger than the levels encountered in the previous game, and with the added bonus of being able to morph the surrounding terrain with high-powered weaponry and explosives. The game will be coming soon on PSN Store as it can already be seen listed by the ESRB Website that it's coming to PSN as a PSOne Classic.
of Loaded, had his body destroyed at the end of the previous game, although his brain fled in an escape pod
. Landing on a harsh desert world, Kee-Butt-5, his brain has been implanted into the body of a chiselled, bronzed young artist hermit named Manuel Auto, and then he murdered the loyal surgeons responsible for giving him a new body. Reincarnated and renamed "C.H.E.B.", which stands for "Charming Handsome Erudite Bastard", the former raving lunatic supervillain
has taken on some of the aspects of his host body, the creative, artistic and thoughtful Manuel Auto. With his matter manipulation powers, C.H.E.B. plans to transform whole planets into "Works Of Art and Genuis", starting with his own body which he grows to the size of a small moon. Once again the group of blood-thirsty anti-hero
es gather to bring him down once and for all and set off for Kee-Butt-5...
. The soundtrack however, this time entirely composed by Neil Biggin, was acclaimed as better than the original and indeed one of the best aspects of the game. Like the previous game, it could be played as an audio CD.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
-themed top-down
Birds Eye View
Birds Eye View is an organisation established in 2002 to celebrate and support women's work in film, most notably by way of an annual film festival in London that places women at the heart of the creative vision.-Overview and History:...
shoot 'em up
Shoot 'em up
Shoot 'em up is a subgenre of shooter video games. In a shoot 'em up, the player controls a lone character, often in a spacecraft or aircraft, shooting large numbers of enemies while dodging their attacks. The genre in turn encompasses various types or subgenres and critics differ on exactly what...
video game that was developed by Gremlin Interactive
Gremlin Interactive
Gremlin Interactive was a British software house based in Sheffield and working mostly in the home computer market.- History :...
and published by Interplay
Interplay Entertainment
Interplay Entertainment Corporation is an American video game developer and publisher, founded in 1983 as Interplay Productions by Brian Fargo. The company had been a quality developer until they started publishing their own games in 1988, like Neuromancer and Battle Chess. The company was renamed...
. Loaded was released in late 1995–early 1996 (around New Year time) on both the PlayStation and Sega Saturn
Sega Saturn
The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...
. The game had origins in DC comics
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
and more notably the more adult-orientated Vertigo Comics, and there was a small graphic novel
Graphic novel
A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format...
based on the game. The six playable characters
Player character
A 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 game are a combination of villains, anti-heroes, psychopaths, perverts, mutants, and flamboyant murderers. They are, however, the last hope to stop the intergalactic supervillain
Supervillain
A supervillain or supervillainess is a variant of the villain character type, commonly found in comic books, action movies and science fiction in various media.They are sometimes used as foils to superheroes and other fictional heroes...
code-named F.U.B. and save the universe. The characters were created and designed with contributions from Garth Ennis
Garth Ennis
Garth Ennis is a Northern Irish comics writer, best known for the Vertigo series Preacher with artist Steve Dillon and his successful nine-year run on Marvel Comics' Punisher franchise...
of Vertigo Comics and Greg Staples
Greg Staples
-Biography:Greg Staples' first job on leaving school was as a trainee draftsman in an architects office in Sheffield.He also spent time working in a comic and film memorabilia shop and also a computer game store, both also in Sheffield, South Yorkshire....
of 2000AD.
Later in the same year the game spawned a sequel
Sequel
A sequel is a narrative, documental, or other work of literature, film, theatre, or music that continues the story of or expands upon issues presented in some previous work...
using almost entirely the same characters and the same game engine
Game engine
A game engine is a system designed for the creation and development of video games. There are many game engines that are designed to work on video game consoles and personal computers...
, albeit one with mildly improved graphics, named Re-Loaded. Re-Loaded was released on the PlayStation and PC
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
at the end of 1996. Although it did not enjoy as good sales as its predecessor, it did however have an acclaimed soundtrack, this time entirely written and recorded by Neil Biggin.
A third game in the series entitled: Fully Loaded was partially developed, but never released.
The game discs of both games could be played as audio CDs. Both games were notorious for their macabre sense of humour, over-the-top violence and extreme gore.
Origins
Loaded was developed by Gremlin Interactive, a BritishUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
software house
Software house
A software house is a company whose primary products are software.- Types :There are a number of different types of software houses:*Large and well-known companies such as Microsoft, SAP AG, Oracle Corporation, HP, Adobe Systems, Apple Inc...
based in Sheffield
Sheffield
Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...
which had previously had a successful run in developing games. Loaded and its sequel Re-Loaded would be among the last games developed by Gremlin Interactive, before it was acquired by French giant Infogrames
Infogrames
Infogrames Entertainment SA was an international French holding company headquartered in Paris, France. It was the owner of Atari, Inc., headquartered in New York City, U.S. and Atari Europe. It was founded in 1983 by Bruno Bonnell and Christophe Sapet using the proceeds from an introductory...
for £24 million, and the studio in Sheffield closed. The game was internationally published by American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
-based Interplay
Interplay Entertainment
Interplay Entertainment Corporation is an American video game developer and publisher, founded in 1983 as Interplay Productions by Brian Fargo. The company had been a quality developer until they started publishing their own games in 1988, like Neuromancer and Battle Chess. The company was renamed...
.
Comic book connections
Loaded was an interesting marketing gimmick when released: considering that the main character design and graphics were done by a host of comic book illustrators like Les Spink and Greg StaplesGreg Staples
-Biography:Greg Staples' first job on leaving school was as a trainee draftsman in an architects office in Sheffield.He also spent time working in a comic and film memorabilia shop and also a computer game store, both also in Sheffield, South Yorkshire....
(of 2000AD fame). The games publisher Interplay
Interplay Entertainment
Interplay Entertainment Corporation is an American video game developer and publisher, founded in 1983 as Interplay Productions by Brian Fargo. The company had been a quality developer until they started publishing their own games in 1988, like Neuromancer and Battle Chess. The company was renamed...
collaborated with DC Comics
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
(Batman
Batman
Batman is a fictional character created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger. A comic book superhero, Batman first appeared in Detective Comics #27 , and since then has appeared primarily in publications by DC Comics...
, Superman
Superman
Superman is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in publications by DC Comics, widely considered to be an American cultural icon. Created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian-born American artist Joe Shuster in 1932 while both were living in Cleveland, Ohio, and sold to Detective...
, Doom Patrol
Doom Patrol
The Doom Patrol is a superhero team appearing in publications from DC Comics. The original Doom Patrol first appeared in My Greatest Adventure #80...
) to create a small 12-page novella
Novella
A novella is a written, fictional, prose narrative usually longer than a novelette but shorter than a novel. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards for science fiction define the novella as having a word count between 17,500 and 40,000...
illustrated with the game's artwork to promote it and introduce the characters and the game premise. The book was published bundled with DC's works at the time and DC signed adult-orientated Vertigo Comics star Garth Ennis
Garth Ennis
Garth Ennis is a Northern Irish comics writer, best known for the Vertigo series Preacher with artist Steve Dillon and his successful nine-year run on Marvel Comics' Punisher franchise...
(Preacher
Preacher (comics)
Preacher is a comic book series created by writer Garth Ennis and artist Steve Dillon, published by the American comic book label Vertigo , with painted covers by Glenn Fabry....
, Hellblazer
Hellblazer
Hellblazer is a contemporary horror comic book series, originally published by DC Comics, and subsequently by the Vertigo imprint since March 1993, the month the imprint was introduced, where it remains to this day...
, Hitman
Hitman (comics)
Hitman is a fictional character, a superpowered hitman in the DC Comics Universe. The character was created by Garth Ennis and John McCrea and first appeared in The Demon Annual #2 and then received his own series by Ennis and McCrea lasting 61 issues.-Background:Hitman chronicles the exploits of...
, Judge Dredd
Judge Dredd
Judge Joseph Dredd is a comics character whose strip in the British science fiction anthology 2000 AD is the magazine's longest running . Dredd is an American law enforcement officer in a violent city of the future where uniformed Judges combine the powers of police, judge, jury and executioner...
, etc.) to write it. The novella is now considered a collector's item.
Plot
The game is set in the distant future, long after mankind has discovered faster-than-lightFaster-than-light
Faster-than-light communications and travel refer to the propagation of information or matter faster than the speed of light....
flight
Flight
Flight is the process by which an object moves either through an atmosphere or beyond it by generating lift or propulsive thrust, or aerostatically using buoyancy, or by simple ballistic movement....
and has since colonized
Space colonization
Space colonization is the concept of permanent human habitation outside of Earth. Although hypothetical at the present time, there are many proposals and speculations about the first space colony...
most of the inhabitable worlds
Planetary habitability
Planetary habitability is the measure of a planet's or a natural satellite's potential to sustain life. Life may develop directly on a planet or satellite or be transferred to it from another body, a theoretical process known as panspermia...
across the galaxy
Milky Way
The Milky Way is the galaxy that contains the Solar System. This name derives from its appearance as a dim un-resolved "milky" glowing band arching across the night sky...
. F.U.B. was once a pretty uncultured and incapable catering officer with questionable sanity in the Sector Marines, often screwing up the field kitchens and dropping jars of Plusgrial fnart jiz powder into the cooking pot. F.U.B. (which stands "fat ugly boy", a name he was never able to escape) finally lost his mind on a barren desert front during a relatively minor skirmish of the last 40 years. Not wanting to let "the boys" down and unable to find any meat, F.U.B. amputated his own legs, cooked them and served them up to the soldiers in a hot broth. Despite it being the best dish he had ever created, F.U.B. was given an unconditional discharge and asked never to show his face again. Vowing to get revenge on the worlds of man for his banishment and exile, F.U.B. replaces his legs with mechanical, hydraulic-powered replacements and becomes a feared and egotistical space pirate
Space pirate
Space pirates are a type of stock characters from science fiction. They operate as pirates in outer space and travel by spacecraft; as opposed to the more traditional pirates on the high seas of Earth, who travel by boat...
, attracting other fragile minds to his cause. He undertakes a dramatic, bizarre and insane appearance; wearing furry dice, smoking Havana cigars and tattooing a target on his portly belly.
The six playable characters
Player character
A 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...
have notable differences and derangements, but what they have in common is that they are all psychotic mercenaries
Mercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
who have been framed
Frameup
A frame-up or setup is an American term referring to the act of framing someone, that is, providing false evidence or false testimony in order to falsely prove someone guilty of a crime....
for crimes actually committed by F.U.B. and are now serving life sentences on an inhospitable maximum security prison planet, the planet Raulf. F.U.B. has even taken on a new secretive identity, joining the intergalactic prison system and working his way up the ladder by murdering his superiors and taking their positions, and F.U.B. is now the warden of Raulf. F.U.B. has done this so that he can pin his crimes as a space pirate on other people, usually those who are psychotic anyway so as nobody will notice.
The player (or two of the game's six characters, in two player mode) must escape Raulf, chase F.U.B. and engage on a bloody odyssey across the strange worlds of the galaxy to exact revenge on F.U.B. The supervillain
Supervillain
A supervillain or supervillainess is a variant of the villain character type, commonly found in comic books, action movies and science fiction in various media.They are sometimes used as foils to superheroes and other fictional heroes...
however is merely excited by this, seeing it as a challenge and a game, and to this end he steals the most advanced machine in existence - a machine which can toy with the very fabric of the universe, manipulate matter and even open doorways to other dimensions. With this machine F.U.B. plans to hold the universe to ransom, and sets up a prison break on Raulf to set things in motion. If he can defeat a group of the most feared individuals in the galaxy who are armed to the teeth and wanting revenge, he figures he can defeat anyone.
Gameplay
The game features levels across fifteen different worlds and has six playable characters: Mamma, Fwank, Bounca, Vox, Butch and Cap'n Hands. Two characters may be selected in co-operative mode to complete the game. A mission briefing will begin at the start of every mission, aided by a 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...
sequence. Loaded's gameplay is similar to that of Gauntlet
Gauntlet (arcade game)
Gauntlet is a fantasy-themed hack and slash 1985 arcade game by Atari Games. It is noted as the first class-based multiplayer game. Released during the emergence of popularity of other role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons, the game was a sensation, being one of the first true dungeon crawl...
, which requires the player to move room to room killing everything in sight, everything of which will try to kill the player also. Score can be increased by looting the bloodied remains of enemies. There are some puzzle and exploration elements, and power-ups and ammo can be found. The levels progress by collecting keycards capable of unlocking doors. The player can zoom in to their character by pressing R2, or zoom out by pressing L2. At the end of each level, the game tallies the player's greed factor, accuracy and body count on a 0%-100% scale in order to give the player's career prospects (ranging from as low as "social worker" to as high as "genocidal maniac", etc.) and final score.
Soundtrack
Loaded features 21 compositions by Neil Biggin, plus 2 tracks by Patrick (Pat) Phelan and 2 more by Pop Will Eat ItselfPop Will Eat Itself
Pop Will Eat Itself are an English alternative rock band, originally formed in Stourbridge in 1986, with members from Birmingham, Coventry and the Black Country. Initially known as a Grebo act, their style changed to incorporate sample driven indie and industrial rock...
(Kick to Kill and RSVP). The game was specially designed so that it could be placed inside a CD player and used as an audio CD (skipping Track 1 which contained the code for the game). This would then enable the listener to play the full soundtrack - including many hidden tracks. There are 25 audio tracks in total on the CD, the hidden tracks were brief demos and were never used in-game.
Reception
The game received mixed reviews, with critics noting that it wasn't exactly a cerebral game, but with others noting that it was nonetheless fun and addictive. Critics are still divided even today, which is evident in the reviews of the game on the GameFaqsGameFAQs
GameFAQs is a website that hosts FAQs and walkthroughs for video games. It was created in November 1995 by Jeff "CJayC" Veasey and was bought by CNET Networks in May 2003. It is currently owned by CBS Interactive. The site has a database of video game information, cheat codes, reviews, game saves,...
website. However the general consensus was positive and Loaded currently has an 82% rating on MobyGames
MobyGames
-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...
.
Controversy
Loaded was noted in many reviews for its violence; everything living encountered by the player must be killed, often resulting in explosions of gore. On June 29, 1996, Loaded was put on index in Germany by the BPjS.Mamma
The largest character in the game, a veritable giantGiant (mythology)
The mythology and legends of many different cultures include monsters of human appearance but prodigious size and strength. "Giant" is the English word commonly used for such beings, derived from one of the most famed examples: the gigantes of Greek mythology.In various Indo-European mythologies,...
, Mamma's real name is unknown and wears a diaper, baby bonnet, woolly hat and bunny slippers. However, both the guards and prisoners of the Raulf prison planet are all terrified of him, due the fact he has a tendency to crush to death anybody who comes near him in a mammoth, bone-crunching, organ-bursting bear hug
Bear hug
In wrestling, a bear hug, also known as a bodylock, is a grappling clinch hold and stand-up grappling position where the arms are wrapped around the opponent, either around the opponent's chest, midsection, or thighs; sometimes with one or both of the opponents arms pinned to the opponent's body...
, which to Mamma is an innocent gesture of friendship; he then believes the crushed bodies are asleep and he will go off looking for his next "cuddle". Mamma was abandoned as a babe in the busiest star port in the galaxy, a place where nobody has any time for anybody else. He is totally without education, manners and most of all the other things which are generally regarded as "civilized". He blunders through life using his very limited vocabulary to get him through all manner of circumstance. The only word he knows, and the only thing that keeps him going is the word "MAMMA!", lending him his name. Obviously he missed something as an infant. His lineage is therefore something of an unknown quantity, but one thing is certain - his mother was friendly with something large and simian
Simian
The simians are the "higher primates" familiar to most people: the Old World monkeys and apes, including humans, , and the New World monkeys or platyrrhines. Simians tend to be larger than the "lower primates" or prosimians.- Classification and evolution :The simians are split into three groups...
. Quite a scary and unpredictable man to have around, even if you are scary and unpredictable yourself. Mamma's weapon is the Plasma Gun and his bomb is the Ripple Grenade, used when Mamma creates a wave through the ground that instantly kills a large amount of foes around him. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Mamma has a very good armour rating but a slow speed.
Fwank
Featured on the cover of the game, Fwank is a very heavily-built and thoroughly psychotic man donning a bank bag over his face with the bag painted, making him resemble a clownClown
Clowns are comic performers stereotypically characterized by the grotesque image of the circus clown's colored wigs, stylistic makeup, outlandish costumes, unusually large footwear, and red nose, which evolved to project their actions to large audiences. Other less grotesque styles have also...
. Almost child-like in demeanour (although not so much as Mamma), he has a notable lisp
Lisp
A lisp is a speech impediment, historically also known as sigmatism. Stereotypically, people with a lisp are unable to pronounce sibilants , and replace them with interdentals , though there are actually several kinds of lisp...
, which causes him to mis-pronounce words (Rs are substituted with Ws), providing his nickname. Fwank killed his parents, and his "pwobation officer
Probation officer
Parole officers and probation officers play a role in criminal justice systems by supervising offenders released from incarceration or sentenced to non-custodial sanctions such as community service...
", when he was young, and the graphic novel explains that he was lobotomised at age six, although his true name is never revealed. His body is described as "that of a steroid
Steroid
A steroid is a type of organic compound that contains a characteristic arrangement of four cycloalkane rings that are joined to each other. Examples of steroids include the dietary fat cholesterol, the sex hormones estradiol and testosterone, and the anti-inflammatory drug dexamethasone.The core...
-eating wildebeest
Wildebeest
The wildebeest , also called the gnu is an antelope of the genus Connochaetes. It is a hooved mammal...
who doesn't shower". Fwank looks upon other lifeforms as toys for his amusement or worse, expendable cardboard targets at a fairground attraction. The only things he cares about is his collection of teddy bear
Teddy bear
The teddy bear is a stuffed toy bear. They are usually stuffed with soft, white cotton and have smooth and soft fur. It is an enduring form of a stuffed animal in many countries, often serving the purpose of entertaining children. In recent times, some teddy bears have become collector's items...
s, especially the one he calls Percy, and keeping his weapon well oiled. Fwank makes one concession to his fellow lifeforms; he ties a mood balloon to his back pack indicating the general ballpark of his demeanour (green for "chuckly", yellow for "I need space", and red for "I wouldn't ask if I were you"). Fwank's weapon of choice is a cannon that fires Neutron
Neutron
The neutron is a subatomic hadron particle which has the symbol or , no net electric charge and a mass slightly larger than that of a proton. With the exception of hydrogen, nuclei of atoms consist of protons and neutrons, which are therefore collectively referred to as nucleons. The number of...
Spheres, and his bombs are Homing Teddies, a floating armada of teddy bears containing explosives that eviscerate nearby foes. This attack can kill enemies stationed directly behind a door, but cannot travel through walls and doors. However, the teddies can follow Fwank and stay in use longer to attack incoming enemies. Fwank has stats almost similar to Mamma; Fwank has a good armour rating but a slow speed.
Bounca
Not quite as big as Mamma, the tuxedoTuxedo
A tuxedo is a type of semi-formal dress for men.Tuxedo may also refer to:-Places:Canada* Tuxedo, Winnipeg, Manitoba, a city neighborhood** Tuxedo , a provincial electoral district in Manitoba...
-wearing Bounca is nonetheless a mammoth of a man and still towers over most other lifeforms. He has spent his adult life as a security guard, personal bodyguard, and mostly as a bouncer
Bouncer (doorman)
A bouncer is an informal term for a type of security guard employed at venues such as bars, nightclubs or concerts to provide security, check legal age, and refuse entry to a venue based on criteria such as intoxication, aggressive behavior, or attractiveness...
. Certainly one of the most widely travelled and employed organisms in the history of the galaxy, he has seen amazing sights that even the most intrepid galactic explorers would go green at; hidden planets, lost continents and the like. Bounca has a slight problem though; he is incredibly thick. Not just a bit thick, enormously thick. All of his experiences amount to a big fat zero, because the only thing he finds interesting is "slappin some innocent geeza about a bit". You might as well have sent a baboon around the galaxy and then questioned it about its experiences, as it is probably more perceptive and definitely less likely to kill you for asking. He lost his lower jaw fighting an alien monster twice as big as him, who was trying to enter a doorway Bounca was watching over; Bounca won the fight, but had to have his lower jaw replaced with a giant, metallic, serrated
Serrated blade
A serrated blade is a type of blade used on saws and on some knives or scissors. It is also known as a dentated, sawtooth, or toothed blade.A serrated blade has a cutting edge that has many small points of contact with the material being cut...
muzzle
Muzzle (device)
A muzzle is a device that is placed over the snout of an animal to keep it from biting or otherwise opening its mouth.An Elizabethan collar is a cone-shaped device placed around an animal's neck to prevent biting and sometimes referred to as a muzzle, though its function is more usually to prevent...
. His weapon is a Missile Launcher and his bomb is the Frag Missile, a randomly-moving burst of shrapnel. This attack can not travel through walls and doors. The all-rounder of the group in stats, Bounca has a medium armour rating and a moderate speed.
Vox
The only female in the game, Vox is a former sound engineer, disc jockeyDisc jockey
A disc jockey, also known as DJ, is a person who selects and plays recorded music for an audience. Originally, "disc" referred to phonograph records, not the later Compact Discs. Today, the term includes all forms of music playback, no matter the medium.There are several types of disc jockeys...
, and glamour model, often called "The Siren" due to her mixed beauty and extremely sharp tongue and temper, and overall devastating sexy countenance. Vox uses modified sound and music technology to kill foes in the game, self developed with the aid of Gabbist Monks, an order who take the vow to never have a second's peace and quiet and are masters in the art of amplification. The device they collaborated on is slung across her back and has a number of "Rapmaster" microphones channelling sound to it via boom mikes on her visor. The sound waves created act as shock wave
Shock wave
A shock wave is a type of propagating disturbance. Like an ordinary wave, it carries energy and can propagate through a medium or in some cases in the absence of a material medium, through a field such as the electromagnetic field...
s and are capable of turning Vox's enemies into bubbling pools of protoplasm. Her weapon is the Hail Flail and her ultra bomb is the Sonic Blast, an extremely potent and charged burst of lethal sound waves. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Vox is small and light, with a poor armour rating but is the fastest character in speed, making it easy for her to even dodge bullets.
Butch
A muscular, balding transvestite man that wears ladies' dresses in combat and dislikes those that find his cross-dressing funny. He brutally murders anybody who snickers at his attire. The game manual and also the graphic novel explain that it is not through choice however; every time he escapes he simply grabs the nearest item to hand, which unfortunately by a staggering twist of fate always happens to be women's clothing in some form. Butch's favoured weapon is a flamethrowerFlamethrower
A flamethrower is a mechanical device designed to project a long controllable stream of fire.Some flamethrowers project a stream of ignited flammable liquid; some project a long gas flame. Most military flamethrowers use liquids, but commercial flamethrowers tend to use high-pressure propane and...
named the "Flaming Queen", and his bomb is the Explosive Ring, the release of fireballs in all directions within Butch's radius. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Instead of splattering enemies into a bloody heap, the Flaming Queen and the Explosive Ring actually chars enemies' bodies on contact. He has a medium armour rating and fast speed, although not as fast as Vox, making him the second fastest character in the game.
Cap'n Hands
A pirate-like character with freakishly large hands and forearms, a cowboyCowboy
A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the vaquero traditions of northern Mexico and became a figure of...
hat and an exposed ribcage. Cap'n Hands has been around for centuries and nothing is known of his origins, although the rumors range from being a pirate who was operating in the Caribbean
Caribbean
The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...
during the Golden Age of Piracy
Golden Age of Piracy
The Golden Age of Piracy is a common designation given to one or more outbursts of piracy in maritime history of the early modern period. In its broadest accepted definition, the Golden Age of Piracy spans from the 1650s to the 1730s and covers three separate outbursts of piracy:the buccaneering...
of the late 17th century, or even a cowboy from the Old American West of the 19th century. Up until recently, before he was captured by the authorities, Cap'n Hands was a leader of the feared and despised "Cirates", a group of cybernetically-enhanced space pirates. Only his head is an original part of his human body and that too is rotten to the core. The rest of his powerful frame is an old and out-of-date cyborg
Cyborg
A cyborg is a being with both biological and artificial parts. The term was coined in 1960 when Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline used it in an article about the advantages of self-regulating human-machine systems in outer space. D. S...
design which he could have replaced over 200 years ago when technology took a giant leap forward, but he likes it. Another reason he keeps this ancient and obsolete skeleton is for its amazing array of original art and engravings which decorate the majority of its panels, showing his numerous exploits and stories through space. He has kept the inmates of Raulf prison amused and beguiled for hours on end with stories of how he acquired them, and with his famous "dancing bare lady" design (only his close friends and people who are about to expire horribly generally get to see that though). The truth is, Cap'n Hands cannot remember who he was before he became a cybernetic, skeletal pirate, simply because it was so long ago, and his mind isn't what it used to be. His weapons are a pair of old flintlock muskets which he has customized for rapid energy fire, although he has made sure they still retain their trademark sound of old. His bomb is the Vortex Bomb, a curtain of dark energy that shreds enemies to pieces. This attack can travel through walls and doors. Cap'n Hands has an average armour rating, and moderate speed, being the third fastest character behind Vox and Butch.
Overview
Less than a year after the original game was released, a sequelSequel
A sequel is a narrative, documental, or other work of literature, film, theatre, or music that continues the story of or expands upon issues presented in some previous work...
was released also for the PlayStation and the PC
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
entitled Re-Loaded, developed and published by the same companies. It featured the same game engine, and even the game menus are the same, although it is a game engine with slightly improved graphics. Four characters from the original game are also in Re-Loaded, such as Mamma, Bounca, Butch, and Cap'n Hands. Vox, however, is not present in the game and is replaced by two new female characters: a pink-haired, cannibalistic sex symbol
Sex symbol
A sex symbol is a celebrity of either gender, typically an actor, musician, supermodel, teen idol, or sports star, noted for their sex appeal. The term was first used in the mid 1950s in relation to the popularity of certain Hollywood stars, especially Marilyn Monroe and Brigitte...
named The Consumer, and a malfunctioning android nun
Nun
A nun is a woman who has taken vows committing her to live a spiritual life. She may be an ascetic who voluntarily chooses to leave mainstream society and live her life in prayer and contemplation in a monastery or convent...
named Sister Magpie. Via cheat code, Sister Magpie can unlock hidden character Fwank from the previous game for use in Re-Loaded. If unlocked, Fwank is the best character in Re-Loaded, with the most speed and best armour. All of the returning characters have new weapons and/or variations of their costumes. There are twelve blood-soaked new worlds to annihilate, much bigger than the levels encountered in the previous game, and with the added bonus of being able to morph the surrounding terrain with high-powered weaponry and explosives. The game will be coming soon on PSN Store as it can already be seen listed by the ESRB Website that it's coming to PSN as a PSOne Classic.
Plot
F.U.B., the antagonistAntagonist
An antagonist is a character, group of characters, or institution, that represents the opposition against which the protagonist must contend...
of Loaded, had his body destroyed at the end of the previous game, although his brain fled in an escape pod
Escape pod
An escape pod is a capsule or craft used to escape a vessel in an emergency, usually only big enough for one person. An escape ship is a larger, more complete craft also used for the same purpose...
. Landing on a harsh desert world, Kee-Butt-5, his brain has been implanted into the body of a chiselled, bronzed young artist hermit named Manuel Auto, and then he murdered the loyal surgeons responsible for giving him a new body. Reincarnated and renamed "C.H.E.B.", which stands for "Charming Handsome Erudite Bastard", the former raving lunatic supervillain
Supervillain
A supervillain or supervillainess is a variant of the villain character type, commonly found in comic books, action movies and science fiction in various media.They are sometimes used as foils to superheroes and other fictional heroes...
has taken on some of the aspects of his host body, the creative, artistic and thoughtful Manuel Auto. With his matter manipulation powers, C.H.E.B. plans to transform whole planets into "Works Of Art and Genuis", starting with his own body which he grows to the size of a small moon. Once again the group of blood-thirsty anti-hero
Anti-hero
In fiction, an antihero is generally considered to be a protagonist whose character is at least in some regards conspicuously contrary to that of the archetypal hero, and is in some instances its antithesis in which the character is generally useless at being a hero or heroine when they're...
es gather to bring him down once and for all and set off for Kee-Butt-5...
Reception
Re-Loaded, despite having notably better graphics than the original game, was not as well received and currently has a rating of 48% on MobyGamesMobyGames
-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...
. The soundtrack however, this time entirely composed by Neil Biggin, was acclaimed as better than the original and indeed one of the best aspects of the game. Like the previous game, it could be played as an audio CD.