Unreal Gold Review

Game: Unreal (Gold Edition)
Year (s):  1998
Company:  dev.  Epic Games, Digital Extremes
            pub.  GT Interactive
Engine:  Unreal Engine 1
Type:  First-Person Shooter
What I Paid:  nothing, got the Unreal bundle for Xmas
Game Time:  tediously long


Plot

You're a prisoner on a transport ship.  The ship crashes on an alien planet.  You shoot everything.


General Comments

This game is a lot like Quake 2.  It's sometimes frustratingly difficult to find out where to go, has a limited inventory, and similar graphics and gameplay.


Combat

Most enemies aren't too bad.  The Skaarj suck, though.  They dodge everything.  Some of them can go temporarily invulnerable.  One particularly stupid boss is basically a flying cyberdemon that dodges in mid-air, and there's lava all over the place.  These factors make combat more difficult than other games of the time.


Down-Loadable Content (DLC)

I think Return to Na Pali is an expansion, I'm not sure how they were originally packaged.  This has a little more plot.  The character from the first one is rescued!  The rescuers send her back to the planet to retrieve something in exchange for a full pardon.  Every few levels, the character will talk a little bit.  So, plot-wise, it's better.  There are twice as many weapons, and some new baddies, but for the most part, it's more of the same.


Final Thoughts

I think this game was pretty competitive in its time.  However, this is 12+ years later.  I find myself frequently going to a walkthrough, or just cheating my way through locked doors and hard fights.  I am honestly playing it just to learn more about the Unreal universe that I love so much in the Unreal Tournament games.  I'm happy to say that several familiar weapons (bio-rifle, flak cannon, shock rifle, ripper...) made their start here.    If you have played Invasion maps on UT2K4, those enemies are from this game. 
If you also got this game with the Unreal bundle, I would not recommend playing it.