''Bad Blood'' is a top-view,

post-apocalyptic Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction are genres of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astronom ...

action role-playing game An action role-playing game (often abbreviated action RPG or ARPG) is a video game genre that combines core elements from both the action game and Role-playing video game, role-playing game genres. Definition Action role-playing games empha ...

from 1990.

Story

nuclear war Nuclear warfare, also known as atomic warfare, is a War, military conflict or prepared Policy, political strategy that deploys nuclear weaponry. Nuclear weapons are Weapon of mass destruction, weapons of mass destruction; in contrast to conven ...

has turned the world into a wasteland. The pure-blooded humans have retreated in large cities while

mutant In biology, and especially in genetics, a mutant is an organism or a new genetic character arising or resulting from an instance of mutation, which is generally an alteration of the DNA sequence of the genome or chromosome of an organism. It i ...

s live in small villages on the plains where they make a living by hunting the many monsters. Now one of the human leaders, Lord Dominix, wants to start a war to wipe out all the "bad-blooded" mutants. Your village chief has assigned you with the task of preventing this war.

Gameplay

''Bad Blood'' is a top-down action-adventure. You can not create your own character but have to pick one of the three predefined ones: Varrigg (a strong green mutant who fights with his bare hands), Dekker (a human male armed with a knife) or Jakka (who looks human but fires laser beams from her eyes). The choice you make has only a limited impact on gameplay and storyline. Gameplay consists of exploring the world map, visiting several cities and villages, talking with

NPCs A non-player character (NPC) is a character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster (or referee) rather than by a ...

, picking up items and new weapons (

shotgun A shotgun (also known as a scattergun, peppergun, or historically as a fowling piece) is a long gun, long-barreled firearm designed to shoot a straight-walled cartridge (firearms), cartridge known as a shotshell, which discharges numerous small ...

grenade A grenade is a small explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a Shell (projectile), shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A mod ...

s, Uzis, etc.) and much real-time combat. The game has a day-night cycle which influences the amount of monsters on the plains and whether or not you can talk with some NPCs.

Reception

Jim Trunzo reviewed ''Bad Blood'' in '' White Wolf'' #22 (Aug./Sept., 1990), rating it a 3 out of 5 and stated that "''Bad Blood'' is a graphic delight with an interesting theme. For hard-core role-players, the game would have little appeal. For the masses, however, ''Bad Blood'' offers a relatively easy play and a high enjoyment quotient."

Charles Ardai Charles Ardai is an American businessman, and writer of crime fiction and mysteries. He is co-founder and editor of Hard Case Crime, a line of pulp-style paperback crime novels. He was also an early employee of D. E. Shaw & Co. and a managing di ...

reviewed the game for ''

Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American Video game journalism, computer game magazine that was published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 199 ...

'', and stated that "''Bad Blood'' is nothing if not well-intended, but it fails for want of a spark of innovation, either in the story or the gameplay."

Reviews

*''

ASM (Aktueller Software Markt) ''Aktueller Software Markt'' (literally ''Current Software Market''), commonly known by its acronym, ''ASM'', was a German multi-platform Video game journalism, video game magazine that was published by Tronic-Verlag from 1986 until 1995. It was ...

'' (Sep, 1990) *''

ACE (Advanced Computer Entertainment) ''ACE'' (''Advanced Computer Entertainment'') is a discontinued multi-format computer and video game magazine, first published in the United Kingdom by Future Publishing and later acquired by EMAP. History ACE launched in October 1987, roughly ...

'' (Aug, 1990) *''

The Games Machine ''The Games Machine'' was a video game magazine that was published from 1987 until 1990 in the United Kingdom by Newsfield, which also published '' CRASH'', ''Zzap!64'', '' Amtix!'' and other magazines. History ''The Games Machine'' ran head ...

'' (Aug, 1990) *''Joker Verlag präsentiert: Sonderheft'' (1992)

References

External links

* * 1990 video games Action role-playing video games Commodore 64 games DOS games Post-apocalyptic video games Role-playing video games Single-player video games Top-down video games Video games produced by Warren Spector Video games scored by Jeroen Tel {{action-rpg-videogame-stub