Descent II
Descent II is a 1996 first-person shooter game developed by Parallax Software and first published for DOS by Interplay Productions. For the PlayStation, it is known as Descent Maximum. It is the second installment in the Descent video game series and the sequel to Descent. The base of the gameplay remaining the same, the player controls a spaceship from the pilot's perspective and must navigate extrasolar underground mines to locate and destroy their reactors and escape being caught in their self-destructions, while engaging and surviving infected robots, which will attempt to destroy the ship. Unlike other first-person shooters, its six-degrees-of-freedom scheme allows the player to move and rotate in any three-dimensional space and direction.
Descent II | |
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Developer(s) | Parallax Software Interplay Productions (Mac OS) R-Comp Interactive (Risc OS) |
Publisher(s) | Interplay Productions Mac Play (Mac OS) R-Comp Interactive (Risc OS) |
Director(s) |
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Producer(s) | Rusty Buchert |
Designer(s) |
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Programmer(s) |
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Artist(s) |
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Writer(s) | Ryan Garcia |
Composer(s) |
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Platform(s) | |
Release | MS-DOS Mac OS
RISC OS
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Genre(s) | First-person shooter, shoot 'em up |
Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer |
Descent II's development started as a project intended to expand the original using a compact disc's storage, which later became a standalone product. The game received very positive reviews from video game critics, who widely lauded the multiplayer mode and the inclusion of the Guide-Bot, a scouting robot that guides the player to their objectives. The PlayStation version's reception was rather mixed, with critics often disagreeing in their evaluations of its frame rate. A sequel, Descent 3, was released in 1999.