Time Crisis (video game)

Gameplay

Time Crisis is a three-dimensional first person rail shooter similar to Virtua Cop and The House of the Dead, in that the player holds a light gun and fires at on-screen enemies. Time Crisis is best known for its cover system, in which players can duck behind cover to avoid enemy fire and reload their weapons. In the arcade version, a foot pedal is used to toggle between ducking and attacking positions. In console conversions, a button command replicates the foot pedal's functions. The player loses a life if hit by a direct bullet or obstacle whilst not taking cover. There are three stages, each consisting of three areas and a boss battle.

The arcade cabinet's light gun (introduced in Point Blank) utilizes a special memory chip to synchronize areas of the screen's image as the player rotates the gun around. The light gun also features a blowback function which simulates real-life gun recoil.

The player must complete each area in a certain amount of time. To avoid running down the clock, the player must take risks, shooting enemies rapidly and hiding only when necessary. A time extension is rewarded when an area is passed, and there are time bonuses awarded for shooting certain enemies quickly.

The PlayStation port features an exclusive side-story mode, in which the player's performance, such as how quickly he can clear an area, affects the path he takes through the game, resulting in multiple possibilities.

Plot

In 1995, the V.S.S.E., an international protection agency, helps Sercian opposition leader William MacPherson engineer a coup that overthrows a century-old authoritarian regime. Shortly afterwards, MacPherson is elected as the Sercian republic's first president. However, Sherudo Garo, the last survivor of the regime, plots to restore the old order, launching a series of attacks and assassinations that quickly destabilize the nation. As the finishing touch, Sherudo has MacPherson's daughter Rachel abducted and imprisoned in his family's castle on a remote island, demanding vital military secrets in exchange for her life. A desperate MacPherson contacts the V.S.S.E., who in turn dispatch veteran agent Richard Miller, the "One Man Army", to infiltrate the castle and rescue Rachel.

Miller reaches the island and rams his explosives-rigged boat into the castle's exterior to create an entrance. Sherudo hears the resulting boom, but his head of security, Wild Dog, assures him that Miller won't last long against his highly trained mercenaries. Meanwhile, Miller confronts Wild Dog's troops in the submarine hangar and makes his way to the main courtyard against heavy resistance, eventually reaching Rachel's location. She warns him of a setup before being whisked away. Miller is then confronted by Dog's chief assassin, Moz, and his unit. He defeats them and interrogates Moz, who reveals that Rachel has been transferred to the clock tower. There, Miller is attacked by Sherudo, a trained knife thrower, and guns him down, only to find Rachel held at gunpoint by Dog. Angered by Sherudo's death (since it means he won't be paid), Dog reveals his intentions to blow up the castle with Richard inside and escape with Rachel. Pursuing them to the castle's helipad, Miller arrives just as Rachel manages to break free, leading Dog to shoot her. A furious Miller engages Dog in a fast-and-loose gun battle across the rooftop, during which Dog accidentally sets off his detonator, apparently killing himself in a fiery explosion. Richard collects the wounded Rachel and escapes in Sherudo's chopper just as the rest of the castle goes up in flames.

The PS1 version features a special mission known as the "Kantaris Deal", which takes place several weeks after the main story's events. Miller is alerted by V.S.S.E to the presence of an illegal arms factory posing as a Sercian hotel, with ties to Wild Dog's organization. He is assigned to infiltrate the factory and eliminate its owner, Kantaris. Upon clearing the lobby, Miller has three different paths to his target. The first takes him through the ballroom/casino, where he eliminates Kantaris's scythe-hand assassin, Web Spinner. He then pursues her to the swimming pool just as she attempts to escape by air. After shooting down an escort gunship, Miller damages the engines of Kantaris's ship just as it takes off, causing it to crash and explode. The second path, which can only be accessed if there are less than 22 seconds left on the clock, instead goes through the shopping mall and down into a garbage disposal. There, Miller uses a claw arm to punch a hole in the wall, allowing him to access the underground arms factory. From there, he makes his way to Kantaris's office in the Lounge and defeats her personal security droid, which then malfunctions and rolls out the window, taking her with it. The third path can be made available if Richard does not activate the claw in time. Instead of entering the factory, he goes through the parking lot. After defeating a spider-legged battle tank, Miller disables Kantaris's car, forcing it to crash. If in any of these scenarios Miller fails to take action soon enough, Kantaris escapes and the mission is aborted. (Canonically, the spin-off game Time Crisis: Project Titan takes place after the mission's failure.)

Release

A soundtrack Time Crisis Arcade Soundtrack was released in 1997. Another soundtrack Time Crisis 3D Sound Ensemble was released later. It contains audio dramas that depicts events during and before the first game, such as Miller's battle against Sherudo from the game.

Reception

A reviewer for Next Generation hailed the game as being superior even to competitor Sega's Virtua Cop 2, primarily due to the unique foot pedal maneuver. He remarked that "By creating this innovative maneuvering technique, in addition to time-based, predetermined path running, providing Story or Attack mode and challenging end-level bosses, Time Crisis thrusts the light-gun genre into a brand-new territory - and develops a whole new way of looking at, and playing, the classic light-gun game."

The PlayStation version received "favorable" reviews according to the review aggregation website GameRankings.