Chaser is sci-fi first person shooter developed by Slovakian developer Cauldron (Quadrax, Spellcross, Battle Isle: The Andosia War). As in many sci-fi games, the future doesn't look too bright. "Chaser is set on Mars, 2044. The UN establishes MARSCORP (Martian Security and Economics Committee) under the leadership of Samuel Longwood. In the years that follow, the UN gradually loses control of MARSCORP, mainly due to the non-transparent licence policy of its director. Samuel Longwood uses his autonomous status to create vassal relations between the corporations and MARSCORP. The unshakable power position of MARSCORP is supported by the companies and thus they acquire additional rights and licenses. Samuel Longwood and his consortium become extremely wealthy from this arrangement. However, dissenting voices in MARSCORP begin to challenge Samuel Longwood's authoritarian policy. They demand the dismissal of Samuel Longwood as director and a complete redistribution of the mining rights. But Samuel Longwood keeps an ace up his sleeve for occasions like this".

Playing as the here Chaser, you awake on board the spaceship H.M.S. Majestic. You doesn't know who are you, what you are doing here, why you are being sought by men in black uniforms and what they will do to you when they find you… From this point, you jump right into the action, trying to avoid or blast enemy troops and escape from the station before it explodes. Well, the idea of you suffering from amnesia has been chucked around quite a bit in the game industry (I still remember Sanitarium or upcoming XIII), but despite this cliché, Chaser's story is really integral to the game.

Chaser features over 30 locations with 30 different types of enemies (roughly 20 hours of gameplay), over 20 well modelled weapons and almost all of them are derived from real weapons including SIG Sauer P225 (9mm semi-automatic), Beretta M12, Calico MX 950, Ingram M10 sub-machine gun, H&K G11 Assault Rifle, FAMAS Assault Rifle, GDL2B (60mm calibre mortar), TAFF20 (four-barreled canon), Colt Commando, and multiplayer support via GameSpy as well as dedicated servers (up to 64 players) - there are DM, TDM, CTF modes and also Counter-Strike like mode called "Shock Troops in which the players from two opposing groups have to accomplish a number of objectives in a set time.

What about gameplay? It's decent fun, but nothing that you haven't seen before in the swarms of other first-person shooters out there. You basically just run around and shooting whoever is in your way and there are only a few stealth missions. The first couple of levels are somewhat linear and pretty boring, but as you progress, the game gets more involving and the missions become more interesting. To make gameplay a bit more juicy, Cauldron have added "Adrenaline Mode" into the game. It's basically just another name for bullet-time mode mode, which you can activate to slow things down and help you aim and dodge bullets better. It's sometime really useful. If you are jumping out on a load of bad guys, you can get your aim on someone's head and start shooting, before they even notice. It does help, if you know when to use it.

Chaser is quite hard to rate. I'd say that Chaser is fairly entertaining game with a good plot, some fun and excellent for 56kers in multiplayer, but doesn't show us anything we haven't already seen before. Try playable demos (SP Demo (150MB) | MP Demo (142MB) and decide yourself. Chaser is currently available in United Kingdom, Scandinavia, Benelux and Australia. The release date for US: August, 19th 2003.

System Requirements: Intel Pentium III 650 MHz or compatible, 3D graphic card with 32 MB RAM, 128 MB RAM, 1,35 GB HDD space