Area 51 game guide

Area 51 was not designed to be a free game and boasted some unusually high production values. The CGI cutscenes were eerily lifelike for the time, and the story is told by a surprisingly high-profile cast of actors. And while I won't give any spoilers, there's also a certain plot twist part way through that kind of broke my hyper-imaginative teenage brain and left me in a trance until the credits rolled.

Unlike other videogame preservation projects I've undertaken, Area 51 isn't entirely broken in its original state on modern hardware. Instead, it's a collection of smaller problems that tarnish and disrupt the experience. As it happens, I'm not the first to undertake the job of fixing it. Project Dreamland on GitHub provides a decompilation of the main executable and a custom launcher which is supposed to solve all the technical issues in a single package.

But unfortunately, this project is itself many years old now, overcomplicated by design, and no longer works on Windows 10 and above. My hat's off to the developer for the incredible amount of work done here, but clearly, a different solution is needed. For my own restoration effort, I took a rather opposite approach: rather than extensively modify the game, I aimed to preserve as much original code as possible and solve issues through the environment running it instead.

This, I believe, is more in the spirit of preservation and will have much fewer compatibility issues over time. Most of Area 51's quirks stem from its renderer, which is based on DirectX in general, an API that retains high compatibility today.

GPU's were still in-progress transitioning from fixed-function to shader model architectures, and it often shows in the way game engines circa expected very specific hardware behavior that no longer works quite the same in pure software.

Thus, I started by testing different DirectX 9 wrappers to other APIs in hopes that adding a translation layer would weed out the quirks. Early tests were promising, but not totally successful. Old favorites like dgVoodoo and WineD3D solved the most basic issues with broken lighting, fullscreen, and aspect ratio modes, but left frame pacing a stuttery mess. They also couldn't universally address needs like frame limiting to prevent physics simulations from breaking on high refresh displays.

Despite its rather obvious naming, DXWrapper ironically isn't doing much wrapping at all in Area 51, but it plays a crucial role regardless. This one library handles fullscreen, limits process affinity to avoid cutscene stutter, adds anisotropic filtering a very nice enhancement that in no means compromises the spirit of preservation , and perhaps most intriguingly, provides a means to auto-launch a secondary application.

What's more, upon adding DXVK to the mix, in-game stutter all but disappeared. DXWrapper's auto-launch function also came in handy for fulfilling a personal wishlist item: controller support.

Upon searching for a command-line based keyboard and mouse emulator, I came across JoyShockMapper , a surprisingly feature-rich solution that met Area 51's needs and then some. Combined with a custom controller profile and Batch script to tie it all together, it is now possible to use most Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo controllers with the same bindings as the game's original PlayStation 2 and Xbox ports.

Everything happens automatically in the background and won't interfere with other applications, so the result feels surprisingly close to native.

When all of these fixes started coming together to the point I realized I had a preservation project on my hands, I honestly wasn't sure if I could check every box off the list within the limited time I had to assemble it.

But instead, not only was I, but with a big cherry on top. GameSpy was formerly a provider of multiplayer services for a large variety of games on PC and console, including Area Although the service shut down in , its technology was transitioned to other providers, and it wasn't long before fans had created their own replacements as well.

OpenSpy is one such service, and as it turns out, it's surprisingly easy to get most GameSpy-based games running on it. Although it is required to modify game code, the result is well worth it. And since I was at it, I bumped the FOV up to 60 for more competitive gameplay without significantly altering the game's feel. I almost couldn't believe when I registered an online account in-game and successfully hosted a match. In the interest of preservation, I've split the main download for Area 51 into three steps, which must be completed in order.

Additional steps are optional if you don't want or need features such as controller support. To start, download the full game installer and run it. However, do not attempt to run the game immediately, as it still contains the original DRM.

Download Game. Next, download the all-in-one collection of official and custom patches. Different versions are provided for DE, EU, and US regions--simply copy the appropriate version to your game directory and overwrite files when prompted.

Download Patches. To run Area 51 on a more modern PC, download the following package of DirectX wrappers and config files tailored specifically for Area Simply copy the files to your game directory and overwrite files when prompted.

Download Wrappers. Deeper into the base, Crispy and Ramirez are both ambushed by the Theta and killed, leaving Cole on his own. Cole manages to locate the rest of Delta, however they are attacked again by the Theta and all but Cole and Lieutenant Chew are killed. Making their way topside, the Illuminati disables the cargo elevator, killing Chew and leaving Cole bitten by one mutant, partially mutating him. Able to switch between human and mutant form, Cole is guided deeper into the base by Edgar reanimating corpses to deliver information telepathically.

Cole is guided to Dr. Cray 's bio labs, where Cray claims there is time to decontaminate Cole and rid him of the virus. Before he can be cured, the Illuminati attack, killing Cray and stopping the process. Cole is teleported to a alien mothership beneath Area 51 where he eventually finds Edgar a powerful Grey, where he reveals the scientists used his DNA to create the virus and the nature of the experiments at the base, which killed dozens of his species to harvest it.

He then tells Cole the history of the Greys and Area Edgar gives Cole the cure to the mutagenic virus, and instructs him to destroy the Illuminati ship, that is leaving with dozens of Theta duplicates.

Cole is teleported miles beneath Area 51 where he locates the vessel and destroys it by overloading its reactor, and uses an alien teleporter to escape into the Nevada desert. He lands by the "White Mailbox" area and watches Area 51 being destroyed by the exploding ship in a tornado like explosion.

Cole watches as a truck drives past, with a green, alien-like container on board with unknown contents inside and walks away from the site, not knowing what is going to happen to him next and saying that Jean-Paul Sartre was only half-right about "Hell is other people".

Area 51 runs on a proprietary game engine developed by Inevitable Entertainment, the studio who later would be known as Midway Studios Austin. Being in development for nearly three years - almost half of that time was spent just building the game engine, toolset and art pipeline, which was absolutely vital for executing on the original vision for the game.

The "faction" system is so robust they evened designed a player mutation ability around it. Contagion causes an enemy to switch faction and attack his friendly team first. A good trick is to use Contagion on a Theta and watch as the hulking giant mauls the leapers that were threatening you. The squad combat was designed to mimic the Military Operations in Urban Terrain instruction our soldiers undergo in advanced infantry training courses.

They provide mutual covering fire, take cover to reload and throw grenades - or provide covering fire while another teammates throws one.

They will try to attack an enemy that is actively shooting at and hitting a teammate over an enemy that is simply maneuvering. Mutant and alien AI took a lot more consideration. They needed to feel different than humans. A good example is the Leaper AI. This was patterned after the way a leopard strikes its prey, by stalking and hitting its victim, then quickly sliding off to one side and then striking again.

Leapers are also fun because they leap and crawl on all fours, including crawling on walls and ceilings. Gray Aliens needed to feel ethereal and above mere humanity. They walk around and barely notice you, except every once in a while, they'll stop and study you with their creepy eyes.

There's also some boss creatures called Thetas that really required a lot of programming and thought. It even includes Dr. Cray who navigates via high-tech wheelchair. Some Illuminati villains are thrown in the mix as well as biological entities that relentlessly home in on you. All of the non-visual ambiance - room tones and streamed ambient sounds - were PLII encoded to set the player in a surround space. The visually based sounds are 3D positioned at runtime as expected.

The Area 51 audio system - lovingly referred to as Cacophony - takes advantage of more than just the standard sound memory so that it can give the player a more diverse and immersive experience. Creatively the sound design follows a similar path as most shooters. The emphasis is on the weapons, death and destruction! For Area 51, it tried to up the ante a bit by adding a more emotional take on the ambiance, utilizing more subtlety instead of bashing the player over the head with sounds coming from nowhere.

The game received largely average to positive reviews on its release, scoring 6. But for anyone looking for something more than an average shooter, it probably isn't worth it". Likewise to GameSpot's review, the game scored 6.

IGN gave the game a positive review, with an average user rating of 7. The game was released as freeware for U. It is no longer available on DoubleFusion. In , ahead of the game's release, Paramount Pictures announced that they had reached an agreement concerning the film rights for the game.