Software:Boiling Point: Road to Hell

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Short description: 2005 video game
Boiling Point: Road to Hell
Developer(s)Deep Shadows
Publisher(s)
  • RU: Russobit-M
EngineVital Engine 2
Platform(s)Microsoft Windows
Release
Genre(s)Role-playing first-person shooter
Mode(s)Single-player

Boiling Point: Road to Hell (Xenus: Точка кипения, Xenus: Boiling Point) is a 2005 first-person shooter game developed by Ukrainian game studio Deep Shadows and published by Atari. Boiling Point's gameplay is a combination of first-person shooter and role-playing video game mechanics, set in an open world. The game was released for Windows in the United Kingdom on 20 May 2005 and in North America on 6 June 2005.

Boiling Point: Road to Hell received mixed reviews from critics. This was attributed to the many technical issues that plagued the game's release: bugs, glitches and choppy performance. Patches have been released that address many, but not all, of these deficiencies. Deep Shadows released a successor in 2009 called White Gold: War In Paradise, and another game with the same engine called The Precursors.[4] It was re-released on Steam and GOG on 14 November 2023.

Premise

Boiling Point's protagonist is Saul Myers (whose character model is based on actor Arnold Vosloo), a veteran of the French Foreign Legion living abroad in Paris. Myers' daughter, Lisa, is a globetrotting journalist. Lisa runs afoul of and is kidnapped by persons unknown while working in the fictional, troubled South American nation of Realia (the CIS version has not been changed. The country is called Colombia). News of this is quickly relayed to Myers, who hastily departs for Realia, where he must tangle with local politics and the criminal underworld while trying to track down his missing daughter.

Gameplay

The game is set in a Realian valley, an undivided 25x25km (625 km2) map. There are no in-game loading screens or level transitions. The geography of the valley itself is tropical jungle. There are two primary cities: Puerto Sombra in the west, which is in the hands of the local government, and Pueblo Faro in the east, which is held by communist insurgents (see: Factions). Scattered throughout the rest of the valley are various bases, plantations, villages, and estates. Due to the large size of the game world there are several modes of transportation available: cars, trucks, tanks, planes, helicopters, and boats.

Gameplay is a hybrid of FPS and RPG mechanics. Character advancement is skill-based, with specific skills either being enhanced through practice, or atrophied via disuse. The list of skills is limited, and is constructed of weapon proficiencies and physical ability. However, killing everything in sight is not the goal of the game. Saul Myers' goal is to find his daughter, so he will need to talk to many people to gather the necessary information to unravel the mystery of her disappearance. Much of this information can only be purchased with the Realian currency, and the primary means of generating income is by completing missions for the game's various factions.

There are no predefined enemies in the game except for hostile animals such as snakes and jaguars in the wilderness. There are many NPCs, with almost all of them being neutral at the start. There are six factions in the game: the Realian government, the communist guerrillas, the mafia, local Indian tribes, unaffiliated bandits, and an American CIA presence. Civilians are also considered a faction for the purposes of calculating Myers' "reputation", which is variable and dynamic. Completing missions for a faction's rivals will lower Myers' reputation with them, and hostile factions will shoot on sight. There are, however, methods of repairing Myer's reputation.

Reception

Due to the buggy nature of the game unpatched, reviewers who rated the game when it first came out were heavily critical of the game, with a reviewer from PC Gamer magazine saying "Unless it receives some extreme patching, don't bother with this game." At the same time, reviewers who either looked past the buggy issues, or were late to review and therefore able to patch the game to the reportedly stable 2.0 version, were largely positive, with a reviewer from gamesTM saying "Atari has landed itself an absolute classic here. A must-have – no questions asked." Edge magazine would bemusedly quote from the patch notes a few months later and observe that the removal of the game's bugs had removed much of the game's limited entertainment value.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Xenus. Точка кипения ушла в печать!". May 11, 2005. http://www.xenus.ru:80/. 
  2. ↑ "What's New? (New releases roundup)" (in en). Eurogamer.net. 2005-05-27. https://www.eurogamer.net/whatsnew-270505. 
  3. ↑ "Boiling Point: Road to Hell". http://4players.de/4players.php/spielinfo/PC-CDROM/4710/Boiling_Point_Road_to_Hell.html. 
  4. ↑ Deep Shadows (16 July 2008). "Deep Shadows Announces Optimization of White Gold and Precursors for Intel-based Multi-core Processor Systems". http://www.gamershell.com/companies/deep_shadows/464570.html. Retrieved 12 June 2014. 
  • Deep Shadows website
  • MobyGames is a commercial database website that catalogs information on video games and the people and companies behind them via crowdsourcing. This includes over 300,000 games for hundreds of platforms.[1] Founded in 1999, ownership of the site has changed hands several times. It has been owned by Atari SA since 2022.

Features

Edits and submissions to the site (including screenshots, box art, developer information, game summaries, and more) go through a verification process of fact-checking by volunteer "approvers".[2] This lengthy approval process after submission can range from minutes to days or months.[3] The most commonly used sources are the video game's website, packaging, and credit screens. There is a published standard for game information and copy-editing.[4] A ranking system allows users to earn points for contributing accurate information.[5]

Registered users can rate and review games. Users can create private or public "have" and "want" lists, which can generate a list of games available for trade with other registered users. The site contains an integrated forum. Each listed game can have its own sub-forum.

History

Logo used until March 2014

MobyGames was founded on March 1, 1999, by Jim Leonard and Brian Hirt, and joined by David Berk 18 months later, the three of which had been friends since high school.[6][7] Leonard had the idea of sharing information about computer games with a larger audience. The database began with information about games for IBM PC compatibles, relying on the founders' personal collections. Eventually, the site was opened up to allow general users to contribute information.[5] In a 2003 interview, Berk emphasized MobyGames' dedication to taking video games more seriously than broader society and to preserving games for their important cultural influence.[5]

In mid-2010, MobyGames was purchased by GameFly for an undisclosed amount.[8] This was announced to the community post factum , and the site's interface was given an unpopular redesign.[7] A few major contributors left, refusing to do volunteer work for a commercial website.{{Citation needed|date=June 2025} On December 18, 2013, MobyGames was acquired by Jeremiah Freyholtz, owner of Blue Flame Labs (a San Francisco-based game and web development company) and VGBoxArt (a site for fan-made video game box art).[9] Blue Flame Labs reverted MobyGames' interface to its pre-overhaul look and feel,[10] and for the next eight years, the site was run by Freyholtz and Independent Games Festival organizer Simon Carless.[7]

On November 24, 2021, Atari SA announced a potential deal with Blue Flame Labs to purchase MobyGames for $1.5 million.[11] The purchase was completed on 8 March 2022, with Freyholtz remaining as general manager.[12][13][14] Over the next year, the financial boost given by Atari led to a rework of the site being built from scratch with a new backend codebase, as well as updates improving the mobile and desktop user interface.[1] This was accomplished by investing in full-time development of the site instead of its previously part-time development.[15]

In 2024, MobyGames began offering a paid "Pro" membership option for the site to generate additional revenue.[16] Previously, the site had generated income exclusively through banner ads and (from March 2014 onward) a small number of patrons via the Patreon website.[17]

See also

  • IGDB – game database used by Twitch for its search and discovery functions

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Sheehan, Gavin (2023-02-22). "Atari Relaunches The Fully Rebuilt & Optimized MobyGames Website". https://bleedingcool.com/games/atari-relaunches-the-fully-rebuilt-optimized-mobygames-website/. 
  2. ↑ Litchfield, Ted (2021-11-26). "Zombie company Atari to devour MobyGames". https://www.pcgamer.com/zombie-company-atari-to-devour-mobygames/. 
  3. ↑ "MobyGames FAQ: Emails Answered § When will my submission be approved?". Blue Flame Labs. 30 March 2014. http://www.mobygames.com/info/faq7#g1. 
  4. ↑ "The MobyGames Standards and Practices". Blue Flame Labs. 6 January 2016. http://www.mobygames.com/info/standards. 
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Miller, Stanley A. (2003-04-22). "People's choice awards honor favorite Web sites". Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. 
  6. ↑ "20 Years of MobyGames" (in en). 2019-02-28. https://trixter.oldskool.org/2019/02/28/20-years-of-mobygames/. 
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Plunkett, Luke (2022-03-10). "Atari Buys MobyGames For $1.5 Million". https://kotaku.com/mobygames-retro-credits-database-imdb-atari-freyholtz-b-1848638521. 
  8. ↑ "Report: MobyGames Acquired By GameFly Media". Gamasutra. 2011-02-07. https://www.gamedeveloper.com/game-platforms/report-mobygames-acquired-by-gamefly-media. 
  9. ↑ Corriea, Alexa Ray (December 31, 2013). "MobyGames purchased from GameFly, improvements planned". http://www.polygon.com/2013/12/31/5261414/mobygames-purchased-from-gamefly-improvements-planned. 
  10. ↑ Wawro, Alex (31 December 2013). "Game dev database MobyGames getting some TLC under new owner". Gamasutra. https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/game-dev-database-mobygames-getting-some-tlc-under-new-owner. 
  11. ↑ "Atari invests in Anstream, may buy MobyGames". November 24, 2021. https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2021-11-24-atari-invests-in-anstream-may-buy-mobygames. 
  12. ↑ Rousseau, Jeffrey (2022-03-09). "Atari purchases Moby Games". https://www.gamesindustry.biz/atari-purchases-moby-games. 
  13. ↑ "Atari Completes MobyGames Acquisition, Details Plans for the Site's Continued Support". March 8, 2022. https://www.atari.com/atari-completes-mobygames-acquisition-details-plans-for-the-sites-continued-support/. 
  14. ↑ "Atari has acquired game database MobyGames for $1.5 million" (in en-GB). 2022-03-09. https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/atari-has-acquired-game-database-mobygames-for-1-5-million/. 
  15. ↑ Stanton, Rich (2022-03-10). "Atari buys videogame database MobyGames for $1.5 million". https://www.pcgamer.com/atari-buys-videogame-database-mobygames-for-dollar15-million/. 
  16. ↑ Harris, John (2024-03-09). "MobyGames Offering “Pro” Membership". https://setsideb.com/mobygames-offering-pro-membership/. 
  17. ↑ "MobyGames on Patreon". http://www.patreon.com/mobygames. 
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