You'd be insane not to pick this game up, even if you only casually consider yourself a gamer.

The first person genre has become way overcrowded over the years. Sure, there have been some great games, but many of them were nothing more that cheap Doom and Quake clones. Take away games like Quake II, Half-Life, and System Shock 2, and you have nothing more than flimsy games like SiN, or Klingon Honor Guard.

For a game in this genre to succeed, it needs to break away from the pack, offer a level of gameplay or storyline to rise above the masses. Half-Life did it with great graphics and an engaging storyline; Unreal did it with a top-notch engine. System Shock 2 offered a level of interactivity and sense of environment like no other game before. For me, a game can only stand out if it can stand up to such games. Nocturne, fortunately, does this with ease.

I love first-person shooters. Whenever I have free time, I log on and play Quake III or Unreal Tournament. I think nothing beats the action of a fast-paced shooter, so when I get one in the mail to review, I do so with eyes wide open, expecting a cheap clone. Boy, was I wrong here. Nocturne is both engaging and beautiful. Truly, I have yet to see a game offer the lavish graphics this game does. On top of that, you have a solid story line, and a good amount of horror. If System Shock 2 made you have to go out and buy some new underwear, you had better visit your favorite undergarment store again.

The setting is the early 1900's, around 1930. It seems the denizens of evil have been turning up, and a new group has come forth to battle them. You play a member of this group, and go by the name 'Stranger'. Basically, your character looks like a tougher Humphrey Bogart. With fedora and raincoat, you hunt down werewolves, vampires, and just about anything else the pits of Hell throw at you. You will work with several partners, ranging from a half-vampire woman (called a dhampir), an ex-boxer, and a wannabe psychic. Your partner is controlled by the computer (similar to how Daikatana will be, I presume) and helps you out in a pinch.

So, we've got demons, and vampires, and werewolves clipping at our heels. Now we have to eliminate them. Nocturne's story is spread over four missions, taking you to four distinct locations, including a small town in Germany, and Chicago. There are several levels in each mission; plenty to keep you busy. The level design reminds me a bit of Scourge of Armagon, if only for how good it is. Most of the levels exist outdoors, and it is here that the graphics engine really shines.

Did I mention the graphics engine? At first, I thought this game ran on a modified Quake III engine. Again, I was wrong. Are you sitting down? Okay, good. This engine blows Quake III away. That's right. Blows it away. You'll need a really good video card capable of handling 32-bit textures to really see this game shine, but let me tell you, this is one of those games that makes you go out and buy a new computer. With the resolution pumped up to, say, 1280x960x32, you damn near think you are watching a movie. And everything is fluid, no slowdown. This, of course, was on a PIII-550, with a 32mb ATI Rage Fury card. I know the Rage isn't the fastest card around, but it handles 32-bit textures well.

The game supports DirectX6 or 7, with a slightly noticeable difference with the latest version. Voodoo3 owners, beware. This game doesn't like V3's at all. Even with a patch that is supposed to speed things up for 3dfx owners, you can't get resolutions any higher than 640x480, because anything higher than that requires 32-bit texture support, which the V3 doesn't have. Running on a PII-450 machine with a V3 3500, everything ran fast, but the level of detail was disappointing. A TNT2 card should run this game beautifully; even a regular TNT should be just fine.

Gameplay is standard for the genre. You shoot monsters, navigate environments, and generally kick vampire ass. There are some truly unique weapons, especially the Sun of God, which emits fake sunlight, toasting any vampires in your path. The standard weapon, two automatic .45s works great, and the weapons come with laser sights, which helps you navigate foggy areas. The action alternates between lightning fast, and mediocre, but it's great nonetheless. Without those laser sights, however, getting through the fog is tough, unless you turn on your flashlight, which just happens to be attached to your guns anyway.

Other than that small glitch, Nocturne plays the way a real shooter should, without an overemphasis on fragging. This is a game, not just a deathmatch, and it is accessible to almost any type of gamer. The camera angles are movie-style, and work most of the time. You can go into FPS mode, but only with night-vision goggles, which only offer a distorted look at your environments. Personally, I don't like the camera style, but it actually works brilliantly here. You can see the expression on your character's face, and when you move him, he moves the way a real human would, not some polygonal character with herky-jerky movements. Stick with the mouse/keyboard setup; gamepad support is there, but like most shooters, it just don't work right. Get your guns, line up your mouse, and head out there.

Speaking of guns, the women in this game are surely something to look at. Every one of them comes fully equipped, and dammit, I'd like to meet one of them. All of the characters are wonderfully detailed, and you'll spend a lot of time checking them out, if you know what I mean.

Really, what we have here is one of the best shooters to come down the pike. The graphics are excellent, the sound (fully 3D) is superb, and the gameplay is there. The only thing forgotten is multiplayer support, but after you play this a bit, you'll understand why it just didn't make sense.

If you're a fan of shooters, particularly System Shock 2, and you're looking for some new action, this is the game to play. Nothing comes close graphically, and nothing is as engrossing. Terminal Reality has come up with one of the prettiest engines I have ever seen. It is reminiscent of Monolith's Lithtec engine, only better and more detailed. I wouldn't be surprised if we started seeing more games license this engine. It's that good.

Reviewed by John Misak, PC Gameworld.