Apogee is the all-powerful emperor of shareware games; that's pretty much common knowledge. Starting with Kingdom of Kroz--a game that offered 16 colors even on a CGA system and ASCII graphics that didn't look like ASCII graphics--Scott Miller and his associates have single-handedly given shareware a good name, constantly releasing high-quality products that make the majority of other shareware offerings look like rancid sacks of platypus snot in comparison. Now, it's time to do it all over again. Once more Apogee has decimated their own standards, coming up with another first-rate game that is soon to have all of us saying, "That is shareware? Holy jeez!" Scheduled for release in October, Rise of the Triad is sure to have every Doom freak in the world lining up just to drool all over it.

	Rise of the Triad is a first-person shooter much like Doom, System Shock, and every other game that's being released this year. You play an agent of HUNT--the High-risk United Nations Taskforce. You are assigned to investigate cult activity in an old monastery on San Nicolas Island, 20 miles off the coast of southern California. Suddenly vicious troops attack, your boat is sunk, and your radio's final transmission chronicles the destruction of Los Angeles. It seems the Oscurido cult has a couple powerful new friends, a pyrotechnics expert and a millionaire to be specific. They will annihilate millions in the name of El Oscuro if somebody doesn't stop them. And guess who just happened to be in the right place at the right time again? Something has to be done, but what? That's right: kill, kill, kill! Grease up that CTRL key, it's time to go a-slaughterin' once again.

	The folks at Apogee have sure been busy since the release of their last first-person shooter, Blake Stone. Blake ran off the Wolfenstein engine, and while it was still a great game, technology-wise it felt a little dated to me. No one taking even the merest of peeks at Rise of the Triad will confuse it with the Wolfie engine. The programmers really didn't pull any punches in the bells and whistles department. Ten real-life actors have been digitized to provide you with realistic-looking people to waste; the hand holding your gun is also digitized. ROTT also takes light sourcing to new levels. You can actually shoot light fixtures and see the illumination of the room drop accordingly! Even atmospheric effects like fog have been added.

	As great as ROTT's visuals are, they are matched by the sound effects. Guards screaming "There he is!" and "Shoot him!" have never sounded clearer, and their anguished death cries are ample reward for a quick trigger finger. (Continued survival makes a nice perk, too.) Flame jets spurt from the ground with a gaseous whoosh, and bullets whine as they ricochet off metal surfaces. The real sonic stars are the weapons. Your pistol barks its deadly retort, and the uzi is the most realistic sounding weapon I've ever heard in a computer game. If you just bought a shiny new Sound Blaster and you want to show your non sound card owning friend what a chump he is, this is the game to do it with.

	One of the things people liked most about Doom was its modem play, so naturally Rise of the Triad will feature it as well. Apart from the 32 regular levels, ROTT will feature 20 levels specifically designed for head-to-head games. It will also include a battle level editor. If you're too lazy to create your own levels, you can make use of the random level generator to create new levels for you and a buddy to stalk each other in. Oh no, I can feel my phone bill increasing tenfold already!

	I have played Rise of the Triad, and it is good. How good? REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEALLY good! Honestly, I can't think of any reason why every Doom nut in the country won't flock to this game when it's released this fall. It's beautiful, fast (on the Pentiums we play with at the office it seems to run slightly faster than Doom), and challenging. Have I mentioned challenging yet? This is not an easy game. Guards are very good at hiding in shadows, and frequently they nailed me two or three times before I could even figure out where I was being shot from. Some of them are even sneaky, and will play dead only to jump up and start shooting at point blank range! However, I digress. Rise of the Triad is a truly awesome game in the making, 20 megabytes of totally unbelievable shareware. I predict another major telecommunication traffic jam in October. First, everyone will tie up phone lines trying to download this monster, then they'll discover the modem play and never hang up! (Wise gamers will, of course, just pick up their copy of IE, which will feature the distributable version of Rise of the Triad once it is available.) When October comes around, buy a few months' worth of groceries, tell your boss you're going on an extended vacation (quit if necessary), and lock the door. You don't need any unnecessary distractions when you're firebombing evil monks!