Creature Shock is a 1994 sci-fi first-person shooter

First-person shooter

First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...

 game released on the PC and 3DO

3DO Interactive Multiplayer

The 3DO Interactive Multiplayer is a video game console originally produced by Panasonic in 1993. Further renditions of the hardware were released in 1994 by Sanyo and Goldstar. The consoles were manufactured according to specifications created by The 3DO Company, and were originally designed by...

. The game was developed by Argonaut Games

Argonaut Games

Argonaut Games plc was a British video game developer. Founded as Argonaut Software by teenager Jez San in 1982 the company name is a play on his name and the movie title Jason and the Argonauts. It had its head offices in Edgware, London....

 and published by Virgin Interactive

Virgin Interactive

Virgin Interactive was a British video game publisher. It was formed as Virgin Games Ltd. in 1981. The company became much larger after purchasing the budget label, Mastertronic in 1987. It was part of the Virgin Group...

. The game was later ported to the Philips

Philips

Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. , more commonly known as Philips, is a multinational Dutch electronics company....

 CD-i

CD-i

CD-i, or Compact Disc Interactive, is the name of an interactive multimedia CD player developed and marketed by Royal Philips Electronics N.V. CD-i also refers to the multimedia Compact Disc standard used by the CD-i console, also known as Green Book, which was developed by Philips and Sony...

, Sega Saturn

Sega Saturn

The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...

 and PlayStation video game systems.

Atari

Atari

Atari is a corporate and brand name owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by Atari Interactive, a wholly owned subsidiary of the French publisher Atari, SA . The original Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. It was a pioneer in...

 was porting it to the Atari Jaguar CD

Atari Jaguar CD

The Atari Jaguar CD or Jag CD is a CD-ROM peripheral for the Atari Jaguar video game console.Late in the life span of the company, Atari released this long-promised CD-ROM unit. The unit hit shelves on September 11, 1995 and retailed for $149.95. The device sat atop the Jaguar console, snapping...

, but it was canceled.

The title was one of the first extensive CD-ROM

CD-ROM

A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....

 titles and used full-motion video for both cutscene and interactive portions. As a result, the game spanned over a gigabyte

Gigabyte

The gigabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information storage. The prefix giga means 109 in the International System of Units , therefore 1 gigabyte is...

 in size and over two discs. Gameplay was divided into two portions: a shoot 'em up

Shoot 'em up

Shoot 'em up is a subgenre of shooter video games. In a shoot 'em up, the player controls a lone character, often in a spacecraft or aircraft, shooting large numbers of enemies while dodging their attacks. The genre in turn encompasses various types or subgenres and critics differ on exactly what...

 arcade portion in which you piloted your ship through various pre-rendered environments (similar to Cyberia

Cyberia (video game)

Cyberia is a science fiction action adventure video game originally released for MS-DOS in January 1994, and released two years later on the PlayStation, Sega Saturn, and 3DO consoles...

) and an adventure-style first-person

First person (video games)

In video games, first person refers to a graphical perspective rendered from the viewpoint of the player character. In many cases, this may be the viewpoint from the cockpit of a vehicle. Many different genres have made use of first-person perspectives, ranging from adventure games to flight...

 action portion where players chose between track-based paths at various nodes.

Story

Taking place in 2123, the game focuses around a lost ship, the UNS Amazon, sent as part of an exploration fleet to various planets to determine new viable locations for settlement as the Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

 is destroyed by human activity. En route to Saturn

Saturn

Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest planet in the Solar System, after Jupiter. Saturn is named after the Roman god Saturn, equated to the Greek Cronus , the Babylonian Ninurta and the Hindu Shani. Saturn's astronomical symbol represents the Roman god's sickle.Saturn,...

, the Amazon is ensnared by a massive alien being which resembled a large asteroid. The protagonist, Commander Jason Barr, is sent to investigate the incident.

Response

While hailed for its elaborate and beautiful artwork, the gameplay was razed. IGN stated in their 2 out of 10 review, "track-based shooters with lots of prerendered cut-shots are the bane of our existence. Woe to the hapless gamer who actually pays his hard earned money for these dogs. I warn you now: avoid Creature Shock like your life depends on it." All Games Guide cites a 5/10 average for the PC version.