Immercenary is a 1995 role-playing First-Person Shooter developed by Five Miles Out and published by EA exclusively for the 3DO console.
In 2027, a programming glitch has trapped all of humanity in a sprawling virtual reality world called Perfect. One day, a player named Raven sends a Distress Call into the past, asking for someone to send a warrior to log in and shut Perfect down, by disabling its operating system known as Perfect 1. In 2004, an underground organization called PIC (Project for Intertemporal Communication) receives the message and sends agents in. With four having died to shock, you are Number 5, the last hope to save mankind.
Immercenary contains examples of:
- And I Must Scream: Several players you meet describe being unable to eat or sleep, due to being logged in for days on end because of the bug.
- Artificial Atmospheric Actions: NPCs will often fight each other in the background if you're far enough away.
- Astral Projection: This is how you access Perfect, by mentally projecting your consciousness forward into the future.
- Autobots, Rock Out!: A heavy metal theme starts playing when entering Vulkan's boss fight.
- Blood Knight: Vulkan is a hulking Orc-like figure that can make clones of himself. He also seems to revel in Perfect's chaotic environment.Vulkan: "It's Bunker Hill, D-Day and Desert Storm all rolled into one!"
- Brain–Computer Interface: In 2027, Perfect is accessed via a bizarre looking transparent headset that can apparently access the system from anywhere. In 2004, you're forced to use a chair with a huge machine above it, given you're accessing Perfect from the past.
- Cartoon Bomb: The HEX bomb weapon has this as its icon.
- Cannon Fodder: Goners, player avatars reduced to primitive polygons. They're on the lowest rank possible, respawn frequently, and don't boost your stats much when killed.
- Company Cross-References: Entering the Stadium leads to an actual football stadium with blue skies and prominent EA Sports logos on the side banners.
- Cryptic Conversation: Most of your conversations in the DOASys come off this way, depending on whom you're talking to.
- Death from Above: The OFA (Objects From Above) weapon, which rains random objects on a target when fired.
- Deflector Shield: Chaff, a shield powerup that blocks all normal attacks for a short time.
- End-Game Results Screen: A variant. Each time you log out to the lab, you're given a stats score on your rank and what ammo you have. This is also the only place you can save your game.
- Energy Ball: Your default weapon fires these. Every new weapon you find comes packed inside Billiard Ball-shaped spheres.
- Essence Drop: Killing an enemy leaves behind a static field, and passing through it, or "Huffmanning" it, provides a boost to your stats.
- Ethereal Choir: A calming angelic choir plays when the player enters the DOASys.
- Femme Fatale: Silva, a bodysuit-clad woman who tries to seduce you if you talk to her in the DOASys. She also claims to be in love with Perfect 1.
- Fun with Acronyms: The PIC (Project for Intertemporal Communication) organization who brought you into this, Your DOA (Defense, Offense, Agility) stats, and the rare powerup called PEMS (Perfect Emergency Medical System), that auto-transports you to the DOASys when used.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation: Early in the game, exiting the virtual world will sometimes trigger a cutscene where PIC scientists will speak to you about your performance in the field. A few of these discussions assume that you "crashed" out, even if you had exited by logging out manually.
- Here We Go Again!: When Perfect 1 is shut down, your PIC colleagues mention having downloaded most of the Garden's OS and source code from the future, and one of them proposes rebuilding it.
- Inside a Computer System: The Garden is a virtual reality network where players constantly fight each other in pursuit of being Rank 1. It also includes an entire city, a park, and even a stadium.
- Interface Screw: Fly's boss battle repeatedly distorts your vision, along with an annoying buzzing sound.
- Knockback: Pushya does this at a range of up to 10 meters.
- Medium Blending: The outside world is fully in live action, while perfect is full CGI. Similarly, the generic NPC avatars are sprite-based, while the bosses are mostly rendered.
- Mental Time Travel: Your character's body remains in 2004 while their mind is projected into the computer game that is running in 2027.
- Mission Control: Dr. Collier and his colleagues at PIC, whom give you information when you die or log out.
- Multiple Life Bars: Your DOA stats, which change in capacity depending on your rank, and most can be replenished from color-coded spires around the Garden. Other NPCs can use them as well.
- Defense, which acts as hit points, and you return to the lab if it hits zero, along with a random loss in stats.
- Offense: Your weapons ammunition.
- Agility: How long you can run. Recharges naturally when resting.
- Nuke 'Em: Nukeya, a rare multi-use weapon that can take out almost any NPC in a couple shots, though at a massive cost of Offense units.
- Ominous Visual Glitch: Occasionally, the various textures give way to wireframes as you crash more enemies. They get worse with each boss you take down. Trees even start floating in the endgame battle.
- Player Nudge: If you talk to NPCs in the DOASys, they sometimes drop hints on how to find items or beat some of the bosses.
- Repetitive Audio Glitch: The Picassos talk like this.
- Shapeshifter: Loki, who can take on anyone's form inside Perfect. At the climax, he assumes Raven's form in the stadium.
- Shock and Awe: Tesla, ruler of the Power Plant. His hair and entire torso are made of electricity bolts, and he can cast lightning with ease.
- Spot the Imposter: After you kill all but the last two bosses in the game, Raven appears in the DOASys to warn you about Loki, who'll be disguised as her in the Stadium. Raven then explains which side of the two she'll be on, and that you must kill Loki before her in order to reach Rank 2.
- Stat-O-Vision: Your HUD's crosshair shows an enemy's name and rank when locked on, and your life bars have markers showing an enemy's stats when in range.
- Taxidermy Terror: Chameleon's mansion has a virtual variant of this, with the heads of generic avatars mounted on one wall, including that of Number Four's.
- The Needs of the Many: As explained in one of the lab cutscenes, every time you crash and 'huffman' another avatar, you condemn the human playing that avatar to an inevitable end via brain-death. Unfortunately, it's the only way to get strong enough to take down Perfect 1 and save the rest of the players trapped in Perfect.
- Timed Mission: Once you crash Raven, Dr. Collier realises that Perfect is on the verge of collapse, with only about 20 minutes left before it goes down and takes you and the rest of the connected players with it. The only way to save yourself and everyone else connected to the system is to destroy Perfect 1 before that twenty minutes runs out.
- Truce Zone: The DOASys in the center of the map, where all combat is automatically disabled. Your life bars refill upon entry, and it's the one place where you can talk to NPCs. Even the bosses, if they happen to show up.
- Whole-Plot Reference: The developers stated that this game was inspired by Snow Crash.
- World of Pun: The ammo balls you collect (Annaballs, Ashflay, Pushya, etc.) and parts of the Garden are all sorts of puns.
- Your Mind Makes It Real:
- Being "crashed" in the virtual world is not directly fatal but does cause a shock to the system that can eventually be fatal (mechanically handled in game by the player's stats being reduced after each crash; if they drop too low the player dies). This happened to the player's four predecessors. Whether this is how the game is supposed to work or just a side-effect of the unorthodox method used by PIC to send people from the past into the game is never stated.
- By crashing Perfect players and huffmanning the field their avatars leave behind, you essentially usurp their place in the system, causing Perfect to consider them nonexistent but still keeping them connected. The player will suffer from brain death in the next twenty minutes as a result; you see this in the opening cutscene as Number Four, your predecessor, is crashed.
- You Are Number Six: Your sole name in the game is "Number Five".