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Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold Episode 1: Star Institute Floor 1: Star Institute General Operations Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold is a first-person shooter computer game created by JAM Productions and published by Apogee Software. It uses the Wolfenstein 3D game engine to render graphics in first person, while adding many features, such as floor and ceiling textures. The shareware version of the game was released December 3, 1993. The registered version of Blake Stone shipped with a comic book, called a “Blake Stone Adventure“. To date it is the only title in the company's product line to do so. In 1994, a sequel called Blake Stone: Planet Strike was released, which continues where Aliens of Gold leaves off. The story is set in the year 2140. Robert Wills Stone III (. Blake Stone) is an agent of the British Intelligence, recruited after a highly successful career in the British Royal Navy. His first major case is to investigate and eliminate the threat of Dr. Pyrus Goldfire, a brilliant scientist in the field of genetics and biology, known for his outright disrespect of professional ethics. Backed by his own organisation, STAR, Dr. Goldfire plans to conquer Earth and enslave humanity using an army of specially trained human conscripts, modified alien species, and a host of genetically-engineered mutants. Agent Stone is sent on a mission to knock out six crucial STAR installations and destroy Goldfire's army before it can assault the Earth. The gameplay of Aliens of Gold is very similar to Wolfenstein 3D. Playable areas are single-leveled, with orthogonal walls and textured floors and ceilings. Level features include: locked doors which can be opened by four colors of access cards (gold, green, yellow and blue) plus red access cards to enter new floors, one-way doors, secret rooms accessible through pushable wall blocks, and teleports that instantly take the player into another location within the level (or in one instance to the episode's secret level). Five weapons are available. Dr. Goldfire appears periodically in certain sections and will attack Stone. After being hit a few times, he activates a teleporter on his watch and escapes. Conscript type enemies have the ability to pick up ammunition when they run out. There are multiple food dispensers in each level, at which the player can spend tokens to purchase food that recharges Stone's health. There are also non-hostile 'informant' scientists who provide information, ammunition, and tokens when spoken to. Informants and hostile scientists look exactly the same, and can only be told apart when Stone speaks to them or begins firing in their direction. In every level the player can boost points for score by destroying all enemies, collecting all points and keeping all informants alive which increases the three respective statuses. Total Points is affected by both the enemies destroyed and the treasure collected. The all informants alive bonus can only be obtained if all informants survive after the first two bonuses are obtained. Floor rating is affected by the other three statuses. Mission rating is affected by the overall statuses from floors 1 to 9. Killing informants decreases both Floor and Mission Rating. id Software released Doom one week after Apogee released Blake Stone. Doom quickly eclipsed Blake Stone, which sold poorly after initial success.
