Cover art for the foreign version. Yes, it's a damn silly game.
Doom, in Amsterdam.
AmsterDoom (also known as Amsterdam Monster Madness) is a 2000 sci-fi First-Person Shooter made by Dutch company Davilex Games.
Combining the late-90s sci-fi movie trend (seen in Independence Day and Men in Black) and FPS craze started by it's namesake, AmsterDoom is set in the aftermath of an Alien Invasion occurring in Amsterdam. Various alien forces have taken over most of the city, with five incoming alien ships attempting to land around Schiphol Airport. To contain the invasion, the United Nations installed an impenetrable force-field around the city while dispatching the player, a commando of the Dutch armed forces, to deal with the alien threat.
AmsterDoom contain examples of:
- Acid Pool: Bafflingly, there's several in Naar de Perrons (bottom level of the Amsterdam subways) which can drain your life if you fell in, while the real-life Naar de Perrons (obviously) doesn't have any (or so we hope...). The aliens probably placed it there after taking over Amsterdam for no reason other than shits and giggles.
- Aliens in Cardiff: Why would the point zero of an Alien Invasion be Amsterdam (besides the fact that this game was made by a Dutch studio)?
- Bloodless Carnage: Despite the title, this game is entirely blood-free, unlike Doom's tendency to overflow onscreen deaths with extreme amounts of gore. Aliens killed just... dies. All of them.
- Bookcase Passage: The painting version of the trope shows up in the Het Rijksmuseum, where it turns out Rembrandt's De Nachtwacht has a hidden corridor leading to an alien base behind it.
- Company Cameo: You can find posters of Davilex Software in the Amsterdam Centraal Metro. Davilex is the game's producer and distributor.
- Crate Expectations: You destroy crates, cardboard boxes, shipping containers, and the like to obtain ammo and health. They're everywhere in the city.
- The Ground Is Lava: You have to deal with the Ground is Acid in several stages, and your only way across is walking on planks.
- Guns Akimbo: The Alien Leader in the last stage, who expectedly packs way more firepower than his mooks. A minigun Arm Cannon for his left hand and a Shoulder Cannon that spams missiles near his right, both which attacks you in tandem.
- Lighter and Softer: Compared to it's inspiration, and also every other alien-themed FPS popular at the time (despite the fact that since you're killing aliens, there's no reasons to really hold back on gore or carnage). Then again the whole game's pretty comedic.
- Live-Action Cutscene: The game's cutscenes are depicted as a live-action newsreel detailing events leading to the invasion.
- Museum Level: One of the stages is set in the Het Rijksmuseum, where you're free to destroy the artworks and displays for fun after killing all the aliens. Like blowing up the De Melkmeid or Het Melkmeisje using a rocket launcher.
- Nobody Here but Us Statues: One of the stages is set in Madame Tussauds Amsterdam, and some of the alien mooks will pose as statues before attacking you as you get close. For some inexplicable reason, the aliens never attempts any human disguises - more often than not you can simply shoot away at the poorly-disguised aliens and kill them on the spot.
- One Riot, One Ranger: The United Nations are completely helpless to do anything about the alien threat, and it's up to your lone soldier character to infiltrate Amsterdam and take out all the aliens.
- Pun-Based Title: Amsterdoom, because it's a Doom clone set in Amsterdam.
- Real-Place Background: The game's streets, backgrounds and various locations follows faithfully to how Amsterdam in the late 90s would look like. The Kalverstraat and Amsterdam Centraal in particular recreates several shopfronts and alleys, just like the real Amsterdam.
- Rewarding Vandalism: Because the entirety of Amsterdam has been evacuated and is devoid of human life, you get no penalties destroying windows, storefronts, flowerpots, payphones, wax statues in Madame Tussauds Amsterdam, and assorted public property. In contrast, destroying stuff yields you goodies and pickups.
