Vice: Project Doom is an Action Game developed by Aicom and published by Sammy that was released in 1991 for the Nintendo Entertainment System. In it, you play as Detective Quinn Hart who intends to stop the B.E.D.A. Corporation and its leader, Damian Hawke from selling a mysterious yet dangerous drug known as Gel. This is one of few NES games that shows its plot through cutscenes (with another notable example being the Ninja Gaiden trilogy games). The gameplay itself mostly involves side-scrolling platforming, but there are also two driving stages (you actually start in one) and two shooting gallery-like stages.
Compare The Ultimate Stuntman, another late-release NES action game that switches up its gameplay (albeit that one's unlicensed).
This game provides examples of:
- Bittersweet Ending: Hart succeeds in his mission of stopping B.E.D.A. from achieving their evil plans, but in the process, he ends up losing both his girlfriend Christy (whom he had accidentally killed) and his best friend Reese (who was brutally assassinated). In addition to this, Hart's Evil Doppelgänger, Damian Hawke warns him during the latter's dying moment that this entire scenario is only a small part of a much bigger threat and the final scene of the game after the credits roll shows that another evil clone of Hart is slowly waking up from his suspended animation stasis.
- Bowdlerise: In the Japanese version, the cutscene following Stage 6 shows the character Reese being shot in the head. The English version changes this to him being startled by a nearby explosion.
- Covers Always Lie: For some reason, Hart looks just like Mel Gibson on the cover. This game has nothing to do with Mel Gibson and Hart looks very different in-game.
- Defeat Equals Explosion: Normal enemies explode into four particles upon defeat, while bosses undergo a Post-Defeat Explosion Chain.
- Duel Boss: Hawke's first phase, which sees Hart and Hawke engage in a 1v1 shootout where Hawke not only has all the same abilities as Hart, but is even better at them. Luckily, he can be baited into standing still and shooting over your head if you duck right after he lands after jumping.
- Final Exam Finale: Stage 11 involves going through every type of gameplay that was established prior (platforming, light gun and shoot 'em up).
- Life Meter: The player character and the boss have a 20-segment lifebar in the bottom-right corner.
- Locomotive Level: Stage 7-1 takes place on top of a train, with eight layers of scenery scrolling in the background.
- Pesky Pigeons: The purple birds from the South America stage love to dive-bomb you into pits during the tricky platforming segments. You'll probably die getting knocked into pits by them more than any other cause of death combined (though thankfully they and the game as a whole are much more forgiving than Ninja Gaiden).
- Timed Mission: Each level has to beaten within a few hundred seconds.
- Warm-Up Boss:
- The first vehicle boss in Stage 1-1 doesn't take long to kill and has a predictable attack pattern, with five shots and two cars.
- The first platforming boss in Stage 2-2 attacks by tossing iron beams which you have to jump on or ignore. He can leap to the other side of the screen, but should be no problem to beat with a ranged weapon.
