Power Slave is a first-person, 3-D action game featuring the standard grunts, explosions, and gunshots players expect from any Doom clone. Taking on the role of the lone soldier, players are sent into an Egyptian city crawling with enemy forces. The mission: Exterminate said enemy infestation at all costs. Yawn.
Unfortunately (at least in the early missions), most of these "forces" consist of decidedly unscary spiders that strongly resemble those of the ancient arcade machine, Centipede. To break up the monotony, the player occasionally runs into an angry bird (which pecks away at his brain), and battles horned bad guys who live to sling blue fireballs at unauthorized personnel. Near the game's conclusion, however, the enemies become a little more interesting - but it's a long way getting there. Ultimately, think of this game as Doom with a plot (sort of), a few camels, and the proverbial mother lode of jumping spiders.
Graphically, Power Slave doesn't really break any new ground. While the surface textures are varied, they are mostly of the "Wow, another rock wall" variety. To be fair, the lighting effects are good, especially when enemy fireballs light up dark halls en route to blasting the player (you) upside the head. The only real additions to the Saturn-based Doom experience are the abilities to jump, look up, and look down. The many different weapons appear at about the right time (starting with a default sword and pistol, and culminating with machine guns and magical staffs), and if only for that reason the game is acceptably challenging. Not unlike Hexen on the PC, players must return to completed levels to find otherwise hidden doorways and passages, and it's not uncommon for a level to have four different exits leading to four different levels.
For those who've scorched through the bowels of Doom and Final Doom and burn for more, Power Slave might just quench that fire. Uninitiated Saturn owners, however, will want to let Power Slave pass on by - other first-person, 3-D action games provide a better bang for the buck.
