Serious Sam: The Second Encounter

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Serious Sam: The Second Encounter
  • Windows
  • Release
    5 February 2002
    • Windows
    • 5 February 2002
    • Xbox
    • 12 November 2002
    • Windows (HD)
    • 28 April 2010
    • Xbox 360 (HD)
    • 22 September 2010
    • Linux, Windows (VR)
    • 4 April 2017
    • Stadia (HD)
    • 3 March 2020
    • Switch, PS4, XONE (HD)
    • 17 November 2020
    multiplayer

    Serious Sam: The Second Encounter is a 2002

    platforming elements, and additionally contains the Seriously Warped Deathmatch mod
    by A Few Screws Loose.

    Development began immediately after Croteam had completed the first game. Working in an improved version of

    mission pack, The Second Encounter was ultimately turned into a standalone product, regarded as the second episode
    after The First Encounter. After a delay from November 2001, Gathering of Developers released the game in February 2002.

    The game received positive reviews, with praise for its improvements over The First Encounter but criticism for its lack of innovation. The level variety and presentation were well received, as were the music and inclusion of power-ups. The bosses raised mixed opinions. Like its predecessor, the game was highlighted for its price–performance ratio. It was GameSpot's "Game of the Month" for February 2002 and "Best Budget Game on PC" of the year.

    The Second Encounter and its predecessor have been combined into one in several packages, including an Xbox port released by Gotham Games in November 2002. Instead of a third episode, The Second Encounter was followed up by a sequel, Serious Sam 2, in October 2005. With the publisher Devolver Digital, Croteam developed a remake, Serious Sam HD: The Second Encounter, that was first released in April 2010 and later brought to Xbox 360, Stadia, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. A virtual reality port of that remake, Serious Sam VR: The Second Encounter, was released in April 2017.

    Gameplay

    Sam fighting Zorg Mercenaries using a flamethrower

    Serious Sam: The Second Encounter is a

    boss battle.[2][6]

    The Second Encounter expands Sam's arsenal from The First Encounter to include a

    multiplayer, The Second Encounter supports cooperative play on all single-player maps for up to sixteen players.[5][6] For the deathmatch modes, the game increased the number of levels to eight.[8][10] The game further includes the Seriously Warped Deathmatch mod, which comprises twenty deathmatch levels, additional weapons, and modes like capture the flag.[5][8]

    Plot

    Serious Sam: The Second Encounter begins with recounting the events of The First Encounter: In the 22nd century, alien forces commanded by Mental were attacking humanity, whose leaders sent the soldier Sam "Serious" Stone (voiced by John Dick) back in time to

    Great Pyramid
    , he defeated Ugh-Zan III, entered the spaceship, and took off towards Sirius.

    Following the first game's events, a group of onlookers attempts to catch up to the Centerprice and inadvertently collides with it, causing the ship to fall back to Earth and crash into the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, near the Maya city of Palenque. Using information obtained from the Centerprice, Sam's Neurotronically Implanted Combat Situation Analyzer (NETRICSA) informs him that the Sirians had prepared a backup vehicle in case the spaceship was destroyed. Sam must therefore find the Holy Grail, which is located 400 years away. As the Sirians had built a Time-Lock for each ancient civilisation, NETRICSA guides him to that of the Mayans in Teotihuacan. After passing through the legendary Xibalba underneath the city, he arrives at the Pyramid of the Sun and defeats the wind god Kukulkan, who was guarding the Time-Lock.

    This transports Sam to a ziggurat in Babylonia. He heads into Persepolis to find the temple of Gilgamesh, the palace of King Tilmun, and ultimately the Tower of Babel. Collecting the three Tablets of Wisdom in the surrounding gardens grants him entry to the tower, where he kills the Exotech Larva, Mental's purpose-designed guard for the Babylonian Time-Lock.

    Sam arrives in the medieval Polish town of Krwawitze in 1138. NETRICSA informs him of the powerful Arc-Al-Magi guild of wizards and guides him to their Book of Wisdom, which reveals the location of the Holy Grail. The book leads Sam to the former Arc-Al-Magi hideout, where a magic portal in the fabled Lava Caves takes him to the Ice Castle with the Holy Grail. Inside, however, he finds the grail to have been removed. NETRICSA believes the Arc-Al-Magi were attacked by Mental's forces and hid the Holy Grail at their Church of Sacred Blood. Sam passes through the Corridor of Death to reach the cathedral, where he overcomes Mordekai the Summoner, one of Mental's longest servants, to obtain the Holy Grail. Finally, he uses the backup rocket ship to continue his journey to Sirius.

    Development and release

    The Croatian development studio

    mission pack until Croteam's chief executive officer, Roman Ribarić, and Gathering of Developers (the Take-Two Interactive subsidiary that had published The First Encounter) agreed to make it a standalone product.[14] Although marketed as a sequel, Ribarić stated The Second Encounter was "neither a mission pack nor a sequel; it is simply the next episode".[15]

    The team built the game on an upgraded version of

    Ogg Vorbis audio compression, enhanced destruction effects, a procedural particle system, and support for DirectX.[16][18][19] While Mosettig was working on the particle system, he accidentally duplicated one line of code that caused everything to be rendered twice. When he noticed this and removed the line, the game's performance improved significantly and the frame rate doubled.[13]

    The Second Encounter moved away from the ancient Egyptian setting of The First Encounter.

    alpha state, with Croteam targeting a release in December 2001.[21] At Ribarić's request, the four-person mod team A Few Screws Loose (composed of Nick "Xavier" Macron, Chris "LanThief" Kreager, Ben "Vinz" Frech, and Sean "mwadaibe" Center) worked with Croteam to produce an updated version of their Seriously Warped Deathmatch mod to be packaged with the game.[22]

    Gathering of Developers formally announced The Second Encounter in September 2001 and scheduled it for release in November.

    LAN gaming centres during the week after the release, with some of them providing a preview on 3 February.[34] The publisher also launched the "Disco Inferno" contest that gave away a GeForce 4 Ti 4600 graphics card to the designer of the best "disco cathedral" deathmatch map.[35]

    Reception

    Serious Sam: The Second Encounter received "generally favorable reviews", according to the

    weighted average rating of 85/100 based on twenty-two critic reviews.[36] Several outlets directly compared the game to The First Encounter. IGN's Ivan Sulic said the predecessor had been expanded upon "in all the right ways" when regarded as an expansion rather than a sequel.[40] Brett Todd of Computer Games Magazine likened it to how The Godfather Part II improved upon The Godfather, while Elliott Chin of Computer Gaming World considered it to be to The First Encounter what Doom II was to Doom.[10][38] Jeremy Williams of PC Gamer opined that The Second Encounter was "better than the original in almost every respect".[6]

    However, Chin believed the sparse addition of weapons and enemies caused the game to feel tedious after some time.[10] Sal Accardo of GameSpy considered the game's lengthy arena sections to be particularly tiresome.[39] On Extended Play, Adam Sessler weighed this as the game's biggest shortcoming and felt that it, combined with "uninteresting" platforming, made the game less enjoyable than The First Encounter.[41] Mike Anderiesz wrote for The Guardian that the game's structure had become predictable since The First Encounter, akin to a "one-trick pony".[43]

    In contrast, Greg Kasavin argued the action gameplay "is some of the best you'll find in any shooter to date", with level designs and production values excelling those of The First Encounter.[8] GameZone's Chuck "Ovaldog" said the new weapons, enemies, and power-ups had the game "come to life".[5] Todd observed that enemy waves had become more varied, while the added traps interactive environment segments broke the monotony.[38] Gary Downs from Games Domain felt the new weapons corrected a gameplay imbalance he had observed in The First Encounter.[4] While Accardo considered the game's bosses less impressive than that of The First Encounter, Williams said he found them entertaining.[6][39] Uros Jojic of Voodoo Extreme noted an increased difficulty.[42]

    Downs and Sulic lauded the game's foliage, texture detail, lighting, and environments.

    self-deprecating humour.[1][37] In a 2016 report, the Ministry of Youth and Sports of Turkey accused the game of Islamophobia for depicting fights near scenery resembling the tomb of Ali.[44]

    Unlike its predecessor, The Second Encounter was priced at £20 in the United Kingdom and did not face an increased

    NPD Techworld, the game was the eighth-best-selling game of its week of release, and the third-best the following week.[46][47]

    Accolades

    GameSpot named The Second Encounter its "Game of the Month" for February 2002 and the year's "Best Budget Game on PC".[48][49] The game was used for benchmarks of graphics cards.[50]

    Legacy

    Port and sequel

    An Xbox game that bundles both games was in development by January 2002, with Serious Engine already adapted for the platform. At the time, Croteam was negotiating with Take-Two to have the game released by the end of the year.[51] In July 2002, Take-Two established the label Gotham Games, with Serious Sam for the Xbox to be among its first products.[52][53] The game features thirty-five levels and improved graphical elements like reworked weapon models.[54][55] Additionally, this version amends the points system to have the player earn lives as well as higher scores through combos.[56] It was released on 12 November 2002.[57] On Windows, the two games were bundled in 2003 as Serious Sam: Gold Edition, based on the Xbox version with an additional episode by modder Trisk.[58]

    Beyond The Second Encounter, Croteam had planned to release a third episode alongside a movie, with its script waiting for approval by October 2001.[19] Instead, Serious Sam 2, described as a "true sequel" to The First Encounter and The Second Encounter, was announced in September 2002 and released in October 2005.[59][60]

    Remake

    In June 2009, the publisher Majesco Entertainment announced a high-definition remake of The First Encounter, Serious Sam HD: The First Encounter, for Windows and the Xbox 360. For this version, Croteam worked with nascent publisher Devolver Digital, founded by Gathering of Developers co-founders Mike Wilson and Harry Miller. As Devolver Digital had not been licensed as a publisher for the Xbox 360 yet, it published the Windows version and worked with Majesco on the Xbox 360 release.[61][62] Days after the remake was released for Windows on 24 November 2009, Devolver Digital announced a remake of The Second Encounter.[63] It was released for Windows on 28 April 2010, followed by the Xbox 360 version, released by Majesco Entertainment, on 22 September.[64][65] In May 2012, Devolver Digital announced and released the Legend of the Beast downloadable content for the remake, containing three maps each for the campaign, survival mode, and deathmatch mode. Alongside its release, Devolver Digital began offering the game's multiplayer modes for free.[66][67]

    The remakes were bundled with their originals as Serious Sam HD: Gold Edition on Steam from 23 September 2010, and they were distributed physically for the Xbox 360 as part of The Serious Sam Collection, released by Mastertronic Group in July 2013.[68][69] Serious Sam HD: The First Encounter, Serious Sam HD: The Second Encounter (including Legend of the Beast), and Serious Sam 3: BFE became part of Serious Sam Collection, which was announced in February 2020 and released for the Stadia streaming service on 3 March 2020.[70][71] Serious Sam Collection was brought to the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on 17 November 2020.[72]

    Around 2016, a small team within Croteam began developing a virtual reality version of the first game's remake, Serious Sam VR: The First Encounter, based on its prior work on Serious Sam VR: The Last Hope.[73] On 4 April 2017, a few days after that version's launch, Croteam also released Serious Sam VR: The Second Encounter.[74][75] Both versions of the remake are part of Serious Sam Fusion 2017, which acts as a hub to launch each game from.[56]

    Other

    The fan collective Alligator Pit developed Serious Sam Classics: Revolution, an updated collection of The First Encounter and The Second Encounter with additional content, under the oversight of Croteam.

    Steam Early Access in April 2014 but its development halted after late 2016 when the members of Alligator Pit became preoccupied with other matters.[76][78] Croteam eventually took over development and released the finished game in August 2019, giving it for free to existing owners of either of the original games.[78]

    Notes

    1. ^ The Seriously Warped Deathmatch component was developed by A Few Screws Loose.
    2. ^ The game was published for the Xbox by Gotham Games. Devolver Digital published the HD and VR versions, co-publishing the Xbox 360 release of HD with Majesco Entertainment.

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    External links