Chaser (video game)


Chaser is a first-person shooter action video game developed by Cauldron. The game is built on the CloakNT 3D engine. It was re-released on Steam and GOG.com in 2011.

Plot

The game takes place in the future, when humanity has inhabited Mars. A coalition of 36 top industrial corporations establish the MARSCORP consortium in 2036 with the goal of terraforming the planet. In 2042, MARSCORP has become the de facto autocratic government of Mars, with its director Samuel Longwood being a ruthless dictator. Meanwhile, Graham Castor's highly elusive rebels seek to liberate Mars.
The game's protagonist wakes up in the medical bay of the space station HMS Majestic, which is under attack by unknown assailants looking for him. Having recovered a gun, he fights his way to an escape pod and flees, moments before the station explodes. The escape pod crashlands into the fictional city of Montack somewhere in the United States, where the news of the Majestic massacre has preceded him. According to the television, he is a notorious Martian rebel called John Chaser.
A wanted man, he is recruited into the Vallero crime family, which is at war with the local Yakuza chapter. The family implants a small remote-controlled bomb into each of its member to ensure their loyalty. As such, on the eve of an attack on Yakuza headquarters, Chaser secretly visits a Japanese hacker in the Yakuza-controlled part of the city to remove the bomb. While receiving weapons and ammo, Chaser hides the bomb inside Vallero's limousine. Shortly afterwards, Vallero learns of Chaser's unauthorized foray into Yakuza territory and detonates the bomb, killing himself. Chaser disappears after killing all of Vallero's men, the Yakuza leaders and scores of Yakuza gunmen.
By this time, Chaser has had recovered a few vague fragments of his memory: On Mars, a vehicle full of armed men, lead by the fearsome Scott Stone, attack the building in which Chaser was, gunning him down and taking away his body.
Chaser contacts Kabir, a smuggler who promises voyage to Mars in exchange for Chaser escorting Kabir's contraband to Siberia. There, Kabir betrays Chaser and shoots him several times. According to an elderly eyewitness, just as Kabir is about to finish Chaser, an armed man in black scares him and his men away and injects Chaser with a medicine. Having recovered, Chaser attacks a local labour camp and rescues a man who can lead him to Kabir's base of operations, an old spaceport. After killing Kabir and his men, Chaser departs to Mars.
On Mars, Chaser is thrown in prison, where he meets one of his old comrades. They orchestrate an escape plan, which, unbeknown to them, is seen and heard by Longwood himself. Once they escape the prison, they make contact with one of the rebels who informs them that Longwood has been rerouting terraforming money into his own projects, including illegal human cloning and memory transfer. They orchestrate a plan of assassination in which they blow up a train carrying Longwood.
With Longwood officially announced dead, the rebels return to their base to celebrate, only to be attacked by Longwood's forces. After an extended gunfight, the base is overrun and both Chaser and Castor are captured. Longwood, alive and well, reveals that the protagonist is, in fact, Scott Stone. The real John Chaser died before he could be interrogated. Aboard the Majestic, Stone assumes Chaser's appearance through plastic surgery. Castor's men, however, attacked the Majestic and disrupted the memory transfer process, leaving left him amnesiac. Castor admits to being responsible for the attack, but vehemently denies all else and pleads with the protagonist not to join Longwood.
Eventually, Chaser shoots Castor dead. Even though the prospects of interrogating him is gone, Longwood is pleased. He has his men shoot Chaser and drag his barely alive body away.

Multiplayer

The gameplay is fast pace. There are 12 maps. These maps make up the gameplay over four different game modes:
The game received "average" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. Scott Osborne of GameSpot said that the game offers "loads of thrilling, old school shooter action".