This year just happens to be the year of random occurrences with Chex Quest content for me. For those of you unfamiliar with the franchise, Chex Quest is effectively a Doom clone that was sanctioned by the Chex foods company in 1996. It came free with their cereal, and as such the devs had to replace all of the guns and assets in Doom to something a little more kid friendly. Instead of Doomguy ripping and tearing your way through Hell, you're a Chex warrior clad in a giant Chex cube as armor, tasked with sending evil phlegm beings called "Flemoids" back to their own dimension.
I played this game a ton as a kid because it was one my father enjoyed himself and would let me play because it was "kid friendly". Like Doom became for me later on, this became a game I could play over and over again. I feel like Doom/Chex Quest are both games I would be comfortable speedrunning based solely off the fact that I wouldn't lose my mind playing them for hours at a time. That said, many fond memories.
As it turned out, someone on my Twitter feed retweeted the fact that a company called Limited Run Games was offering a collector's edition-style version of the original Chex Quest. Before this sold out, I grabbed this and the smaller box (for my dad's birthday). I'm so excited for this stuff to arrive, I mean just look at it:
Incidentally, @MisterPookie also reminded me that the Chex Quest HD remake from some of the original developers was made available on Steam today FOR FREE. I had to pick it up and play it.
It's goofy. It's buggy. The AI is mostly garbage, they won't notice you if you shoot them from behind, and half the time they'll start jittering all over the place. There are only 5 levels (like the original, though there were two additional games after the OG one), and you don't have any of the cool guns for long enough/with enough ammo to really make use of them. Many of the wall textures have gaps so you can see right through them. And on Linux, the game plays just fine but the cutscenes are just blank white screens for me.
But I love it. The levels are not 1:1; they've added some content but kept the aesthetic of each of the levels. Even then, there are sections from each level (certain rooms, designs, placement of enemies within a room) that harken back to some very specific pieces of the original game. Many of the original enemy/gun/environment sound bytes (albeit likely cleaned up a bit) are used in the new game. The main character's dialogue when performing certain actions is intentionally silly and over-the-top. The music has the original themes but fleshed out and recreated with new technology. Despite how crappy it plays, it's obvious that this was recreated with great love, and the developers did an excellent job capturing the essence of the original game. The only time I wasn't smiling while playing this was when my brow was furrowed in concentration as I tried to find the secrets on each map. Also, there are several more playable characters that are unlockable by buying bags of chex mix with the character codes on them (what is this, 2000???). Amazing.
Obviously this game has a lot of history for me, but it's free! And it takes maybe an hour to play front to back. So do yourself a favor, download it, and give it a whirl :) Maybe it'll make you curious for what the original was like!
