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Saturday 16 November 2019

CLAW


Back in 1997, Claw from Monolith Productions (Blood, F.E.A.R., Shadow of Mordor) was something of a rarity; a PC exclusive platformer. And a good one at that. This tough-as-nails 2D side scroller proved that home computers could play host to such a game without playing second fiddle to the genre's prolific nature on consoles.

Being released only a few short months after Blood, Monolith's debut game, Claw has since become a sought after rarity in its own right, at least in its original form. The big-box release had few copies made with most discs being bundled with other software or hardware later down the line. This includes a DVD version - one of the first games to come on the format - complete with higher quality cutscenes. Unfortunately, those video files cannot be run without the disc present so they're not included here.

Jolly Roger flags are checkpoints, while arrows aid you in where to go (left)
Collect the map piece to end the level (right)

It's a shame as these cinematics are pretty decent. The opening scene even runs almost 7 minutes, complete with a naval battle stint in a Spanish prison. Our hero is the Pirate Captain Nathanial J. Claw, a feline swashbuckler imprisoned by the Cocker-Spaniards. In many ways, the story and setting take great influence from the works of Dumas - The Count of Monte Cristo in particular. During his time in prison, Captain Claw has found a treasure map left by the cell's previous inhabitant which points to the mystical Amulet of Nine Lives. He then takes advantage of an over-zealous guard dog and makes his escape. And thus our adventure begins.

Level one takes place in the prison's dungeon. Inspired by the real-life Chateaux d'If featured in  Monte Cristo, La Roca (translation; The Rock) eases the player into the intricacies of the game without being an entire cakewalk. In fact, that's my major criticism. It is almost unforgiving in its difficulty. The large, sprawling levels which can branch wildly on your way to the end are filled with devious traps, tough enemies and instadeath aplenty to overcome. I certainly found myself dying quite a bit.

If there's no map piece, collect the duel symbol to trigger a boss fight (left)
Duels will end with the bad guy releasing one of the gems of the Amulet of Nine Lives (right)

Enemies are a little more complex than your average platformer. You can shoot, punch or stab them multiple times until they're weak enough to fly off the screen spraying gold coins as they go. In response, they will often block or parry making you think about each encounter, especially when it comes to bosses. At the end of every other level, you'll confront one of these big bads. More often than not, they'll devolve into a mash of swirling blades as you button mash the Ctrl key until one of your health bars drop to zero. I'd have liked them to have more of a pattern to clue you in on their weak spots but in the end, they're like playing an early one-on-one fighter.

That's not to say they're devoid of personality. Each one of them is designed and animated beautifully with enough spoken quips to convince you of their personality. In fact, every anthropomorphic creature has this level of attention to detail, including you. On top of that, the slick animation doesn't get in the way of the responsive controls. Claw can stop on a dime, instantly attack and move mid-jump to be more precise in landing. The small platforms that make up much of each level are not too much of a pain because of this. Even when you do die - and you will often - the thoughtful placement of checkpoints and lack of unskippable scenes before trying again reduces frustration. The game will even remember collected gold and defeated foes too, allowing you to bypass that tricky treasure-hunting interlude on your way back to where you were.

Treasure plays a big part in the game. These collectables are everywhere and play a part in your score at the end of the level. In a rather unusual move, perhaps allowed by the superior hardware a PC has over consoles, the gold will not disappear after a short time. If you defeat a guard or smash a box, its contents will remain where it lands until you collect it or reach the end of the stage. This is one of my biggest pet-peeves in a collect-a-thon platformer so it's nice to see that it's not found here.

Your treasure map will gradually fill in as you complete stages (left)
You'll get a gem for your Amulet each time you defeat a boss (right)

Other than gold trinkets and food and vials that replenish health, there are a plethora of power-ups to pick up too. You can find bullets for your pistol, glowing orbs for your Magic Claw attack and dynamite. Press Shift to toggle between the three secondary attacks. For some temporary gains, there are some mouse-shaped catnip which will make you run faster and jump higher for a limited time. If you find one of these, it usually means that there is an out-of-reach gem, platform or secret nearby. Your sword can be given some mystical properties too. Find the Fire, Ice or Lightning sword and your normal attack will also shoot out a beam of elemental destruction. Again, like the invisibility invulnerability special items, these are only temporary.

While Claw remains a very tough game, it is also a very good one. It plays sublimely, with few cheap deaths or bad level design. It looks spectacular, with high-quality animation both in-game and in the substantial number of cutscenes. It's so good that a dedicated group of players support it with custom levels to this day (check them out here)! If platformers mostly found their home on consoles, PC owners can be assured that they found one of the best in Claw.


To download the game, follow the link below. This is a custom installer exclusive to The Collection Chamber uses dgVoodoo to run on modern systems. Design Document included. Tested on Windows 10.

File Size: 403 Mb.  Install Size: 472 Mb.  Need help? Consult the Collection Chamber FAQ

Download



Claw is © Monolith Productions Inc
Review, Cover Design and Installer created by me


Like this? Try These...

http://collectionchamber.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/traps-n-treasures.html  http://collectionchamber.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/quik-thunder-rabbit.html  http://collectionchamber.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/sea-legends.html

17 comments:

  1. Fun fact: Stephan Weyte (Caleb in Blood and Nylartholep in DUSK) voiced Capt. Claw it was reported that he would record lines for both characters in one day.

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    Replies
    1. I thought that voice sounded familiar!

      Here's another fun fact - the designers must have been X-Files fans. A couple of the cheats reference that show. Type 'mpscully' to skip a level, 'mpskinner' to skip to the level's boss and the slightly mispelled 'mpmaulder' takes you back a level. Being an unabashed X-Phile, I thought that was neat.

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  2. I'm always appealed to a good platformer, as long as I have a soft spot for the world (wherein the game plays) and its characters, along with preferably smooth gameplay mechanics, all of them going hand in hand. So far, so clear. Which, in turn, means that your present presentation is absolutely something I'm excited to stretch out my Claw for. :-)

    Thank you, Biff, for another interesting title that has stayed below my radar until you came round the corner of your Collection Chamber - with a venturous cat in tow!

    Bye for now,
    Thomas

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    Replies
    1. You're welcome Thomas! I'm sure you'll enjoy it - it's a goodun.

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    2. You've hit the nail on its head, Biff, with your assumption of my humble self enjoying the game. In fact, I'm amazed how good it still looks nowadays, even if its original resolution only provides a ratio of 640x480 image pixels. The dressed up artwork, clever level constructions and the bustling sound backdrop are timelessly beautiful, the scrolling is smooth and its controls dreamlike. Honestly said, Claw is one pirate's hell of a platformer gem whose qualities would even shine through the eyepatch of one dreaded - and buried long ago - Captain Blackbeard! So, to me it feels like an old pirate's treasure has been eventually salvaged and is now exhibited in the sacred Collection Chamber, where it can be marvelled at by any inclined wannabe pirate's soul! :-)

      Bye for now,
      Thomas

      P.S. Thanks for mentioning the DVD version as well! ;-)

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  3. Jolly good my dear fellow.

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  4. Nice release, but the music isn't playing in the levels for some reason

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  5. Nice upload, going to check it out! Might be worth mentioning that the cutscenes can be found on youtube (I searched 'claw monolith cutscenes' and got loads of results.)

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  6. Seems that cutscenes don't work (white glitched screen, loud audio) on Win10 :( also I think there is no BGM?

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    1. Just tested and both are working for me. Audio and video are encoded into a proprietary format and are decoded by the game's executable. The issues you face could be dgVoodoo not kicking in. Open dgVoodooCpl.exe and under Direct X tab select dgVoodoo Watemark. When you play the game a logo on the bottom right should appear to let you know these setting have been applied.

      If that fails, it could be a bad install. Try installing/downloading again or run the game as admin.

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  7. Thank you so much for the work you do, i have enjoyed a large number of your releases now.
    I cannot seem to change the controls, when i select controls in options it crashes to desktop. Same thing if i select 'edit players'. No other problems, sound, music videos all fine

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    Replies
    1. Run "CLAWADV.EXE" from the install directory and select "Enable DirectDraw Emulation". That seems to work.

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  8. Unfortunately I'm having trouble with this one, too - it simply refuses to launch. I wonder if it's because it's not on the C drive, maybe it's looking for that?

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    Replies
    1. It's not a C: problem as Irunning from drive J without issue. I've just done an install and it seems to work well for me. Without looking at your system, I'm not sure what it could be. Have you tried some of the points mentioned in the FAQ?

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    2. I have, but no luck. This is the error I get: https://imgur.com/4JzIhTG

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    3. i have lots of memories with this game, the last level "The Temple" was so freaking HARD!!! to the point i used cheats to beat it. anyway it's great playing this classic game once again. but im having issues running it, its starts out fine at first but like 2 mintues later the game just froze on me and forced to ctrl+alt+del to esc the game. it happend to me few times. i dont know if it's related to the "CLAW.FEC" file (cutscenes) it's very unusual. on my both pc's it happend to me.

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  9. Monolith have been one of my favourite game dev studios. All their games were bangers, yes even Blood 2, even Shogo. Blood, NOLF, and Claw were masterpieces. Thanks for making this available!

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