In 1997 the “Blade Runner” universe expanded into a PC Computer Game called “Blade Runner”, made by Westwood Studios.
The game is based upon the movie and some locations from the movie are also in the game, The game also has some of the important stuff from the Phillip K. Dick book “Do androids dream of electric sheep” on which the movie was based
You take on the role as the Blade Runner detective Ray McCoy and you have to solve a case that involves 
an animal murder. You soon find out that some things isn’t what they appear to be.
So.. Who would be better to tell you what he thinks of the game, then a die-hard Blade Runner movie fan ?. Here it goes…
The game is pretty big, it comes on 4 CD’s and you have 12 different endings depending on how you play the game, and depending on how you play you will also notice that the computer controlled individuals behave and act differently from game to game. Westwood Studios call the game “The First Real-Time 3D Adventure” and when they say 3D they don’t mean “Doom” style graphics. Instead they use something called Voxel technology. So they first made 3D models and then made them look alive by using Motion Capture technology.
The Graphics are truly wonderful but sometimes different characters look a little grainy. But that’s something that comes along with using the Voxel Technology. Westwood Studios have successfully kept the feeling of the city Los Angeles as it’s portrayed in the Blade Runner movie. The intro sequence are one of the most beautiful intros I’ve ever seen in any game, it’s hard to see if it is computer generated graphics or if its video taken from the movie during the intro.
The Graphics are truly wonderful but sometimes different characters look a little grainy. But that’s something that comes along with using the Voxel Technology. Westwood Studios have successfully kept the feeling of the city Los Angeles as it’s portrayed in the Blade Runner movie. The intro sequence are one of the most beautiful intros I’ve ever seen in any game, it’s hard to see if it is computer generated graphics or if its video taken from the movie during the intro.
Game play are also good, you have a “K.I.A” (Knowledge Integration Assistant) that saves up all the important leads you have to work on.
You use the mouse to control Ray and you can point and click on the left mouse button to move Ray, if you press the left mouse buttons several times, then Ray starts to run (a pretty nifty idea). If you click on the right mouse button then Ray picks up his gun. You also get to use the “Esper machine” and do Voight Kampf tests just like in the movie.
The Sound is good too. The music are the same as in the movie but the music are not done by Vangelis. The characters voices are good and some of the original cast came back to do their characters once more, this however are something that usually never ends up as good as it should. (There are a lot of Star Trek games with the real cast doing voices for their movie/tv characters, one can usually feel that they did the voices without the costumes and not on a real set) and I did notice this in this game too, some of the voices worked, some didn’t.
The re-appearing characters/voices from the movie are: Sean Young as Rachael, Joseph Turkel as Tyrell, James Hong as Chew, William Sandersson as Sebastian and finally Brion James as Leon
The Story are great enough to be turned into a book by itself, as I mentioned they didn’t just remodel the movie into a game, who ever wrote the script for the game made a great story. I belive that the story could do great as a book, it isnt a sequel that picks up where the Blade Runner movie ended. It could be described as a story of yet another cop on the Blade Runner unit that finds a group of replicants “by mistake”
My Opinion:
There is actually not one thing I can think of that made me dislike the game. You will notice that Westwood Studios have really put down some hard work on this game (Not that they ever done a bad game that I know of) but they made Blade Runner into something extra, and when you play you get the “Blade Runnerish” feeling that you get from watching the movie, but then again, the storyline is not much like the movie (which I think is a good thing). The people who wrote the story for the game must have looked a bit more to the book “Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep” and used a lot of stuff from it.
It has a nice blend of the movie and the book that the movie was based upon. It isn’t just like the movie Blade Runner (Even thou they mention Deckard once), Westwood Studios worked together with The Blade Runner Partnership and I belive that The Blade Runner Partnership selected Westwood Studios because they felt that this where people who could do a great game and know what the Blade Runner universe is all about.
So.. It’s a great game, worthy of being titled “Blade Runner”
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