

Amen: The Awakening

The Ultimate Resource

Choose a section:

1 :: Real-Life Story

2 :: In-Game Story

3 :: Movie Clip

4 :: Music Samples

5 :: Screenshots & Concept Art

6 :: Preview

7 :: Desktop Backgrounds

This section on Amen: The Awakening is designed to help provide a more complete picture of Cavedog and all of their games, and to release exclusive content TA Universe and Enemy-One have obtained.



1 :: The Story In Real Life

January 6, 2000 was the real awakening for game players looking forward to Amen: The Awakening. On that day, Infogrames/GTIS/Humongous/Cavedog decided to pull the plug on the ambitious game.

The game fell victim to an overly optimistic design plan. The features of the game, while achieveable, were too time consuming for cash-strapped GTIS to allow to continue. Cavedog Entertainment was hardly a bankable entity, with Total Annihilation a moderate success (although, critically, a huge advance in the RTS genre) and Total Annihilation: Kingdoms, the sequel that wasn't a sequel, was foundering in the bargain bins.

Significant expenditures had gone into several other projects that would never see the light of day, specifically Elysium and Good and Evil, which weren't going to see the light of day for a long time, if at all. With the project about 50% complete, the plug was pulled and the gaming world was left with a few tantalizing images and movies to show what could have been. When the game was cancelled in January of 2000, it had already been in production for at least a year and a half but was still only 50% done.

Not long after the cancellation, Cavedog shut its doors for good, suspending production on all projects and laying off or shifting its staff to Humongous Entertainment, the parent company.

For those that hold lingering hope for the title, word has it that Greg MacMartin, the lead designer, retained rights to the story after his departure from Cavedog. He is currently working on Homeworld 2.

2 :: The In-Game Story Line

Date: Christmas Eve, 2032.

People around the world prepare for the one day when peace generally reigns over the turbulent planet. Children across the globe are filled with excitement and wonder; parents settle down to enjoy a relaxed holiday; and even soldiers and police are filled with an inner joy at this special time of the year.

But this quiet happiness is brutally shattered when a third of the world's population suddenly goes on a berserker rampage, killing anyone around them who hasn't experienced what's eventually called "The Awakening." An evil spirit dwells in a large portion of the world's populous, known simply as "The Afflicted."

After his wife and daughter are killed by The Afflicted, an SAS commando known as Bishop Six decides to join a strike force whose goal is to halt the advance of The Afflicted in the United States, which, mere months after the disaster, has used the upheaval to come perilously close to gaining total control. Whether the madness is caused by an unknown virus, unchecked chemical warfare development, or is the start of Armageddon as prophesied in the Bible, Bishop Six's objectives remain the same: stop the carnage and uncover the causes for the horror.

3 :: Movie

Exclusive Amen: The Awakening movie clip - Requires a recent QuickTime version

Stills from the movie:

4 :: Music

Sample two songs written for Amen by Jeremy Soule, award winning composer:

"Act 3: Mysterious Attacker"

:: MP3

5 :: In-Game Screenshots & Concept Art

Click on the thumbnail to view a larger image:

For almost 20 more screenshots see the Amen Preview.

6 :: Preview

Read the complete Amen Preview from early 1999, complete with almost 20 screenshots.

7 :: Desktop Backgrounds