The Conduit
The Conduit is a first-person shooter video game developed by High Voltage Software for the Wii console and Android. The Conduit was revealed on April 17, 2008,[7] and on October 29, 2008, the developer announced that Sega had signed on to be the game's publisher.[8] The game was released in North America on June 23, 2009,[2] in Europe on July 10, 2009,[1] and in Australia on July 16, 2009.[3]
This article is about the 2009 video game. For the 2005 album by Jarboe, see The Conduit (album).The Conduit
High Voltage Software
War Drum Studios (The Conduit HD)
Wii:
Sega
Android:
High Voltage Software
Rob Nicholls
Eric Nofsinger[4]
The Conduit
Quantum3
Development of The Conduit began in October 2007.[9] The game makes use of the Quantum3 engine, a game engine designed by High Voltage Software specifically for the Wii. The engine allows effects such as bump mapping, reflection and refraction, and gloss and detail mapping to be implemented in the game.[7] High Voltage Software's goal in creating the engine was to make The Conduit a competitive experience visually comparable to games on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.[4]
The campaign storyline focuses on an alien invasion of Washington, D.C. in the near future. The alien race, known as the Drudge, uses the eponymous portal-like Conduits to deploy their forces throughout the city. A shadow government organization called the Trust sends newly inducted agent Michael Ford into the area initially to disrupt a terrorist threat, but he quickly becomes embroiled in the fight to stop the invasion and save the capital from destruction.[10] The online multiplayer feature of the game can support up to 12 players and includes several game modes such as "Free for All" and "Team Reaper", and has voice chat capability through the Wii Speak peripheral.[11][12]
A sequel, Conduit 2, was announced on March 29, 2010,[13] and released in April 2011. A high definition port titled The Conduit HD for Android was released, initially for devices with Nvidia Tegra chipsets, on March 14, 2013.[14] The port went on to receive critical acclaim.[15]
Synopsis[edit]
Setting[edit]
The Conduit takes place in the near future, as Washington, D.C. is shaken by several unusual and tragic incidents. A mysterious flu-like disease known as "the Bug" has swept across the region through local water sources, resulting in high-security locations being left understaffed as government workers are afflicted. Months after the initial outbreak, an alleged terrorist attack destroys part of the Washington Monument, and on September 11, a senator is assassinated by another terrorist cell reportedly disguised as members of her staff, greatly heightening local and national tensions.[10] Most alarmingly, an assassination attempt on the President of the United States occurs only weeks after the previous attacks, carried out by the president's own Secret Service detail.[28] In the midst of these events, Agent Michael Ford must overcome the onslaught of the alien Drudge and the humans under the Drudge's control, and defeat the masterminds behind the invasion.[10][18]
Characters[edit]
The Conduit's protagonist is Agent Michael Ford[31] (voiced by Mark Sheppard),[32] a Secret Service agent who is inducted into the Trust after saving U.S. President Charles Thompson during an assassination attempt.[28] John Adams (voiced by W. Morgan Sheppard)[32] is the enigmatic commander of the Trust who sends Agent Ford into Washington, D.C. to combat a rising terrorist threat and recover stolen Trust technology; he is later set up as the game's central antagonist. Prometheus (voiced by Kevin Sorbo)[32] is introduced as the terrorist leader, but becomes the sole supporting character and assists Ford's efforts against the Drudge.[10][18]
Plot[edit]
Agent Michael Ford regains consciousness in a collapsed Washington Metro tunnel, some time after the invasion of the alien Drudge. Fighting his way through utility corridors, Ford comes upon a massive Conduit embedded in the atrium of a Metro station. After defeating the aliens' defense, Ford enters the Conduit.
The story then flashes back to five days earlier, before the invasion, as Ford is contacted by John Adams, leader of the mysterious Trust organization. He informs Ford of an upcoming operation to recover a Trust prototype stolen by the terrorist Prometheus. The Trust has set up an ambush at Reagan National Airport to capture Prometheus as he flees, and Ford is assigned to ensure that if the ambush fails, Prometheus will be apprehended at any cost. During the operation, the Trust agents turn against Ford and he is forced to battle his way through the airport to the Metro train that Prometheus is supposed to be using. As Ford reaches the forward train car with no sign of Prometheus, a wounded scientist tries to destroy the train. Ford survives the explosion and regains the prototype All-Seeing Eye. Alarmed at Prometheus' ability to turn his own agents against him, Adams orders Ford to infiltrate Prometheus' base at Bunker 13, a defunct Cold War-era facility, and hack into his lines of communication. After Ford destroys a cache of mind-altering chemicals, Adams betrays him, saying he will tell the President that Ford died fighting the first wave of the Drudge invasion. Ford is then contacted by Prometheus, who offers him a way out. Emerging from the bunker near the now combat-damaged Jefferson Memorial, Ford eliminates a Drudge force and is airlifted to safety by Prometheus' helicopter.
Ford is dropped at the Library of Congress and told to demolish the Drudge nests hidden in the sewers below before the city is overwhelmed. Prometheus reveals that he was a former member of the Trust who became disillusioned and defected with the All-Seeing Eye. He explains that Adams had been manipulating Ford, and had made him destroy the Trust-developed neuro-toxins in Bunker 13 to cover the organization's tracks. At this point, Ford assumes Adams and The Trust are cooperating with the Drudge in order to take control of the country. Desperate to upset Adams' plan, Ford storms the White House in an attempt to save President Thompson. During the rescue the President is led to believe that Ford is a Trust agent; thinking that the Trust can avert the crisis, Thompson signs over executive power to Adams before escaping on the Marine One.
Prometheus then prompts Ford to investigate and defend the Pentagon and secure its national defense codes. After he eliminates the Drudge forces there, Prometheus deduces that a much larger infestation is in downtown Washington D.C. The search for its source leads Ford down into the subways, where he finds and enters the large Conduit depicted at the start of the game. It transports him to the Trust's headquarters, where he learns that the existing Drudge are being created and deployed into the city by Trust-maintained Conduits. After fighting through the base, with Adams taunting Ford and jamming Prometheus' communications signal, Ford reaches a chamber holding a single captive alien being who reveals himself as Prometheus. Prometheus explains that he was used as the genetic blueprint to clone Adams' army of Drudge, who at this point are revealed to be creatures created on the Earth and are not aliens, and persuades Ford to kill him to prevent Adams' work from continuing. Ford, after hesitation, complies and proceeds to clear out the rest of the base, when Adams disables the base's Conduit networks and activates its self-destruct sequence to trap Ford. Prometheus then speaks to Ford from the ASE, where he uploaded his consciousness before his death, and instructs Ford on how to reactivate the Conduit network in the base. After fighting his way through the last of the Drudge, Ford enters a Conduit to escape the self-destructing Trust headquarters, determined to find and kill Adams. This leads immediately into the events of Conduit 2.
During the credits, Adams can be heard speaking to an unknown alien contact, where he reveals himself to be Enlil, an alien exile who has been on Earth for 240 years. Adams/Enlil reports that Prometheus is dead, and that the plan to take control of Earth is still in effect.
Marketing[edit]
Promotions[edit]
High Voltage Software launched a contest for user-created control configurations for The Conduit on September 18, 2008. One control scheme would be selected from the submissions and added to the game as a preset configuration, and the name of the configuration's creator would be noted in the credits.[47] The contest ended with three winners being chosen; the results were announced by Lead Designer Rob Nicholls in a video overview of the game released on January 15, 2009.[40]
In May 2009, a video mashup contest for The Conduit sponsored by the creator of the software program ACIDPlanet and in association with the game's developer was announced. Participants are asked to create and submit a video of in-game footage from The Conduit using the available video clips and game audio tracks on the ACIDPlanet website. Winners received assorted merchandise from Sony Creative Software, Sega, and High Voltage Software, and the winning audio mixes were included as a bonus track with the game's official soundtrack.[48] The soundtrack however, was never officially released.
Retail editions[edit]
The Conduit was sold in two separate versions: the Standard Edition and the Special Limited Edition. The Standard Edition includes only the game disc and instructional manual with no extra features. The Special Limited Edition includes the game disc, the manual, a 24-page art book featuring concept art made at different stages of the game's development and an alternative Special Edition case cover art. On the last page of the Art Book are two cheat codes to unlock a special ASE for single player mode and a Special Agent skin for online player. There is a third code that is not listed that lets the character play as a Drone. However, since the game disc and manual is the same in both releases, the codes are not unique, and thus purchasing the Special Limited Edition is not necessary to unlock the bonus in-game content.[49]
Comic[edit]
To promote the release of the game, Sega released a tie in comic book titled The Conduit: Orange Lights, written by Pat Dolan. The comic was made available as a free PDF file through amazon.com.[50] Set three weeks after the events of the game's single-player campaign, Orange Lights chronicles the efforts of conspiracy radio host Gordon Welles to disseminate incomplete, raw footage of Michael Ford's actions, captured by news reporter Heather Hampton, to the public.