The Terminator

God what a great game. It was made by Bethesda Software in the very early 90s. The very first first person shooter I ever played. I don't know why this didn't skyrocket like Wolfenstein 3d. Sure, it had worse graphics but much better gameplay. And gameplay makes the game. For one, you had a very fun mission. You either play Kyle Reese or the T-1000 and try to kill each other. You are both placed on random spots on a positively HUGE map of Los Angeles. If you are Reese, you are weaker and you have to find and protect Sarah Connor but your advantage is that you can heal at hospitals and walk into stores without causing chaos. If you are the T-1000, you are stronger, faster, but you can't do the things listed above. God there were so many weapons. You had your uzis, Berettas, hunting rifles, ak-47s. But if you found the secret army depots, you had grenades, m-16s, and rocket launchers (blowing up random cars was my secondary mission besides searching and destroying the T-1000)! Damn what a cool game. Plus you could jack and drive any car you see. Rob banks and stores, shoot around in a shooting gallery, mow down innocent people and then mow down entire SWAT teams. You could buy a whole load of things from crowbars to running shoes. I didn't know how to effectively use the condom though. Also, I always figured you were supposed to inseminate Sarah Conner as Kyle Reese but didn't know how. Note: Ignore what holloway has said about this game. He's thinking of another game. I am not referring to the bland point and shoot uzi conversion to a pc. This game came way before that.

There are a number of different versions of the Terminator.

The original Terminators created by skynet had rubber skin and were very easy to detect and destroy.

Later the T-800 was created. This terminator was often adorned with human skin. This made them much more difficult to detect. Dogs were often used for this purpose. The kind of Terminator that was originally sent to kill Sarah Connor was a T-800. It was also the kind that was reprogrammed and sent back to help save Sarah and her son later.

After this the T-1000 was developed. This kind of terminator was created out of liquid metal which allowed it to change its form into anything that it touched. This adds both resiliance and stealth to the machine. The-T 1000 was the type of terminator sent to kill Sarah's son.

Somehow these machines managed to find themselves in two movies of the same name.

Along with the various androids, a terminator is one who terminates.

It is also a device that ends electrical signals.

The Terminator (although as far as the script and trailers are concerned it was just 'Terminator') is a seminal action film from 1984. It was directed by James Cameron and starred Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael Biehn and Linda Hamilton. It is a model of how to make a low-budget action film - short, taut, suspenseful and action-packed, with a memorable villain and heroes that the audience care about. Everything works by dint of being created by intelligent, resourceful people who cared about the material and who were left alone; the talking bits ('exposition', of which the film contains an unusually large amount, due to the complex plot), the fighting bits, the romantic bits hang together in a way that a thousand dtv directors wish they could bottle.

The plot was based heavily on Harlan Ellison's Outer Limits episodes 'Demon with a Glass Hand' and 'Soldier'; this was not initially acknowledged, and Ellison successfully sued. James Cameron had previously directly Piranha 2, whilst Arnold Schwarzenegger was still trying to find a place in Hollywood after the swords-and-sorcery boom started by Conan the Barbarian had fizzled out. The Terminator itself was originally to be played by either O J Simpson or Lance Henriksen, whilst Schwarzenegger was to be the hero (Cameron's own pre-production artwork shows Henrisksen as an anonymous, shadowy figure closer to a private eye than an unstoppable killing machine). Arnie was shrewd enough to realise that the part of the hero, whilst heroic, was utterly overshadowed by that of the title character; with this film he passed from being a comical muscleman to being cool as fuck. Despite the unemotional nature of the role, and the fact that he delivered fewer than a hundred words, Schwarzenegger's interpretation of the character was a fine piece of acting; the Terminator became the most interesting character, with tiny, human gestures breaking through the metal. A small sequence in which the Terminator pauses - having just cut out a damaged eyeball with a dirty scalpel - to pat down his hair and adjust his sunglasses is sublime.

The film cost $5 million, and was filmed largely on location in the streets of Los Angeles. It was extremely influential - blue fog, electronic soundtracks, a robot baddie with cyborg vision, and the 9mm Uzi submachine-gun all became cliches shortly afterwards. Part of the key to the film's appeal was that, like The Matrix years later, it came out of the blue - by all rights, it should have been a disastrously tacky re-run of the late-70s vigilante films. That the film worked as science fiction, romance and action flick was completely unexpected.

Furthermore, it introduced Arnold's signature quote, 'I'll be back', although in the original script this was the less-memorable 'I'll come back'.

Rather like Robocop a few years later, The Terminator should be required viewing for all students of cinema, action or otherwise. It gets straight to the point, it doesn't have a wasted moment, and it exceeds expectations.