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Terminal Reality (often shortened to TRI) is a video game development and production company based out of Lewisville, Texas. Founded in 1994 by ex-Microsoft employee Mark Randel and former Mallard Software general manager Brett Combs, Terminal Reality develops a variety of games including racing games (such as 4x4 EVO 2), 3D action games (such as BloodRayne), and more. It is part of the many game development companies in the Dallas area, known as the Dallas Gaming Mafia.

History

Mark Randell began programming commercial software at age 15, but it wasn't until 1991 that Mark entered the computer game industry when he teamed with game programmer Bruce Artwick to write add-on products for the just released Microsoft Flight Simulator 4.0. This led to Mark becoming the co-designer and lead programmer for Flight Simulator 5.0 and designing the next generation flight technology standard. This technology is still in use today by Microsoft in various Flight Simulator releases.

After leaving the Bruce Artwick Organization in mid 1994, Mark and Brett founded Terminal Reality in October 1994, which required Brett leave Chicago where he had just finished up on his BSE and MS in electrical engineering from University of Illinois. The goal of Terminal Reality was to exploit texture mapped 3D game engines, with only $1000, and working out of Brett Combs' home. During that time they were developing their first release, Terminal Velocity, and pulled together $120,000, received advances on the game and were basically able to avoid giving up ownership and primary decision rights to venture capitalists. After that first year the company generated $1.2 Million and nearly doubled it the second year with $2.1 Million.^[1]

Terminal Reality's first game, Terminal Velocity, was a 3-D air combat game, Brett Combs pitched to Garland-based publisher 3D Realms. 3D Realms was the new division started by the popular Apogee Software known for its arcade style action shooters and titles such as Wolfenstein 3D. Scott Miller was intrigued by Randel's technology and Combs' management. Scott later said in a Dallas Business Journal report that "They had the backgrounds and track records with proven experience to pull off the game they were pitching to us."^[2]

Terminal Reality went on, after the success of Terminal Velocity with 3D Realms, to publish titles with Microsoft such as Fury3, Hellbender, Monster Truck Madness, CART Precision Racing and Monster Truck Madness 2. By January 1998, Terminal Reality became an equity partner and founding developer of Gathering of Developers, a Dallas, Texas based publisher in which Brett Combs sits on the Board of Directors.^[2]

TRI Technology

Infernal Engine

In addition to game development, TRI is also the creator of the Infernal Engine: a cross-platform, full-featured foundation for building video games that the company licenses to other developers and publishers.^[3] The Infernal Engine is a unified system, providing superior rendering, physics, sound, AI, and even metrics in a single package.^[4]

A key component to the Infernal Engine is the VELOCITY Physics Engine: a highly advanced physics simulator that offers an advanced collision system, dynamic destruction for scenery and environmental objects, accurate vehicle driving dynamics, ultra-real human body physics with anatomical joint constraints and simulated muscles/tendons, advanced hair and cloth simulation for actors.^[4]

Photex Engine

The Photex engine was the original 3D engine created by Terminal Reality. The last game using this engine was Fly! II, which used Photex 3.

Games developed

Games published

• 4x4 EVO 2 (PlayStation 2 & Xbox)
• Fly! (Macintosh)

Games cancelled

• Demonik (Windows, Xbox 360) (cancelled by the publisher, Majesco) when they ran into money problems. Gameplay footage taken from this game was used in the film Grandma's Boy.
• Monster Truck Madness 3, was rumored (namely, about Bill Gates and an MTM3 alpha) but never confirmed, was later canceled.

References

External links

• Terminal Reality's website
• Infernal Engine website
• Infernal Engine full game list
• Terminal Reality profile on MobyGames