Mace: The Dark Age is a 1997 fighting video game developed and published by Atari Games for arcades, with a port for the Nintendo 64 later released by Midway. Like many fighting games of the time, its style is marked by extreme violence, with characters graphically slaying defeated opponents. Utilizing 3dfx Voodoo chips for the hardware, the game received attention for its cutting-edge graphics and turned Atari a profit in the arcades. Critical response to the gameplay was much less enthusiastic.
Gameplay
[[File:Mace_The_Dark_Age_Arcade_Gameplay_Screenshot.png|thumb|left|Mace: The Dark Age's graphics were praised by many critics. An evade button allows characters to step backward or forward into the 3D environments.
Development
Mace: The Dark Age took roughly two years to develop. The developers created 30 characters, then narrowed them down to a lineup of 11 through focus groups of teenagers. A member of the Atari team who happened to be in the Society for Creative Anachronism did all the motion capture acting. The 3Dfx technology was cheaper to develop for than a proprietary system, and Atari used the savings to sell the game at a lower cost to arcade operators.