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ByeBye Bush:
-1193 days
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ByeBye Bush:
-1193 days
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Originally written: sometime in 1997 or 1998
The Mac Daddy of all first person shooters (FPS), probably needing no introduction.
For those living in a cave the last two years: in Quake you run around making giblets of anything that moves. It has an extensible system for modification and arguably has the largest online following of any game (definitely the commercial ones).
Yes, I played Wolfenstein. Yes, I played Doom. Yes, I played Duke Nukem 3D, Rise of the Triad, Blood, Dark Forces (I & II), and all their ilk. None of them can hold a candle to Quake.
Perhaps I should qualify this statement. No shooter holds a candle to multiplayer, modified Quake; or even more specifically Team Fortress.
If you are looking for single player (SP) fun and excitement, look elsewhere. However, if you enjoy sneaking up behind someone before sending their head to the ceiling from your recently-launched rocket Quake is the game for you.
Positives: Um... well... if you use a bot you can get ready for online play. Some of those bots are damn good. If you like turning beasties into chunky piles of goo but are not ready for the online experience I guess SP might be OK for you. Better FPS SP experiences can be found in either of the Dark Forces games or even Duke Nukem.
Most of the games drawbacks are shown most readily in SP mode. The drab color palette. The boring and predictable enemies (with the possible exception of the Reaper... or whatever that jumping creature is named). Some overly large maps. Simple 'quests'. etc. etc. SP mode should be considered only to get yourself familiar with the game. The real fun lies in multi-play.
This is where the game really shines (with a few caveats). Deathmatch in general doesn't light my fire (I would like to say 'it blows' but I believe that is the Quake-mentality slipping in). Rocket Arena is the sole deathmatch-style game I enjoy.
Straight deathmatching contains all of the drawbacks of the SP experience with the added bonus of three million pimply-faced anonymous wannabe-flamer boys (and gals) who get their jollies from showing the world they can type "fuck" in extended ANSI characters. Their world revolves around the size of their ping (the smaller the better), camping, and gay bashing when they are losing. I've only encountered a collection of comparably feeble minded individuals thrice; at the '94 Republican convention, the Promise Keepers, and in Diablo.
Note: this is in regards to iNet play only. LAN parties with your friends are a blast (especially with the low latency inherent with a LAN).
There are also innumerable clans out there. If you have a belief I'm sure you can find a clan to fit your needs. Personally, I am not all that into clans but whatever floats your boat.
Have I mentioned Team Fortress (TF) yet? Capture the Flag (CTF) was OK, but you are still just the Quake dude. TF introduces 9 new classes, all with distinct traits requiring different strategies. No better fun is to be had in Quake than Quake TF. Mega TF is a nice addition that kept me playing a couple weeks longer than I would have otherwise, but it seriously unbalances the beauty that is TF. Further review can be found on my TF page.
Some other mods I've enjoyed are the aforementioned Rocket Arena; mano a mano in a tiny enclosure with just a rocket launcher. Still, TF Arena beats regular Rocket Arena any day of the week. CTF started the mod craze, but wore out quickly. Quake Rally and Quake Soccer - both fairly fun - burnt out quickly. I have found and wanted to try others but either the installation was unsuccessful or no servers are to be found.
Don't bother with any of the mods sold in stores. X-Men, from what I hear, is an extremely poor mod and is outshined by numerous free ones. There are many other examples, but none are worth the money.
That said, let me explain why I will probably play Quake into the next millenium. Quake is the "killer app" for two thinigs; one a piece of hardware and the other a paradigm shift of epic proportions.
The hardware, naturally, is the 3D accelerator card. I bought one because I wanted to play GL quake. The folks at 3dfx owe their entire existence to the id folk (id should have made the 3dfx people be their gofers out of respect. Luckily they did not and 3dfx is well ensconced now and way ahead of the rest of the game). Oh, I bought a Canopus Pure 3D (Voodoo 1, 6 MB) to go along with my Riva 128 by the way.
Being able to play at a higher resolution with more colors, sharper images, and faster performance is amazing. The difference between GL and normal Quake is astounding, and one can never go back to 300x200 256 color normal Quake after playing 640x480 16 million color GL.
The paradigm shift is the more important of the two. Quake ushered in a move towards openness and extensibility in commercial games. Though the iNet and certain other segments (Linux comes to mind) had long been aligned in this direction, Quake was the first to really really buy into it.
Not only is quake extensible and open, but it is simple to do so (with a little work). Public servers are easily set up and maintained. Custom skins for your players are easily designed. The extensibility of the core game itself is of paramount importance. The game is so open to modification that you can create an entirely different (and unrecognizably Quake-ish) just by programming and some modelling (no, not that kind of modelling). Total Annihilation and Starcraft have picked up on this trend somewhat - TA with it's plethora of new units and SC with it's fairly powerful Campaign Editor. Let's hope this trend continues with other games and genres.
I find myself gong through phases where I do not play Quake for weeks or months at a stretch and then go insane over it for a while. Quake, and particularly Team Fortress will always hold a place in my heart. Buy it. Frag some friends. Ignore the retards in DM and make the world a better place.
I'm not going to link maps here, but rather point you to my review of Quake Maps. If I'm in a good mood, I might go back and find links for all of them (I'm on a laptop disconnected from the iNet at the moment, so it will have to go on The List).