Bjossi on 29/11/2008 at 22:18

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I vastly prefer the old-style movement of the Unreal games. No nonsensical moves like double jumping, and the speed was in sync with the scaling. In UT2003/4 and UT3 I feel like a midget holding down fast-foward.

june gloom on 30/11/2008 at 01:08

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Nothing can save UT3. The only thing epic about Epic is their fail.

Gryzemuis on 30/11/2008 at 10:22

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There was one single reason why UT99 was such a successful online game. Most gamers don't realize this. And Epic certainly never realized it.

UT99 allowed players of different skill and experience levels to play together online.

Note two things. Different skills. Together.


Until UT99 most online shooters focused on deathmatch. There was Q1 CTF of course. But Q3 was about deathmatch. You play on your own against everybody else. With UT99 CTF you could go online, and play in a team. That is not only more fun, more social. But it also brings more depth to the game. Later other games had successful teammodes. But UT200[34] basically killed CTF and brought focus back to solo deathmatch.

Now how come that different players of different skills could play together better ?

UT99 had heavier weapons. You could kill someone with full health, maybe 200 health or a shieldbelt in one hit. 6 rockets fired simultanously. A combo with the asmd. A flak grenade in the face. A headshot with the rifle. Any noob could have one lucky shot and kill an uberplayer. This would make the lesser player happy. It would actually give him a chance. He could camp the flag. Or camp a chokepoint near midfield. Even a lesser player could make himself a little useful. In UT200[34] you needed to hit several shots against your opponent before he would die. This would even out odds, and give the better player more chance to survive and kill his lesser opponent.

The instagib mod is an example of this. Although aiming skill (and dodging skill) is very important in instagib, the kids seemed to love it. Powerful weapons give more fun to the average gamer.

UT200[34] movement was out of control. A good player could dodge around so much, and so quickly, a lesser player would hardly be able to hit him. Same thing as about the heavy hitting weapons. Not fun for a lesser player.

UT200[34] movement allowed flag-carriers to move quicker. And the nerfed translocator made it harder to catch up with a flag-runner. In UT99 as a flagrunner you often had to fight the same opponents 3 times before you made it back all the way. That was hard, but gave you an epic feeling. Getting the flag and getting back to midfield in UT200[34] was just as hard as in UT99. But in UT99 once you made it to midfield, you had to battle through midfield, and then probably battle in your own base one more time. In UT200[34], once you made it to midfield, you were almost done.

UT2003 had adrenaline. A game-element that made things worse. When you capped a flag, you would get extra adrenaline. That would allow you to do another flagrun on higher speed, or with extra healing, etc. Basically, the team that capped first would have a huge advantage to cap a second time. This would make skill differences between teams bigger, not smaller.

UT200[34] dodging and movement makes it harder to kill someone with splash weapons. Hitscan weapons were much more important. So aim got more important. This favors better players. At the same time, UT200[34] had some maps with such narrow chokepoints, that spam was ridiculous there. A good map has wider chokepoints, where you have to aim your spam just a little bit.

Players want close games. Players like to have a chance, even when they lose. UT200[34] lowered chances for the lesser players. They could have less lucky frags and less lucky wins. Teamplay would matter less in UT200[34]. The better players would dominate the rest. This makes the noobs leave the game, as it is no fun to get no frags in a 20 minute CTF match. After that, the better players would dominate the average players. Now the average players would leave. In the end you have only the best players left. The community is very small now, and won't survive. And you won't get fresh blood.

Combined with the lack of good CTF maps, and the focus on deathmatch, it killed CTF. And in deathmatch, the problem is even worse, as the better players will dominate the average player, and there are no teams to even out sides.

Also, the menus in UT200[34] and UT3 are terrible. Designed for monkeys playing on consoles. The UT99 UI was perfect. The refusal by Epic to fix the UI is a slap in the face for PC users. They have said and showed so many times that they don't care for their heritage, but only care for console games and trying to push their engine. As a result, I promised myself to never pay a single euro for any of their games anymore.

Epic never understood what made UT99 so good. They are clueless.

Bjossi on 30/11/2008 at 17:45

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I agree with everything LittleFlower said. And dethtoll summarizes it pretty nicely above; the only thing epic about Epic is their fail. I lost a lot of respect for Epic with the release of UT3, but after announcing that they would never release GoW 2 for the PC I lost the rest of that respect. Not that I care for GoW, just that it shows their opinion on modern PC gaming.

At least I got my original copies of Unreal, Unreal: Return to Na Pali and UT99 GotY still in excellent shape. Yay. :D

Aja on 30/11/2008 at 19:37

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epic fail haha do you guys write your own material??