Articles in the archive contain broken links because outdated files are removed.
| Friday, August 1, 1997 |
Quake 2
Screenshots
Thanks [DC]GRiFTeR for pointing out that
the screenshots corresponding to the animated GIF in Dis' .plan (next story) are up on id's Quake 2 page.
Flash in the .plan
From Disruptor's
.plan (thanks Monkeyboy):
Quake 2 Screenshot
There is a screenshot from a level Paul Jaquays is working on posted on
the Quake Workshop.
Deathmatch
Essentials
A spiffed up version of the really cool Deathmatch Essentials demo (4.4 MB) that was
premiered at QuakeCon has been released on the Deathmatch
Essentials page. The demo shows RAzOR Entertainment's new patch (to be released soon),
which allows for crouching, and will also show what weapon each player is holding in
deathmatch. To show the weapons, a new player model is required for each weapon, which
requires 16 MB of RAM to accomplish (one of the reason's id chose not to do it), but if
you have the RAM, and most do at this point, the effect works with no slowdown on the
machine (and looks beautiful).
Fray Stuff
Priority registration (which pre-registers you for all the tournaments,
etc.) for the Fray ends this evening at 7:00 PM Eastern Time. There is also word on the Fray page that today marks the
opening of the CyberWeb Cafe (there's an odd "name the painting contest" posted
in honor of that), so congrats to them on the occasion. Thanks Prophet.
Half Life Screenshot
There's another new Half-Life screenshot out, this one on Jaspur's Half-Life.
Sin FAQ
The Sin FAQ,
created under the watchful (sinful?) eye of Ritual Entertainment's Harry Miller has been
posted on Elitegame's Sin page.
Paul Jaquays Interview
Paul Jaquays, id software artist and writer, sent along word that he did an interview that's
posted on the Quake Workshop. Among
other things Paul focuses level design and his approach to it. A very interesting,
informative read.
Arch Mage
The version 0.1 beta of the Arch Mage TC has been released on the Arch Mage homepage (hey, that rhymes!).
The release is in two parts, a zip of the .pak
file (4.3 MB), and a zip of the progs.dat
(288 KB), to easily allow replacement of one but not the other in the future. Note: you
may not be able to use this TC is you have less than 16 MB of RAM. The Beta features 8 new
monsters (4 combatant, 4 non), 43 spells, many new items, and a giant level with
completely new textures. This fantasy TC looks very cool, and features a conversation mode
where the story advances by talking to the other characters in the game.
Un-Unreal Movie
The Unreal movie that was posted on Unreal.com
has been pulled because it was apparently the "wrong version". Also, a transcript of Mark Rein on IRC
(unrelated to the movie, as Stonage was quick to
point out) recently has been posted on Unreal.org. Thanks
Prophet.
DirectX 5 Caveat
There is a warning on Zanshin's
GLQuake Dojo about DirectX 5 interfering with the windows versions of Quake, so
proceed with caution. Thanks micron.
Modesty Update!
I just wanted to pass along to the many out there concerned by the lack of
contact with modesty since her recent accident. You will be happy to know that the reason
for her absence is that she has been convalescing with her sister, which also explains the
disappearance of her wonderful webpage: she had it wiped to ensure there was room for all
the email that would accumulate in her absence. She returns home soon, and hopefully is
well on her way to a speedy recovery.
Quake C Editors
Movement
EQCP, The European Quake Contest Page has relocated to www.swissquake.ch/homepages/eqcp/, and
their '4th contest' has begun.
LAN Parties
But a single LAN Party addition:
Someone attempting to get a gathering together in South Jersey.
etc
Oh, Baby! Guess the exact time (to the nearest minute) of Mynx's impending
baby on the Mynx Babywatch
they had no prize, so I've offered to chip in a SpaceOrb ... I laughed out loud at
sCary's Vanilla Fudge story (show's what's
wrong with me, maybe) ... Got opinions? A Madman's Guide to Game Design is still
interested in feedback on what makes a good deathmatch level ... Similarly, the
implications of 200 Player deathmatch are discussed in this
interesting essay ... News on Bots (the good ones, not the bad ones)
on Dark_Skye's Scrap Heap.
Thanks legion ... Making skins in
16-bit color is the new topic on Slaine's Skins Tutorial
(I've mailed him about the hard to read background, hopefully it'll change) ... Enroll
me now! Where else would you want to go, but Quaker
Valley High School? Thanks CotE|DeathTongue
...
| Thursday, July 31, 1997 |
QuakeCast
Tonight on QuakeCast
(no StormFront tonight, it will be next week), we have Dank and Scud, Thresh (if he
answers the phone) and the proverbial lots more. The show airs live at 8:30 PM Eastern,
and of course will live on forever after that in the archive (eeek!).
GL Screenshots
There are some cool screenshots up on QuakeWorld.Net
of the new colored lighting effect for Quad and Pent carriers that will be in an upcoming
version of GL QuakeWorld. Thanks Monkeyboy.
New BSP
Version 0.83 of the BSP level editor is available on BSP.com.
New SoundBlaster Drivers
I saw on Redwood's that new
Win95 Full Duplex Sound Blaster Drivers (300 KB)
for SB16/SB32/AWE32/AWE64 have been released by Creative Labs.
New Gatling Gun
Gatling Gun version 1.5 has been released on Means of Destruction. Thanks Top Quark.
QuakeWorld Map
Beta
Brian Vannatta, author of the
famed Danzig series of Doom 2 deathmatch maps (considered to be textbook examples of well
made DM levels) is going to be testing his new QuakeWorld map, titled Veni Vidi Vici
(Latin for "I came, I saw, I conquered", or "I sat, I napped, I
fished", or something) this evening at 10:00 PM Eastern Time. Here is beta 4 of Regular Vici for Quakeworld (692 KB) and Vici compiled for GLQuake (696 KB), also available
on Strag's Place of Quakeness.
Brian (aka Strag) is looking for more servers to participate, so email him if you can
help. The test is currently scheduled to take place on these QuakeWorld servers:
24.92.5.23:27500
136.142.161.9:26001
136.142.161.9:26002
The Fray Games
If you are planning on attending the Fray (and you are, aren't you?), you
should probably stop by the
Fray Games, which is collecting information about who is planning on playing what
games there (other than Quake, of course), to allow attendees to be properly prepared when
they arrive.
Intellimouse
BuzzKill's
Quake Page has a section up devoted to the use of Microsoft's Intellimouse (the one
with the little wheel-doohickey). They have also posted a freeware utility to allow you to
use the wheel to switch weapons in Quake.
Quake 2 Editing
Plucky posted an email exchange with American McGee on Quake Editing News, discussing what's involved
in level editing for Quake 2 maps. Many questions get appropriately vague answers, but the
post does reveal that the textures will no longer be held in the .bsp file, though there
is no explanation of how id will copyright their maps now (the reason for the inclusion of
the textures in the first place.
GL Quake Stuff
Jack Mathews updated
his .plan talking a bit more about upcoming features for GL Quake. morbid has been
working a bit on the GL miniport which is opening the door for better performance, and
more cool effects. Jack also makes a point of crediting Gary McTaggart over at 3DFX as an
unheralded hero of GLQuake.
X-Men Page
Marvel Comics has posted their own page on the upcoming X-Men TC (titled X-Men: Ravages of
Apocalypse).
Midnight CTF
Version 4.2 of Midnight CTF has
been released, supporting Zoid's latest fixes and more. There is also a patch there to
allow any QuakeWorld CTF to enable the QW1.64 feature that drops the quad and ring
powerups when the player is killed.
New Qoole
Version 1.982 beta of WinQoole has been released on the QOOLE Page. the new release fixes the texture crashing
bug. Thanks Prophet.
Star Wars Double Header
The Star Wars TC has released a little
preliminary demo (450 KB) that turns the super nailgun to a blaster and adds
stormtrooper skins to the grunts to give a feel for how this project is going. Thanks Ant. Additionally (and coincidentally), Star Wars CTF has been released,
apparently based on ThunderWalker CTF (which is based on Threewave CTF). Thanks David Koskamp.
Quake Name Maker
Version .60 of Quake Name Maker
has been released.
Snipe You Say?
PC Games has a new feature called Snipe's Soapbox, where their Quake
commentator can do his thing. On tap for the first episode? Why a justification of
sniping, of course.
Quake Modeling Association
The Quake Modeling
Association, or QMA, has opened its virtual doors. The site has the goal of being a
home base for those who make models, and their first featured activity is a monthly
low-poly count modeling contest.
Society of the Damned
An .mp3 recording of Freedom Drug, a Society of the Damned song, has been
posted on Eye on Ion, to let you check out what has become the Ion Storm house band.
Thanks Prophet.
Help Wanted
LAN Parties
LAN Party updates: I mentioned
yesterday someone trying to organize a large Northern California event, but I think I
forgot to add it to the page, it's there now; I also added what looks like a huge
gathering in Finland; Also, thanks to loonyboi for passing along this page, of vital
interest to those planning on throwing, or attending a LAN party: a list of Denny's
locations 
| Wednesday, July 30, 1997 |
200 Players
John Carmack updated
his .plan (thanks Slaine) describing something he
discussed a bit at QuakeCon: the limit, or lack thereof, to the number of players possible
in a Quake 2 game:
quake2 +set maxclients 200
:)
The stage is set for ultra-large servers. Imagine everyone at QuakeCon in one gigantic level! A single T1 could run 80 internet players if it wasn't doing anything else, a switched ethernet should be able to run as many as we are ever likely to have together in one place.
There will be a number of issues that will need to be resolved when this becomes a reality, but the fundamentals are there.
There will probably be issues with UDP packet dropping at the ethernet card level that will need to be worked around with a seperate qued thread.
Quake 2 isn't as cpu intensive as QuakeWorld, but I'm not sure even a Pentium-II 300 could run 200 users. An alpha 21264 could certainly deal with it, though.
The new .bsp format has greatly increased size limits, but you could still make a map that hits them. The first one to be hit will probably be 64k brush sides. Ten thousand brushes can make a really big level if you don't make it incredibly detailed. Loading a monster map like that will probably take over a minute, and require 32+ megs of ram.
I should probably make an option for death messages to only be multicast to people that are in the potentially hearable set, otherwise death messages would dominate the bandwidth.
Everyone should start thinking about interesting rules for huge games. A QuakeArmies dll has immense potential. Enemy lines, conquering teritory, multiple clan bases, etc.
Cooperating servers will be possible with modified dlls, but I probably won't include any specific code for it in the default game.dll.
Yes Jib!!
American McGee has made a pair of updates to
his plan that I hope will (but fear will not) settle once and for all that the proper
pronunciation of the word gib is, in fact, jib. Thanks Monkeyboy.
**Ugrent update to the Gib-Jib Debate**
The TRUE inventor of the word "Gib" turns out to be Adrian Carmack, who explains as follows:
"Gib is short for gibblet. Gibblets are guts of a chicken. I first heard a friend of mine use the term. Once I started working at id, I would call the guts I drew "gibs"."
Thanks Adrian. Now we can all sleep a little easier.
Following the original:
As far as I know, the word "Gib" was invented here at id during the DOOM days. At first it was how we referred to the little chunks of meat that we left laying around the level in order to add atmosphere to a level. The editor included all types of "Gib". The editor entities were created by John Carmack and John Romero. I am pretty sure that Romero was the inventor of the word, and I know for a fact that he (and everyone else at id) pronounces it "Jib", not "Gib".
When Christian started working here he would say "Gib". After much beating and torture I have convinced him that he was wrong. If you find yourself having a hard time saying "Jib" then please whack yourself in the head a few times and try again.
When You're Hot, You're Hot
KillCreek made it into Rolling Stone's Hot List this month, which also
earned her a spot on Ion Storm's website,
where they have a copy of the picture (of KC trying to stick a SpaceOrb up her nose) and
the article. The article mentions how she cracked the Romero's skull, so apparently he is
talking rematch.
Half-Life Screenshot
sCary posted another
screenshot from Valve's upcoming Half-Life.
Unreal Movie
Epic has released their Unreal Summer Movie in Quicktime format on the Unreal Homepage. Thanks Anyware. I had mirrored this but Epic asked me to
remove it, sorry.
New Testament
Thresh's Deathmatch Bible
has been updated with new sections covering underwater fighting and one-on-one strategies.
Thanks Anyware.
DM4 version 2
CurMo of YPOD has released an updated version of his
patch to bring the new DM4 rules to all. DM 4
version 2 (65 KB), fixes all known bugs, and adds the new variations that Disruptor
has made to the original.
Star Wars Skins
Skin stud Dan Bickell has redone
his Star Wars Skin collection (383 KB). Check
this out:
The Ripper
Kenneth Scott has posted a cool-looking new monster called the Ripper on
the SkinForge. Thanks Prophet.
Daikatana Site
Ion Storm's Daikatana site is
on-line. Thanks Hudd (Hudd's Daikatana News).
Word on the Stingray 128/3D Drivers
Zanshin, the 3D authority from Zanshin's GLQuake Dojo, has sent along a bit
of info to shed light on why the new beta Windows
drivers (1.8 MB) for the Hercules Stingray 128/3D
are actually slower in GLQuake than the previous drivers.
"...I had an excellent conversation with a source at 3Dfx, who assures me that all is not lost. The reason for the release of the beta drivers is Mechwarrior 2 Mercanaries. It was not their intention to alienate all the GLQuakers out there. Second, the triangle setup problem IS fixed, but there is a new issue with fill-rate being caused by GLIDE internals on the Rush chipset. This is something they will probably be able to fix. ..."
QOOLE Iteration
WinQoole v1.981 beta fixing some bugs that were in v1.98 beta, and DOS
Qoole v1.981 beta are up on the QOOLE site . Thanks Daniel. There is also a new version of the QOOLE QuickBar
at Matt Lee's QOOLE Page. Thanks Prophet.
TEN Flame
Well, there's been some talk among the participants in the All-Female Quake Tourney about the pros and cons
of using TEN as the host. In a development that will shock no one familiar with onethumb,
OT has some strong opinions on the subject, and has posted an essay called TEN just has No Clue on his webpage that recounts some of the
dialog that has surrounded TEN's participation.
All-Male Tourney
There are two websites up for the All-Male Tourney: amt.mauls.com/ and amt.highsynth.com/.
Defusion
Word from the Defusion
team is that the QW port won't be ready by next week, as originally [promised, because
they are working on version 1.0. Also, Monolith
sent along the addresses of two known Defusion servers, as there has been some trouble
with those previously announced:
199.171.28.18
24.3.98.17
HPCL Signups
Some unreliable info turned in by teams signing up for HPCL Season 2 has
caused all the sign ups to be discarded. Teams wishing to participate are required to
register again (HPCL Season 2 only: other leagues are not effected). HighPing Leagues have added staff members to
assist in observing matches. Staff may usually be found in Efnet #highping. Check their
website for details on how to become an HPL Observer if you are interested.
Laurels?
Levelord is sitting
on some laurels. Okay Rich, get back to work!
Server Admin Help
I get a lot of requests for info on a website to help server
administrators: here's a Quake Server Admin Help page
being run by the DeathStar Consortium.
Quake for Charity
The details on the Australian Quake for Charity event have been posted on Quake for Kids.
LAN Parties
LAN Party updates galore: a firm
date for Phoenix; someone trying to organize a large Northern California event; a monthly
tourney in Madison, WI; a monthly Dallas, TX event; a tourney in Wichita KS;
| Tuesday, July 29, 1997 |
The Fray
The Fray page has been
updated with news that the event has moved from the Sheraton to the Nanuet Inn in Nanuet,
NY, which has cut the room prices almost in half, as well as providing a location with
more going on in the vicinity (though no Denny's that we know of). The winners of free
registrations from over the weekend have also been posted.
Linux Glide
The Glide 2.4
Rasterization Library for Linux (Voodoo Graphics) is now available from 3Dfx. Thanks dink[LpL].
Chex Quest 2
From the truly offbeat department, comes Chex Quest, a non-violent game
based on the Doom engine, available on CD-ROM in specially-marked boxes of Chex cereal.
Thanks STZ for sending along the URL of the Chex Quest 2 Page.
Wampeys Census
Wampeys Census has been
updated, with news answers and questions. The new results show over 81% of the respondents
prefer the pronunciation Gibbed over Jibbed (even though it's short for giblets, which is
pronounced jib-lets). Interesting new query: "Given the close relationship between
the game companies and the webmasters of the major Quake pages, do you percieve (sic) a
possible conflict of interest in reporting *all* the news?"
Witchfinder's Quake for the People
GameSpot has a new section called Witchfinder's Quake for the
People to, in their words, "guide you through an armory of independently forged
software add-ons for the unholiest of 3-D games". Thanks Fletcher.
Special Forces Quake
Version 1.0 of Special Forces
Quake (6.4 MB) has been released on the Special
Forces Quake page. The patch features eight new weapons, 10 new enemies, nine new
levels (plus two new Deathmatch levels), as well as new sounds, and music.
DM4 Update
CurMo has released a patch for Quake or QuakeWorld to implement the insane DM4 rules that are being run experimentally on
Inferno (192.246.40.250:27500). You can find it on the YPOD pages (the regular Quake patch also
includes the DM3 rules). Also, Disruptor updated
his .plan again to further reflect upon DM4 (I played it, and it's got to be the
wildest deathmatching I have ever experienced). Here's Xian's update:
Man... It's talking me 3 hours to vis my latest map on all 16 R10k's =(
*sigh* But at least it's a pretty cool looking outdoor/cavy type area.Here are some of the more recent additions made to DM 4.0 rules (and for everyone who e-mailed me about it, yes, it will be released with the next version of QuakeWorld)
More Deathmatch 4.0 Addendums:
------------------------------attain a free "Bonus Invulnerability" *AND* "Bonus Oct". You lose all your cells during the duration, and when it wears off, you regain your cells, and are reduced to 100 health and no armour.
- When you pick up a Quad, you lose all your armour, lose your cells but you do *8 TIMES* (OctaPower) as much damage. When it wears off, you regain your cells, and are reduced again to 0 armour.
- The grenade launcher is back (temporarily). We're testing some new rules due to popular demand. The grenade launcher fires every 1.5 seconds and you lose 2 health points for each grenade you fire.(Oh, and incase you are wondering WTF I am doing this, well, if it works out we'll have a similar idea for a deathmatch mode in Quake II. Doing this as a proof of concept)
GLQuakeWorld
I've gotten to play around with the new GLQuakeWorld client (still in
closed beta), and I am blown away by the performance improvement in GL since morbid
implemented his 8-bit texture mode. In a complete turnaround, I think that the OpenGL
version of the client now offers better gameplay than the vanilla version (I can't wait
for a new version of GLQuake using the same technique). The new version has loads of other
goodies, like the flood protection (we need that in regular Quake, as well), and the
transparent status bar, but most importantly, the gameplay feels much more solid. I am a
die hard regular net Quake fan, but QuakeWorld is rapidly winning me over.
Gaming WebCast
GameCenter is planning a live webcast (Real
player required) this Friday at 4:00 PM Pacific Time. The show features John Romero
"and his buddies from Ion Storm," Paul Schuytema (project leader on Prey), and
some unnamed members of Ritual Entertainment , as well as special guests "to be
announced later." If you have questions for the panel, Send them to Gamecenter, and they may be used for the
show.
Adding Reapers to Other Patches
There are patches on Decker's
Quake Page to allow you to add Reaper Bots to the PainKeep patch and Scourge of
Armagon. Thanks Faustus.
QuakeRally Stuff
Here are a few QuakeRally-related
links that Prophet dug up: A Quake Rally server list, the Official UK QR Site, and
the Speed Zone (QR news and info).
There is also an interview with Rally-meister Ridah up on hyper@ctive.
Demo Specs
Uwe Girlich, the
keeper of all knowledge pertaining to demos and demo recording, has released his Unofficial QWD Format
description, which demystifies the QWD file format of demos recorded with QuakeWorld
as of version 1.64. Also LMPC, The LMP/DMO/DEM/QWD Control Centre (version 3.1.2) now has
rudimentary support for QWD files. the Linux, DOS, Windows, and source code are all
available on the Games Page of
Uwe Girlich.
Operation Modesty
Anyone with an idea on how to contact Modesty (Vanessa Bell) please
contact Bryan Logie so that Operation Modesty
can reach her.
Leagues
Stingray 128/3D Drivers
There are new beta Windows
drivers (1.8 MB) for the problematic Stingray 128/3D, up on the Hercules page. Thanks Cipro. Zanshin
of the fabulous Zanshin's GLQuake Dojo
warns that they seem to actually be slower than the previous drivers.
Rumble Rolls
Rumble, the Quego biz-guy, has announced he is leaving Centaur Interactive to pursue real life
(among other things, he's soon to become Mr. Mom). Best of luck to Rumble in his future
endeavors.
Movement
Quake Utils for SGI IRIX has been renamed Quake for Irix (QFI), and
relocated to woody.agicorp.com/quake/.
Thanks Prophet.
LAN Parties
More, more more! Here are some new LAN
Parties: San Francisco, CA; Dallas, TX; and London, England; Also the confirmed date
for QuakeFest II (Australia) has been announced..
| Monday, July 28, 1997 |
Custom CTF Skins Fix
Grey_Ghost has used the occasion of the release of Threewave CTF 4.2
(Zoid's last CTF for Quake), to repair the remaining bug in CUSTOM-CTF. CUSTOM-CTF allows
you to play CTF and have the anti-crossdresser skins (those clever players that use the
other team's color as their shirt color) whether you play the version with or without the
client-side models. The anti-crossdresser patch and the bug-fix can both be found on the CTF Skins Page.
Quake 2 Music
American McGee updated
his .plan to clarify the plans for music in Quake 2:
There seems to be some talk in the Quake community regarding the Quake 2 music and who might be working on it. I'd like to let you guys in on what's going on in the music area, and set some things straight.
Sure thing:
The majority of the music in Quake 2 is being done by Sascha Dikiciyan and his partner. These are the two guys who did the "Methods of Destruction" CD for Quake. You can find their homepage at: http://www.cyber-age.com/qcdmain.html They will be contributing as many tracks as possible, hopefully allowing us to have at least one track of music per level or level group.Possible things:
Sony records is interested in doing a compilation CD to which you would play Quake 2. Most of the songs on this CD would be previously released material from bands on Sony labels that we here at id enjoy listening to. There is also a chance that there would be one track on this CD done especially for Quake 2. This CD would be a separate product that you would purchase to listen to while playing Quake 2, driving your car, etc. Basically this product would have no connection to id aside from the Quake 2 logo and an id "stamp of approval".The guy most likely to record the special Quake 2 track is Ozzy Ozbourne. He has shown interest in this project and might also do the player sounds (death, pain, etc...)
>From what I understand Ozzy is very interested in this and chances are that all will go well... but this is the music industry, and things could just go nowhere. We'll have to wait and see.Trent Reznor has also sent word to me that he may be interested in doing some music for Quake 2. Again, this may or may not happen, but I am going to try my hardest to make it happen again.
For now you can be assured that even without the contributions of Trent and Ozzy the Quake 2 sound track is going to kick ass. The music that Sascha and his partner have been contributing is nothing less than amazing. But if things go as planned we could end up with a game soundtrack unlike any other done before. Cross your fingers.
More Thresh
Thresh appeared on CNET's
television show CNET Central this weekend, as this accompanying GameCenter article
describes. Thanks QuaziModem.
Transparent Water Server Listing
Timothy J. Uhl is compiling a list of
Servers running with maps VIS'ed for transparent water. If you submit a server, please
include the server IP address, the server domain, and whether it's CTF, DM, or QW, etc.
(example: 198.60.22.2 - quake.xmission.com - DM - NONQW). There is also a plan to create a
tab for QuakeSpy users to locate these maps. Also, the GLQuake Outpost is a new page devoted
to... GLQuake.
Braindead Explanation
An explanation for the odd note recently about Braindead's Art page. The
site is not moving, however, since Braindead is on vacation, art submissions will be
accepted for him on this temporary page
by CO2's Design page.
Defusion
There is a server running the Defusion patch, which requires players to
compete to be the one to disarm a bomb on the level, up at 24.112.45.36. Thanks Prophet.
QuakeCon Forever
A personal take on QuakeCon: Locke's
Spiffy QuakeCon Experience.
New Visage
There's a new version of Visage, the Mac .pak utility, on the Visage page. Thanks Prophet.
Movements
Leagues / Contests
Results
LAN Parties
Added but one LAN Party: Perth,
Australia.
| Sunday, July 27, 1997 |
Half-Life
sCary has posted a couple
more Half-Life screenshots. Speaking of sCary, there's a cool interview with
him here that discusses deathmatch strategy.
Monster Sound Review
Process has reviewed
Diamond's Monster 3D Sound Card over on Redwoods.
DM4
Disruptor updated his .plan to describe the experimental new deathmatch
rules being used on id's QuakeWorld server, Inferno (192.246.40.250:27500):
Haha... OH MAN!
While one of my maps was BSPing, I hacked in DM 4.0 rules on Inferno (something American and I were discussing as a novelty feature).
Everyone starts with all the weapons and has unlimited ammo. Try it. It's nuts.
He followed that up with a second update describing refinements already being added:
American and I were talking some more this morning, and we added the following to DM4.0 rules;
- You start with 250 health
- You start with 200 red armour
- Every time you pick up an enemies pack, you get 10 additional health
- For obvious reasons, weapons and ammo do not spawn
- If you pick up enough packs to attain 300+ health, you automatically attain a free "Quad Bonus"
- In order to prevent camping, the grenade launcher has been removed
And one more revision:
- If you pick up enough packs to attain 300+ health, you automatically
attain a free "Bonus Invulnerability" (This was changed from a
Bonus Quad)
GLQuake Tweak
I get the question all the time about my preference for VQuake (Vérité
Quake) over GLQuake, and my answer is simple: I play deathmatch, and GLQuake's framerate
tends to slow down severely in the midst of heated combat. But there is good news on the
horizon for GL lovers: In Jack
Mathews' latest .plan update, he describes his success in getting GLQuake to use 8 bit
(rather than 16 bit) textures, which will reduced the texture thrashing that contributes
significantly to the problem. morbid also has a bit to say about the imminence of QSpy
5.3, the coolness of QuakeSpy 5.4, QuakeCon, and OpenGL versus Direct3D. In his own words,
"a monster of an update".
Quake Demo Launcher
A new version of the Quake
Demo Launcher has been released. QDL is a browser plug-in to allow you to launch and
view Quake demos, but the new version also associated DEM and QWD file with DemoLauncher
so you can also launch demos from Windows Explorer, WinZip, etc.
QuakeCon survey
Any attendees of QuakeCon that care to add their comments to the NAWC's humorous QuakeCon survey can submit them now, as it
will be updated again soon with more feedback.
WinQOOLE
There is a public beta of WinQOOLE 1.98, the Windows version of this
object-oriented level editor up on the QOOLE Page in
preparation for an upcoming version 2 release. A new beta of the DOS version of QOOLE is
promised shortly. Thanks Fogleman.
Dream Machine
When Avatar's latest project was in beta it was called the Gas Gun (but
was looking for a new name). Now the final version, renamed the Dream Machine (the patch's
new weapon adds sleeping gas and gas masks to the game) has been released, featuring new
models and Quake C, on avatar.telefragged.com/.
Interview
Tournaments / Leagues
Movements
LAN Parties
Razing Arizona? The LAN Parties
added today are in Mesa, AZ; and Tucson, AZ.
| Saturday, July 26, 1997 |
Prophet
In case you are curious about ace newshound Prophet, he sent along this picture of himself, in his natural
environment (Ultima Online), in his, umm, natural outfit.
m3 versus QuakeCon
dweomer has written an article on PlanetQuake
called QuakeCon & M3: a
Look Back that chooses to compare the two events.
Defusion
Defusion, the bomb-squad
TC, that was previewed at QuakeCon (though I didn't get to see it), that sCary is very
high on, was released the other day (which I missed too: I'm behind the ball on this one).
There is now word on their page that the search for more servers is on, as well as a
request for server operators running the patch to let them know so they can compile a
list.
GLQuake Optimizer
There is a utility to tweak you GLQuake setting for performance, promising
up to a 100% performance increase, on the Spawn Clan page.
Future versus Fantasy
There is an update for registered users of Future versus Fantasy up on the
FvF Homepage. Thanks Prophet.
Quake C Editor
Quake C Editor version 1.0 has been released on the Quake C Editor page, which is now on TeleFragged.
New QuakeOn
Version 0.96 of QuakeOn, the Quake front-end that features the famed
helping head, has been released on the QuakeOn page.
Help Wanted
Steve
"Gateway" Tietze updated his .plan with a help wanted ad for a conceptual
artist to work at Rogue.
id Novel
Witzbold has posted a
very long (but interesting) essay about id Software's history, and their effect on the
gaming industry on the Quake Literary Guild.
QuakeCon Reactions
NAWC has posted the feedback they've received on a humorous
survey they passed around to some of the well-known QuakeCon attendees. Funny stuff.
CTF League
The Crazy CTF League is
now accepting entries for both a low-ping and a high-ping division.
Pseudo Tour
Wanker has posted a video tour (RealPlayer required) of the Pseudo studios
(home of QuakeCast/StormFront)
featuring the antics of Mace Royer on the QuakeCafe.
Interviews
Movement
GibStats, the most versatile log parsers and statistics program has moved
to www.planetquake.com/gibstats/.
LAN Parties
Grab your Ethernet card, more LAN
Parties on tap: Langley, B.C., Canada; Auburn, AL; Northwest AR; and a contact trying
to organize a large gathering in Ohio.
CTF 4.2
Zoid has released Threewave
Capture the Flag 4.2 (559 KB) on Threewave
(only required for servers). Thanks DeathMonger[MD].
According to the accompanying update, this is the final version of CTF for Quake, as Zoid
will now be concentrating on the version of CTF that will be built into Quake 2. Further
updates to the Threewave site will now be handled by DaKoTa of the Xenocide Flag Academy, who is clearly a
fine choice for the post. As a way of commemorating the final CTF, Zoid wrote up a history
of the patch from it's origination through today. It's funny that he mentioned the first
posting here, because I actually remember it well (I just dug through the archives, it was
October 2, 1996), as I was doing my updates from a road trip to Virginia at the time.
Excuse me while I wax nostalgic...
QuakeWorld 32 Player .pak
The QuakeWorld 32 Player team has released their deathmatch .pak, featuring new levels designed
with enough elbow room for 32 players.
Peace is Declared
The dust seems to be settling from yesterday's
brouhaha. Paul Steed and I exchanged a couple of emails to clear the air, and he went
so far as to update his .plan to apologize to me. Paul subsequently updated
again to note that this matter seems settled, as id had also received an apology,
which Tim Sweeney (of the Unreal team), also copied
me on:
I'm sorry about the recent flame war that resulted from one of my team members' .plans. I guess this is a result of the pressure one should expect when two competing development teams are working months of 95-hour weeks for the final stretches of their projects.
Speaking on behalf of Epic, we don't feel that id Software has copied our work. The designs of both Quake 2 and Unreal are obviously influenced by other art forms like movies, past games, and so on; it's unsurprising that we have independently arrived at some similar decisions on the themes and characters of our games.
We have ultimate respect for id's track record in creating great games and great technology, and we owe a lot of gratitude to id for creating the first-person genre which has brought 3d gaming to the mainstream.
While many of us are Quake fans, and id's games have influenced some aspects of Unreal, our ultimate goal here has always been to make a great game that appeals to gamers on its own strengths.
We realize that we're competing with the "best of the best" and we know we'll succeed or fail based on whether we can create a great original game, rather than whether we can get a competent "Quake 2 clone" to market, or whether we can win the ".plan wars". I truly believe that Unreal will be a fun game and will live up to everyone's expectations, but gamers will ultimately decide whether we measure up.
I hope that id Software will accept my appologies for the unfortunate comments, and I wish id the best with Quake 2 -- we know it will be a great game and we look forward to playing it.
New Headhunters
Version 1.0b of Headhunters
is out with a couple of bug fixes. Thanks Prophet.
Thresh Interview
Gamecenter scored their own Interview with Thresh.
Thanks Prophet.
Eeek
As David Laprad points out,
doesn't this John Carmack .plan update make you nervous?
| Quake and the
stylized "Q" are trademarks of id Software, used with
their kind permission All rights reserved. Copyright © 1997 by Stephen Heaslip |