Articles in the archive contain broken links because outdated files are removed.
| Friday, October 24, 1997 |
PGL Registration Opens
Registration is underway for the Professional Gamer's League
as detailed in this announcement from TEN:
The PGL registration process, and PGL practice arenas, are up and running!
Let's get ready to Rummmmmbbbbblllllle !!! The new Professional Gamers' League is now accepting sign-ups; do you have what it takes to compete with Thresh, CnC_God, and the rest of the gaming elite? Go to the PGL web site at www.pgl.net and hit the SIGN UP NOW button to register for the Professional Gamers' League. Existing TEN subscribers can then simply type their screen name and password in the PGL registration form to register. All TEN members MUST register for the PGL to participate in the month-long qualification period, but they do not have to pay the $9.95 PGL Entry Fee that non-subscribers pay. (Non-subscribers: the $9.95 entry fee provides access to PGL-specific games and game arenas for three months: 10/23/97 through 1/23/98)
Aspiring pro gamers who are not TEN subscribers will need to create a special TEN/PGL account via the pgl.net web site and pay the PGL Entry Fee of $9.95 for the Fall (Inaugural) Season. Following the on-screen instructions will create a TEN/PGL account in no time. After creating an account, players can download and install the TEN software and the appropriate game enablers (Quake and C&C: Red Alert). Then get ready to compete in the PGL!
PGL Practice arenas for Quake C&C: Red Alert also opened today. All PGL and TEN players wishing to practice in the PGL arenas can now do so before PHASE I: Online Qualification begins on November 3rd. Players will still be able to practice during PHASE: I Online Qualification without affecting their rankings. Currently all PGL arenas on TEN are unranked "PGL practice" arenas. Once PHASE I: Online Qualification begins on November 3rd, ranked "PGL Competition" arenas will be available. All players will have the option of playing in practice or competition arenas.
NOTE: All games played in ranked "PGL Competition" arenas will be tracked by the new PGL ranking system. The exact number of "logged encounters" that players must generate in order to have their ranking recognized will be announced by Nov. 3.
New Video Drivers
Today's Daikatana Screenshot
OGR has posted a new Daikatana screenshot of the day.
PlanetQuake Ache
Bastard let me know that it isn't typical 'net difficulties keeping PlanetQuake off-line,
it's extra special difficulties. A major crash to their web host has had them working
through the night (the Red Cross is now serving coffee and doughnuts). No data was lost,
and service could resume as early as this afternoon.
Beast of the Week (Updated)
The new OGR
Exclusive Half-Life Monster of the Week has been posted. The new edition profiles the
Alien Grunt [Xenotherium myrmex]. Thanks [DoS]Tiger.
An update to the reference to the Grunt's preferred diet, where it said Chub-Toad in the
article was a typo. Valve's Marc Laidlaw wrote to point out that it was supposed to be
Chum-Toad, chum as in bait. That certainly makes more sense, though I still like Chub-Toad
better.
New Jedi Maps
Well, not technically new, the Dark Jedi Level
Patch (303 KB) is a collection of five maps for deathmatch pulled from the single
player game by Mike (Molunar) Nelson. The maps are
set up for battle with Force Powers and light sabers only (even the Bryar is removed), and
will not allow you to disregard the "rules" for picking Force Powers. BTW, the
name is from where the levels originated, and has nothing to do with which side of the
Force you must use. Thanks JediKnight.Net.
New Rocket Arena
Version 1.13 of the Rocket Arena server code has been released on the Rocket Arena page. The new version
addresses a few bugs including the water jump bug among other things. A new service has
also been set up to at http://ripper.stanford.edu/
to allow Net Quake server ops to set up a custom map rotation.
Requiem?
Sorry about confusing anyone yesterday, the Requiem
Quake 2.0 beta may be released this week, but it's not out yet.
.plans
Jedi Knight Tournaments
Interviews
Reviews
Departments
etc.
The newest Dear Mynx is up, and is
always worth a read ... PC Gamer has a preview of the i76 Nitro Pack, a sequel to Interstate '76 (loved that game) due out
next Spring. Thanks Prophet ... Some hardcore anti-Quake ranting, in living stereo (through the
magic of RealAudio), can be heard on SnarfAudio, found on Snarf's Unreal Emporium. Thanks Prophet ... Image of
the Day is this new Prey logo
(24 KB), passed along by my pal Lithium of the fine ole PreyStation ...
| Thursday, October 23, 1997 |
Double Speed GL Quake? Not So Fast
Brian Hook made a .plan update to clarify that the SGIS_multitexture extension and its
impact on Quake II he referred to earlier would have no impact for existing Voodoo
owners::
To clarify -- the multitexture stuff only helps on 3Dfx Voodoo boards with more than one TMU chip. This means that it won't help Flash3D, Monster3D, Righteous3D, etc. and will likely only benefit people with Obsidian boards.
Sorry, didn't mean to be a tease like that.
Oh, and the performance increase likely will NOT be 2x in overall gameplay, since the early numbers I'm generating are with TIMEREFRESH in a room with no Alias models.
QuakeCast
On QuakeCast tonight, TeamGameSpy's
Jack Mathews (as referenced
in his .plan) and his 3Dfx cohort Scott Alden will join us to give us the poop on
what's up with them, (the Voodoo doo-doo?). Speaking of Voodoo, we also welcome
"Wholesome" Billy Wilson of Voodoo
Extreme as our guest. The action begins as usual at 8:30 PM Eastern time. BTW, while
on the subject, Voodoo
Extreme's Matrox m3 review is up.
Valve-job for Game Gimps
Tonight on GameGimps,
at 10:00 PM Eastern, immediately following QuakeCast on Pseudo,
Gabe Newell, Dario Casali, Marc Laidlaw, Jay Stelly and Steve Bond (Wedge) of Valve are
the guests of the Gimps to discuss the latest on Half-Life.
Daily Dose of Daikatana
OGR's new Daikatana screenshot of the day is up.
Half-Live/Worldcraft 2.0 Preview
There is a preview up on the PlanetQuake Game
Designer's Corner called Half-Life
and Worldcraft The New Dynamic Duo that looks at what to expect from the upcoming
integrated game and toolset from Valve.
More .planning
Avoiding the Dark Side
Darth won't be interested, but there is a review of Jedi Knight
on PC Games focusing on using the light side of the Force. Thanks Prophet.
Interviews
Hexen Skins
Hexen II skin
specifications have been added to the Shotgun
Messiah's Skin Tutorial. Thanks Prophet.
New Drivers
.plans
3Dfx has done a rough implementation of the SGIS_multitexture extension, and I've spent most of tonight/this morning getting it to limp along with Quake2. The performance difference is, well, pretty damn incredible (nearly double). Preliminary cheesy numbers (TIMEREFRESH at the beginning of DEMO1 in Q2TEST) are 56fps with multitexture, and 28fps without -- literally a doubling of overall performance.
We can't draw too much from this, not until we do a full TIMEDEMO score, but right now the results are encouraging, to say the least.
We got one of those fancy Quantum3D SLI boards -- 4MB of framebuffer, and FOUR TMUs, EACH with 4MB. That's a 20MB 3Dfx board kids.
Unfortunately, that SLI board wasn't quite the "ultimate" Voodoo board, at least not nearly as much as the price ($795) and specs would make you believe. It seems the big performance killer is triangle setup -- the Voodoo lacks a full triangle setup core, so lots of polygons (which Quake2 has) hurt almost as bad as lots of pixels. The SLI board isn't lacking in fill rate, but its triangle throughput could stand some work.
The Quantum3D SLI board gave us about a 50% increase in performance over a regular Voodoo. This is pretty incredible, but I'm doubting that it's worth $795. After multitexture it might make a REAL performance difference though.
We have some new benchmark figures, and they're, er, interesting. When we have final data I'll post the numbers along with some analyses. For the time being I'll say this: the leader is the still the leader, the slower boards got faster, and some of the faster boards got slower. I have a feeling that the Quantum SLI board with multitexture support is going to own the 3D board landscape, at least for the foreseeable future (next few months). The test results will make the overall picture much clearer.
More to come soon...for now, must sleep.
Review
Billy Wilson of Voodoo Extreme has posted a Malice Review.
Departments
etc.
Finally got to see Robin Williams do his bit about Quake on
Letterman, as they re-ran that appearance on last night's Late Show ...
| Wednesday, October 22, 1997 |
No CTF in Initial Quake II Release
Speaking of interviews (actually, that's next, I just love a good segue), I didn't notice
on first read, but Zoid's
recent interview on the Quake Workshop brought to light a bit of news (thanks Tom Sorensen): The integrated Quake II CTF support
that is one of Zoid's Quake II projects for id is not going to make it into the initial
release:
CTF won't be in the initial commercial release. It will come out a little later as an upgrade/addon. Time constraints of development. The CTF will not be significantly different--the essential gameplay elements will remain intact. I don't want to change something that works. Lots of small issues, such as grapple redesign, the runes (or possible lack thereof), etc. actually still need to be worked out. I'm hoping it will be an evolution of CTF into a more refined game. Many people know my dislike for adding stuff for the sake of just having new gadgets to play with. ThreeWave CTF has always been basic, simple and complete.
Interviews
Daikatana Shot o' the Day
OGR's Daikatana screenshot of the day has been
posted.
The Ultimate Quake Board?
Next Generation has an article up titled The Ultimate Quake Board Cometh
that goes into the most detail yet about Quantum 3D's (Zanshin's company) upcoming
3Dfx-based SB100 line of accelerators (the least expensive of which is expected to retail
for $795.00), said to offer twice the performance of current Voodoo Graphics cards in
GLQuake. Thanks "Woolly" Billy Wilson (Voodoo
Extreme). Billy also passes along word that Zanshin has updated his 3D Cards Quick and Dirty Chart.
Minion Arena
I still haven't been able to check this out, but it sounds way cool,
Minion Arena is a variation on Rocket Arena where the combatants take on the form of
monsters not players. More details can be found on Minion's Lair.
AirQuake Fix
There is a fixed progs.dat (151 KB) for
AirQuake test 24 that repairs a teamplay bug (deja vu from test 23) on the AirQuake TC homepage.
Jedi Strategy
Gamesmania has posted their Jedi Knight strategy
guide, detailing the Force powers and level secrets. Thanks Prophet.
HexUtils
eman has released HexUtils (165 KB), Hexen II compatible versions of
qbsp/vis/ and light to hold eager authors over until Raven releases their own. Thanks HexenWorld.
HeadHunter Release Party
GreyBear passes along word of an IRC party to
celebrate the release of version 3.0 of the HeadHunters conversion on Friday:
There's a Headhunters V3.0 Release party schedule for Friday night, 10/24, 9:30PM EST on irc.3dnet.net, channel #headhunters. Charlie Zimmerman and Jamis Eichenauer will be on hand to tell Headhunter 'remember when' stories.
Afteerwards, Charlie and Jamis will visit our own Digital Pla.net HeadHunters Deathmatch server (207.14.239.13:27500) for a game of 'Kill the Creators'.
RBR Out of the Closet
Rebel Boat Rocker has been somewhat
tight-lipped about their plans since forming earlier this year to create games in the 3D
shooter genre, but are now showing signs that they may be ready to start talking a bit
more about what they are up to, as evidenced by this press release they recently released.
.plans
...A lot of people are looking to id for a game that id doesn't want to write -- an RPG, a fighting game, a 3/4 view fighter, whatever.
...Which brings me to my point -- the first person shooter, aka FPS, is a genre unto itself. It is not a technology, it is an actual, honest to goodness genre...defined as "running around a world from the first person point of view and shooting things". Invariably an FPS involves "finding a key" by "killing enemies" so that you can "go to the next level"....
...What this comes down to is that MANY classes of game fall within this description, yet people get upset when "yet another shooter" comes out that does this. You don't see people saying, "Oh great, yet another flight sim" or "yet another football game", but for some reason shooters are singled out as being overly derivative....We're seeing much the same thing with real-time strategy games right now, and maybe an analogous "problem" exists in that field....
...If people buy more copies of Unreal than Quake2, we will have to re-evaluate our design decisions. If people buy more copies of Half-life than Quake2, we will have to re-evaluate our design decisions. If people buy more copies of Jedi Knight than Quake2, we will have to see about getting a Star Wars license :-)....
...id software writes first person shooters. We do these types of games far better, in my opinion, than any other game company on planet earth. And I do not see us giving up this _genre_ any time soon. But we are always looking to IMPROVE upon this genre to make, with each successive generation, the definite product that defines the genre, much like other companies do with RTS and flight sims.
Reviews
Movement
Turmoil's Quake2 Console Commands page has moved to www.quake2.com/tq2cc/.
Departments
etc.
Monlith's Riot site has been updated with this week's new Riot: Mobile Armor screenshots. Thanks Flame ... OGR has posted
yesterday's Diakatana
screenshot of the day (a much cooler shot than its predecessor) ... DaKiller wanted me
to pass along the word that there are a couple of rants on Frag.com and a small response on UnrealNation debating Unreal versus Quake II kinda stuff ... Crack's Golgotha page has a fix for a problem Voodoo Rush users have with the Golgotha demo
... PreyStation is having a logo contest where
the winner receives a Prey T-shirt autographed by the Prey
development team ... Iconmania:
Here are some more Icons for 3D games (39 KB) sent
along by John Green ... Image
of the Day is this easter egg that o_dog claims to have found in the Quake II Demo
of a bit of graffiti found in an explosion ...
| Tuesday, October 21, 1997 |
John Carmack on the Quake II Demo
John Carmack updated his .plan with a response to some of the reactions to the Quake
II Demo:
Many of the comments about the Quake 2 test are already being addressed. We expected quite a few of them, but the test has served its purpose of bringing in some good feedback that we couldn't have predicted.
The final game will definately be better as a result of the test.
However, it certainly won't please everyone. I am confidant that the majority will think that Quake 2 is significantly better than anything we have ever done before, but even if we please 80% of our potential customers, that will still leave a couple hundred thousand people thinking that we let them down.
I suppose that I have it the easiest there -- I can always defend my technical decisions with specific discussions of my evaluations of the tradeofs that led me to the paths I chose. In fact, in a large number of cases when someone suggests something, I can actually say "Tried it. Didn't work as well."
Defending level design, artwork, or sounds is a lot harder. We can't even always agree here at id on many of these issues, so we know for sure that we can't please all the users simultaniously. All we can do is put talented people on the job and have confidence in their abilities.
Note: Q2TEST DOES NOT INCLUDE ANY HIGH QUALITY SOUNDS! That would have added another 15 megs to the demo size. Selecting high quality sounds just upsamples the existing 11khz / 8 bit sounds. There is a significant quality increase (at a slight speed and memory cost) with the full production sounds.
Quake 2's goal is to be the best first person shooter ever. We are trying to evolve a genre, not move to a different one. If you don't want a game that mostly consists of running around and killing things, you will be dissapointed. We are trying to be cohesive, but not deep. I have high hopes for the games that are atempting to aply our technology to other genres, but don't look for it in Quake 2.
A quick plug:
if you have any interest in programming, you should look at Michael Abrash's Graphics Programming Black Book Special Edition. It has just about everything he has written, from the ancient work on optimizing for the 8086 (still interesting to read) to the articles written during quake's development.
I personally learned a lot from Michael's early articles, and I was proud to contribute to the later ones.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=1576101746/3226-6070174-877180
John Carmack on the Quake II Editor
Jim Lowell of Trinity: The Site got a
response from John Carmack on his question about what kind of video cards are optimal for
running id's Quake II editor when it's released (Carmack's responses are in yellow):
At 09:48 AM 10/20/97 -0500, [Jim Lowell] wrote:
>I read that you are releasing the Quake II editor (does it have a name
>yet?) shortly after the release of Quake II. Will the editor run on most
>people's computers, or will you need a high-end OpenGL accelerator to use
>it. Would the 3Dfx work?
3dfx will not work.
RIVA cards can run it at low (800*600) res, but the editor really isn't designed for that.
We run it on intergraph realizm cards with 32mb of memory, but we don't expect normal people to have those...
The best bets are either a rendition v2200 with 8 mb, or a 3dlabs permedia 2 with 8 mb. You can then run the editor at high res and get good performance.
>Also, will it run under Win95 or require NT?
Anything that has a FULL opengl driver. Right now, 3dlabs is the only win95 OpenGL ICD, but more are coming early next year.
John Carmack
GL Quake Guide
Zanshin's GLQuake Dojo now has a chart detailing the video cards that
support GL Quake. Thanks "Wily" Billy Wilson (Voodoo Extreme).
Quake II Demo Guide
OGR has posted a complete guide to the Quake II Demo in
their Quake II
Test-Demo Intelligence Compendium.
New BSP
Version .86 of the BSP level
editor (1.4 MB) has been released on BSP
Headquarters. The new version features built-in Hexen II and Open GL support, which
may require that you install some GL
.dll's (349 KB), even if you are not running the GL version. Thanks Stickerboy.
New GLQoole
Version 2.11 of GLQoole
(1.3 MB) has been released addressing the bug that causing the Fatal Error, "No more
DC's available" (WinQoole is unaffected by this bug). Thanks Prophet.
Texture Repository
TEX.365 is a great idea
for a new site: it's dedicated to generating and storing free textures for authors to use
when creating levels for Quake, the the upcoming Quake 2, and other games. The idea is to
post a new high-quality texture every single day.
The FRAG News
Pro Gaming Article - PGL
There is an article
about professional game competitions on Gamespot
that focuses on the PGL examining the viability of the
concept. Thanks loonyboi. Additionally, TEN
has announced that those wishing to participate in the PGL will not be required to become
TEN subscribers, but rather can register for the three month season for a one-time fee of
$9.95, as detailed in this press
release.
Mark Reign Interview
There is an .avi demo of an interview with Epic's Mark Reign talking about Unreal that
runs about 44 MB, posted on Unreal.org (inspired,
perhaps, by the 50+MB .avi Prey interview recently released). Thanks Prophet.
Mac Unreal Progress
There is an update on the progress of the Mac version of Epic's upcoming Unreal on the Maverick Software page. Thanks Prophet:
Development is going smooth as can be. Sound is now working (good job Ken!), and TCP/IP networking (Mac<->Mac) is up and running. We're still ironing out glitches in 3dfx support and adding more features to the RAVE support. We'll probably be tackling Mac<->PC networking next week after we get another code update from the PC. For more Unreal info and screenshots, check out unreal.org.
New Stingray 128/3D Flash BIOS
There's a new flash BIOS for the Voodoo Rush based New Stingray 128/3D on the Hercules
Stingray 128/3D Driver Library. Thanks Page Fault,
who also says that, according to Harvey Fong, Technical Support Manager for Hercules, a
free BIOS chip upgrade will be announced shortly for the Dual Planar boards that have no
Flash BIOS.
.plans
Quake II Demo Reviews
A few reviews of Q2Test:
Slide Review
The Slide TC
is the subject of the new review at Q-fever.
New Golgotha Demo
Demo 5 of Golgotha (10.1 MB) has been
released by Crack dot Com. Also available at the FTP
site, the demo features:
Evil Empire Quake
Beta 2 of Evil Empire Quake has been
released.
Competitions
Movement
The Valley of the ThunderWalkers, the ThunderWalker CTF Homepage has moved to its own
domain at www.thunderwalker.net.
Departments
etc.
Perhaps the most frequently asked question about the Quake II Demo is how to cure "Error : UDP_OpenSocket socket" error
messages. To get rid of those you must have TCP/IP installed on your
computer (even though the demo does not support multiplayer). Thanks loonyboi for
reminding me to point that out ... Grey Lady Quake:
Quake got mentioned in the New York Times yesterday, being used as a comparison
for an article in the Business Section on Ultima Online. Thanks Peter Williams ... Aliens
Online: A preview
of Aliens Online is up on PC Games. Thanks Prophet
... Quake International: The Swedish
National Quake Team scored a 1963-782 victory in a 15 on 15 battle on death32a this
weekend. Details and screenshots on the Swedish
National Quake Team News ... More candidates for "the program"? Birdman's Lair has a preliminary
SpaceOrb config for the Quake II Demo. Thanks Ronin ... Image of
the day is this submission of a Quake II
Demo "bug" received by PC Games ...
| Monday, October 20, 1997 |
Daikatana Screenshot of the Day
OGR is now planning on having a Daikatana screenshot of the day
until the debut of the premier issue of the print version of OGR in December with a big
Daikatana cover story.
Zoid Update
Dave "Zoid" Kirsch updated
his .plan describing his current projects: Linux GLQuake using MesaGL with GLIDE for
3Dfx based hardware. , Sun Solaris Quake (and QuakeWorld client), Linux Quake2 Test,
QuakeWorld 2.1 ("mostly just a maintenance release that addresses some bugs and
issues that appeared in 2.0.").
Quake II Brain Bucket
There is an ad up on the Activision Quake II
website where you can order a Quake II hat for $14.00 plus $4.00 shipping and
handling.
Cliff Bleszinski Interview
Profile has launched on PlanetQuake as a
home for interviews interviews, containing links to over 130 interviews, as well as
interviews of their own, kicking off with an interview with Cliff Bleszinski,
co-designer/lead level designer on Epic's upcoming Unreal.
New AirQuake
Test 24 of AirQuake (3.3 MB) has been
released on the AirQuake TC homepage.
Americans Quake II Demo Caveat
(Updated Again)
American McGee updated
his .plan again to cancel his request for feedback on the sounds he had added to his
earlier request that id failed to include in the Quake II Demo read me:
Wow... Ok, enough sound comments :)
Seems like everyone has pretty much the same to say about the sounds. Thanks guys.Something that we forget to mention in the readme.txt
We would like to request that you not pull the textures and sounds out of the Quake II Test. If you must yank them out and play with them, please keep it off the net.
Thanks.
I asked for a clarification of whether he was talking about things like the new MedDLe and he said:
"...no, i guess i should have been more specific. we basically don't want people taking the art and using it for add-ons... same goes for the sounds. they will be able to do all that stuff once the game is released... we just dont want it starting right now..."
More Quake II Demo
Paul Steed updated his .plan listing a few of the pieces of feedback he was
receiving frequently that will be addressed:
MAN! Thanks for the intelligent, detailed, excited and flattering comments. Due to the number of mails I've been getting please don't trip if I can't send a reply. I need you all to do me a favor, though. At the current rate of comments (again I'm not bitching) its going to be hard for me to make the time to read them all so I'm going to list the most commonly referred to criticisms. This will help you guys find other things and ease your mind that I'm addressing this stuff:
1. Death Anims: I'm going to go back and make them longer and especially go over the baseline grunt.
2. Weapons: I'll try to adjust them so they don't block your view as much
3. Gibs: mentioned to John and Kevin the seemingly small pieces and possibly too fast velocity.
4. These are some of the other things you mentioned that we're going to discuss: explosions (sprites):(, flies (too many, appear too quickly), ejecting shells and other weapons effects.There's more common critiques, but these are the really common ones. So again thanks for the input and definitely thanks for all the flattery. We're very pleased that you all like the game but are still focused on making this baby the hottest thing out there this year.
We're not just content to win the super bowl. We want to win it by about 90 points!
John Romero Interview
Those nutty guys Sharky and "Witty" Billy Wilson talk to the Romero in a funny
and informative interview on Voodoo Extreme.
Quake II Demo Benchmarks (Updated)
Rogue's Steve "Gateway" Tietze updated
his .plan with word on his research on Quake II demo performance on different
machines. There are some benchmarks of the Quake II Demo running on different machines on this page.
New MedDLe with Quake II Demo
Support
On the heels of the new MedDLe with Jedi Knight support comes MedDLe version 2.01a2
(260 KB) which can view models in the Quake II Demo, on the MedDLE Page. Here are the required MFC DLL's (782 KB) if you
don't have them.
Quake II Demo Console Commands
Turmoil's Q2 Commands is a list
of all known Quake II Demo console commands (adding the couple of new Q2 commands the
Quake commands). The plan is to keep this updated with all new developments in this area.
Quake II Icon
Here's an icon (4 KB) from Doc Wilco for the Quake II Demo.
Quake II Demo Joystick Support
David Disney sent along this config file for joystick support in the Quake II
Demo (2 KB). It was designed specifically for the Assassin 3D, but should be useful
for other joysticks. My (unsolicited) advice? It' s a new game with a chance for joystick
users to get with the program and use a mouse. But hey, as long as you have fun, go to
town.
Jedi Grenades
A grenade launcher patch for Jedi Knight (14 KB)
has been released on The Jedi Knight
Outpost that modifies the Thermal Detonator weapon to be more like a Quake grenade
launcher. Thanks Jediknight.net.
Community Movement Ups and Downs
I'm sorry to say that Pat Cupka will no longer be updating the Void, his oft updated news site,
but the good news is, he's going to be concentrating his efforts more fully on his duties
as newsmaster of PlanetQuake. Also, the MacQuake Nexus will be shutting its doors
after a brief run as a premier source of info on the Mac version of Quake. Finally, on a
brighter note, congrats to skinmeister Dan Bickell,
whose talents have unsurprisingly landed him a job in the game industry with
Screaming Neurons LLC, a new game company based in (eek!) Redmond Washington. From Dan's
email, and inspirational message for those who aspire to work in the game industry:
I know how much it encouraged me and kept up my hopes everytime I've seen someone in the gaming community reach their goal of being hired to work in the industry, and now it's finally my turn. To everybody out there with similar dreams, I personally advise you to stick with them. It might take a while, and there might be a few false starts, but in the end, if you have the talent and the will, you will reach your goals. Never ever give up your dreams, because where there's a will... there's a well paying job in the gaming industry.
Quake II Demo Polls
The AVault is running a quickie poll
on their main page asking your opinion of the Quake II Demo. Thanks Prophet. There is a similar effort up on 3Dx.
Review
There's a full review of QA's iminent TC
Malice up on the Adrenaline Vault.
Q2Test For DEC Alpha
The DEC Alpha Q2Test binaries (799
KB) have been released on on id's
FTP site. Brian Hook and Disruptor both made .plan updates announcing the release,
with Disruptor stressing "Please send all Alpha specific bugs to Brian
directly at bwh@idsoftware.com" and Brian's
update showing the contents of the read me.
Q2Test Mania
I hope everyone is enjoying the quake 2 test.
Its always hard to release a version of a product that you know isn't in its final form. There are plenty of things that are getting better every single day, but we need to chop it off at some point to let everyone test it out.
We will do another demo after we finish the full retail product, so if you don't like looking at preproduction stuff, wait for that one.
Still, I am pretty happy with the test. I think Quake 2 is definately the most cohesive game we have ever done.
Don't worry -- just because the test doesn't have multiplayer in it, it doesn't mean that we haven't been thinking about it. Many features in the quake 2 architecture are going to enable a whole new level of net play. It will take a few months after the full release for all the potential to start showing through, but just you wait!
The biggest changes to Quake 2 are internal. Anyone doing modification work on Quake is going to be ecstatic when they get to work with quake2. The game dll source code and all the utilities (including the OpenGl map editor) will be released shortly after the game hits store shelves.
Paul Steed updated his .plan with congrats and a wish for feedback on his work (I've got to rave for a second about the models and animation in the demo, which are quite stunning, something also noted by GL Guru Zanshin in his .plan and on his webpage as he praises the demo). Here's Paul's email psteed@idsoftware.com, and his update:
Congratulations to the rest of my teammates on a seriously intense push to get the demo out this morning. I left once we confirmed it was up, but I still didn't sleep very well knowing that our baby was out and about lifting her skirt for you all. I encourage you to e-mail me directly with any character or weapons animations critique. I plan on doing tweaks until we release the full game so any input will be a valuable source for making the game even better for you fans.
Hope you dig it.
and .plan updates by Disruptor, John Cash, and tokay mention the demo's release (Cash and American also mention sleep: I'm jealous).
New QTracker with Jedi Knight
Support
Qtracker 1.1 (2.9 MB) has been released on
the Qtracker homepage, the_DM's server finder now features Jedi Knight
support, QuakeWorld master server lists, bug fixes, and other enhancements. Also available
as an upgrade patch (1.0 MB) for users of
version 1.0.
New MedDLe with Jedi Knight Support
According to JediKnight.Net, MedDLe 2.01a (259 KB)
has been released on the MedDLe page, which has relocated to meddle.stomped.com (it is not on my DNS, and I can't
find it myself). The new version allows you to view Jedi Knight's .3do files.
Jedi Knight Editor
There's a screesnhot of an early version of ForceBuilder, an upcoming Jedi
Knight editor on the Official
Forcebuilder page. Thanks JKNewsNet.
Blade FAQ
Version 0.50 of the Blade
FAQ, covering Q&A for Rebelact's upcoming 3D
action game has been posted with information from Rebel Act designer Javier Cortijo.
Competitions
Movements
etc.
Log Parser of the Week, (I guess) is WiT Stats which now will output in HTML ...
I got in late from visiting Grandma (yes, I'm old as dirt, which makes her, well, really
old) and I'm cranking along at reduced speed (a side effect of one hour sleep in the last
40, that, and I'm staring to enjoy the company of the little gremlins dancing in the
periphery of my vision), so Sunday Night's update gradually
turned into Monday morning's ...
| Sunday, October 19, 1997 |
BBL
Off to visit Grandma Blue (she's sure to enjoy my sleep-deprived self). Be back this
evening. Enjoy the demo. 
Quake II Demo 1
Released
The first Demo of Quake II (10.8 MB)
featuring three single player levels has been released by id Software.
The link at the top of the page (oh, heck, here it is again) can be used to report bugs, but please be sure to go
through the read me first.
Here is a list of download locations (not all links will be active right away):
Local (www.bluesnews.com)
id Software | CDROM.COM
Activision FTP West | Activision FTP East
Download.com | Gamecenter
Stomped | Brutality
AVault | Quake2.com
Gamer's Alliance | Frag.com
3D Action Gamers.1 | 3D Action Gamers.2
sCary's Shuga Shack | Ultra Game Players
QuestGate | PlanetQuake
UnrealNation | OGR
| Saturday, October 18, 1997 |
LavaBall 1.0
Jonathan! Jonathan! Version 1.0 of LavaBall has been released on the LavaBall homepage. This modification turns
Quake into a sport, reminiscent of the James Caan classic Rollerball. Here's the Client pack (1.4 MB), and the server pack (75 KB). Remember, Moondoggie,
Lavaballers dream of being businessmen, but the businessmen, well, they dream of being...
Lavaballers.
Interviews (Updated)
Edited Valve Logs
Thanks to Elly Davis and Sean McCleese for passing along edited logs of last
night's chat session with the guys from Valve. Here's Elly's Log and Sean's.
New QSI
Version Quake Servers Info (QSI), a server query application, à la
GameSpy written in Java, has been released on the QSI Page. Developed with Mac users
in QSI will run on most Java platforms, and now features filtering and some other
enhancements.
Quake on TV (Sorta)
This week's episode of Soldier of Fortune, titled "Alpha Dogs" will
feature a plot that involves a sports car driving game programmer (apparently fashioned
after either John Carmack, or John Romero, but no clue which), and when snippets of the
game (called "Alpha Dogs") are shown, they are actually Quake. SOF is
syndicated, so it airs at different times and on different channels, with "Alpha
Dogs" slated to air between October 19 through October 25. Check local listings or www.rysher.com or www.soldieroffortune.com. Any questions, praise
or flames can be directed to JamesC@sofprod.com
and/or DukeS@sofprod.com.
Sin Screenshot
There's an exclusive screenshot from Ritual's upcoming Sin at The Ultimate SiN.
Jedi Patches
There is a decapitation patch for
Jedi Knight (2 KB) up on The Valley of the Jedi.
Thanks Prophet. Also, Solo's Saber
Control patch (8 KB) has been updated to disable the amputation feature until some
problems with it are worked out.
New(er) Expert Quake
Version 1.31 of Expert Quake (1.1 MB) has been
released on the Expert Quake Page. This
fixes minor bugs that afflicted the recent 1.3 release and enhancements to FlagTrack
(which is a new teamplay mode).
New Qooles
Version 2.10 of WinQoole
(1.3 MB) and GLQoole
(1.3 MB) have been released on the Qoole page. For
owners of the Qoole CD, the new versions will recognize your CD to register the upgrade.
GL Qoole now supports Voodoo Rush (3Dfx Glide runtime drivers required). Thanks [FF]GeNeSiS.
Mailing Lists
New QuAdS
Version 3.0 of the Quake Add-on Starter, or QuAdS was released a couple of
days ago on the QuAdS page. Here
is some of what's new:
.plan
Brian Hook updated his .plan with a detail-filled report on his latest experiences
testing GL Quake II features with the current crop of 3D cards.
Preview
There is a Daikatana preview
up on Redox Portal. Thanks Acid Clown.
Competitions
Departments
etc.
There are now over 150 deathmatch level reviews
up on MultiPlayer Quake (MPQ) with more added
all the time ... Log Parser of the Day is
Version 1.4 of GibStats which has been released on the GibStats page, featuring CTF support (the
program will now report on DM, CTF, TF, FvF, Hexen II, and PK servers) ...
| Quake and the
stylized "Q" are trademarks of id Software, used with
their kind permission All rights reserved. Copyright © 1997 by Stephen Heaslip |
