I'd have to agree with those that aren't satisfied with this game. FPS isn't my preferred genre, and until recently I avoided multiplayer FPSs largely because of the rampant cheating i had heard about. That changed awhile ago when some friends at i installed UT on a work server and started playing some LAN games. I really got into the multiplayer aspect - but mainly it was enjoyable because I KNEW these people and we could all laugh about it and exchange stories and boasts. As a single player experience, I thought UT dull (at best).

In UT2K3, I was hoping for some broadening of the playing experience. Yes, as people have noted, the visuals are impressive. Beyond that though, it really seems like a rehash of old material. The weapons are largely the same, the game mechanisms are the same, and the opponents are the same....It's like a mediocre sequel to a good movie: you're left thinking it's good because of your positive feelings about the original, but on reflection you're wondering what's so good about it....

Compare, if you will, NOLF to NOLF 2. The demo looks to have recaptured the elements that made the original great (wit, gameplay) and then added to it with new elements like character development and encumberance

quick notes:

rock: agree with you on the lightning gun. I also thought the sharp sound of a nearby richochet was more ominous(and effective) than the lightning gun's visuals.....which made me just think of something: why develop a sniper weapon that reveals its shooter's position?

robo: spam and no skill? yeah, i think so. I think people use this tactic cause ammo is plentiful and a life is short. I wonder if a map had very limited ammo or if you could only carry one/two weapons, if that would make a difference?

Why is it so hard for everyone to discuss these topics without getting snippy, or resort to name calling? Didn't your mothers teach you to play nice? The internet, the games, the PC are now designed to be "easy" to learn. Cool! More people added to this community. That's a wonderful thing. n00bs are n00bs, but there are people behind those keyboards. Try and making a friend for once, instead of a new enemy. We have enough enemies.

Besides, you may find that the new friend you make is a great target. What could be better than that?


http://www.fragfuck.com

This comment was edited on Sep 21, 01:14.

Brick:

Actually, I did not "feast on newbies" I played on servers where the skilled played so I would have a challenge. Noobs didn't hang around those servers much. That's why I had so much fun. Why don't you try to listening rather than insult me with your less than witty attempts.


If you read my posts, I didn't say I was "the best" I said I am far above average in the games I choose to play and most of that comes from my ability to profile players very quickly (like Thresh used to do) because they don't even realize they repeat patterns while they play, and aim/track well. This can be taken to any game. But it bothers me personally to play games where people don't really have to aim well. This is MY OPINION. It's like going deer hunting with a M4, or fishing with a grenade. Both would be entertaining for a while, but the thrill runs out fast.

Got it all this time?

Now shut that cock-holster you call a mouth and go play your game, troll boy.

This comment was edited on Sep 21, 01:01.

What Epic has done is patch together some code on top of old technology and made the graphics a little prettier, then they made the game pace so quick, you can only win at it if you are a 12-yr old kid on crack.

This isn't like the differences we see from gaming companies like ID Software, who completely redesign their games so that we have a new experience. This is a lazy bunch of developers trying to make some money off an old title.

THUMBS DOWN!!!!

Rock climber, wtf are you talking about? On one hand you hark back to the days that unless you played 10 hours a day and memorized all the maps than you didn’t have a chance in hell and an expert like you would slaughter all the new players that attempted to learn the game and now you whine that today’s game is nerf and spam and far from challenging because it’s so easy for new guys to get kills???? Well if it’s so easy for new players to get a grip on things than isn’t that more of a challenge for the elite, Delta Force, SAS, Wackenhutt Security types like you? It sounds like you miss having the “Home Field” advantage more than anything else and you miss the days when you could sit back and feast on noobies. What challenge is that? But of course, “we wouldn’t understand” because us unskilled peons don’t understand how great minds like yours operate. You want a challenge than try MOH:AA realism (tht's what I play) sans rockets and nades or something like instagib. Games where your first shot is usually the only shot you get. This is a twitch video game and not international Chess or Formula1 racing so relax on the melodrama. Maybe you are as good as you say you are and if indeed that is the case than it won’t matter what game they come out with because you’ll still be head and shoulders above the rest of us.

Regards,
Brick

Well after reading all this I believe there's a great number of people that are of the opinion that UT2003 is all about spam and no skill.

I'm really looking forward then to these people banding together and making a very nice skill based mod for the "hardcore" gamers.

I'll be learning UScript for the new engine and I'm already quite proficient at mapping (http://nzue.skankyflat.net). I'll be happy to help on any mod that the people feel will bring the skill factor back to the UT universe =)

rock climber, lets start a q2 RA2 clan. lol. best gaming of my life was rockjumping around on those maps and using the railgun. in my opinion the q2 railgun was the best weapon we've ever seen. without a silly zoom like todays snipers.

Sharpei Diem:

Well said. You are getting close to my thought, but not quite. You can evolve the gameplay and the game rules (like bombing run) without making the weapons spray and pray. That is what I don't like. It seems to be a growing trend in games these days, and is designed to make the game easier for new people. People who think like I do will tell you that being able to keep your xhair on a player and rip them up is more exciting that just aiming in their general direction and letting the gun do the work. I am not against the evolution of the games at all, in fact, quite the contrary. I am against taking away weapons that reward skilled aim and strategy, and replacing them with n00b friendly weapons.

Trust me, I have no problem kicking ass in any of the games out now. I don't claim to be the best at any of them, but I am far above average in all the shooters I play. After 6+ years of online shooter playing, you develop a good mental toolset to quickly kick ass in just about any shooter. I didn't have the slightest problem getting kills in the UT2K3 demo, which was one of the things that makes it boring to me.

Look, I really don't expect any of you to understand my point. I am really picky about the shooters I play, and shooters are the ONLY video games I ever play. It is my problem, and I have to find a game I will enjoy. I just want to get my opinion out there because I hear people talk about this all the time.

I'm actually looking forward to Raven Shield although Im not into the other Rainbow Six games. That game will bring the aim factor back, and I think it will be good for me.

Quade:

There may have been a few cheats around back then, but there was a very strict gaming ethic too unlike today where we have servers full of cheaters and TKs. There is at least 100 fold more cheating today than ever happened in Q1/Q2. The rocket launcher did take skill back then although I didn't need it that much. The truly good players knew the timing of the rockets and could easily stand in front of a noob and move from side to side dodging rockets. Even when people wised to that and started aim at your feet for splash effect, the good players knew how to move and avoid them. The weapons were very balanced in Q2. I did more damage with the SSG and the Railgun than the RL. In CTF, the mode I played, the grappling hook added a whole new skill and dimension to the game that baffled new players. Yes, if you joined a server as a n00b with some elite players on it, you were screwed and didn't live very long..let alone score kills.

As far as your comment about sniping...yes, that is one of the only weapons left that require real skill anymore. In fact, I was planning to play UT2K3 as a sniper with the Lightning gun, but I just don't like it. There is no feeling of firing a high-speed large caliber round like in standard guns or the Q2 railgun. It feels mushy like the Q3 railgun did, only much worse than that. Again, that is my opinion. It just isn't a fun gun to me. The only gun that deserves kudos is the shock rifle with the ability to detonate the secondary fire with the primary to create a nice explosion..but even that thing moves so slow it's easily dodged. You'd have to hope people were off guard to get any kills out of it.

Like I said...I'm not complaining about the game as much as the weapons and the lack of skill needed to use them. I have seen the full version of UT2K3 and the maps are breathtaking. Still, It felt too cartoony and weak for me.

I'm glad you enjoy UT2K3...have at it. I will wait for something better to come along.

Well, give the 40.41s a try and see how they work. I am using that series with my Ti4600 and I do not have any problems, except for when I overclock my card to its usual levels; doing that causes me to have the infamous "hitch" effect. Otherwise, the game runs fine and I get better performance than I do with the 30.82s.

Going to see Spirited Away later tonight,
Ray

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Just say no to anonymous posting registered trolls!

Rock, I don't quite understand what specifically it is that you don't like. If in the game it's easier for you to kill oponents(and thus easier), isn't it easier for your opponents to kill you(and thus harder) which balances things out? I'm thinking one of two things:

1) Perhaps you're not challenged because there are more low/un skilled players playing the game now than before(which seems obvious - larger pool, only a certain % can ever be highest quality) and so getting a match with the same number of similar high-skilled players is more difficult.

2) You're pissed off more by the fact that otherwise mediocre players who would never have been able to touch you before can now have a reasonable chance at a kill and the skills you developed over a long period of time are diluted by the game's engine(a FPS version of old coot's syndrome - (lol) everyone uses guns now, any idiot can use a gun, but back in my time you had to learn to use a sword, and let me tell you...)

Seriously though, I think that it's just the nature of evolution and every sport/game goes though it. Tennis, baseball, football, hockey, bridge, chess, tv, video games, take your pick. Every so often something new(rule, equipment, etc) is introduced for some benefit(you listed some of them) and some of the purists always argue that the fundamental sport is changed....and perhaps it is, but you can live in the past(nothing's stopping you from still running a quake 1/2 server) with it's hindrances(nothing new in the game) or live in the present with it's hindrances(too damn much new in the game) lol....

To no. 79's comment, yeah it did take some skill back then, but come on now, you still had the rocket launcher and you still had alot of splash damage, so as far as just skill, i disagree, you could stay alive more than just ten seconds as well, as far as all those old timers are concerned, the ones you say are so skilled, well alot of them cheated as well, though I will admitt to the fact that skill was important, it still is today, even in ut2k3. I too came up on games like doom and q1 etc but like everything in life there is always someone better than you in gaming, but there were alot of code cheats as well, as i am sure you are aware of also. And what about the chain gun etc you did not need alot of skill to use that, i think the skill you are really talkin about is sniping, now that was a skilled warrior, it took skill to snipe and kill 9 out of 10 times, but todays games are still as good if you just give them the time to learn different skills.

This comment was edited on Sep 20, 20:40.

I would have told you to upgrade to the 40.41's but ut2k3 has problems with them according to Epic. Try NVREfreshTool with the 30.82's. It worked for me. Also, I would set your PC back to normal clock speed just to test the demo.

i hate sigs

Alright I'll upgrade those, but the video card drivers I like because there are refresh rate issues with the 30.82, the nvreffix software i use doesn't work with it, I don't think.

I am overclocking to 1.46 GHz, but temperature is not an issue, it never was, and I never crash unless I play ut2k3.

Tony,

You are straight up ignorant. The games that are out NOW are the ones that are nerfed, spamming weapons. You couldn't mop up your own slobber, you mo-tard.

It's not that I don't like the new games, it's just that what they are doing now is taking much of the skill out of them. For all you game n00bs like Tony: New players use to join quake 1 and quake2 servers only to be devistated so badly, that they never even got a chance to learn the game (which I think kicks ass BTW). They whined and moaned and sales went down because the word got out that trying to play Quake2 online was a waste of time unless you happened to land on a server with other unskilled players (same thing happened in Quake 1 as well, but the community was smaller so there wasn't such an outcry).

So, since all these game companies are out to make money, they are now starting to realize that they can't cater to the hardcore players anymore (not totally anyway), cause there just isn't enough of us. Logic dictates that they have to dumb-down the games and make it so any n00b can jump in the game and start spamming....getting kills....so they will stick around and tell all their friends to buy the game. This = More $$$$.

Of course this is the wise thing for them to do from a business standpoint. But for people like me who were around from the beginning days of Quake1, all through Quake2 and today's games, they just seem to get more and more luck/spam oriented....for the reasons noted above. So, when I jump in a new game today, and all I have to do is point in someone's general direction and fire....i get bored real quick. Take your pick...Quake3 started in that direction, Halo, sof2, bf1942, UT2K3 (and manyothers_ are in this "new game" catagory. Dumbed down and boring in my opinion.

I have a solution to this, although I doubt it will ever be used. I think new games should have 2 engine modes.

1. Normal Mode = Keeping in the grand spam/nerf tradition of today's modern games...keep the spread on the weapons wide open and let the n00bs rip.

2. Expert Mode = tighten the groups on all the weapons down so we have to really aim to get a kill. Maybe throw in some other tweaks to the game that require PRACTICE to use well.

Of course those are highly simplified descriptions of the two engine modes, but you get the idea. This would allow people to run server in EITHER mode, and the hardcore players could play Expert Mode, and the casual players (majority) could play Normal Mode.

Many people feel the same way I do. Gaming has grown in popularity a lot in the past 2-3 years so many of you aren't aware of the skill it took to even be able to PLAY on an old Q1/Q2 server. When I say you had to be good just to stay alive for more than 10 seconds...i'm not kidding. I'm sure many of you remember those days. I know I am out numbered here and most of you think UT2K3 owns, which is fine. It's just my opinion. I miss having to really aim and because it took aim, there was a whole other way of thinking in order to get kills. I miss that as well.

Way to much effort, and no focus. UT2K3 Looks Awesome!, but that's it. The Game itself is... well is the main problem, I think the developers forgot people plan on buying this product to have fun "playing it" The Game play itself was terrible, all the weapons "felt" the same and did the same damage, thou the graphics where outstanding, the basics of the game...well there was none. I believe the developers became blindsided by the graphics and "high tech. development" It is the same Problem and/or Mistakes like that of Mr. Lucas screwing up on StarWarsII.(All special effect)(no good plot twist or surprises.)

Notice this is MY Opinion! I am NOT Write/Wong.

-ForGoTTeN OnE-

What do us skilled players play?

It's called instagib

I'm one of those old skewl "hardcore" gamers myself. Personally I think the apex of the genre was q 1/2 as well. I think the weapon balance and style of play in q2 really was the most balanced and did require the most amount of skill/map knowledge than any game released since. I don't however dislike the style of the new generation all that much. The fact is people make arguments like this at every generation change. When q2 came out people made comments about how slow it was compared to q1, so what did id do? make q3a faster. Same deal here. There is always going to be a rotation of styles going on and people are always going to point to a previous iteration as the high water mark. Personally I think this problem would be solved if epic and id didn't rotate on the same schedule so that we have to deal with two very similar games (don't flame, im just talking generally). That said I wasn't looking forward to UT2k3 all that much but have been caught up in the demo recently. For once I think epic finally got the weapons done right, and the maps on the whole seem to be well designed if a bit frantic.

On a seperate note, does anyone know if any of those game server rental businesses are still around? I'd really like to start up an organized clan and don't have a server of my own. Does anyone have any experience with any of this, i'd really like to find a realible company. Finally have some time to actually play games semi-competively on a team again and think UT2k3 might be the game.

oh as for the anon posting. believe me, it's helped out quite a bit.

Rock Climber, just admit it. You have not skill. End of story. LOL, it's the old "none of the games are good enough for me story". Just shut up and let me clean the floor with you in UT2K3. Like it or love it, what are you going to do about it? Get a new hobbie maybe? You could learn to play darts in your garage.
Nurfed weapons. That's another way of saying you miss the spam. Yea, games back in the day were easy to score kills all right. And how does that make you skilled?

-Tony!!!;)

Hoping Devster was not directing the comment directly at me

hehe.

Devster