We can pretty much declare Quake Live dead

For several years Quake Live served basically as a free version of Quake III Gold with the blood taken out of it. Later on in it's cycle it would see controversial changes made to it, such as a premium paid subscription model (since the original ads in the arenas idea didn't work) and a stupid as hell loadout system. As bad as those changes were, it sure as hell didn't cause the negativity that the latest one has done. As of writing, the game has become Steam exclusive, has had a $10 tag slapped on it, and EVERYTHING (player stats, friends lists, clans, etc.) have all be wiped out. Without a doubt most of it's playerbase will either be migrating back to classic Quake III Arena and possibly other games like Reflex. It wouldn't surprise me if a few move over to Unreal Tournament 4 or come here either.

http://kotaku.com/quake-live-fans-are-an...1739068130

The question is, is the new QL a proper client now or still the same old sheep herder?

Have you played the game recently? For a long while now it's been absolute garbage if you didn't subscribe. As a free player you're denied of the most basics of things such as map voting at the end game. And even if you we're a "pro" subscriber the freedom of access was still an illusion, you still couldn't make dedicated servers or test custom made maps/mods with friends (why Defrag didn't happen), you were always confined to whatever came up with patches once or twice a year.

So, it's one time pay now and you won't have limited access to things? I'd say that's a huge step forwards, although stats and friends getting wiped & still no linux support is obviously bullshit.

No king rules forever, my son.

The question is, is the new QL a proper client now or still the same old sheep herder?

Have you played the game recently? For a long while now it's been absolute garbage if you didn't subscribe. As a free player you're denied of the most basics of things such as map voting at the end game. And even if you we're a "pro" subscriber the freedom of access was still an illusion, you still couldn't make dedicated servers or test custom made maps/mods with friends (why Defrag didn't happen), you were always confined to whatever came up with patches once or twice a year.

So, it's one time pay now and you won't have limited access to things? I'd say that's a huge step forwards, although stats and friends getting wiped & still no linux support is obviously bullshit.

I booted it up just for the hell of it, since I already had it in my Steam library before the switch. I remember it sucking complete ass as a free player after they introduced their subscription model and never bothered to get said subscription due to already having copies of Quake III lying around. From what I've seen, it's the full game with Steam workshop and full Steam integration in it. Still, it's completely dead unlike Quake III which seems to have exploded. If the game had been released as a full Steam client, etc. a long time ago, then it probably would've helped the game. To do what they did without even telling anybody was complete suicide. I'm pretty sure they lost a shit ton of their playerbase awhile back when they gave Linux users the boot as well, for whatever reason Linux users tend to eat up arena FPS games about as much (and in some cases more) as Windows players, one of a handful of things people will argue killed UT3.

No king rules forever, my son.

Is that you King Terenas?

Linux users tend to eat up arena FPS games about as much (and in some cases more) as Windows players

I'd argue that's more the case with open source games than arena shooters, pretty much half if not majority of the currently existing arena shooters are open source in a way or another. But you're right, Linux users are a higher percentage of players in arena shooters than they are in mainstream shooters and that is quite simply because the rest of the aFPS player base being windows users isn't exactly that vast either. Still, it's a shame developers like ID and Turbo Pixel assess the priority of Linux support based on what the odds are supposedly in mainstream gaming.

Linux users tend to eat up arena FPS games about as much (and in some cases more) as Windows players

I'd argue that's more the case with open source games than arena shooters, pretty much half if not majority of the currently existing arena shooters are open source in a way or another. But you're right, Linux users are a higher percentage of players in arena shooters than they are in mainstream shooters and that is quite simply because the rest of the aFPS player base being windows users isn't exactly that vast either. Still, it's a shame developers like ID and Turbo Pixel assess the priority of Linux support based on what the odds are supposedly in mainstream gaming.

No doubt.

I don't think that UT3 suffered because of the lack of Linux support, but more because it's netcode was wonky, and the engine performed very poorly on lesser hardware of it's era. I honestly loved UT3, but then again it ran great on my system.

Quake Live died for a couple of reasons, but mostly because their business model lacked direction, and kept(keeps) changing. Also, it's appeal was somewhat limited more to old-school players who loved the Quake games. It's extremely dated looking, it's not sucking new gen players in for it's beauty - it's main appeal is the game play, which isn't all that appealing to new gen players. It's too fast, too balanced, weapons are too weak. Kids these days don't have the patience to learn, not to mention they are often up against seasoned players that obliterate them.

QL was the worst thing to happen to the OS Arena FPS games. It siphoned off a good number of existing players, and it cornered the market of those new gen players who DID like free to play, fast-paced arena FPS games and caused the player bases of the OS games to dry up significantly. When I look at the servers of the OS games, the playercounts are but a fraction of what they were from the late 2000's. I don't know if it'll ever rebound, simply because the fast-paced arena FPS is somewhat of a dead genre, at the moment. Maybe QL being on Steam will generate a revival, and people will start looking at the truly free ones again as alternatives to forking out 10 bucks(one can hope). Maybe if it cost 50 they would, lol! The truth is though, it's been quite some time since a successful commercial arena FPS has been released...maybe UT2k4 was the last truly successful one. There certainly have been attempts, but most met with meager response and even more meager player bases.

Now I'm glad that I put verbiage on our home page stating that our game "is and /will always be/ free-to-play". At the time I wrote that, this was just an imagined scenario that hadn't yet happened to a competing game. It was more to drive home the point that no one can take this game away from you because of the copyleft licensing. Sucks to see it actually happen out in the wild, but I am at least comforted in knowing that it can't happen to us.

Irritants line for me:

"Too balanced, weak weapons".

What I hate about most "competitive" FPS games now. Weapons end up quite boring for me, UT and Nexuiz / Quakeworld are the last games where I really find the weapons enjoyable as you can do multi-frags at times e.g Shock combo multikill, sniper rifle headshots multikills, Nexuiz fast combo frags due to strong(er) weapons etc.

I'd rather just see a developer or someone create a game with nice movement but strong weapons, something fun. Super balanced games just aren't fun for casuals and as Irritant said, end up getting stomped by old hard-core players.

The unbalance of the weapons and especially maps makes the game more complex and harder to learn imo. I don't think there's any other team game in the world harder than Quakeworld 4on4, you could waste an entire match without making a frag due to never getting(finding) a stronger weapon and because you simply don't know wtf is going on. So I doubt the super unbalanced games particularly are casual friendly either. You will get stomped in aFPS either there's a strict weapon balance or not, as long as casuals can't get over their stompphobia, I'm afraid there can never be a fun arena shooter game for them. I do agree though, too balanced weapons and too much emphasis on weapon specific roles is boring and takes away the improvisation value per weapon.

If a casual player can enjoy an arena fps, I get really skeptical of that arena FPS because good arena FPS aren't about the "fun" that everyone can experience right off the bat. They simply aren't at their best if literally everyone can get into it. Comprehending something complex or succeeding in something difficult is what gives me fun in arena FPS, but if everyone can do the same without practically trying or practicing, the rewarding feeling and the fun of that feeling gets instantly nulled and well, non existent. And in contrast, the more complex the mechanics are in every aspect, the more possibilities the game has for those rewarding feelings.

When people say arena FPS are like Chess, they don't only refer to the tactical element of it, but also the game being old and abysmal in learning curve and has a mixture of generations of skill, with rulesets that will never change in the future for any humanly just reason. The game will always be available for showcasing of skill.

I agree with a lot what your saying Smilecythe.

However, you can't really compare quakeworld as that game is well over 15 years old, so obviously anyone new trying to play is going to really really struggle. Also the majority of casual players are not going to go straight into competitive 4on4 matches!

I'm more thinking of new FPS based games, that people don't know the mechanics of and a FFA environment.

If you have a new(er) game, with strong style weapons and new elements, then people will be able to get into it as long as it's fun and easy to access. There will always be someone who is better then you ofcourse and the skill ceiling will always be pushed, however if it has new mechanics no one is going to be as far ahead in the curve as below.

The problem you have with something like quakelive / reflex / UT4, is that it tends to be hardcore players that shape the landscape of the balance. It just isn't easy to get into when people are playing games, that are pretty much direct sequels to a game that a hardcore community has been playing for X amount of years.

As a result, it is very difficult to keep players in a 'modern' gaming scene interested, when so many people are playing who have months or years of experience with the same / almost the same weapons & mechanics.

This issue never appeared in the past as UT / Quake games were the first big multiplayer aFPS games. Also back then you didn't have the amount of games you have now.

I don't see any quake based movement game, or UT game (UT4 / Toxikk) becoming 'massively' popular anytime soon, because hardcore players will continue to dominate it and to be honest, there not interested in learning something new.

I know people are big on match-making now, that's the only way I see a way for casual gamers to get into aFPS games like the new UT / Reflex etc and stick to it.

I know one UT player who told me Overwatch is going to be the next big thing (without even playing it), purely because it will have prizemoney tournaments, so basically rather play a game because it will have money, then if it's any good or not.

Last but not least, content is definitely an essential ingredient to keeping people playing, easily accessible and (frequent) new content!

Chivalry: Medieval Warfare was hugely popular when first released and still had a decent player count last time I checked - not exactly a aFPS but it's fun and easily accessible to casuals, or was to begin with. Also it spawned it's own competitive scene, was never designed as a 'competitive' game.

The problem you have with something like quakelive / reflex / UT4, is that it tends to be hardcore players that shape the landscape of the balance. It just isn't easy to get into when people are playing games, that are pretty much direct sequels to a game that a hardcore community has been playing for X amount of years.

As a result, it is very difficult to keep players in a 'modern' gaming scene interested, when so many people are playing who have months or years of experience with the same / almost the same weapons & mechanics.

Of course it's going to be hardcore players shaping the balance, because it's made for them by them, hoping people who didn't have access before would now. The point of projects like quakelive / reflex / UT4 is to uphold the skill accumulated from those X amount of years, for those specific games and their competitive playerbases. Their goal is to cultivate their history, instead of writing entirely new history. The only problem facing them is the majority of modern gamers who want it to change so that they can get a shortcut in. Simplest of all demands is new maps and that alone is enough to shift the balance of skill. When you dig a little deeper into core mechanics, the game changes entirely and the point of the projects is lost.

If the goal is to remake this, it should look like this and not like this.

The demand for new content and innovative games is mostly inspired by the short life spanned nature of games today, their fun tends to end as fast as it was easy to get into it. eSports will never truly be eSports if we disregard any game or content that has 15 or more years of history. Most modern games last barely 2 years perhaps because of a big pool of money (like you said) being only thing running it. And as a frequent follower of competitive gaming of all sorts, it is quite damn boring to watch inexperienced try hards drooling for money.

I'd rather take a risk of making a game only a few people like, but for a long long time than make a game that is only popular and fun for a microscopic fraction of time. Some projects needs to think ahead and I think projects like QL/RFLX and UT4 are doing it.

Eh. I actually got Q3A a few weeks back. As a newcomer to the arena shooter genre, I... wasn't impressed. In bot matches (which are pretty much all you can get now), I was crushed mercilessly on any difficulty that is in any way high, but I expected that because I Suck. But your character feels sluggish, and the only way to build up a reasonable speed is advanced movement, which I suck at, so every time I try it, I bang into walls because apparently the only thing that can stop you in Q3 is your momentum. The weapons are fun, but if your controls don't feel good, than it really doesn't matter. It was especially disappointing, because I'd been playing Quake 1, and QuakeWorld, although mostly Quake 1 because all the servers are empty. There, you feel as fast and nimble as a quark. Mind, I still Suck, and can't bhop or strafejump, because that is constant. And then out of curiosity, I downloaded CPMA. I didn't think I'd enjoy it any more than I enjoyed Q3A, but I gave a botmatch a go anyways. And holy crap. I was still getting curbstomped regularly, but I didn't care, because it was so FUN. The movement felt unbelivably good. And now, mysterious creatures that have taken the name of id Software, you want me to give you my money for a cut-down version of a game that used to be a free cut-down version of a game that many people say kicked ass, but I only liked with a mod you sorta-kinda-not-really included in the game, when I could instead by a game that is an expanded version of said mod (reflex)? Do I really need to tell you what I'm going to do? (Play QW and Xonotic, and maybe buy Reflex if I can scrounge up the cash)

On another note, why are we complaining about hold-down-space bunnyhop being added? To me, it seems that's not so much the pot calling the kettle black as the pot painting itself black, talking about how great black is, and then screaming that the kettle has been ruined when it paints itself the same way.

You're bumping into walls because you're probably used to more air control. There's aircontrol in Q3 too, but nowhere as much. In general the game is not as fast because you have to stop occasionally to make sharp turns in ground rather than in air.

The essentials for advanced movement are very similar however; if you turn in air your speed accelerates. Imagine turning around a huge circle and the circle that you're circling around gets bigger when you go faster, which means you have to adjust your mouse angle and key pressing accordingly to make those optimal curves happen. If you turn around the circle too fast or too slow, you won't be getting nearly as much speed.

Now, the way aircontrol responds to key presses and mouse turning in Q3 is also similar. Assuming you're using WASD for movement:

If you hold A or D in air and turn the mouse - the center point of the circle is at the direction where the left or right side of your character is.
If you hold W or S in air and turn the mouse - the center point of the circle is at the direction where the front or back side of your character is.
If you hold A/D+W/S - the center point will be at the diagonal direction from your character. A/D+W is the most common and used technique for strafe jumping. Looking up some tutorials really helps to get the grasp of it.

On another note, why are we complaining about hold-down-space bunnyhop being added? To me, it seems that's not so much the pot calling the kettle black as the pot painting itself black, talking about how great black is, and then screaming that the kettle has been ruined when it paints itself the same way.

In a game like Xonotic, complaining about it would not make sense indeed. However in CPMA and Reflex there's a mechanic called "double jumping". It works as follows: if you jump twice within 400 milliseconds, the second jump will go higher. Watch this part from Kovaak's tutorial to see the many ways how it can be executed: https://youtu.be/gt99wfDKP9U?t=5m13s

This feature requires you to be in full control of individual jumps and having autohop on makes it harder and quite honestly it's a pain in the ass. As we've seen in PQL (quake live promode) that tries to simulate CPMA with autohop enabled, it's actually harder to control the jumps executed via autojump than individual jump presses. Sometimes you press jump key too long (1 millisecond is enough for too long) and end up jumping that one extra time and then fail your trick.

Double jumps is kind of the jam in CPMA/Reflex, that's why we're complaining about autohop.

Thanks for the tips, Cythe. Resources are somewhat scant online. Also, given how much time I spend on the ground (I need some practice) I think they slowed the base movement speed from QW in VQ3. And thanks for explaining why people hate the autohop. I still think it's a reasonable addition to VQL physics (it really does help the new player experience), but adding it to PQL is braindead. That's like adding training wheels to all the bikes in the Tour De France.

Still sad in Xonotic that you can't use the scroll wheel for jumping.

Still sad in Xonotic that you can't use the scroll wheel for jumping.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but this should be very simple.
Just go to menu > settings > input, double click on jump,
and then use the wheel as you desire.


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rdfg movement? That's rather interesting, don't think iv heard of that before. That must allow more buttons on the left side to use, howether, is it that needed? I am an esdf user myself, and it seemed that there was enough.

rdfg movement?

Good catch. I use an ergonomic keyboard that is split in the middle.
These keys are the right-most on the left side, i.e. the most slanted and thus most comfortable for me.

rdfg movement? That's rather interesting, don't think iv heard of that before. That must allow more buttons on the left side to use, howether, is it that needed? I am an esdf user myself, and it seemed that there was enough.

Heck, I've never seen the need to move beyond wasd myself. If I was trying to play optimally, sure, but the extra 2 or 3 buttons never seemed worth the hassle.

Now, numkeys on a mouse, that I'd go for. But those are often expensive.

rdfg movement?

Good catch. I use an ergonomic keyboard that is split in the middle.
These keys are the right-most on the left side, i.e. the most slanted and thus most comfortable for me.

I would actually like to see how that works. Can you show a picture of the keyboard and your config file?

PS move this to the config thread?

Still sad in Xonotic that you can't use the scroll wheel for jumping.

There's no need for you to use mousewheel. It's only necessary in games where you need to spam the jump to time it perfectly with landing. Xonotic has autohop and all you need to do is hold a key. So you're likely to get mistimed jumps if you use mousewheel to spam jumps instead.