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Server Haxors -updated
Some cool dudes out there have found the
backdoor that id Software left in the Quake2 servers as well as QuakeWorld servers. Here is a little program written up by crt of Rocket Arena fame that will patch your
QuakeWorld or Quake2 server if you are having problems with kids hacking your server. Keep
in mind the backdoor is just an exception made for the id Software ip subnet having rcon
access to any server.
Here is what John Carmack had to say about the backdoor action:
The rcon backdoor was added to help the development of QuakeWorld (It is not present in Quake 1). At the time, attacking Quake servers with spoofed packets was not the popular sport it seems to have become with Quake 2, so I didn't think much about the potential for exploitation.
The many forced releases of Quake 2 due to hacker attacks has certainly taught me to be a lot more wary.
It was a convenient feature for us, but it turned out to be irresponsible. Sorry.
There will be new releases of QuakeWorld and Quake 2 soon.
Daikatana
The www.ionstorm.com
website has been updated with some nice pictures of the weapons you will be able to check
out if you are lucky enough to be attending the upcoming E3
event. Hey, they fit in a weapon that has the word "railgun" in there too!
Prey
Thanks to Lithium for the word that the www.3drealms.com website has been updated as well with
info on their Prey project and talk about the KMFDM music deal.
LithTech Demo
If you were deemed cool enough by Monolith
last time when they let out the DirectEngine demo, then I imagine you may wanna try and
check out this updated engine tech demo now dubbed
LithTech. Keep in mind you have to be awfully cool to get a password key handed to you
via email from these guys. They wouldnt want some unqualified gamer possibly seeing an
engine demo without their knowledge. -VE
werd
Well, been up all night doing the new
partition thing on my PC and watching DVD's. That USB run-in that I had on Wednesday was
not even fully cleared up after a reinstall of windows, So what the hell, I did some
format c: action. Oddly enough about 4 guys emailed me assuming I had a velcro wallet? was
that email link and the name I pasted just oh so similar to Steve Gibson that it got
confusing? Strange...
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Unreal Preview -updated
MarcEG's Unreal Universe has just
posted a review of sorts of Unreal. This is of course a first hand account from a fans
point of view after getting to visit the Epic offices and check out the latest version of
Unreal and make stains on the carpet. -VE
Oh hey, check out this GameSpot peak at Unreal, thanks Redwood.
Pat Hook Has A Velcro Wallet
Pat "Sabian" Hook, a level designer
over at Ritual Entertainment is currently living in the past. He is the proud owner of a
1980's velcro wallet which I was witness to late Wednesday evening on one of our regular
IHOP visits. Patrick is currently 21yrs old. If you wish to share your pain with Patrick,
and his choice of using a Velcro wallet. (I'm willing to bet those shoes he wears are
velcro too) drop him a line at phook@ritual.com Tell
that turd to change my link on quakeworld.net while yur at it! :)
Messiah and Uber at CGDC
Games.net has posted an article
talking about Shiny and their plans to show off some of their work on the Messiah project
at CGDC. Should be really interesting to see with all the copyright stuff and the
incredible claims that have been made. Also giving a
talk, but not showing their deck of cards just yet will be Gary McTaggart and Charlie
Brown of Ritual Entertainment. Although Gary & Charlie have not made any outrageous
claims about the technology they are working on, it's a pretty well known fact among the
game companies that the stuff that these two monkeys are working on is "the next big
thing." Meaning, we will probably see a lot of companies licensing their technology,
much like Carmack's Quake tech.
Blood2
There is yet another page update to the Blood2
page over at www.the-chosen.com with talk about
LithTech as always and some info about the editor that will be packaged with the completed
engine as well. No comparisons have been made to Unreal and UnrealEd just yet, but like..
uh.. I'm doing it now damn it. They are both engines, and they both have editors. Can you
believe they pay me to write this stuff? muahahaha
Monster Truck2 Demo
According to VE and the Microsoft info site, we should be
seeing a demo version of Monter Truck Madness 2 sometime today! The screenshots looked
purty durn interesting, so make sure and check it out.
Final Fantasy VII
Operation 3dfx
has posted an account from a reader of PC Gamer who received the FFVII demo CD along with
his magazine. A fine little piece of literature it is too.
Well, I received PC Gamer in the mail today (FINALLY) and when I opened it, a nice little black treasure fell into my lap.. Yes, the long awaited FF7 demo disc arrived. Let me first start off by saying not many games on the PC have made me say "Wow" or "Holy Shit" in terms of graphics and flashy effects. Off the top of my head, the only ones are: Glquake, Quake2, the incredible Forsaken and now FF7.
New Display Doctor
Not sure what was wrong with the other
version, but I'm guessing it has something to do with replacing your freaking windows
driver? Hello!? At any rate, Display Doctor,
when used correctly can really help boost your Quake framerate. Make sure and check out
the new version over at the homepage. Incredible how much email these guys send you when a
new version is about to be released.
DirectX v5.2
Ayup! a new version of DirectX for you to *cough*
install and see if your computer still works. This mostly deals with the directinput stuff
(joysticks etc) and as far as I saw doesnt really deal much with the display driver. So
dont go expecting to see your Quake framrates to increase.
The Views
Hardware
The Patches
.plan Wagon
Among all the useless stuff out there, every
once in a while something actually interesting still pops up ;)
werd
I'm leaning a bit more towards changing the
format of the page a bit more now. Since the actual *GAMES* are what people are intersted
in, I try to get those all covered at the top of the page, then break down into all the
sub categories towards the bottom.
Sorry I'm not all over thid DIVX crap btw. Check out the Houston Chronicle article though. -hawkwind Ah, and also Tony on Yahoo sent this link to a news.com article.
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Daikatana Video
Thanks to Redwood for the word that www.stormtroopers.com has posted a new Daikatana
video for you guys to check out. There are 3 different quality videos depending on your
bandwidth:
- daikatana2.zip
(High-quality AVI/36MB)
- d2_small160.zip
(Reduced-quality AVI/8MB)
- DaikatanaTrailer.zip
(RealVideo/2MB)
The movie features rapid action shots of various enemies, massive levels, in-game action, and even some blood and gibs to drool over. You'll get to see many new characters up close and personal and check out their amazing detail and fluid movements.
Prey
The Prey
Designer Diary has gotten the monthly update thing goin right on schedule. New
screenshots as always and chat with the guys from 3DR talking about the progress of the
neeto project. -VE
Descent: Freespace Demo
As promised, the demo of Descent Freespace has
been released on the Volition Inc. website. No
word from anyone on whether or not it's worth the hefty 26meg download or not. (I was
never really a fan of Descent, but may grab this tonight I guess) Thanks Brian Thomas.
- Here is the link to AVault, fastest download I know of.
X-Com: Interceptor Demo
While you are checking out demos, dig on the new X-Com release
available over at OGR. There is also a preview posted on GameSpot. I
found linked on VE.
Half-Life
After several tries, Peter Kim over at Gamers Extreme got this url right. They have posted a new preview of Valve's
Half-Life project
Gabe Newell, the founder and Managing Director of Valve, along with Ted Backman, gave us the guided tour around the various worlds of Half-Life. From the beginning of our tour, this Quake and Quake II engine-based game set itself apart from the competition on the merits of its single player gameplay and technical innovation. The version we saw and played at the launch event was labeled "Alpha 0.61," so it should go without saying that we are writing about a project which is very much in development. As with all such works in progress, anything we've seen (and subsequently reported) can be drastically altered or even removed in the final product.
Quake3
Paul Steed answered some questions from "Carl" and they are posted on VooDoo Extreme for you to check out.
Q. How are you planning on improving on your representation of damage to monster (or even players)?
A.Everything about our current animation presentation will change. Mulitiple weapons (held differently) are for sure and we may be able to blow limbs off. Directional deaths and pains are going to be implemented as well.
Wheel of Time
The Wheel of Time page has been updated yet
again with a progress report for you kids to check out. The game is looking pretty spiffy,
aside from those wacky doctored screenshots that they put out so long ago I'm kinda
excited about this one.
Levelord Interview
Richard Gray from Ritual got an interview posted on his page of choice, www.deathmatch.org and is pretty damn excited about
it. Also he reveals that there will be a sequel to the famed HIPDM1 Quake mission pack #1
level in Sin. Even a screenshot for you kids.
GameSpy & CGDC
The guys on the GameSpy team www.gamespy.com are all
excited that they will actually have a booth to show up all those par per play guys (TEN,
etc) that the free play stuff is the way to go kids. They will be holding a 2on2 Q2 Rocket
Arena tourney at their booth as well. Neeto!
The Man
According to OGR Newsnet, Microsoft has signed a deal with
DeathRow to use their products (Mice) in all official clan games for now until the
contract they all signed expires. Thats 10 members.. Last I heard Reptile was using a
Logitech Mouseman, I wonder how thats gonna work out.
Microsoft announced today that the professional gaming team, Clan Death Row, has signed an agreement to endorse the Microsoft Mouse line of products. According to Microsoft, Clan Death Row will use the Microsoft Mouse line in worldwide competitions as well as conduct usability testing on future products. Clan Death Row is comprised of ten Quake players, including the renowned Thresh (a.k.a. Dennis Fong) and Unholy (a.k.a. Wes Culver)
SiN Box Art
Hey cool, I really dig this box art that Ritual and aCtivision have finally agreed upon
for Sin. The HardCorps SiN News page
from aCtivision has just posted the image, here is the thumbnail linking to their page.
Divx
It sucks.
Hardware
The Patches
.plan Wagon
werd
So.. you are wondering what happened
yesterday. ... Lets just say I have my doubts about USB, and have a really clean new
install of windows going. Also learned a lesson, write down information like your ISP
stuff someplace besides on your computer before you go doing a deltree /y windows.
"Honest, I'm Steve Gibson.. please can I have my password?" Talk about a shit
week.
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.plan Wagon
Brian Hook made an interesting .plan update talking about
nVidia:
Saw this Mike Hara (of NVidia) quote:
"...we're trying to ratchet up the visual quality of the game. If they [3Dfx] want to claim that they did it first, that's fine."
Because they're right?
"But weRre trying to be good for development and for playback. 3Dfx canRt claim that given it canRt do 3D in a window or 2D. TNT will be the first board that will be good for both development and playback which is really what the agreement with Activision revolves around."
This is somewhat subjective, but a dual-monitor configuration a la 3Dfx is actually really pleasant to develop on, more so than an integrated 2D/3D solution. Now, in the grand scheme of things a 2D/3D part is the way to go, but for development having a monitor dedicated to output is really nice -- you can have your debugger going on your main screen, and your output on another (shades of the old monochrome monitor + VGA stuff from 5 years ago).
Using the word "development" in such a broad stroke is kind of extreme, but in one way Mike is correct -- for running tools and stuff, you want a nice 2D/3D combo. But for program development, having separate monitors is nice.
But with multi-monitor, then 3D-only will have almost no advantage over a dual-monitor 2D/3D setup.
Also, thanks to Mr. Solo for adding RBR to the tracker as well as Jack Mathews and Joe Powell. Oh, and also I've had a couple .plans pulled due to wasting space.
MacQuakeWorld
MacQuake.com has posted a support board that all
you Mac users should check out with your questions. (Funny how many emails I've gotten
from Mac users. Sorry guys, I'm still pissed that you cant get a floppy out of a Mac in a
power outage)
Trespasser!
Check out GameSpot's look at the
incredible looking Trespasser project. The screenshots arent really new (heh Billy)
but it is well worth the look. Sporting their own 3d engine and not getting a whole lot of
press, Trespasser may surprise a lot of people.
While you are at it, check out this link which talks about Half-Life, Unreal etc. -VE
You hearing voices?
GameSlice has posted an interesting bit
talking about the next gen of games and the possible integration of voice communications.
There have already been rumors of Quake3 supporting this. (It was originally mentioned as
a possibility for Quake back in the day.. never happened) So check it out. Here's a quote:
Based on the discussions I’ve had with developers, implementing this voice technology isn’t really that difficult, so I think you’ll see a wealth of multiplayer games supporting this feature in 1998
The next Nintendo
Ok, not even close to related, but very
interesting. You guys should check
out this Next-Gen article which discusses Nintendo's future plans with their next
gaming system. The N64, although fairly cool, is not doing so hot in comparison to the
Playstation from SONY.
The Views
What everyone else is saying
ThreeeDeee
Two days in a row, threeedeee representin!
For all you aspiring game programmers that want to use OpenGL but are having trouble getting a good start on the Win32 part of it, I have a little present. (it's worth all you will pay for it... :o) I have put on the downloads page a zip file that has an example program that will run OpenGL full-screen or in a window and will change the screen resolutions for you, etc. This program is called glDemo for obvious reasons. Special thanks go to John Carmack for some sample code that clued me in on the right way to do some of this stuff. I am releasing this in the spirit of trying to get as many people as possible using OpenGL. I hope you find it helpful. Even if there is only 1 thing you pick up from it, it will have been worth the work I did. For those of you that have 3Dfx cards, you will need to also downloadthe mesadll.zip file for the Mesa drivers. The 3Dfxgl.dll from Quake willnot work with this program. www.frag.com/doom
The Patches
werd
Yea, can you believe it? I actually updated my
weekly section last night as promised, as well as am updating this morning before 10am!
Incredible.. Must be a fluke though. :)
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Duke4
With all the excitement surrounding Duke4
after that recent screenshot release, Check out this PCFan Duke4 preview which gives
us a bit of insight on the project, as well as a bit more hype just for fun. -VE
Descent Freespace demo
Word from the www.volition-inc.com website is that the demo of
this project could be out as soon as tomorrow. thanks Billy.
HexenWorld CTF
Check out the www.hexenworld.com website for more info on the
status of the CTF mod for HexenWorld now in progress.
The Views
Jason Hall of Monolith (Part 2 of 2) talks about Blood 2 (and more Monolith stuff) on the Monday, April 27th, Daily Dementia...
http://meccaworld.com/daily_dementia/
Monday returns, and TC is hepped up on Pepsi like never before. The big show begins with Jason Hall of Monolith talking about their upcoming title, Blood 2. In the Spotlight: Feedback from the Friday show regarding Buillion Base Entertainment; Polling the electred; Spare a quarter, Duke?; the Daily Dementia's upcoming lineup of guests -- Running time: 22 minutes, 19 seconds (longest show ever -- told you he was hepped up!)
ThreeeDeee
Couple items of mention in 3D world
Q2 Patches
The daily poison:
FAQ YOU EH?
Many reasons to FAQ:
Sites
werd
Oh boy.. Langsuyar over at Ritual hangs out at
the house here along with the rest of the gang and has decided to start keeping tabs on
some of the more disgusting things that come up in our nightly get togethers. I'm telling
you guys, it's all giggler. btw, minor correction in that .plan update, replace
"slapping" with "sticking" :)
I've got a Q2 tournament to run for VRGN tonight but will have another update as well as the weekly section posted before midnight my time. Tell you what, If I dont update tomorrow before 10am you can all come to my house and flogg me :)
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Daikatana Shots
The Daikatana shots are just a flowing lately,
AVault has gotten a hold of 4 more
screenshots for you kids to check out. They look great, the texturing of the models is
excellent.
Mac QuakeWorld
Westlake
Interactive has released the 2nd beta of their QuakeWorld port for the Mac. Yea, they
fixed several of the more annoying bugs that have popped up, it should be a bit more
stable now.
QERadiant
Yup, after the big party last night that means
a new versino of QERadiant has been
released. Check out the homepage or something. Version 071 now to
be exact, and a couple of new features for ya:
- preferences reorganized and revamped internally
- copy/paste now works between multiple copies of the editor
- Edit | Load Prefab.. will open a map load dialog in the prefab path per prefs
- File | Load... will load a map on top of the current map, meaning it loads and selects
the map file so you can append maps easily
- Copy/Paste, Load Prefab, and File | Load will all remap conflicting target/targetname
pairs
- File | Save Selected... saves the selection to a map file
- Brush/Entity count is now back on the status bar, it is overwritten during moves but
should come up per QE4 otherwise
Q2 Proxy
Version 2.0 of this Quake2 proxy program that will let multiple
people play Quake2 sharing the same IP. (Such as a shared dial up ISDN)
Coven Demo
The Coven is hoping to release a demo version
of the Quake II section of Disposable Heroes before the end of this month. (within a week)
Heroes is a commercial Quake and Quake II deathmatch pack featuring new mods, levels,
skins and models for both games. The demo will feature three maps taken from the Quake II
part of the pack, plus a nuclear-free version of the MAD patch. You can find further
details and screenshots at The Coven website at http://www.planetquake.com/TheCoven
The Views
Patches
Sites
werd
Sorry for the lack of morning updates the past
3 days. I'm just a jerk who likes to sleep in. :)
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