Unreal Interview

This game isnt really taking off all that well is it? Or is it my imagination. I realize its still early, but the lack of servers amazes me.

UT2003 just needs for HW to catch up to it and for some better maps to come out. Should get more popular as time goes on. Its not like Doom3 is going to have killer multiplayer support. Maybe we will have to wait for Quake4. Time being UT2003 and BF1942 is there for us.

Well, after having recently dusted off my old copy of the original UT, and having UT2k3 installed as well, and having been playing both a fair bit over the past month or so, I must say that there are definitely a lot of things that UT2K3 does much better than UT.

For one, the mouse control and movement feel of UT is just so "heavy" and "slow" that is painfully frustrating in comparison to games like Q3, UT2K3, even QW. Plain and simple, the movement code is the biggest improvement in UT2K3 (aside from the obvious graphical improvements).

The toning down of weapons in UT2K3 compared to UT is good as well, waayyyyy to much rocket spam and the Flak cannon is ridiculously powerful in UT. I think Epic did a good job overall with UT2K3.

The only downside that I have found with the new game is the maps. Plain and simple, most of em sacrificed good layouts for "WOW" factor and more polygons (just to show off what the engine could do). In UT, the maps were definitely interesting, and had their own "feel"... in UT2K3, they all feel as if they've been processed through a cookie cutter machine with slight variations.

Thus, I think that once new map packs become available, UT2K3 will definitely take off a lot more. As for the original UT, it was the deathmatch that Unreal should have had... compared to todays games, its just way to heavy, slow and clunky.

So anyone ask them about this?

http://gamershq.madonion.com/news/?newsarticle=200210/2002102202#200210/2002102202

Well, that interview was bought and paid for.

How about asking some *real* questions:

1) Has Epic done anything about internal Quality Assurance seeing that there are WILD framerate swings in the base maps? In CTF-Face3, you can get 120+ framerate and in the CTF-Magma bases and many other DM and DD maps, the framerate drops to mid to low 40s and lower.

2) Seeing that UT2k3 debuted online as the #7 most played game and has since dropped to #8 and #9 (http://www.gamespy.com/stats), does Epic regret clowning up the game with the uncalled for "sports theme" crap and making the game more Q3TA-like?

3) Seeing that there has been an infusion of people playing UT, does Epic admit they probably went too far changing the game?

Dear Epic, one simple request that would really improve the numbers of people playing your game.

In your first Expansion pack, include a Classic UT mod that includes the old weapons, player speeds, gameplay, etc.

Thank you

Pretty good read.

I think that UT2k3 will make for a good mod platform (assuming modders pick it up and do stuff with it). It has probably the best technology for modders out there right now (although I think once Tenebrae gets polished up and what-not it will provide a pretty tempting choice too). It has vehicles right in the code out of the box, it has a pretty powerful/versatile physics system (Karma) built into it. It manages to do BOTH indoor and outdoor stuff pretty well (unlike BF42 which tends to have much more impressive outdoor capabilities than indoor stuff by a long stretch...or the many many examples of games/engines that do indoor stuff well and suck balls for outdoor stuff). It has a nice particle engine and has a lot of nifty effects and potential for nifty effects. Its very nicely object oriented (while OOP definately has its share of ups and downs, it is beneficial when it comes to reading someone else's code and becoming familiar with it along with the overall user-friendliness of it as opposed to "traditional" methods (I know the Q3 game code pretty well, but it isn't easy for someone new to it to just jump in and learn it...and like anything else less time spent on familiarization means more time to be spent on working towards the end goal)).

The game itself isn't one of my favorites (although with a mutator I made I enjoy the hell out of it...but thats just me with bots playing around here and there). I just hope that if good mods come out for it that players give them a chance and that they aren't hurt by the quality of the base game.