[Jim]

AD 1.8 is out!!

http://www.simonoc.c...esign/sp/ad.htm

[jkas789]

NightFright, on 01 October 2020 - 09:31 AM, said:

Proof of life from the Quake community!

The first episode of "Dwell" has been released today. They intend to turn this into a full-blown 4 episode adventure with new monsters, bosses, weapons and music (!). That came up out of nowhere.

https://www.quaddict...ic.php?pid=3961

The screenshots look very promising, which is rather an understatement. Mind-blowing boner material would be more adequate. Gotta give this a spin one of these days.

This looks awesome. Between this, Raven Keep and the new Arcane Dimensions update I will need to inject caffeine into my veins with all the time I'm gonna waste playing instead of sleeping

[Aristotle Gumball]

Jim, on 13 October 2020 - 02:01 AM, said:

AD 1.8 is out!!

http://www.simonoc.c...esign/sp/ad.htm

Tears of the False God is blowing my mind right now. Fuck.

[DisgustedGrunt]

There's a secret exit on Tears of the False God, you have to find all 16 hallowed shards to access it. Just leads back to the AD hub, but there's one hell of a battle before you can leave.


760 enemies on hard. Damn

if you're missing a hallowed shard:

Spoiler

13 are on the "main" area, where you start the map.
1 is on the "boss" area, but you'll need to already have 8 shards to access it.
2 are behind the portals that go between the main and boss area, you have to enter the portals from behind. took me forever to figure that

[Aristotle Gumball]

Some of this stuff is so pretty to look at, lol. I only wish they replaced all the old weapon models with slightly better looking ones instead of just the nail gun and that extra shotgun you get. But yeah, playing AD last year (or maybe 2018, I forget) from start to finish was an amazing experience. There are parts that get too Serious Sam-y for my tastes as I don't think Quake was ever about that or should be, but mostly it's a good mix. There's just a ton of variety in general and no map plays the same.

Wife and I did Dwell in co-op a few days ago and map 6 is crazy detailed and almost like some twisted art piece. I'm enjoying mapping in Trenchbroom as well (moved my project over to it).

The Quake modding community is really nice by the way. That was a huge draw for me in deciding to start modding for it cause I ask a lot of questions and people are super helpful and don't seem to have huge egos. It's a weird niche where everyone seems focused on creating and there's very little else (talking about func), which is good if you just wanna make stuff and be inspired by people who are creative geniuses.

[NightFright]

I finished Dwell yesterday. Levels are amazing, very interesting environments with well-executed Egyptian theme. However, gameplay is... hard. Very hard. Even on easy. At first it's still amusing when the game throws dozens of grunts at you which you can kill easily even without a Quad, but later on it's waves of ogres, demons, vores, shamblers... Sure, you often get lots of respawning powerups and ammo, but it still wasn't enough to prevent me from getting overwhelmed eventually.

For me the breaking point arrived around the sixth map when I had to resort to god mode since I just wasn't willing to go through this ordeal. It's a great episode, but unfortunately it was made for Plutonia lovers, assuming all Quake players must have ascended to this skill tier by now. And remember, Quake has never been an easy game, anyway.

[jkas789]

Fun fact. I have never played the two missions pack for Quake. I have so far finished the first one and I hope I can finish the second one this week. I like them so far. They are not as grandiose in level design as say, Arcane dimensions but they are fine. I have to say that for Scourge of armageddon I was not a fan of those scorpion type enemies. I found them really annoying.

I was a fan of the laser blaster though, it was really good against shamblers and anything that I wanted out of my way in a pinch. The final boss was a final boss, even if a bit meh. I'm hoping Dissolution of eternity is way better but so far I have found the extra weapons cumbersome when trying to change weapons with the mouse wheel on the fly.

[Aristotle Gumball]

I prefer Dissolution. It's got more varied environments (you'll recognize the textures if you've played AD or any of the map jam packs) and is a bit more challenging.

[NightFright]

I have a slight preference for Armagon. Especially the laser gun is a great addition and quite powerful (that hammer less so, though - only if you are surrounded, maybe). The scorpion is annoying and the next-best thing to a hitscanner, but it's not overused at least. Level design got a lot better compared to the original episodes. I remember how people complained they couldn't run SoE properly on machines that were able to handle Quake just fine before. Little did they know what AD would be like about 20 years later...

DoE is quite alright as well, even though levels and new weapons are less spectacular. It has some highlights in the Egyptian episode like that pyramid or the Greek temple, but it's usually rather conventional. Those wraiths are also annoying, like flying vores. I hate them more than the Armagon scorpions. You can gave fun with that anti-grav belt, they could have used that more, not just for reaching secret areas. The dragon boss is what makes it special, I think it's even one of the monsters id had to cut from the original game due to time pressure.

Both mission packs are great in general and any Quake edition sold without them is a crime.

[NightFright]

In case you have missed it, another 10-map episode has been released on Oct 20, called "Epochs of Enmity".
Its aim is to deliver a vanilla-style experience similar to the inofficial 5th episode released by J.F. Gustafsson a while ago (Dimension of the Past).

Since the custom music is in ogg format, you won't hear it in Mark V. Best played with Quakespasm-Spiked like most Quake addons these days, I guess.

Announcement:
https://www.quaddict...?pid=4108#p4108

[Lunick]

I really liked Epochs of Enmity except from the final map, it's a complete contrast to the rest of the episode and is not really fun.

Calling it an unofficial 6th episode is probably going a bit far though, some of the map designs stray a little bit beyond vanilla and some of the level design is not consistent with levels within the episode itself.

[Mark]

Odd. I was taught the word was emnity, not enmity. The graphics look great. I'm not a fan of the warped perspective in the screenshots. Hopefully an adjustable FOV setting will lessen it like it does for Eduke32.

[NightFright]

If you play on Easy, there is an updated version for the 7th map to fix a problem with a missing mob preventing you from continuing:

http://www.quaketast...s/eoem7_fix.zip

[NightFright]

Btw, is it just me or is the Quake community... not so helpful?

It's happening time and again to me if I have a problem that I get an answer like: "I tried to do it and got it working. You need these tools, now do it yourself."

Can I say I absolutely HATE that attitude. Why do I have to repeat the same steps someone else obviously already did? For the sake of learning something? And what if I can't get it done? The person keeps sitting on the solution forever?

I know this isn't really about Quake itself, so my apologies. Just please, don't be like that. Not everyone is a coding/compiling crack. And just because you are, don't assume others should be one, too.

[Lunick]

NightFright, on 20 December 2020 - 09:16 AM, said:

Btw, is it just me or is the Quake community... not so helpful?

I don't really engage with Quake communities outside of Twitter because the forums they have just look terrible to me so I can't comment on this matter

[jkas789]

NightFright, on 20 December 2020 - 09:16 AM, said:

Btw, is it just me or is the Quake community... not so helpful?

Depends. Without saying names there are some forums out there that have people that are very... elitist let's say. You just gotta roll with it in my experience. The answer to the question is always somewhere buried in a old dusty thread.

Anyways I have been playing this mini user episode called Ontranto which is good (Saw you there on the reviews NightFright small world I guess). My only gripe is that for some reason it messes up with my keyboard binds and disables the keys I use to cycle through weapons. Other than that I like it well enough and I would definitely recommend if you guys are having a boring afternoon.

[Jimmy]

I mean if someone tells you how to do something and you're too lazy to do it, why even ask?

[jkas789]

Jimmy, on 20 December 2020 - 08:39 PM, said:

I mean if someone tells you how to do something and you're too lazy to do it, why even ask?

I was not referring to that. That IMO is fine. At the very least they oriented you at where to look/what to do and then you can figure it out on your own even if it is not optimal. I was referring to when a forum has a lot of... "personalities" with big egos and where ownership of assets/methods/knowledge is highly a contested matter.

A good explanation of what I'm trying to explain and my problems with some modding communities is a document that a guy named Wrye wrote back in the days of Morrowind modding (not that it is dead atm, the old girl is till alive and kicking) on the concept of open modding.

Yes I know, it can be a very optimistic view of modding but one that I very much agree with.

[Aristotle Gumball]

Depends what is meant by Quake community. I approached specific personalities who answered my modding questions in-depth. I mean serious newb stuff that anyone "legit" would scoff at anywhere else.

But yeah, it is full of veterans who are good at making stuff and not so good at explaining the how/why.

At least I don't know what any of these people's political views are. Thank god.

[jkas789]

Just the stuff you see in Arcane Dimensions is really impressive. The level design is way better and more impressive than a lot of commercial games I have played in the last 5 years. Truly it is a work of art. Can get difficult as shit though.

[Aristotle Gumball]

I played AD on normal the first time around and found it fairly reasonable in terms of difficulty and navigation. I am even impressed with all these map jam's that come out every couple of months. The level of talent is what initially drew me to the community.

Dwell is insanely hard even on easy, though. Great design, but holy crap...

[Jimmy]

jkas789, on 20 December 2020 - 09:21 PM, said:

I was not referring to that. That IMO is fine. At the very least they oriented you at where to look/what to do and then you can figure it out on your own even if it is not optimal. I was referring to when a forum has a lot of... "personalities" with big egos and where ownership of assets/methods/knowledge is highly a contested matter.

A good explanation of what I'm trying to explain and my problems with some modding communities is a document that a guy named Wrye wrote back in the days of Morrowind modding (not that it is dead atm, the old girl is till alive and kicking) on the concept of open modding.

Yes I know, it can be a very optimistic view of modding but one that I very much agree with.

This type of behaviour in the early 2000s is pretty responsible for the small and limited scope of this community.

[jkas789]

BattleWalrus, on 21 December 2020 - 07:07 AM, said:

Dwell is insanely hard even on easy, though. Great design, but holy crap...

Yes. There is some very bullshit enemy placement going around in Dwell. Though to be fair at this point everyone and their grandma has had the time to git gud in Quake.

Quote

This type of behaviour in the early 2000s is pretty responsible for the small and limited scope of this community.

Huh. Is it? I was not referring to the Duke Nukem Community in particular, but rather every Bethesda Modding Community ever except Daggerfall's (from my experience they are all bros). As I have said before, I had been lurking around since here before formally making an account. However I tended to lurk more in the Duke Nukem 3D maps & level editing and Everthing Eduke32 section digging around for maps and mods. If it was not that I skipped on the thread so I was not very familiar on the socials of Duke4 beyond who did what map that was dope. Like Forge and that guy who was making Doom style levels years ago.

[Jimmy]

Yeah the reason there aren't many programmers is that almost everyone in the early days didn't really share or help others to learn. Mappers tended to be more open, which is why you see more maps than mods. Many of the Cathedral guys are still around, the Parlor type of guys have been gone for years.

[Aristotle Gumball]

Xmas Jam 2020 is out.

[Tea Monster]

Was doing some sculpting the other day and came up with this:

Done a low-res version for Quake engines.

[NightFright]

Shameless self-promotion:

Quake Authentic Model Pack Rev.22 has been released. We did some fine-tuning on skins for the Super Shotgun and Ogre (which looks even better now with a new chainsaw skin). Special appearance by Tea Monster who provided the long-overdue head gibs for the Scrag (based on Chillo's model).

[Jim]

New map released!

https://www.celephai...ad.php?id=62009

[jkas789]

Yeah I saw that one in the Blood discord. Tried it and it was pretty good IMO. I had fun.

[Tea Monster]

I found that there could be an attitude of "RTFM" over at Quakeone.com. Quakeone is sort of back up, but it's not even a shadow of what it was. I've not really tried func or Quaddicted. I'll have to see what is going on there. I've tried doing some QII editing with Tread (yes, THAT long ago!) and wanted to get to grips with Trenchbroom and see what I could come up with. I'm always too busy with other things.

I played Armagon when it was released. I've only just acquired Dissolution and started playing through it. AD is amazing, as is Bloodshot's Quake 1.5.