Quake 4

[damonrpayne]

Comes out today. Can't wait to go pick it up. The doom 3 engine with Quake-3 style multiplayer.

[meuge]

Comes out today. Can't wait to go pick

it up. The doom 3 engine with Quake-3 style multiplayer.

I got banned from a bunch of QIII servers because I kept railing

everyone. Over and over... I kept trying to explain to them that I was

world top 50 in RogueSpear, and can't help my aim, but they just

wouldn't listen!

[DrWho]

haha, I have that same problem in CS. I just never pull the trigger

until I've got a headshot lined up which always makes people

suspicious. After a while you get real quick at it, which makes it look

even worse. It really sucks though because it's so hard to find a good

server to play on.

I never really was a quake fan, but if you want to experience an

intense surround sound game check out half-life: source. I hate single

player FPS games, but really liked this one for some reason...probably

because the surround sound was so well done that it really sucked you

into the game.

[damonrpayne]

I got it, and it is a lot of fun, more fun than doom3 so far. The intro scenes have you fighting some trench warefare while stuff is blowing up all around you and airstrikes are going on overhead, definately makes you feel like you are in a war. Tonight I'll try out the multi player. I did notice that one of the most fun maps of all time "The Edge" was ported from Quake2 to this one.

A buddy of mine just got fear, which I'll pick up once I get a new graphics card.

[007]

I just picked up my copy of quake4. Its a lot like quake 3 with a touch more of quake2. Mostly because of the map The Edge.

There are a few quake 3 maps thrown in there two which I have always hated. I tried to get "elite" at quake3, but never really got to the pro level. I was a pro half-life dm (VERY FUN GAME AT the pro level) player for a number of years.. top 5-10 players for a period of time, but that was years ago. I was thinking I could try to get back into the scene with quake4, but the competition is VERY tough. I was playing in some tourney servers tonight and I got killed by quake 3 players all night long.

One other notable thing, you'll need to upgrade your PC if you are serious about this game, unless you have a good one. I was running a XP 2400+ with a Ti 4800. That doest even come close to what you need. Im gonna grab a 4000+ with 7800 GT in a few days.

Good luck people, and ill see you in the servers...

[damonrpayne]

HalfLife DM was a lot of fun. The map where you can call down the airstrike was a favorite, and for some reason beating people up with the crowbar was very satisfying. Quake 4 is a lot more fun to DM than a lot of the other games that are popular right now, like Call of Duty and such. "Realistic" does not equal fun in my book.

I definately need to replace my ATI x700 though, its the weak link in my system. (3.4ghz p4, gig ram, 10,000 RPM SATA drive)

[007]

crossfire... and elite players never bothered with that. You can ecaspe the nuke by gauss jumping up about 250+ feet right before it hits.

Is your 3.4hz still lagging in quake? Shit, Do you knwo if the cpu is more important than the video card or the other way around. I hear its the videocard, but i know if you have a slow cpu, things also crawl.

[damonrpayne]

crossfire... and elite players never bothered with that. You can ecaspe the nuke by gauss jumping up about 250+ feet right before it hits.

Is your 3.4hz still lagging in quake? Shit, Do you knwo if the cpu is more important than the video card or the other way around. I hear its the videocard, but i know if you have a slow cpu, things also crawl.

(Putting on the amature game programmer hat)

The graphics card is all-important. Triangle setup, shadow calculations, and texture mapping are done natively on the GPU. In some extreme cases your texture memory may leak into your main system memory, in which case having tons of RAM and a fast bus(ergo PCI-Express over AGP) helps the graphics card retreive texture or vertext mesh information from your system's main memory so that it can do work on it and render it. So, spend money on the graphics card ESPECIALLY if you are mostly deathmatch.

(Putting on the amature physics and AI programmer hat)

Many of today's modern games are using more and more realistic physics and AI. Realistic physics takes a lot of CPU cycles to, say, calculate the position and velocity of a spinning projectile as a function of time after it's bounced off of a surface. AI takes both tons of processing power and tons of memory. The better the AI, the more attributes it is aware of and training it has, the more memory it will use and CPU cycles to figure out what to do. CPUs can keep up with the type of AI and physics in games today much easier than graphics cards are keeping up with the punishment dev shops are throwing at them.

[TheEAR]

Comes out today. Can't wait to go pick it up. The doom 3 engine with Quake-3 style multiplayer.

I got banned from a bunch of QIII servers because I kept railing everyone. Over and over... I kept trying to explain to them that I was world top 50 in RogueSpear, and can't help my aim, but they just wouldn't listen!

LOL

Yes,elite FPS players are not an understood breed. I was called cheater and bot user countless times.In UT on some maps I was invincible finishing 10-15 kills before the second best and not getting killed one time.Armor ripping and HEADSHOT galore...MMMMMMMONSTER KILLLLL one after the next. [] Never jumping just side to side starfig and missing a shot when I was dead tired.

Played for 6-8hours/night each night.Quite sick

Minimum detail at 1280*1024 with precision weapons only,no rockets,no BS.

In Quake the rail gun is it,in UT the sniper gun.

I have to ick up my Q4 this weekend.

[007]

crossfire... and elite players never bothered with that. You can ecaspe the nuke by gauss jumping up about 250+ feet right before it hits.

Is your 3.4hz still lagging in quake? Shit, Do you knwo if the cpu is more important than the video card or the other way around. I hear its the videocard, but i know if you have a slow cpu, things also crawl.

(Putting on the amature game programmer hat)

The graphics card is all-important. Triangle setup, shadow calculations, and texture mapping are done natively on the GPU. In some extreme cases your texture memory may leak into your main system memory, in which case having tons of RAM and a fast bus(ergo PCI-Express over AGP) helps the graphics card retreive texture or vertext mesh information from your system's main memory so that it can do work on it and render it. So, spend money on the graphics card ESPECIALLY if you are mostly deathmatch.

(Putting on the amature physics and AI programmer hat)

Many of today's modern games are using more and more realistic physics and AI. Realistic physics takes a lot of CPU cycles to, say, calculate the position and velocity of a spinning projectile as a function of time after it's bounced off of a surface. AI takes both tons of processing power and tons of memory. The better the AI, the more attributes it is aware of and training it has, the more memory it will use and CPU cycles to figure out what to do. CPUs can keep up with the type of AI and physics in games today much easier than graphics cards are keeping up with the punishment dev shops are throwing at them.

thanks, i figured as much. I knoew the CPU is very important for games, as the entire game logic is done via the cpu. the gpu is just for drawning thoes polys, but as we progress, the polys get seemly more and more complex.. real time bumbmaping, reflectinos, what not. I guess its good to just get a fast cpu and a fast gpu. Thats sorta what im going for, but not the top of the line as i can not afford it.

btw, ear, i have pulled 300+/0 in half-life - not easy.

In quake4, i was happy to get 19/7 last night.. boy that game is hard and i need a new pc BAD!

[meuge]

How about both?

AMD64 X2 3800+ (OCed to 2.4GHz or 4800+)

X800GTO2 (unlocked and clocked to 520/550 or X850XT)

1GB Corsair XMS @ 200MHz

Antec P180 case (the Jaguar of PC cases)

3x 120mm fans @ 7V (>60CFM through the case at <40dB altogether)

Thermalright XP-90 w. Panaflo L1A 80mm fan (yeah, I know - 80mm fans are so two years ago... but it's quiet... and free.

Antec TruePower 430W (modded w. 1x80mm Panaflo L1A @ 10V, 10V 90mm fan mod)

~

CS:Source 1280x1024, 2X AA, 4X AF, detail to max, doesn't drop below 60 fps.

Too bad I had to sacrifice my RAID array.

[skonopa]

(Putting on the amature physics and AI programmer hat)

Many

of today's modern games are using more and more realistic physics and

AI. Realistic physics takes a lot of CPU cycles to, say,

calculate the position and velocity of a spinning projectile as a

function of time after it's bounced off of a surface. AI takes

both tons of processing power and tons of memory. The better the

AI, the more attributes it is aware of and training it has, the more

memory it will use and CPU cycles to figure out what to do. CPUs

can keep up with the type of AI and physics in games today much easier

than graphics cards are keeping up with the punishment dev shops are

throwing at them.

What is intersting is that the next big trend seems to be seperate

"PPU" (Physics Processing Unit) add-in cards or "Physics

Boards". These will be (are) seperate add-in cards that will

off-load the physics processing from the CPU. Much like the

graphics cards and the sound boards, these will enable much more

realistic physics modelling in games. For example, bringing down

an entire wall and the physics involved in modelling every brick

tumbling would be handled by the PPU. Another example is that a

raging snowstorm could be rended where the physics of each snowflake

would be modeled, thus resulting in realistic looking snowfall.

Not only that, but the CPU will be better able to process the AI and

other "game management" aspects of running a game, since it will not

need to handle the physics processing.

Here is an article talking about one such board, called PhysX, produced by an oufit called Ageia.

Now, will be intersting to see what manufacturers as well as game

producers take advantage of this. In the near future, not only do we

need to upgrade out graphics and sounds, but our physics as well!

If this technology delivers, and the gaming industry takes full

advantage of it, it is a pretty good bet that my next or second-next

gaming rig will be sporting one of these. (And I am due for a

full upgrade, as my current rig consists of an AMD Athlon 2400+, Ati

Radeon 9800 Pro, 1 gig DDR 2800 RAM, and just slightly less than 100

gigs of harddrive (two drives - 18 gigs and 80 gigs). Does a very

respectible job of running Half-Life 2 at 1280x1024 resolution, but the

machine is getting up there in age. The mother board is some 5

years old - one of the very first to support DDR RAM, with only a

266mhz FSB)

[TheEAR]

skonopa,

Yes the next wave is PPU's,ASUS and BFG should be the first to release such cards.I am getting one as soon as it hits the market,the less great news to me is one one flavour will be be made at first.No ubber ultra turbo deluxe for bragging rights []

I may get two,one for my main system using dual PCIE(dual 7800GTX) and the second one for my most potent AGP(6800Ultra)just to see the gains with each in games supporting the new PPU.

[skonopa]

skonopa,

Yes the next wave is PPU's,ASUS

and BFG should be the first to release such cards.I am getting one

as soon as it hits the market,the less great news to me is one one

flavour will be be made at first.No ubber ultra turbo deluxe for

bragging rights []

Yeah, but it'll only be a matter of time before people figure out how

to overclock the things, as well as the "super ultra turbo deluxe"

versions to come out. From what I've read, it seems they will be

fairly inexpensive - around $200 to $250 or so. Not "cheap", but not rediculous either.

I'll admit, it has me pretty excited about this. I am one that

fully admits that probably the coolest aspect of Half-Life 2 was the

realistic physics, and I can only hope that future games, especially

with these PPU cards coming out, will feature even better/more

realistic physics modeling.

[DrWho]

the coolest aspect of Half-Life 2 was the

realistic physics

ah yes, the hover boat flying over bridges...the crazy hang time in the dune buggy...etc, etc []

nothing will beat BattleZone in terms of physics (the colorized 3D version of the old arcade classic).

sorry, just had to poke fun []

[skonopa]

the coolest aspect of Half-Life 2 was the

realistic physics

ah yes, the hover boat flying over bridges...the crazy hang time in the dune buggy...etc, etc []

nothing will beat BattleZone in terms of physics (the colorized 3D version of the old arcade classic).

sorry, just had to poke fun []

Awww, come on! Don't you love all the fun you can have in Half-Life 2 with the physics engine? []

After all, look at what I did! Another exciting moment in Half-Life 2! [6]

[damonrpayne]

My two year old does the same thing with her blocks, hers tend to be a little more straight though.

Nice job!

[DrWho]

oh right, that reminds me of another annoying thing....standing on top of stuff never works and results in stuff flying across the room, lol. []

I'm just being picky here, the physics were pretty cool....at the very least a great starting to point for future gaming.

[damonrpayne]

If I mostly just like to shoot stuff, would I enjoy HL 2?

[DrWho]

If I mostly just like to shoot stuff, would I enjoy HL 2?

oh my goodness heck ya...in fact, there was too much stuff to shoot at

(for a change) so you have to run hardcore through the levels. But you

have to be careful because there are a lot of traps that will catch you

if you're blindly being a rambo []