Quakecon 2006

8/4/2006

The goals of day two of the Sanitarium's excursion to Quakecon were trying out Quake Wars first hand, attending the id software Q&A, and also attend the Quake Wars modders meeting.  After the Q&A ran long and I found a place to eat, I missed the modders forum so two out of three ain't bad this time.

First up was the id Q&A session with Todd Hollenshed, Kevin Cloud, Tim Willits, Robert Duffy, and Jan Paul  Waveren. There were quite a few questions which were all over the board so it's a little difficult to put them into coherent paragraphs. Therefore, we'll just slap up the question and put in the answer right after it.

Q: Does id intend to stay in the FPS genre or move beyond it

A: A new project being developed by id expands on the first person genre but not really remove itself into something like RTS or turn-based.  

Q: Will mega-texture technology be used in other titles?

A: Yes but no specifics given

Q: What other titles currently being developed or assisted with by id

A: Raven is working on RtCW2, both the single and multiplayer

Q: Does the new project from id focus on DX10 or Open GL? Also, what about Linux and Mac Support?

A: The new project will use both DX10 and OpenGL as well as support both Mac and Linux

Q: Will id have third parties using their engines make their games run on all OSes?

A: id will provide the code to do so and encourage it but they will not force another shop to do so.

Q: What's with all the id partnering?

A: id's a small shop of thirty people that does not want to expand into a massive development house. With the large turn around times of games (2-3 years), it makes sense then to partner with other shops so you don't have to wait 10 years for a sequel to each of their titles

Robert Duffie let it slip that they are working on bots for Quake Wars.  Yesterday at the Quake Wars conference Kevin and Paul wouldn't commit to that.   When Robert stated this, it caused the others at the table to get a little upset then laugh. 

Q: Porting maps of RtCW to RtCW2?

A: No decision

Q: Modern combat games rather than futuristic?

A: id wants to stay focused on what they like which is the occultic/futuristic

Q: Would toolsets be made easier or improved for the next project?

A: A major focus of the next project was a solid set of tools and while they will hopefully be greatly improved, with the new megatexturing and other technologies, the amount of content to create and render will still be huge. 

Q: Is id working on using physics card technology?

A: No. 

Q: What about Vista as a gaming platform?

A: No real testing with Vista but they hope Vista does assist  in fighting piracy.

Q: Will dual-core/multicore systems be utilized more in future titles?

A: They are attempting to have multi-thread games work particularly for consoles. I don't think I understand this part but Jan Paul might have mentioned something about how Enemy Territory will somehow multithread data but that didn't make sense since he then started talking about content from the DVD. 

Q: Any downside of the E3 downsizing?

A: Bad because it will lessen the mass media market's attention on the gaming industry. 

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars hands-on

Make no mistake that this is not your older brother's Enemy Territory.  Sure you have similar classes and it is still all about teamplay but the inclusion of vehicles, air droppable support units, and somewhat different styles of play for both sides results in what will probably be a much steeper learning curve but hopefully a worthwhile gaming experience that will be on par or surpass RtCW:ET. Unfortunately, this won't be free though. 

I discussed the basics of the map and gameplay yesterday so today I wanted to focus a little more on the individual classes that I was able to play as well as some of the vehicles in use on the game.  Unfortunately, by the time I was in line the systems had been running for nearly two days straight and the people controlling the line stated they needed to reset the servers and possibly shut down the line for a little while to let the machines cool off and reboot.  So, I was only able to play as the Strogg once and will focus on that side for now. 

The Strogg, like the GDF, possess five troop classes: soldier (heavy weapons, rockets), field ops (artillery strikes and air droppable support units), medics (med packs, revive fallen soldiers, force shields), engineer (build/repair units, mines), and covert ops (sniper railgun, claymore charges).  

When the game started I began as a medic and the entire team headed to the first objective of preventing the GDF forces from building and crossing a bridge.  On our first try we did horrible with the GDF forces easily running through us due to a lack of field ops support.  But, when the server crashed this allowed us to start over and give it another try. On our second try, without any communication between any of the players mind you we quickly realized what needed to be done. First another medic and myself placed some of those energy shields near the edge of the bridge while other teammates hopped in those one-man jetpacks called Icarus. The used those to quickly jump over the destroyed bridge and immediately harass the GDF forces in their base.   However, with no heavy armor to support our teammates they were quickly overwhelmed and the GDF started coming.

At this point several people went Field Ops which allowed them to request the building of one of three units: artillery units, anti-vehicle units (targetable mortars), or anti-personnel guns.   This was actually quite simple in theory but while taking fire it can become a bit tricky. First you must switch to your binocs then hit a key to start the construction.   When you do this, the game switches to a third person view slightly above and behind you to let you see the field better. You must then find an area where you can deploy or request the unit similar to how in RTSes you have to have a flat field in a controlled area to build a building (what is this a shooter or Warcraft 3!?) Once you select the area you can then rotate the unit to the direction you want.   Once it's deployed or built and if it's not destroyed by enemy fire you then must use your binoculars to aim and fire the artillery piece similar to how it was done in Enemy Territory. Now artillery was what you might be used to in any other game. You mark an area and a few seconds later that area is toasted.  The mortars were pretty tricky but it appeared that if you're using your field binoculars you can put a vehicle or unit in the center and the mortar will track the target and obliterate it when you give the command to fire.  The anti-personnel guns auto-aimed from what I could tell but the action was so crazy (as mentioned by the developers) that it became difficult to keep track of exactly everything that was occurring at once. 

The final tool for the Field Ops was the air strike and this will segue nicely into another good story of our team.  The Field Ops for the Strogg doesn't exactly have an air strike. Instead, they throw a marker (not smoke now but it's the same principle) and then a massive death ray comes from the clouds wreaking havoc across a line parallel to the direction you threw the marker.  In my case, I saw the Engineers for the GDF building the bridge.  I quickly jumped into the ravine the bridge went over and tossed a marker into the ravine. I then went under the bridge and climbed up the opposite side just in time to see the Strogg Death Star ray pierce the sky and churn up the dirt near the engineers and eventually vaporize them.  The churning of the earth is not an exaggeration as dirt, particles, and debris flew up from the ray as if watching a tornado tear up a Kansas trailer home. A GDF soldier ran right past me at this time so I was able to shoot him in the back and score the teabag as well. My first teabag in Quake Wars felt good.  Wait, do Strogg even have teabags?  I never thought of that. 

I only had a passing glance or two at the other classes but it appeared the Engineers do the normal repair and build but also laid mines, deployed guns, and deployed shields for the Strogg which could stop enemy artillery fire. I do not know if the GDF have a similar counter force.   Soldiers appeared to have rocket launchers which, when the sight was used, would lock on and track enemy targets. They also had machine guns (Strogg had nail guns), and a few other weapons at their disposal.  It appeared that the soldier machine gun didn't have recoil resulting in what appeared to be very accurate fire even when not firing bursts. But again, I can't confirm that totally.  

Unfortunately just a few minutes later the game started freezing up on us once again but not before I talked to one of the producers of the game who showed me some other interesting things including:

1. Requesting vehicle drops.  Since my XP (score) was low I was only able to call in a small vehicle (the Icarus) but as you gain more XP you're able to request bigger and better units as the campaign progresses.  Please note (AGAIN) that XP persists across a campaign but not across servers. No stat whoring your BF2 monkeys.

2. The quick voice chat command buttons.  While they were not laid out similar to EnemyTerritory (and hence Wolfenstein) the producer of the game (his name escapes me now. Young Asian fellow, really stressed out at the time) told me there'd be an option to use an "old school" Enemy Territory shortcuts for voice commands as well.  The less new stuff I have to learn, the better.  There will also be regular voice chat in the game as well (or so they said yesterday). 

3. Vehicles and commanding them appears to be very simple but the most interesting part about it was that on multiple manned vehicles such as the tanks and helicopters the first person in the vehicle can either permit or deny someone to get in a vehicle with them.  This could be good in that if you want to gun and shoot with your buddies in a tank you can deny someone else the chance to get into it.  Of course, this option might be abused and people could become vehicle whores.

A few bugs popped up while playing the most noticeable being that when I went into crouch mode I couldn't seem to get back up. I was running at a normal speed but my point of view was that of a field mouse. But, it's all still in beta so hopefully the major issues can be addressed.  All in all I really looked forward to it but a public beta is definitely needed before the full release to ensure game bugs are sorted out and people get to understand the various classes and their responsibilities. 

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