Romero is leaving - id dying?
Jason A. Farque'
Firstly, in case you haven't seen it, here's John Romero's .plan file.
His first of consequence as far as I recall:
---
Login name: johnr In real life: John
Romero
Directory: /raid/nardo/johnr Shell: /bin/bash
Last login Tue Jul 30 18:16 on ttyp2 from idece4
Project: Quake, the Cosmos Ruler.
Plan:
I'm going to jump on the .plan bandwagon just this once.
I have decided to leave id Software and start a new game company with
different goals. I won't be taking anyone from id with me.
John Romero
---
The Doom series are the greatest computer games to date for any
platform. The first-person game theme is sheer genious, and id has
certainly popularized it. Sadly though, I believe that id is waning.
Here's why:
The article in Wired virtually admits that the guys were having
serious motivational and productivity problems (we all know how long
we waited for Quake). The article also admits to a lack of teamwork
that became so bad that had to simply pile everyone into one room
until it was "finished". Wired says that the game's theme was
rewritten no less than twice - essentially from scratch both times.
This has left Quake with absolutely no plot. None. However, the lack
of plot could be justified because Quake provides an Internet playable
"environment". I understand that, but believe it or not, not everyone
is connected to the Internet; some people actually play against the
monsters.
I'm Vice President of a small electronics company similar in scale to
id, and if I rewrote and second-guessed my software like that, I'd be
dead meat in the market. Other computer gaming companies will step in
and kick their ass. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that.
Quake and QuakeC don't provide the things that were promised. They
fall well short of a true "world" environment where a player can jump
from Server to Server. This would seem not to be too big of a
problem, and by itself it's not. I can live without these things;
Carmack doesn't *have* to deliver the things that he dreamed about in
email, newsgroups, IRC and his .plan file. However, Prey and/or
Unreal *will* supply these things to us and take the market from the
relatively uncoordinated, seemingly not-quite-finished Quake.
Carmack's rewriting the netplay now because he couldn't see that not
everyone has a T1 in their house and that most of us dial up a
provider with a 28.8 modem? If that's even half the truth then the
company is *rediculously* out of touch with its market. How can you
possibly design a game with that high of an investment capital,
targeted at Internet playability, without doing the required research?
This simply amazes me.
John Romero is leaving id to form his own computer gaming company
without taking anyone from id with him. The timing of this is too
significant to ignore.
I love playing Quake. I've stayed up *way* to late many nights
blasting the living daylights out of you people and enjoyed every
minute of it. Unfortunately I agree with others that have said that
Quake simply doesn't cause them to jump out of their seats the way
that Doom does. My personal opinion is that Reznor's sounds effects
bite, which doesn't help.
I hope to be proven wrong, but if you analyze id the way that you
would any other company, I think that most will agree with me. Yes,
John Carmack, John Romero and Adrian Carmack all have a shitload more
money and faster cars than I do. But maybe that's the problem.
Jason A. Farque'
CDI - Worldwide suppliers of pipeline pig location & tracking equipment.
Extensive product information at http://www.pigging.com
Adam Williamson
In article <32093e10...@news.ionet.net>, "Jason A. Farque'"
<far...@ionet.net> writes
>"environment". I understand that, but believe it or not, not everyone
>is connected to the Internet; some people actually play against the
>monsters.
So? Id wrote a game to cater to the Internet market. Your criticism is
about as valid as if I wrote a kick-ass platform game and you said
"sure, but believe it or not, not everyone likes platformers; some
people actually prefer RPGs." So what?
>company is *rediculously* out of touch with its market. How can you
>possibly design a game with that high of an investment capital,
>targeted at Internet playability, without doing the required research?
>This simply amazes me.
The thing is, somehow, it works. Id have sold ridiculously large amounts
of Quake. You yourself say you enjoy the game. So where's the problem?
Yes, Unreal may very well kick Quake's ass. What of it? Id don't lose
anything - on the contrary, they gain. They've _already_ made fuckloads
of money out of Quake. When Unreal is released, if it kicks Quake's ass
Id gain:
1) A new game to play (yes, hard to believe, but companies play each
others' games).
2) Motivation for later games - if Quake stayed on top for years and
kept rolling in cash, where's Id's motivation for Quake2, Quake3,
whatever?
--
Adam Williamson
Memento Mori 2 Level 6
ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/idgames/themes/mm/mm2.zip
Juan Miguel Custer
Adam Williamson wrote:
>
> The thing is, somehow, it works. Id have sold ridiculously large amounts
> of Quake. You yourself say you enjoy the game. So where's the problem?
> Yes, Unreal may very well kick Quake's ass. What of it? Id don't lose
> anything - on the contrary, they gain. They've _already_ made fuckloads
> of money out of Quake. When Unreal is released, if it kicks Quake's ass
> Id gain:
>
> 1) A new game to play (yes, hard to believe, but companies play each
> others' games).
> 2) Motivation for later games - if Quake stayed on top for years and
> kept rolling in cash, where's Id's motivation for Quake2, Quake3,
> whatever?
> --
> Adam Williamson
> Memento Mori 2 Level 6
> ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/idgames/themes/mm/mm2.zip
I think what he meant though is that id Software isn't acting
like a real business. One of their main programmers is leaving, they
have apparent motivational problems, and they aren't doing their
hoemwork (note that this is all secondhand information). Kinda sounds
like what would have happened to those two guys that invented Apples had
they not hired a true business manager. In markets like today you NEED
sound business strategies and deadlines and you must follow through with
it. Yes they have a resounding success with Quake but not like what it
could have been. I'm sure the crowds will still be slavering for Quake
2 when/if it comes out, but they will be slavering less. And other
companies that include both hot programmers AND sound business people
will be trying to shove into the market. id's still holding the
significant market share in these type of games, but if they don't get
it together they start losing their lead. Of course maybe its not
totally their fault either... maybe Romero and Carmack just can't get
along and this needs to happen, maybe they've got personal problems. I
think this probably won't have a lot of effect in the near future, but
this may have larger effects later on.
BTW, I love Quake, its great... I just wish they'd fix the damn
COM4 problems...
Juan Miguel Custer
"Justice"
Osquar Sandberg
On Thu, 08 Aug 1996 01:49:08 GMT, far...@ionet.net (Jason A. Farque')
wrote:
<snip>
>Quake and QuakeC don't provide the things that were promised. They
>fall well short of a true "world" environment where a player can jump
>from Server to Server. This would seem not to be too big of a
>problem, and by itself it's not. I can live without these things;
>Carmack doesn't *have* to deliver the things that he dreamed about in
>email, newsgroups, IRC and his .plan file. However, Prey and/or
>Unreal *will* supply these things to us and take the market from the
>relatively uncoordinated, seemingly not-quite-finished Quake.
All though I can agree with some of what you have written (I don't
agree with your analysis, I don't think id are dying, they still have
two of the worlds best programmers) I can not see this philosophy.
Can you people wait until after Unreal and Prey are out to start
talking about how much better they are then Quake. Its completely
ridiculous that you are basing your opinion that id are in such deep
trouble on the hype of two unreleased games. Can you at least wait
until you have played either of these two games until you decide how
much better then quake they will be. Neither game is even close to
completion, we are talking 9 months or maybe even more, think about
how you imagined quake 9 months ago, things can change between hype an
release.
I thought that your article took up some very interesting points, but
when you fall from being rational to hyping unreleased products, then
your credibility hits the ground.
Jason A. Farque'
>Can you people wait until after Unreal and Prey are out to start
>talking about how much better they are then Quake. Its completely
>ridiculous that you are basing your opinion that id are in such deep
>trouble on the hype of two unreleased games. Can you at least wait
>until you have played either of these two games until you decide how
>much better then quake they will be. Neither game is even close to
>completion, we are talking 9 months or maybe even more, think about
>how you imagined quake 9 months ago, things can change between hype an
>release.
>
>I thought that your article took up some very interesting points, but
>when you fall from being rational to hyping unreleased products, then
>your credibility hits the ground.
>
>
I wasn't really trying to compare Quake to unreleased games. If you
reread my message, I think you will find that my intent was to state
simply that if id cannot release a game that has the capabilities that
Carmack spoke (dreamed) of, some other company's game will. Unreal
and Prey were merely intended as examples of potential candidates.
Dan Bongard
Mark S. Wyman (wy...@turtle.cig.mot.com) wrote:
: Two problems here :
: a) I doubt they planned on the single playing mode to suck so bad.
I'll bet they planned on some people THINKING it sucks, though. The
belief that single-player Quake sucks is by no means universal.
: Hmmm, how many are preorders BEFORE anyone saw the game? I did preorder
: but cancelled after playing it. Also, if Id is just in it for the money
: and cars then it will show in their product. Its not a terrible product,
: just not one I would rank as hall of fame material.
That places you firmly in the minority, I'm afraid. :)
-- Dan
Mark S. Wyman
Adam Williamson <Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk> writes:
>In article <32093e10...@news.ionet.net>, "Jason A. Farque'"
><far...@ionet.net> writes
>>"environment". I understand that, but believe it or not, not everyone
>>is connected to the Internet; some people actually play against the
>>monsters.
>So? Id wrote a game to cater to the Internet market. Your criticism is
>about as valid as if I wrote a kick-ass platform game and you said
>"sure, but believe it or not, not everyone likes platformers; some
>people actually prefer RPGs." So what?
Two problems here :
a) I doubt they planned on the single playing mode to suck so bad. Heck
from the readme files they don't sound too convinced that the Internet
play will really work.
b) The majority of people out there don't have Internet access or if they
do they don't know how to use it to play Quake. Internet gaming is still
in it's infancy and most gaming companies are still putting it low on
their priority lists.
>>company is *rediculously* out of touch with its market. How can you
>>possibly design a game with that high of an investment capital,
>>targeted at Internet playability, without doing the required research?
>>This simply amazes me.
>The thing is, somehow, it works. Id have sold ridiculously large amounts
>of Quake. You yourself say you enjoy the game. So where's the problem?
>Yes, Unreal may very well kick Quake's ass. What of it? Id don't lose
>anything - on the contrary, they gain. They've _already_ made fuckloads
>of money out of Quake. When Unreal is released, if it kicks Quake's ass
>Id gain:
Hmmm, how many are preorders BEFORE anyone saw the game? I did preorder
but cancelled after playing it. Also, if Id is just in it for the money
and cars then it will show in their product. Its not a terrible product,
just not one I would rank as hall of fame material.
>1) A new game to play (yes, hard to believe, but companies play each
>others' games).
Who cares if these millionaires get a new game to play....
>2) Motivation for later games - if Quake stayed on top for years and
>kept rolling in cash, where's Id's motivation for Quake2, Quake3,
>whatever?
Thats the problem I think we are seeing right now. Its inevitable. Back
in the early 80s EA supposedly had the hottest game designers. I remember
the EA poster with the programmers which looked like more like a rock band
advertisement.
I think Jason is right (like alot of others) in that Quake is not a polished
game which feels rushed at the last minute. But then again, who cares really.
Games come and go faster than new underwear.
Mel
Don't get too worked up over this guy. He seems unable to understand
the kernels of most posts.
I really enjoyed your post. It was very insightful and informative.
I can't help but to compare what's going on with Id right now and
what happened to the Beatles. The analogy is in no way strict, so
do bear with me.
I simply mean that when a key member of a team leaves at the height
of that team's success then something is usually wrong, and it's
something that the public doesn't know about nor understand until
it's too late -- as in this case.
The problems with the Beatles actually started between Lennon and
the rest of the band as far back as '65 when he first met Yoko and
they steadily progressed from there. However, Lennon stated that
he always wanted to leave the band, just didn't have a good enough
reason or motivation. Perhaps Romero's problems with whoever or
whatever at Id go way back as well and something has just recently
happened to bring his decision into concrete reality -- that
something being Quake.
It's also true that the 'net is still pretty much an elitist thing.
I'm a computer technician by trade (I fix peoples machines --
I don't write software, programs) and between spending 40 hours
a week trouble-shooting all types of networks and systems and
knowing many PC buddies from way-back, I can personally say that
few and far between are those who either know how, are able to
or do pay for a flat-rate ISP. My friends who do have an ISP pay the
5 free hours and $2.95 an hour deal through just about every ISP
available. With that type of setup Quake and 'net play is not too
plausible.
In regards to the above, the greatest thing about Quake that I show
them all is the 'net play to which they say, "wow, cool, too bad
I can't do that." They then have no intentions of buying it.
As of today I am the only one of the some dozen good computer friends
I have who is buying Quake. The rest play War2, Duke, et al.
After all, other games are easier to understand, easier to buy, were
easier in the shareware or beta releases (i.e., you didn't need to
download and install the monsters), and they simply see no large
difference between Quake and DOOM than the Internet play which brings
us back to the point that they don't have a flat-rate ISP connection.
Also, keep in mind that this 'group is an elitist group representing
a very small percentage of the PC gaming market (i.e., only serious
netters and Quakers around, so posts like this one usually die a
flame-broiled death).
Nevertheless, I do like Quake (and many other new and current games),
John is leaving, Quake has real problems (story line?, setting,
dragon?, hammer? etc.), and the market is simply too competitive to
indulge over-grown teenagers (i.e., Id).
Quake is like the German Panthers and Tigers (for those of you who know
both WWII history and games like PG). Awesome beautiful tanks, but
products of a dying effort. However, the greatness of the expertise
still radiated in their design despite the obvious decay of the over-all
war-effort.
Take this post for what you will.
If you do not flame it then I'll forget this is the 'net.
"Bones, this man is sick." "Damnit Jim, I'm a doctor not a...oh yea."
To all flamers,
"I know you are infinity, nah!"
David Matiskella
One thing people are forgetting is that while Carmack was responsible for
the great game engines. The game play was generally attributed to Romero.
How many engines have there been that are superior to Dooms but the
actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
Seems like id is shifting from putting out playable games to
technological tour de forces.
David Matiskella
mati...@aa.washington.edu
Dan Bongard
Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
: I can't help but to compare what's going on with Id right now and
: what happened to the Beatles. The analogy is in no way strict, so
: do bear with me.
Well, the reason this analogy doesn't really hold up is that both
Lennon and McCartney wrote the music. Whereas John Romero is,
basically, just a level designer. A good one, mind you, but
not really any better than the others at id.
As long as they hang onto their coders, there won't be any problem.
-- Dan
Mel
Dan Bongard wrote:
>
> Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
>
> : I can't help but to compare what's going on with Id right now and
> : what happened to the Beatles. The analogy is in no way strict, so
> : do bear with me.
>
> Lennon and McCartney wrote the music. Whereas John Romero is,
> basically, just a level designer. A good one, mind you, but
> not really any better than the others at id.
>
> As long as they hang onto their coders, there won't be any problem.
>
> -- Dan
Well,
I suppose that one would need to have some knowledge of music and
exactly
how and in what way both McCartney and Lennon contributed to each
Beatles
song to have an adequate understanding of the analogy.
Let's switch things around,
Saying about Lennon and McCartney, "what's the big deal? They both
wrote
music. What's the difference if one leaves or the other?" Is like
someone
who knows nothing about either computers or programming saying, "What's
the
big deal about Romero leaving Id? He and all the other Id guys all did
the
very same thing: they just wrote programs."
You see, Lennon didn't do the same thing as McCartney. In the words of
Lennon,
"I wrote the middle 8." In other words, Lennon took care of the
change-ups
in the middle of the songs that made Beatles' tunes so cool, different,
and
world-changing. I'll give a brief example here from "I wanna hold your
hand."
The middle change up is from Lennon while the rest, especially the main
chorus,
is from McCartney. Lennon's middle part is "and when I touch you I get
happy
inside. It's such a feeling that my love, I get high, I get high, I get
high."
Then it comes back in McCartney's "Oh yea you've got that something. . .
."
So, each individual contributes a unique part that together makes the
product
what it is. This is proven further by the fact that after the Beatles
McCartney
sucked royally. Even Harrison added much, especially later, and he
continued to blossom after the break-up (as did Lennon who died almost a
diety
in music productivity). Breaks-ups have differing effects on the
different
members as they take-off on their own to go it alone. The Eagles each
seemed to
do individually well (almost all of them), as did the Doobie brothers.
However,
some of the individuals never seem to be able to stand alone and their
lights shown brightest in the beginning with the team that made them all
shine.
This sounds off-track but it's really not as I now come back to Id to
say that
it will take time for us to find out how each of the individuals from Id
will
fair alone, but to say as an individual leaves a team that "they weren't
really
important to the team's creativity anyhow" is a kind of cop-out.
Especially when
that individual's contributions are known, but are simply down-graded by
saying,
"well, Romero didn't write code, didn't do the engine, didn't do this
that or the
other; all he did was design levels and that's not very important at
all, so Id
is exactly the same as it was when it wrote Wolf3d and DOOM1(2)."
Is it really? At what point will Id not be the same company anymore?
I'd like to
see what will be said when all that is left of the original group is one
guy.
I'm sure then I'll read stuff on this 'group like, "well, turns out that
John
Carmack is all that is left of Id, but come to find out, he's actually
the very
essence of Id and all the other guys didn't really do anything there
anyhow."
Perhaps Id fans will become like Cleveland Brown's fans. No team, not
even one
player or coach, yet hey! they still have their Browns, albeit, only
empty
jersies and an empty stadium. Where will we find any spoiled over-grown
teenagers to fill Id jersies then? And any who can still create on the
level of DOOM1(2)?
Later,
To all flamers,
As the Human Torch says (i.e., the Fantastic Four), "Flame on!"
"Kill it Captain!" "Spock! are you out of your Fulcan mind?"
Adam Williamson
In article <320C11...@cdc.net>, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> writes
>Jason A. Farque' wrote:
>> simply that if id cannot release a game that has the capabilities that
>> Carmack spoke (dreamed) of, some other company's game will. Unreal
>
As is implicit in the finger of one of the Id guys (forgotten which), it
was much more Romero who did the grandiose statements about what Id were
doing, not Carmack. Read all the quotes again and notice how many were
Romero's.
Osquar Sandberg
On Fri, 09 Aug 1996 21:47:25 GMT, far...@ionet.net (Jason A. Farque')
wrote:
>On Thu, 08 Aug 1996 22:18:18 GMT, m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se (Osquar
>Sandberg) wrote:
>
>I wasn't really trying to compare Quake to unreleased games. If you
>reread my message, I think you will find that my intent was to state
>simply that if id cannot release a game that has the capabilities that
>Carmack spoke (dreamed) of, some other company's game will. Unreal
>and Prey were merely intended as examples of potential candidates.
I'm sorry if I read you wrong, but it seems everybody is posting
messages "Quake is really nice, and I love to play it but it doesn't
stand a chance cause Unreal/Prey is gonna kick its ass."
It seems people don't understand that if this was any other games
genre, a 9 month advantage over the nearest competitors would be
considered HUGE.
Osquar Sandberg
While Carmack is very technically creative, being able to think of new
technologies and ideas surrounding such (just look at his latest
brainchild, Quakeworld), I think that id might suffer from Romero's
absence in that he was gameplay creative. Romero's head was absolutely
full of ideas for games, things that he would like to see in games,
and a lot of it came out in the interviews with him, and ended up
being the hated "hype."
For example, it might have been Carmacks idea to make quakeC, but I'm
pretty sure that the "backpack" idea came from Romero. You see what I
mean.
Adam Williamson
In article <Pine.OSF.3.91.96081...@curtis.aa.washington
.edu>, David Matiskella <mati...@aa.washington.edu> writes
>the great game engines. The game play was generally attributed to Romero.
>
has never made more than a third of the levels for a game (if that), and
the ideas came from everyone involved in Id. (There's a sorta
premonition here...in the back of the Wolf3D hint book there's a set of
wacky pictures of the Id guys, and there's one with Romero standing on
the freeway looking weird and about to take off his shirt (ooh-err) with
the caption "Romero doing _anything_ to hitch a lift out of Wisconsin"),
and the next picture is Adrian Carmack (well, it's close...) with a
manic look on his face and a car in the background with the caption
"Adrian (the Hitman) gleefully walks to his car after hearing that
Romero is on the road and helpless". True story.)
David Matiskella
On Mon, 12 Aug 1996, Craig Murch wrote:
> David Matiskella wrote:
> >
> > One thing people are forgetting is that while Carmack was responsible for
> > the great game engines. The game play was generally attributed to Romero.
> > How many engines have there been that are superior to Dooms but the
> > actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
>
> Uh, can you name one?
Wich Haven, tec War. actually I guess thats just the build engine.
> > Seems like id is shifting from putting out playable games to
> > technological tour de forces.
>
> All they have to do is hire some more people.
>
> > David Matiskella
> > mati...@aa.washington.edu
>
> Craig
Sure and you can replace Carmack just by hiring more programmers.:) Maybe
they don't need him. Maybe he'll be missed. I think the only people who
really know are the ones at id who know who contributed what to the game.
I must admit I one of the ones who feel that Quakes game play is
basically identical to dooms and who would have prefered something more
innovative. ALL IMHO of course.
David Matiskella
mati...@aa.washington.edu
Dan Bongard
Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
: > : I can't help but to compare what's going on with Id right now and
: > : what happened to the Beatles. The analogy is in no way strict, so
: > : do bear with me.
: > Well, the reason this analogy doesn't really hold up is that both
: > Lennon and McCartney wrote the music. Whereas John Romero is,
: > basically, just a level designer. A good one, mind you, but
: > not really any better than the others at id.
: > As long as they hang onto their coders, there won't be any problem.
: Saying about Lennon and McCartney, "what's the big deal? They both
: wrote music. What's the difference if one leaves or the other?"
: Is like someone who knows nothing about either computers or programming
: saying, "What's the big deal about Romero leaving Id? He and all the
: other Id guys all did the very same thing: they just wrote programs."
But that's just it... Romero didn't write programs. He just designed
levels. There are three coders and four level designers who worked
on Quake; the only reason Romero stood out of the crowd (for Quake
AND for Doom) is that he was the "mouthpiece" of id. He did most of
the talking, so he got a lot of credit. But let's look at reality:
Romero's Quake levels:
e1m1 and e1m3.
All of episode 2.
dm3 (abandoned base)
Shub-Niggarauth's lair
Now Episode 2 (Realm of Black Magic) was, of course, good. It wasn't
the best, IMO (Eps 3 and 4 were), but it was good. e1m1, e1m3, and dm3
were nothing special; pretty straightforward Doom-era level designs.
Copare those to, say, Willets' Wind Tunnels or McGee's Ziggaurat
level... not so hot. And of course Shub-Niggaurath's lair was a
standard DoomII-style ending; avoid scads of baddies and blast the
big nasty. The level itself was not very interesting.
Of the 4 "entry levels" (slipgate complexes), the most interesting
one, the one that makes the most of the Quake engine, is the
Sewer Systems. This is the one Romero didn't do.
If you doubt me on this, check through the design credits in
MANUAL.TXT, and compare that to a list of your favorite Quake
levels. For me, Romero ranks fourth out of the four designers;
I think I have to give Willets the most credit for pushing
the engine, and Peterson points for "mood".
[Lennon-McCartney analysis cut]
: This sounds off-track but it's really not as I now come back to Id to
: say that it will take time for us to find out how each of the
: individuals from Id will fair alone, but to say as an individual
: leaves a team that "they weren't really important to the team's
: creativity anyhow" is a kind of cop-out.
Bear in mind that only Romero is leaving. This means id is losing
1/4 its creative team and none of its coding.
: Especially when that individual's contributions are known, but are
: simply down-graded by saying, "well, Romero didn't write code,
: didn't do the engine, didn't do this that or the other; all he did
: was design levels and that's not very important at all, so Id
: is exactly the same as it was when it wrote Wolf3d and DOOM1(2)."
Not the same as when it did Wolf3d, but I'd say it is the same
as it was when Doom was put together. Has anybody got a list of
who designed what in Doom and DoomII? I know Peterson was brought
onboard for Doom.
The image of "Carmack and Romero" as "Lennon and McCartney" is
a tempting one, but a more accurate comparason is "Carmack and
Romero" = "Lennon and Ringo Starr". The Beatles wouldn't have
been the same without Ringo, public-image wise, but the music
would have been pretty much exactly the same (if not better...
Starr wasn't exactly the world's greatest drummer).
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Osquar Sandberg (m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se) wrote:
: For example, it might have been Carmacks idea to make quakeC, but I'm
: pretty sure that the "backpack" idea came from Romero. You see what I
: mean.
Yeah, I think I do. QuakeC was a brilliant idea, and about half the
reason I like the game so much. :)
-- Dan
Howard A. Gyton
In article <dbongardD...@netcom.com>, Dan Bongard
<dbon...@netcom.com> writes
>
>Yeah, I think I do. QuakeC was a brilliant idea, and about half the
>reason I like the game so much. :)
Agreed! I spend more time pissing about with the QuakeC addons than I do
playing the game seriously. :-))
--
Howard A. Gyton
KeyID 0x8635ed79 | 44 D0 22 64 94 BF A4 B5 4D 41 D4 15 06 B9 6B F2
Scott Lyon
Osquar Sandberg wrote:
> >How many engines have there been that are superior to Dooms but the
> >actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
> >Seems like id is shifting from putting out playable games to
> >technological tour de forces.
>
> While Carmack is very technically creative, being able to think of new
> technologies and ideas surrounding such (just look at his latest
> brainchild, Quakeworld), I think that id might suffer from Romero's
> absence in that he was gameplay creative. Romero's head was absolutely
> full of ideas for games, things that he would like to see in games,
> and a lot of it came out in the interviews with him, and ended up
> being the hated "hype."
>
> For example, it might have been Carmacks idea to make quakeC, but I'm
> pretty sure that the "backpack" idea came from Romero. You see what I
> mean.
Agreed Romero does have some pretty Awesome Ideas.....But as you can see
some of the ideas that he had are not in Quake for the simple reason
that WE don't have a system capable of handling it yet! I thought that
the huge interactive world that he discussed awhile back would be neat,
but i also realized that even by the time they got it out, most systems
wouldn't be capable of running it......Maybe in 2 or 3 yrs we'll have
they Technology on the street to handle his vision, (should be about the
right time for him to put out his first game with his new company)
;)
--
********************************************
sco...@cyberlynk.com
GAMERS CORNER -> http://www.cyberlynk.com/~scottl
Handle -> MUGGER. NET QUAKE Rules !!!!!
********************************************
Michael Sims
dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard) wrote:
>Mark S. Wyman (wy...@turtle.cig.mot.com) wrote:
[snip]
>: Its not a terrible product,
>: just not one I would rank as hall of fame material.
>That places you firmly in the minority, I'm afraid. :)
I don't know about that Dan. I've seen just as many posts that would
agree with him as those that would agree with you. I don't think
there is a minority in the debate on how good Quake is, I see it as
firmly split down the middle. (Here on the newsgroups, anyway.)
----------------------------------------------
Michael Sims
phs...@sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu
(aka Ford in Quake)
----------------------------------------------
Kevin Hollywood
Who was the first co-founder to leave?
-Kevin Hollywood
Lawrence
Adam Williamson wrote:
>
> In article <Pine.OSF.3.91.96081...@curtis.aa.washington
> .edu>, David Matiskella <mati...@aa.washington.edu> writes
> >
> has never made more than a third of the levels for a game (if that), and
> the ideas came from everyone involved in Id. (There's a sorta
> premonition here...in the back of the Wolf3D hint book there's a set of
> wacky pictures of the Id guys, and there's one with Romero standing on
> the freeway looking weird and about to take off his shirt (ooh-err) with
> the caption "Romero doing _anything_ to hitch a lift out of Wisconsin"),
> and the next picture is Adrian Carmack (well, it's close...) with a
> manic look on his face and a car in the background with the caption
> "Adrian (the Hitman) gleefully walks to his car after hearing that
> Romero is on the road and helpless". True story.)
> --
> Adam Williamson
> Memento Mori 2 Level 6
> ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/idgames/themes/mm/mm2.zip
Well in light of recent publications, and info related to id, I'm under
the impression that Romero was more of their "celebrity". Ok so he's no
celebrity officially, but he is somewhat to alot of computer gamers.
He's kindof been their icon to take all the press. Jeesh I how do I say
it? Almost like I'm now under the impression that he's what id would
like the world to think of id being. Kindof like he represent the
archtype they want to use to project to the world, what they are all
about. I guess.
Lawrence
I don't know. To me it just seems that alot of people like Quake, but
are just anxious to see how Prey and Unreal will compare to them. If
they will be as good, worse, or better. Like how Duke3d, was the final
long awaited 'doom killer'(no Quake killer though, IMO). Like we saw
alot of clones back then that didn't even hold a candle to doom. I
think it will be interesting to see if history will repeat itself having
id ,yet again, be the definition of action gaming, by which all other
action (but moreso, first person) games will be judged by comparing to
how they measure up to it.
More than anything, I think id showed the game development world that
the 'construction set' premise is a good one. At least a marketable
one. They kindof set the trend for others to follow. Of course they
didn't originate it though. I'd have to say EA did, but for some
reason, abandoned that concept. Maybe due to the fact that they can't
afford the flexablity nor the gambles that a shareware company can.
Afterall, the programmer of Commercial companies probably have some
suit(or marketing rep) breathing down their neck constantly. And these
type of Distributors are more likely not to try something new. They
have the mentality of sticking to ,safe tried and successful in the
past, concepts. I think at shareware companies the programmers have
alot more freedom.(based on what alot of people who've programmed for
both types, have stated.)
well anyway just my two cents worth.
Lawrence
Osquar Sandberg wrote:
>
> On Sat, 10 Aug 1996 00:44:45 -0700, David Matiskella
>
> >One thing people are forgetting is that while Carmack was responsible for
> >actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
> >Seems like id is shifting from putting out playable games to
> >technological tour de forces.
>
> While Carmack is very technically creative, being able to think of new
> technologies and ideas surrounding such (just look at his latest
> brainchild, Quakeworld), I think that id might suffer from Romero's
> absence in that he was gameplay creative. Romero's head was absolutely
> full of ideas for games, things that he would like to see in games,
> and a lot of it came out in the interviews with him, and ended up
> being the hated "hype."
>
> For example, it might have been Carmacks idea to make quakeC, but I'm
> pretty sure that the "backpack" idea came from Romero. You see what I
> mean.
Maybe that's why Romero want to leave and start up his own thing. I'd
bet that he just wants to do some ideas that he couldn't do with id. A
good idea, I think, that way he can totally direct a game without
stepping on his friends at id. (ie. hire his own staff to do the game
he's always wanted, instead of what he and the whole staff of id
wanted).
That would make alot of sense to me anyway. It's very hard to get
creative minds together on something and to see eye to eye on alot of
stuff. If you're in a postition like Romero where you could start up
your own thing and be in charge, that would be ideal.
I'm not saying that alot of the other guys at id don't have great ideas,
but I imagine they all have to compromise a little bit on some of them.
And that none of them have ever done completely what they would've like
to to a game.
Osquar Sandberg
On Sun, 11 Aug 1996 12:58:02 GMT, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard)
wrote:
>But that's just it... Romero didn't write programs. He just designed
>levels. There are three coders and four level designers who worked
>on Quake; the only reason Romero stood out of the crowd (for Quake
>AND for Doom) is that he was the "mouthpiece" of id. He did most of
>the talking, so he got a lot of credit. But let's look at reality:
What people are afraid of was that his creativity will hurt future id
games. Romero had a mind that was full of new ideas, which was why he
hyped games so much, his mind was overflowing with creativity.
>Romero's Quake levels:
>e1m1 and e1m3.
That's e3m1 not e1m3 (necropolis by tim willits)
>All of episode 2.
>dm3 (abandoned base)
>Shub-Niggarauth's lair
start (welcome to quake level.)
>Now Episode 2 (Realm of Black Magic) was, of course, good. It wasn't
>the best, IMO (Eps 3 and 4 were), but it was good. e1m1, e1m3, and dm3
>were nothing special; pretty straightforward Doom-era level designs.
>Copare those to, say, Willets' Wind Tunnels or McGee's Ziggaurat
>level... not so hot. And of course Shub-Niggaurath's lair was a
>standard DoomII-style ending; avoid scads of baddies and blast the
>big nasty. The level itself was not very interesting.
The elder world was definitely the best of the three episodes, but I
would say that romero's was second. I liked the stone/metal atmosphere
in it, and there were no TAR-BABIES.
The pain maze was one of the best levels IMO, or maybe the one before
it, I forget the order now.
>Of the 4 "entry levels" (slipgate complexes), the most interesting
>one, the one that makes the most of the Quake engine, is the
>Sewer Systems. This is the one Romero didn't do.
I liked the sewage system too, lots of swimming.
>If you doubt me on this, check through the design credits in
>MANUAL.TXT, and compare that to a list of your favorite Quake
>levels. For me, Romero ranks fourth out of the four designers;
>I think I have to give Willets the most credit for pushing
>the engine, and Peterson points for "mood".
Yeah, the mood in Petersons levels is unbelievable, and the way he
hides the enemies in the shadows and makes good use of there AI, he
must spend much time playing through his own levels to create such
masterpieces. They are very beautiful to look at as well.
I wouldn't have been too impressed by Tim Willits, if it hadn't been
for the wind tunnels level, which was IMO unbelievable. Damn I would
like to play deathmatch in there. I think they moved it out of the
shareware on purpose as it was to good for that.
>Bear in mind that only Romero is leaving. This means id is losing
>1/4 its creative team and none of its coding.
And 90% of its loudness.
>Not the same as when it did Wolf3d, but I'd say it is the same
>as it was when Doom was put together. Has anybody got a list of
>who designed what in Doom and DoomII? I know Peterson was brought
>onboard for Doom.
I can't be bothered to look up the manual for Doom 2. The readme has
no list, but the end screen list sandy peterson only for design.
>The image of "Carmack and Romero" as "Lennon and McCartney" is
>a tempting one, but a more accurate comparason is "Carmack and
>Romero" = "Lennon and Ringo Starr". The Beatles wouldn't have
>been the same without Ringo, public-image wise, but the music
>would have been pretty much exactly the same (if not better...
>Starr wasn't exactly the world's greatest drummer).
Only the future can tell, if things will go good, or to hell. I don't
think this is a real problem. Carmack is cool, and he doesn't need
romero around. Romero can try his best to make good games in his new
company, and I wish him the best of luck.
Adam Williamson
>as it was when Doom was put together. Has anybody got a list of
>who designed what in Doom and DoomII? I know Peterson was brought
>onboard for Doom.
>
McGee's, but Ziggurat Vertigo restored my faith in his talents :).
Haven't a clue about Doom1, but Romero was definitely involved, as was
Petersen.
Craig Murch
David Matiskella wrote:
>
> One thing people are forgetting is that while Carmack was responsible for
> the great game engines. The game play was generally attributed to Romero.
> How many engines have there been that are superior to Dooms but the
> actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
Uh, can you name one?
> Seems like id is shifting from putting out playable games to
> technological tour de forces.
All they have to do is hire some more people.
> David Matiskella
> mati...@aa.washington.edu
Craig
TJ
dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard) wrote:
>Romero's Quake levels:
>e1m1 and e1m3.
>All of episode 2.
>dm3 (abandoned base)
>Shub-Niggarauth's lair
Uhm..the info in the manual.txt file says that e1m3 was NOT made by
Romero, but by Tim Willits (The Necropolis).
If what the file states is incorrect, I apologize, I just wanted you
to know.
TJ
Mel
My biggest complaint about Quake is that it simply
seems unfinished and/or rushed. It's like a diamond,
not just in the rough as though it will be polished
finely later, but a diamond in a state of roughness
that is meant never to come out of that state for
whatever reason.
In regards to what I just said above, the key to
my complaint is setting, story-line in the majority
and functionality in the minority. Regarding the
latter, this is greatly over-riddin by the prospect
of the alias capabilities which are way cool to
those with the time and know-how to put it all
together -- however, this is a big thought.
Let me explain: why does the functionality in Quake
need to be so esoteric? The market is not made up
primarily of Carmacks and Romeros. It's made up
of people who don't know c++ or any other programming
language and who want to do what they've done with
every other game: install it, set it up, and "bang,
bang." Therefore, the alias thingy, while way cool
to those of us here, is asking too much in over-
coming the short-comings of Quake functionality.
However, whereas the functionality may be excused
or redeemed due to the aliases, the setting and
storyline can claim no such salvation. Just what the
heck is going on beyond what is poorly explained in
the manual.txt?
It's easy to, at this point, claim that we serious
3d gamers don't necessarily need no stinkin' story-
line (you know like, "we don't need no stinkin'
badges"), but is this really true? I think not.
The human mind needs a context or else we'd pay
millions of dollars to see nothing but spaceships
blow-up all of the east coast getting nothing more
than explosions -- oh, we do and did pay for that
kinda thing didn't we, Independence Day.
But seriously, even in the bang-'em-up movies like
these we still need a rough context, a glue, to
hold it all together. Perhaps this is much less
needed in gaming, but is it really? I remember
playing DOOM for the first time thinking, "this
is cool but what is all of this stuff?" After the
initial thrill of the blood and explosions wore off
I looked into the txt files to find out just what
it was all about, and the game seemed more natural
after understanding that hell got transported to the
moons around Mars (as crazy as that sounds), and
would Wolf3d have been as fun without that German
national anthem (or patriotic song) at the beginning
of it, or less the German shouts of defiance and
agony, or the swasticas, or killing Hitler? It was
a context, a setting, a story line, simple yet
well defined and known to the player. And let's not
forget Dark Forces: big points off for not having
any type of multi-player play, but major points for
story-line most of which they didn't even need to
discuss because hey, we all love Star Wars and Vadar
and Chewy and Old Ben and so on. That music was
Star Warrish and the storm troopers were way cool
and you were there man doin' it to them man.
Quake is way cool, no doubt about it, but after the
initial thrill of the graphics, guns, blood, guts,
and even the new 'net play (big thumbs up despite
bugs) I personally need a little more glue to hold
it all together, a little more explanation of why
moats are inside castles, of why I'm in a medieval
setting with far-futuristic devices (teleport, slip-
gate, modern and futuristic weaponry), of why
I'm in a castle at all, of who the zombies are, the
other D&D monsters, and of who the big guy at the
end is and what's his relationship to Quake
(Quake of course, as we've been told, is a dude that
we're after, after this is said there's nothing more
available except his using slip-gates; i.e., the
teleports that exited us to the next level in every
3d game since Wolf3d -- and where the heck has the
dragon gone to?).
Oh well, that's my spill
To all flammers,
"I know you are but what am I?"
Spock, "Captain this man is dying." Captain, "Spock,
are you out of your Fulcan mind? Bones, do something."
Bones, "Dammit Jim, I'm doctor not a...oh yea, right."
Spock, "Captain, I want to have your baby."
Paul Thurrott
Adam Williamson <Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk> wrote in article
<5EZMdXBY...@scss.demon.co.uk>...
> In article <32093e10...@news.ionet.net>, "Jason A. Farque'"
> <far...@ionet.net> writes
> >"environment". I understand that, but believe it or not, not everyone
> >is connected to the Internet; some people actually play against the
> >monsters.
> So? Id wrote a game to cater to the Internet market.
And what game is that? Surely you are not referring to Quake! In
Quake--unless you are "on" the server or have a killer (i.e. T1,
Cable modem or ISDN) connection, Internet Quake deathmatch is the
laggiest thing around...it's more like slow motion ice skating.
Quake, ironically, is *far* better single player...mostly because
it's tiring when lesser players with better ping times can kill you.
I say "ironically" because id invented deathmatch.
If you don't agree with me, please re-read John Carmack's plan
file--*HE* agrees with me: Quake deathmatch sucks for 28.8 players.
> The thing is, somehow, it works. Id have sold ridiculously large amounts
> of Quake. You yourself say you enjoy the game. So where's the problem?
Most of id's sales are based on the pre-release big-talk of John
Romero. His claims--like kicking around the heads of victims, server
to server jumping, and "speed of light" Internet connections have
all been proven false with the final release. The result? He's gone,
and to read John Carmack's version: "good riddance". It's sad, what's
happened here to id. They let us all down. You are just too
fanatical to see it. You, and the many, many people like you out there,
have contributed to Quake's success.
> Adam Williamson
> Memento Mori 2 Level 6
As a fan of Momento Mori, I look forward to anything you can do
for Quake. Certainly, I burned through the registered levels in
two days and have yet to find a worthy deathmatch opponent. Perhaps
your add-on levels will breathe some life into a surprisingly
lifeless game. Success--on a monetary level--does not make Quake
good, unfortunately.
Paul
--
thur...@netwrx.net
www.netwrx.net/thurrott/
CSS1 version: www.netwrx.net/thurrott/test
YoGrE
Common guys, this is the best thing to happen in the 3D gaming scene for
a long time. According to id's press release, Romero's company will be a
license partner with id and will be using the Quake engine for 3 (yes, 3
new games). Imagine what Hexen would have been liek if Romero worked at
Raven. I think we can expect 3 new huge "Quake clones" from "Dream
Design".
Muhd. Hidayat
Damn it, have you people no shame, no sense of respect? Does anyone still
remember gawking at the screen-shots of the beta version of DOOM in
Computer Gaming World and how you said "Man if they REALLY made a game like
that, its gonna REALLY ROCK, but is it possible.....?" and guess what? They
did! Together John Romero, John Carmack and Adrian Carmack made DOOM. No
one pointed fingers then and said "oh he coded this and he made that level
and yeah he did that..." All we knew was the id TEAM made it TOGETHER! They
worked together as a TEAM and made the greatest ever "HOLY SHIT" game ever
made in history! They created a whole new game genre. All we had then were
silly arcade and flight-sims and all that stuff. DOOM's 3D-look introduced
FEAR, ADRENALINE and high ACTION into computer gaming. Never before did we
play such games. And now, that team is now breaking up. An age has passed.
We don't need talk like "good riddance Romero. Never did much anyway...etc
etc" Romero was part of the team, just like the rest and his contributions
to DOOM and QUAKE are invaluable. Now that he is gone, id has lost that
special "Romero touch". Perhaps they will still make good games, and
perhaps Romero's company will also make good games, but GREAT KICKASS HOLY
SHIT games that only the Romero and Carmack brothers team made are gone
forever. That's what we're losing. AMEN.
Yeah and to both Romero and Carmack, good luck guys, its been great.
Hidayat aka PADRE.
Born to DOOM circa 1993
Chris Clarke
Craig Murch <I@don't.want.anymore.junk.mail> wrote:
>David Matiskella wrote:
>>
>> One thing people are forgetting is that while Carmack was responsible for
>> the great game engines. The game play was generally attributed to Romero.
>> How many engines have there been that are superior to Dooms but the
>> actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
>Uh, can you name one?
Dark Forces.
Although I know people will disagree with that one.
Chris.
Followups snipped.
============================================================
Chris Clarke, Systems Test Engineer
Hughes Aircraft of Canada Ltd, Systems Division
Opinions expressed do not reflect those of Hughes Aircraft.
"In the beginning, the universe was created. This is generally
regarded as a bad move." -- Douglas Adams
Dirk Vandenheuvel
a...@mercury.co.il (YoGrE) wrote:
Yep... you are right. I always wondered why companies tried
reinventing the wheel after DooM. Instead of licencing the DooM engine
and create *good* games, most companies spend way to much time trying
to write a DooM-like engine. What happened??? Lot's of crappy DooM
wannabees!
Now things look very good for Quake. At last we will get some games
that are 100% gameplay and 100% graphics (ok... ok... and some
programming). Raven, iD and Romero are a formidable team. A good thing
for us gamers...
CU and happy gaming
/*--------------------------------------------------------------------------*\
Gothic SIG of the day:
Look at an altar without going to a mausoleum first.
Dirk 'Dizzy' Vandenheuvel (van...@innet.be)
\*--------------------------------------------------------------------------*/
Adam Williamson
In article <320EB3...@ix.netcom.com>, Lawrence
<Cry...@ix.netcom.com> writes
>they will be as good, worse, or better. Like how Duke3d, was the final
>long awaited 'doom killer'(no Quake killer though, IMO). Like we saw
>
Duke3D level replacement, there's been a Memento Mori 2 thread simmering
in the Doom group for about 2 weeks though...
--
Memento Mori 2 Level 6
Adam Williamson
In article <320EB1...@cdc.net>, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> writes
>In regards to what I just said above, the key to
>my complaint is setting, story-line in the majority
>and functionality in the minority. Regarding the
You're asking the wrong thing of the wrong people then. Id aren't
authors, they are game makers. They have a tiny staff compared to
commercial firms. They have no-one who can write a decent story, they're
smart enough to realise that so they leave stories out of their games.
If you want a storyline, buy something from LucasArts or Origin, who
employ people solely to write storylines.
TJ
m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se (Osquar Sandberg) wrote:
>I can't be bothered to look up the manual for Doom 2. The readme has
>no list, but the end screen list sandy peterson only for design.
Hey, really? That was what I claimed, too, that Sandy did the most of
Doom2's design, but somebody claimed that American McGee did the Doom2
levels. Maybe I was right anyway. Oh well, who cares...
TJ
Adam Williamson
In article <BZrDyM2K...@pacific.net.sg>, "Muhd. Hidayat"
<hid...@pacific.net.sg> writes
>Damn it, have you people no shame, no sense of respect? Does anyone still
>remember gawking at the screen-shots of the beta version of DOOM in
>Computer Gaming World and how you said "Man if they REALLY made a game like
>that, its gonna REALLY ROCK, but is it possible.....?" and guess what? They
>did! Together John Romero, John Carmack and Adrian Carmack made DOOM. No
>one pointed fingers then and said "oh he coded this and he made that level
>and yeah he did that..." All we knew was the id TEAM made it TOGETHER! They
<nostalgia mode>
Funny how no-one mentions Wolf3D (collective "aarrrrgggghhhhh"). That,
if anything, was the game where the Id guys really had team spirit.
*Everyone* did a bit of everything. Yeesh, the music man, Bobby Prince,
made a level (it wasn't particularly good, but does that matter?)
Adam Williamson
In article <01bb8816$d224b660$7380a5ce@p166ntws>, Paul Thurrott
<thur...@netwrx.net> writes
>Adam Williamson <Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk> wrote in article
><5EZMdXBY...@scss.demon.co.uk>...
>> In article <32093e10...@news.ionet.net>, "Jason A. Farque'"
>> <far...@ionet.net> writes
>> >"environment". I understand that, but believe it or not, not everyone
>> >is connected to the Internet; some people actually play against the
>> >monsters.
>
>> So? Id wrote a game to cater to the Internet market.
>
>And what game is that? Surely you are not referring to Quake! In
>Quake--unless you are "on" the server or have a killer (i.e. T1,
>Cable modem or ISDN) connection, Internet Quake deathmatch is the
>laggiest thing around...it's more like slow motion ice skating.
>
>Quake, ironically, is *far* better single player...mostly because
>it's tiring when lesser players with better ping times can kill you.
>I say "ironically" because id invented deathmatch.
>
>If you don't agree with me, please re-read John Carmack's plan
>file--*HE* agrees with me: Quake deathmatch sucks for 28.8 players.
Funny how many 28.8k players I find who say they've been on hours and
are enjoying themselves when I go on experimentally again (why do I do
it? I haven't a clue). Maybe Carmack agrees with you, but a lot of
people don't.
>
>> The thing is, somehow, it works. Id have sold ridiculously large amounts
>> of Quake. You yourself say you enjoy the game. So where's the problem?
>
>Most of id's sales are based on the pre-release big-talk of John
>Romero. His claims--like kicking around the heads of victims, server
Come on, people have more sense than that. BTW, there's a patch
available that enables player-head-kicking, and moreover, wasn't that PR
for Blood?
>to server jumping, and "speed of light" Internet connections have
>all been proven false with the final release. The result? He's gone,
>and to read John Carmack's version: "good riddance". It's sad, what's
>happened here to id. They let us all down. You are just too
>fanatical to see it. You, and the many, many people like you out there,
>have contributed to Quake's success.
Me? Fanatical? I just go for the truth. I have more registered Apogee
games than registered Id/Raven games - I have Doom2, Doom1, and Wolf3d
(which was half Apogee). I don't have Heretic, Strife, HeXen or Quake
(yet - I will have). However, I do have Duke Nukem 1, 2 and DN3D (*all
separately, i'm not talking about the registered DN1 and 2 on the DN3D
CD), Terminal Velocity, Keen: Vorticons (OK, that's half Id, too), and a
few others. Also, Apogee was the company with the decency to send me a
load of Wolf3D stuff to help with my FAQ.
>
>> Adam Williamson
>> Memento Mori 2 Level 6
>
>As a fan of Momento Mori, I look forward to anything you can do
>for Quake. Certainly, I burned through the registered levels in
>two days and have yet to find a worthy deathmatch opponent. Perhaps
>your add-on levels will breathe some life into a surprisingly
>lifeless game. Success--on a monetary level--does not make Quake
>good, unfortunately.
>
Be happy, Memento Mori 3: The Quake Encounter is coming just as soon as
some *decent* level editors come out. And it's M_e_mento Mori! :)
TJ
hid...@pacific.net.sg (Muhd. Hidayat) wrote:
> Perhaps they will still make good games, and
>perhaps Romero's company will also make good games, but GREAT KICKASS HOLY
>SHIT games that only the Romero and Carmack brothers team made are gone
>forever. That's what we're losing. AMEN.
Amen.
>Yeah and to both Romero and Carmack, good luck guys, its been great.
It sure has.
>Hidayat aka PADRE.
>Born to DOOM circa 1993
TJ, born to Doom 1993-1996
reborn to Quake 1996 - ????
Mel
Adam Williamson wrote:
>
> In article <320EB1...@cdc.net>, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> writes
> >In regards to what I just said above, the key to
> >my complaint is setting, story-line in the majority
> >and functionality in the minority. Regarding the
>
> You're asking the wrong thing of the wrong people then. Id aren't
> authors, they are game makers. They have a tiny staff compared to
> commercial firms. They have no-one who can write a decent story, they're
> smart enough to realise that so they leave stories out of their games.
> If you want a storyline, buy something from LucasArts or Origin, who
> employ people solely to write storylines.
How foolish of me. I should have realized what
the priorities are for an Id guy. They
probably go something like this, "hire a guy
to write a story-line . . . 'nother red
Porché? . . . story-line, Porché? story-line . . .
red or blue? . . . red or blue. . . ."
Let's get real, are you telling me that they
don't have the resources to hire some good
writers? Well then heck, I'll do it part time
for minimum wage just to have that on my resumé.
After all, I did major in English in college.
To all flammers, "I'm telling mom!"
Mel
"Dammit Spock, what are doing way down here!"
Brian Schmitt
On Mon, 12 Aug 1996 18:26:04 -0400, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> wrote:
>How foolish of me. I should have realized what
>the priorities are for an Id guy. They
>probably go something like this, "hire a guy
>to write a story-line . . . 'nother red
>Porché? . . . story-line, Porché? story-line . . .
>red or blue? . . . red or blue. . . ."
>
>Let's get real, are you telling me that they
>don't have the resources to hire some good
>writers? Well then heck, I'll do it part time
>for minimum wage just to have that on my resumé.
>After all, I did major in English in college.
>
>To all flammers, "I'm telling mom!"
>
>Mel
>
...honered. Everything you say here is flawed. First, I don't think
anyone at id has a Porsche, they prefer Ferrari's. Second, story has
absolutely nothing to do with an action game being good or bad. If you
want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything by Square of
Japan). Third, everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at
college was an English major and I can't think of a single one that
had enough sense of drama or imagination to write a good story. They
could nail the sentence structure down, though.
Brian Schmitt
Artist:Neversoft Entertainment
br...@neversoft.com
Mel
Jason Price wrote:
>
> Mel <mana...@cdc.net> wrote in article <320C11...@cdc.net>...
>
> > In regards to the above, the greatest thing about Quake that I show
> > them all is the 'net play to which they say, "wow, cool, too bad
> > I can't do that." They then have no intentions of buying it.
> > As of today I am the only one of the some dozen good computer friends
> > I have who is buying Quake. The rest play War2, Duke, et al.
> > After all, other games are easier to understand, easier to buy, were
> > easier in the shareware or beta releases (i.e., you didn't need to
> > download and install the monsters), and they simply see no large
> > difference between Quake and DOOM than the Internet play which brings
> > us back to the point that they don't have a flat-rate ISP connection.
>
> Not only that, but the people smart enough to have a flat-rate Internet
> connection are the hackers out there that pirate the games anyway. Not
> much of a money-making proposition. I did, however read an article in
> Computer Gaming World that said the release version of Quake is much better
> for independant play so it might catch on with people without a serious
> Internet connection.
>
> But you have to say to yourself, "Who's got the money to play this thing
> over the net anyway?" When I bought my computer in October, it cost me
> $6000 Canadian. Which is about $4000 American. I suppose you could get
> the same computer now for $2500 - $3000 but you'd also need to get an ISDN
> connection if you want to have a good time playing Quake over the net.
> It's frustrating playing with a 28,800 connection. In addition, I only get
> 24fps in Quake's lowest resolution. So if you want it to look good, you
> need either have to play with a lower frame rate, or get a faster computer.
>
> So I'd say you're right. Quake wasn't made for the masses.
> --
> Jason Price
> pri...@king.igs.net
> http://www.king.igs.net/~pricej/
>
> Dyin' ain't much of a linvin', boy.
> --Clint Eastwood
Thanks for the reply, but I'm really responding to comment on your
Eastwood
Quote. Way cool man, that's one of my most favorite lines out of any
movie, and that's one of the best movies ever,
The Outlaw Josey Wales -- better than any Dirty Harry (although I love
the
D.H. movies).
How about this one from the movie,
-- when he's crossing the street carrying the packages and comes upon
the
5 (is it) union soldiers who all get ready to draw but then hesitate
because it's Wales, and Josey says,
"Are you gonna pull those pistols or whistle dixie?"
-- A second one,
Josie just killed the two ambushers (great scene throughout, what
dialogue;
my friends and I quote this one to each other often), and the young man
he's been helping says something about burying the two ambushers to
which
Josie replys,
"Hell with them fellas, buzzards gotta eat, same as worms."
First time I've seen that quote you gave in a group. Great choice.
Again, way cool.
P.S. Check out http://www.pyramid.net/eastwood/, way cool Eastwood
page.
Sorry off subject all
Justice
Osquar Sandberg wrote:
>
> On Sun, 11 Aug 1996 12:58:02 GMT, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard)
> wrote:
>
> >But that's just it... Romero didn't write programs. He just designed
> >levels. There are three coders and four level designers who worked
> >on Quake; the only reason Romero stood out of the crowd (for Quake
> >AND for Doom) is that he was the "mouthpiece" of id. He did most of
> >the talking, so he got a lot of credit. But let's look at reality:
>
> What people are afraid of was that his creativity will hurt future id
> games. Romero had a mind that was full of new ideas, which was why he
> hyped games so much, his mind was overflowing with creativity.
>
> >e1m1 and e1m3.
>
>
> >dm3 (abandoned base)
> >Shub-Niggarauth's lair
>
> >as it was when Doom was put together. Has anybody got a list of
> >who designed what in Doom and DoomII? I know Peterson was brought
> >onboard for Doom.
>
> no list, but the end screen list sandy peterson only for design.
>
> >a tempting one, but a more accurate comparason is "Carmack and
> >Romero" = "Lennon and Ringo Starr". The Beatles wouldn't have
> >been the same without Ringo, public-image wise, but the music
> >would have been pretty much exactly the same (if not better...
> >Starr wasn't exactly the world's greatest drummer).
>
> Only the future can tell, if things will go good, or to hell. I don't
> think this is a real problem. Carmack is cool, and he doesn't need
> romero around. Romero can try his best to make good games in his new
> company, and I wish him the best of luck.
You've got to be joking... Azure Agony was probably the most
tortuous level I have EVER seen... if I ever try to beat it on Nightmare
mode again it'll be too soon... especially that silly Shambler at teh
beginning! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?
Justice
Mel
Brian Schmitt wrote:
>
> On Mon, 12 Aug 1996 18:26:04 -0400, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> wrote:
> >How foolish of me. I should have realized what
> >the priorities are for an Id guy. They
> >probably go something like this, "hire a guy
> >to write a story-line . . . 'nother red
> >red or blue? . . . red or blue. . . ."
> >
> >Let's get real, are you telling me that they
> >don't have the resources to hire some good
> >writers? Well then heck, I'll do it part time
> >for minimum wage just to have that on my resumé.
> >After all, I did major in English in college.
> >
> >To all flammers, "I'm telling mom!"
> >
> >Mel
> >
> Wow folks. We have an english major reading this newsgroup. I feel so
> ...honered. Everything you say here is flawed. First, I don't think
> anyone at id has a Porsche, they prefer Ferrari's. Second, story has
> absolutely nothing to do with an action game being good or bad. If you
> want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything by Square of
> Japan). Third, everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at
> college was an English major and I can't think of a single one that
> had enough sense of drama or imagination to write a good story. They
> could nail the sentence structure down, though.
>
> Brian Schmitt
> Artist:Neversoft Entertainment
> br...@neversoft.com
Pow, got me, ahhhh!!!!,
Well hello flammey,
Get ready all I'm about to rant!
Here goes, rant, rant, rant,
Now for rage!
rage, rage, rage,
You guys (flammers) are like moths to the flame -- metaphorically
speaking. And as far as my English experience goes, I majored in
English Lit.; it was my second major (the primary one being philosophy),
and I also got a minor in ancient Greek. Right now I'm working on
a Master's degree with the help of a full scholarship and doing
computer tech work on the side, but who gives a rip right? I suppose
that I feel a right to mention something of my friggin' education since
it's put me in such great debt, and the topic you responded to,
so bombastically, offered a good threshold. But since we're on
the subject of what one does or did, just what do you do besides
examine the pieces of dung that drop out Id programmer's buttocks
and offering servile witticism?
But don't worry about spelling or grammar from me as I lean toward
the linguist side of the field who say, "leave the language alone
it was here before universities ever were." By the way, Shakespeare
spelled his name at least three or four different ways.
Oh, and also, tell me just what one should major in since
you know. It must be wonderful to have your college carrier so
figured out, but in case you haven't noticed, everyone thinks that
every other major is base except their own. In that regard, it's
good to see how higher learning has opened your mind and cleared
your thinking into a more acceptable approach toward life. Also,
FYI people who don't know what to do in college usually major
in business -- something that I have no problem with, but I'm sure
you do. Also, furthermore, to say that someone did not have a
direction based on their major in college (or A major in my case)
is narrow-minded and simple to say the least -- highly doltish.
What a sectarian mind, even fascist, even nationally fascist:
"anyone not like me is screwed-up." Open your mind. As Pink Floyd
would say, "breath, breath in the air." Let people be who they
are. I guess art majors are equally backwards huh? So, you would
have discouraged Leonardo, Michael Angelo, and the rest of the
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from having ever studied art in
Renaissance Europe. And Milton, Tenneyson, Coleridge -- how those
guys wasted their time. People like you are a gem. Do not go
away or ever stop posting. I need to be reminded of how beautiful
and multifaceted this planet really is. You are part of a
beautiful botanical garden, albeit, a weed. But "every weed
enjoys the air it breaths," to twist Wordsworth.
As for the Porsché thingy, well you got me. I really don't know what
each of the Id guys drive as I don't spend my time researching what
each member of the company drives, what they wear, eat, drink, screw,
blue, or chew like you yourself do (congratulations, great hobby).
It was, by the way and since you missed it, rather a joke. If it
makes you feel any better then do replace the word "Porsché" with
"Ferrari." The motive and emphasis of the section will be the same,
sheesh!
A few more rants right about here ought to do it!
rant, rant, rant, . . . rant,
However, I do love Quake, love the 'groups, the 'net, the aliases and
all other manner of 'netting and Quaking and other newsgroups all
over.
Thanks for the suggestions concerning Role playing, but I'm really
not interested; and after your blast of fire and smoke why would
I really want to take a suggestion from you in the first place?
Sorry to be so bold, but hey, "there's fire in this here thread."
And I'd like to get more opinions over whether setting and story-line
(as I originally offered) has absolutely nothing to do with an
action game as you suggested and as I disagree.
Now, if you want to answer with a little more sentience and a little
less bombast then please do. Of course, I wouldn't know bombast
if it bombastically bombast[ed] me in the face.
=_-- Star-date, blah, blah, blah
"Spock!" "Yes Captain?" "I want you to kill bones."
"Captain, that would be illogical if it weren't him."
"Dammit Spock, I'm a doctor not a . . . ehhh, uhhh!"
Oskar Sandberg
On Sun, 11 Aug 1996 11:20:37 -0700, Scott Lyon <sco...@cyberlynk.com>
wrote:
>Agreed Romero does have some pretty Awesome Ideas.....But as you can see
>some of the ideas that he had are not in Quake for the simple reason
>that WE don't have a system capable of handling it yet! I thought that
>the huge interactive world that he discussed awhile back would be neat,
>but i also realized that even by the time they got it out, most systems
>wouldn't be capable of running it......Maybe in 2 or 3 yrs we'll have
>they Technology on the street to handle his vision, (should be about the
>right time for him to put out his first game with his new company)
> ;)
But aren't visions exactly what you need if you are gonna create
something. And that's what games companies do, (think Origin.)
Oskar Sandberg
On Sun, 11 Aug 1996 13:01:36 GMT, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard)
wrote:
>Osquar Sandberg (m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se) wrote:
>
>: For example, it might have been Carmacks idea to make quakeC, but I'm
>: pretty sure that the "backpack" idea came from Romero. You see what I
>: mean.
>
>Yeah, I think I do. QuakeC was a brilliant idea, and about half the
>reason I like the game so much. :)
Yeah, but with the exception of a small minority of us, quakeC is not
a sails strength.
Or maybe it is for id, since it makes licensing the engine so much
easier.
Frans P. de Vries
Dan Bongard (dbon...@netcom.com) wrote:
} Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
} : Especially when that individual's contributions are known, but are
} : simply down-graded by saying, "well, Romero didn't write code,
} : didn't do the engine, didn't do this that or the other; all he did
} : was design levels and that's not very important at all, so Id
} : is exactly the same as it was when it wrote Wolf3d and DOOM1(2)."
} Not the same as when it did Wolf3d, but I'd say it is the same
} as it was when Doom was put together. Has anybody got a list of
} who designed what in Doom and DoomII? I know Peterson was brought
} onboard for Doom.
Here's what Romero posted about this himself:
<quote>
From: jo...@idece2.idsoftware.com (Mr. John Romero)
Newsgroups: rec.games.computer.doom.misc
Subject: Re: Many id related questions...
Date: 17 May 1995 07:31:08 GMT
Organization: id Software Inc.
[snip]
DOOM level design: i did the first episode, except for level 8 (Sandy did
it). And level 4 was a Tom Hall makeover. In the last 2 episodes, Sandy
Peterson did mostly new levels, with many of them makeovers of Tom Hall's
earlier efforts and one level of Shawn Green's.
...
DOOM programming: Carmack did the game superstructure and engine and some
utilities. I did DoomEd, the map editor, as well as the menu system, all
the special effects in the game (hurting slime, flashing lights, building
stairs, etc, etc, etc.) I also did the external utilities (DM.EXE,
SETUP.EXE, etc.) Dave Taylor did the automap, status bar, and the layer
between the low-level sound driver and the game.
</quote>
Further, in Ultimate Doom he did E4M2 and E4M6, which I reckon amongst my
favourites. I have no list of who did which Doom II levels.
At this point, it's hard to tell whether the split between Romero and id
Software will be for better or for worse, for either of them, but I wish
them well.
Note followups.
--
Frans P. de Vries | f...@xymph.iaf.nl | Rec.Games.Computer.Doom FAQ maintainer
Erik Farquhar
In article <320E97...@worldnet.att.com>,
Kevin Hollywood <The...@worldnet.att.com> wrote:
>Who was the first co-founder to leave?
As far as I know, it was either Tom Hall [is that his name] or Dave Taylor.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Erik Farquhar
Jason Price
Dan Bongard
Adam Williamson (Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk) wrote:
: <dbon...@netcom.com> writes
: >Not the same as when it did Wolf3d, but I'd say it is the same
: >as it was when Doom was put together. Has anybody got a list of
: >who designed what in Doom and DoomII? I know Peterson was brought
: >onboard for Doom.
: Peter_sen_, for a start.
Well, he's listed as "Peterson" in the Quake manual; my apologies. :)
BTW... this is the same Sandy Petersen who did the "Call of Cthulhu"
RPG, is it not? Or is there more than one American horror game
designer named that?
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Osquar Sandberg (m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se) wrote:
: Dan Bongard wrote:
: What people are afraid of was that his creativity will hurt future id
: games. Romero had a mind that was full of new ideas, which was why he
: hyped games so much, his mind was overflowing with creativity.
Well, my point is that Romero never struck me as the most creative
member of id by any means. Sure, he had a lot of greate ideas for
Quake, but none of them really got implemented for the simple reason
that they weren't really possible with the available technology.
True "creativity" involves bringing your dream to fruition, not
just suggesting nifty ideas.
On top of that it was never clear to me just how many of the ideas
Romero mentioned were actually his, as opposed to Petersen's or
Carmack's or McGees or whatever. Given the extremely high quality
of id's games I have a hard time believing that the rest of the
creative team wasn't at least as good as Romero.
: >Romero's Quake levels:
: >e1m1 and e1m3.
: That's e3m1 not e1m3 (necropolis by tim willits)
Sorry, typo... I can't stop myself thinking that Quake consists of
missions with many episodes, rather than episodes consisting of
many missions. :)
: >Bear in mind that only Romero is leaving. This means id is losing
: >1/4 its creative team and none of its coding.
: And 90% of its loudness.
Which is, IMO, a huge upside... Quake got hyped way too much. Many
people, as a result, were expecting Quake to be one step
down from Reality(tm) itself, so they felt let down instead of being
excited about the awesome game that DID come out.
: Only the future can tell, if things will go good, or to hell. I don't
: think this is a real problem. Carmack is cool, and he doesn't need
: romero around. Romero can try his best to make good games in his new
: company, and I wish him the best of luck.
Well, id may well have problems of its own; we'll see if the remaining
team stays together or if more people leave.
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
[usual flames, snipped]
I notice English majors write basically the same sorts of flames
as everybody else (although I'll admit you use more $0.25 words
than the average high school student).
: But since we're on the subject of what one does or did, just what
: do you do besides examine the pieces of dung that drop out Id
: programmer's buttocks and offering servile witticism?
First, a fair-sized chunk of the people reading this, myself
included, have degrees and jobs. Might I ask what you have
accomplished in life that surpasses what id has done? Any fool
can get a college diploma (I know many who have).
: But don't worry about spelling or grammar from me as I lean toward
: the linguist side of the field who say, "leave the language alone
: it was here before universities ever were." By the way, Shakespeare
: spelled his name at least three or four different ways.
And early computer scientists had to write code in machine language
on punch-cards; this does not mean that it is a rational or
respectable thing for modern-day programmers to do. :)
: Oh, and also, tell me just what one should major in since you know.
One should major in whatever one wants to. It might, however, be
a good idea if "one" learned something from the experience. All
you seem to have learned is (a) that correct spelling isn't really
necessary (I'd love to know which professor taught you THAT) and
(b) a lot of twenty-five-cent words. You might (and this is just
a suggestion) want to take some night classes to find out what
the words actually mean, BTW.
: Also, furthermore, to say that someone did not have a
: direction based on their major in college (or A major in my case)
: is narrow-minded and simple to say the least -- highly doltish.
The original poster's point was that having an English degree
didn't guarantee, in the slightest, that you have a single creative
bone in your body you don't need creativity for an English degree
any more than you need it for a EE degree.
: What a sectarian mind, even fascist, even nationally fascist:
: "anyone not like me is screwed-up."
What?
[misc. quotes from The Usual Literature deleted]
If you really want to convince people you're creative, you should
probably think of your own interesting things to say instead of
quoting other, interesting, people.
: As for the Porsché thingy, well you got me. I really don't know what
: each of the Id guys drive as I don't spend my time researching what
: each member of the company drives, what they wear, eat, drink, screw,
: blue, or chew like you yourself do (congratulations, great hobby).
What they blue?
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
: >Mark S. Wyman (wy...@turtle.cig.mot.com) wrote:
: [snip]
: >: Its not a terrible product,
: >: just not one I would rank as hall of fame material.
: >That places you firmly in the minority, I'm afraid. :)
: I don't know about that Dan. I've seen just as many posts that would
: agree with him as those that would agree with you. I don't think
: there is a minority in the debate on how good Quake is, I see it as
: firmly split down the middle. (Here on the newsgroups, anyway.)
Exactly; here on the newsgroups, where flaming is always more popular
than praising. :) Personally, I'm just basing my experiences on
RL. In RL I have yet to find anybody who didn't think Quake was
an amazing game. :)
-- Dan
Michael Sims
dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard) wrote:
>: I don't know about that Dan. I've seen just as many posts that would
>: agree with him as those that would agree with you. I don't think
>: there is a minority in the debate on how good Quake is, I see it as
>: firmly split down the middle. (Here on the newsgroups, anyway.)
>Exactly; here on the newsgroups, where flaming is always more popular
>than praising. :)
Slightly more popular, yes, but spooging and hyping are very popular,
for a good game. How many people were bashing Doom when it came out?
>Personally, I'm just basing my experiences on
>RL. In RL I have yet to find anybody who didn't think Quake was
>an amazing game. :)
Forgive my ignorance, but what's RL?
----------------------------------------------
Michael Sims
phs...@sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu
(aka Ford in Quake)
----------------------------------------------
Richard Ward
In article <dbongardD...@netcom.com>,
One and the same. He's listed as "Petersen" in the DOOM manual.
John Romero is listed as a "software engineer" in the DOOM maual (and DOOM
][). Speaking of people who left id, what ever happened to Maurice Hale?
(tech support credit on DOOM)
--
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| "The box...you opened it. We came. It's a means to summon us - Cenobites. |
| Explorers in the further regions of experience. Demons to some, angels to |
| others. ... No tears please. It's a waste of good suffering." - Pinhead |
| rrw...@netcom.com Richard R. Ward |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Richard Ward
In article <N1ZfsjAT...@scss.demon.co.uk>,
Adam Williamson <Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <320EB3...@ix.netcom.com>, Lawrence
><Cry...@ix.netcom.com> writes
>>they will be as good, worse, or better. Like how Duke3d, was the final
>>long awaited 'doom killer'(no Quake killer though, IMO). Like we saw
>>
>Duke3D? Doom killer? Haven't seen much discussion about the latest full
>Duke3D level replacement, there's been a Memento Mori 2 thread simmering
>in the Doom group for about 2 weeks though...
Duke's no DOOM killer. Even though it has technilogical improvements it has
none of the atmosphere and internal reality that DOOM had. Repologle (or
however you spell his name) took Ken Silverman's impressive engine and covered
it with purile jokes, sexism, crassness and plain old stupidity. Duke could
have been a _great_ game. Too bad they just cranked out another Blake Stone.
Brian Schmitt
Damn, you were really hoping for a reply to your original letter. That
was quite a rant and left my wittle brain fellin' numb. I can't
compete with your literary diarrhea, sorry.
Richard Ward
In article <OVufUmAN...@scss.demon.co.uk>,
Adam Williamson <Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <320EB1...@cdc.net>, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> writes
>>In regards to what I just said above, the key to
>>my complaint is setting, story-line in the majority
>>and functionality in the minority. Regarding the
>
>You're asking the wrong thing of the wrong people then. Id aren't
>authors, they are game makers. They have a tiny staff compared to
>commercial firms. They have no-one who can write a decent story, they're
>smart enough to realise that so they leave stories out of their games.
>If you want a storyline, buy something from LucasArts or Origin, who
>employ people solely to write storylines.
..and we shouldn't expect enduring designs from tiny car companies like Avanti
and Tucker?
Id could have _hired_ a writer to come in and give the game some plot and
direction. Being small does not excuse them from being sloppy.
Anthony Trainor
Craig Murch <I@don't.want.anymore.junk.mail> wrote in article
<4ujret$l...@seagoon.newcastle.edu.au>...
> David Matiskella wrote:
> >
> > One thing people are forgetting is that while Carmack was responsible
for
> > the great game engines. The game play was generally attributed to
Romero.
> > How many engines have there been that are superior to Dooms but the
> > actually game sucks do to unbalanced play, shitty controls, and so on.
>
> Uh, can you name one?
Tekwar. Worst game I ever played.
WitchHaven's H2H combat was very monotonous, too.
> All they have to do is hire some more people.
I'm more interested in what Romero does with the Quake engine. Maybe
something with more RP and less psychotic grenade free-for-all?
sors immanis Trakka rex sedet in vertici
et inanis -==(UDIC)==- caveat ruinam
Pontiac Dragon
Mel
Dan Bongard wrote:
>
> Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
>
> [usual flames, snipped]
>
> I notice English majors write basically the same sorts of flames
> as everybody else (although I'll admit you use more $0.25 words
> than the average high school student).
>
> : do you do besides examine the pieces of dung that drop out Id
> : programmer's buttocks and offering servile witticism?
>
> included, have degrees and jobs. Might I ask what you have
> accomplished in life that surpasses what id has done? Any fool
> can get a college diploma (I know many who have).
(thinking to self) Should I go on with this? should I go on with this?
should I go on? . . . what the hell. Why not (back from thinking to
self).
Okay, I seemed to have picked up another stray flammer.
It happens that way you know. They just seem to gather like May
flies around the Mississippi. Let us now examine why Mr Dan
took up the shield, helm and sword for the other guy (what was
his name?).
I myself believe that it was the under-dog thingy, however, I have
heard of people getting friends involved when a flame-war gets to
hot. Maybe you feel real guilty over that experience you had
with your mother about 12 years ago (yeck!).
> : But don't worry about spelling or grammar from me as I lean toward
> : the linguist side of the field who say, "leave the language alone
> : it was here before universities ever were." By the way, Shakespeare
> : spelled his name at least three or four different ways.
>
> And early computer scientists had to write code in machine language
> on punch-cards; this does not mean that it is a rational or
> respectable thing for modern-day programmers to do. :)
Don't follow you here and don't care to try either.
> : Oh, and also, tell me just what one should major in since you know.
>
> One should major in whatever one wants to. It might, however, be
> a good idea if "one" learned something from the experience.
Gee, you managed to argue exactly what I did, yet somehow (slipping into
a German accent as though speaking to a university class) our zpezimen
zeems to believe zat hiz view iz actually oppozed to zat of ze
original poster (end character type).
Yes, I believe exactly what you just said above, but then, below here,
you get (snif) really nasty.
> All you seem to have learned is (a) that correct spelling isn't
> really necessary (I'd love to know which professor taught you THAT)
> and (b) a lot of twenty-five-cent words. You might (and this is just
> a suggestion) want to take some night classes to find out what
> the words actually mean, BTW.
You really leveled some pops here guy. Exactly what did I ever do
to you?
(Ace Ventura voice here) Alrighty then,
Well, isn't it wonderful how communication falls apart over the 'net.
When did I ever say that "correct spelling isn't really necessary?"
Again, you are a marble statue of incomprehension. First of all,
me trying to explain to you now the mechanics of linguistics and
grammar and the war between those two opposing groups (yes,
they are people in universities who disagree much like people do
here except not quite as nasty) would be crazy. Simply know that
a grammarian would correct everything that you said and the
extreme ones even claim that Shakespeare, and all other great
English writers, are the worst examples of the language. They're
one desire is to turn English into a science.
Linguists, on the other hand, approach the language from its natural
spoken origins and present existence focusing on the language more
as an art from rather than a science. There, I've said it. How in
the world did you get that I advocate leaving or writing misspelled
words into a college or higher paper?!?
A healthy linguist (I'm actually explaining this stuff on a Quake
newsgroup, but hey, mention something about yourself and get nailed
for no good reason -- flamming, go figure) understands that
the mechanics of grammar need to be applied to writing, but that
such laws should cease when it leaves the written format and
becomes the spoken. You probably don't know this but some
countries have actually passed laws forbidding the use and
publication of certain forms in a language and words. France is
a mild example of this. This is what I'm talking about and
don't go condescending me. I wrote 140 friggin pages worth of
research last year and lost 2 weeks worth of sleep.
So, no prof. taught me anything like what you are saying which
I don't even know where you're coming from, and I don't need
no stinkin' night school, I'm through with jr. high.
> : Also, furthermore, to say that someone did not have a
> : direction based on their major in college (or A major in my case)
> : is narrow-minded and simple to say the least -- highly doltish.
>
> The original poster's point was that having an English degree
> didn't guarantee, in the slightest, that you have a single creative
> bone in your body you don't need creativity for an English degree
> any more than you need it for a EE degree.
This is where you are also wrong. He blasted me for simply saying
that I was had an English major. Check it.
Here it is,
>>Wow folks. We have an english major reading this newsgroup. I feel so
>>...honered.
Un-called for, but I forget his focus was only to say that I wasn't
qualified, which, by the way, I'll agree with. But seriously
people, he flammed for no darn good reason like they all do
and like I do in times like right now when I'm, well, (sniffle)
mad (whimper).
>>Third, everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at
>>college was an English major and I can't think of a single one that
>>had enough sense of drama or imagination to write a good story. They
>>could nail the sentence structure down, though.
And he didn't just down all English majors? Yea, right.
Gee, you can really read into things. In what he just said
above he's actually telling me, very nicely mind you at that,
that just because I have an English major that doesn't mean
I can write. In which part was that most delineated (sorry,
for the big word here that you label 25cent, gee, if you
wrote a dictionary and took out all the "25cent" words that
bother you I guess you'd have about, oh, say, 20
really cool words; so let me get this straight, if it's a
word that your not familiar with then it's not familiar
to anyone else either or it's just stupid, correct? Again,
they gather like mayflies)? Was it the part where he says,
"everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at college
was an English major." Break this up into its parts, Einstein.
He's saying that every English major doesn't know what they're
doing (which I might agree with in certain situations).
Or, was it the part where he said, "and I can't think of a
single one that had enough sense of drama or imagination
to write a good story." So, he's just saying that just
because "I" have an English major then "I" am not,
necessarily qualified as a writer. Gee, he sure broadened
that variable to include every single English major.
Are you getting this yet? And would it surprise you to
know that many good and great writers did study English?
Think about it, a lot of people doing engineer work might
have studied engineering, etc. Of course, there are
exceptions, but follow the sort of logic you two
are presenting here and any kind of education at all
is a complete waste -- hey, I think I agree with that
(insert Pink Floyd's "We don't need no education").
> : What a sectarian mind, even fascist, even nationally fascist:
> : "anyone not like me is screwed-up."
>
> What?
Well, as handy (the human ton's hand-puppet says -- you know, from
the Tick) "read a book." There is whole wide world of history
and socio-economic politics just waiting for you to delve into
('nother 25center there). You see, there's this thing called
political science and then there sociology and. . . .
In other words, a narrow world-view. I was going to be mean here
and not let you in on that little secret.
> [misc. quotes from The Usual Literature deleted]
>
> If you really want to convince people you're creative, you should
> probably think of your own interesting things to say instead of
> quoting other, interesting, people.
Sorry, gee I forgot how inappropriate it is to ever quote
someone. Man, then what are we doing with all of these things
called books? Ray? Bradburry? Fahrenheit 451? I also
forgot how every single great figure throughout history
never quoted anyone else from time to time (see handy section for
appropriate sarcastic remark here).
> : As for the Porsché thingy, well you got me. I really don't know what
> : each of the Id guys drive as I don't spend my time researching what
> : each member of the company drives, what they wear, eat, drink, screw,
> : blue, or chew like you yourself do (congratulations, great hobby).
>
> What they blue?
>
> -- Dan
Yes, yes, they blue -- an obscure mechanism that simply carries the
momentum and rhyme of the badinage (oops, watch those 25centers;
I know how you do have trouble with them).
Sorry to flame so hotly, but hey, when in Rome. . . .
To all flammers,
"If you don't stop that, you're going to go blind."
Hi, I love you all really :_)
not
Dan Bongard
Oskar Sandberg (m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se) wrote:
: sco...@cyberlynk.com wrote:
: But aren't visions exactly what you need if you are gonna create
: something. And that's what games companies do, (think Origin.)
Well, setting aside the fact that it isn't a universally held opinion
that Origin has done any good games recently... what is needed is
the vision to see what CAN be done. I could come up with a great
game design involving direct neural interfaces and the like, but
unless someone comes up with the hardware and the code, I'm up
the creek. :)
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Richard Ward (rrw...@netcom.com) wrote:
: Id could have _hired_ a writer to come in and give the game some plot and
: direction. Being small does not excuse them from being sloppy.
But what would have been the point? Doom didn't have a plot either and
it didn't really affect my ability to enjoy the game.
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Mel (mana...@cdc.net) wrote:
: Dan Bongard wrote:
[pretentious train-of-thought deleted]
: Okay, I seemed to have picked up another stray flammer.
What's a flammer?
: I myself believe that it was the under-dog thingy, however, I have
: heard of people getting friends involved when a flame-war gets to
: hot. Maybe you feel real guilty over that experience you had
: with your mother about 12 years ago (yeck!).
Hm... let's break these two sentences down:
Incomprehensible babble about under-dogs.
Unfounded rumor about flaming.
Weird incest idea.
Ok, nothing so far.
: > : But don't worry about spelling or grammar from me as I lean toward
: > : the linguist side of the field who say, "leave the language alone
: > : it was here before universities ever were." By the way, Shakespeare
: > : spelled his name at least three or four different ways.
: >
: > And early computer scientists had to write code in machine language
: > on punch-cards; this does not mean that it is a rational or
: > respectable thing for modern-day programmers to do. :)
: Don't follow you here and don't care to try either.
I'll avoid metaphors, then: using ancient, outdated, inferior
techniques does not make you a better writer (or a better
programmer). In the case of programming it generally means the
software you create is of inferior quality; in literature it
generally means the author is hiding his or her own inadequacy.
: > : Oh, and also, tell me just what one should major in since you know.
: > One should major in whatever one wants to. It might, however, be
: > a good idea if "one" learned something from the experience.
: Gee, you managed to argue exactly what I did [snip]
Actually, my point was that you don't seem to have learned anything
in college; maybe a different major, such as Basic Spelling and
Grammar, would have given you some useful skills. As it is you only
seem to have learned the same writing techniques I learned in
Jr. High.
It seems pretty unlikely to me that you've graduated from high
school yet, let alone gotten a college degree; certainly not
a degree from a decent college. Maybe you went on an athletic
scholarship? :)
: > All you seem to have learned is (a) that correct spelling isn't
: > really necessary (I'd love to know which professor taught you THAT)
: > and (b) a lot of twenty-five-cent words. You might (and this is just
: > a suggestion) want to take some night classes to find out what
: > the words actually mean, BTW.
: You really leveled some pops here guy. Exactly what did I ever do
: to you?
I dunno... I just have this knee-jerk reaction to pretentious
people suddenly flaming my favorite software company. :)
[more posing deleted]
[metalinguistic nonsense deleted]
: Simply know that a grammarian would correct everything that you
: said and the extreme ones even claim that Shakespeare, and all
: other great English writers, are the worst examples of the
: language. They're one desire is to turn English into a science.
So... why was it you didn't learn grammar and spelling as an
English major? I can't say I see why the above paragraph of
yours is really relevant.
: How in the world did you get that I advocate leaving or writing
: misspelled words into a college or higher paper?!?
I never said you advocated bad spelling and grammar in "college
or higher paper"... I'm not sure where you got that one from.
You did, however, say:
" But don't worry about spelling or grammar from me as I lean toward
the linguist side of the field who say, "leave the language alone
it was here before universities ever were.""
Which, whether you intended it to or not, translates to "I don't
think spelling and grammar are important."
[more linguistic stuff snipped]
: I wrote 140 friggin pages worth of research last year and lost 2
: weeks worth of sleep.
Wow... how long did the spell checking take?
: So, no prof. taught me anything like what you are saying which
: I don't even know where you're coming from, and I don't need
: no stinkin' night school, I'm through with jr. high.
But not, apparently, with high school.
: And he didn't just down all English majors? Yea, right.
: Gee, you can really read into things. In what he just said
: above he's actually telling me, very nicely mind you at that,
: that just because I have an English major that doesn't mean
: I can write.
: sorry for the big word here that you label 25cent, gee, if you
: wrote a dictionary and took out all the "25cent" words that
: bother you I guess you'd have about, oh, say, 20
: really cool words; so let me get this straight, if it's a
: word that your not familiar with then it's not familiar
: to anyone else either or it's just stupid, correct?
No; "stupid" is using synonyms for common words in an attempt
to inflate your perceived IQ. Back in college I knew quite a
few people who would use sentences like "Utilization of grammar
in an erudite manner is a notably beneficial course of action",
thinking to themselves all the while "That sounds so much
more intelligent than 'It is a good idea to write intelligently';
now I'll get a good grade"... not realizing that not only is
the sentence annoying to read; it is also a less accurate way
of expressing the idea.
: "everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at college
: was an English major." Break this up into its parts, Einstein.
: He's saying that every English major doesn't know what they're
: doing (which I might agree with in certain situations).
I'm truly amazed that you got an English degree without learning
how to read an English sentence. Saying "everyone I know who
didn't know what to major in at college was an English major"
translates to "all the [aimless] people I knew in college
ended up majoring in English", not "all the English majors I
knew didn't know what they were doing." If all clueless people
are English majors, does that mean all English majors are
clueless? No it does not; a course in basic logic would have
taught you that (given that you claim to have a philosophy
degree too, I imagine you must have taken such a class?)
: Or, was it the part where he said, "and I can't think of a
: single one that had enough sense of drama or imagination
: to write a good story." So, he's just saying that just
: because "I" have an English major then "I" am not,
: necessarily qualified as a writer.
Are you sure you've done research? What his statement means is
that he knew a lot of English majors who couldn't write
worth a damn, and that therefore (since obviously an English
degree doesn't miraculously grant writing ability to its
recipient) it follows that you don't _necessarily_ know how
to write a good story. This is not the same as saying "you
are an English major, therefore you can't write."
: Gee, he sure broadened that variable to include every
: single English major.
Every single English major he knew; I missed the part where
he claims to know every English major in the world.
: Are you getting this yet?
Every word... so far you've demonstrated a general inability
to spell, use grammar correctly, or comprehend simple English
sentences... although you do score well in the "quote pop bands
and high school Lit books" category, as well as the "ad hominem"
flame category.
: And would it surprise you to know that many good and great
: writers did study English?
Actually I know quite a few English majors who write, among them
my father and an ex-roommate from college. That's why I have
such a hard time believing you could possibly have a degree...
On the other hand, a lot of really BAD writers had English
degrees too, so I guess that covers it. Oh... and again, a
reminder that saying "Having an English degree doesn't make
you a writer" is not the same as saying "Having an English
degree means you can't write."
: > : What a sectarian mind, even fascist, even nationally fascist:
: > : "anyone not like me is screwed-up."
: > What?
: Well, as handy (the human ton's hand-puppet says -- you know, from
: the Tick) "read a book."
`Well, as handy "read a book."'
What I was wondering was where you suddenly got this "They think
anyone who isn't like them is screwed up" idea.
: There is whole wide world of history
: and socio-economic politics just waiting for you to delve into
: ('nother 25center there). You see, there's this thing called
: political science and then there sociology and. . . .
: In other words, a narrow world-view. I was going to be mean here
: and not let you in on that little secret.
"In other words, a narrow world-view"... what exactly is "a narrow
world view" other words for? PoliSci? Soc? History?
Incidentally, using "facism" to describe the belief that you,
personally, are a putz... well, that isn't the way facism is
generally used. Last I checked it was usually used to refer to
a certain philosophy of unity.
: > [misc. quotes from The Usual Literature deleted]
: > If you really want to convince people you're creative, you should
: > probably think of your own interesting things to say instead of
: > quoting other, interesting, people.
: Sorry, gee I forgot how inappropriate it is to ever quote
: someone. Man, then what are we doing with all of these things
: called books? Ray? Bradburry? Fahrenheit 451?
Hm, ok... I think I see what you're getting at. If you actually
made intelligent remarks yourself instead of quoting Pink
Floyd... well, hell, I guess the next logical step would be
to burn all the books. Lord knows they're not good for anything
besides giving semi-literate Usenet posters something to extract
quotes from. Wouldn't want to read them or anything, after all,
heavens no.
: I also forgot how every single great figure throughout history
: never quoted anyone else from time to time (see handy section for
: appropriate sarcastic remark here).
But, strangely, historical figures are seldom remembered for
their great quotations of other people's work. Know why? Because
if all you're doing is quoting other people without adding anything
interesting yourself... well, people might as well read the
originals and ignore you, hm?
: Sorry to flame so hotly, but hey, when in Rome. . . .
Personally I like getting flames from really pretentious people...
they're so easy to take apart bit by bit.
-- Dan
Chris Clarke
Mel <mana...@cdc.net> wrote:
>Okay, I seemed to have picked up another stray flammer.
Yep, like you weren't obvisouly trolling for flamers (notice, one m by
the way) with the abusive followups you did to every post.
Get a life. By this group's standards you aren't even a particularly
good troll or good flamer.
And I love you too -- not.
Chris.
Followups snipped.
============================================================
Chris Clarke, Systems Test Engineer
Hughes Aircraft of Canada Ltd, Systems Division
Opinions expressed do not reflect those of Hughes Aircraft.
"In the beginning, the universe was created. This is generally
regarded as a bad move." -- Douglas Adams
Chris Clarke
m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se (Oskar Sandberg) wrote:
>But aren't visions exactly what you need if you are gonna create
>something. And that's what games companies do, (think Origin.)
Visions are what create games like Wolf 3D / Doom, when everyone else
is doing side-scrollers.
In other words, visions are what give a company the edge to stay 3
years ahead of the competition, and create huge unparalleled
successes. That's why most people can't do it.
Need I say more?
Dave Kosak
In article <320fc1a4...@la-news1.digilink.net>, br...@neversoft.com
(Brian Schmitt) wrote:
[Big snip]
> First, I don't think
> anyone at id has a Porsche, they prefer Ferrari's.
Can't argue with that.
>Second, story has
> absolutely nothing to do with an action game being good or bad. If you
> want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything by Square of
> Japan).
...but I have a problem with this. Story isn't neccessary but it CAN be a
prominent factor in ANY game, even fighters, even shooters. Id stated
that "A crappy game with a great story is still a crappy game. A great
game with a crappy story is still a great game." The logic there is
solid, but I still have to disagree. By throwing together a nice engine
and some scary bad guys and tacking a paragraph of explanation as to why
they're there after the fact, Id sold itself short. They ended up with
"Doom III," as some people have rightly claimed.
The thing is, a soryline helps to give a game a strong theme and thus make
it more immersive. I'm not going to try and argue that it's crucial to a
3D shooter game, I just think that for all the effort that Id put into the
engine it could have been so much more interesting if they had spent a day
or so planning out a story before they designed all the levels and
baddies. Look at the Prey site -- the game is still vaporware but they've
already developed a whole world involving different fighting styles and
races and areas and a plot. Imagine how much creative fodder the
programmers and designers have to work with now while they create the game
and build the engine. No, [before the flames start] I'm not trying to
argue that Prey is going to be a better game, I just think that they've
started off on the right foot.
A plot doesn't have to be too rich or detailled for a shooter. Look at
Tyrian -- it was your typical arcade top-down blast-fest but they took the
time to develop a continuing plot and a mystery that unfolded, as well as
multiple paths (even if they led to the same places.) It was fairly
shallow but, in my opinion, gave the game a little more gas. I love
Quake, I play it all the time -- I just think Id could have afforded to
hire a freelance writer for a week or so to help them lay out some more
interesting groundwork than this slipgate deal.
>Third, everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at
> college was an English major
The previous poster wasn't "bragging" about being an English Major at all,
and all these shots are unnessessary, personal, and irrelevant.
>and I can't think of a single one that
> had enough sense of drama or imagination to write a good story. They
> could nail the sentence structure down, though.
>
> Brian Schmitt
> Artist:Neversoft Entertainment
> br...@neversoft.com
--
-----------------------------------------------------
Dave Kosak | The above thoughts are my own
Grey Interactive | and don't neccessarily reflect
david...@grey.com | the generally less interesting
| opinions of my employer
-----------------------------------------------------
Dave Kosak
In article <dbongardD...@netcom.com>, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan
Bongard) wrote:
Sure, Doom had a plot. If you remember, scientists on the moons of Mars
were tinkering with dimensional portals. They were sending stuff through
the gate on Phobos and it would reappear almost instantly at Deimos. But
not everything made it ... some cargo got lost. And whenever they sent
PEOPLE through, they came out the other end gibbering like maniacs,
assuming they lived. So the project wasn't working out very well.
Then, suddenly, a distress call was recieved from the Phobos base.
Shortly thereafter the Deimos base ENTIRELY disappeared! So in comes a
well-armed ship full of space marines to investigate the Phobos base. You
were supposed to stay behind and guard the ship -- they took all the cool
weapons and left you with the pistol. For two hours all you heard was
gunshots and screaming. Then silence. That explains why when you started
the game you only had a crappy pistol and there were dead bodies
everywhere.
The original DOOM was structured around this plot. Episode one: the
Phobos base. It ends with the Phobos Anomaly level, where you actually
step on the teleporter hoping to go home. Instead, you are taken to the
Deimos base -- Episode Two -- which is, we later discover, now entirely
within the planes of hell. After clearing the Deimos base you have to
journey through hell itself (in Episode 3) to get through a gate and back
home. The levels had themes -- 1 was a space base, 2 was a space base in
hell, three was hell itself. They got progressively wierder, creepier,
after starting from an identifiable point of reference (a space station on
Phobos with things like "landing areas" and "computer cores".)
At the time it was pretty original. Without the story it still would
have been DOOM, but the story was interesting. Quake is a tremendous
game, don't get me wrong. But the storyline is this: "something" is
called Quake, and it's bad. Scientists have been working on teleporters
(familiar?). "Quake" comes through the teleporters and kills them all.
Now you're the only one left and you have to go through the gates and kill
everything. It doesn't even hold up. Where the hell am I? Were the
slipgates built on Earth? Who am I? Some corporate bounty hunter type?
Why didn't I just get some backup? Why the hell did I go through the
slipgate with just a shotgun and a handfull of shells? And "Quake" is
just a bunch of vaguely demonic evil things. DOOM didn't have a whole lot
of Plot -- but Quake manages to have HALF the storyline of DOOM. I think
it's a legitimate complaint. It took two years to make the engine -- had
they just sat down and come up with a plot beforehand, they could have
come up with much more interesting themes to the levels. It's just too
vague -- an element of immersiveness is lost because I'm just a vaguely
good guy running around killing vaguely bad guys in vaguely hell.
Adam Williamson
In article <4uonaa$a...@prometheus.acsu.buffalo.edu>, Erik Farquhar
<farq...@acsu.buffalo.edu> writes
>In article <320E97...@worldnet.att.com>,
>Kevin Hollywood <The...@worldnet.att.com> wrote:
>>Who was the first co-founder to leave?
>
>As far as I know, it was either Tom Hall [is that his name] or Dave Taylor.
>
musta been after Wolf3D...
--
Adam Williamson
Memento Mori 2 Level 6
ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/idgames/themes/mm/mm2.zip
Adam Williamson
In article <320FAF...@cdc.net>, Mel <mana...@cdc.net> writes
>How foolish of me. I should have realized what
>the priorities are for an Id guy. They
>probably go something like this, "hire a guy
>to write a story-line . . . 'nother red
>
>Let's get real, are you telling me that they
>don't have the resources to hire some good
>writers? Well then heck, I'll do it part time
>for minimum wage just to have that on my resumé.
>After all, I did major in English in college.
>
>To all flammers, "I'm telling mom!"
>
stories, for the precise reason they don't want to be Origin or
Lucasarts, they don't want to grow huge like that.
Adam Williamson
In article <rrwardDw...@netcom.com>, Richard Ward
<rrw...@netcom.com> writes
>][). Speaking of people who left id, what ever happened to Maurice Hale?
>(tech support credit on DOOM)
>
that Lottery advert... :)
Brian Schmitt
On Tue, 13 Aug 1996 12:45:06 -0500, david...@grey.com (Dave Kosak)
wrote:
>>Second, story has
>> absolutely nothing to do with an action game being good or bad. If you
>> want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything by Square of
>> Japan).
>
>...but I have a problem with this. Story isn't neccessary but it CAN be a
>prominent factor in ANY game, even fighters, even shooters. Id stated
>that "A crappy game with a great story is still a crappy game. A great
>game with a crappy story is still a great game." The logic there is
>solid, but I still have to disagree. By throwing together a nice engine
>and some scary bad guys and tacking a paragraph of explanation as to why
>they're there after the fact, Id sold itself short. They ended up with
>"Doom III," as some people have rightly claimed.
intriguing stories. A good story cannot hurt any game but I think it's
benefits are overestimated in action games. If id had decided to put a
great story behind Quake it would have done two things....
1. It would have taken time to implement the story into the game for
it to have had any effect on the game. This takes time and I think
it is time better spent on play mechanics and tweaking the game.
I won't even go into how sick I am of seeing crappy cinema's in
games and I've seen and done enough animation to even be sick
of the good ones. Quake is a game based on pure reaction and
any story that may have been implemented would be TOTALLY
forgotten when playing it. As for your comment about Quake
being "DoomIII"....so what!! I can't think of a better game than
Doom so if it can be compared to Doom, I think of that as praise,
not a critisism. I can't think of a single game I've had installed
for even one-tenth the time I've had Doom installed on my machine.
Hell we here at Neversoft still play DoomII EVERY DAY!
2. id would have most likely had to hire a professional writer to come
up with a decent story and good writers don't come cheap. My guess
is that you would have seen this expense tacked on to the price of
the game.
>it more immersive. I'm not going to try and argue that it's crucial to a
>3D shooter game, I just think that for all the effort that Id put into the
>engine it could have been so much more interesting if they had spent a day
>or so planning out a story before they designed all the levels and
>baddies. Look at the Prey site -- the game is still vaporware but they've
>already developed a whole world involving different fighting styles and
quit 3D Realms to work on a game using the Quake engine. All that
story didn't seem to help Prey at all judging by this.
>races and areas and a plot. Imagine how much creative fodder the
>programmers and designers have to work with now while they create the game
>and build the engine. No, [before the flames start] I'm not trying to
>argue that Prey is going to be a better game, I just think that they've
>started off on the right foot.
>
>A plot doesn't have to be too rich or detailled for a shooter. Look at
>Tyrian -- it was your typical arcade top-down blast-fest but they took the
>time to develop a continuing plot and a mystery that unfolded, as well as
>multiple paths (even if they led to the same places.) It was fairly
>shallow but, in my opinion, gave the game a little more gas. I love
>Quake, I play it all the time -- I just think Id could have afforded to
>hire a freelance writer for a week or so to help them lay out some more
>interesting groundwork than this slipgate deal.
>
>>Third, everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at
>> college was an English major
>
>The previous poster wasn't "bragging" about being an English Major at all,
>and all these shots are unnessessary, personal, and irrelevant.
>
>>and I can't think of a single one that
>> had enough sense of drama or imagination to write a good story. They
>> could nail the sentence structure down, though.
>>
experience with. How can you find an insult in that. A little touchy
folks.
>-----------------------------------------------------
>Dave Kosak | The above thoughts are my own
>Grey Interactive | and don't neccessarily reflect
>david...@grey.com | the generally less interesting
> | opinions of my employer
>-----------------------------------------------------
>
Michael Sims
dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard) wrote:
>Richard Ward (rrw...@netcom.com) wrote:
>: Id could have _hired_ a writer to come in and give the game some plot and
>: direction. Being small does not excuse them from being sloppy.
>But what would have been the point? Doom didn't have a plot either and
>it didn't really affect my ability to enjoy the game.
It didn't have much of a plot, but what it had was better than
Quake's...surely you agree that Doom had much more atmosphere in a
single player game than Quake does? Remember jumping out of your seat
when that imp you didn't know was there sneaked up behind you in the
dark tunnels? Do you get that same feeling playing Quake (single
player)?
Of course, I guess the argument now is, was that Doom atmosphere a
product of the plot, or something else...? What do you think?
Richard Ward
In article <dbongardD...@netcom.com>,
Dan Bongard <dbon...@netcom.com> wrote:
>Richard Ward (rrw...@netcom.com) wrote:
>
>: Id could have _hired_ a writer to come in and give the game some plot and
>: direction. Being small does not excuse them from being sloppy.
>
>But what would have been the point? Doom didn't have a plot either and
>it didn't really affect my ability to enjoy the game.
DOOM did not have a plot with the depth of Dark Forces, but it did have an
underlying theme that meshed with the storyline presented in the docs. Quake
does not even have this - you are battling the forces of some "person" named
Quake and yet you have to defeat the beast of a thousand young to win. The
plot is destroyed by the game itself (kinda like ROtT(en). DOOM's plot was
not deep, but it was there.
Dan Bongard
Jason Price (pri...@king.igs.net) wrote:
: Not only that, but the people smart enough to have a flat-rate Internet
: connection are the hackers out there that pirate the games anyway.
Um... no, we just have the common sense to get cheaper ISPs. :)
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Michael Sims (phs...@sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu) wrote:
: >: Id could have _hired_ a writer to come in and give the game some plot and
: >: direction. Being small does not excuse them from being sloppy.
: >But what would have been the point? Doom didn't have a plot either and
: >it didn't really affect my ability to enjoy the game.
:It didn't have much of a plot, but what it had was better than Quake's.
Well, for both games the 'plot' consists solely of a few paragraphs of
text at the beginning, and a paragraph of text at the end of each
episode. Not really enough to be considered a real plot in either case.
: surely you agree that Doom had much more atmosphere in a
: single player game than Quake does?
No; quite the opposite, actually.
: Remember jumping out of your seat when that imp you didn't know
: was there sneaked up behind you in the dark tunnels?
Well, Doom _was_ scarier... of course by the time Quake came out I
was so accustomed to 3d shooters that I can't see them getting to
me like Doom did. After Quake, Doom seems too much like "attack of
the cardboard cutouts" to be scary anymore.
The main non-scary things about Quake were the Ogres (chainsaws
and hand grenades? That's silly, not scary), Vorns(hard to kill yes;
scary no) and the spawn (deeply annoying, but not scary). The
Fiends and Shamblers were great. :)
But then the original Doom monsters weren't all that scary either.
: Of course, I guess the argument now is, was that Doom atmosphere a
: product of the plot, or something else...? What do you think?
I give credit to Sandy Petersen and the rest of the id design crew;
Sandy knows how to scare you. :)
-- Dan
Dan Bongard
Dave Kosak (david...@grey.com) wrote:
: Dan Bongard wrote:
: > But what would have been the point? Doom didn't have a plot either and
: > it didn't really affect my ability to enjoy the game.
: Sure, Doom had a plot.
[snip... I'm sure everyone knows what it is :)]
Doom didn't have a "plot"; Doom had a "setting". During the game
itself the 'plot' consisted of "don't get killed; make it to the
end of the level." Then at the end of the episode set, you would
get a paragraph explaining the next setting. If you missed the
end-of-episode text or introduction, you wouldn't have the foggiest
idea what the story was... to me, that says "there's no plot".
Then you have 3d shooters like CyberMage and Marathon, in which
the plot plays a larger role (you get exposition a couple of
times each level, and there is some interaction (in that it is
your actions which trigger the exposition). Even without reading
the manual you can pick up the story from the games as you go along.
Then you have System Shock and the Ultima Underworld games... these
are heavily plotted and feature a lot of interaction with the
environment (besides blowing it to bits as in Duke3d), and in addition
are mostly non-linear. But of course neither of these games ranked
with Doom or Marathon in terms of action.
Basically we have yet to see an action-packed 3d shooter with a
real plot. Sure, I'd like to see one, but in the meantime I'm
perfectly happy with Quake and Doom as they are.
-- Dan
Richard Ward
In article <K1vCviAd...@scss.demon.co.uk>,
Adam Williamson <Ad...@scss.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <4uonaa$a...@prometheus.acsu.buffalo.edu>, Erik Farquhar
><farq...@acsu.buffalo.edu> writes
>>In article <320E97...@worldnet.att.com>,
>>Kevin Hollywood <The...@worldnet.att.com> wrote:
>>>Who was the first co-founder to leave?
>>
>>As far as I know, it was either Tom Hall [is that his name] or Dave Taylor.
>>
>I'm pretty sure it was Tom Hall. BTW, when did DDT come on board? It
>musta been after Wolf3D...
Dave (idspispopd) Taylor was brought on board spefically for DOOM. He's not
in the Wolf credits at all.
Scott Lyon
Oskar Sandberg wrote:
>
> On Sun, 11 Aug 1996 11:20:37 -0700, Scott Lyon <sco...@cyberlynk.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Agreed Romero does have some pretty Awesome Ideas.....But as you can see
> >some of the ideas that he had are not in Quake for the simple reason
> >that WE don't have a system capable of handling it yet! I thought that
> >the huge interactive world that he discussed awhile back would be neat,
> >but i also realized that even by the time they got it out, most systems
> >wouldn't be capable of running it......Maybe in 2 or 3 yrs we'll have
> >they Technology on the street to handle his vision, (should be about the
> >right time for him to put out his first game with his new company)
> > ;)
>
> But aren't visions exactly what you need if you are gonna create
> something. And that's what games companies do, (think Origin.)
Well ....Yes. But the idea is only good if you can use it :)
--
********************************************
sco...@cyberlynk.com
GAMERS CORNER -> http://www.cyberlynk.com/~scottl
Handle -> MUGGER. NET QUAKE Rules !!!!!
********************************************
Oskar Sandberg
On Mon, 12 Aug 1996 19:58:02 GMT, tor...@alfa.itea.unit.no (TJ) wrote:
>m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se (Osquar Sandberg) wrote:
>
>>I can't be bothered to look up the manual for Doom 2. The readme has
>>no list, but the end screen list sandy peterson only for design.
>
>Hey, really? That was what I claimed, too, that Sandy did the most of
>Doom2's design, but somebody claimed that American McGee did the Doom2
>levels. Maybe I was right anyway. Oh well, who cares...
He (american) is listed as design and support.
Don't know what that means
Lonnie McCullough
phs...@sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu (Michael Sims) wrote:
> It didn't have much of a plot, but what it had was better than
>single player game than Quake does? Remember jumping out of your seat
>when that imp you didn't know was there sneaked up behind you in the
>player)?
> Of course, I guess the argument now is, was that Doom atmosphere a
>product of the plot, or something else...? What do you think?
I'm gonna have to disagree here. Quake is really scary at times. I
do jump out of my chair especially when those damn spawns come jumping
at me. It is very real and this is what makes it scary still. If it
was a bitmap that was jumping out at me it would be different, maybe
even funny. But quake's realism, for me at least, overcomes it's
silliness and lack of storyline. And the sound. When I hear a fiend
or a spawn or a death knight I turn around quickly looking for it then
relax only to realize it was above me or around a corner where I
couldn't see it. Quake has more atmoshere, in my opinion, than doom
ever had.
Lonnie McCullough
lon...@nol.net
Chris K
Somehow, Mel got untangled from the keyboard cable and managed to write...
>
>(thinking to self) Should I go on with this? should I go on with this?
>should I go on? . . . what the hell. Why not (back from thinking to
>self).
>
>Okay, I seemed to have picked up another stray flammer.
Here's another one. What's this doing here? Nobody gives a toss what you
majored in. You must be pretty insecure about something to have gone off like
that.
Take it to alt.whine. You might be appreciated more there.
<childish, irrelevant bickering snipped>
(sheesh.. what we have to put up with in this NG :) )
CK
Matthew Leddington-Hill
> No; "stupid" is using synonyms for common words in an attempt
> to inflate your perceived IQ.
iirc, the word you are looking for here is obfuscation.
_Author
| The Truth is Out There | Trust No One | Deny Everything |
Kyle R. Hofmann
In article <320fc1a4...@la-news1.digilink.net>, Brian Schmitt wrote:
: Wow folks. We have an english major reading this newsgroup.
Kool dudz! He kan tootur mee!11! :)
: Second, story has absolutely nothing to do with an action game being
: good or bad. If you want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything
: by Square of Japan).
It does have a little to do with an action game's level of quality. id is
correct in stating that great games are great games whether or not they
have a good story; what they left out is that great games with great
stories rise above the level of mere "great" games and go on to something
better. Doom, while it didn't have a great story, did have an open and
flexible story which people could develop and expand. There have been
Doom stories written, Doom wads based on extensions of the storyline (and
I don't mean Ultimate Doom and Final Doom), Doom books (one word: ugh),
and much other stuff (I know there's some GURPS Doom stuff out there, and
there's undoubtedly a lot that I've missed).
Quake has a pathetic storyline; it's like the plot of a 1950s B movie
but worse. At least movies like "Them" have an enemy. In Quake, you
have this strange enemy named only "Quake" who hurts people. But once
you get into the game, you learn that it's really part of the Cthulhu
mythos. Your final enemy is even Shub-Niggurath. Last time I checked,
Shub-Niggurath could kill you without even noticing it; remember, this is
the Cthulhu mythos. The "Quake" enemy talked about in the manual is
nonexistant.
The "Quake" enemy idea had plenty of potential. You could start out in
the slipgate complex as usual and teleport into the rest of episode one.
Episode one would be a high tech setting like ExM1, but much more
advanced. Quake's technology would be far superior to ours, and you
would see things such as hover technology (platforms) and genetically
engineered monsters. At the end of E1, you get to attack some sort of
supreme genetic mutant (similar to Chthon, but different to give the
impression of being some sort of patchwork). Episode two would be high
tech like E1, but distorted to give the impression of a different world
very different from our Earth. The high tech theme would be emphasized,
but with changes such as organic controls and organic machinery.
Conceptually, this would be similar to Doom's E2 but with a slant
other than Hell. Episode three would be a military base set on Quake's
home world. It wouldn't have too much high tech stuff, but would instead
be like a biological first episode. Episode four would be Quake's
stronghold, which looks like some sort of H. R. Geiger paradise. When
you beat all four episodes, you get to meet Quake in a one-on-one battle in
your home military base.
Now if I can come up with an idea and flesh it out like that in 10
minutes, why can't id? (Or should they hire me as a writer? :)
: Third, everyone I know who didn't know what to major in at
: college was an English major and I can't think of a single one that
: had enough sense of drama or imagination to write a good story. They
: could nail the sentence structure down, though.
Actually, this sounds like Micro$oft's Slate. The writers can write,
but they can't really *write*. (IMHO, Stale (http://www.stale.com), a
parody of Slate, is a lot better. It has substance, which Micro$oft
always had trouble with)
-Kyle R. Hofmann
Andrew York
i have a P75 with a 28.8, 16 megs RAM, a NETCOM account and registered
quake...
how can i play quake over the internet??
modem-to-modem sucks a nut
please e-mail a response if possible
thanks
-Imp
Zappy
*snip*
> If you want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything by Square of
>Japan).
You flame this guy, and then have the guts to say Japanese RPGs have good
stories? Pal, those fucking things are so derivitive it's not even funny. Mix
the following in a pot: 1 part lame, badly translanted dialogue, 2 parts
courier based "quests" to liven things up, 3 parts ridiculous and meaningless
"combat", and 4 parts contrived plot twists with naseauting genre standbyes.
The result: your typical Japanese "RPG" <----doesn't that involve role-playing
rather than a play-by-numbers, linear stinker?
The ONLY exception to this that I know of is ChronoTrigger. Even that isn't
very good.
Dave
Martijn Dekker
"Anthony Trainor" <ltr...@tpgi.com.au> wrote:
:I'm more interested in what Romero does with the Quake engine. Maybe
:something with more RP and less psychotic grenade free-for-all?
yeah, I think it is great that romero starts his own company. He has
ideas and visions, the other guys at id are great programmers
that can do endless versions of the game doom, but can also develop
great new technologies, so I hope romero now has the freedom to
develop a great *new* game with the id-technology!
--
Martijn Dekker [ mailto:mde...@fwi.uva.nl ] http://www.fwi.uva.nl/~mdekker/
PFF [ Linux, X, Games, Java ] http://www.fwi.uva.nl/~mdekker/pff.html
Xcogitate [X11/Java game] http://turing.fwi.uva.nl/~mdekker/xcogitate.html
Jeremy Davis
far...@ionet.net (Jason A. Farque') wrote:
>Firstly, in case you haven't seen it, here's John Romero's .plan file.
>His first of consequence as far as I recall:
I for one am glad he's leaving... John knows that the format is worn
out.. there's no spark.. sure it looks nicer, heck I BOUGHT the
game... but there's so much more that could be done with that
engine... remember before quake came out, all the great ideas everyone
had? It boiled down to a first person RPG..
I mean how many more times is it gonna be fun to kill, die, repeat...
It's hard to build anything.. build a character.. sure I suppose a
pack of 100 rockets would get you far, but... it's not quite there..
Martijn Dekker
dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard) wrote:
:Doom didn't have a "plot"; Doom had a "setting". During the game
:itself the 'plot' consisted of "don't get killed; make it to the
:end of the level." Then at the end of the episode set, you would
:get a paragraph explaining the next setting. If you missed the
:end-of-episode text or introduction, you wouldn't have the foggiest
:idea what the story was... to me, that says "there's no plot".
:
:Then you have 3d shooters like CyberMage and Marathon, in which
:the plot plays a larger role (you get exposition a couple of
:times each level, and there is some interaction (in that it is
:your actions which trigger the exposition). Even without reading
:the manual you can pick up the story from the games as you go along.
:
:Then you have System Shock and the Ultima Underworld games... these
:are heavily plotted and feature a lot of interaction with the
:environment (besides blowing it to bits as in Duke3d), and in addition
:are mostly non-linear. But of course neither of these games ranked
:with Doom or Marathon in terms of action.
:
I do not compare System Shock to doom. Ok, they both use the
first person perspective, but they are completely different
kinds of games! I like them both, but don't compare games
just because they use first person perspective...
:Basically we have yet to see an action-packed 3d shooter with a
:real plot. Sure, I'd like to see one, but in the meantime I'm
:perfectly happy with Quake and Doom as they are.
haven't tried daggerfall yet, but isn't daggerfall a 3d shooter
with a real plot?
Chris Clarke
za...@zapppy.com (Zappy) wrote:
>In article <320fc1a4...@la-news1.digilink.net>,
> br...@neversoft.com (Brian Schmitt) wrote:
>*snip*
>> If you want a good story play an RPG (I recommend anything by Square of
>>Japan).
>You flame this guy, and then have the guts to say Japanese RPGs have good
>stories? Pal, those fucking things are so derivitive it's not even funny. Mix
>the following in a pot: 1 part lame, badly translanted dialogue, 2 parts
>courier based "quests" to liven things up, 3 parts ridiculous and meaningless
>"combat", and 4 parts contrived plot twists with naseauting genre standbyes.
>The result: your typical Japanese "RPG" <----doesn't that involve role-playing
>rather than a play-by-numbers, linear stinker?
Sounds like your average Anime cartoon, and those are pretty popular
:-)
Matthew BLB
In article <david_kosak-13...@204.245.65.101>, Dave Kosak
<david...@grey.com> spake thusly:
>In article <dbongardD...@netcom.com>, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan
>Bongard) wrote:
>
>> Richard Ward (rrw...@netcom.com) wrote:
>>
>> : Id could have _hired_ a writer to come in and give the game some plot and
>> : direction. Being small does not excuse them from being sloppy.
>>
>> it didn't really affect my ability to enjoy the game.
>>
>
> Sure, Doom had a plot. If you remember, scientists on the moons of
> Quake manages to have HALF the storyline of DOOM. I think it's a
>legitimate complaint. It took two years to make the engine -- had
>they just sat down and come up with a plot beforehand, they could have
>come up with much more interesting themes to the levels. It's just too
>vague -- an element of immersiveness is lost because I'm just a vaguely
>good guy running around killing vaguely bad guys in vaguely hell.
My personal opinion on the 3D first person genre, is that they should
be constructed as follows:
1)Rough ideas for game.
2)Game Engine.
3)Storyline of game.
4)Levels of game.
1) So that they knew what area roughly to aim for. When they designed
the engine, they obviously weren't thinking of fluffy-bunnies and
platform games.
2) The engine should follow, so that the programmers know where to
limit their imaginations, and to get a better understanding of what will
be created.
3) Now the team should aim to find a good plot to hang all the ideas
together with. They _could_ have hired a writer to do this, but why? We
know that id are capable of a really good storyline, see above -Doom.
The storyline should also help inspire the team with ideas for part
four -the levels.
4) This is where the level designers get down to it. (Obviously). They
have by now got a clear design to follow through with, but a design
which is inspiring -not limiting. They know what will and will not fit
into their enviroment without looking out of place. Let there be
teleporters in a medieval castle! Fine, as long as the storyline
explains why they are there!
Now don't get me wrong, the list is _not_ a list of priorities. Levels
are definately MORE important than a storyline. But the storyline should
have _been_ there, to help it all hang together whilst they were working
on them.
________
/ 150W \
Bulb. <Bu...@bulbinc.demon.co.uk> / \
\ \~~~~/ /
.SIG File under construction \ \ / /
My sig file isn't in at the \ _\/_ /
moment. Leave a message after the [____]
beep. BEEP. [____]
[____]
Matthew BLB
In article <320e391d...@nntpserver.swip.net>, Osquar Sandberg <m-
17...@mailbox.swipnet.se> spake thusly:
>On Sun, 11 Aug 1996 12:58:02 GMT, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard)
>wrote:
>
>>Bear in mind that only Romero is leaving. This means id is losing
>>1/4 its creative team and none of its coding.
>
>And 90% of its loudness.
>
And 90% of the statements which spoke of unimplemented features.
If Quake hadn't been overhyped by _certain people_, the whole gaming
community would have creamed over it. As it is, we're left feeling
disapointed and slightly bitter.....
Mel
Kyle R. Hofmann wrote:
>
> In article <320fc1a4...@la-news1.digilink.net>, Brian Schmitt wrote:
> : Wow folks. We have an english major reading this newsgroup.
>
> Kool dudz! He kan tootur mee!11! :)
>
> : Second, story has absolutely nothing to do with an action game being
> : by Square of Japan).
>
Incredible post!
This is what I was getting at, at the very beginning of this thread --
a thread that got side-tracked into an endless flame-war over me and
one of my college majors simply because I mentioned the same elements
that you did regarding lack of story-line (and setting), mentioned
that Id could and should have hired a writer, and finally mentioned
that a writer wouldn't be hard to find and that I would even do it for
practically nothing (and humbly so) to illustrate the availability
of writers out there (if not me then fine, tons of people who could
write are surely available for practically nothing -- internship?).
What you've just offered here is astounding and maybe someone at Id
will take note. It is only too bad that you'll get tons of flame
now for no reason whatsoever. Flammers (or flamers as some need it)
remind me of the Russian Communist's justice system:
Old Russian prisoner to new Russian prisoner,
"What did you do?"
New Russian prisoner,
"Absolutely nothing."
"How many years did you get?"
"20"
"That's incredible! That's totally unfair!
You're only suppose to get 15 years for
absolutely nothing."
Later,
Mel
Adam Williamson
In article <4uqg0t$1...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu>, Michael Sims
<phs...@sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu> writes
>single player game than Quake does? Remember jumping out of your seat
>when that imp you didn't know was there sneaked up behind you in the
>dark tunnels? Do you get that same feeling playing Quake (single
>player)?
>
*say* things like that, actually try and remember "jumping out of your
seat when that imp sneaked up behind you". Did it ever actually happen?
And I get a very similar feeling to the one you describe when I saw the
Fiends for the first time.
Adam Williamson
>>>
>>I'm pretty sure it was Tom Hall. BTW, when did DDT come on board? It
>>musta been after Wolf3D...
>
>Dave (idspispopd) Taylor was brought on board spefically for DOOM. He's not
>in the Wolf credits at all.
>
you know. :). So when exactly did he join? 92? 93?
Adam Williamson
>home. The levels had themes -- 1 was a space base, 2 was a space base in
>hell, three was hell itself. They got progressively wierder, creepier,
2 was more of an outpost of hell, if Phobos had been left for a while it
would have been like Deimos - originally the places were similar but
since our hero cleaned out Phobos first, Deimos had more time to be
overrun.
Oskar Sandberg
On Tue, 13 Aug 1996 07:15:47 GMT, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard)
wrote:
>Oskar Sandberg (m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se) wrote:
>: But aren't visions exactly what you need if you are gonna create
>: something. And that's what games companies do, (think Origin.)
>Well, setting aside the fact that it isn't a universally held opinion
>that Origin has done any good games recently... what is needed is
>the vision to see what CAN be done. I could come up with a great
>game design involving direct neural interfaces and the like, but
>unless someone comes up with the hardware and the code, I'm up
>the creek. :)
Ehh, what I said about Origin was a joke, when I talked about creating
worlds it made me think of Origin's slogan "We create worlds."
Origin don't suck that bad, they made, whh, ehh, WC4. ha, got you
there :-)
Oskar Sandberg
On Tue, 13 Aug 1996 08:10:18 -0700, Scott Lyon <sco...@cyberlynk.com>
wrote:
>Oskar Sandberg wrote:
>>
>> But aren't visions exactly what you need if you are gonna create
>> something. And that's what games companies do, (think Origin.)
>
>Well ....Yes. But the idea is only good if you can use it :)
>
Seems I'm on both sides of this argument...
Yes, as I just wrote to CC, the inventor of a genre is the one who
makes it, not the one who thinks "that would be neat."
Oskar Sandberg
On Tue, 13 Aug 1996 03:26:34 GMT, dbon...@netcom.com (Dan Bongard)
wrote:
>Osquar Sandberg (m-1...@mailbox.swipnet.se) wrote:
>
>Well, my point is that Romero never struck me as the most creative
>member of id by any means. Sure, he had a lot of greate ideas for
>Quake, but none of them really got implemented for the simple reason
>that they weren't really possible with the available technology.
>True "creativity" involves bringing your dream to fruition, not
>just suggesting nifty ideas.
Know I was just thinking about the description of Romero in the Wired
article "darkly sarcastic" they called him, which is exactly the mood
of ids games, and why I like them so much.
>On top of that it was never clear to me just how many of the ideas
>Romero mentioned were actually his, as opposed to Petersen's or
>Carmack's or McGees or whatever. Given the extremely high quality
>of id's games I have a hard time believing that the rest of the
>creative team wasn't at least as good as Romero.
No doubt, but maybe he did do more for the atmosphere then the others,
I don't know. The other level designers are good as well, so it isn't
really a problem.
<snip
>: And 90% of its loudness.
>
>Which is, IMO, a huge upside... Quake got hyped way too much. Many
>people, as a result, were expecting Quake to be one step
>down from Reality(tm) itself, so they felt let down instead of being
>excited about the awesome game that DID come out.
I liked the hype. I'm very down to earth. and I realized that it would
not come true, but I liked to dream about it. :-)
>Well, id may well have problems of its own; we'll see if the remaining
>team stays together or if more people leave.
The thing is, we actually think of id more as a "rock band" then a
company. A company can take one of its members leaving, but it is
seldom that "bands" survive that kind of change.
The best analogy I can think of (and I am not implying that I listen
to stupid 80's rock music, or like the shit) is the rockband Guns n
Roses who disappeared completely when there base player ( I think)
left the band. One wouldn't have thought that such a person was
crcuial, but it turned out he was.
>
>-- Dan