Quake
Encyclopedia
Quake is a first-person shooter
video game that was released by id Software
on June 22, 1996. It was the first game in the popular Quake series
of video games. It was made available on Steam on August 3, 2007.
Before the start level, there is a set of three pathways with easy, medium, and hard skill levels; in order to reach the Nightmare skill level (described in the game manual as "so bad that it was hidden, so people won't wander in by accident"), the player must drop through the water before the Episode 4 entrance and jump into a secret passage.
Quake single-player campaign is organized into four individual episodes of about eight levels each (each including a secret level, one of which is a "low gravity" level—Ziggurat Vertigo in Episode 1, Dimension of the Doomed—that challenges the player's abilities in a different way). As items are collected, they are carried to the next level, each usually more challenging than the last. If the player dies, he must restart at the beginning of the level. However, games may be saved at any time.
Upon completing each episode, the player is returned to the hub Start level, where he can then enter the next episode. Each episode starts the player from scratch, without any previously collected items. Episode I (which formed the shareware or downloadable demo version of Quake) has the most traditional ideology of a boss
in the last level. The ultimate objective at the end of an episode is to recover a magic rune. After all of the runes are collected, the floor of the Start opens up to reveal an entrance to the End level which contains the final boss, based on the god Shub-Niggurath
from the Cthulhu Mythos
.
after some time, and may be picked up again.
The most popular multiplayer modes are all forms of deathmatch
. Deathmatch modes typically consist of either free-for-all (no organization or teams involved), one-on-one duels, or organized teamplay with two or more players per team (or clan
). Teamplay is also frequently played with one or another mod
. Typically, monsters are not normally present, as they serve no purpose other than to get in the way and give away the player.
The gameplay in Quake was considered unique for its time because of the different ways the player can maneuver through the game. For example: bunny hopping
or strafe jumping can be used to move faster than normal, while rocket jumping
enables the player to reach otherwise-inaccessible areas at the cost of some self-damage. The player can start and stop moving suddenly, jump unnaturally high, and change direction while moving through the air. Many of these non-realistic behaviors contribute to Quake appeal. Multiplayer Quake was one of the first games that people singled out as a form of electronic sport
. Most notable was Dennis "Thresh" Fong
who won John Carmack's Ferrari 328
at the Microsoft-sponsored Red Annihilation
tournament in 1997.
The sole surviving protagonist in Operation Counterstrike is the player, who must advance, starting each of the four episodes from a human held but overrun military base, before fighting through into other dimensions, traversing these via slipgate or their otherworld equivalent. Once passing through each slipgate, the player's main objective is to survive and locate the exit which will take him to the next level, not unlike that of id Software's previous hit, Doom.
The game consists of around 28 separate "levels" or "maps", grouped into four episodes. Each episode represents individual dimensions that the player can access through magical portals (as opposed to the technological Slipgate) that are discovered over the course of the game. At the start of each episode, the player is deployed in a futuristic military base and he has to find a slipgate that will take him to the alternate realm. The various realms consist of a number of gothic
, medieval, as well as "fire and brimstone"-style caves and dungeons with a recurring theme of hellish and satanic imagery reminiscent of Doom (such as pentagrams and images of demons on the walls). The latter is inspired by several dark fantasy
influences, notably that of H. P. Lovecraft
; most notably, Dimensional Shamblers appear as enemies, the "Spawn" enemies are called "Formless Spawn of Tsathoggua
" in the manual, the end boss of the first episode is named Chthon
, and the final boss is named Shub-Niggurath
(though actually resembling a Dark Young). Some levels have Lovecraftian names, such as the Vaults of Zin and the Ebon Fortress. Originally, the game was supposed to include more Lovecraftian bosses, but this concept was scrapped due to time constraints.
It should be noted, however, that by the time the game was released the specifics of the story had become relatively unimportant and somewhat disorganized. This is mainly due to a last-minute mix of two different game designs: lead level designer John Romero
wanted to make a dark fantasy beat 'em up
/RPG
hybrid game, while level designers Tim Willits
and American McGee
wanted to make a more futuristic, Doom-like game. Ultimately the Doom-like mechanics were implemented and many of the dark fantasy design elements were incorporated into the graphics and visual effects of the game.
A preview included with id
's very first release, 1990's Commander Keen
, advertised a game entitled The Fight for Justice as a follow-up to the Keen trilogy. It would feature a character named Quake, "the strongest, most dangerous person on the continent", armed with thunderbolts and a "Ring of Regeneration." Conceived as a VGA
full-color side-scrolling role-playing video game
, The Fight for Justice was never released.
Quake was programmed by John Carmack, Michael Abrash
and John Cash. The level and scenarios were designed by American McGee
, Sandy Petersen
, John Romero
and Tim Willits
.
The graphics were designed by Adrian Carmack
, and Kevin Cloud
. Music and sound design was by Trent Reznor
of Nine Inch Nails
fame. The game engine
developed for Quake, the Quake engine
, popularized several major advances in the 3D game genre: polygonal models instead of prerendered sprites
; full 3D level design instead of a 2.5D
map; prerendered lightmap
s; and allowing end users to partially program the game (in this case with QuakeC
), which popularized fan-created modifications (mods)
.
Quake was given as a title to the game that id Software
was working on shortly after the release of Doom II
. The earliest information released described Quake as focusing on a Thor
-like character who wields a giant hammer, and is able to knock away enemies by throwing the hammer (complete with real-time inverse kinematics
). At the start, the levels were supposed to be designed in an Aztec style, but the choice was dropped some months into the project. Early screenshots then showed medieval environments and dragons. The plan was for the game to have more RPG
-style elements. However, work was very slow on the engine, since John Carmack
, the main programmer of Quake, was not only developing a full 3D engine, but also a TCP/IP networking model. (Carmack later said that he should have done two separate projects which developed those things.) Eventually, the whole id team began to think that the original concept may not have been as wise a choice as they first believed. Thus, the final game was very stripped down from its original intentions, and instead featured gameplay similar to Doom and its sequel, although levels and enemies were closer to medieval RPG style rather than science-fiction. Praised throughout the gaming community, it quickly dethroned previous FPS
titles and revolutionized the way multiplayer games were developed.
Before the release of the game or the demo of the game, id software released QTest on February 24, 1996. It was described as a technology demo and was limited to three multiplayer maps. There was no single player support and some of the gameplay and graphics were unfinished or different from their final versions. Nevertheless, the game's multiplayer support caused Quake servers to spring up everywhere overnight. QTest also gave gamers their first peek into the filesystem and modifiability of the Quake engine, and many entity mods (that placed monsters in the otherwise empty multiplayer maps) and custom player skins began appearing online before the full game was even released.
and due to its popularity, has been the focus of many fan "mods". The first mods were small gameplay fixes and patches initiated by the community, usually enhancements to weapons or gameplay with some new foes. Later mods were more ambitious and resulted in Quake fans creating versions of the game that were drastically different from id Software's original release.
The first major Quake mod was Team Fortress
. This mod consists of Capture the Flag gameplay, but with a class system for the players. Players choose a class, which creates various restrictions on weapons and armor types available to that player, and also grants special abilities. For example, the bread-and-butter Soldier class has medium armor, medium speed, and a well-rounded selection of weapons and grenades, while the Scout class is lightly armored, very fast, has a scanner that detects nearby enemies, but has very weak offensive weapons. One of the other differences with CTF is the fact that the flag is not returned automatically when a player drops it: running over one's flag in Threewave CTF would return the flag to the base, and in TF the flag remains in the same spot for preconfigured time and it has to be defended on remote locations. This caused a shift in defensive tactics compared to Threewave CTF. Team Fortress maintained its standing as the most-played online modification of Quake for many years.
Another popular mod was Threewave
Capture the Flag
(CTF), primarily authored by Dave 'Zoid' Kirsch. Threewave
CTF is a partial conversion consisting of new maps, a new weapon (a grappling hook
), power-ups, some new textures
and new rules of game play. Typically, two teams (red and blue) would compete in a game of Capture the flag
, though a few maps with up to four teams (red, blue, green, and yellow) were created. Capture the Flag has become a standard game mode included in most popular multiplayer games released after Quake, in addition to Deathmatch
first introduced in Doom. Rocket Arena
provides the ability for players to face each other in small, open arenas with changes in the gameplay rules so that item collection and detailed level knowledge are no longer factors. A series of short rounds, with the surviving player in each round gaining a point, instead tests the player's aiming and dodging skills and reflexes. Clan Arena is a further modification that provides team play using Rocket Arena rules. One category of mod, "bots
", were introduced to provide surrogate players in multiplayer mode.
There are a large number of custom maps that have been made by users and fans of Quake. These maps are still being made today, over fifteen years since the game's release. Custom maps are new maps that are playable by simply loading them into the original game. Custom maps of all gameplay types have been made, but most are in the single-player and deathmatch genres. More than 1500 single-player and a similar number of deathmatch maps have been made for Quake.
demos (replayable recordings of the player's movement) of Quake levels completed in record time on the "Nightmare" skill level
. The footage was edited into a continuous 19 minutes, 49 seconds demo called Quake done Quick (QdQ) and released on 10 June 1997. Owners of the game could replay this demo in the game engine, watching the run unfold as if they were playing it themselves.
This involved a number of players recording run-throughs of individual levels, using every trick and shortcut they could discover in order to minimize the time it took to complete, usually to a degree that even the original level designers found difficult to comprehend, and in a manner that often bypassed large areas of the level. Stitching a series of the fastest runs together into a coherent whole created a demonstration of the entire game. Recamming is also used with speedruns in order to make the experience more movie-like, with arbitrary control of camera angles, editing, and sound that can be applied with editing software after the runs are first recorded. However, the fastest possible time for a given level will not necessarily result in the fastest time used to contribute to "running" the entire game. One example is acquiring the grenade launcher in an early level, an act that slows down the time for that level over the best possible, but speeds up the overall game time by allowing the runner to bypass a big area in a later level that they could not otherwise do.
A second attempt, Quake done Quicker (QdQr), reduced the complete time to 16 minutes, 35 seconds (a reduction of 3 minutes, 14 seconds). QdQr was released 13 September 1997. One of the levels included was the result of an online competition to see who could get the fastest time. The culmination of this process of improvement was Quake done Quick with a Vengeance (QdQwav). Released three years to the day after QdQr, this pared down the time taken to complete all four episodes, on Nightmare (hardest) difficulty, to 12 minutes, 23 seconds (a further reduction of 4 minutes, 12 seconds), partly by using techniques that had formerly been shunned in such films as being less aesthetically pleasing. This run was recorded as an in-game demo but interest was such that an .avi
video clip was created to allow those without the game to see the run.
Most full-game speedruns are a collaborative effort by a number of runners (though some have been done by single runners on their own). Although each particular level is credited to one runner, the ideas and techniques used are iterative and collaborative in nature, with each runner picking up tips and ideas from the others, so that speeds keep improving beyond what was thought possible as the runs are further optimized and new tricks or routes are discovered. Further time improvements of the continuous whole game run were achieved into the 21st century. In addition, many thousands of individual level runs are kept at Speed Demos Archive
's Quake section, including many on custom maps. Speedrunning is a counterpart to multiplayer modes in making Quake one of the first games promoted as a virtual "sport".
and GameRankings. GameSpot
agreed with positive reviews and praised every aspect of the game, stating "Quake is a masterpiece on every level, with its ominous atmosphere, silky-smooth animation, incredibly well-balanced gameplay and level design, and unparalleled soundtrack."
of the Quake and QuakeWorld
engines was licensed under the GPL
in 1999. The id Software maps, objects, textures, sounds and other creative works remain under their original license. The shareware
distribution of Quake is still freely redistributable and usable with the GPLed engine code. One must purchase a copy of Quake in order to receive the registered version of the game which includes more single player episodes and the deathmatch
maps. Based on the success of the first Quake game, id later published Quake II
and Quake III Arena
; Quake 4
was released in October 2005, developed by Raven Software
using the Doom 3
engine.
It is also interesting to note that Quake was the game primarily responsible for the emergence of the machinima
artform of films made in game engines, thanks to edited Quake demos such as Ranger Gone Bad and Blahbalicious
, the in-game film The Devil's Covenant and the in-game-rendered, four-hour epic film The Seal of Nehahra
. On June 22, 2006, it had been 10 years since the original uploading of the game to cdrom.com archives. Many Internet forum
s had topics about it, and it was a front page story on Slashdot
. On October 11, 2006, John Romero
released the original map files for all of the levels in Quake under the GPL.
Quake and its four sequels, Quake II
, Quake III Arena
, Quake 4
, and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars
have sold over 4 million copies combined. In 2002, a version of Quake was produced for mobile phone
s. A copy of Quake was also sold in 2001, labeled Ultimate Quake, which included the original Quake, Quake II, and Quake III Arena. In 2008 Quake was honored at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Award
s for advancing the art form of user modifiable games. John Carmack accepted the award. Years after its original release, Quake is still regarded by many critics as one of the greatest and most influential games ever made.
, making the design more technological and futuristic rather than Lovecraftian fantasy. Quake 4
followed the design themes of Quake II, whereas Quake III Arena mixed these styles, as it existed in a parallel continuity that housed several "id all-stars", from various games, as playable characters. The mixed settings occurred because Quake II originally began as a separate product line. Unfortunately, due to the failure to gain rights to the title they wanted, id designers were forced to fall back on the project's nickname of "Quake II." Since any sequel to the original Quake had already been refused, it became a viable way of continuing the series without actually continuing the storyline or setting of the first game. In June 2011, John Carmack made an offhand comment that id software was considering a remake to the "...mixed up Cthulhu-ish Quake 1 world and rebooting [in] that direction."
Quake Mission Pack 1: Scourge of Armagon is the first official mission pack released on February 28, 1997. It was developed by Hipnotic Interactive. It features fifteen new single player missions, a new multiplayer arena, and gameplay features not originally found in Quake, including rotating structures and breakable walls. New enemies include Centroids, large cybernetic scorpions with nailguns, Gremlins, small goblins that can steal weapons and multiply by feeding on enemy corpses, and Spike Mines, floating orbs that detonate when near the player. New weapons include Mjolnir, a large lightning emitting hammer, a laser cannon, which shoots bouncing bolts of energy, and a Proximity Mine Launcher, which fires grenades that attach to surfaces and detonate when an opponent comes near. The storyline follows Armagon, a general of Quake's forces, planning to invade Earth
via a portal known as the 'rift'. Armagon resembles a giant gremlin with cybernetic legs and a combined rocket launcher
/laser cannon for arms.
Quake Mission Pack 2: Dissolution of Eternity was the second official mission pack, released on March 31, 1997. Developed by Rogue Entertainment
, it featured sixteen new single player levels as well as several new enemies and bosses. New enemies included Electric Eels, Phantom Swordsmen, Multi-Grenade Ogres (which fire cluster grenades), Hell Spawn, Wrath (floating, robed undead), Guardians (resurrected ancient Egyptian warriors), Mummies, and statues of various enemies that come to life. The bosses were Lava Men, Overlords, large Wraths, and a dragon guarding the "temporal energy converter". Rather than offering new weapons, the mission pack gave the player new ammo for already existing weapons, such as "lava nails" for the Nailgun, cluster grenades, rockets that split into four in a horizontal line, plasma cells, and a grappling hook to help in moving around the map.
In late 1996, id Software released VQuake, a port of the Quake engine to support hardware accelerated rendering on graphics cards using Rendition Vérité chipset. Aside from the expected benefit of improved performance, VQuake offered numerous visual improvements over the original software-rendered Quake. It boasted full 16-bit color, bilinear filtering (reducing pixelation), improved dynamic lighting, optional anti-aliasing and even improved source code clarity, as the improved performance finally allowed the use of gotos to be abandoned in favor of proper loop constructs. As the name implied, VQuake was a proprietary port specifically for the Vérité; consumer 3D acceleration was in its infancy at the time, and there was no standard 3D API for the consumer market. After completing VQuake, John Carmack vowed never to write a proprietary port again, citing his frustration with Rendition's Speedy3D API.
To improve the quality of online play, id Software released QuakeWorld
on December 17, 1996, a build of Quake that featured significantly revamped network code including the addition of client-side prediction
. The original Quake network code would not show the player the results of his actions until the server sent back a reply acknowledging them. For example, if the player attempted to move forward, his client would send the request to move forward to the server, and the server would determine whether the client was actually able to move forward or if he ran into an obstacle, such as a wall or another player. The server would then respond to the client, and only then would the client display movement to the player. This was fine for play on a LAN—a high bandwidth, very low latency connection. But the latency over a dial-up Internet connection is much larger than on a LAN, and this caused a noticeable delay between when a player tried to act and when that action was visible on the screen. This made gameplay much more difficult, especially since the unpredictable nature of the Internet made the amount of delay vary from moment to moment. Players would experience jerky, laggy motion that sometimes felt like ice skating, where they would slide around with seemingly no ability to stop, due to a build-up of previously-sent movement requests. John Carmack has admitted that this was a serious problem which should have been fixed before release, but it was not caught because he and other developers had high-speed Internet access at home.
With the help of client-side prediction
, which allowed players to see their own movement immediately without waiting for a response from the server, QuakeWorld network code allowed players with high-latency connections to control their character's movement almost as precisely as when playing in single-player mode. The netcode parameters could be adjusted by the user, so that QuakeWorld performed well for users with high and low latency.
The tradeoff to client-side prediction was that sometimes other players or objects would no longer be quite where they had appeared to be, or, in extreme cases, that the player would be pulled back to a previous position when the client received a late reply from the server which overrode movement the client had already previewed; this was known as "warping". As a result, some serious players, particularly in the USA, still preferred to play online using the original Quake engine (commonly called NetQuake) rather than QuakeWorld. However, the majority of players, especially those on dial-up connections, preferred the newer network model, and QuakeWorld soon became the dominant form of online play. Following the success of QuakeWorld, client-side prediction has become a standard feature of nearly all real-time online games. As with all other Quake upgrades, QuakeWorld was released as a free, unsupported add-on to the game and was updated numerous times through 1998.
On January 22, 1997, id Software released GLQuake. This was designed to use the OpenGL
3D API
to access hardware 3D graphics acceleration cards to rasterize the graphics, rather than having the computer's CPU fill in every pixel
. In addition to higher framerates for most players, GLQuake provided higher resolution
modes and texture filtering
. GLQuake also experimented with reflections, transparent water, and even rudimentary shadows. GLQuake came with a driver
enabling the subset of OpenGL used by the game to function on the 3dfx
Voodoo Graphics card, the only consumer-level card at the time capable of running GLQuake well. Previously, John Carmack had experimented with a version of Quake specifically written for the Rendition Vérité chip used in the Creative Labs PCI 3D Blaster card. This version had met with only limited success, and Carmack decided to write for generic APIs in the future rather than tailoring for specific hardware.
On March 11, 1997, id Software released WinQuake, a version of the non-OpenGL engine designed to run under Microsoft Windows
; the original Quake had been written for DOS
, allowing for launch from Windows 95
, but could not run under Windows NT
-based operating systems because it required direct access to hardware. WinQuake instead accessed hardware via Win32-based APIs such as DirectSound
, DirectInput
, and DirectDraw
that were supported on Windows 95, Windows NT 4.0
and later releases. Like GLQuake, WinQuake also allowed higher resolution video modes. This removed the last barrier to widespread popularity of the game. In 1998, LBE Systems and Laser-Tron released Quake: Arcade Tournament Edition in the arcades in limited quantities.
Software. It is currently only available in a 68K
version.
In 1996, there was a port of Quake to Linux by an id software employee working in his free time. It was not until 1999 that a retail version for Linux was distributed by Macmillan Digital Publishing USA
in a bundle with the two add-ons as Quake: The Offering for Linux. Finally, in 1997, the official port to Mac OS
was done by MacSoft and a port of Quake to SPARC
Solaris was released.
Quake was also ported to console systems. In 1997, it was ported to Sega Saturn
by Lobotomy. The Saturn port used Lobotomy's own Slavedriver engine (the same engine that powers the Saturn ports of Duke Nukem 3D
and Powerslave) instead of the original Quake engine. It is the only version of Quake that is rated "T" for Teen instead of "M" for Mature. The Saturn version also contains four exclusive levels not seen in any other version. In 1998, Quake was brought to Nintendo 64
by Midway Games
. Both console ports required some compromises because of the limited CPU
power and ROM
storage space for maps. The Saturn version lacks multiplayer but has most of the maps from the original game, with only the secret levels (Ziggurat Vertigo (E1M8), The Underearth (E2M7), The Haunted Halls (E3M7) and The Nameless City (E4M8)) not making the cut. Instead, it has four new maps: Purgatorium, Hell's Aerie, The Coliseum and Watery Grave. The N64 version has multiplayer, but is missing The Grisly Grotto (E1M4), The Installation (E2M1), The Ebon Fortress (E2M4), The Wind Tunnels (E3M5), The Sewage System (E4M1) and Hell's Atrium (E4M5). It also does not use the "START" map where the player chooses difficulty and episode; difficulty is chosen when starting the game, and all the levels play in sequential order from The Slipgate Complex (E1M1) to Shub Niggurath's Pit (END).
Two ports of Quake for the Nintendo DS exist, QuakeDS and CQuake both run well however multiplayer does not work anymore for QuakeDS. Since the source code for Quake was released a number of unofficial ports were made available for PDA's and mobile phones, such as PocketQuake, as well as versions for the Symbian S60 series of mobile phones and Android mobile phones.
In 2005 id Software signed a deal with publisher Pulse Interactive to release a version of Quake for mobile phones. The game was engineered by Californian company Bear Naked Productions. Initially due to be released on only two mobile phones, the Samsung Nexus (for which it was to be an embedded game) and the LG VX360. Quake mobile was reviewed by Gamespot on the Samsung Nexus and they cite its US release as October 2005, they also gave it a Best Mobile Game" in their E3 2005 Editor's Choice Awards. It is unclear as to whether the game actually did ship with the Samsung Nexus. As of today the game is only available for the DELL x50v and x51v both of which are PDAs not mobile phones. Quake Mobile doesn’t feature the Nine Inch Nails soundtrack due to space constraints. Quake mobile runs the most recent version of GL Quake (Quake v.1.09 GL 1.00) at 800x600 resolution and 25 fps. The most recent version of Quake Mobile is v.1.20 which has stylus support, there was an earlier version v.1.19 which lacked stylus support. The two Quake expansion packs Scourge of Armagon and Dissolution of Eternity are also available for Quake Mobile. As of now the game is available for download at download.cnet.com as are both expansions.
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
video game that was released by id Software
Id Software
Id Software is an American video game development company with its headquarters in Richardson, Texas. The company was founded in 1991 by four members of the computer company Softdisk: programmers John Carmack and John Romero, game designer Tom Hall, and artist Adrian Carmack...
on June 22, 1996. It was the first game in the popular Quake series
Quake (series)
The Quake series is a line of first-person shooter video games produced by id Software.-Overview:The Quake series is somewhat unusual in that its focus changes frequently; the story of Quake II has nothing to do with Quake, and Quake III Arena has little to do with either of its predecessors...
of video games. It was made available on Steam on August 3, 2007.
Gameplay
In single player players explore and navigate to the exit of each level, facing many challenging monsters and a few secret areas along the way. Usually there are buttons to press or keys to collect in order to open doors before the exit can be reached. Once reaching the exit, the game takes the player to the next level.Before the start level, there is a set of three pathways with easy, medium, and hard skill levels; in order to reach the Nightmare skill level (described in the game manual as "so bad that it was hidden, so people won't wander in by accident"), the player must drop through the water before the Episode 4 entrance and jump into a secret passage.
Quake single-player campaign is organized into four individual episodes of about eight levels each (each including a secret level, one of which is a "low gravity" level—Ziggurat Vertigo in Episode 1, Dimension of the Doomed—that challenges the player's abilities in a different way). As items are collected, they are carried to the next level, each usually more challenging than the last. If the player dies, he must restart at the beginning of the level. However, games may be saved at any time.
Upon completing each episode, the player is returned to the hub Start level, where he can then enter the next episode. Each episode starts the player from scratch, without any previously collected items. Episode I (which formed the shareware or downloadable demo version of Quake) has the most traditional ideology of a boss
Boss (video games)
A boss is an enemy-based challenge which is found in video games. A fight with a boss character is commonly referred to as a boss battle or boss fight...
in the last level. The ultimate objective at the end of an episode is to recover a magic rune. After all of the runes are collected, the floor of the Start opens up to reveal an entrance to the End level which contains the final boss, based on the god Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath, often associated with the phrase “The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young”, is a deity in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft...
from the Cthulhu Mythos
Cthulhu Mythos
The Cthulhu Mythos is a shared fictional universe, based on the work of American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft.The term was first coined by August Derleth, a contemporary correspondent of Lovecraft, who used the name of the creature Cthulhu - a central figure in Lovecraft literature and the focus...
.
Multiplayer
In multiplayer mode, players on several computers connect to a server (which may be a dedicated machine or on one of the player's computers), where they can either play the single-player campaign together in co-op mode or against each other in multiplayer. When players die in multiplayer mode, they can immediately respawn but lose any items that were collected. Similarly, items that have been picked up previously respawnSpawning (computer gaming)
In video games, spawning is the live creation of a character or item. Respawning is the recreation of an entity after its death or destruction....
after some time, and may be picked up again.
The most popular multiplayer modes are all forms of deathmatch
Deathmatch (gaming)
Deathmatch or Player vs All is a widely-used gameplay mode integrated into many shooter and real-time strategy computer games...
. Deathmatch modes typically consist of either free-for-all (no organization or teams involved), one-on-one duels, or organized teamplay with two or more players per team (or clan
Clan (computer gaming)
In computer and video gaming, a clan or guild is an organised group of players that regularly play together in a particular multiplayer games. These games range from groups of a few friends to 1000-person organizations, with a broad range of structures, goals and members. The lifespan of a clan...
). Teamplay is also frequently played with one or another mod
Mod (computer gaming)
Mod or modification is a term generally applied to personal computer games , especially first-person shooters, role-playing games and real-time strategy games. Mods are made by the general public or a developer, and can be entirely new games in themselves, but mods are not standalone software and...
. Typically, monsters are not normally present, as they serve no purpose other than to get in the way and give away the player.
The gameplay in Quake was considered unique for its time because of the different ways the player can maneuver through the game. For example: bunny hopping
Bunny hopping
Bunny hopping, or bunny jumping, is a term used in video games to describe the basic movement technique in which a player jumps repeatedly, instead of running, in order to move faster.-Concept:...
or strafe jumping can be used to move faster than normal, while rocket jumping
Rocket jumping
In first-person shooter computer and video games, rocket jumping is the technique of pointing a rocket launcher or other similar explosive weapon at the ground or at a wall then firing and jumping at the same time. The rocket's explosion propels the player to greater heights and distances than...
enables the player to reach otherwise-inaccessible areas at the cost of some self-damage. The player can start and stop moving suddenly, jump unnaturally high, and change direction while moving through the air. Many of these non-realistic behaviors contribute to Quake appeal. Multiplayer Quake was one of the first games that people singled out as a form of electronic sport
Electronic sports
Electronic sports comprises the competitive play of video games. Other terms include competitive gaming, professional gaming and cybersports...
. Most notable was Dennis "Thresh" Fong
Dennis Fong
Dennis "Thresh" Fong is an entrepreneur and retired celebrity pro gamer. Fong has been called "the Michael Jordan of video games", a "Top 20 Entrepreneur Under 35" by Red Herring magazine, and voted as the "Top North American E-Sports Figure of All Time" by the E-Sports Entertainment Association,...
who won John Carmack's Ferrari 328
Ferrari 328
The Ferrari 328 GTB and GTS was the successor to the Ferrari 308 GTB and GTS. While largely based on the 308 GTB and GTS respectively, small modifications were made to the body style and engine, including an increase in engine displacement to 3.2 L...
at the Microsoft-sponsored Red Annihilation
Red Annihilation
Red Annihilation was a Quake competitive eSport event, sponsored by Microsoft, held in May 1997. The winner, Thresh, took home John Carmack's 1987 Ferrari 328 GTS cabriolet as the offered prize....
tournament in 1997.
Story
The player takes the role of an un-named protagonist sent into a portal in order to stop an enemy code-named "Quake". Previously, the government had been experimenting with teleportation technology, and upon development of a working prototype called a "Slipgate", this enemy has compromised the human connection with their own teleportation system, using it to insert death squads into the "human" dimension, supposedly in order to test the martial capabilities of humanity.The sole surviving protagonist in Operation Counterstrike is the player, who must advance, starting each of the four episodes from a human held but overrun military base, before fighting through into other dimensions, traversing these via slipgate or their otherworld equivalent. Once passing through each slipgate, the player's main objective is to survive and locate the exit which will take him to the next level, not unlike that of id Software's previous hit, Doom.
The game consists of around 28 separate "levels" or "maps", grouped into four episodes. Each episode represents individual dimensions that the player can access through magical portals (as opposed to the technological Slipgate) that are discovered over the course of the game. At the start of each episode, the player is deployed in a futuristic military base and he has to find a slipgate that will take him to the alternate realm. The various realms consist of a number of gothic
Gothic architecture
Gothic architecture is a style of architecture that flourished during the high and late medieval period. It evolved from Romanesque architecture and was succeeded by Renaissance architecture....
, medieval, as well as "fire and brimstone"-style caves and dungeons with a recurring theme of hellish and satanic imagery reminiscent of Doom (such as pentagrams and images of demons on the walls). The latter is inspired by several dark fantasy
Dark fantasy
Dark fantasy is a term used to describe a fantasy story with a pronounced horror element.-Overview:A strict definition for dark fantasy is difficult to pin down. Gertrude Barrows Bennett has been called "the woman who invented dark fantasy". Both Charles L...
influences, notably that of H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
; most notably, Dimensional Shamblers appear as enemies, the "Spawn" enemies are called "Formless Spawn of Tsathoggua
Tsathoggua
Tsathoggua is a fictional supernatural entity in the Cthulhu Mythos shared fictional universe. He is the creation of Clark Ashton Smith and is part of his Hyperborean cycle....
" in the manual, the end boss of the first episode is named Chthon
Chthonian (Cthulhu Mythos)
Chthonians are fictional creatures in the Cthulhu Mythos. The species is the creation of Brian Lumley and was first featured in his short story "Cement Surroundings" —though the creature never made a direct appearance...
, and the final boss is named Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath, often associated with the phrase “The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young”, is a deity in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft...
(though actually resembling a Dark Young). Some levels have Lovecraftian names, such as the Vaults of Zin and the Ebon Fortress. Originally, the game was supposed to include more Lovecraftian bosses, but this concept was scrapped due to time constraints.
It should be noted, however, that by the time the game was released the specifics of the story had become relatively unimportant and somewhat disorganized. This is mainly due to a last-minute mix of two different game designs: lead level designer John Romero
John Romero
Alfonso John Romero is a game designer, programmer, and developer in the video game industry. He is best known as a co-founder of id Software and was a designer for many of their games, including Wolfenstein 3D, Dangerous Dave, Doom and Quake...
wanted to make a dark fantasy beat 'em up
Beat 'em up
Beat 'em up is a video game genre featuring melee combat between the protagonist and a large number of underpowered antagonists. These games typically take place in urban settings and feature crime-fighting and revenge-based plots, though some games may employ historical or fantasy themes...
/RPG
Role-playing video game
Role-playing video games are a video game genre with origins in pen-and-paper role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, using much of the same terminology, settings and game mechanics. The player in RPGs controls one character, or several adventuring party members, fulfilling one or many quests...
hybrid game, while level designers Tim Willits
Tim Willits
Tim Willits is the creative director and former co-owner of video game developer id Software.-Early life:Willits is a graduate of the University of Minnesota and a former member of the University of Minnesota Army ROTC program...
and American McGee
American McGee
-Career:McGee began his career at id Software, working on level design, music production, sound effects development, and programming in such games as Doom, Doom II, Quake, and Quake II. In 1998, he moved to Electronic Arts, where he worked as creative director on several projects, including...
wanted to make a more futuristic, Doom-like game. Ultimately the Doom-like mechanics were implemented and many of the dark fantasy design elements were incorporated into the graphics and visual effects of the game.
Development
Id Software
Id Software is an American video game development company with its headquarters in Richardson, Texas. The company was founded in 1991 by four members of the computer company Softdisk: programmers John Carmack and John Romero, game designer Tom Hall, and artist Adrian Carmack...
's very first release, 1990's Commander Keen
Commander Keen
Commander Keen is a series of video games developed by id Software in the early 1990s. The series focuses on the adventures of Billy Blaze, an 8-year old boy who travels through space and assumes the identity "Commander Keen". The series was successful at replicating the side-scrolling action of...
, advertised a game entitled The Fight for Justice as a follow-up to the Keen trilogy. It would feature a character named Quake, "the strongest, most dangerous person on the continent", armed with thunderbolts and a "Ring of Regeneration." Conceived as a VGA
Video Graphics Array
Video Graphics Array refers specifically to the display hardware first introduced with the IBM PS/2 line of computers in 1987, but through its widespread adoption has also come to mean either an analog computer display standard, the 15-pin D-subminiature VGA connector or the 640×480 resolution...
full-color side-scrolling role-playing video game
Role-playing video game
Role-playing video games are a video game genre with origins in pen-and-paper role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, using much of the same terminology, settings and game mechanics. The player in RPGs controls one character, or several adventuring party members, fulfilling one or many quests...
, The Fight for Justice was never released.
Quake was programmed by John Carmack, Michael Abrash
Michael Abrash
Michael Abrash is a technical writer specializing in optimization and 80x86 assembly language programming, a reputation cemented by his 1990 book Zen of Assembly Language Volume 1: Knowledge. The original 8086 processor, the focus of the book, was several generations behind the state of the art by...
and John Cash. The level and scenarios were designed by American McGee
American McGee
-Career:McGee began his career at id Software, working on level design, music production, sound effects development, and programming in such games as Doom, Doom II, Quake, and Quake II. In 1998, he moved to Electronic Arts, where he worked as creative director on several projects, including...
, Sandy Petersen
Sandy Petersen
Carl Sanford Joslyn Petersen is a game designer.Petersen was born in St. Louis, Missouri and attended University of California, Berkeley, majoring in zoology....
, John Romero
John Romero
Alfonso John Romero is a game designer, programmer, and developer in the video game industry. He is best known as a co-founder of id Software and was a designer for many of their games, including Wolfenstein 3D, Dangerous Dave, Doom and Quake...
and Tim Willits
Tim Willits
Tim Willits is the creative director and former co-owner of video game developer id Software.-Early life:Willits is a graduate of the University of Minnesota and a former member of the University of Minnesota Army ROTC program...
.
The graphics were designed by Adrian Carmack
Adrian Carmack
Adrian Carmack is one of the four founders of id Software, along with Tom Hall, John Romero, and John D. Carmack . He had worked there as an artist. He was a major stock owner of id Software until he left the company....
, and Kevin Cloud
Kevin Cloud
Kevin Cloud is a computer games graphic designer from Shreveport, LA. He was hired in 1992 by id Software to work as an assistant artist to the then lead artist, Adrian Carmack. Prior to that, he was employed by Softdisk, where several other id founders worked. During part of his employment at...
. Music and sound design was by Trent Reznor
Trent Reznor
Michael Trent Reznor is an American multi-instrumentalist, composer, record producer, and leader of industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails. Reznor is also a member of How to Destroy Angels alongside his wife, Mariqueen Maandig, and Atticus Ross. He was previously associated with bands Option 30,...
of Nine Inch Nails
Nine Inch Nails
Nine Inch Nails is an American industrial rock project, founded in 1988 by Trent Reznor in Cleveland, Ohio. As its main producer, singer, songwriter, and instrumentalist, Reznor is the only official member of Nine Inch Nails and remains solely responsible for its direction...
fame. The game engine
Game engine
A game engine is a system designed for the creation and development of video games. There are many game engines that are designed to work on video game consoles and personal computers...
developed for Quake, the Quake engine
Quake engine
The Quake engine is the game engine that was written to power 1996's Quake, written by id Software. It featured true 3D real-time rendering and is now licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License ....
, popularized several major advances in the 3D game genre: polygonal models instead of prerendered sprites
Sprite (computer graphics)
In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional image or animation that is integrated into a larger scene...
; full 3D level design instead of a 2.5D
2.5D
2.5D , 3/4 perspective and pseudo-3D are terms used to describe either:* 2D graphical projections and techniques which cause a series of images or scenes to fake or appear to be three-dimensional when in fact they are not, or* gameplay in an otherwise three-dimensional video game that is...
map; prerendered lightmap
Lightmap
A lightmap is a data structure which contains the brightness of surfaces in 3d graphics applications such as video games. Lightmaps are precomputed and used for static objects. Quake was the first computer game to use lightmaps to augment rendering. Before lightmaps were invented, realtime...
s; and allowing end users to partially program the game (in this case with QuakeC
QuakeC
QuakeC is an interpreted language developed in 1996 by John Carmack of id Software to program parts of the computer game Quake. Using QuakeC, a programmer is able to customize Quake to great extents by adding weapons, changing game logic and physics, and programming complex scenarios...
), which popularized fan-created modifications (mods)
Mod (computer gaming)
Mod or modification is a term generally applied to personal computer games , especially first-person shooters, role-playing games and real-time strategy games. Mods are made by the general public or a developer, and can be entirely new games in themselves, but mods are not standalone software and...
.
Quake was given as a title to the game that id Software
Id Software
Id Software is an American video game development company with its headquarters in Richardson, Texas. The company was founded in 1991 by four members of the computer company Softdisk: programmers John Carmack and John Romero, game designer Tom Hall, and artist Adrian Carmack...
was working on shortly after the release of Doom II
Doom II
Doom II: Hell on Earth is an award winning first-person shooter video game and second title of id Software's Doom franchise. Unlike Doom which was initially only available through shareware and mail order, Doom II was a commercial release sold in stores...
. The earliest information released described Quake as focusing on a Thor
Thor
In Norse mythology, Thor is a hammer-wielding god associated with thunder, lightning, storms, oak trees, strength, the protection of mankind, and also hallowing, healing, and fertility...
-like character who wields a giant hammer, and is able to knock away enemies by throwing the hammer (complete with real-time inverse kinematics
Inverse kinematics
Inverse kinematics is a subdomain of kinematics, which is of particular interest in robotics and computer animation. In contrast to forward kinematics, which calculates the position of a body after a series of motions, inverse kinematics calculates the motions necessary to achieve a desired...
). At the start, the levels were supposed to be designed in an Aztec style, but the choice was dropped some months into the project. Early screenshots then showed medieval environments and dragons. The plan was for the game to have more RPG
Role-playing video game
Role-playing video games are a video game genre with origins in pen-and-paper role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, using much of the same terminology, settings and game mechanics. The player in RPGs controls one character, or several adventuring party members, fulfilling one or many quests...
-style elements. However, work was very slow on the engine, since John Carmack
John Carmack
John D. Carmack II is an American game programmer and the co-founder of id Software. Carmack was the lead programmer of the id computer games Commander Keen, Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, Rage and their sequels....
, the main programmer of Quake, was not only developing a full 3D engine, but also a TCP/IP networking model. (Carmack later said that he should have done two separate projects which developed those things.) Eventually, the whole id team began to think that the original concept may not have been as wise a choice as they first believed. Thus, the final game was very stripped down from its original intentions, and instead featured gameplay similar to Doom and its sequel, although levels and enemies were closer to medieval RPG style rather than science-fiction. Praised throughout the gaming community, it quickly dethroned previous FPS
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
titles and revolutionized the way multiplayer games were developed.
Before the release of the game or the demo of the game, id software released QTest on February 24, 1996. It was described as a technology demo and was limited to three multiplayer maps. There was no single player support and some of the gameplay and graphics were unfinished or different from their final versions. Nevertheless, the game's multiplayer support caused Quake servers to spring up everywhere overnight. QTest also gave gamers their first peek into the filesystem and modifiability of the Quake engine, and many entity mods (that placed monsters in the otherwise empty multiplayer maps) and custom player skins began appearing online before the full game was even released.
Expansions
Quake can be heavily modified by altering the sounds, graphics, or scripting in QuakeCQuakeC
QuakeC is an interpreted language developed in 1996 by John Carmack of id Software to program parts of the computer game Quake. Using QuakeC, a programmer is able to customize Quake to great extents by adding weapons, changing game logic and physics, and programming complex scenarios...
and due to its popularity, has been the focus of many fan "mods". The first mods were small gameplay fixes and patches initiated by the community, usually enhancements to weapons or gameplay with some new foes. Later mods were more ambitious and resulted in Quake fans creating versions of the game that were drastically different from id Software's original release.
The first major Quake mod was Team Fortress
Team Fortress
Team Fortress is a team- and class-based online multiplayer video game mod based on id Software's Quake. Team Fortress was designed and written by Robin Walker, John Cook and Ian Caughley in 1996. The mod's gameplay has caught on with a large following of fans, which has spurred many developers to...
. This mod consists of Capture the Flag gameplay, but with a class system for the players. Players choose a class, which creates various restrictions on weapons and armor types available to that player, and also grants special abilities. For example, the bread-and-butter Soldier class has medium armor, medium speed, and a well-rounded selection of weapons and grenades, while the Scout class is lightly armored, very fast, has a scanner that detects nearby enemies, but has very weak offensive weapons. One of the other differences with CTF is the fact that the flag is not returned automatically when a player drops it: running over one's flag in Threewave CTF would return the flag to the base, and in TF the flag remains in the same spot for preconfigured time and it has to be defended on remote locations. This caused a shift in defensive tactics compared to Threewave CTF. Team Fortress maintained its standing as the most-played online modification of Quake for many years.
Another popular mod was Threewave
Threewave Software
Threewave Software is a videogame developer based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. They are best-known for the development of Threewave CTF, an early Capture the Flag mod for Quake developed by Michael Goodhead and his mod group. Defined as an independent studio, the company has taken on...
Capture the Flag
Capture the flag
Capture the Flag is a traditional outdoor sport generally played by children, where two teams each have a flag and the objective is to capture the other team's flag, located at the team's "base," and bring it safely back to their own base...
(CTF), primarily authored by Dave 'Zoid' Kirsch. Threewave
Threewave Software
Threewave Software is a videogame developer based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. They are best-known for the development of Threewave CTF, an early Capture the Flag mod for Quake developed by Michael Goodhead and his mod group. Defined as an independent studio, the company has taken on...
CTF is a partial conversion consisting of new maps, a new weapon (a grappling hook
Grappling hook
A grappling hook is an anchor with multiple hooks , attached to a rope; it is thrown, dropped, sunk, projected, or fastened directly by hand to where at least one hook may catch and hold. Generally, grappling hooks are used to temporarily secure one end of a rope. They may also be used to dredge...
), power-ups, some new textures
Texture mapping
Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...
and new rules of game play. Typically, two teams (red and blue) would compete in a game of Capture the flag
Capture the flag
Capture the Flag is a traditional outdoor sport generally played by children, where two teams each have a flag and the objective is to capture the other team's flag, located at the team's "base," and bring it safely back to their own base...
, though a few maps with up to four teams (red, blue, green, and yellow) were created. Capture the Flag has become a standard game mode included in most popular multiplayer games released after Quake, in addition to Deathmatch
Deathmatch (gaming)
Deathmatch or Player vs All is a widely-used gameplay mode integrated into many shooter and real-time strategy computer games...
first introduced in Doom. Rocket Arena
Rocket Arena
Rocket Arena is a free modification for the multiplayer first-person shooter games Quake, Quake II, Quake III Arena and Quake 4. There are also ports for Half-Life and Unreal Tournament...
provides the ability for players to face each other in small, open arenas with changes in the gameplay rules so that item collection and detailed level knowledge are no longer factors. A series of short rounds, with the surviving player in each round gaining a point, instead tests the player's aiming and dodging skills and reflexes. Clan Arena is a further modification that provides team play using Rocket Arena rules. One category of mod, "bots
Computer game bot
A bot, most prominently in the first-person shooter types , is a type of weak AI expert system software which for each instance of the program controls a player in deathmatch, team deathmatch and/or cooperative human player. Computer bots may play against other bots and/or human players in unison,...
", were introduced to provide surrogate players in multiplayer mode.
There are a large number of custom maps that have been made by users and fans of Quake. These maps are still being made today, over fifteen years since the game's release. Custom maps are new maps that are playable by simply loading them into the original game. Custom maps of all gameplay types have been made, but most are in the single-player and deathmatch genres. More than 1500 single-player and a similar number of deathmatch maps have been made for Quake.
Speedruns
As an example of the dedication that Quake has inspired in its fan community, a group of expert players recorded speedrunSpeedrun
A speedrun is a play-through, or recording thereof, of a whole video game or a selected part of it performed with the intent of completing it as fast as possible, optionally under certain prerequisites, mainly for the purposes of entertainment and competition...
demos (replayable recordings of the player's movement) of Quake levels completed in record time on the "Nightmare" skill level
Difficulty level
In general usage, difficulty level refers to the relative difficulty of completing a task or objective.In computer and video games, the term specifically delineates the ease or difficulty with which an average user may complete a game or a part of a game. Arcade games as well as many early console...
. The footage was edited into a continuous 19 minutes, 49 seconds demo called Quake done Quick (QdQ) and released on 10 June 1997. Owners of the game could replay this demo in the game engine, watching the run unfold as if they were playing it themselves.
This involved a number of players recording run-throughs of individual levels, using every trick and shortcut they could discover in order to minimize the time it took to complete, usually to a degree that even the original level designers found difficult to comprehend, and in a manner that often bypassed large areas of the level. Stitching a series of the fastest runs together into a coherent whole created a demonstration of the entire game. Recamming is also used with speedruns in order to make the experience more movie-like, with arbitrary control of camera angles, editing, and sound that can be applied with editing software after the runs are first recorded. However, the fastest possible time for a given level will not necessarily result in the fastest time used to contribute to "running" the entire game. One example is acquiring the grenade launcher in an early level, an act that slows down the time for that level over the best possible, but speeds up the overall game time by allowing the runner to bypass a big area in a later level that they could not otherwise do.
A second attempt, Quake done Quicker (QdQr), reduced the complete time to 16 minutes, 35 seconds (a reduction of 3 minutes, 14 seconds). QdQr was released 13 September 1997. One of the levels included was the result of an online competition to see who could get the fastest time. The culmination of this process of improvement was Quake done Quick with a Vengeance (QdQwav). Released three years to the day after QdQr, this pared down the time taken to complete all four episodes, on Nightmare (hardest) difficulty, to 12 minutes, 23 seconds (a further reduction of 4 minutes, 12 seconds), partly by using techniques that had formerly been shunned in such films as being less aesthetically pleasing. This run was recorded as an in-game demo but interest was such that an .avi
Audio Video Interleave
Audio Video Interleave , known by its acronym AVI, is a multimedia container format introduced by Microsoft in November 1992 as part of its Video for Windows technology. AVI files can contain both audio and video data in a file container that allows synchronous audio-with-video playback...
video clip was created to allow those without the game to see the run.
Most full-game speedruns are a collaborative effort by a number of runners (though some have been done by single runners on their own). Although each particular level is credited to one runner, the ideas and techniques used are iterative and collaborative in nature, with each runner picking up tips and ideas from the others, so that speeds keep improving beyond what was thought possible as the runs are further optimized and new tricks or routes are discovered. Further time improvements of the continuous whole game run were achieved into the 21st century. In addition, many thousands of individual level runs are kept at Speed Demos Archive
Speed Demos Archive
Speed Demos Archive is a site dedicated to speedruns done on many computer and video games.-History:The site originally began as a demo archive of Quake play throughs. SDA was formed initially by Nolan "Radix" Pflug of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania by merging with a site created by Gunnar and Jesse in...
's Quake section, including many on custom maps. Speedrunning is a counterpart to multiplayer modes in making Quake one of the first games promoted as a virtual "sport".
Reception
Quake has received near-universal critical acclaim from reviewers since its release, receiving an aggregated score of 94% on both MetacriticMetacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
and GameRankings. GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
agreed with positive reviews and praised every aspect of the game, stating "Quake is a masterpiece on every level, with its ominous atmosphere, silky-smooth animation, incredibly well-balanced gameplay and level design, and unparalleled soundtrack."
Legacy
The source codeSource code
In computer science, source code is text written using the format and syntax of the programming language that it is being written in. Such a language is specially designed to facilitate the work of computer programmers, who specify the actions to be performed by a computer mostly by writing source...
of the Quake and QuakeWorld
QuakeWorld
QuakeWorld is an update to id Software's seminal multiplayer deathmatch game, Quake, that enhances the game's multiplayer features to allow people with dial-up modems to achieve greatly improved responsiveness when playing on Internet game servers...
engines was licensed under the GPL
GNU General Public License
The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project....
in 1999. The id Software maps, objects, textures, sounds and other creative works remain under their original license. The shareware
Shareware
The term shareware is a proprietary software that is provided to users without payment on a trial basis and is often limited by any combination of functionality, availability, or convenience. Shareware is often offered as a download from an Internet website or as a compact disc included with a...
distribution of Quake is still freely redistributable and usable with the GPLed engine code. One must purchase a copy of Quake in order to receive the registered version of the game which includes more single player episodes and the deathmatch
Deathmatch (gaming)
Deathmatch or Player vs All is a widely-used gameplay mode integrated into many shooter and real-time strategy computer games...
maps. Based on the success of the first Quake game, id later published Quake II
Quake II
Quake II, released on December 9, 1997, is a first-person shooter computer game developed by Id Software and distributed by Activision. It is not a sequel to Quake; it merely uses the name of the former game due to Id's difficulties in coming up with alternative names.The soundtrack for Quake II...
and Quake III Arena
Quake III Arena
Quake III Arena , is a multiplayer first-person shooter video game released on December 2, 1999. The game was developed by id Software and featured music composed by Sonic Mayhem and Front Line Assembly...
; Quake 4
Quake 4
Quake 4 is the fourth title in the series of Quake first-person shooter computer games. The game was developed by Raven Software and published by Activision. Raven Software has collaborated with id Software, the creators and historical developers of preceding Quake games...
was released in October 2005, developed by Raven Software
Raven Software
Raven Software is an American video game developer. The company was founded in 1990 by brothers Brian and Steve Raffel. In 1997, Raven made an exclusive publishing deal with Activision and was subsequently acquired by them...
using the Doom 3
Doom 3
Doom 3 is a science fiction horror video game developed by id Software and published by Activision. An example of the first-person shooter genre, Doom 3 was first released for Microsoft Windows on August 3, 2004. The game was later adapted for Linux, as well as being ported by Aspyr Media for Mac...
engine.
It is also interesting to note that Quake was the game primarily responsible for the emergence of the machinima
Machinima
Machinima is the use of real-time 3D computer graphics rendering engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation...
artform of films made in game engines, thanks to edited Quake demos such as Ranger Gone Bad and Blahbalicious
Blahbalicious
Blahbalicious is a machinima film made using the Quake game engine. It was recorded by Mackey 'Avatar' McCandlish and Brian 'Wendigo' Hess and released at 11pm ET on Monday 8 December 1997...
, the in-game film The Devil's Covenant and the in-game-rendered, four-hour epic film The Seal of Nehahra
The Seal of Nehahra
The Seal of Nehahra is an American film made in 2000, created by Mindcrime Productions as part of the Nehahra Project. Made using a modified version of id Software's 1996 first-person shooter computer game Quake and released over the Internet as a non-interactive game demo package, the film was the...
. On June 22, 2006, it had been 10 years since the original uploading of the game to cdrom.com archives. Many Internet forum
Internet forum
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are at least temporarily archived...
s had topics about it, and it was a front page story on Slashdot
Slashdot
Slashdot is a technology-related news website owned by Geeknet, Inc. The site, which bills itself as "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters", features user-submitted and ‑evaluated current affairs news stories about science- and technology-related topics. Each story has a comments section...
. On October 11, 2006, John Romero
John Romero
Alfonso John Romero is a game designer, programmer, and developer in the video game industry. He is best known as a co-founder of id Software and was a designer for many of their games, including Wolfenstein 3D, Dangerous Dave, Doom and Quake...
released the original map files for all of the levels in Quake under the GPL.
Quake and its four sequels, Quake II
Quake II
Quake II, released on December 9, 1997, is a first-person shooter computer game developed by Id Software and distributed by Activision. It is not a sequel to Quake; it merely uses the name of the former game due to Id's difficulties in coming up with alternative names.The soundtrack for Quake II...
, Quake III Arena
Quake III Arena
Quake III Arena , is a multiplayer first-person shooter video game released on December 2, 1999. The game was developed by id Software and featured music composed by Sonic Mayhem and Front Line Assembly...
, Quake 4
Quake 4
Quake 4 is the fourth title in the series of Quake first-person shooter computer games. The game was developed by Raven Software and published by Activision. Raven Software has collaborated with id Software, the creators and historical developers of preceding Quake games...
, and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is a first-person shooter video game, and is the follow-up to the 2005 title Quake 4. It is also the first game in the series to be rated T by the ESRB...
have sold over 4 million copies combined. In 2002, a version of Quake was produced for mobile phone
Mobile phone
A mobile phone is a device which can make and receive telephone calls over a radio link whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network provided by a mobile network operator...
s. A copy of Quake was also sold in 2001, labeled Ultimate Quake, which included the original Quake, Quake II, and Quake III Arena. In 2008 Quake was honored at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Award
Technology & Engineering Emmy Award
A Technology and Engineering Emmy Award is given by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for outstanding achievement in technical or engineering development...
s for advancing the art form of user modifiable games. John Carmack accepted the award. Years after its original release, Quake is still regarded by many critics as one of the greatest and most influential games ever made.
Sequels
After the departure of Romero, the remaining id employees chose to change the thematic direction substantially for Quake IIQuake II
Quake II, released on December 9, 1997, is a first-person shooter computer game developed by Id Software and distributed by Activision. It is not a sequel to Quake; it merely uses the name of the former game due to Id's difficulties in coming up with alternative names.The soundtrack for Quake II...
, making the design more technological and futuristic rather than Lovecraftian fantasy. Quake 4
Quake 4
Quake 4 is the fourth title in the series of Quake first-person shooter computer games. The game was developed by Raven Software and published by Activision. Raven Software has collaborated with id Software, the creators and historical developers of preceding Quake games...
followed the design themes of Quake II, whereas Quake III Arena mixed these styles, as it existed in a parallel continuity that housed several "id all-stars", from various games, as playable characters. The mixed settings occurred because Quake II originally began as a separate product line. Unfortunately, due to the failure to gain rights to the title they wanted, id designers were forced to fall back on the project's nickname of "Quake II." Since any sequel to the original Quake had already been refused, it became a viable way of continuing the series without actually continuing the storyline or setting of the first game. In June 2011, John Carmack made an offhand comment that id software was considering a remake to the "...mixed up Cthulhu-ish Quake 1 world and rebooting [in] that direction."
Expansions
There have been two official expansion packs for Quake. The expansions pick up right where the first game left off, use all the same weapons and powerups, monsters and gothic atmosphere/architecture and continue/finish the story of the first game and its protagonist. A third unofficial expansion pack, Final Mission: Abyss of Pandemonium, was developed by the Impel Development Team.Quake Mission Pack 1: Scourge of Armagon is the first official mission pack released on February 28, 1997. It was developed by Hipnotic Interactive. It features fifteen new single player missions, a new multiplayer arena, and gameplay features not originally found in Quake, including rotating structures and breakable walls. New enemies include Centroids, large cybernetic scorpions with nailguns, Gremlins, small goblins that can steal weapons and multiply by feeding on enemy corpses, and Spike Mines, floating orbs that detonate when near the player. New weapons include Mjolnir, a large lightning emitting hammer, a laser cannon, which shoots bouncing bolts of energy, and a Proximity Mine Launcher, which fires grenades that attach to surfaces and detonate when an opponent comes near. The storyline follows Armagon, a general of Quake's forces, planning to invade Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
via a portal known as the 'rift'. Armagon resembles a giant gremlin with cybernetic legs and a combined rocket launcher
Shoulder-launched missile weapon
A shoulder-fired missile, shoulder-launched missile or man-portable missile is a projectile fired at a target, small enough to be carried by a single person, and fired while held on one's shoulder...
/laser cannon for arms.
Quake Mission Pack 2: Dissolution of Eternity was the second official mission pack, released on March 31, 1997. Developed by Rogue Entertainment
Rogue Entertainment
-Rogue Entertainment Group, Inc.:Rogue Ent. is a record label group, music distribution company, graphics/web design firm, audio production/engineering firm, and promotion company based out of Richmond, Va...
, it featured sixteen new single player levels as well as several new enemies and bosses. New enemies included Electric Eels, Phantom Swordsmen, Multi-Grenade Ogres (which fire cluster grenades), Hell Spawn, Wrath (floating, robed undead), Guardians (resurrected ancient Egyptian warriors), Mummies, and statues of various enemies that come to life. The bosses were Lava Men, Overlords, large Wraths, and a dragon guarding the "temporal energy converter". Rather than offering new weapons, the mission pack gave the player new ammo for already existing weapons, such as "lava nails" for the Nailgun, cluster grenades, rockets that split into four in a horizontal line, plasma cells, and a grappling hook to help in moving around the map.
In late 1996, id Software released VQuake, a port of the Quake engine to support hardware accelerated rendering on graphics cards using Rendition Vérité chipset. Aside from the expected benefit of improved performance, VQuake offered numerous visual improvements over the original software-rendered Quake. It boasted full 16-bit color, bilinear filtering (reducing pixelation), improved dynamic lighting, optional anti-aliasing and even improved source code clarity, as the improved performance finally allowed the use of gotos to be abandoned in favor of proper loop constructs. As the name implied, VQuake was a proprietary port specifically for the Vérité; consumer 3D acceleration was in its infancy at the time, and there was no standard 3D API for the consumer market. After completing VQuake, John Carmack vowed never to write a proprietary port again, citing his frustration with Rendition's Speedy3D API.
To improve the quality of online play, id Software released QuakeWorld
QuakeWorld
QuakeWorld is an update to id Software's seminal multiplayer deathmatch game, Quake, that enhances the game's multiplayer features to allow people with dial-up modems to achieve greatly improved responsiveness when playing on Internet game servers...
on December 17, 1996, a build of Quake that featured significantly revamped network code including the addition of client-side prediction
Client-side prediction
Client-side prediction is a network programming technique used in video games intended to conceal negative effects of high latency connections...
. The original Quake network code would not show the player the results of his actions until the server sent back a reply acknowledging them. For example, if the player attempted to move forward, his client would send the request to move forward to the server, and the server would determine whether the client was actually able to move forward or if he ran into an obstacle, such as a wall or another player. The server would then respond to the client, and only then would the client display movement to the player. This was fine for play on a LAN—a high bandwidth, very low latency connection. But the latency over a dial-up Internet connection is much larger than on a LAN, and this caused a noticeable delay between when a player tried to act and when that action was visible on the screen. This made gameplay much more difficult, especially since the unpredictable nature of the Internet made the amount of delay vary from moment to moment. Players would experience jerky, laggy motion that sometimes felt like ice skating, where they would slide around with seemingly no ability to stop, due to a build-up of previously-sent movement requests. John Carmack has admitted that this was a serious problem which should have been fixed before release, but it was not caught because he and other developers had high-speed Internet access at home.
With the help of client-side prediction
Client-side prediction
Client-side prediction is a network programming technique used in video games intended to conceal negative effects of high latency connections...
, which allowed players to see their own movement immediately without waiting for a response from the server, QuakeWorld network code allowed players with high-latency connections to control their character's movement almost as precisely as when playing in single-player mode. The netcode parameters could be adjusted by the user, so that QuakeWorld performed well for users with high and low latency.
The tradeoff to client-side prediction was that sometimes other players or objects would no longer be quite where they had appeared to be, or, in extreme cases, that the player would be pulled back to a previous position when the client received a late reply from the server which overrode movement the client had already previewed; this was known as "warping". As a result, some serious players, particularly in the USA, still preferred to play online using the original Quake engine (commonly called NetQuake) rather than QuakeWorld. However, the majority of players, especially those on dial-up connections, preferred the newer network model, and QuakeWorld soon became the dominant form of online play. Following the success of QuakeWorld, client-side prediction has become a standard feature of nearly all real-time online games. As with all other Quake upgrades, QuakeWorld was released as a free, unsupported add-on to the game and was updated numerous times through 1998.
On January 22, 1997, id Software released GLQuake. This was designed to use the OpenGL
OpenGL
OpenGL is a standard specification defining a cross-language, cross-platform API for writing applications that produce 2D and 3D computer graphics. The interface consists of over 250 different function calls which can be used to draw complex three-dimensional scenes from simple primitives. OpenGL...
3D API
Application programming interface
An application programming interface is a source code based specification intended to be used as an interface by software components to communicate with each other...
to access hardware 3D graphics acceleration cards to rasterize the graphics, rather than having the computer's CPU fill in every pixel
Pixel
In digital imaging, a pixel, or pel, is a single point in a raster image, or the smallest addressable screen element in a display device; it is the smallest unit of picture that can be represented or controlled....
. In addition to higher framerates for most players, GLQuake provided higher resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...
modes and texture filtering
Texture filtering
In computer graphics, texture filtering or texture smoothing is the method used to determine the texture color for a texture mapped pixel, using the colors of nearby texels . Mathematically, texture filtering is a type of anti-aliasing, but it filters out high frequencies from the texture fill...
. GLQuake also experimented with reflections, transparent water, and even rudimentary shadows. GLQuake came with a driver
Device driver
In computing, a device driver or software driver is a computer program allowing higher-level computer programs to interact with a hardware device....
enabling the subset of OpenGL used by the game to function on the 3dfx
3dfx
3dfx Interactive was a company that specialized in the manufacturing of 3D graphics processing units and, later, graphics cards. It was a pioneer in the field for several years in the late 1990s until 2000 when it underwent one of the most high-profile demises in the history of the PC industry...
Voodoo Graphics card, the only consumer-level card at the time capable of running GLQuake well. Previously, John Carmack had experimented with a version of Quake specifically written for the Rendition Vérité chip used in the Creative Labs PCI 3D Blaster card. This version had met with only limited success, and Carmack decided to write for generic APIs in the future rather than tailoring for specific hardware.
On March 11, 1997, id Software released WinQuake, a version of the non-OpenGL engine designed to run under Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
; the original Quake had been written for DOS
DOS
DOS, short for "Disk Operating System", is an acronym for several closely related operating systems that dominated the IBM PC compatible market between 1981 and 1995, or until about 2000 if one includes the partially DOS-based Microsoft Windows versions 95, 98, and Millennium Edition.Related...
, allowing for launch from Windows 95
Windows 95
Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented graphical user interface-based operating system. It was released on August 24, 1995 by Microsoft, and was a significant progression from the company's previous Windows products...
, but could not run under Windows NT
Windows NT
Windows NT is a family of operating systems produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released in July 1993. It was a powerful high-level-language-based, processor-independent, multiprocessing, multiuser operating system with features comparable to Unix. It was intended to complement...
-based operating systems because it required direct access to hardware. WinQuake instead accessed hardware via Win32-based APIs such as DirectSound
DirectSound
DirectSound is a software component of the Microsoft DirectX library for the Windows operating system. DirectSound provides a low-latency interface to the sound card driver and can handle the mixing and recording of multiple audio streams....
, DirectInput
DirectInput
In computing, DirectInput is a Microsoft API for collecting input from a computer user, via input devices such as the mouse, keyboard, joystick or other game controllers. It also provides a system for action mapping, which allows the user to assign specific actions within a game to the buttons and...
, and DirectDraw
DirectDraw
DirectDraw is part of Microsoft's DirectX API. DirectDraw is used to render graphics in applications where top performance is important. DirectDraw also allows applications to run fullscreen or embedded in a window such as most other MS Windows applications. DirectDraw uses hardware acceleration if...
that were supported on Windows 95, Windows NT 4.0
Windows NT 4.0
Windows NT 4.0 is a preemptive, graphical and business-oriented operating system designed to work with either uniprocessor or symmetric multi-processor computers. It was the next release of Microsoft's Windows NT line of operating systems and was released to manufacturing on 31 July 1996...
and later releases. Like GLQuake, WinQuake also allowed higher resolution video modes. This removed the last barrier to widespread popularity of the game. In 1998, LBE Systems and Laser-Tron released Quake: Arcade Tournament Edition in the arcades in limited quantities.
Ports
A port for the Commodore Amiga was also made available in 1998 by clickBOOMClickBOOM
clickBOOM is a global design firm, founded in Canada in 1994. clickBOOM is best known for their ports of Quake and Myst for the Amiga computer during the late 90's....
Software. It is currently only available in a 68K
68k
The Motorola 680x0/m68000/68000 is a family of 32-bit CISC microprocessors. During the 1980s and early 1990s, they were popular in personal computers and workstations and were the primary competitors of Intel's x86 microprocessors...
version.
In 1996, there was a port of Quake to Linux by an id software employee working in his free time. It was not until 1999 that a retail version for Linux was distributed by Macmillan Digital Publishing USA
Macmillan Publishers (United States)
Macmillan Publishers USA, also known as Macmillan Publishing, is a privately held American publishing company owned by the Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than 30 others....
in a bundle with the two add-ons as Quake: The Offering for Linux. Finally, in 1997, the official port to Mac OS
Mac OS
Mac OS is a series of graphical user interface-based operating systems developed by Apple Inc. for their Macintosh line of computer systems. The Macintosh user experience is credited with popularizing the graphical user interface...
was done by MacSoft and a port of Quake to SPARC
SPARC
SPARC is a RISC instruction set architecture developed by Sun Microsystems and introduced in mid-1987....
Solaris was released.
Quake was also ported to console systems. In 1997, it was ported to Sega Saturn
Sega Saturn
The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...
by Lobotomy. The Saturn port used Lobotomy's own Slavedriver engine (the same engine that powers the Saturn ports of Duke Nukem 3D
Duke Nukem 3D
Duke Nukem 3D is a first-person shooter computer game developed by 3D Realms and published by GT Interactive Software. The full version was released for the PC . It is a sequel to the platform games Duke Nukem and Duke Nukem II published by Apogee...
and Powerslave) instead of the original Quake engine. It is the only version of Quake that is rated "T" for Teen instead of "M" for Mature. The Saturn version also contains four exclusive levels not seen in any other version. In 1998, Quake was brought to Nintendo 64
Nintendo 64
The , often referred to as N64, was Nintendo′s third home video game console for the international market. Named for its 64-bit CPU, it was released in June 1996 in Japan, September 1996 in North America, March 1997 in Europe and Australia, September 1997 in France and December 1997 in Brazil...
by Midway Games
Midway Games
Midway Games, Inc. is an American company that was formerly a major video game publisher. Following a bankruptcy filing in 2009, it is no longer active and is in the process of liquidating all of its assets. Midway's titles included Mortal Kombat, Ms.Pac-Man, Spy Hunter, Tron, Rampage, the...
. Both console ports required some compromises because of the limited CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...
power and ROM
Read-only memory
Read-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
storage space for maps. The Saturn version lacks multiplayer but has most of the maps from the original game, with only the secret levels (Ziggurat Vertigo (E1M8), The Underearth (E2M7), The Haunted Halls (E3M7) and The Nameless City (E4M8)) not making the cut. Instead, it has four new maps: Purgatorium, Hell's Aerie, The Coliseum and Watery Grave. The N64 version has multiplayer, but is missing The Grisly Grotto (E1M4), The Installation (E2M1), The Ebon Fortress (E2M4), The Wind Tunnels (E3M5), The Sewage System (E4M1) and Hell's Atrium (E4M5). It also does not use the "START" map where the player chooses difficulty and episode; difficulty is chosen when starting the game, and all the levels play in sequential order from The Slipgate Complex (E1M1) to Shub Niggurath's Pit (END).
Two ports of Quake for the Nintendo DS exist, QuakeDS and CQuake both run well however multiplayer does not work anymore for QuakeDS. Since the source code for Quake was released a number of unofficial ports were made available for PDA's and mobile phones, such as PocketQuake, as well as versions for the Symbian S60 series of mobile phones and Android mobile phones.
In 2005 id Software signed a deal with publisher Pulse Interactive to release a version of Quake for mobile phones. The game was engineered by Californian company Bear Naked Productions. Initially due to be released on only two mobile phones, the Samsung Nexus (for which it was to be an embedded game) and the LG VX360. Quake mobile was reviewed by Gamespot on the Samsung Nexus and they cite its US release as October 2005, they also gave it a Best Mobile Game" in their E3 2005 Editor's Choice Awards. It is unclear as to whether the game actually did ship with the Samsung Nexus. As of today the game is only available for the DELL x50v and x51v both of which are PDAs not mobile phones. Quake Mobile doesn’t feature the Nine Inch Nails soundtrack due to space constraints. Quake mobile runs the most recent version of GL Quake (Quake v.1.09 GL 1.00) at 800x600 resolution and 25 fps. The most recent version of Quake Mobile is v.1.20 which has stylus support, there was an earlier version v.1.19 which lacked stylus support. The two Quake expansion packs Scourge of Armagon and Dissolution of Eternity are also available for Quake Mobile. As of now the game is available for download at download.cnet.com as are both expansions.
External links
- id Software: Quake
- Quake: Scourge of Armagon at MobyGamesMobyGames-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...
- Quake: Dissolution of Eternity at MobyGamesMobyGames-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...