Unreal Tournament Retrospective Part 2

Unreal Tournament 2003

Some sequels are a wondrous continuation of a glorious first effort. Others turn out to be the biggest train wreck this side of Speed 2.

Unreal Tournament 2003 is thankfully closer to the former.

PROS: Almost everything you loved about UT bulked up.

CONS: Even steeper learning curve. No more Assault mode.

WTF?: Mmmmmiiiiiiiissssstttteeerrrr Crrroooooooooooooooowwwww!

UT2k3 added a lot of revisions to the standards set by UT. The first change was an entirely new run of character classes. Whereas UT featured mostly human characters, and a few Unreal Universe villains like The Skaarj, Nali, and Necris. UT2k3 put a more E-Sports spin on the Tournament story adding a wider cast of races. These included The Juggernauts, who resembled Warhammer 40k’s Space Marines. The Liandri Corporation’s AI Robots. The Nakhti, a group of humans in Ancient Egyptian garb. The Nightmare, a group of mutants, transhumans, and experiments gone awry, and The Gen Mo Kai, a group of reptoids.

Each of these races also had their own attributes. The Juggernauts for example could take a higher number of hits before dying than the other races. They also had a little bit more power behind their hits. But they were the slowest characters in the game. The Nakhti were a lot more acrobatic in their air jump animations making them harder to hit. They were also a little bit faster while sacrificing some resistance to weapons fire. The Liandri bots fell in between extremes, making them a popular choice. As were the Gen Mo Kai. The craziest faction were the Nightmare. To this day, Mr. Crow remains one of the most memorable things about UT2k3, and it’s follow-up UT2k4.

In addition to these attributes, UT2k3 also added a new mechanic called Adrenaline. Throughout a game your character would earn pills either by collecting them on the battlefield, or when killing an opponent. After collecting 100 of them players could tap four directions for super secret power moves:

Booster: This increased your health (So long as you’re not being shot) every second until you ran out of pills

Speed: This made you run faster

Berserk: This made your attacks temporarily more powerful.

Invisible: This made you cloak so that you were a lot harder to see.

The third change UT2k3 made was expanding upon the movement set by the original UT. Now not only could you dodge by double tapping directions, you could do wall dodges. By dodge tapping away from any wall, your character would kick off the wall. Players could also now double jump by pressing jump a second time. They could also combine double jumping with wall dodging for even greater mobility. Finally, there was the dodge jump. This move allowed one to jump after a dodge to do a great leap. Dodge jumping would be an imperative skill when trying to escape enemy shock combos.

Movement was vastly more complex here. Maps were also built a lot around the new system. Where UT used dodges to mix things up, the sequel made these advancements imperative. Because not only did they make players harder to get a bead on, they also allowed players to get around a lot faster.

Some of the movement, and adrenaline changes alienated some UT fans, keeping them playing the old game. There was also one omission that would cement that fact: Assault mode. Assault mode was one of the more popular modes from the original UT, and when gamers saw it had been replaced by Bombing Run ( An object carrying mode in which two teams would try to get said object into the opposing side’s goal) many players stayed with the original Unreal Tournament.

Bombing Run wasn’t a bad mode. It could be fun when played with two evenly matched teams. It was a cross between Football, and Capture The Flag. Some of the community really enjoyed bombing run, and preferred it to many of the other modes.  But ultimately it would prove the least popular mode in the game for die-hard fans of the original.

Other modes were the staple Deathmatch, and Team Deathmatch types. Also returning were Capture The Flag, along with Last Man Standing. UT2k3 also had Invasion, a mode that was essentially a horde defense game. In it players worked together against A.I. enemies. Finally there was Mutant, where one player had to fight everyone until he or she died, and his or her killer became the new Mutant.

Grievances aside, UT2k3 carved out a nice niche for itself, as people looking for a game with a lot of depth, and challenge would stick around. Graphically the game was a huge leap over UT, as there were huge environments, higher resolution textures, improved lighting, improved skyboxes, and all kinds of little touches. The changes to movement made the game more aerial, as people learned advanced movement would find, dodges, and jumps allowed for faster navigation along stages. UT2k3 also added rag doll physics, a newer convention at the time. Gone were the canned animation of headless combatants flailing around. Instead, rocket splash damage sent characters flying.

The weapons were also tweaked, and retooled. In addition to this, UT2k3 added a Lightning Gun that replaced the Sniper Rifle from UT. It too had a scope, for headshots. But it would fire a large arc of lightning that could be traced back to the point of origin. Unfortunately the saw blade shooting favorite doesn’t return here.

Customization was still a big part of Unreal Tournament in UT2k3. Players could change the typical resolution, texture, and geometry settings. They could change crosshairs for each weapon, their HUDs, and access console commands. As in Unreal Tournament, the game once again gave players access to all sorts of tools they could use to create their own maps, or mods. There were countless maps, mods, and even total conversions done as the game had gone from Unreal Engine to Unreal Engine 2.

Not only did the engine upgrade make for a very pretty Unreal Tournament game, it also gave its community of fans the ability to create a lot of great content. More than the original game.  Much of this content became so popular on servers, that it caught the eye of game developers everywhere.

Atari, and Epic had hoped this would mark the beginning of an annualized series. They had looked at Electronic Arts’ Madden series, as well as THQ’s wrestling games at the time, and thought they could do for  shooters what those games did with sports, and sports entertainment. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the game’s story. UT games tend to put in a single player training ladder to get players used to the various modes. During these tutorials, UT2k3 featured a lot of in-game engine cut scenes. All heavily inspired by pro wrestling. From the Titantron videos, to the custom entrances, to heckling fans you’ll see it all here.

For a host of reasons this idea of annual Unreal Tournament never came to pass.

With it’s improved graphics, physics, and new gameplay conventions UT2003 was an awesome addition to the Unreal Tournament series. however it wasn’t without its flaws. It had dropped a very popular mode fans of the original loved, and it’s requirements at the time were high enough to keep some players from adopting early.  Overall, though the wide variety of characters, the advanced movement, and additions to the gameplay made for an ambitious sequel. However, as good as the game was upon release it’s hard to recommend because of a certain little follow-up. You see Unreal Tournament 2004 would include everything in Unreal Tournament 2003, and more.

Final Rating: Try it out! 6.5/10 (If you can find it.)

 

Unreal Tournament Retrospective Part 1

Unreal became a household name back in 1998 when it challenged Quake II, Half-Life, and SiN for the First Person Shooter crown. It had a solid storyline for a blockbuster game. It had a cool universe of its own, with numerous races, and factions. But most importantly, it had one of the better multiplayer death match modes anyone had seen.

Unreal, and Quake II’s multiplayer modes became so popular in fact, they exceeded the popularity of the campaigns. So iD would follow-up Quake II with Quake III Arena. Q3A was an entirely multiplayer affair. It was fast. It was frantic. It became an instant hit with competitive gamers everywhere.

While this was going on, Epic realized while creating Unreal’s multiplayer focused expansion pack that it was now advanced enough it could be its own game.

Unreal Tournament

The first in a line of one of gaming’s most popular arena shooters. This is where it all began.

PROS: Customization. Variety. Mod tools. Everything.

CONS: Graphics haven’t aged well.

HOLY WMD BATMAN: The Redeemer.

Unreal Tournament takes place in the same universe as Unreal. In it, the New Earth Government, partners with Liandri corporation to devise a bloody gladiator sport with characters representing each of the races in the Unreal mythos. As such you get to choose from a bunch of races, and characters to use.

Unreal Tournament is a vintage game that holds up very well for both original fans, as well as newcomers who missed it. UT was, and is novel because instead of simply copying Quake III’s “Faster! Faster! Faster!” philosophy it instead blazes its own trail. How does it differentiate itself from the competition?

The first observation a new player would note is the weapons. Instead of a standard hand gun, shotgun, machine gun, rail gun, and rocket launcher along with laser or plasma guns UT mixes things up.

Unreal Tournament does have some stock weapons in it, but even those are set apart by their alternate firing modes. Pistols can be fired gangsta style. The minigun can have faster spins with less accuracy but more power, or standard spins with less power but more accuracy. Rockets can lock on to targets.

UT does feature a sniper rifle too. But don’t go into it thinking it is going to be an easy job getting headshots from afar. Because of the frantic nature of the game staying in one spot camping away is usually a bad strategy. It’s only a matter of time before you’re spotted, and taken down.

Science fiction themed weapons get outright bizarre. The shock rifle can shoot slow-moving orbs with its secondary function, that can then be shot with its primary function causing it to explode taking out enemies in its wake.

The flak  cannon can fire shrapnel or grenades. The biorifle can either pepper an area with green sludge or slowly charge a single shot that will kill many combatants in one hit. This also fires on a slow arc, so it takes time to master.

The ripper is easily the most sadistic gun in the game. Firing giant buzz saws, players unfortunate enough to be hit in the neck will be decapitated. Moreover, the blades ricochet off of walls. So really skilled players can use that knowledge to rack up frag counts. The secondary fire won’t decapitate. But it does have farther knock back.

The redeemer is the showcase weapon. Firing the primary shot launches a nuclear missile. Firing the secondary shot lets players remotely control that missile, driving it into a crowd of potential victims.

If you do run out of ammo UT has you covered with the impact hammer. It’s essentially a jack hammer you can use to explode enemies, or boost jump at the cost of some damage.

But weapons are only a small part of the equation. The biggest contribution Unreal Tournament makes is the ability to dodge. Unreal Tournament allows you to double tap any direction to do a sidestep or a roll. This becomes key when playing because in a full game, there will be projectiles flying around everywhere.

Dodges can also get you moving down hallways faster than running in some cases. Making movement a really big reason why many still play UT to this day.

Unreal Tournament has a few modes that are staples today. There are of course the typical Death match, and Team Death match modes. These work the way they do in every other shooter, players or teams trying to get in more kills than the opponent until either the kill limit is reached or the time runs out. Last Man Standing also appears with every player fighting until only one remains.

Assault is one of Unreal Tournament’s modes that set it apart upon release. This mode has an attacking, and defending team with the attackers setting up targets to be destroyed. This has been adapted, and retooled in a number of other games. But it was here it really came into its own.

Domination is another mode that has been retooled by other games. In it teams try to hold control points on the map for as long as possible. The more points held, the higher the score becomes. This leads to skirmishes around the points as teams rally to increase their scores before the time expires.

Capture The Flag is also here, and while UT didn’t invent the mode, it is one of the most popular series to play that mode in. This is because of some spectacular map design.

In fact map design is so memorable that many of them reappear in sequels as well as many fan made mods for other games.  Maps like Deck 16, Fractal, and Face are prime examples of the games’ glory.

The music is also very memorable. Tracks like Go Down will never be forgotten by the fans of this series for a reason. The soundtrack is full of electronica crafted for the environments throughout the maps. It matches the tone of Unreal nicely.

While the blocky visuals, and lower quality textures won’t wow you the way they wowed audiences in 1998 the customization options just might. Over the years a lot of PC games have really watered down the options. These days you can turn on or off certain visual effects, set detail levels, set your resolution, and whether or not you want to have v-sync enabled.

UT takes it further. You can change every one of those options as well as fine tune your HUD, crosshairs (You can give each weapon its own) as well as a bunch of other under the hood options. You can also punch in engine commands by pulling down the console. It’s sad to see in retrospect how much tinkerers no longer have the ability to tweak without going into a buried .ini file somewhere in a directory.

Unreal Tournament (and its successors) also gives you the tools you need to make your own stages, mods, and other user content. That’s on top of the 16 years of community mods you can still find today.

Going back to Unreal Tournament now will give you mixed emotions. On the one hand the old visuals aren’t going to wow you at all. On the other hand the tight gameplay, advanced movement, and reflex requirement will make you wonder why such a fun, and rewarding style had to fade out.

Still, even 16 years after its release, Unreal Tournament has a small but devoted group of people still firing it up. Do check it out if you have even the slightest interest in video game history.

Final Score: 8 out of 10