The demise of classic deathmatch MP

Curio

Curio

Curio

Soldato
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It's very sad.

http://archive.gamespy.com/stats/

Half-Life2 (CS): 38397 players
BF2: 20723 players
Quake4: 199 players :rolleyes:

Why have the classic DM style shooters died such a spectacular death? I mean, I understand that the more "realistic" squad-based games are popular these days, sure, but I can't believe how few people play Quake or UT now. I could understand CS/BF2 being, say, twice as popular....maybe even 3x.....but how can they be sooooo far ahead in terms of number of players and servers :confused: I just don't understand.

I love Q4 multiplayer but I'm sitting here in absolute frustration because there is just nobody playing. It makes no sense. Surely the pure and simple deathmatch style still has a place? :(
 
imo these new games are really dumb'ed down there a lot slower and you arent watching timers for the quad reswaps, theres no rocket jumping/bunny hopping :( and anytime you work out a bug to speed it up its quickly patched out. Also Q4 was really poor imo i got banned from 3 servers for "camping" the flag in ctf :/ the good old days have been replaced with 12 yr out cs players :)
 
Well firstly, it's that quad-based games are by their nature a lot easier for beginners to get into, and have a much less steeper learning curve than throwing yourself in against other deathmatchers and getting constantly owned.

Secondly, there hasn't been a decent deathmatch FPS since Quake3 and Unreal Tournament quite frankly. Quake 4 has rubbish MP (and why you took that as evidence for your point instead of UT 2004, Q3, or SOF2 on that list I'm not sure), and no new FPS seems interested in trying to tackle the DM area, just like they don't seem interested in doing anything other than 'realistic' single-player FPS games these days. Without sounding ranty, the realism and graphics crowd have pushed FPS makers in this direction with their constant calls for shinier guns and greener trees. The UT series is pretty much the only game left not doing this, and even they conceded a bit between the original and 2003, by toning the physics and movement down.

A top-quality FPS game, imo, needs to be fast-paced (or fairly fast at least), unrealistic (large jumping, fast movement), smooth (decent scalable engine), and with little extraneous graphical additions as possible (no mass amounts of grass and other needless fluff please).

But so few people would accept a game like that if it came out. They'd be all "OMG the graphics aren't as good as FEAR/HL2/Crysis/current game of the moment, that makes it rubbish!", or "Oh it's so difficult, I keep dying, I give up". or "lol, everyone knows you can't make laser guns, and it's impossible to jump large distances like this in real-life. This game is unrealistic, and therefore stupid and rubbish!"
 
I think Quake 4 multiplayer is fantastic, and for the most part it feels and plays like Quake 3 Arena, meaning I own at it :p. Problem is, too many people have gone over to different games, as they grew tired of the same old system, so you've got a lot more UT players out there playing with that deathmatch style, but team based and all that.

I was hoping for Quake 4 to revive the old simple deathmatch system. It hasn't, but I'm not really that suprised.
 
Its not really sad, DM is boring now, it's had its day.

Yeah we all have fond memories of Quake, but if you go play it now, you'd be bored after 30 mins. Just like all good games, they are best left to memories.
 
DaveyD said:
I was hoping for Quake 4 to revive the old simple deathmatch system. It hasn't, but I'm not really that suprised.
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I think this is because people are far too keen to nit pick holes in a game now-a-days. People's standards are way too high, and this is constantly shown by when a new game is released, everyone immediately says it's "over-hyped". Quake 4 is a good multiplayer game; the only reason people don't like it, is because it isn't Quake 2/3.

A mon avis, ofcourse :]

-RaZ
 
Weebull said:
Well firstly, it's that quad-based games are by their nature a lot easier for beginners to get into, and have a much less steeper learning curve than throwing yourself in against other deathmatchers and getting constantly owned.
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Yes, that's very true. But do some people not want a challenge? When I first started playing Quake2 there were already some amazing players around and I remember getting smacked around all over the place. Did I give up? No - I thought "wow. I wanna be that good too!". Shame I never was :p

Secondly, there hasn't been a decent deathmatch FPS since Quake3 and Unreal Tournament quite frankly. Quake 4 has rubbish MP (and why you took that as evidence for your point instead of UT 2004, Q3, or SOF2 on that list I'm not sure)
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That I don't agree with and it's one of the reasons I get frustrated with the lack of players on Q4. Quake2/3/4 are pretty much the same game....there are slight differences of course, but there's no reason at all why Quake players can't move along with the series. The same happened when Q3A came out - most of the people I played Q2 with moaned because, well, it wasn't a 100% remake of Q2. And now it's the same story with Q4. I found it very easy to move from one to the other - and really enjoyed the challenge of mastering the slight differences.

But so few people would accept a game like that if it came out. They'd be all "OMG the graphics aren't as good as FEAR/HL2/Crysis/current game of the moment, that makes it rubbish!", or "Oh it's so difficult, I keep dying, I give up". or "lol, everyone knows you can't make laser guns, and it's impossible to jump large distances like this in real-life. This game is unrealistic, and therefore stupid and rubbish!"
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Again, sadly true I guess.
 
Valve are also releasing (at some point) TFC2 are they not.

I dunno what it is about DM style games but i just get bored of them after a while.
 
Get Call of duty 2.. it may sound stupid, but on dm its absolutely mental..

Also, UT2003 still has a few servers, as does Ut2004 (lots) They're kinda similar.
 
Last time I checked the ingame server browser on UT it had about ~3500 players. Probably more with modded versions of the game, because these dont show up on the built in browser.
 
Personally I think DM/TDM just sucks anyway, allways been more a CTF player :D

Sadly I agree though, I do long for the matches past of UT '99 CTF & Assault, UT2003/4 just plain sucked, lost the magic of UT '99 somehow.

I am a realistic gamer, coming from many many Operation: Flashpoint coop and CTI games, but games that are trying to be fast paced just seem to fall short of the mark nowadays.
 
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