Stryfe-Recap of UT3 @ Digital Life

[kAoS-Rage]

Well, since I've been asked more times then I can count to cough up info about the game, I figured I would just make a post and shove everything into it.


The Setup:
First of all, this was not Epic or Midway or anyone that has anything to do with Unreal Tournament displaying the game. This was Dell, showing off their laptops that contained Ageia's mobile PhysX card's. To further show off what their cards "can do" they made this custom map called "CTF-Tornado" that came with destructible environments.

This map will not be in UT3, there will be no destructible environments in the game, and all this stuff was strictly for Ageia. However I was told that all the weapons speeds/damage rates, run speeds, physics of the characters themselves etc were all untouched.

There were two laptops that only ran this map, you could play each other with some bots throw into the fray. The GFX were all at max, and as a result their "monstrous" cards ran it at a cool sub 30 FPS....so it was hard to do much of anything. This alone may sway my opinions of the game so take all of what I write with a grain of salt, this is all based strictly on what I played hands on at this booth.


The Movement:
Right off the bat you will feel the movement is "heavy". And by that I mean there is like double gravity compared to UT2k4's movement. It feels heavier then UT99 also. The only way I can describe it right now is Quake 4 out of the box with dodging. Everything is stiff, yet crisp and precise.

The run speed is faster then any UT I've played, I guess they had to make up for the removal of dodge jumping. You can get across maps pretty fast, even though the delay between doing one dodge after another seems to have increased by a tiny amount.

Double Jumps - Yes, but you do not go nearly as high as you did in 2k4. You also fall down a lot faster. (again, "heavy")
Wall Dodges - Yes
Dodge Jumping - No


The Weapons:
Impact Hammer - It looks like a British bondage queens sex toy of choice but is pretty much the same old thing from UT99. I managed to kill someone with a full charge and it did seem accurate compared to the complete random crap from 2k4.

Primary - Full charge, release for blast
Secondary - Small puffs of damage continuing


Enforcers - Very different then UT99, and pretty much any starting gun I've ever seen. It does a lot more damage then the AR does in 2k4, so I guess damage wise it is comparable to UT99's, but more accurate.

Primary - Slow single shots
Secondary - 3 Shot burst fire
Guns Akimbo - Yes


Bio Rifle - This thing is an absolute unbalanced monster right now. Primary fire is fast shots of goo like every other game. However, the secondary charge is just insanity. You charge a giant glob as always and release it, but the thing stays in place for a good 25-30 seconds now without exploding. When it does explode it does some unbelievable amount of damage. For example, I was 199 HP w/ a helmet, I was about 1 dodge away from a load on the ground, it exploded and completely killed me. I can't imagine what it's damage is if you actually walk on top of it. You can literally just throw the thing on top of an armor and it will act like a sticky bomb for half a minute, your enemy runs over it and dies. Needs changing for sure...

Primary - Fast goo shots continuing
Secondary - Charge up for bigger amounts of goo


Shock Rifle - Everyone is going to like this one. The primary beam is a bit wider it seems then the other games, but much slower then UT2k4's newnet rape shit. The ball is faster, and the combo explosion is bigger. The damage seems to be the same, about 45hp per primary hit but don't quote me on it. The combo damage is definitely increased, but I wouldn't know by how much.

Primary - Slower yet wider beam
Secondary - Faster ball
Combo - Bigger, stronger


Link Gun - By far the most improved gun out of everything. This thing got a much needed make over and even the quakers are going to love this thing. It's primary is small like a Q3 plasma rifle, and it's secondary is almost exactly like a Q3 lightning gun. The beam stays straight and doesn't bend like some ghostbusters ectobeam. When you hit an enemey with secondary they completely light up like a christmas tree, making it very easy to track them with it. That mixed with the heavier movement is going to make this gun used more then LG was in 2k4.

Primary - Very fast, but smaller (then 2k4's) projectiles
Secondary - Link beam that's actually possible to use as a gun to start a fight off with and finish it without switching


Stinger - This thing is supposed to be our new minigun but it's nowhere near as useful as anything we've been given in U1, UT99 or 2k3/4. The primary is the faster mode for it, but it's still way to slow. The secondary is like a shotgun blast of multiple shards (like U1's stinger) but doesn't seem to do much of anything. The link will definitely replace this as a "finishing" weapon.

Primary - Slow continual shards
Secondary - Shotgun style blast of multiple shards


Flak Cannon - Seems to be following nicely with the updated games, looks wise at least. The primary is a lot more accurate then anything we've gotten, the shards seem to concentrate where you shoot them rather then bouncing around randomly everywhere. The secondary though, has like no arch to it. It, much like the movement, just kind of "falls". It is also the size of a damn beach ball, much like we saw in the Comic Con videos. It's as damaging as always, maybe a bit more, I didn't get many shots in with it. The splash damage is definitely less though, but I guess it's size makes up for it.

Primary - Accurate/focused shotgun style blast of shards
Secondary - Much bigger, more gravity, less arch flak ball with less splash damage then earlier games.


Rocket Launcher - Doesn't seem to be much changed here. UT's rockets have never been like Quake's, and they never will I'm sure. They did not seem sped up to me compared to 2k4, but if they are it must be miniscule. The secondary was a charge of 3 rockets or less and I saw no way of firing grenades out of the thing. Sho was spectating someone else using them, so I guess they are in the weapon but you don't fire them with secondary or both buttons together. Damage seems unchanged, but again, it was to hard to tell.

Primary - Single rockets, bit faster then 2k4
Secondary - 3 Rockets max charge
Primary + Secondary - Rocket spiral
??????? - Grenades


Sniper Rifle - Flat out, 2k4's will hate it, and UT99 players will be alright with it, I don't see anyone loving it. It's speed is somewhere in between UT99 and 2k4, with it being faster then 2k4 and slower then 99 by about equal amounts. The choppy-ness of the set up made it impossible to hit anything so I don't know about damage. I took a few shots and noticed I kept getting dropped to 30 HP so I guess it does 70. It does have a tracer, but I still couldn't tell where in the hell I was getting hit from.

Primary - Average speed, same damage as 2k4
Secondary - Zoom, nothing special


The Armor System:
Helmet - +20
Thigh Pads - +30 (I think...)
Vest - +50
Shield Belt - +100, but acts as a second health bar

Playing CTF on some god awful map is hard to make judgement in a real environment of the game but I can see a few flaws in the way armor is set up. We all know about the helmet imbalance, but for those who dont:

Helmet = 20 hp of armor, but it completely blocks a single headshot and then you lose it. The problem with this is, you take zero damage. So, for example, if you have LG, with amp and you hit a head shot, that should = 280 damage. If the player has a helmet, it turns into 0. Definite problem, and I don't see it being used in 1v1.

With a keg and shield belt you technically have 299HP, and then with the other armors thats another 100. I couldn't pick up the same armor twice, so I guess you can't stack them on top of each other like that but it already seems excessive without that. Something has to be re-arranged with the armor system for 1v1/TDM and it looks like removal of the shieldbelt would be the best thing if the others have to stay.


The Skins:
The videos do make them look bright, but again, due to the set up it may be forcing me to say that they flat out suck. Yes they are better then 2k4's of course, but they just look like a blur when running past you. I knew all the bot patterns and just watched them run around and I could not track them with my eyes yet alone with my hands to shoot them. Rockets looked like they were flying out of the shadows and snipers were coming from god knows where. The only time I could see anyone was when they had a giant flag on their back. Brightskins will be needed within the first 15 minutes of installing.



All in all I think in it's current state at this booth the game was completely lack luster. However, the real game itself will definitely be different and feel like it should. Can UT3 be the next big thing? Yes. Will it be better then 99 and 2k4? That's relative. Can it be used in competitive play all around the world? It better damn well be.

[gämmö]

Nice review....

I doubt the game will ship with all the armour and weapon imbalances, thou......

I think Epic will tweak it just right between the demo and the game going Gold.

Now as far as I can tell from this review, this is what I think, will happen;


The game is no longer the HARDCORE FPS that any of it's predecsors were. This is heading in the Massive Multiplayer genre, and FPS is just going to be the format, not it's definition.  In other words, it looks like the game has moved away from twicth monkey responses to n00bydoom responses. Been good with a few weapons ain't going to cut it, this is going to require much more 'team' and much less on l337 individual skill.

Well that's more towards the new gametypes, then the classic ffa or 1v1, honestly I think the new weapons balances will totally throw the Ut4  style of play out the window. You're going to see much slower, harder games, were the scores are going to be much closer then Ut4.  (Wich I think, is exactly what epic wants).

The armour is a worry, I never thought they would take the shield out and put EXTRA armour in. See using the shield is tricky, takes a bit of skill... picking up armour is a piece of piss. Again this is a  n00b feature introduced, and like Stryfe says, unless fixed, it's going to fuck it up.

Brightskins, yeah i said that from the very first Ut3 screenshot I saw. Look good, but totally impractical.

Strickly by what he's saying, I think the weapons that will dominate will be:

THE FLAK!
THE GOO
THE SHOCK
THE LINK
THE ROX

In that order. Hit scanning is well and truly dead.

It's going to be a flakamania nightmare. (Personally I lik that, Flak is my second wep of chooice, so I'm kool with that. But it's been target assisted, by concentrating the shoot and making more accurate. The current version, requires a degree of skill to get one shoot kills with the primary up close. New version is going to be easier to use, I think, if it's easier to aim with it.

I like the shock specs, the current primary fire rate is a fucking cataclysmic load of BS!!!!!!! A total spawn raper. Bigger shock balls... man.. what a mess there going to make... fuck.....

The GOO is a real worry thou.. shit it's like a spider mine almost.. drop it  and it will sit there for ages.... man... can you just image the spawn raping going down with that?

Kill the opponent, straight away drop a bit of GOO on the nearest weapons to their spawn point... and man there totally naked and can't pick the wep up.. sitting duck.    Not good.  You could almost use it to force the opponent into were you want them.....

The Stinger, is just a spam gun, period. A  n00bs best friend and I see it becoming a real pain in the arse...

Rox, 2k's best friend, is going to become his trademark, ffs..... God he will want an online marriage ceremony... mark my words, the Rox are going to be a major spamm tool, particulary with the new grenades feature..... 2k wil bore us to death with this one, yuo watch.....

mmmmmmmmm  Really upset at the way they fucked up the LG, quite frankly Epic fucked up there, totally fucked up.  The LG right now is pretty well balanced and it's not the utimate camping wep, cause it's so hard to get a heady with it and the low damage ratio, combined with the recharge speed.

Look at it this way;  I fucking use the LG, like a crak hoe... and all bs aside I'm pretty damm good with it at getting headys.... over 4,000 of them in the last few years.... so why  ain't I the worlds greatest player?  Well cause apart from the flak, I sux with all other weps!

Cause the LG alone is useless, you need to round it off with a few other weps, to have an  effective attack/defence.

So why fuck with it?  Seriously there are more unbalanced weps in Ut4, then the LG, I think Epic have made a big mistake, they kill off one of the most unique and awesome weapons in the video game industry and replace it with a run of the mill, everyday sniper rifle....

Well overall, i'm  starting to get a bit worried, this is not going to be very familiar to us at all. it almost feels like a skill downgrade... not sure what that means, but I like he way in Ut4 you can play out of the box within 5 minutes of purchasing the game, but it will take real dedication to 'master' the game. No matter how many times you play, you always improve, but if you don't keep at it, you get worse. No matter how good you think you are, you always find someone that floors you with their skill.  

Ut3, better not loose that dynamic. But I think it might, cause if you n00b down everything, remove skill levels for mass player access, you get a flat playing ground, were it's easy to get a kill and you can be lazy about it, cause the weapons are so generic, that anyone can use them to their full potential, without much practice or effort, cause, they are easy to use.

But on the brightside, that might mean that Ut3 could be the next 'big' thing and spawn a huge community for years to come.

At the end of the day, it makes no difference, cause within weeks of the game going retail, there will be a bag full of Mods, that will turn the game into any Ut version you want. The prob is, wich one is going to stick? I think the Ut4 community will be divided over this game much more then when Ut4 replaced Ut2k3 and it's going to get confusing, the more competetive players might want more 'hardcore' elements, back in, but the majority of weekend warriors, just want to log on and have some fun... wich means getting a few kills and not totally raped....

Only thing that might solidify this, is if the new gametypes are totally awesome... then no one, but me and my trusty old LG, is going to give a shit about the past......

And yes, soon it will be called Unreal Quake Tournament.

[kAoS-Wakko]

Without reading the whole posts, I have seen the GOO mine/mess on teh floor can be shot to destroy it, so that gets rid of that problem.

I might be wrong, someone try it.

More later.