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GVMERS: 'The Rise and Fall of Unreal Tournament'

Thick Thighs Save Lives

NeoGAF's Physical Games Advocate Extraordinaire
Wolfenstein 3D, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake. These seminal games rest at the forefront of the first-person shooter genre. All were instrumental to the genre’s birth and subsequent growth in one way or another. Although, there does exist one title of consequence that too often goes without mention—Epic’s Unreal.

In recent years, Unreal has exclusively been associated with the game engine of the same name. As such, its roots are either forgotten or wholly unknown to younger generations of gamers. But long before Epic began showcasing demos of its graphics engines on console hardware, the studio’s original group of staffers dreamt of creating the premier PC gaming engine and FPS experience. The crew achieved this and more upon unleashing Unreal and the Unreal Engine in 1998.
Unreal began as a serviceable shooter powered by inventive technology, but held back by lackluster network offerings. A spinoff in the form of Unreal Tournament saw the series blossom into a tour de force competitive shooter, whose DNA remains scattered across modernity’s popular multiplayer adventures. And yet there were instances where it appeared Epic had lost track of Unreal’s roots, as the series lapsed into a ghost of its former self that followed the herd instead of leading as destined.
 

RagnarokIV

Battlebus imprisoning me \m/ >.< \m/
unreal-tournament_1.jpg


One of the next PC games ever.



 
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Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
I really miss this version of Epic. Obviously, they've found what works for them now, but it's hard to explain to someone who hasn't played UT before just how damn good those games were. They still play incredibly well - the movement feel and weapons are perfect. I miss that era of shooters that were completely rewarding of individual player skill.

UTIII was obviously where things started to fall apart a bit, but I still thought it was super fun - I'd be more than happy to revisit that if it got a GOG re-release or something. Even so, I still go back to UT2K4 every now and then and it's like no time has passed at all.
 

MayauMiao

Member
I hope the next one will be GVMERS covering Concord. That game's failure deserve equal standing with Atari's E.T. in terms of disaster, if not surpass it.
 

sono

Gold Member
This franchise has an incredibly rich and long history

The video missed you can still play UT4 online today because there is a community, they have leagues, custom maps, discord channels and host gameplay servers


You also need hubtools



Hub tools details:

**DOWNLOAD**: https://github.com/dcramps/HubTools/releases/download/v1/HubTools.zip

**INSTALL**: Navigate to your UT4 install directory and drag the contents of the zip (aka the HubTools folder from inside the zip file, not the contents of the HubTools folder inside the zip file) to

*Epic Games/UnrealTournament/UnrealTournament/Plugins*

**NOT YOUR PAKS DIRECTORY**

**THE GAME MUST NOT BE RUNNING DURING INSTALL**

**FAQ**

What if I don't install it?

-You will be auto kicked from the server

What if I don't download the mutator?

-You will be auto kicked from the server

Why do I have to install this manually?

-It is not possible to send plugins to clients via redirect
 
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The late 90's was an incredible time to experience as a PC gamer, when online multiplayer evolved, became more competitive and attracted more players. I used to nerd out hard playing SC and UT at LAN parties, cause OMG no latency.
As a big UT fan, I even preferred playing Tactical Ops over Counter-Strike.
I will say though, QuakeWorld definitely laid the groundwork, where UT went all out with CTF and Valve/HL went all out with Team Fortress. I don't think it's mentioned in the video (only skimmed through).

As for UT4. I played it and it felt like a half-assed effort, like a hobby side project, where the plug was pulled too soon. I remember playing the early, original version of Fortnite (before it turned into a BR) and was like did UT4 really die for this?
 
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I preferred Quake 2/3 over UT but still played it a shit load with friends that preferred UT. God damn miss those days. Quake, UT, Tribes. Never been the same.
 

mdkirby

Member
Loved unreal tournament back in the day. But what I miss more, particularly as I don’t really play multiplayer these days is just unreal, the single player fps. It was a pretty unique and interesting universe that would be great to see a return to.
 
UT99 was the first online game I really sank my teeth into. The sense of community was amazing, haven't felt that way about online gaming since. We used to hang out and chat in low grav instagib servers.
 

JohnnyFootball

GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
I honestly found this video to be uninteresting and disappointing. Unreal was one of my favorite games in the early PC days.

Unreal Tournament 99 and Unreal need a Nightdive re-release.
 
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