UT3 is the best of the series

[Plutonia_Experi]

In this topic I'd like to express my views about how and why I consider UT3 to be absolutely the best UT game so far.

I started playing the UT series since about 2000, I played extensively UT, UT2003 and UT2004 - I also downloaded a lot of custom content (I'm talking about hundreds and hundreds of maps). Each one of these games has been my favourite when it was its time (yes even UT2003).
This little introduction is to tell that yes, me too have personal memories and a childhood bound to UT, and that no, I don't praise UT3 because it has a better graphic.

So, here's some of points of why UT3 is superior to its predecessors:


- Weapon balance UT3 weapons are the best balanced so far. Never had a game where there is no dominance of a single weapon. Each weapon is different and has it's use, each weapon is lethal in its own way.
UT2004 had dominance of hitscan (or we'd better say, shock rifle) and all the floating pigeons and huge mapscale rendered the non-hitscan pretty much useless.
And don't let me started with UT, because its weapon balance was a complete crap (e.g. shock rifle primary that delivers 60hp, who needs sniper rifle? Ah sorry, you need sniper rifle because it shoots faster LOL - biorifle useless - ripper was good only to spam, with headshots included -flack didn't allow for a good bouncing hit - pulse gun (for the new players, that is the predecessor of the link gun) had the exact same use of the minigun - etc.)


- Feeling of power Ah, never felt so powerful in any FPS so far. You have the feeling that you have a real instrument of death in your hand, that you can destroy everybody - providing you can shoot well. In no game like UT3 the weapons are so deadly, and yet, there's large room to avoid the enemy fire. They did a miracle IMO: putting together a great deadly arsenal, but still offering great possibilities for good players to avoid being killed.
Sure it doesn't have the reward for the abilities like in UT2004, as now a n00b can get a kill once in a while, but hey, it's a game and it's supposed to be fun. If I wanted a 100% competitive game I'd go playing chess.


- movement system Oh finally I don't have to shoot down flying pigeons anymore! Finally jumping does not mean instant death and finally you can actually kill someone with a non-hitscan. The scale of the map is more realistic and a great fun to play - no more ant-like players.
Removal of the dodge-jump (something I really frowned upon at the beginning) makes the fight a pure "in your face" action, no easy escape. On the other hand, the smaller map scale allows great uses for the wall-jump. In UT2004 it was pretty much useless, now the wall-jump is great both in a fighting action and to navigate the map (e.g. Reflection, Coret, etc.).


- item whoring Finally it counts less. With more powerful weapons it's a little less relevant who gets the 100hp armor. In UT2004 with the nerfed weapons was pretty much impossible to kill someone who just geared up with items, the 1on1 were really frustrating.


- gametypes yes, take your Assault, your Domination, your BR...and give me vCTF any day. Assault was never played online on UT2004 (sure it wasn't the right game for it, perhaps it would be better in UT3), and the other gametypes were simply disregarded. vCTF is a great fun, just look at the players online. I know that vCTF was introduced by UT2004, but the lack of stock maps made it unplayable online.
WAR is really more interesting than ONS. I miss huge maps to travel in (like Dria), but new objectives, barricades, countdown nodes, new strategies really make it all more fun to play. No more boring shoot node-touch node - link node for the whole match. Orb was a great idea, 'nuff said.


- heroism Finally a game where, in addition to teamwork, good performance of a single player can really turn the tide of a battle. Mixing firepower (that allows to take out a lot of opponents quickly in CTF), powerful vehicles, and orb, the game leaves room for great actions from solitary players. It's so satisfying when you do a cap by yourself, or destroy the heavily defended node by yourself in a BR fashion. This wasn't possible in the previous games.


- vehicles Not only they are 16 (sixteen) they are all perfectly balanced. They work as rock-paper-scissors, requiring for teamwork (in addition to the above point). Besides some rarely used one (cicada, paladin), they are all really useful in the actual combat and a great fun to play.
Let's face it, in UT2004 you took the scorpion or the hellbender only to travel the map. Now these 2 vehicles are so deadly in their own way, that you can actually find yourself choosing them.
Also I love how they are all powerful, how they can crush easily a foot player that forgot to take the Avril. In UT2004 it was a joke, you just got hit by the shock rifle and your vehicle was thrown away as it was made of paper. You were stronger on foot than in a vehicle (except for the manta that could do a massacre).


- maps They might be less, but the overall quality is really superior to the previous games. In UT2004 they just loaded up trash, proof was that online there were only 2 DM maps played (rankin, deck).


- style This could be a personal matter, but I love the UT3 style. The Necris style in particular, it looks so cool, so realistic, and so original. Just take a look at e.g. Floodgate or Sanctuary, how can you not like this Sci-Fi/Alien style, with tentacles and statues?



Oh well, that's a long read and I should have worked on my essay instead :P
But I'm so sick of hearing "if UT3 had x, y, z, etc. it would be just as good as UT", or "UT3 for the look, UT2004 for the gameplay".
Seriously, I don't understand why people keep sucking the other games cock so badly. UT3, in spite of its flaws, is the best game we ever got.
And the massive whining it got, it's because people realized its potential and didn't want to let it go.

UT3 über alles

[jomi294]

I love UT3 too<3.

[UBerserker]

Agree on all of that, especially with this.

Originally Posted by Plutonia_Experi

And the massive whining it got, it's because people realized its potential and didn't want to let it go.

Eff yes (assuming it's really that way).

To be honest, now that UT3 2.0 completely convinced me of how it's great, I'm only keeping UT1 for the Single Player stuff. Can't leave what made me start to love this series.

[GreatEmerald]

Yea, UT3 rocks! I generally agree, except two points:

Originally Posted by Plutonia_Experi

- maps They might be less, but the overall quality is really superior to the previous games. In UT2004 they just loaded up trash, proof was that online there were only 2 DM maps played (rankin, deck).


- style This could be a personal matter, but I love the UT3 style. The Necris style in particular, it looks so cool, so realistic, and so original. Just take a look at e.g. Floodgate or Sanctuary, how can you not like this Sci-Fi/Alien style, with tentacles and statues?

It depends on what you call quality. If you mean layout - maybe, I don't quite care about the layout. But if you mean style - UT2004 is way better, at least with DM maps. There were a lot of different styled arenas to choose from, and all looked very nice. Especially the Egypt ones, I just love that theme. Necris is OK, it's not too bad, the tentacles look quite interesting in most of the maps (like CTF-FacingWorlds, it enters the building from the back), but it's still not as stylish as Nakhti (Barrens) or Alleria maps. Though the best style I've seen was in Unreal II, Drakk Homeworld. DM-Fearless actually reminds me of that, but it's still not as breathtaking as actual Drakk Homeworld maps...

[brdempsey69]

The beast that many thought-- myself included--would stay sleeping, is now awake.

[Raynor.Z]

UT3 is good, it's really good - but IMO not enough to beat almost ten year old original UT =]

[Sir_Brizz]

They Egyptian theme in UT2kX was retarded. It made no sense.

[Jane's_Addiction-]

Good to see you like ut3.. but on some points you are just talking your personal opinion,

No way in ctf, and dm maps are better.
ut99 had some of the best dm/tdm maps to the date..Curse, Tempest, liandri, pressure, gothic, barricade, along with the remakes deck, turbine on ut3. and ut2004 had some awsome maps as well: osiris, abestos, grendelkeeps, corrugation, antalus, yes rankin, and deck.

Right now ut3 has what? 2 maps deck and defience. The rest can't even be taken serioulsy. Biohazard is horrible, heatray is a joke wiht the darkwalker, and the new maps..lets see you have one that is pitchblack, and two more that have spiders running all over the place doing the job for you.

CTF maps are ok. but I feel ut99 had better map selection eventhough many of them were no symetrical. take you don't play those gametypes. But I wouldn't know about vctf, and war, or vehikals gametypes. I hope they are better since I feel that is where Epic spent most of their energy creating.

As far as game types. Domination was a gem, and so was last man standing. I was sorry to see these go. I take domination over any type of vehikal ametype any day. and LMS over any greed/betrayal game type.

The weapons. I don't feel they are the most balanced, at least not with eachother. you have an overpowered rL with a weak link gun, and goofy sniper.
How do you explain this? you have 8 rockets on your rl and you practially can kill 8 people without picking up ammo given that you hit everone with a direct hit and they don't have armor. However, you can barely kill 1 person with link wihtout running out of ammo, if you're lucky, sometimes the ammo is gun, before you can finish anyone up. how is 8kills vs 1kill balanced?

Ut2k4 the most balanced weapons at least to each other. But you are righton teh fact that they felt weak over a stacked player. that was a health/damage issue. But every weapon was just as good or useful as the rest of the arsenal. it all came down to how you played your cards.

With all that being said. there are many things I like about all 3 games that are not present on the other ones. As well, as many different things that bother me on all 3. However, if they made me choose right now which game would you like to be playing out of all 3 I would prolly say ut3.

[brdempsey69]

Originally Posted by Raynor.Z

UT3 is good, it's really good - but IMO not enough to beat almost ten year old original UT =]

Agreed, UT3 is good, but not good enough to permanently displace original UT. No game will ever do that for me.

[UnrealGrrl]

i have always said i like UT3 the best despite its problems and lack of voicepacks.

for me its UT3, UT, UT2k3/4, but i love em all. Original Unreal is the one that got me started in MP and i have luv for her too but thats a different first crush kinda luv...

[MonsOlympus]

!

[jomi294]

Lol. Janes you're probably the first person I've seen feels UT2004 has the most balanced weapons of any UT.

Do any of you guys feel the same?

Originally Posted by Jane's_Addiction-

Ut2k4 the most balanced weapons at least to each other.

[GreatEmerald]

Originally Posted by Sir_Brizz

They Egyptian theme in UT2kX was retarded. It made no sense.

It made as much sense as in UC2, that is, perfect sense. There's a neo-Egypt planet system where combatants are allowed to fight. I don't see any nonsense here. The China-themed maps in UT3 make even less sense

Talking about weapon balance, they all felt balanced to me... Though UT3 might have an overpowered RL, yet that's probably so Morbias would play better

[N1ghtmare]

I agree with most of it, except the balancing of vehicles. Necris Vehicles are generally more powerful. Part of it is certain maps like Avalance and Suspense Necris give the necris sides too many powerful ones. (In suspense necris the necris side gets two nemesis').

All I really think needs to be done though is to make the Hellbender turret more powerful. The hellbender is usually substituted by the Nemesis, which is a lot more powerful. I think they should not give the bender secondary any chargup at all but make its single burst do something like 40 damage and have maybe .3-.4 seconds inbetween each shot. It would at least make it seem a bit more intense.

Otherwise the vehicles are a bit more balanced in terms of each set.

The weapons. I don't feel they are the most balanced, at least not with eachother. you have an overpowered rL with a weak link gun, and goofy sniper.
How do you explain this? you have 8 rockets on your rl and you practially can kill 8 people without picking up ammo given that you hit everone with a direct hit and they don't have armor. However, you can barely kill 1 person with link wihtout running out of ammo, if you're lucky, sometimes the ammo is gun, before you can finish anyone up. how is 8kills vs 1kill balanced?

I don't think anyone can get 8 kills with 8 shots. People wither try to aim at the feet (which will take more than one rocket) or charge two or three up, which is more than one. And the lionk gun is a hell of a lot more powerful this time around. Obviously it works better in close ranges, but if you are good enough that most of your shots hit it is very effective.

[Kantham]

It's the best for offline for me. UT2004 was the best online for me, but it has gone dust in my book. I could always go "UT2004 4 life!" but see me play UT3 more than any other games lately.

lol.

[Kantham]

Originally Posted by Sir_Brizz

They Egyptian theme in UT2kX was retarded. It made no sense.

You mean MiiiiiiiiiisterCroooow.

[shoptroll]

Originally Posted by GreatEmerald

It made as much sense as in UC2, that is, perfect sense. There's a neo-Egypt planet system where combatants are allowed to fight. I don't see any nonsense here. The China-themed maps in UT3 make even less sense

It made more sense in UC2 because the game was designed around the Nahkti concept. UT2 was like "hey here's some Egyptians, but we're not going to tell you where they came from or how they fit into the universe." Same with the Nightmare, and Gen Mo'kai teams.

The Asian motif fits since I think the Izanagi corporation is Asian origin. As is the Ronin team.

http://liandri.beyondunreal.com/Ronin

[cosmix]

Originally Posted by Sir_Brizz

They Egyptian theme in UT2kX was retarded. It made no sense.

You mean in terms of storyline this makes no sense? Because I like the visuals very much! They differ from all the other great stuff

EDIT:
Ah btw... I fully agree to that threat. I loved UT2004, for sure. But all I missed in UT2004 is now avaiable and better. It's a worth sequel! Even with Patch 2.0 and Titan Pack installed.

[Dogger]

Originally Posted by Plutonia_Experi

I know that vCTF was introduced by UT2004, but the lack of stock maps made it unplayable online.

Completely dissagree with this, the community made vctf in 2k4. The whole gametype was made by people who specifically played the game type. The maps where very simplistic with creative layouts and not jammed up to the tits with vehicles. UT3's idea of phun in vctf is to place every vehicle made for the game on one map.

[Benfica]

Originally Posted by Jane's_Addiction-

Good to see you like ut3.. but on some points you are just talking your personal opinion

Exactly. This sums it all pretty well

Originally Posted by Plutonia_Experi

- movement system. Oh finally I don't have to shoot down flying pigeons anymore! Finally jumping does not mean instant death and finally you can actually kill someone with a non-hitscan.

This movement system is retarded too, makes the game dull, boring and unispiring. UT2004 was OTT, but bring back mobility and sense of freedom please.

Removal of the dodge-jump (something I really frowned upon at the beginning) makes the fight a pure "in your face" action, no easy escape.

People didn't get used to escape due to dodge-jump, the problem was the shield-gun.

On the other hand, the smaller map scale allows great uses for the wall-jump.

Which is useless on outdoor maps, i.e. for 60% of UT3 players.

- item whoring Finally it counts less. With more powerful weapons it's a little less relevant who gets the 100hp armor. In UT2004 with the nerfed weapons was pretty much impossible to kill someone who just geared up with items, the 1on1 were really frustrating.

I see that the main point are the weapons, but items are there for a reason. Map control is a virtue of DM.

- gametypes yes, take your Assault, your Domination, your BR...and give me vCTF any day.

So, you are happy that people should not get what they want...

Assault was never played online on UT2004 (sure it wasn't the right game for it, perhaps it would be better in UT3), and the other gametypes were simply disregarded.

Now, I'm sure that is yet another UT3 > UT2004 thread. UT also had assault too, remember?

Orb was a great idea, 'nuff said.

There's not 'nuff said There's one problem with the Orb: makes the team turn against itself, a.k.a. "n00b flaming". Unlike CTF and greed that reward the courage to try, Orbware punishes failure. Sign of the times, 'nuff said.

- vehicles Not only they are 16 (sixteen) they are all perfectly balanced. They work as rock-paper-scissors, requiring for teamwork (in addition to the above point). Besides some rarely used one (cicada, paladin), they are all really useful in the actual combat and a great fun to play.

LOL! Do you really consider the cicada fun when it block 30% of your screen and has wierd aiming, yes I know it can be fixed with 10 lines of code out of a million. Or the paladin dumbed down shield, or the bender 2nd seat and handling, or the raptor RoF that make the cicada barely usable.

Let's face it, in UT2004 you took the scorpion or the hellbender only to travel the map. Now these 2 vehicles are so deadly in their own way, that you can actually find yourself choosing them.

You are correct about the scorp. You are about the bender, but only if you weren't that goodwith it. And now you don't use the bender to travel because it's damn slow!

Also I love how they are all powerful, how they can crush easily a foot player that forgot to take the Avril. In UT2004 it was a joke, you just got hit by the shock rifle and your vehicle was thrown away as it was made of paper. You were stronger on foot than in a vehicle (except for the manta that could do a massacre).

That has nothing to do with the vehicles, why do people even go on with this? If you can't get the avril from the lockers and need to get it, that's because the freaking locker doesn't have it in the first place, lol. If they bounce that's due to low gravity and the push-back effect of shock. UT2004 "vehicles" were less powerful than UT3's yes, but the main reason was the rest of the game.

- maps They might be less, but the overall quality is really superior to the previous games. In UT2004 they just loaded up trash, proof was that online there were only 2 DM maps played (rankin, deck).

Then choose the good ones, lol! Or get out of the typical confort zone and pick customs. I don't care about DM maps so whatever, but how are stock orbfare are better than UT2004 ONS. You can cleary say that UT AS stock maps were better than UT2004, maybe CTF too, but now the UT3 single-node Warfare are better than Dria or Adara?

- style This could be a personal matter, but I love the UT3 style. The Necris style in particular, it looks so cool, so realistic, and so original. Just take a look at e.g. Floodgate or Sanctuary, how can you not like this Sci-Fi/Alien style, with tentacles and statues?

If you like what you see, you should see them again on a color TV. It would blow you away.


I agree with the title, for me UT3 is the best of the series. Now, with Titan and greed. Before it was intended to be so hardcore and pr0, for the "OMG I've been a loyal fan", Red Bull and LOD cheat crowds, that they forgot to make it fun.