This game has huge potential

[Razorjack]

UT3 was great fun while it lasted, for me that was from its release in nov 2007, till sometime in the summer of 2008, at which point I just lost the urge to continue playing it daily. It's still on my computer and I still play every once in a while, but I miss the great times we were having in the period between its release and about half a year later.

But seriously, how many times have we been through this?! Stop beating a dead horse

 

[[404]Cham3l3on]

But seriously, how many times have we been through this?! Stop beating a dead horse

Sorry for reviving the thread, but tbh, I stopped playing about a few months or so in when most of the teams I knew went defunct. I just recently had the itch to play and along with it the whole thought process came back to me....kind of like "oh yeah, that's why I stopped playing" Even though I enjoyed the game while I was playing it. I think the biggest problem I was having was that I was used to playing matches, not pubs. The pug scene wasn't all too strong as I remember it.

 

[WHIPperSNAPper]

Sure, instead of making a brand new installation, just throw the previous two games together and call it a new game instead.

It annoys me to no bounds that some people hate UT3 because "It's not a UT99/UT2k4 hybrid."

I dislike UT3 because, IMHO, it essentially killed the UT franchise. Epic had a chance to revive the franchise and failed miserably by releasing a consolized monstrosity. UT3 is in many ways the opposite of what UT99 was.

You're certainly welcome to idolize UT3 and to claim that it's the greatest FPS of all time if you wish, but the low player counts suggest otherwise.

I think that what Epic needed to do with UT3 was to faithfully replicate the feel and game play of the original while also allowing an option for UT 2004 style, especially for games like Onslaught. Had they done that we wouldn't be having this conversation and UT3 probably would have been a hit.

EDIT: I also like how you created an entire essay just to stress your opinion on how much you think UT3 sucks.

I send it as a PM to people on the Epic Games forums when newbies to the series come along and ask why such a great game as UT3 has so few people playing it online.

 

[Sir_Brizz]

UT3 had low player counts because the game itself was broken and messy at release and you can't save any game, even one with great gameplay, from a launch as bad as UT3 had. It has nothing to do with whether people liked the gameplay or not. The game didn't work for most people so they moved on to other games.

 

[Kantham]

I like the fact that

1- This thread is still going.
2- Some people completely missed the point.

 

[dizzm]

UT2003 shipped with 37 maps. UT3 shipped with 41 maps. You can learn all of this from the Liandri Archives

41 maps is fairly meaningless when the majority of them were absolute garbage, moreso than any prior UT game in my, and many of the other respective competetive community members, opinion. Given the length of time it took to make UT3, they should've made many many more maps, and by chance have a higher # of quality maps. And when I say quality I don't mean pretty eye-candy that takes forever to make, I mean quality mapflow and gameplay. The HOLP map packs are a perfect example of this, giving the hardcore community exactly what they wanted with low poly counts making it playable for everyone combined with intelligent design, and accomplishing it in a very short time. What's funny is some of the maps were already UT99 or UT2K4 classics that Epic probably could have done themselves. Why they didn't, boggles my mind. Ohter than the notion they're really not in tune with the veterans of their own franchise, or things were mismanaged internally, or Midway is to blame for the crunch. Sadly, the game was already too dead before it made any impact on the scene.

I also clearly remember meeting the "Recommended" hardware spec for minimum requirements, yet still getting terrible fps on the stock maps even at the lowest possible settings from a mipmapped ini. High poly counts ftl.

 

[Sir_Brizz]

I completely disagree with that notion. UT3 has roughly the same ratio of good/bad maps as every other UT (except UT2004 since it had good UT2003 maps and good new maps that came out with UT2004).

 

[dizzm]

I completely disagree with that notion. UT3 has roughly the same ratio of good/bad maps as every other UT (except UT2004 since it had good UT2003 maps and good new maps that came out with UT2004).

You can disagree all you want but statistics paint a different picture, moreso in CTF. I have played in hundreds of league matches, tourneys, scrims and pugs between both games, and have looked at pug stats logs. I can tell you what became a mainstay map for each respective game and those which did not last at all. UT3 tdm/ctf was at about half that of UT2003 in terms of staple maps in the competetive scene. And even Shangrila needed modifying (amp in middle) to become more accepted. Coret was a terrible remake and most disliked it.

Just to keep it simple I'm using DM/CTF as examples of maps which didn't get the axe based on pug stats, scrims, league and tourney usage...

UT3 DM: Deck, Shangrila, Sentinel
UT3 CTF: OmicronDawn, Strident

UT2003 DM: Antalus, Compressed, Asbestos
UT2003 CTF: Citadel, Chrome, Maul, Orbital2 (all which carried over to 2k4)

And you still want to be more technical in terms of proportionate, you're not even including the fact 2k3 shipped with more gametypes on its own. If anything it was clearly obvious Epic was more concerned with getting GOW out in time for MS holiday marketing rather than finishing up and polishing UT3, especially with Midway out of $ and not giving 2 shiz about what happened.

 

[Sir_Brizz]

You can disagree all you want but statistics paint a different picture, moreso in CTF. I have played in hundreds of league matches, tourneys, scrims and pugs between both games, and have looked at pug stats logs. I can tell you what became a mainstay map for each respective game and those which did not last at all. UT3 tdm/ctf was at about half that of UT2003 in terms of staple maps in the competetive scene. And even Shangrila needed modifying (amp in middle) to become more accepted. Coret was a terrible remake and most disliked it.

Just to keep it simple I'm using DM/CTF as examples of maps which didn't get the axe based on pug stats, scrims, league and tourney usage...

UT3 DM: Deck, Shangrila, Sentinel
UT3 CTF: OmicronDawn, Strident

UT2003 DM: Antalus, Compressed, Asbestos
UT2003 CTF: Citadel, Chrome, Maul, Orbital2 (all which carried over to 2k4)

And you still want to be more technical in terms of proportionate, you're not even including the fact 2k3 shipped with more gametypes on its own. If anything it was clearly obvious Epic was more concerned with getting GOW out in time for MS holiday marketing rather than finishing up and polishing UT3, especially with Midway out of $ and not giving 2 shiz about what happened.

Who cares what pugs and comps are doing? They rarely know what a good map is, they pick maps that people in the leagues play more often than the others. Chrome, for example, is one of the worst maps ever made and yet it was one of the most popular competitive maps of both UT2003 and UT2004. Maul was also ridiculously unbalanced and it was also played frequently in competitive games. GrendelKeep is also an insanely popular map despite it being a pretty bad map overall.

My point is that competitive gamers typically like maps that they feel like they can get some kind of advantage in. On Ci we used to pick Orbital2 nine times out of ten because we could destroy almost anyone on that map for a variety of reasons. Teams and leagues rarely pick maps that can be defined as "good" maps. Aside from Pistola, I'm having a hard time thinking of a single TWL map in UT2004 that I would call a good map.

 

[dizzm]

Who cares what pugs and comps are doing? They rarely know what a good map is, they pick maps that people in the leagues play more often than the others. Chrome, for example, is one of the worst maps ever made and yet it was one of the most popular competitive maps of both UT2003 and UT2004. Maul was also ridiculously unbalanced and it was also played frequently in competitive games. GrendelKeep is also an insanely popular map despite it being a pretty bad map overall.

How can good players not know what a good map is? I mean how can you rationalize that statement based on anything other than gameplay values because that's really what matters to most people (except, I digress, very casual noob players). But even in pub games those maps were about as popular. But also not caring what pugs/comp players think is ignorant as they're the one's who stuck around the game forever and have played every map in between to tell which one's make better gameplay. I have a hard time seeing why casual pub players might have any better opinion than competetive players, unless all they care about is eye candy and popsicle sticks [facepalm]. Secondly, the premise of my argument was based off of the STOCK maps that came with the game, not how good or bad you think those maps are in general. So, you're either implying the other stock maps are better, or you're way off base and criticizing that those aren't even mainstay maps, although regardless what you think of them they're the one's that were the most popular. But then again you said Grendelkeep a pretty bad map overall, which I have to say is absurd, and you would be the first person in my 10 years of playing UT to ever say that, so it speaks volumes about your opinion. It is considered by the majorty of anyone from either USA or Euro, pug/comp/pub players the best nwCTF map there has been in the 2k series. It has excellent z-axis action, multiple non-linear pathing, an armor in the middle to fight over, ideal amount of health placement, weapon placement, map length, etc. Orbital on the other hand is a long map that slows the game down unneccessarily because you run out of trans once you get inside the other base and was never generally liked. In fact it was liked maybe only slightly more than Chrome. Maul was popular because it was fast paced with lots of fragging and intense standoffs. Without a powerup there really wasn't much unbalance other than separating the skilled fraggers from the noobs. But if you can't frag very well and have fun then you probably shouldn't be playing it in the first place. I could go on and critique every map in the game but the reason most of those maps were played was because there really weren't other maps which were considered better so it's moot to even talk about it. The quality map-making community for UT2K* CTF was very lackluster to a point it was painful. CMBP made several maps but almost all of them were extremely bad (save for Virility) and most people agreed on that.

My point is that competitive gamers typically like maps that they feel like they can get some kind of advantage in. On Ci we used to pick Orbital2 nine times out of ten because we could destroy almost anyone on that map for a variety of reasons. Teams and leagues rarely pick maps that can be defined as "good" maps. Aside from Pistola, I'm having a hard time thinking of a single TWL map in UT2004 that I would call a good map.

Competetive players picked maps not only because they had good flow and provided glorious games but in a competetive sense, of course teams are going to pick maps where they feel they have a winning strategy on, that's nothing new. But I don't see how that justifies the maps as not "good", or how you are judging a map other than gameplay qualities relative to all other map choices. Also I could name atleast 5 other teams (out of 10?) that would not only beat you on it, but destroy you and I don't remember Ci ever being that good. In fact I recall doing it to you guys while in ugodz without so much as getting capped on.

 

[dc]

Chrome, for example, is one of the worst maps ever made and yet it was one of the most popular competitive maps of both UT2003 and UT2004.

i can't speak for 2k3, but it most definitely was not in 2k4. i dont remember ever playing it on twl or in any of the ui tournaments. chrome-le was fine anyways.

Maul was also ridiculously unbalanced and it was also played frequently in competitive games.

it wasnt unbalanced enough for anyone (except you apparently) to care. it was mindless fun. that's why i liked it. fast paced, chaotic for offense. it was great.

GrendelKeep is also an insanely popular map despite it being a pretty bad map overall.

grendel was great...i don't know a single person that didn't like it other than the fact that it was overplayed

 

[Sir_Brizz]

Hahahaha. Wow, JD predicted exactly how this thread would go. Peace out, fools!

 

[N1ghtmare]

JD knows all.

 

[Alhanalem]

Why aren't they calling it the Gears Engine yet?

 

[JohnDoe641]

Get dowon tha stehs.

 

[N1ghtmare]

Get dowon tha stehs.

No.

The children need to go upstairs for bedtime.