Hours played per day of UT3/UT2004

[WedgeBob]

The way I see those results, UT2004 just seems like it's better with online gameplay, and UT3 seems to play better offline with bots, judging by those results. That's just my two bits in terms of how I see things going.
I do like both equally, as mentioned before, but in terms of best multiplayer game based on Unreal Technology within the last five years or so, I'd have to give that to SWAT 4 Gold. It almost seemed like Irrational seemed to know more about team-based multiplayer than Epic did during those times...just a shame that Take Two had to buy them out.

 

[KillerSkaarj]

Epic should just forget about multiplayer and make a single player Unreal game again. It's beginning to become brutally obvious that they can't really make good multiplayer by themselves. Okay, maybe they shouldn't totally forget about multiplayer. I still loves me some coop

 

[WedgeBob]

Yeah, just so long as the next single-player Unreal game is better than The Awakening, that had to be the worst storyline out of almost any game Epic's ever done. Seems like Gears of War franchise seems to be their new single-player game franchise, I have a hunch, anyway. I don't anticipate anything with the Unreal name in it anywhere, but time will tell...

 

[pine]

I wish more people played UT3.

 

[WedgeBob]

Exactly, bringing out the Titan Pack and Patch 2.1 should have brought more respect to UT3, but I suppose for most, it'll take a lot more than that. I'm doing what I can to make it better. Probably bringing back some nostalgic maps with UT3 technology and more modern facelifts should do it.

 

[Cr4zyB4st4rd]

Titans ****ed up **** though. Titans were a bad idea.

 

[oldkawman]

That was the nail on the coffin, Titan mod, just plain killed it.

 

[JohnDoe641]

Titan is amazingly fun offline because of the bots, online, no way, it's terrible.

 

[Sir_Brizz]

Titan is fine and it could be disabled easily. There is no reason it could have or should have killed it.

The real problem is that no amount of patching can fix a release as bad as UT3s. It had a stigma and it never overcame it.

 

[Cr4zyB4st4rd]

Epic force Titan on a good amount of their servers. Many people that still played at time of release of the pack then had to deal with public servers becoming a noobfest of titans.

So, id still say Titans themselves helped kill off the public play.

 

[Kantham]

If I had a choice between those 2, I'd pick the way less frustrating game and much more fun. Yes, I'm talking about UT2004.

 

[Fluorescence]

Added a graph with Xfire rankings.

UT1? I don't care about UT2k4.

Well, originally, i didn't bother recording UT1 because over the years of me playing it, i've asked people if they have Xfire and 9 times out of 10 they say 'wtf is that?'..but maybe the BT community is slighty more detached from any sort of development; I remember playing with quite a few people that didn't even know UT2004 existed.
However, i think these graphs are taken from a large enough sample to not be completely worthless. The fact UT peaked at 1 shows there must be quite a few UT players with Xfire. If it's rank peaked at 100, then i would have thought differently.

 

[Godfrey.Payans]

I had a choice between those 2 and picked the much more visceral and fun game, yes, UT3.

I thought one of the things that ensured it would never succeed online is that the multiplayer side of it seems difficult and buggy.

 

[KillerSkaarj]

I tried playing UT2k4 again today. I'm not kidding you, I finished half a match before I got bored and closed it. I know why I don't like UT2004. There's no punch to the weapons. I feel like I'm playing with toys. When the rockets explode in UT2004, they go "boosh." In UT3, they make a more familiar sound, I think it goes like "BOOM." When you hit someone square in the face with a rocket or a flakshell, they don't just fly back an inch and keep coming, or die and simply lose an arm like in UT2k4. In UT3, they actually get completely blown apart, resulting in a much more satisfying kill. This is why I'm looking forward to the UT3Style mod by GreatEmerald.

Also, fun fact, I've never experienced a glitch in UT3 save for the DemoGuy glitch. You know which game by the same company had more glitches? Gears of War. Both games. Here's a funny little anecdote.

I remember in Gears of War 2, I reached a checkpoint, and the door to the previous area began closing before I could get fully through it. I made it through all right, but when I died, I spawned at the checkpoint and got stuck in the door. I also have been in countless situations where I couldn't switch or pick up weapons. I thought UT3 was the supposed rushed game, so why have I had more glitches in Gears 1 and 2?

The only problem I've had in UT3 was trying to make up my mind on which map I wanted to play. And that was before Patch 2.0 and the Titan Pack.

Collision issues? Random crashes? Where? The only thing related to collision and crashes that I've experienced is the scorpion that I just bullseyed into that unfortunate bot in the HellBender. Like I said, fragging bots in UT3 is much more satisfying than in UT2004, which is why UT3 is more fun. And since I play games for fun, naturally I'm sticking to UT3.

 

[flak-spammer]

You play with bots... jeez maybe that's your problem. I find UT3 terribly boring online or offline because the game is pharted. The netcode is terrible way worse than ut2004s or even the original UT. The weapons are just cheezy and half the time they don't work. Shock has become completely useless, rockets are nearly garbage. Flak except for primary fire is garbage the alt fire arc is messed up. Oh and sniper is crap. The graphics put a punchy setting in UT3 but too much bloom and skins that aren't easy to see. Overall I think they just nerfed the gameplay up and the single player campaign is the worst I've ever played, it's just downright terrible. Even when I played UT3 fragbu I still found that the gameplay resulted in too many spontaneous and ridiculous results, the game was not at all fun. I played more for talking and being around other BU member than for the game itself. Honestly that's why I still play ut2004 and not UT3.

 

[KillerSkaarj]

You play with bots... jeez maybe that's your problem. I find UT3 terribly boring online or offline because the game is pharted. The netcode is terrible way worse than ut2004s or even the original UT. The weapons are just cheezy and half the time they don't work. Shock has become completely useless, rockets are nearly garbage. Flak except for primary fire is garbage the alt fire arc is messed up. Oh and sniper is crap. The graphics put a punchy setting in UT3 but too much bloom and skins that aren't easy to see. Overall I think they just nerfed the gameplay up and the single player campaign is the worst I've ever played, it's just downright terrible. Even when I played UT3 fragbu I still found that the gameplay resulted in too many spontaneous and ridiculous results, the game was not at all fun. I played more for talking and being around other BU member than for the game itself. Honestly that's why I still play ut2004 and not UT3.

Sorry, all I could hear from you was "UT3 SUCKS BECAUSE IT'S NOT UT2004."

You rag on me for using bots and then say how the netcode is terrible? Huh? Also, looks like the problems with the weapons means you just suck with them. After playing UT3, I can't hit anyone with the flak in the older games any more because I got so used to the new Flak's trajectory, something that maybe you should have done. Also, Sniper is crap? Wtf it's the same weapon from the last 7 Unreal games. Everything's the same besides the look and sounds. What more do you want from it? Auto-aim? Same with the shock. Explain "completely useless," please.

Too much bloom? Oh, ok. I see now. That's a pretty valid complaint, I mean, it's not like you can TURN IT OFF or anything.

Although I have to agree about the campaign. The way you're complaining about it though, it's almost like you absolutely have to play the campaign. You know, UT2k4 didn't even have a campaign, unless you consider the tournament mode that apparently everyone in UT2k4 is still playing a campaign...

This is the problem with UT3-haters. They expect the game to be UT2k4 with better graphics, and when it isn't, they get all pissy about it. Oh well, I'm not gonna force you to play the game.

 

[Bi()ha2arD]

I don't use X-Fire. I use IRC

 

[WedgeBob]

Well, the only reason I felt that UT3 was a downgrade from UT2004 was not from the reasons flak-spammer claims. It's just that you had less features, and less choice of stock maps to play in. However, the Titan Pack changed that, some features worse, others way better. And I did catch on to UT3's UnrealEd to make sure that more maps were made. Before that, I did more with UT2004 mapping, but now...I'm doing things back and forth between the two, but UT3 just leads to more realism and better gameplay overall. I still do like both games equally, however, that may never change.

 

[i_hax]

The weapons are just cheezy and half the time they don't work. Shock has become completely useless, rockets are nearly garbage. Flak except for primary fire is garbage the alt fire arc is messed up. Oh and sniper is crap.

You have many valid points and I'm not here to debate the huge lack of polish UT3 has, but the part I quoted is way off.

I'll be blunt - Those who think shock is useless and the sniper is crap have never been any good at UT3. Obviously you can't hit 70% like 2k4, the hitboxes are half the size. But if you find the sniper (or any other weapons) useless you really can't comment on the gameplay of UT3, because you have no idea how to play it.

 

[WHIPperSNAPper]

I think the reason UT3 has less players than UT2k4 is because to some people, UT3 isn't as polished as UT2k4, which is a biased opinion because UT2k4 was basically a giant patch and expansion pack for UT2k3 that you had to buy and install separately, hence the higher level of polish. Then Midway had to go bankrupt and now Epic can't work on UT3 any more.

It may not be Epic's fault if they were forced to rush UT3 to market, but consumers don't care who's fault it is. The fact of the matter is that at its release UT3 was a stillborn.

I do wonder what was really going through Epic's head. Perhaps one day the real story of UT3's awful release will come out.

What's sad is that they got the basic feel of the movement--the basic game play--the chemistry--the hard part--the subjective part--pretty much right with UT3. It's just everything else that surrounds it--the easy objective part--that's screwed up (user interface, server browser, Gears-of-Warrified looks, Gamespy integration, etc.) UT3 does have its own game play problems, however. Whenever I load it up I find myself thinking, "What a shame."

Another annoyance is when someone complains about UT3's problems, then when a community member comes out with a solution (i.e. MapMixer for the UI), that same person says "this should have been in from the start" and quits playing. What? Where's the logic in that?

UT3 also has some serious game play problems. I can't quite put my finger on it but it seems to me like a player has less control over the outcome of combat and I feel like I have much more control over what's going on in UT99 and UT 2004. Maybe it just moves too fast. The other huge problem in UT3 is that the feel of driving the vehicles is very much inferior to the feel in UT 2004. I played UT3's Warfare for a couple months and then ended up returning to UT 2004's Onslaught.