Review: U4E 4 UT2K3

[Jesco]

[ Transcript of review for U4E 4 UT2K3 | Posted by Nemephosis on 2003-11-08 | Score: 7 ]

Keep it Unreal

U4E has made its way to UT2K3, and I’m left wondering whatever happened to the “commercial” product they were going to put out. This version of U4E doesn’t live up to what we’ve come to know and love from UT, but then again, it IS a first release. U4E for UT sure didn’t start out as great as it became.

So I hear we have some new weapons. 11 of them in fact. However the weapon replacement screen has slots for 9 weapons. 11-9=2, so this means you won’t be able to use at least 2 weapons. Now last I checked, UT2K3 had at least 12 slots counting shield gun, super weapons, etc. so there’s no reason in the world we can’t use all of them. I’m also not sure what weapon replaces what as nothing is LABELED. You would be doing yourself a favour reading the readme, copying the weapon names down and then summoning them in the game so you can be sure you actually get them all. Beware though, they left out the reaper, so add “u4e.reaper_pickup” to the other weapons in the readme and you’re good to go. Just keep telling yourself this is a first release and like in UT, things will get a lot better as the mod develops. It works for me.

Your weapons of Unreality

The Reaper is a tri-bladed spinning device (or it’s supposed to spin when thrown and doesn’t, yet...) and looks like a real badass when you’re holding it. Look at the pic over there. Does that not scream “DON’T SCREW WITH ME” to you? You can do a great Goodfellas impression with it. (I’m funny how, what I'm funny like I’m a clown? I amuse you? I make you laugh? I’m here to ****in amuse you?) Then chop off their head. The best way to use this weapon is mid range in an open field. Primary throws it with extreme speed, and secondary recalls it. After it’s bounced a few times and gets around corners etc. you’ll need to practically jam secondary to get it back cause it gets away from you fast, making it hard to get back. This is why you use it in an open space: throw it, and when it hits them and goes through them, recall it immediately. It should peg them again on its return flight and usually kill a 100-health enemy. Head shots are considerably more dangerous.

This weapon is a remake of the old “Xena disc” from U4E fro UT, and I have to say thank God they remade it and it’s actually badass instead of sissy now. This however is the current best weapon in the pack, which ought to tell you something. Just remember: first release. Best is yet to come. Wait till we get the better stuff. However the “take out” and “put away” animation is amazingly cool. You toss it up a bit and the blades fan out and lock to become the big badass you see over there. When you put it away you toss it up and the blades all fold in on each other and it just looks so cool.

The bots love the reaper. A lot. They’re also morons when it comes to using it. Primary fire, altfire, hey it’s all the same to them. This makes matches, eh... less fun than it needs to be. Simple solution? Leave out the reaper as one of the two weapons you can’t replace. Nice temp fix but a real one would be appreciated. They also suffer from “statue” syndrome in where they’ll stand there and won’t fire until they see you. And they’ll have to see you, cause you’ll be the only one moving anywhere. They’ll fling their Reaper at you, and then be too stupid to recall it, while you can chop their heads off with impunity. First release, first release....

The Katana is a sword. This one has no range to it. You need to be practically up your opponents ass to use it and even then you might miss! The Katana needs a little... okay a LOT more range than that! Secondary teleports you a short distance, and standing still for 10 seconds or so hides you in the shadows (gives you invisibility until you swing the sword or put it away). Want to cover lots of ground fast? Dodgejump forward, then teleport. Yikes.

It also makes some of dinky little “ding” sound when it hits something, be it a wall, or an opponent. The “pull up/put away” animation is again excellent, as you draw the sword from its sheath and put it away again. I have to give mad props to the guy who did that, because it’s simply amazing and you’d damn well better be proud of your work. The model is again amazing. There's a "before shadows" picture of the Katana and an "after Shadows" picture over there.

The Beretta. It’s a pistol. It has no place in U4E. It’s weak, it’s useless, I don’t know why it’s in here.

The Python is better. I’d like to see the gold one yet though, the more powerful one. While this is still a revolver, and still not quite U4E enough for my taste it’s a HELL of a lot better than the beretta. The desth message is weird though... *victim* found out that *killer*’s python bullet hurt a lot” (no period at the end). Now I’m not quite sure what kind of an idiot has to get shot to figure out that it might hurt, but hey, seems like you need to be the teacher here. So let’em find out. Accuracy needs to be improved.

The little “spin the pistol on your finger” animation made it back here and it’s a very nice touch.
The Bubble Gun fires bubbles. I’ve never liked this weapon but it seems to be a little better than in U4E UT. Primary fires rapid fire bubbles that inflate your targets head. A few of these is enough for a kill. Secondary fires a bubble that traps them inside a huge oily looking bubble (lots of colour) and is great for escapes and getaways. Still not my favourite but better than it used to be.

Then we have grenades in four varieties. Gas, Flying, Sticky, and regular. These are all left handed and that bites, as I can’t aim a left handed model to save my life. Being right handed to fit with the rest of the mod would be A Good Thing. I’m sure you can just flip the models for next version. The new models look nice but I sort of miss the simple ball-style grenades that were different vivid colours. These grenades bounce around way too much and there’s no “charge” bar to throw them further. Needs to be implemented. And they shouldn’t bounce so damn much.

Gas grenades are just that: poison gas. Flying grenades stop bouncing (eventually) and then sprout a helicopter-like thing and fly to the nearest target, usually missing them and hitting the ground but causing splash damage. Sticky grenades stick to your enemy when you hit them directly with it and regular grenades, well, I think we all know how those work.

The Tomahawk makes its return, much to my dismay. Always hated this thing so badly. Primary fire shoots a rocket that seems to have much better control than secondary, but you don’t get the fulkl screen, you get this tiny little window to your left to guide it. Secondary is like the redeemer secondary but with a rocket instead of a nuke. I never did like this at all.

The railgun is quite frankly a joke. It can’t even kill in one shot like a railgun ought to and the fire effect looks so God-awfully cheesy. The pic I took over there was frozen with playersonly to get a better look at that beam, it doesn’t really fire that off center. Look at that beam. It looks like something from a cartoon for God’s sake. For the love of God I hope that’s a “placeholder” beam until they can get a new one. The model again does indeed kick ass however. When you fire it instantly shows up in one frame, and instantly disappears in the next. They say it’s a known issue and it’s supposed to fade out. I think the bigger issue is the fact that it looks like **** to begin with. Again though, first release, everything is subject to change at this point. This needs to be one of them changes. It zooms with secondary but if you really want a zooming weapon, use the Lightning Gun.

Our selection of weapons is slightly questionable. 6 out of 11 weapons are “realism-type weapons” in that we have four types of grenades, and two pistols. WHY? Well okay realistic grenades don’t fly or stick to your face but still, I already have mods with grenades, I don’t want them in an unrealism mod too unless they’re going to do stuff like create black holes or spew poison gas or belch fire or all the other awesome stuff the U4EUT grenades did.

I can name a bunch of weapons off the top of my head I’d rather have seen: Litesword, QSG, the bow and arrow, unrealism grenades like the QSG and Nuclear ones, the BFG, the Nuker, that’s seven without even thinking. Next release, I’m sure will be a lot better (after all you can only get better!)

You have anything positive to say or what?

When stuff sucks, I bluntly point it out. That’s me, I am blunt. I am as subtle as a bowling ball. I’ve certainly done a great job pointing out what could be improved or changed, but there’s good stuff in here too. First, the models. Your modeller deserves a huge pat on the back, if not a check. The weapon models are some of the better ones I’ve seen, and the Reaper is just the best period. Looks like one dangerous SOB, and it certainly is.

Two, the innovation of the bubble gun and reaper. While the other stuff may be realism or cliche like a Rail Gun (what mod doesn’t have one of those these days) the Bubble Gun and Reaper are the more innovative weapons. And no other mod I’ve seen yet has a Katana much less one as good looking as this one. Again, range needs to be improved a bit but still, wow. This mod may be almost 14 megs but it’s worth getting for the reaper alone. The fact we get the Katana, the Gas Grenades, and the Bubble Gun (these being the better weapons) is just gravy.

So, while there is a LOT of room for improvement, again it is a first release and will most certainly become a top tier mod. I highly anticipate this day.

Nemephosis

 

[MortimerV]

I agree for the most part on your review, except that you missed the biggest point of the railgun. Its zoom lets you see players through walls, marked with dots and distances. The beam can pass through walls, and that means you can snipe anyone on the map regardless of location.

I too look forward to a bigger and better U4e release.

 

[DrayGon]

As do I, and even though you don't seem to like the Tomahawk, I was hoping it'd make a comeback myself, though not as powerful as it was in UT, which right now it isn't, but it may be a bit on the weak side still. *shrug* Also, I'm not sure if you noticed that the katana increases your speed, as well as jump height (maybe not right away if you start with it, but once you switch to another weapon, and back again, wou'll get it. Another issue they plan to try fixing). Also, U4E isn't all about super-powered weapons. It also had normal weapons in it for UT, like the bow and arrow you were hoping for (with the exception of the interesting types of arrow ammunition).

Maybe I'm just a huge fan of U4E, but you did want comments on your review, right?

 

[Nemephosis]

Of course. That's what these threads are for, to discuss the review and the mod

I could see through the walls with the Railgun but couldn't fire through them with it. I must have taken 10 shots at a guy through a wall and he didn't die. Now I'm pretty sure it is weak but not THAT weak, so the only other thing I can think of is "hey, this isn't working too well yet...."

Doesn't matter though. I'm sure next release will be really good. a 7 for a first release is a pretty damn good starting point!

 

[Pxtl]

Funny, neme

Funny, you bashed my two fave weapons of U4E - the RailGun and the Tomahawk. Both of them are so much more interesting than normal boring sniper action on facing-world type maps.

U4E stands alone among weaponmods for having all new content - almost every other weaponmod is just weapon code. U4E actually brings models, sounds, and nifty special effects to the table.

I just hope that U4E sticks to making interesting weapon mods and suchlike, rather than the stupid stupid stupid monster-player classes and fortress games of U4ET. The only good "special feature" of u4e besides the weapons was the Gauntlet gametype.

Anybody notice if the Katana lets you move extra-fast like in normal UT? UT2k3 is so fast I can't tell.

 

[DrayGon]

I just hope that U4E sticks to making interesting weapon mods and suchlike, rather than the stupid stupid stupid monster-player classes and fortress games of U4ET. The only good "special feature" of u4e besides the weapons was the Gauntlet gametype.

Anybody notice if the Katana lets you move extra-fast like in normal UT? UT2k3 is so fast I can't tell.

I kinda liked the monster player classes myself, especially Draco (and they are planning on impimenting them eventually, but for now, it's only the weapons. Perhaps I can suggest they add a server-side option for disabling the monster classes?).

The Katana does make you move faster, and jump higher, but if you start with it, the engine doesn't immediately recognize that aspect of the Katana, and thus you have to switch weapons, and then return to the Katana to get the full effect.

Now, with the Railgun against bots, I did manage to take them out through the wall, but it did take a few shots (unless I was lucky enough to get a headshot, which I've done once). It can be done, but not as easily. As I recall, UT's U4E railgun had the same problem (in so much as you can't really tell if you are hitting your target). Anyways, the team is currently looking into a better way to see your targets through walls.

 

[Pxtl]

Well, my problem with the monster classes wasn't the principal of the idea - its that they were badly implemented.

I liked the basic principle (replace the default weapons and the attributes) but there were some serious problems.

First, the fact that default playerclasses don't get any compensation. IMHO, add a special power to all the players, or remove the "active power" thing so that the monster classes are _instead_ of human, not _better_ than human.

Second, many of the monsters were immune to certain environmental hazards. This was just painfully dumb - it made maps where there was no way out of the hazard frustrating - you just had try to kill yourself if you fell in an environment hazard.

Third, the classpickup ammo was unusable, as it was hard to keep mixed with normal weapon ammo. IMHO, they should just have one classammo for all monster classes.

The "monster master" playerclass was painfully stupid - the concept of the monsters levels persisting from life to life went against many of the core design concepts of a DM (funny how adrenaline does too). It also demonstrated an inconsistency in design - some of the classes felt like alternate player races - you just had a new starting weapon and stats, but you still wanted to run around and get new weapons and pickups and generally play normal UT but with different edges (the Dragons, Zhal, and MrBig captured this well) whil other classes felt like they were like a Team Fortress class: you were nothing but the class, all you want is classammo. Given the fact that U4E gives tons of interesting weapon pickups, I much perferred the former style of class.

The Teddy Bear class was frustrating - it had the coolest ability (the builder weapon) but was otherwise unusable - no team skins, the dumb chainsaw, etc. Also, with the constructor ability, it felt much more elaborate than the simple classes (dragon, zhal, etc), more like the Monster Master.

The super-slow regen rate of the dragon energy made the dragon have a very stupid gameplay - if there weren't classammo pickups on the server, you'd play as the dragon until you were out of energy, then deliberately commit suicide as the energy was what made the dragon good.

And the models were hideous (WTF was the Golem? one big envmap??) and badly coded (I couldn't select the skin or teamcolour for half of them). Plus, the classes will totally conflict with the normal Adrenaline system.

The fact that they made all these new, ugly models instead of just using the pretty bonuspack models was just so dumb.

I'd much rather see them implement a special power, special starting weapons, and special adrenal powers for each of the normal basic UT2k3 models and then add new classes. Hell, ditch the special power and save us the trouble of a new keybind, just give each race different adrenal powers or something.

 

[DrayGon]

Oh. Forgive me for misinterpretting your post. I'll let them know, and see what they plan to do about it. As for me, I tend to agree with a lot of what you said. MaxSMoke (the main person in charge I believe, as well as the artwork person), had said that he was making U4E mainly for the CTF gametype. That might be why some of the monster classes are as they were in UT (and I have a feeling they weren't finished with UT yet, but now that UT 2003 is out, they don't plan on going back to work on the UT version anymore).

As for the Monster Master, I guess they wanted them to keep monster experience since you'll hardly ever get the monsters above a couple levels (and if you did, and then died, it could be very frustrating). I'm not sure I want another Monster Master class myself though (being that there may be an issue again with no self damage).

For the classes that were immune to certain damage zones, I thought they had implemented something to where, if they spent too long in those zones, then they'd actually take damage. Guess it just didn't work... Perhaps that's what translocators would be needed for (since that's the only weapon that everyone would have for certain that could get one out of something like that). I think they wanted to give the mappers a way of allowing certain classes to be able to go places others just couldn't. Not sure if they plan to do that again.

Now for the monster models, and skins, I think they were looking for low polycount models in order to keep performance high. With UT 2003 however, since everything already looks so darn good, they will make better models this time around. With the team color skins, I thought they all had them. I know the Henry's was a bit hard to descern, but the other characters were easier (speaking of the Henry, I think that one startwed with a much too powerful class weapon. Couple that with permanent [or maybe nearly permanent] armor and a lot of health, and you couldn't take them out very easily, at least not before they killed you [or other people] a few times. Reduced speed didn't counteract it enough. ).

How about I try suggesting that certain classes able to be disallowed. That way, if you didn't like a certain class, you wouldn't have to have it on the server (but then you'd have to run your own server in order to get the classes the way you want them). That's assuming they can even do something like that, but it wouldn't hurt to try asking. I'll also suggest that the default characters have some sort of special bonus so they can compete with the monster classes.

 

[Pxtl]

Models

The original models were very buggily implemented - the 2nd gen models such as Draco2X and the TeddyX both had no teamcolours or alternate skins on some installs. Either it was conflicting with other mods or something, but even after reinstalling from scratch, those models never worked right for me.

 

[}MDA{BlackDragon]

hi
I think the review is ok, but i think there were too many negitive comments about it.
V2 will be better though.
I find the U4E Models really Good, theyre different from most other mods (i find it more more fun killin Zhals then Women in Tight Leather and what not )
The Player Classes Rock imo
Hi DrayGon hehe

 

[DrayGon]

hi
I think the review is ok, but i think there were too many negitive comments about it.
V2 will be better though.
I find the U4E Models really Good, theyre different from most other mods (i find it more more fun killin Zhals then Women in Tight Leather and what not )
The Player Classes Rock imo
Hi DrayGon hehe

Off topic...

Hello... I like your avatar... got one in green?

 

[Nemephosis]

hi
I think the review is ok, but i think there were too many negitive comments about it.

This is why Max doesn't like me, I don't bend over and kiss his ass.

I have every confidence Version 2 will be better, you can't really do some work on something and make it worse.

I'm really looking forward to the next version and seeing what the team can come up with.