it was killed off before it even started by coming to 2020 with nintendo 64 graphics, but also most gamers simply don't like high ttk games with a focus on tracking. every new game has to be either boots on the ground, ads, low recoil, battle royale or a counter strike clone with abilities. i chose warzone, still has a high time to kill, and has more players than both.

also https://steamcharts.com/app/611500

ttk?

time to kill

[img1]

Today date. I haven't played QC for 3 years.

Diabotical has 1 problem. Waiting time.

I suggested a solution, but they are afraid that everyone will only play tournaments.

Then I suggested to give the opportunity to play the tournament system only once a week, but there is no answer. Someone in studio 2GD does not understand how the tournament system can be used by ordinary players. They offer to play pickups, but pickups have a long waiting time.

2GD studio doesn't understand how you can play tournaments where there are no prizes...But, personally, I saw how ordinary players play tournaments without prizes on the site chess.com for example.

Their developer Raven disappeared somewhere without finishing the dialogue with me at the most interesting place.

Reminder

https://www.reddit.com/r/Diabotical/comments/...stem_poll/

Not finished important dialogue between me and Raven
https://www.esreality.com/post/2965452/so-diabotical-is-alive/

https://www.esreality.com/post/2965380/2gd-pa...e-promise/

2017 QC is still going with all the top pros, a fun to watch pro league and a decent playerbase with fast queues.

Yeah but it's a pity the game is absolute dogshit. Enjoy you're gay, janked, outsourced Overwatch spinoff, faggot.

Logged in to plus this.

Pure poetry. I've given QC my fair share of chances and "janked outsourced OW spinoff faggotry" is the perfect descriptor.

QC is Quake with abilities, but it is not OW ...
just like Valorant is CS with abilities and is not OW ...
the real reason u dont play QC is a) u suck at it or at quake in general and b) u r in nihilism land because of general (competetive) desinterest in gaming

c) QC is a dogshit game where you need to pay people to play it

*DING* *DING* *DING* *DING*
We have a winner!

need to pay, rly? where all the Q3A/QL players at on twitch?
Only old quake game that stil seems being played is Q1

loooll losers trying to move the goalpoasts. The topic isn't about how good or bad QC is dumbass, it is about QC beating Diashitical. You morons were shilling for a hovering sphere simulator but in the end you got owned by a subpar Quake lol. Diashitical is dead whilst QC is still going, stay mad losers

you seem more invested in this than the people who actually just play and enjoy diabotical

You just wrote some of the dumbest shit I've seen on the internet. Only person shilling here is you buddy. And I'll bet you're doing it for free. Go sit on a dick and spin, retard.

Lets be real, 2gd did not have the grit and tenacity to finish the game and deliver on the kickstarter and other promises. He took the easy way and sold out when the finish line was in sight.

But for some weird reason, not before taking a huge dump on his creation, adding completely out of place game decisions with the plasma whatever gun, the secondary fire concept, then announcing the two new games and the shift of developers to that.

Am I still bitter about it, having supported the kickstarter, waited patiently for years, stayed positive and even bought in some more, shortly before it all crashed and burned? Naaah.

Plasma whatever gun is the only good thing about UT (apart from OST?) and it's overall a fun weapon.
Having only one programmer working on EVERYTHING wasn't optimal.
He did a great job but there's only so much one person can do.

Diabotical is a potentially better game than QC, it looked like it from the start. But here is the thing, these games are all the same. They try to be like their parent ancestors, but butcher the mechanics and balance. These games to me are dying, if not as dead as any other Quake game and that is something key to acknowledge. They are all the same flavor ice cream, but different brands and varying sweetness and flavoring. To me, that is a very weak marketing objective. There is no reason to give a shit about the brands and varying sweetness because it is all the same thing.

Quake Champions and Diabotical both are games that are dying if not already dead in terms of competitive tournaments. What is there left for them? They are both lesser versions of what was a solid, classic gameplay experience. And yet people still play them instead.

I would rather see people come back and play one of the older titles and revive them again than see them play these fake Quake games. And if I were to direct an idea for a new game, I would do something similar to Quake Champions (marrying a different popular game meta), but instead of making it Quake again... try and improve their games instead of ours, introducing similar duel mechanics to theirs, similar depth of meta and allow us to try something different out of the box that still gives us a good learning curve. Quake and it's duel gamemode are not improvable. The only thing improvable are the teammodes. So my belief is that we need to move over to something like Halo (which is really far off from our experience) and try and improve theirs to have something similar to ours. There ya go.

I am enjoying Quake Champions casually for as along as it will last. I can log in, click play and get automatically assigned to play some DM, TDM, CTF etc. I dont have to put much effort into finding a game or whatsoever.

Despite the abilities, it's still very much Quake. In a way it brings all Quakes together with the different movement styles etc.

Obviously QC is lacking MANY things that we had decades ago.And I hate not having a console to type commands and back-read chat etc. Also technically the game feels a bit more 'disconnected' than Quake 1 and 3 (Quake 2 50ms 'spoolup' time I always disliked').

Yes we could have a better situation in many ways, but as long as it lasts I am enjoying what we have as an old Quake player.

I get the casual angle. I really do. I too enjoy kicking back in the evenings with something that I don't have to work hard for. But I'd rather take a bit of time to set up QW or QL games, or some other title, than undergo the mental gymnastics that it takes to ignore everything that's wrong with QC. The game feels way off, aesthetically and functionally. The voice acting is intolerable. The game takes too long to load. The rounds are too short. The gameplay is brimming with Overwatch-style cheese.

Something we used to take for granted is that the equality of player attributes off the spawn in 'normal' Quake is a level playing field that puts more emphasis on in-game player choice, thereby highlighting the individual styles and personalities of players. This is far more interesting to me than the 'strategy' involved in picking characters at the start of the game. Having players with different health, movement speed and special abilities is a messy and inconsistent arrangement. It doesn't work and it's not interesting to play or watch. I think there is an unspoken consensus that this was a crude attempt at luring in Overwatch players while garnering the interest of the massive MOBA community. And I think it was a low-budget attempt too despite the significant prize money put up around the time of release. I think the effect of alienating Quake players was ultimately greater than attracting new ones from other scenes. The player numbers speak for themselves.

In a similar way the 'it brings all Quakes together' thing was a crude marketing ploy by Tim Willits. As stupid as he is, he did sense that the distribution of the existing old-school community across various titles was a risk that could be addressed by throwing elements of each one into a big melting pot. It's like the Austro-Hungarian empire - it's big, impotent and everyone involved hates it. I mean, yeah, you can throw different movement speeds and rulesets into the mix as a novelty, but that doesn't translate into a coherent or interesting game. This is isn't Dissidia: Final Fantasy or Smash Bros or something - you're trying to create a serious competitive platform.

I don't cope about this stuff and keep putting up. I just walk away and put my energy towards some other hobby.

Many of the QOL issues with QC would have been fixed through third-party mods in past Quake iterations. Even QL had a few handy workarounds. Id Software mismanaged and neglected its multiplayer titles for a very long time and due to Carmack's lack of interest I don't think he ever bothered to really focus on multiplayer and learn from what Blizzard and Riot Games were doing with their titles. To be honest I don't anything they did beyond Q3A was really remarkable. These issues appear to have been accentuated after Bethesda acquired the company, at which point it seems that the possibility of any third-party improvements disappeared. Carmack's saving grace was that despite his lack of interest, in previous years when the company had more control over its products he did not place obstacles in the way of the community improving the products after release.

I largely agree with you (although I think the graphics are pretty good and I dont mind the 10 minute rounds), but kinda stopped caring too much about it for some reason.

I think what is also a difference. When I was younger online gaming was still on the rise and getting its footing in many ways.

We're all pretty much past that. We kind of 'know' now what the future looks like when we thought about it years ago, and although it's unfortunate, we now 'know' that high-skill arena shooters ended up in a niche, although I wouldn't discount the abilities of pro-level fortnite players. It's not as if those teens are fundamentally different people (brain / ability wise) than we were when we played Quake. It's just that I think those games are fucking boring to watch and play, at least for me, having already been there and done that..

I mean, we now have Twich and shit. In the past we had GTV and IRC and lots of chatting thereon. The experience was very similar, just with a better game. I mostly played CPMA (cpm mode) but very high level 'vanilla Quake 3 Arena' was very often awesome to watch, maybe even better because more people played it so more skilled people in the tournaments.

anyways, I digress. Bottomline: Quake Champions offers some nice snacks to someone who sometimes just wants to have some nostalgia trip every once in a while :)

I agree that the QC graphics are good. There is some good art direction there.

I have never accepted the idea that arena shooters are somehow doomed to obscurity because they're too hard. It has always been a question of investment and execution. As long as StarCraft and CS have remained popular I refuse to believe that an arena shooter such as Quake Live or Diabotical cannot meet with the same success.

Meanwhile the dying community has cried in despair about the game being too hard and that we were playing the wrong game mode, and Id Software fumbles about like retards trying to increase player numbers by making meaningless concessions to noob zoomers and MOBA players. I don't care anymore but this stuff was really tiresome to watch at the time.

Look it's fine - you can like and play the game. That's cool - enjoy. As an aside I will say that there is a lost discourse around the proper use of leisure time. Hopefully we can talk about that stuff when we start rebuilding following the collapse.

Anyway, thanks for reading my blog. Like and subscribe.

It is really crazy to see how big twitch and game streaming has become, if you were on the ground floor for QTV/GTV with irc and chat relays.

It's not fair to put QC and DBT in the same boat. Although it is proprietary DBT is much more of a community title. It was produced by a Quake player and aimed at the competitive/semi-comp Q3/QL community. It was a serious contribution that was very promising. QC was not serious. It was outsourced to some Ukranian developer and they didn't even use their proprietary engine.

With DBT there's a lot of potential there still and I don't understand why James doesn't want to stay committed to it. I'm sure there are business reasons but I wish he would just suck up and put in the effort that's required to get it up to scratch. It's not that far away but they need to grind. I guess he thinks there's just not enough value there to justify the work. But I beg to differ - what other title is there like Diabotical? Which other title occupies this market segment other than QC? These two games are worlds apart.

I feel sorry for James to a degree. He is the victim of circumstance as we all are. He's an extremely talented and smart guy who wants to make good games. But the games industry is retarded and he seems unable to power through that and bend circumstances to his will.

Apart from pissing off the onwer of steam which is the largest portal for distributing and selling PC games, James was very smart given his goal is to develop and distribute PC games :)

Whether its fair from Gabe to treat him that way is another matter, but its not exactly the guy you want calling you an ass and saying he would never work with you again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Q-GnkKFWMw

2gd was more of a stand-up comedian then a caster at the time. Something that should have been obvious to everyone, including Gabe Newell. Calling him an ass and subsequently banning him from Valve events, just by heresay of 1 or two people, for doing exactly his thing, staying in the same character, was of course absolutely unfair and stupid.

2gd never learned that there are times to keep your mouth shut. Wasn't there an MLG tournament for QL that got canned because he kept shit talking them during the casting, when they were basically doing the community a favor by hosting to begin with

So who is dumber?
Yames for talking shit his entire life or organizers who invite someone who talks shit constantly and then are surprised he talked shit?

I wonder if there was a lawsuit going on behind closed doors between 2gd and gabe after that, while it might have been justified for letting him go for underperformance, you dont call out someone like that in public

I'm not into the detail about what happened with Steam. It would presumably have been more popular with that service but I reckon it wouldn't have made a big difference. But I agree that that's a bridge you don't want to burn. I think Gabe should have been more discrete and that, with the expectations they held and in view of 2GD's track record, they shouldn't have chosen 2GD to lead the entire panel for the whole tournament. He should have been in a more secondary role like with the ESL stuff where Joe would lead with color commentary and 2GD steps in with analysis. I personally thought the thing was hilarious, partly because I think MOBAs are a waste of time. If you're 2GD in that situation with that kind of production value why wouldn't you take the piss, to the max?

The guy has always been a bit unhinged. I always took him for someone kind of bored with life who coped using alcohol and comedic indifference. He is really funny but he really shines with his Quake commentary and the Diabotical stuff is, as I've said, quite promising though undercooked. I mean the ESL hosting/commentary in particular was top notch when it was good and he was taking it seriously. As I said before, it's sad for him and everyone involved that that stuff came to an end and from an objective standpoint he's the victim of circumstance. But you know, that's a philosophical thing. You can't actually blame circumstance for your problems.

Steam wouldn't give free cash stack like Ebin did.
I wouldn't be surprised if "Steam timeline" had bigger start but similar end.

Yeah, I think it's mistake to view Steam as some kind of intensive marketing exercise.

The truth is distilled in iterations of trial and error. Who knew that weapon imbalance a la Quake1 makes a pvp game great?

Diabotical is way waaaay too aim heavy.

All weapons require autistic amounts of tracking aim, twitch aim rails like you are 14 years old. Whoever dominates Aim Lab dominates dbt in no time.

Also, who knew John Carmack's implementations of netcode were that great at the time. Some people (mostly on modem and bad connections) complained about the netcode giving an 'unfair' advantage to players with stable coinnections and low pings...
But having witnessed the mindboggling unfairness that is Diabotical against high ping, packet loss, WLAN using warpers, I prefer the old netcode any day.
Every player was responsible for their own connection, had to get the right provider, tweak it, to become and stay competitive.
With dbt it's like, the shittier your connection, the harder you are to hit, the "better" your results. This already started with Q3 CPMA netcode impelemtations to a lesser degree.

Lets not even start with the abomination that is QC netcode...backwards reconciliation is a nice idea in theory, but if the implementation turns out like what QC has now - fuuuuck this.

Then trade-off is just so bad. You enable competitive play at over 100 ms ping, but on the flipside games in the normal ping range play like shit with the randomness and weird feeling.

Regarding the graphics, dbt is absolutely competent in that regard, arena fps do not need amazing graphics at all.
But the art style could have been more fleshed out. I disliked the tiny player models in the end, too small, lame animations, with the fov perspective of an ant.

Finally for me at least, the concept of early access and kickstarter are a very delicate matter. A lot went wrong in that regard. Instead of picking up steam with many iterations of feedback, bug reports, until the basics are polished, there was too much experimenting without polishing any basics, only focussiing on the wrong things in hindsight.

The netcode is still bad, you can still 'cheat' by fucking your connection up. The sounds still have close to no impact. The modes did not arrive at something great. Noone wants to play mcguffin, because no polish.
The map contest was a dud. Throwiing away money with no real concept, a half finished map editor with no manuals and corrupt judging.

Agree and will add that antilag / client side hitreg was a net negative for gaming. It's sad that it became standard right around the time everyone was getting broadband and <100 ping anyway.

Now we have a lower skill ceiling on aiming as well as netcode jank like being shot behind walls and peeker's advantage out the ass.

10 ping westerners still crying about the good old days when there was no lag compensation and everyone else had a shitty dial up connection.

It has been 20 years since modern netcode was introduced and eastern europe got wide spread broadband, but you still havent reconciled with the fact that you just suck

It has nothing to do with skill, to get annoyed by lag compensation fuckery. Watch Rapha stream, watch Raisy stream. They are even invested in QC, so they do 'light' complaining, but they still do complain. Do they suck as well?

Just for the record, I don't think the concept of lag compensation is bad, I think we have not seen a proper implementation of it. In my personal opinion, Overwatch was closest to a good implementation, QC is by far the worst. dbt is basically allowing connection cheating, there is zero downside for shitty upload for the player, only for everyone else.

I'm a hobby programmer, but netcode is way out of my league. I would like to try and program a better implementation and offer it for free, or give advice for improvement, but I simply can't, it will take another few years, if ever (late programming starter).
What I'm bitter about is the industry not giving much of a fuck, they do it half-assed and then call it a day.

No, they don't suck, they are just making excuses for themselves. Everyone does that, no matter the skill level.

And a that's fine, were all human. But on the other hand you have morons like Weird, who have convinced themselves that they would dominate the scene if it weren't for "netcode"

well in both cases that's why I chose them, they are 100% correct, ou can observe on the stream how the rails went through, how rockets didn't connect, how a perfect dodge gets reversed to a face rocket, railed seconds after escaping behind cover.

Those are no single incidences, they are common.

You can be the bigger player and accept this game is luck based like poker, or you can just not play it.

But if the netcode was more solid, I guarantee more players would join and stay and had a lot more fun.

Watch anyone play any game competitively. They will complain. Coincidence?

I don't know about dbt, but in q3/ql netcode if you handicap your upload in a certain way you will get perfectly smooth gameplay on your end and be unhittable warper for anyone else. Don't see why you think it got worse since q3, maybe just certain cheat got popular in dbt?

How do you come up with conclusion that industry doesn't give a fuck or haven't tried if you don't even have ability to understand q3 netcode yourself? There are problems that simply cannot be solved the way you wish them to be solved. Often progress is solving problems by other means noone thought of before or redefining "rules of the game" so that they are not problems anymore. There are really things that can't be done, we just find a way around them.

There is competent lag compensation netcode. Overwatch was one of my examples, I just don't like the game.

Curiously, QC has always been great right after a new patch was done to the servers. For a few hours, the game played great, but then always deteriorates. Which makes me believe it is not impossible to make it better, if you iron out all bugs and polish.

Netcode is not something that is just done at some point. Where is the constant analysis of server logs to find the big and small bugs, the bottlenecks and such things?

It is such a major part of any online fps, like the engine in a car. Why do the programmers not realize this and put a shitload of resources on it?


Q3a had 50ms of smoothing and no lag compensation. You could not cheat by making the upload bad what are you talking about, your own game would suffer much more then that of the enemies. No, that stuff was introduced later with cpma, then QL

You are actually right, without unlagged it will affect your hit detection (still I believe it's bigger deal for the opponent). Anyway, it's a crude way of cheating because anyone can see by looking at your lagometer that you either cheat or your connection is not suitable. People are going to cheat and you won't technically eliminate possibility of cheating in online fps. It's more of a social problem than technical. There are way more effective cheats anyway.

Obviously they put quite a lot more resources into it in qc/dbt than in q3, even if you don't like the results. How do you know it wasn't logged and analysed for bugs? You talked to developers? I know it was back in q3 development because there are tools for it in code and it's mentioned in Carmack's .plan files.

As I said, because there were short bursts of time, after an update, with all servers going down and up again, when QC played great. But after a short period of time, the fuckening creeped back in.

I'm not the only one detecting this btw., just recently I think Rapha said something similar on stream. Others posted about this phenomenon on the QC reddit long ago. All independent of my own perception.

As for DBT the netcode was way better in the beginning imo. Then there were several iterations, one where warpers were unstoppable, one where they did not have a big advantage - they settled for a medium advantage for warpers /facepalm

So yeah, of course they could improve as well