Man, I remember others and I played Q2's FreezeTag mod (met Doolittle in person), Q2's CTF, Action Quake2 (AQ2), etc. at my college's LAN parties (why did they start on my last day of college? haha).

I never played against Thresh but Quake 1/2 TF/CTF/Death Match and Half-Life 1 TF/CTF/Death Match are among the best gaming years I've had during my teens.

I really miss those early glory days of FPS.

The soundtrack for Quake is/was awesome. But, yeah - I really got into even heavier music than I was into already at the time and would listen to that while playing any number of multiplayer Quake mods.

The segment about Threewave CTF (with the grappling hook) really shot a wave of nostalgia through me. Aside from some really unique Ultima Online guild skirmishes, Threewave CTF for me takes the cake for best multiplayer experiences I've ever had ; and to lesser extents Doom 2 over dialup and WoW.

Super combative terminal jokey from the winning team is on camera saying he can't close IE On a system that is supposed to be secure ... I'm guessing CTF at DEF CON would wipe the floor with these folks.

Claiming to have "won" against the NSA at the end, more like failed less than the others.

These exercises are fine in themselves, but anybody who knows what they are doing and has been tasked to comply with NIST security controls ( the ones the US Gov requires) will notice that many of the requirement unambiguously reduce the security of the system, and the folks who audit these projects don't care how bad it is as long as it's checked on the list.

The problem for the military is that regimentation, "sailor proof" instructions and other necessities of running a massive organization that has to assume the lowest common denominator just don't work in computer security. If people don't know what they are doing no amount of check-listing is going to solve the problem.

Anybody who really knows what they are doing -- as some of these students may one day -- will realize that you have to choose one or the other optimal security or regulation compliance.

disclaimer: my rant may be excessive, I just wasted 18mo building a server cluster that needed to pass gov audit - so I'm bitter

Wow, very rare indeed to see anyone else who has played that game. The off-hand grapple that everyone had in that game made it INSANELY fast and fun. Every game after that had me saying "So why can't I websling in this game again?"

EDIT: looks like the site hasn't been updated in a while: http://www.lmctf.com/index.htm

EDIT 2: lol I knew it wasn't just my imagination that no one I came across knew what i was talking about, the steam group has 15 people in it: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/LMCTF

EDIT 3: There is a Q3 Mod apparently, http://www.moddb.com/mods/lokis-revenge-capture-the-flag >>> http://www.lrctf.com/

Let me know if you get as bored as I do.

In reply to this comment by MonkeySpank:
Man, I miss the old Loki's Minions CTF with the grappling hook. Those were the days!

Still think Quake Threewave CTF is the best multiplayer game out there.

Man, I miss the old Loki's Minions CTF with the grappling hook. Those were the days!

If you want some real RAGE go to any PC gamer site and read any thread about Rage.

I've got to take exception to him calling quake 3 a pile of old wank. It performed it primary task exceptionally well, which was to be an excellent multiplayer DeathMatch or CTF game. I understand he's not big into the whole multiplayer thing, but if you bought Q3 expecting a rich single player experience you failed to have any understanding of the product before you purchased it. Its like buying a golf club to open cans of peas. Yeah you can do it but you're not going to be satisfied with the results. /nerdRAGE

In reply to this comment by netean:
This game feels like it's been in development nearly as long as Duke Nukem Forever - I remember seeing early footage just after Quake 4 launched.

Tragic to think that after all this time, all this development and money, they've made a very visually stunning game that looks quite dull and tedious. To my eye looks exactly the same as Quake 4/3/2/1 Doom etc just with better graphics.

So essentially this is Quake 1 but you'll still need to invest an a top of the line new gaming rig just to get more than 15fps.

ID Games: a 1 trick pony that seem to think if they up the graphics enough time no one will notice the total lack of originality!

ID Tech 5 is portable across all major platforms. A high end gaming rig is most certainly not required. It's designed to make cross-platform releases have as much parity as possible. The fact that is made to run at solid 60 FPS on a PS3 and an Iphone as well as PC and 360 is probably one of the reasons it took so long to develop. I'm sure you will be able to crank up the bells and whistles on a high end PC but that was not the intention of this game or the engine.
Another reason for delay would be that Id is actually creating a new graphics technology too. Not just cranking out a game based on someone else's engine. Id Tech 5 streams MASSIVE amounts of textures on the fly into and out of memory seamlessly. Game devs never have to worry about texture memory constraints or making each platform look good. The engine optimizes everything per platform so each looks as good as possible while the developer only need make one version of the texture for all platforms.
Another reason for a long delay would be that Id licenses it's engines to a bevy of other game companies who could not pursue or afford the R&D of developing new tech. Part of selling such a high cost package is they need to provide usable tools for artists and programmers to interface with. This is a priority for their profitability down the line because if the tools suck there will be heavy tech support costs to fix them and maybe a lawsuit. "Rage" is just half of the equation here.
Finally, I believe the delay in this game could be attributed to it being a semi-open world exploration game, with a story line, and with a sizable racing component thrown in as well. It is not just a first person shooter as you see in this clip. In fact the multiplayer part of the game is said to be just the combat-racing. Not deathmatch or CTF. It's a pretty big departure from the "one trick pony" you describe.
Personally, I would like game devs to release a game when it's fully completed and not draw unfair comparisons to 3D Realms' laughable situation. There really is no similarity at all if you know the facts.

Besides the 1997/1998 the being the golden era for CRPGs, I'm really nostalgic for the Quake I days. The community seemed to be way into, not everyone and their grandparents were on the net yet and the mods that came out for a while were truly awesome for their time. Sometimes I play TF2 and I like it... but it is absolutely nothing compared to the original. I also don't think I've ever played any other CTF game as good as the Threewave CTF besides maybe Tribes CTF. That grappling hook [in 3wave] made it awesome - why the hell has it been forgotten about?

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by vaporlock.

Vanilla Q1 CTF is still the best FPS of all time in term of enjoyment out of any FPS game I've ever played. I nearly cried when I heard they were taking out the grappling gun mechanism from future games.

I get all you're saying, and I'm all for it, though what seems to get your nerdgasm on would mostly be seen in strategy games and one on one matches like this. Fuck knows what brings a guy to reach a level of playing where he memorizes so many tiny details, to me just the thought of playing games in that way is frustrating. But I imagine if you let 20 of these guys play simultaneously I'd get much more excited about the way they demonstrate their skills. Again, more players = more chaos, more chaos = more variables. Seeing how a player utilizes group tactics is much more impressive to me. For example, being an old school UT player, seeing smart players play UT CTF always satisfied the shit outta me. I guess I just never got the appeal of 1on1, and even though I played quite a bit of online strategy games in my time, if I knew the person I'm playing against has reached such a level of familiarity with every single aspect of the game I probably wouldn't enjoy playing any longer...

Oh and, you do know random crits can be turned off in TF2? Why the hell not have that option? Why does the game need to cater only to the top-level competitive crowd?

>> ^Jinx:

In all competitive games the goal is to understand the rules better than your opponent. The more you understand, the more you can predict, the better you are. A game in its infancy is often full of chaos. Look at SC2 compared to SC, even with the wisdom of progamers nobody has really figured out the game to the same degree as SC. The build orders aren't refined, the small details which made all the difference in Brood War aren't as important as just having solid fundamentals in SC2. I wouldn't say I enjoy that sort of chaos, what I enjoy is the pursuit of order, that very human need to understand as much as we possibly can. Its when you see two players that understand the game so thoroughly that its every tiny move that gains advantages, thats when I get excited. I get geekchills from a perfectly timed +armour upgrade for example. Ofc, if a toy is ever truly figured out it begins to lose its magic. The most succesful games are those which aren't unnecessarily complex, but have enough depth to keep the players learning. I always thought Chess was the perfect game because its so elegant, such simple rules but with almost infinite depth. I don't think Quake is quite that good, but as far as videogames go it comes pretty close.
I guess the tl;dr is that I find the chess like strategy fascinating, and I find gratuitous complexity/chaos frustrating, especially when its jammed in by the developers by some sort of diceroll (I'm looking at you Valve. Don't you ever try that random crit shit again yah hear...) because it always dulls the fine edge that seperates the top players.

big thanks for the quality, there is another of these vids here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7jxAyd4-M0&feature=channel with cooller doing the talking about his win in the same set.

I'm really glad people appreciate this video.
In reply to this comment by marinara:
>> ^syncron:

Why hold a tournament of such an old game which nobody really cares about?


*quality
hell didn't play quake 3 for long, loved UT so much. (for the maps and CTF)

apparently this was recorded in july 2010. that's 10 years of quake. Nice to get inside the head of a competitive player.

>> ^syncron:

Why hold a tournament of such an old game which nobody really cares about?


*quality
hell didn't play quake 3 for long, loved UT so much. (for the maps and CTF)

apparently this was recorded in july 2010. that's 10 years of quake. Nice to get inside the head of a competitive player.