Quake

Never played Quake until this year. To me, Quake: The Offering is a Doom-like game which, again, to me, is fun to run through but if I ever play it again it will be just to kill some time. I remember people losing their minds over this game after its release, and I may have been one of those people had I played it, but it just didn't do it for me. Maybe because of its age, maybe because it was too much like the original Doom only with better graphics, I dunno. To complete the game, you must battle monsters, solve puzzles and collect a rune per episode, through several levels per episode. There are 4 episodes to complete. After the 4th episode, you "fight" the final monster, Shub-Niggurath. I think I spelled that correctly. Anyway, I'm not disappointed with my purchase (got it on sale). I knew what to expect because I watched gameplay on YouTube before I bought it. I still don't think it's that great of a game, though.

This game is great in its own right, but what matters to me most is that it is open-source for all your modding needs. If you don't like the game, you can change it. If you DO like the game, you can make it better. Romans 10:13 "For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."

A masterpiece! I would put this on my top ten list of greatest video games ever made. Yes, unfortunately it DOES NOT have the Nine Inch Nails music soundtrack so take a star off of my review if that is important to you. Also it does not run on Linux either - tried both WINE 1.9 Beta and DOSBox - I eventually installed it on a Windows 10 system copied over the files to Linux and used the nice "Dark Places Engine" to run it on Linux. This is an absolute MUST HAVE in my professional opinion! Thanks! -J eZxLee

NOTE: I'm playing Quake as released by GOG.com using GLQuake. I've also ripped the CD audio as provided by GOG to play the game as originally intended. ----------------------------------------------------------- This is my very first time sitting down to play Quake with the included OSTs (including the expansion packs! - mind you getting the OST working does take a little tinkering). Before I played didn't quite understand what others meant by an oppressive atmosphere - just even taking into consideration the first two episodes, I can feel that seeping through the tightly crafted gameplay, awesome art design, and memorable ambient music. Playing those first two episodes I felt afraid to move ahead, but pushed on anyways, because if you keep moving, you have better chances at surviving! It takes a little to get used to, but when it all clicks, it works very well. The level design: Somehow labyrinthine yet incredibly easy to find out how to get where you need to go to. Masterful stuff - wish level design like this was more common in games, as it makes the game infinitely more fun to play through. This is definitely still a game you'll want to check out today - even if you've never played it before now. The OST definitely does well to bring you into it too. The unfortunate part with this on the GOG base game is that it doesn't work "out of the box" due to problems with the copyright and the fact that the music directly plays "ogg" files to make the original game's CD audio work. Luckily, GOG has included the original games (and the expansions!) disc images so that you can: (1) burn the game to a CD and let the music play that way or (2) rip the disc images into "ogg" as you like and place them into "music" folder respective to each game. While this requires a little extra work and know how, a quick visit to the forums can get you up to speed on what you need to do to play the game as it was originally intended. There are other ways to get music working as well.

I am a Quake newb and have been playing Quake for a couple days now. Let's start with the fixes, First, I downloaded a replacement for the Glquake.exe called DarkPlaces (http://icculus.org/twilight/darkplaces/) which provides higher resolution textures. They look very good. If you rename the DarkPlaces.exe "Glquake.exe" it will run with the updated graphics. Be sure to read the readme because there is a file that needs to be deleted before it will execute. Second, I found a fix that puts the music back (it appears to be a technical issue rather than a rights issue). The score is fantastic. Having Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails composing the score is a perfect match and the job they did is superb. (Thanks to Johnny Law on Steam http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=119489135) The best thing I can say about Quake is that it is beautifully optimized (thank you John Carmack) and the design does a great job of simultaneous introducing mechanics while simultaneously throwing up a speed bump for 90's FPS Newbs (or just people who haven't played a 90's style FPS in a long while, thank you John Romero). The controls are great. In spite of being a 20 year old game, the controls are seemlessly adaptable for a contemporary audience. The aforementioned optimization makes this a perfect low-power PC game. I have an Intel Atom Windows 10 Tablet and Quake runs perfectly on it, which means I can bring a mouse to work and set up in the break room and shoot not-Hellspawn. The aesthetic is rather kitschy. Everything about the visual design looks like it would be the perfect place to set up a Hot Topic. The level names read like the album titles that would be sold at a Hot Topic. It's rather silly, but Quake owns it and it works beautifully. Theres a definite consistent atmosphere here, but it is not as colorful or as memorable as the first two DOOM games. That is not to say that it is bad. I just wish it was a bit more colorful.