Happy Birthday UT2004
Posted: Sat 16. Mar 2024, 20:03
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Happy Birthday UT2004
Posted: Tue 19. Mar 2024, 13:44
Twenty years ago to the day since the game launched in the EU, assuming the game's Wikipedia entry has it right. Might seem a bit pedantic to point that out specifically whenever some anniversary for UT2004 rolls around and people start talking about it on March 16th first, but, what can I say, it helps stir memories of anticipation and initial funtimes in me from way back when, so I'll stick with it 
. After all, on a day like this, it seems appropriate to indulge in a bit o' reminiscing.
Feels like an eternity by online gaming standards, a bitunreal surreal to hit such a milestone. All the gamemodes and mods we tried, all the servers & communities we frequented, all the ggs and people we played with there, all the effort n' accumulated experience in this specific ingame skill or that modding discipline, the good times, the wacky antics, the occasional bouts o' drama...
All to get to what these days feels like a post-apocalypse with just a few scattered island-communities, loosely connected via rickety bridges across a barren landscape, holding on as best they can. If you count yourself among those, still around and playing, I'd say you're effectively the last of a dying breed. Dunno if it's a case of more conviction than convenience that's keeping you around or vice versa, or a mix of both perhaps, but I'm glad for that nonetheless.
Pragmatically, I don't foresee much fanfare or any kinda party being thrown to mark the occasion by Epic, nor do I harbour any high hopes about some fancy type o' UT revival project getting announced by them for that matter. They know what their golden egg-laying goose is these days, and this old gal ain't it. 'Sides, too many boomer shooters by indie devs already floating around, eating into that very small demographic for there to be enough meat on that proverbial bone to make it worth their while, too. If anything UT/ONS-like is gonna take off nowadays, in all likelihood it'll be a clone from some other dev, not a new installment of this franchise. Sad but true.
At any rate, we stay in our lane, Epic stays in theirs, we all keep on going our merry way. We might lose a regular here or there over the months and years, but that's pretty much how it's been for awhile and there's little that can change it. Such is life, and it's only gotten more hectic, complicated and unpredictable for most of us since the olden glory days - it's certainly the case for me :/. Seems more sensible to just look into the future with stoicism and hope for the best. And, who knows, as we're entering a celebratory year for UT2004 - and ONS - maybe someone will have enough time n' inclination to whip up something nice to surprise everyone else with. I certainly wouldn't put it past the ONS community. If there's ever been a collectively defining trait for it, it's that we're a resourceful bunch.
Happy 20 years of UT2004 and the excellent gameplay it brought with it in Onslaught, and here's to many more!
. After all, on a day like this, it seems appropriate to indulge in a bit o' reminiscing.Feels like an eternity by online gaming standards, a bit
All to get to what these days feels like a post-apocalypse with just a few scattered island-communities, loosely connected via rickety bridges across a barren landscape, holding on as best they can. If you count yourself among those, still around and playing, I'd say you're effectively the last of a dying breed. Dunno if it's a case of more conviction than convenience that's keeping you around or vice versa, or a mix of both perhaps, but I'm glad for that nonetheless.
Pragmatically, I don't foresee much fanfare or any kinda party being thrown to mark the occasion by Epic, nor do I harbour any high hopes about some fancy type o' UT revival project getting announced by them for that matter. They know what their golden egg-laying goose is these days, and this old gal ain't it. 'Sides, too many boomer shooters by indie devs already floating around, eating into that very small demographic for there to be enough meat on that proverbial bone to make it worth their while, too. If anything UT/ONS-like is gonna take off nowadays, in all likelihood it'll be a clone from some other dev, not a new installment of this franchise. Sad but true.
At any rate, we stay in our lane, Epic stays in theirs, we all keep on going our merry way. We might lose a regular here or there over the months and years, but that's pretty much how it's been for awhile and there's little that can change it. Such is life, and it's only gotten more hectic, complicated and unpredictable for most of us since the olden glory days - it's certainly the case for me :/. Seems more sensible to just look into the future with stoicism and hope for the best. And, who knows, as we're entering a celebratory year for UT2004 - and ONS - maybe someone will have enough time n' inclination to whip up something nice to surprise everyone else with. I certainly wouldn't put it past the ONS community. If there's ever been a collectively defining trait for it, it's that we're a resourceful bunch.
Happy 20 years of UT2004 and the excellent gameplay it brought with it in Onslaught, and here's to many more!
Happy Birthday UT2004
Posted: Wed 27. Mar 2024, 11:29
The silver lining is the game is now abandonware and the lack of a master server to validate keys doubles down on it. It's easier than ever to get into this game thanks to fast connections where a 2GB download for a game is only a few minutes, compared to modern behemoths. Therefore it's a "fuck it why not" type of decision for anyone on the edge of trying this game. Very little to lose if they don't like it.
I've played various Quake/UT clones and other AFPS attempts and they were all cobbled-together garbage compared to the standard of this game. There will never be a game to rival UT2004 because it's a product of a bygone era where graphics expectations were still reasonable (less bloat and higher performance), there are minimal bugs compared to modern games where bugs are features, you don't have to pay for DLCs - you make them yourself with the same editor the devs used to make the game that ships with every copy. I could go on, but UT3/UT4 were both garbage and died because they lacked real modding support which the UE1/2 games don't.
I made a curated UT2004 "distribution" which has all the patches and config changes already made so new players don't have to waste hours setting up the game to modern standards (including competitive settings to make it fair against others who made the changes). It has a .reg to add a CD key to be able to launch the game, with a few keys to spare. Feel free to share it.
https://archive.org/details/ut2004-3369
I've played various Quake/UT clones and other AFPS attempts and they were all cobbled-together garbage compared to the standard of this game. There will never be a game to rival UT2004 because it's a product of a bygone era where graphics expectations were still reasonable (less bloat and higher performance), there are minimal bugs compared to modern games where bugs are features, you don't have to pay for DLCs - you make them yourself with the same editor the devs used to make the game that ships with every copy. I could go on, but UT3/UT4 were both garbage and died because they lacked real modding support which the UE1/2 games don't.
I made a curated UT2004 "distribution" which has all the patches and config changes already made so new players don't have to waste hours setting up the game to modern standards (including competitive settings to make it fair against others who made the changes). It has a .reg to add a CD key to be able to launch the game, with a few keys to spare. Feel free to share it.
https://archive.org/details/ut2004-3369