Topic: Ranting about the days of old

[NickNiteQ93]

Ok all you 18+ people this is for you.  I'm not trying to discriminate, it's just anyone under 18 is too young to probably understand what I mean by what I'm going to say.  Do any of you remember the days of Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, and Doom II?  Back when FPS's where all about precision, skill, patience.  I remember how hard it was to actually hit someone in Doom in E1M1 in the Rocket Arena where the blue armor is.  Damn near impossible, and you earned bragging rights when it happened.  Now days, all the FPS's have this fancy shmancy jumping thing.  What's the deal?  Everyone bounces around like they're tripping on E while taking their Prozac, and they think they have skills.  A 2 year old can hop around and not get shot.  Now all you have to do is aim down and shoot him more than he shoots you.  Jump out of the way fast enough.  Screw that.  I liked relying only on my incredible ability to strafe left and aim in the anticipated spot, only to shoot and have my rocket slam right into the opponent's face in glorious defeat.  Now it's aim down, shoot shoot shoot, game over.  Too fast paced for me.  I always got into Doom more than I ever did the Quake series, and it's all because Doom was much slower paced.  It actually made you think about each and every shot.  Hell shooting twice around your opponent was the way to win most of the time.  Now, I aim at the wall above you so when you bounce like the Prozac bunny you are, you'll get a rocket in the face, and that's only if I'm lucky.   Luck shouldn't have anything to do with it.  It's all about planning, timing, and know-how.  I've spoken my piece, now it's time to see who agrees/disagrees with me.

[Grey Ninja]

Personally, I was never a fan of FPS games in general.  I played my share of Doom and Wolfenstein of course, but I could just never get into them.  The first FPS game I actually had any respect for was Goldeneye, as it had some genuine story and fun factor about it.

Recently though, I have been playing a lot of America's Army.  It sounds to me that you would really like the game.  It's only the counterstrike morons who jump around like little fairies coming out of the closet, and it doesn't work so great.    As you have a fairly limited supply of ammo, and the game has a realistic pace about it,

Check this out.

Keep in mind that I said I didn't like FPS games, and check out my time played.    

[joeamis]

i have experienced the jumping fools on quake 3
they jump jump jump and shoot while doing it

im 22 yrs old so i remember the days of doom and wolfenstein
i think youre both right and wrong in your comment about the jumpers

1. doom didn't take all that much skill, for instance to shoot people
who were higher up than you, you simply had to line them up horizontally
and the gun would automatically aim vertically for you and shoot them
2. however doom did require more skill, because you couldn't just use a rocket launcher
and aim at the ground near other players to hit them (quake 3 is an example of the shooting the
ground to kill people)
3. new FPS (started with goldeneye for consoles) let you aim yourself which requires more
skill rather than letting it do it for you (like i said in #1)
4. so basically youre right and wrong in my opinion, I do admit
the first time I encountered the jumpers in quake 3 they frustrated me a bit
but after a little amount of playtime i learned how to do it myself.
i think its okay though, its just a new type of gameplay which i welcome.
5. i can play games like quake 3 for the jumpers style of deathmatch,
or i can play a game like timesplitters 2 which has no jumping in it
either way im getting two different style FPS for me to play.

[KnowsNothing]

jus to tell you, i'm 13 and i've played wolfenstine.  but, last time i played it (couple years ago now) it seemed too hard.  it's not because i suck (that bad), but because older games really do require much more skill.  and jumping around does make things much easier.  but it's really the player who decides to jump or not.  the same goes for cheats.  there are people today that complain that modern day games have too many cheats, ok, then don't use them.  just thought i'd say that.  i also (kinda) like who in wolfenstine, you don't aim up and down, if i remember correctly, you just aim side to side.  i like it becuse it's not like todays FPS where you walk forward with one control stick, and look around with the other.  just one's enough, especially for not talented players like me.  plus, there were alot of actually hidden passageways in wolfenstine, alot i'd find by luck.  the end.

anyone know if the wolfenstine for GBA is any good, or a huge waste of money.

[Sir Kero]

So far as I know, Wolfenstine GBA is Identical to the DOS version, only with fewer buttons.. I dunno if that makes it worth getting or not, it depends on how badly you want to play the game on the go.

I never did get into FPSs, something about the tunnel vision and the lack of a good controller bug the snot out of me. some will argue that mouse and keyboard are great for games, and really it's more of an issue of what you started with, but I like more analog in my 3d games, and I really hate having to pick the mouse up and recenter it. Then again, they work great for Abuse...

I agree that the pace is usually too fast now, though that's actually something the host can adjust. it seems like most people prefer a high speed setting, they're just hyperactive loons I think, and the kind of chaos they create really doesn't work so well in first person. It's a little bit like playing Smash Bros. blindfolded if you ask me.

[EggyToast]

Well, I'm old enough to have played a coleco vision when they were still relatively new, but honestly, old FPSs were less about skill and more about bad design.  It was impossible to kill anyone in the old days because it was hard to aim and the weapons sucked (not to mention being unbalanced).

Sure, there are some FPSs that let you jump now, but is that so bad?  It may make you harder to hit, but it also makes it harder for you to hit someone (unless they're really bad).  Personally, I think that's just a strategy decision.  It's like finding where the best weapons spawn and making a bee-line for that location whenever you die.

Also, games are less about getting that perfect kill and more about racking up kills.  Is a game better because one person could master the badly-designed control system and got 10 kills in 10 minutes, or is a game better because people who don't play FPSs can play and still get a few kills in, despite losing to someone who's much better?

I think FPSs have come a long way, and for the better.  It's like comparing the difficulty in Super Mario Bros. to the difficulty in Mario64 -- the first one killed you with stupid randomness and long jumps, whereas the second one had much more difficult puzzles and strategy even though you died less.  The first one was "harder," but I'd say the second was "better."

Difficulty doesn't make a game better if it's hard simply because the developers were lazy, or were limited by technology.  I personally would rather play a modern FPS where I can have fun killing people with cool weapons where I don't have to spend 5 hours a day perfecting my aiming.

There are also far more FPSs than just Doom and Quake.  I don't like Quake for many of the reasons you said, but I love Timesplitters 2.  That just came out, and there's no jumping to be seen.

[NickNiteQ93]

Well I think the most modern FPS I like the most is TimeSplitters 2.  Sorry I didn't mention it.  I just dont like this jumping crap.  And you can tell, if I'm ever playing against you in Quake 3, how old school I am.  I rarely jump, and if I do it's because I have to.  I'm usually last in rankings because I haven't gotten the whole jump while running, shoot while jumping and running, then get armor deal yet.  I just liked the skill I had to have to pull off some of the rocket shots I had while playing Doom.  I remember this one time I was playing against a friend of mine in Doom.  We played until 7 o'clock that morning, and we had only accumulated 35 frags.  We didn't suck by any means, it's just you have to anticipate where the person's gonna be and shoot, hoping the person would actually go to that location.  Now if you can't pull off 250 frags in an hour you just don't need to even play.  Now bullet weapons were never really a problem, but the slow rockets on the rocket launcher required precise timing.  Now days I just have to aim at everyone's feet and hope I get to pull off 3 shots before he pulls off his masterful in my face luck shot.  Maybe I'm just having a fit of nostalgia.  

[Duriez]

I've seen demos of people playing Quakeworld and it doesn't matter if you jump around.  People can hit other people in mid-air with rockets.  If anything, playing Quakeworld requires more skill and precision than Doom.  Everything after Quakeworld to me is watered down and n00b friendly.  The only thing that came close to Quakeworld for me was Goldeneye.  License to Kill in the basement or the complex was awesome and put the skill back into mulitplayer shooters for me.  Quake 3 or Halo is n00b garbage compared to Quakeworld if you ask me.    

[codyy]

Hey. I'm 14 and I've played all the classic firstperson shooters-Doom, Doom 2, Quake, Quake 2, Wolfenstein 3D, heck even Spear of Destiny. Blue Key, Red Key, Yellow Key, well that was about how deep it got.They still hold a special place in my heart, I can even still remember the cheat (IDDQD-invincibilty IDKFA all guns). The graphics sucked, but it was still fun to punch out an imp. I nearly went blind playing Wolfenstein. Very little skill still fun.

[NickNiteQ93]

Heh Quakeworld..... Now there's something that made me miss lots of hours doing homework.  You know what tho?  I used to play a mod for Quake 1 alot, and now I can't seem to find it.  I think it got canned because of licencing problems.  it was Star Wars CTF.  That mod was really fun cuz I'm a Quake and star wars fan.