BTRY B 529th FA BN
Lifer
- Nov 26, 2005
- 15,194
- 403
- 126
BTRY B 529th FA BN
Lifer
- Nov 26, 2005
- 15,194
- 403
- 126
BTRY B 529th FA BN
Lifer
- Nov 26, 2005
- 15,194
- 403
- 126
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
How do you get access to the Beta? Those screenshots do look like a step in the right direction.
For reference:
I was asking lxskllr, and asking him for a reason. Your screenshots look nice, so congratulations, but they don't explain why someone doesn't like playing UT3. I inferred from his post that he took issue with some element of the gameplay, not the mediocre UI. FWIW, the new screens look nice, but they don't look like an "overhaul"; they simply look like they were finally finished. I'm not saying that's a bad thing at all. But if someone hated UT3's menus before, I don't see how the new UI - represented in those screenshots - is going to reverse their opinion. Frankly, I think all the fuss over the UI is simply misdirected angst over the fact that the masses don't find arena shooters as enganging as they used to be, but said masses haven't figured out how to identify those sentiments and articulate them yet.
I've said it several times in the past, but I'll say it again since it's quite relevant at the moment: UT3's UI **sucked**, but it was not a barrier to the game. It functioned and served its purpose. It was an inconvenience easily skirted by editing INI's (which gamers get off on doing anyway) and using a free third party browser. Hell, I wrote my own server browser in a day that I use all the time now. From what I'm seeing in the new UI, I don't intend to stop using it, either. But that's neither here nor there. The issue with UT3 is the genre (or sub-genre, actually); not the gameplay, UI, weapon balance, performance, blah blah blah. It's out of style and and out of touch with the new generation of gamers, which include the new kids who weren't around for UT99 as well as 25 - 35 year olds who are just now discovering gaming. They want milsim shooters and Warcraft. Not fantasy Flak Cannons and pocket-sized nuclear arsenal.
Guys like you and me who love Unreal-style gameplay are no longer in the majority. As others have stated here before, UT is a very harsh world for new fans. It's extremely skill-based: map knowledge, timing, hand-eye coordination, and sheer twitch-reflex time are the REAL barriers here, not the fact that you can't set the number of leaves on trees without editing an INI file.
lxskllr
No Lifer
- Nov 30, 2004
- 60,130
- 10,601
- 126
The patch fixes a bunch of issues, but it still leaves some problems. Here's my list that isn't included in the patch...
Game feels too "heavy" I get sore fingers from mashing the buttons so hard trying to get my avatar to do something.
Flak secondary is borked. It's all but un-aimable. I don't know how that could have gotten through the first phase of testing, and the designer says "yea, this feels perfect"
Bio is overpowered. If you swapped bio's with UT2k4 it would be perfect. The UT3 maps are too small, and movement is too reduced for the huge glob that has tremendous staying power
Can't bind taunts
I'm not sure what UI changes have been made, but at the end of a match, I don't want to be forced to a different screen. I don't even like the forced map vote from UT2k4. I have a button to select maps, and I'll use it if I choose to.
There's probably some more, but I haven't played in awhile. I'd have to refresh my memory. I'll say up front that my favorite of the series is UT2k4. The 2kx gamestyle is what got me into UT, so in any case, I'm just not going to be completely happy with UT3. It's my least favorite of the franchise, and I'd prefer playing GOTY than UT3 as it stands. I'm hoping to change my mind with the new patch, but we'll see. UT3 will never be the perfect game to me, but with enough fixing, it may become tolerable :^)
Game feels too "heavy" I get sore fingers from mashing the buttons so hard trying to get my avatar to do something.
Flak secondary is borked. It's all but un-aimable. I don't know how that could have gotten through the first phase of testing, and the designer says "yea, this feels perfect"
Bio is overpowered. If you swapped bio's with UT2k4 it would be perfect. The UT3 maps are too small, and movement is too reduced for the huge glob that has tremendous staying power
Can't bind taunts
I'm not sure what UI changes have been made, but at the end of a match, I don't want to be forced to a different screen. I don't even like the forced map vote from UT2k4. I have a button to select maps, and I'll use it if I choose to.
There's probably some more, but I haven't played in awhile. I'd have to refresh my memory. I'll say up front that my favorite of the series is UT2k4. The 2kx gamestyle is what got me into UT, so in any case, I'm just not going to be completely happy with UT3. It's my least favorite of the franchise, and I'd prefer playing GOTY than UT3 as it stands. I'm hoping to change my mind with the new patch, but we'll see. UT3 will never be the perfect game to me, but with enough fixing, it may become tolerable :^)
Herein lies a fundamental problem with the entire series AND its fanbase. There are two factions: The UT99 faction, and the 2kx faction. When UT2k3 was released, a lot of UT99 fans felt "left behind" and that Epic trashed what they felt was "perfected gameplay".
So they stuck to UT99 and UT2kx ushered in some new fans (not nearly as many as UT99 brought, though).
The designer's goal (Steve Polge) with UT3 was to take the best of both worlds to try to bring the two fanbases together. Truth be told, UT3 is truer to the original than it is the UT2kx incarnations. Personally, I'm ok with that, but then again, I found something enjoyable in each game of the series. UT99 was too harsh on beginners. UT2k3's map design was, largely, attrocious. UT2k4 fixed some of what was wrong in 2k3, but it never fixed the scaling issues and the new game mode Onslaught actually exacerbated them.
UT3 intended to "ground" the game a bit, which I love, to be honest. No argument that the flak secondary is messed up, but that's easily fixed with a mutator.
Regardless of how you or I feel, though, the fact remains that any iteration of UT is going to piss someone off. Everyone thinks their way is the only way. Between this paradox and the fact that there are simply too many gametypes and that arena shooters are a niche these days, UT is pretty much doomed.
I certainly hope they have a UT4 in the pipeline - based on UT3's gameplay (which I favor out of all in the series) - but I won't be surprised if UT3 is the last installment
.
lxskllr
No Lifer
- Nov 30, 2004
- 60,130
- 10,601
- 126
Oh, I remembered a big one... Sound positioning. I have a hard time hearing other players, and what they're doing. I use my ears a lot in UT2k4, and the positional audio is essential for how I play the game. I mention this, because the game feels too spammy to me. I wish I had a $ for every time I got fragged by a salvo of rockets that I didn't hear, and had no idea where they came from.
I was playing UT3 IG for awhile, and had a decent time with that. I can also play 1v1, or a very small FFA and it's kind of fun. When you get more than 5 people on a map, it just feels too spammy to me. There's some custom maps that aren't bad, but I haven't played enough to thoroughly check them out.
I was playing UT3 IG for awhile, and had a decent time with that. I can also play 1v1, or a very small FFA and it's kind of fun. When you get more than 5 people on a map, it just feels too spammy to me. There's some custom maps that aren't bad, but I haven't played enough to thoroughly check them out.
Well UT2k4 was far too floaty and thats partly why I hated it. In UT3 they brought back the movement of UT99.
WhipperSnapper
Lifer
- Oct 30, 2004
- 11,442
- 32
- 91
I've started playing UT3 again because of the anticipation that people have for the patch and I also play UT 2004 Onslaught. I agree with you that UT3's gameplay might well be part of its problem. I find Onslaught to be more fun but will play UT3 Warfare when the Onslaught servers are empty.
Something feels off to me about the vehicle-pedestrian balance in UT3 and the vehicles also lack first person view (important for flying vehicles). Also, the grungy, kind of washed-out visual style of UT3 makes it harder to tell what's going on around you; it's as though the graphics clutter things up.
I agree. You still don't have a box where you can enter a numerical value for a given setting.
I disagree. Many of the people who complained about the UI (and server browser) are still playing UT99 and UT 2004 today; obviously they find arena shooters to be engaging. Folks who just lost interest in arena shooters probably just lost interest in the entire series and moved on rather than post complaints on discussion forums.
Also, note that many opinions were formed shortly after UT3 came out, back when the server browser was featureless and barely functional (you couldn't even add server Favorites). With the Main Menu running in the background and with having to load it, the UI felt clunky and slow. Some aspects of the game are still clunky last I checked. The Map Vote menu is inferior to the UT 2004 map vote menu and you still have to leave the server if you want to look at the server browser.
Maybe so, but I have a hard time believing that male neuro-biology has changed all that much.
Also, UT3's issues were not merely with the UI and the server browser, but rather just about everything that surrounded the decent game play and it had game play issues itself. (Like I said, many people find UT 2004 Onslaught to just be more fun than UT3 Warfare regardless of UI and server browser.) I also think the visual clutter detracts some from the game play. It's hard to put into words but it feels like you have more control over your avatar and your environment in the earlier UTs.
When you sum that up, it might explain why UT3 flopped. I think one hole in your argument that people are no longer interested in arena shooters is that UT fans--people who are still interested in them--went back to UT99 and UT 2004--something about UT3 didn't grab a-hold of them.
I just installed this and it was atrociously hard to play online. There is a serious delay with any kind of ping. I played on a server with 100 ping and i just couldn't stand the delay of all my weapons. Is this normal?
BTRY B 529th FA BN
Lifer
- Nov 26, 2005
- 15,194
- 403
- 126
CrystalBay
Platinum Member
- Apr 2, 2002
- 2,175
- 1
- 0
Incorrect.
There are only 4k players playing UT2k4 right now, and gobs of those are actually bots, not humans. The real number, nobody knows, but it's a fraction of that I'm sure.
There are 600 humans playing UT3 right now.
There are 1800 players in UT(99) at the moment. This number has been fairly steady for years. UT3 might not have sapped any players from UT99, but then again, neither did UT2k4.
Some people keep trying to single out UT3 as the oddball in the series, and that's far from reality. The truth of the matter, anything that isn't UT99 upon release is the oddball out. Have you forgotten about UT2k3's reception? UT2k4 was a success only because it was measured against UT2k3's failure.
Nostalgia drives these games, so no matter what is thrown into the game, it's doomed because it's not just a redux with better graphics.
UT2k4 was fun for me, but it had a ton of its own problems. Terrible scaling issues, horribly "floaty" gameplay, etc. What you're praising today was actually being lambasted and harpooned just a few years ago.
UT fans don't adjust well to change. UT3 isn't any different.
Originally posted by: CrystalBay
Furiously searching the web for da patch...It was up on epics site , they took it down
Was it? What did they name it?
Originally posted by: lowrider69
Originally posted by: CrystalBay
Furiously searching the web for da patch...It was up on epics site , they took it down
Was it? What did they name it?
There are rumors of a leaked alpha/beta patch, but the only one really worth downloading is the official release.
I've downloaded the beta patches before, usually directly from the epic server. They must have switched the directory because I can't locate it. I was hoping it would something like UT3Patch4beta1.exe..along those lines.
BTRY B 529th FA BN
Lifer
- Nov 26, 2005
- 15,194
- 403
- 126
JoshGuru7
Golden Member
- Aug 18, 2001
- 1,020
- 1
- 0
I admit that I strongly preferred UT'99 to 2kX, but the gameplay in UT3 feels far superior to me than it did in 2kX.
2kX felt more realistic (in everything but the gravity) but did so at the expense of precision and if I had wanted to make that trade I would have played any of the realistic shooters on the market who did it better. I liked the UT'99 shock rifle, sniper rifle and translocator how they were, and if it made the learning curve really steep then I thought that was a fair tradeoff.
UT3 extends dodging a bit, increases run speed, adds a hoverboard, ditches the jump/dodge and moves weapon balance back closer to '99 (welcome back shock rifle!). Most importantly for me, it brings back dodging as the primary mode of defense over the shield gun (and the bio can very definitely be dodged).
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