Cult Unreal Tournament That Rivaled Quake is Now 25 Years Old. This Game Shook Foundations of Online FPS Games
Unreal Tournament is a game well-known to any FPS lover raised on the genre's 1990s classics. Here's why, even 25 years after its release, the work of Epic Games and Digital Extremes enjoys an awe-inspiring reputation.
In the late 1990s, the id Software team dominated the first-person shooter genre. Nevertheless, in 1998, the game Unreal was released, and its appearance and later success could cause a headache for members of John Carmack's team, who were accustomed to their unshakable position as leaders until then.
Although the weakness of the Epic Games' title was the multiplayer mode lacking on many levels, after 1.5 years the game launched, which was designed to erase the stain that in the field of multiplayer had the original, and at the same time to rub the nose of Quake III: Arena, which had debuted shortly before. Unreal Tournament, because that's the game we're talking about, hit store shelves exactly 25 years ago. Let's recall what the title offered, raising the companies Epic Games and Digital Extremes to new heights.
Multiplayer for singleplayers
There is no doubt that Unreal Tournament was a project created for multiplayer gameplay, either in a local network or over the Internet. However, players who prefer to play solo could also find something for themselves. The devs didn't attempt to create a full-fledged story campaign, divided into missions and tasks waiting to be completed, pushing the story forward.
Instead, we were faced with having to play a series of matches against bots. During the successive clashes, we moved from one map to another and transitioned to different modes. The climax of our efforts was a showdown with the powerful Xan Kriegor. All of this was tied together by a simple plot about a bloody tournament set in the future, where participants competed against each other for the title of Grand Master. As you can easily guess, our main goal was to become one.
Players who honed their skills in multiplayer games often viewed the single-player mode in Unreal Tournament as mere training or even disregarded it entirely. However, plenty of people developed a deep appreciation for the game of Digital Extremes and Epic Games due to the game's single-player mode. This is how it was for me and my pals (players who were at best equipped with modems and could only dream of a stable internet connection at that time).
Double Kill, Multi Kill, Ultra Kill, Monster Kill!!!
Unreal Tournament did its best so that players couldn't complain about boredom. The game offered a variety of modes, including Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch, where the player or team with the most frags at the end of the match wins. Furthermore, the Domination module was ready for trying, with players divided into teams fighting for control over specific areas, as well as the Capture the Flag mode, where two teams attempted to steal the flag from the enemy base and bring it back to their own headquarters. The list of gameplay variants concluded with Assault, where one team performed missions (often involving the destruction of objects), and the other team had to prevent them at all costs. Another variant was Last Man Standing, in which the goal wasn't so much to kill opponents, but to avoid deaths.
A special mention should be given to the locations in which the gameplay took place, as they were as diverse as possible.The list of arenas included a spaceship, a fort, a gothic cathedral, a city street, and more imaginative locations, such as a moving train, asteroids floating freely in space, and a large galleon. We moved around them on foot (it wasn't yet the time when vehicles could be seen on the "unreal" battlefields), and the movement from point A to point B was made more engaging (and streamlined) by, among other things, launchers capable of swiftly transporting us to the other end of the map.
Bloodbath
The commentator's shouts not only informed us about the points we were scoring but also about how well we were performing. In addition to those mentioned in the previous subtitle, which demonstrates the number of frags we achieved in a short period of time, you could also hear the resounding "Killing Spree!", "Rampage!", "Dominating!", "Godlike!", which echoed after reaching a certain number of frags on one "life."
Speaking of "fragging" - it's time to take a look at the arsenal that the devs have made available to us. Although we started the game modestly, with a single pistol called the Enforcer, we quickly acquired other, more powerful tools of murder. These included, among other things, rifles (machine, sniper, energy), a ricocheting blade launcher (Ripper), and a rocket launcher or even a Flak Cannon. The icing on the cake was the Redeemer, which launched a mini atomic bomb, causing real chaos around the player who used it.
Each gun had an alternate fire mode; in most cases, it caused the weapon to deal more damage at the cost of using up ammunition faster. On the arena, we could also find power-ups in the form of health packs, armor (increasing resistance to damage), and other amplifiers. The fun was also enhanced by "mutators," which are special gameplay modifications. For example, "InstaGib" mode made all players enter the map with the same weapon (Shock Rifle), which could kill with a single shot.
Beautiful chaos
Whether we were playing solo or competing with other players, the gameplay in Unreal Tournament was incredibly dynamic. As a showcase of the Unreal Engine technology capabilities, the title in question looked awesome for its time. It was pleasing to the eye with detailed textures, great use of light and shadow, and smooth animations. The game was grotesquely brutal - a common effect of explosions was turning the opponent into several loose pieces of meat... which from today's perspective looks quite funny. The atmospheric music setting the pace of the game was encouraging for the fight. Nonetheless, on the release day, UT could scare off some people due to quite high system requirements.
Unreal Tournament launched on personal computers in November 1999, accompanied by very good reviews from the industry media. It's fair to say that the average of the reviews was 92/100 according to Metacritic. The game sold like hotcakes; in November 2001, Cliff Bleszinski claimed in Maximum PC magazine that it had sold over 2 million copies, which he believed was largely due to the community's support.
What happened next?
Unreal Tournament was also released on PlayStation 2 (2000) and Sega Dreamcast (2001). In 2002, the game was succeeded by Unreal Tournament 2003, which was followed in 2004 by Unreal Tournament 2004. Over time, spin-offs of this sub-series appeared, namely the games Unreal Championship (2002) and Unreal Championship 2: The Liandri Conflict (2005), created for the first Xbox. In 2007, Unreal Tournament III launched, first on personal computers and later on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
Unfortunately, the series has slowly lost its former shine and impact on the industry over the years, with the culmination being the suspension of work on the next entry in the series titled Unreal Tournament in 2018. The game, which had been in development since 2014, eventually had to give way to another priority for Epic Games, which in the meantime had grown into Fortnite.
How to play Unreal Tournament today?
At the time of writing, Unreal Tournament isn't available on the Epic Games Store, GOG.com, or Steam. Players who don't care about the physical version can use the free version, which Epic Games has granted permission to be distributed by fans from the Old Unreal group. The boxed edition for PC is an expense of around 35 bucks. Cheaper, because for about $20, you can buy the version for PlayStation 2.
Unreal Tournament still boasts a devoted fan base that keeps it alive. Thanks to this, even though its official servers have been shut down, it's not hard to find someone to play with.
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