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Xtasy26

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#1 Xtasy26
Member since 2008 • 5593 Posts

What's your budget? What are the rest of your PC specs?

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Xtasy26

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#2 Xtasy26
Member since 2008 • 5593 Posts

@uninspiredcup said:

Another year, another Christmas. Steam game prices go higher, Steam sales always go lower. A cynical loop of corporate greed clinically eroding value for it's own unsated greed.

Have you bought any garbage this year?

---

Limiting spending to £40. Buying £10-20 games only/.

These are auto-buys. ( Nightdive trust)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1678430/PowerSlave_Exhumed/?curator_clanid=5644295

https://store.steampowered.com/app/668980/Forsaken_Remastered/?curator_clanid=5644295

Won't regret Forsaken. One of the best 360 degree games ever made. I played the fan modded (X Project) around this time 9 years ago which supports HD resolution. Honestly, I don't why they call it just a "Descent clone" while it is like Descent but in many ways it's so much better. I think the controls the environments and the flashy graphics overall make it a better game.

Too bad Probe Entertainment went bust 20+ years ago and they no longer make many good 360 degree games.

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#3  Edited By Xtasy26
Member since 2008 • 5593 Posts

What can I say about 1998. The greatest year in Gaming over that past 25 years. Some years come close (ie 2004, 2007). But 1998 was a year that from which games I am still playing today (recently Heretic 2, with 25th Anniversary game mods to improve the game with better graphics and other fixes). And recently of course the Quake 2 remaster which had the two expansions that came out in 1998.

Anyways, my favorite would be breaking it down into what I have played from 1998 and may play in the future:

Played:

Unreal: The Crysis of 1998. The 3D GPU benchmark of 1998 which was used to bench all the latest graphics card at the time. My jaws dropped to the floor with the graphics. Coming out the crashed space ship and into the vast amazing world was nothing short of stunning. The beautiful waterfalls, the lens flare, it all had a woo ahh moment. The Castle walk through in the main menu with reflective lighting on the castle bridge was stunning. One of the first if not the first Open World First Person shooter.

Forsaken: Beautiful graphics, another popular 3D graphics benchmark. A good Descent clome but I would argue it's better in some ways at least with the controls.

Half-Life: Revolutionary FPS. From the beginning of the tram ride to it's scripted sequence, to it's AI, to teleporting you to another dimension. Revolution stuff, probably the best FPS form the 90s.

Sin: The last hurrah of the 90s shooters with a bit a Duke Nukem flavor. Diverse levels with great gun play and a sexy antagonist. They don't make games like this anymore. I wonder why? ;)

Playing: Heretic 2, a good overall 3rd person game. Descent graphics for a Quake 2 engine game with community mods to improve the graphics. Better than half the crap we get in 2023 with better level design and Single Player campaign. Look at the recent Call of Duty with it's crap Single Player that only lasts 3-4 hours.

Want to play (maybe in the future):

-Grim Fandango (remastered): Played the demo back in the day. Great art design, and unique story telling with great puzzles.

-Battlezone (98 redux): Remastered 98 version. First person RTS type of game. Played the demo back in the day. Great game set in the Moon (I believe). Where you fight the Soviets for control over the moon.

-Turok 2 (remastered): From what I heard maybe the pinnacle of the Turok series. Great colorful graphics where you shoot Dinosaurs.

Other notable mentions:

-The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Some say the best Legend of Zelda game.

-Need For Speed 3: Recently played it with 1080P mod. Pretty good game for it's time. First introduced the cops vs players mode. Great tracks. Although I may not recommended it today but having played it on the PC with patches and 1080P resolution. I can see why people highly rated this game back in the day.

Other Notable Mentions:

Blitz (arcade version)

Starcraft 2.

There's too many others to mention. But it should be noted that's also when Second/Third Generation of GPUs started to hit the market and we started to see huge leaps in Computer Graphics. So, in many ways 1998 left a landmark in gaming.

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#4  Edited By Xtasy26
Member since 2008 • 5593 Posts
@mrbojangles25 said:
@Xtasy26 said:

I noticed Opposing Force and Blue Shift is for sale too:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/50/HalfLife_Opposing_Force/

Is it worth playing in 2023-2024?

Opposing Force was a great expansion. In my opinion, yes, worth it in 2023 but as others have said the original HL games are dated by modern standards.

Still, if you never have, definitely worth giving it a spin, getting a bit of gaming history.

Nice. Was always interested in these two.

Nice Christmas 1998 story. I had fond memories of that time. While we didn't have a good enough computer to play Half-Life I do remember trying many demo versions of games on my Dad's work computer at his work place. I believe it was P2 266 with 64MB RAM an had a nVIDA Riva 128. Tried many great games like Quake 2, Forsaken, Turok, and Need For Speed Hot Pursuit. 1998 had great many games, I would say it was probably the greatest year of gaming over the past 25 years. That's also when the second generation of 3D graphics card started to come out and you really started to see what developers could do with the new tech. It was a "magical" type moment to be around. Developers were willing to take risks on trying different types of games FPS shooters, 3rd person Action/RPG game like Heretic 2 which came out around the same time. Stealth games like Thief also came out in 1998.

Now days, it's the same old same old every year, looks at Call of Duty series.

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#5 Xtasy26
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@Mozelleple112 said:

@Xtasy26: Quake 3 had 512x512 textures?

I've recently been on a modding spree for RDR2 and apparently a lot of the textures in the game are 512x512 or 1024x1024. (with mods brining them to 2048x2048 or 4096x4096 and still not being 100% perfect...)

So you're telling me some of RDR2's textures are literally PS2 grade? (technically 1999 would be PS1 but no way could the PS1 run Q3)

You would assume that Valve would have updated texture file size long time ago. Not 25 years later! Guess they thought Half Life Source was the "definitive" version and didn't bother with the original. Strange they only decided to update the original Half-Life instead of Half-Life Source which had a better engine and could have updated that and gave that away for free!

Yep, Quake 3 supported 512x512. That was one of the main criticism in 1999 when Voodoo 3 was coming out in that it only supported texture 256x256 while 3DFX's competitor like the Riva TNT2 from NVidia which came around that time supported the higher texture. That's when people started to move away from 3DFX and started going into NVIDIA because upcoming titles like Quake 3 was going to support the higher texture and 32-bit color whereas 3DFX only support 16 bit.

Quake 3 like many of John Carmack's engine was ahead of it's time. It was like the Unreal 3 engine of it's time which dominated the Xbox 360 generation where multiple games was using the Unreal 3 engine, and now Unreal 5 engine in this generation.

It wasn't until Unreal Tournament 2003 and Monolith's Jupiter Lithech engine which was used in No One Lives Forever 2 that came out in 2002 that when you had a better 3D engine then Quake 3's.

Texture size would depend on the engine. Quake 3 wasn't on the PS1. No way in hell would a game like that would run on the PS1. It was however on the Dreamcast which had an actual dedicated PowerVR GPU.

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#6  Edited By Xtasy26
Member since 2008 • 5593 Posts

I noticed Opposing Force and Blue Shift is for sale too:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/50/HalfLife_Opposing_Force/

Is it worth playing in 2023-2024?

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#7  Edited By Xtasy26
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My story of Half-Life began in a magazine where it got rave reviews of the game footage Valve showed at E3 of that year (1998 I believe) and how great the AI was where, they will track you down and attack you. I remember it was all over the place with numerous "Best of E3" awards. I didn't have a good enough compute to run it back then when it war released. .

I did play Half-Life Source later in 2010 and while there were better games that came out by them. I thought it was pretty impressive for a game that came out in 1998. With the interactivity and the initial tram ride and being teleported to another dimension and the level design, definitely the best game from the 90s. I was only used to playing Quake 1 and Duke Nukem 3D on our family PC. So, I didn't have exposure to Half-Life (since didn't have good enough computer to run it). I did try other 3D games like Quake 2, Forsaken, Turok, back in 1998 on my Dad's Work PC that had a RIVA 128 GPU.

Website that lists the changes/updates made.

"Added supported for UI Sprites and Texture files larger than 256x256."

^^ I am surprised that they only added support for Texture larger than 256x256 only now. Even the nvidia TNT back in 1998 supported larger texture files. Quake 3 was doing 512x512. Only the 3DFX Voodoo 2 and Voodoo 3 was stuck at max 256x256 texture size and 16 bit color while nVidia anything past TNT+ and I believe Rage 128+ from ATI supported 32 bit color.

You would assume that Valve would have updated texture file size long time ago. Not 25 years later! Guess they thought Half Life Source was the "definitive" version and didn't bother with the original. Strange they only decided to update the original Half-Life instead of Half-Life Source which had a better engine and could have updated that and gave that away for free!

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#8 Xtasy26
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@lamprey263 said:

Forget which, Heretic or Hexen, whichever came first, that's the one I played. Like wizard Doom. Now Microsoft owns both of those via the ABK acquisition. They may want some re-release to add it to Game Pass. Perhaps they should partner with 3D Realms since they're taking a committed approach to re-releasing older PC games, and bringing them to consoles too. Might also help build a great working relationship to bring more of their content to Xbox and Game Pass.

This. I saw 3D Realms stream all the games and boomer shooters that are coming out with their partners and various developers. It's no longer the original 3D Realms of the 90s. I could see them do a great job of bringing a new Heretic/Hexen game with the IP. Have doubts though Microsoft will release the IP to 3D Realms. Bringing them to consoles would also be great for the younger gamers.

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#9 Xtasy26
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@uninspiredcup said:

Love the Nightdive treatment of these.

I hope so. Nightdive has been hitting it out of the park with these remasters.

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#10 Xtasy26
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@judaspete said:

I hope Raven gets pulled off CoD support duty and makes a new Hexen. It's a dirty word among us old gamers, but this is a series that could benefit from some "modern" sensibilities. Not saying it needs a floating arrow pointing where to go next, but it would be nice to get SOME indication what that switch I just flipped did.

Well Phil Spencer did wear a Hexen t-shirt. It's a travesty that Raven has been wasting time over the last 10+ years working on crap CoD support instead of working on original titles or follow up to their other titles they worked on. There were a lot of talented folks at Raven. Of course they would have to adjust to modern sensibilities, no indication of which switch to pull or making it hard to find your way through the map would be too much for most people but it would need to be somewhat challenging and less hand holding like today's games.