Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Games & Gameplay >

Deathmatch

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

21:01 / 20.12.05

I know I'm kind of late to the party, but I just bust my online FPS cherry, and have spent the last couple of hours playing F.E.A.R. against a bunch of real, actual people. Possibly even some of them were on the moon. I don't know. All I know is that most (MOST... not ALL...) were better at handling automatic weapons than I... BUT THEY STILL BURN BRIGHTLY WHEN YOU HIT 'EM WITH THE PARTICLE GUN...

I loves it, I does.

Recommend me some shooty shooty online goodness! (And for reference, I'm avoiding HL2 until I've got to the gravity gun bit in the single-player mode... I only started playing THAT a couple of days ago, and wish to avoid spoileriness).

11:34 / 21.12.05

PC, Xbox or other?

12:40 / 21.12.05

HL2 multiplayer won't give you any spoilers, as far as I'm aware. Not played HL2 Deathmatch much so I can't say for sure. I guess if you don't want to know a couple of the weapons you'll come across later you might want to avoid it, and I guess there's a small risk of people saying "OMG what about the bit in HL2 where Gordon gets eaten by a pixie" too.

However, HL2's real multiplayer is Counter Strike: Source and Day of Defeat: Source. I haven't played DoD:S much but it's meant to be awesome, so if your Steam account has it give it a go.

Other games with good online killing I'd recommend are: UT2k4 (basically pure deathmatch), Battlefield 2 (much more team-oriented and tactical ... on the right server), and I guess that's about it actually. I dont' play online games as much as I used to so I don't know what's good these days.

If you're feeling brave you could try Condition Zero (which if I recall correctly is included free with HL2). Good luck finding a server not filled with muppets though - I used to play with a great bunch who played tactically and weren't just fraghunters, but they've mostly moved on to BF2. Their server is active on Friday evenings though - check out www.deadmen.co.uk for info about the server, and the [BoD] clan are similar if you can find their server.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

15:14 / 21.12.05

Oh, it's not so much plot spoilerage I'm worried about- I'd just like to be introduced to the gravity gun properly!

'Tis PC at the mo... though I plan to get Xbox Live sorted sooner rather than later.

Withiel: DALI'S ROTTWEILER

17:42 / 21.12.05

UT2004 is indeed a thing of joy: not only is it a totally distilled, optimised multiplayer game, and not only does it have a join-the-dots vehicle assault where you can decapitate people with a hovercraft's rotor, the setting (while claiming to be a vaguely coherent sci-fi world) is this hallucinatory battlefied filled with bizarre creatures doing impossible and lethal things to each other. If Counterstrike is all about cover and realism, the UT series (apart from 2003, which was unspeakably misguided) is all about suddenly jumping fifty feet in the air to avoid being over by a bipedal lizard in a dune buggy with razor-sharp blades coming out of the sides. And then blowing the fucker to kingdom come with a shock combo and using the explosion to cushion your landing so you don't die*.

*I have done this nearly once

22:17 / 21.12.05

OMG. HL2DM. Fuck. Yeah.

I think you've got the right idea by waiting till you've been introduced to the grav-gun in-game, as without some skills, you will get hammered online. Wait'll you've finished the game, then take what you've learned and reap.

The DM itself is one of the most under-rated, joyous, dynamic pieces of gaming I've ever played. Imagine killing a room full of four people (real people too, cussing their monitors as they respawn) with a single battered and bloody barrel, thwacking and grabbing, thwacking and grabbing. Someone has their (lethal) magnum pointed at you - grab a table, block the shot and fire the table - blammo, no more opponent.

I'm a bit biased, as I got very good at this game (never beaten once on the scoreboard for about 3 weeks, when I got bored of winning. my own personal best video-game achievement - I have screenshots and everything ::geekout:: ), but it's awesome. Chucking toilets at people, explosive barrels, grenades... good times. AND fucking people up with the guns when they're not expecting it. A machinegun to the head is as lethal as any kitchen sink, and lots of gamers forget that...

unfortunately, there seem to be less and less people still playing this online, and no bot-support. Which sucks.

23:50 / 21.12.05

and have spent the last couple of hours playing F.E.A.R. against a bunch of real, actual people

Don't you require a pretty hefty piece of hardware to run that? I've only played the demo, and it tends to chug on my system unless the visual settings are turned down to near zero.

On the FPS subject, I've personally never been much of a fan of them, although the one weak point in that statement is that I do find simple joy in playing a sniper in online Vietcong now and again, largely since it invariably results in immature US players whining and bleating about 'camping' whenever they are foolish enough to pass by my scope.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

09:38 / 22.12.05

I'm running it on an Athlon64 3700, with 1 gig of ram and a 256 meg graphics card... if you turn most of the effects down it plays perfectly, and still looks pretty lush. But Christ, what a hardware-hungry game!
The Asylum map in F.E.A.R. is currently my favourite- it's dead spooky and has all the atmospheric noises from the singleplayer game (which scared the shit out of me, I have to admit).

21:18 / 22.12.05

Try Day of Defeat if you get the chance. It's HL2-turned WW2, and it's a LOT of fun. Helmschmied's been hooked on it for 3 years now...

22:08 / 22.12.05

Another thing about UT2004 is that one can play it against those superior beings who own Macs. I'm getting a little short of proper AWSDMouseFireAltfire action.

16:39 / 20.08.06

Just a note to let all of you know that F.E.A.R multiplayer is now available as a free, standalone download (of 1.7 gigs) right here. I've been playing it today, and it's awesome. It's all the maps from the retail version and all the gametypes and I'm fairly sure that owners and freeloaders can play together. It's basically the multi from the 1.07 version of the game. It's well worth a dl if you're not an owner.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

15:45 / 25.10.06

Having not played F.E.A.R. in ages, but having been lured back by the Expansion Point demo, I've just (after HOURS spent patching the bugger up-to-date) got back into the DM. I think once you're all patched up you can play Combat against someone with the full game and vice versa.