About to watch...

Please be against please be against please be against

I know sponge said some stupid stuff and I am not pleased with these changes, but I do feel bad for Sponge and Sync. Poor guys are stuck between an angry die hard fanbase on one side and a bunch of money making suits on the other side who dont give a shit about quake.

I would not want to be in their position. Nonetheless I think the decision they have made is not the right one. Heres to hoping there are enough classic servers and classic players.

poor guys?

If they are so cool and love quake community and can't get good aggreement (which will be close to their mind) with their company, they should just leave such company.

especially in IT sector, it should be quite easy to change company for them.

I think they have faith that their plan will work and be good for quake. I dont think it will be but that may explain why they are still keepin on truckin.

I think their intentions are good, I just think they are going about it the wrong way.

I was exaggerating a bit, but still...

imo they doesn't really give a shit, it's ok for them. Calling them 'poor guys' imo is not correct.
work, work.

they wasted many chances.

they should just leave such company.

lol better being praised as a martyr by a bunch of videogame addicts than bringing home money for wife and sons?

rotfl. I didn't mean that. I just disagree with "poor guys". I think their current job is ok for them and they dont give a shit about 'bunch videogame addicts'.

But somebody told that they are "poor guys" and they want to do "good stuff"... but maybe bad, evil Zenimax told them to do it... I dont think so.
We already read what kind of atmosphere is in the id company. It's bad. If you are arguing all the time with your company, people there, it always suck. IT sector is one of the easiest to change your job, they could probably get better job than id, and better paid.
So yes, in that case I would leave such company, if you care what you want to do and you can't because of somebody. Such projects are pointless.

but imo they are not 'poor guys' and they don't give a shit :)

I don't feel like discussing about the "poor guys" thing, i was just speculating about changing job since (I work in the IT sector too).
first me, changing job is easy IF you live alone (no family/kids/pets), you are quite young, motivated and have some offers proposed.
also, it implies going through a lot of efforts (e.g. moving, new social life, learning a new language, ...) which may be quite stressful.
if I have to choose between being a hero for a small crowd and ensuring $ and tranquility to my family, well... you got it :/

I think Im just talking about different thing.

if you are working and can't do what you want or you are doing something you don't want, atmosphere is really bad etc. You really want to change such job. No matter what. It's too stressful.
And this is the situation when you call somebody "poor guys" and in such case you need to leave, sooner or later.

And I aggree some some kind with you. And imo nobody really trying to be a hero here. Thats why I don't expect that somebody will leave their company ;)

fair enuff

bunch of money making suits

It takes money to maintain server network, website, Steam deployment, developers working on game's code and content and so on. This is not charity man - people in RL work for money.

If you say you feel sorry for Sponge&Co but in same post you demand putting "die hard fanbase" over revenue, then you are against those ppl to get paid for work you benefit from :|

IF "simpler" Quake gameplay model will be worse for players than "classic" one, people won't play "dumbed down" version. It's up to players to decide at this point.

I still don't get fuzz about all of this. Those who want "casual" mod, will go play "casual". Those who want "classic" - will play classic.

It takes money to maintain server network, website, Steam deployment, developers working on game's code and content and so on. This is not charity man - people in RL work for money.

I'm not saying the money making suits are doing anything incorrect. They are completely correct for wanting to make quake earn them money. I'm saying it sucks for sync and sponge to be trapped between them and the quake community.

If you say you feel sorry for Sponge&Co but in same post you demand putting "die hard fanbase" over revenue, then you are against those ppl to get paid for work you benefit from :|

I didnt make that demand in my post. Where did you read that? I want quake to remain a good game and to make lots of money. I just think the method they chose isnt the right one. I dont want quake to be a good game that makes no money which seems to be what you are implying I think.

The fuss is that it's just wrong to barely and ineffectively redevelop a 15 year old game, pretty much leave it stagnant for 6 years whilst slowly monetizing it's original f2p model to the point where you are then more or less forced to subscribe to play the aforementioned 15 year old game.

It takes money to maintain server network, website, Steam deployment, developers working on game's code and content and so on. This is not charity man - people in RL work for money.

no thats called corporate greed.Community made this game a lot better for free.The costs theire generating from this game is their own fault and only theirs.They were in chase for 100% profit and now theire facing buisiness losses, kinda serves them right for cutting us off like that.There is noone to blame apart from Zenimax/ID

No doubt. I'm sure they could fire one of tweedle dee or tweedle dum and there would be no difference on any level in Quakelives development or lack of.

Quite frankly I think both these guys are lazy as hell and not very smart or motivated. In 7 years no match making system. No anti cheat (and it's not like there's a million hacks being developed for a game no one plays).

Sponge doesn't believe in match making though. It's got nothing to do with success.

Someone should have slapped him with a question resembling:

'Name one online competitive game that's successful that does not have match making or a ladder'

Because he kept listing unsuccessful games that had it. Which of course is a really fucking idiotic point and highlights how biased he is to his own bullshit.

"Name one online competitive game that's successful that does not have match making or a ladder"
BF4 ?
no mm, not even restrictions on skill level of server to join. Most of the servers for PC run by enthusiast willing to pay around 70USD/month for 64Slots server. Game itself costs over 100USD with premium and you also need really high end PC to run it on 120+ FPS consistently.
they have ~25K online PC only and over 100K online across all platforms. New players getting somped by veterans just like in QL. Even more so now because the game is 9month old. And this game has shitty engine full of unfixable bugs which is noticed and admitted even by extremly casual players, but who cares? Hype hype hype and everybody buys it.
And yes it IS competitive despit being crap in that regard because EA pays for that.

So it is actually all up to trandy eye candies and alot of hype with proper marketing budget and voila even QL copypaste with modern graphics, alot of hype big FFA maps so noobs can camp there successfully and tourney setup will sell nicely with 60USD pricetag or even more. And you can charge PRO sub for server spawning another 40USD annually. But since this is not happening I imagine Zenimax thinks that this is too risky, because they have to invest shitloads of money into that while revenue result is uncertain, since no Q3style game was even remotely close to CS style games in terms of popularity and money generation.

From 2011
http://pastebin.com/LbsjUhR7

As you can see, Neither Sponge, Lillie or Syncerror believe in Matchmaking and see 8-0 games as a simple shuffle issue.

When everyone aside from them know what happens pregame/in game (how people go to spec and rejoin on the team that is down a man (the stacked team).

Their version of matchmaking was simply to remove callvoting. Their job is done now. Matchmaking problem solved (in their eyes)

These idiots at zenimax don't understand, that you can't make money off a game which is underdeveloped, and it can't change having only two guys working on it. If you want to make money, you need a proper team, start over, make that goddamn QL 2.0 while learning from their mistakes, implement all the stuff mentioned on this site over and over again. I find myself playing CS lately. The gameplay is boring, but it has matchmaking. And skins. Take note, id and zenimax.

poor guys?

Zenimax is not telling them to make these changes. That was 100% their (sponge and syncerror's) decision.

"and a bunch of money making suits on the other side"
if sponge and sync did, what fans ask, they could get 5-10x more money in few first years already, but...

Idgas if it moves to steam, i just want to play quake how it is now....

how is altering gameplay going to attract new players, if theire 4years too late with Steam release??

Quake is Quake, there is no higher science to it.If problem was in the gameplay, people would simply move on to another title, but thats not the case is it?How is quake going to be any different from what Xonotic,Warsow and other shitty games of this type already are right now??Theire intentionally killing the project.

Quake Live won't die on its viking shield... it'll die in its fucking clown car. -wormed


IF QUAKE IS CHANGED INTO THIS SHIT, THEN IT AIN'T QUAKE. IT'S SOMETHING ELSE, JUST LET IT DIE THEN.

EDIT: I *could* live with the changes if they named it 'Beginners Quake, or Ezquake (ahaha fu q1)

Then named our quake to Promode. BUT don't have the pay wall there, just make it so only tier 4 players can join.

That will separate newbs from good players, however I wouldn't care much about the changes or newbs playing their shit newb Beginners quake.

More or less this, there should be a progressional skill model where gameplay its based accordingly to skill level in a 'ladder system' and public play as 'beginner servers' with the required changes. It is the standardization of the changes that is my biggest problem with what is suggested, coupled with the paywall.

What you're saying is true zsx. My biggest problem however is that like yesterday when you were just playing, I joined the same server and someone on the server thought it was great to annoy others. And when the match was over and I could finally join you left saying that it could also be a good thing to be polite (to that annoying person), so you left, which many others did. Even though nobody doesn't care about it, if anyone reads this post, if you're one of these guys who think it's so cool to mess with people online because you are behind your screen, and if you're also one of these people who "defend" this game and got upset about the upcoming changes, then think about it, you silly person, think about how your a**holish behavior affects your beloved game and how it will influence its state when newcomers will try it.

Small community (and so many veterans), yet many bad seeds, doesn't make sense.

Are you moaning about the way I acted or? I was tabbed out to 2/3 people saying "kick zsx, too high elo" or something. All I said was, "you could just ask? maybe you could try it"

I was going to leave anyway I was chatting on skype between matches, I didn't see what was said before that. Am I the asshole or what? I played 1 map of CA, didn't say anything during it and then left...

No no no you got it totally wrong, you're not the asshole, but the guy who was annoying everyone... Do I explain things really that bad =(

Ah ok I guess I misread the way you intended it. :p

I see your point now and the sad reality is you will never stop assholes on the internet, but it can be particularly bad in a game like quake.

if you're one of these guys who think it's so cool to mess with people online because you are behind your screen, and if you're also one of these people who "defend" this game and got upset about the upcoming changes, then think about it, you silly person, think about how your a**holish behavior affects your beloved game and how it will influence its state when newcomers will try it.

That sentence made me think you were having a go at him

Now when I read it again, yeah I should have made it clearer ='D

How does english?

Kaputt.

I disagree to be honnest. A good game should be fun for anyone at any level.

How would that make it less fun? It's just a suggested means of learning the mechanics of the game without becoming overwhelmed. It's using the same concepts they want to implement but without standardizing it across the entire game.

We all know that an effective matchmaking system is needed, but without that this is just one idea.

Edit:

So you could have a, "learn to quake" ladder system. Where as you progress through the ranks more gameplay becomes unlocked - you wouldn't stay in any given rank for very long its merely for learning purposes. A normal ladder system, using classic quake, where you are ranked against your skill level, and public - with classic quake servers and 'beginner' quake - for people that still want to learn.

This just sounds an infinitely smarter way to progress newbies with gameplay changes.

Problem is, they couldn't even figure out a ladder system for standard QL gameplay, ladder+changes may be owerwhelming :)

I'm not saying it would be less fun but it would blur the game's identity. If the game on level 1 is about x and on level 2 it's about y you can wonder what the real game identity is.
For you and me, quake is about movement, flow, weapon choice, item timing and positioning, etc. However, for the majority of the people who play this game, quake is CA where items are not present weapon choices and dodging are different and movement is not a necessity. CA is a good way to learn about what quake "actually" is about. After all, many of use started with CA before they dived into duel/tdm/ctf. However, for many people it will always remain the mode that defines the game for them.
I dream of the day where they make a round based mode like CA with decent starting weapons that includes item timing in some very basic form, change/extend the movement to make it a component that is actually existant for new players and turn that into a main pub mode because that would be accessible quake, not too far off from the core elements.

Edit:
Just saw your edit, a ladder system could be interesting as that encourages quite a few people to step up continously and improve their knowledge about the game.

I agree it would blur the gameplay, which is why it is intended as a 'learn to quake' system. We are approaching this since we are unable to have, and should not even dream of, a matchmaking system. I am just presenting an alternative to standardizing the changes into a more manageable and 'quaker-friendly' version.

I think as quake players we forget how much there is to digest in quake, all the variables you posted are alien now to the casual gamer of today. Grasping the movement and aiming alone is extremely difficult without comprehending the other characteristics of timing/items/positioning.

Sure people can start with CA, but there will be a lot of people that saw quake on streams and would want to jump straight in and experiment with dueling/ctf/tdm. I know as a noob I was attracted to ctf more than most modes, there needs to be a way to smooth their entrance to the game.

Presenting tutorials/guides are one way and should be designed, but I'm sure these will be largely ignored anyway at the very beginning, once people have had a taste they will return to them. Having a system that gradually teaches you the basics is required in some form.

Edit: nevermind you saw my edit :D

I think you could simulate parts of this (since they won't implement it) by just limiting newbies to easier gametypes with unranked matchmaking. Make them gain X levels for each new mode in ranked, going through Freezetag, maybe some of the newer gametypes, CA, CTF, finally TDM and then duel. Give ranked duel when they obviously can handle the main parts of the game well enough.

Give oldschool duelers custom duel games only. Many would whine for no unranked duel from the start, but it would be healthy for the scene.

Something they devised in the new system could work for unranked newbie matches. It just shouldn't be physics changes, and I'm not sure if even with them there's any reason to believe it'd be better for newbies themselves than, say, freezetag.

Your proposed system with limited gametypes in unranked matchmaking would be ideal if they weren't convinced their effort was better spent in stupid community-dividing gameplay changes.

Been dreaming about this for ages: simplified game on first tier and removing wheels and help little by little as you progress through tiers...

So obvious! All the guys in charge are clueless about this game.

they could have forced pql like this in the first place, if they though that would generate new players.Just look at how many players are playing that shit now lol.

Song name?

You fucking kno...
D A R U D E S A N D S T O R M
A
R
U
D
E

DUDUDUDUDUDUDUDUDU

It's barely QL 0.2, maybe we're getting there instead

I only just realised, this is the stuff they were referring to with all the QL2.0 teases a while back.

Thats disappointing. I dont know why that only just clicked

as I said on the other thread - really no evidence to support that

I really hope its not

It is. I closed the channel to avoid raging any further at sponge's ramblings so I don't have the exact quote, but he basically said QL2.0 was a stupid meme and these leaked changes are actually what our understanding of QL2.0 is.

ok now that's depressing.

C u in lundern

I can see ddk's point but my problem with it is that i'm not that sure that their problem was "we have to make some money".

From what i can see, QL's subscriptions had to pay for the salary of 2 people + the rental of SOME servers. Keep in mind that a good numer of server is paid for by the community (I'm 100% sure about ITA and NOR, not sure about the others). From what i can see the mantainment expenses are really minimal, and really, was there any effort towards developing something? Only content relases i can think of are new maps, and even there do you really think id software gave cityy or bst more than a tip?

Now take into account the number of people that paid for premium or pro, sure it's not huge, but isn't it at least ENOUGH to make a small profit out of QL?

So, was Sync's and sponge's problem that they weren't making any money or that they weren't making enough?

QL's subscriptions had to pay for the salary of 2 people + the rental of SOME servers.

id should earn something, after all.
also, i don't know if sasparillo is hired full time, but i think his work is worth something.

isn't it at least ENOUGH to make a small profit out of QL?

let's make a rough estimation:
salaries: 2/3ppl @ 60-90k/year + servers: 20 x 750$/yr + offices/premises: 1k/month
that makes around 230k/year (just for costs comepnsation and zero gain), that is more than 6k pro subs (8-9k after taxes?).

750$/yr for a server?

The italian one costs 450$/yr and i honestly have 0 problems with it.

Also from what i understand sasparillo doesn't exclusively work on ql but is a community manager for various Bethesda games.

About offices i'm not suer what you mean, If you mean the actual place where they work i thing they either work from home or are given a hole somewhere ina big Bethesda building.

1) costs depend on location (e.g. it will be hard to see swiss ql servers).
also, 450$ or EUR ? which year / server are you talking about ?
it was ~800EUR in 2011 (i made the payment), 2012 was quite foggy (during the 2013 donation, someone asked for the real costs of the 2012 donation, the organizer just said gtfo and left, together with some of his blog pages).

currently, afaik, pornoman hosts it all in a domestic server and he hasn't been thanked enough.

1b) servers are a minor part of the costs, i just wanted to add them.

2) if you have a "hole" and it's 100% non-productive, it's a money loss as a tenantless house (rent + electricity + heating + ...). that means a (minor) cost. also, holes should be filled :D

3) i just calculated that mentally, iirc i considered 2.5 people working with an average IT salary.
if you halve the grand total, you need 3k pro subs to compensate costs plus, say, 1k for gaining something.

feel free to propose your figures.

If a shitty coder and a community manager that doesn't interact with the community are making 90k a year, id Software is dumber than anything on this planet. Maybe 50k, MAYBE.

then?

Then what?

i needed that figure for guessing a decent goal for the company in terms of subs (if that is your point, 3k x 50k / 75k = 2k).

They haven't had a community manager for a loooong time SyncError's job changed to "Producer".

You pay taxes from profit, not from income. So, if they break even, they don't pay taxes from these money.

Didn't Carmack said that ql pays for itself?

That would be an interesting statement to have a source for, even though it would obviously be a bit old.

its somewhere in the 2012 keynote afaik.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wt-iVFxgFWk

edit: found time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_d...FWk#t=1039

no gameplay changes to quake are going to have any effect except you loose the few long term fans that still cling to the game.
quake is old. very old. actually there is no game that is more activly played while beeing that old as quake. thinking quakelive is dying because of bad gameplay is a stupid conclusion and thus it doesnt need a fix. do they really think they can please yolo generation and make them play this game by just throwing in cs/cod gameplay that still looks ancient and has multiplayer features that were a thing 10years ago?

yes, they may be out of resources to accomplish anything that would work and instead try to squeeze the last bit of money out of it with as little investment as possible - but they are so because of more than 10 years of bad, gutless and up to plain false desicions and management in game developement that did lead to this.

Panties in a bunch lol :)

I agree with ddk, on most, shame, but it still keeps going if you love the game. Gameplay ladders, loadouts mods, are not a big deal, if corrected to satisfy skill levels and player demand.

It is effectively a business model problem. Their main problem is "Renewable's" which is what they are doing, generating monthly renewable income. Its a great idea, like renting properties etc,

However, when the tenant stops renting they stop paying. Support , servers, development, jobs, is always in the balance depending on the renewable income value / month.

I do feel for Syncerror, must be a hard job delivering these monthly figures and data of usage, unless its bulging with our purchases!

Perhaps their business model doesn't work as well. Renting is a pain in the ass, as you always get the tenants coming back complaining or wanting this and that and the other. (which in QuakeLive player community seems warranted, with more rights. which is technically true, as we fund it monthly.)

However, buying seems a more sustainable idea, as you get what you wanted, if you don't like it then, move on, or buy the next version update? I am sure they could host some servers, or the community would do, just like Barrysworld and xs4all b4 and now.

The current norm on steam is either, "download it free", which doesn't really make much money! or "Purchase the game", and "buy upgrades packs" and "multiple game packages at discount"

£6.99 isn't going to break the bank.. Then upgrade for more.

That decision is up to ID and Zen, as they are the ones who know what their balances are like with the QuakeLive consumer's monthly renting revenues.

Problem lies with renewable's, as all renters feel that they are in the hands of the letters, whom could pull the plug at any time. Hence the concern I guess, after many years of payments, for nothing at the end.

Well said ddk. It's time to put your money where your mouth is boys. Quake has been dead for years, if you really love this game, fork up the money, and play "real Quake" :D

NOBODY WANTS TO PLAY YOUR STUPID CPM

2fast4u.com

not cpm, but play vq3 in cpma. as it was played before.

That's my best option as well. Maybe adapt it to more VQL-like gameplay, but it's fine either way. But that's not what xerosawyer was saying I think.

Definitely not :P

What does this have to do with cpm? If you want to play "real" quake, then pay for QL Pro account.

i thought fork up meant the opposite of what it is D:

dummy

edgy, man... edgy.

CPMA VQ3 here we come.

yep. I loved CPMA vq3. The nades, lg. everyting.

We need a thread calling for all Quakers to return to Q3 and Promode.

Would it take much to set up cpma to be like quakelive? maybe even steal the maps ;)

no, gameplay wise.

Sync and sponge are just trying to stretch their jobs out for as long as possible.
That's their only concern.

so in summary he says to live with it since otherwise the project could be dead?

I rather have something I like to go out quickly, not tortured and beaten, with a smile on their face saying 'so you'll keep paying us right? right?'

I'm not surprised since DDK has some investment in to QL, seeing it die would hurt what he does, but for everyone else we're unaffected in that regard

I WANT to see QL die. I've wanted it since a year after it was released. Screw this mess, Q3 was everything we wanted, we gained nothing except 3+ years of e-sports longevity with QL. in terms of a GAME, we went backwards and now we pay monthly for it, like fools

I'm actually having FUN playing other games, so seeing this go away will be a blessing. oh look, now pickups are easy, oh look, now we can play the modes and maps we want on one server, oh look, we're not having ping and routing issues anymore

it was sickening to see sponges replies to matchmaking. it was basically "well it's too hard"

so we don't have matchmaking because it's hard to make and program? how does ANYTHING get made then? I'm cancelling my QL subscription on those reasons alone. oh a leaderboard and matchmaking are too hard for lazy american programmers to make?

I hope QL is shut down just to see sponge transferred to a different project at bethesda. enjoy programming skyrim animation scripts. or maybe that's "too hard"

inb4 anonymous coder produces Q3:QL mod in 2 weeks time after QL2.0 launch

It's already made: edawn

And there's a pirate version of QL too, called QLOP. I don't think it has been updated in a while, but probably will when the "2.0 patch" is up.

yes please

A version of punkbuster that allows multiple CD keys would be quite cool too, so ppl with no q3 dont have to give even more fucking money to these wankers.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/2200/

So DDK....
How do you think that these gameplay changes will actually improve the cashflow for ID/bethesda//zenimax over leaving the game entirely the same except for also going to steam?

Because I don't see it... I see it like:
1) some of the people who join -> see that the game is shit -> leave.
2) the rest of the players that join -> might consider the new gameplay as fun -> get a subscribtion -> see that everything subscribed is different -> leave.

I don't see how these changes can possibly benefit them on the whole.

Yup, I forgot how making strafe jumping easier and making 'loadouts' would bring them more money.

I get that strafe jumping can suck, but last time I checked people aren't avoiding QL because of the movement.

No matchmaking, no leaderboards, no aestetics to customize or purchase, nothing taking this game into the current year.

Yeah I agree with you.

Whatever the balance of the gameplay, that they decide, with as much input as they can take from other games, and suggestions from the community, the project is on ID's heads when its launched. I don't care any more what it turns out to be, whatever it is I am sure it will be playable. If no good, then there are plenty of other games, or they can adapt their own game.

Is it not the subscription thing that sucks?. Should it not just be "Buy and play", and not "Buy every time you want to play"? Which is technically what is happening with subs. Like drug barons, getting the hard-core members hooked and then punished for their addiction, ongoing financial contribution and loyalty.

Why not bring out another game, or a mod or pack? Like in the quake1 with mission packs?

Completely agree with ddk, although one topic which he didn't address was how QL should have never arrived at this desperate situation in the first place. The QL platform had so much potential, even a child could see the potential, so considering the platform is still so fundamentally flawed after 5 years of development can only mean that Sync & Sponge's prioritization skills are practically non-existent.

Yes, I understand that there are only 2 devs, and that budget and resources are very limited, and that there is a vast array of smaller factors involved, but the QL situation would be dramatically different now in 2014 if they had focused on what truly mattered. Core issues. Core issues within core issues. Matchmaking. Cheaters. Ladders. Subscription structure.

Limited resources and budget should have been incentive to focus even more on these key points, instead of carelessly discarding them as expendables in order to focus on designing useless ctf maps or introducing incomplete gametypes.

Just as an example, they literally gave up on matchmaking, and Sponge now rambles on mindlessly in irc, stating as fact that matchmaking does not belong in QL for a variety of extremely surreal reasons. He expresses statements of similar magnitude for other (missing/broken) key aspects of the game. I am not exagerrating at all when I say that I had to close #quakelive to avoid raging any further. I'm guessing there is an element of butthurt stubborness in his stance after the community's outrage after the leak, but there are undertones of ignorance that are hard to ignore.

I hope this will be my only say on the matter, aside from the occasional spongebob img1. After engaging sponge in conversation i've realized that getting upset about this or even trying to find reasoning is a futile endeavour, as ddk already pointed out.

dang, I wish I was as eloquent and could express my thoughts as well as mr kapadia

Totally agree. Man, that was pretty much the key point in the video. They did nothing for however many years its been out, 5 1/2, and now they change the one part which is perfect - the gameplay.

Boggles the mind. You're exactly right.

just look at all the mods that were created for q3a, etc. ...
these modders created more in 6 months in their freetime than these guys in 5,5 years full time ...

butbutbut how are they gonnan recrute all those massiv CS-ers into kweik if no bunnyhoping?? :((

sponge is smart boy!

The biggest insult is obviously changing the game play of Quake Live, all they are trying to do is beat reflex and Reborn, projects to the punch by making all these changes and marketing it on steam like it will be what the FPS community has been asking for all along.

Well I sure hope it works or you are going to see a quick death of Quake Live. Even now I know a lot of players who are actually starting to actively play other FPS games now. It is really a shame to see what has been decided upon for the future of Quake Live. They have taken a truly amazing game and completely butchered it, all in what I think is a desperate attempt to increase the revenue and player base, which with this business model will be temporarily.

Lets face the facts these changes were kept a secret for a reason, but the problem is it is a desperate attempt to revive the game by making massive changes that everyone that currently plays the game will hate. As DDK said transparency would have been a whole lot better imo as well.

If you wanted to increase the player base while adding it to steam you should have kept it simple and only done a few changes to the actual rulesets of the FreetoPlay game on Steam.

Team Games(CTF, TDM, CA)
1. Make all servers no voting(Except for next map at the end of the current map).
2. Have a 30 sec warmup and the match starts right away(No F3 ready).
3. Have teams set at 8v8(Evens the play between new players and veterans).
4. Weapon respawn is set to 1 second in CTF and 5 in TDM.

Duel
1. Leave it the way it is now in order to truly give new players a taste of what Quake Live actually is. :)

This gives new players a taste of Quake Live in a fun type of atmosphere not a competitive form the way it is now. It allows them to still play the game and enjoy it and not get roflstomped constantly by us old school players who have been playing the game for +15 years.

Once you get that influx of money rolling in from steam then spend that money on providing real content for the people who actually have bought the game(Matchmaking for just Duel, along with all the other things that have been mentioned a million times in this forum).

My motto has always been keep it simple and then go from there and for some reason in the gaming community everything seems to get way over complicated way to quickly. Anyways just my two cents on the whole thing. You will still see me playing "Classic" Quake Live, if there is games to be had and recently there has been some pretty good non stop CTF games in the evenings. If not well there is always CS:GO been enjoying that a lot lately with friends too.

My biggest concern is all the hype and excitement that QCON delivered this year seems all for not now, especially with it being the twentieth anniversary next year. :(

The Duel part should be truly left alone

DDK for presidente! :)

well said ddk, expectation were to high and with the leaked update dream of ql success were not met.

i havent looked it that way, but i guess quake as a franchize allways realy was on its last leg, but this shows, what it means to realy have a dedicated, hardcore fans of the game, look for how many years quake has stood up againt the tide with the help of its fan base.

In a way all this rant about the update is also an indicator of how much people realy love this game. If no one cared, no one would complain.

But all that said, fans can not increase the popularity of the game or expand its fan base.

If id is realy trying to push quake on, to make a profit out of it in the future they should advertize it more, they should think about investing in marketing and make sure quake gets in the spotlite of some mayor tournaments, besides Qcon. Steam was a good idea and i hope it generates enough of revenue for future investments.

"they should advertise more(...)invest in(...)"

i doubt they can (plus they didnt when they still could)

when was the time that they could invest? ... i don't think there was such a time.

If this happens. people will get back to q3 asap.

Maybe too many people -- in the community and The Powers That Be -- have taken Quake for granted. To rest on the assumption that everybody "will just play Quake" no matter what is ignorant at best, irresponsible at worst, especially for people in positions where they can more easily help.

I have lots of respect for ddk and the incredible work he's done in bringing Quake to a bigger audience. But I believe apathy has been a large reason why Quake/QL isn't at the center of the e-sports world. Quake doesn't need more apathy. It needs more people that are passionate about the game to take action, by subscribing, by introducing the game to others (yes, hold their hand if necessary), by donating to tournament pools, by spending endless nights with notepad.exe and a compiler to implement the out-of-game features required by e-sports players today.

I wonder.. if everyone that truly wants QL to survive -- including those that are up in arms about these changes -- would have subscribed years ago and stay subscribed, if that would have been enough for them to hire a man/team to give us reliable matchmaking. I guess we'll never know :/

From your post it seems like players are scums and id just doing their job.

Hi Sync.

We do all that already, even when it isn't our job. In all other games the company is in charge of all that, but here id software just tries to milk their 1999 game and their free community-made efforts over and over again.

Since the very beginning of QL and to this day that:
1. The community is the one passionate about the game. Certainly id software isn't, as they only have two employees on the project and they been really close to shutting it down several times. Furthermore, if you read the IRC chat logs it's clear that at least one of those two devs isn't passionate about quake at all, namely sponge.
2. We subscribe no matter we know the game itself is crap (these days QL is a 6/10 game at best) and even inferior to modded Q3. The game would get more subscribers if it was better, which again it's not our fault but theirs.
3. We are the ones that introduce the game to others. Id has never done anything to advertise QL, in 6 years and counting.
4. The only tournament that's not directly community-funded or community-organized is quakecon. All the hundreds to thousands of others happened solely because of "us". Actually the existence of this centralized system and lack of support by id (the QL team) have been quite detrimental to tournaments, in various ways.
5. The best features of the game are all made by the community, regardless that the game is centralized in such fashion that our contributions are limited by the company.
6. Casting-wise everything is altruistic. To use your example about apathy, in other games ddk and faceit would be paid by id to cast and promote the game. If you haven't noticed, faceit actually loses money when featuring quake.
7. We the community have to pay ourselves for some server locations since id doesn't want to do it, no matter that's their selling point in QL, plus all social integration, support, forums, etc. are hosted by us. The situation is absurd to the point that we actually give assets to id software.

If the changes go through what should be done is going back to Q3. We take quake for granted because it actually is, since we have gone back to it many times in the past.

Sounds like a case of Stockholm syndrome or some shit.

Let me give you an example of id's incompetence. I have a Mac. I d/led the QL Mac version years ago and found I got 65 fps. The 65 fps was constant no matter what graphics/video settings. The game felt spongy and horrible. On top of that, the game would usually crash a few times per session. QL was unplayable on Mac. BTW, on the same Mac, when I dual boot, I get solid 250 fps.

So instead of fixing the problem, they finally discontinue the Mac version citing lack of interest. Well of course there is a lack of interest for the game BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING UNPLAYABLE ON MACS.

It's just pure incompetence. Head scratching unbelievable incompetence. They have the framework to one of the best games ever made. A game that allows two people go compete, pure skill vs skill, a game that would be a monster in the esports world if only they would modernize it and set up tourneys and streaming.

But instead it's the communities fault the game is failing. The community that has modded the game, made maps, streamed the game, set up tourneys, donated money to players, played the game for 15 years. It's somehow our fault id can't figure shit out. Right.

You have to have actually downloaded the mac version to try it to be put off (or not) by the crashes, it was always listed as beta even when the game went live officially.
They'll have been looking at the download numbers to guage interest not just active players (of which combined with linux only hit 6%)

Point taken but probably a normal gaming company would have released something that worked properly and promoted it. It's sort of hard to get word of mouth on something that runs like crap and crashes. Well positive word of mouth. I'd have to guess that they simply didn't feel like putting forward the effort.

yep, it may only be 6%. but why would it be any higher if the game doesnt run properly on both mac and linux. if you take that in mind 6% is actually a lot because what it means is that 6 out of 100 people are willing to endure a bad gaming expirience instead of just dualbooting into windows. and all of that after quake3 was actually perfectly fine on those systems.
i did boot into windows just for quake (and for wow for that matter :P) but ever since id software dropped mac/linux support all along (even tho it was shitty) i said 'screw it', cancelled my subscription and stopped playing. im not willing to pay a single cent to a company that effectlvly did NOTHING all those years besides pruning the game more and more and blaming the comunity for it that every other developer would love to have for their games.
besides, dropping linux support and then bringing the game to steam is a stupid move (then again, what did i expect) because having steamOS support makes Valve advertise your game like no tomorrow.

I, and a lot of people, think that the last thing the Quake community is is apathetic. You mean some people aren't so enthused about giving id Software money for a game that has literally done (almost) nothing in terms of bug fixes, additions, etc? Instead of legitimate additions to the game we got sponge making shitty mods that nobody gives a fuck about.

Quake community apathetic? Fuck that. Quake community finally tired of this shit? Yea. I paid for pro since it was introduced and even I don't know why the fuck I supported something that didn't get any improvement.

your talking out of your idiotic arse

You are using matchmaking as an excuse sync.

You want to have your cake and eat it too.

take a look at your own actions before you point the finger.

-You ban/unban cheaters
-You affiliate yourself with people who destroy noobs on a daily basis, many of whom are in your clan .403
-You failed to enforce your own rules (1 account per person).
-You promised matchmaking in an interview in 2011, yet never delivered.
-You try to buy votes/favorable opinion, by giving certain people free subscriptions (many of them mods, server owners, focus players)
-You did nothing to help new players reach their potential (nevermind matchmaking), speaking solely on behalf of others who created tutorials for you to use, 3rd party software, and numerous other graphics for marketing purposes (only 2 major sites were given a heads up that quake live was coming out of beta in 2009.

One fail after another. After 6 years and your failures with quake 4, you really don't deserve to talk down to the people who have been paying for your vacations every weekend with your kids, a time when quake live was often down till you decided to check on the servers.

No more excuses. You're lucky people here think you're the only person who can keep this game afloat. Truth is, you're the reason QL died in NA.

We were talking about you recently, ray.

Good to know you're still alive and at liberty.

Fuck DDK is smart. Good thinking.

It fucking amazes me how people in the "business, especially the IT-business" world cannot grasp the basic simple truths of how things work and at the same time do everything in their power to dig their own grave as fast as possible.

I'm not talking about id only. All the "big" developers fuck up their own good thing in a similar way. Attepting to earn more money always leads to big and as the years go buy even bigger losses.