Why every Quake player should be playing CPMa.

Over the years a number of different versions of Quake (you may count Doom as well) have appeared. With every new game there have been a number of Quake players that refused to move on because their game was best. I’ve even seen arguments about how Quake is better than Quakeworld, although the difference is minimal. Everyone has had a “favorite” Quake, which is usually the one you started on. CPMa (Challenge Pro-Mode Arena) is meant to bring it all together, and in my eyes, it has achieved that, as well as adding a number of features which is REALLY useful to the community.

I have been a Quake 3 player most of competitive gaming life. I actually scoffed at CPMa players labeling as n00bies because obviously if they were any good they would be playing Quake 3. Then at the beginning of this year, I got Quakeworld and started watching some demos. The speed and level of skill was incredible. I just watched more and more, totally forgetting about any “slow” Quake 3 demos that might be released.

Then someone mentioned if I liked Quakeworld demos I should try and get CPMa demos. So I did. After I watched my first few demos I started playing the next day. I was having fun playing BOTS!?! This was about 3 weeks ago, and I am now totally convinced that CPMa is THE game.

Arguments that have arisen from new Quake games are:
- It’s too slow
- It’s too n00bie friendly
- The physics suck
- Too little skill
- Netcode sucks
- Not fun
- Boring to watch

It’s too slow
The speed decrease from Quake to Quake 2 to Quake 3 has been rectified. Thanks to a combination of Quakeworld/Quake 2 movement. You can now turn corners in mid-flight, as well as strafe jump as fast as you like. Then there is the Quake like weapon changing, which although is not instant like Quake, it is still pretty dang fast.

Some Quake 2 players may say this is bad, because it removes the strategy involved in choosing which weapon to use where. But this is not like Quake where your weapon choice revolved around rocket launcher, lightning gun, rocket launcher, grenade launcher, rocket launcher. Behold! You have the weapon choice of Quake 3. Which makes weapon choice vitally important, and knowing what weapons your opponent has. So people moving around maps incredibly fast and people switching weapons really fast… It’s not slow, but…

It’s too n00bie friendly
I think the friendly game between matr0x and ZeRo4 at WCG2002 demonstrated how n00bie UNfriendly CPMa is. (People are going to say “BUT ITSS ONLY A FRIEENDLY!!! The pt4 game were z4 raped unkind was also a friendly) Hell, ZeRo4 is far from a n00b, he just didn’t know CPMa (or maybe cpm3) like matr0x did.

The Quake 3 “n00b friendly” elements have been removed. Players spawn on 100 health and the machine gun has been scaled down so you don’t get taken from 100/100 to dead after you fragged the opponent. (I play Ph4nt0m sometimes, when he takes out the mg, I usually run) So CPMa isn’t n00b friendly, still…

The physics suck
Well, this is something I can’t really argue against, you either like it or not. The physics are far closer to Quakeworld/Quake 3 than Quake 2, so Quake 2 players might have something to moan about.

But hey, it has the Quake 2 double jumping, slope jumping, well basically all the Quake 2 jumping, it just won’t feel like Quake 2. There is still the rail gun, and the Quake 2 armor system. But hey, when has id engine physics REALLY sucked, sure you might say, it’s not as good as the last, it’s still not UT2k3 :P Ok ok, so the physics are cool, but it might have…

Too little skill
Has anyone been reading what I’ve been writing? We have here, more to learn than any other Quake game. Different elements to learn from each game, if that’s too little skill then I’m Thresh (Just incase you misunderstood, I’m not :P) Yeh whatever, but the…

Netcode sucks
Quake 3 netcode definitely sucks. No going around the bush there, except that CPMa IS NOT Quake 3!!! It’s funny to think that the 2nd best online CPMa player in America lives in Europe. (rat) CPMa is perfectly playable on 120 ping, which should be a joy to any HPB. (Like me) So the netcode is great, it’s still…

Not fun
Does anyone remember me saying I was having fun playing bots? That’s after playing Quake 3 for 4 years against bots. (I live in South Africa ok, the internet sucks) Just start up CPMa on a suitable map, and jump around a bit, get used to the movement, try to figure out what you can do. Before you know it, you have just wasted 2 hours jumping around a map. Why? Because it’s FUN!

So you play some quake god online and lose 48 to -2. You had fun just admiring the opponent’s movement and control of the map. It’s not like Quake 3 where it’s “*sigh* He fragged me again, let me walk some where while he gets all the guns, all the armor and then drops down and kills me.” In CPMa it’s “WHOA, how did he do that!? That was insane! Oh god, did I just die again?”

And before you know it the games finished (All action) and somehow the score is really really high. Some people may get upset from this, and maybe I’m just crazy. But I used to just love playing Quakeworld against a good player. I think the first game I played online I lost 56 to -4. I was pretty good at Quake 3 then… but it was totally different, I just played again, trying not to lose by so much. Because it’s so fast, it’s even fun losing. Ok so it’s fun, but it’s…

Boring to watch
MVD anyone? For those of you who don’t know, that stands for Multi-View Demo. You can switch views while you watch demos!?!? Isn’t that just so COOL. You can also bring up the score sheet anytime too, which has all the accuracy stats all there for you as the game progresses. My personal favorite feature while I’m watching is the little box in the top right hand corner that shows THE OTHER PLAYERS VIEW!!! How many times have you watched a demo where you just had to know where the other player was?

If Quake is ever shown on TV, the CPMa setup for demo watching is exactly how it is going to look. And I haven’t even gotten into how exciting it is to watch. It’s fast, there is a lot of action and if you’ve ever played a Quake game it’s not confusing at all, it’s just like normal Quake 3 demos without the boring bits. I’m not even going to go into TDM or CTF. (Flag running to the extreme) Ok, so it’s not boring to watch but…

OH SHUT UP ALREADY. If you aren’t convinced by now, you never will be. Separate yourself from the next big thing in Quake, remove yourself from the community, go play Counter-Strike or UT2k3, you won’t be missed. For the rest of you…

Challenge Pro-Mode Arena
http://www.promode.org

CPMa Demos
http://www.challenge-tv.com

Anyway, I’m gonna go try to get a CPMa server up in South Africa again…
Over and out.

tB0nE

PS. I just read arQon’s interview, what a co-incidence that I decided to post this now. Think of this as the “more friendly” persuasion into CPMa :)

10 years later:
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Found this on way back when machine, first thing I contributed to ESR, hehe, thought I would share.