I’ve been playing first-person shooters since the original Castle Wolfenstein 3D. I’ve killed more gurgling bullpig demons than I have slept nights on this earth.
While I was never a big Unreal Tournament player in the past, I downloaded the new 2004 demo last night. Though the graphics have gotten niftier and the animation is smoother, It’s pretty much your standard first-person shooter. You run around, kill people, capture the flag, etc.
Last night I’m playing this demo for the first time. Judging by the chatter on the com channel, I’m playing against people nearly half my age. You know what? I was kicking their asses. To use the local argot:
1 4m 133t! 1 0wnz0r!
I’m getting older, and my reaction speed is only getting slower. Clearly, I had a faster ‘twitch speed’ when I was 16. The only explanation is that experience is of some value in first-person shooters. For example, I’ve learned to always fire rockets at players’ feet, so that even if I miss they take ‘splash damage’. I imagine the youngins will ramp up their skills faster, but in the meantime, I’m loving the domination.
DarrenBarefoot.com 
I was very dissappointed with ut2004. I saw virtually no change from ut2003, which is fun in it’s own right (though I prefer q3). The weapons were the same, voices, taunts, animations, ragdoll effects, were all virtually the same. I didn’t see any vehicles (a big thing in the new version I thought) and no real graphics updates except minor tweaks to the hud and menus. I read somewhere that they focused on gameplay and not eye candy, but it honestly looked like ut2003. I only played a bit against bots and didn’t bother to try out any of the other (new?) game types because of the above… it just wasn’t exciting enough to try. This was on a mac though, maybe it’s a different experience on a better PC gaming box.
Having never played the previous version, I just assumed the graphics et al were better. This is a de facto assumption for me, and not a particularly wise one. Generally, though, when big, much-anticipated games are released, they’re significantly better than previous versions.
I haven’t played UT2004 yet, but I’ve spent a ridiculous amount of time with first-person shooters and even more time hanging around people absolutely obsessed with the FPS genre (some of which have graduated to game & level designers).
Experience *does* count, but still not nearly as much as impeccable aim. Using your example, an experienced player shoots at the feet whereas someone with great aim shoots at the head. Here’s the odd thing though, where experience does better is usually with the more tactical games and UT is more pure deathmatch.
I’m curious, which method do you use? The best players that I’ve seen at tournaments always seem to fall into the “pathfinder” category. What I mean is they constantly stay moving and stick to one or two routes through a level, hitting the congested areas and shoot on instinct to the populated spots (often whether or not the spots are currently populated). This works well whether there are 20 players or just 2, whereas just mixing it up works best when there are large numbers.
One thing I’ve found frustrating with previous UT incarnations is their particular methods of prediction code. For some reason, it just throws me off, worse than with other shooters. Mind you, I’m a diehard oldschool LAN gamer, so prediction code has been biting my ass since QuakeWorld, everything is optomized for Internet play now.
There’s a new gametype now where you have tot ake control of a series of linked power nodes. That’s the level which has vehicles in it. I was playing it this morning over the ‘net. Once I found a server with 0 lag time, it was pretty fun. I never plaed Tribes 2, but I understand it’s a very similar feel.
I’m very impressed with the graphics. I was flying the Raptor, a small one-man missile firing plane, and blowing things up from high in the air with ease. I didn’t have the slowed-down graphics that I always used to get in open-air environments, such as with Descent 3 or Quake 3. Everything ran smoothly. Graphics look nice. Gameplay is familiar.
Yeah, it might just be Yet Another Unreal Tournament, but I’m enjoying it. I like the strategic levels more than the Deathmatch levels, though. I miss Team Fortress off the Half-Life engine. Now THAT was a game.
And since UT2004 comes with a native Linux client, I’m very impressed. I’m a bit worried about Half Life 2. I don’t have Windows installed in my computer and don’t want to bother with it, truthfully. I might just stick with UT2004 as my FPS of choice this year.
-Augie