Low ammo on Machine Games' episodes

[coffee009]

I feel like I'm barely scraping by on ammo and health on medium with the two dimensions campaigns, yet on the main Quake campaign I was able to beat it on Hard and Nightmare just fine. Do I need to find the secrets to succeed?

[V I D A L]

It didn't feel any different than the other episodes to me.
But then again.. I do have the ocd for finding all secrets.

[Gila]

You have to consider the following.

Original game was made in 1996, while Scourge and Dissolution, the two original expansion packs, were made in 1997. Back then some people played on keyboard only (there's a video of QuakeCon from those days and some are even using joystick!) and the framerates weren't that great either. It was also one of the first 'full 3d' shooters. Back then people were still "learning to play", for a lack of a better word. So by today's standards, original Quake and it's two original mission packs are considered easy, more or less.

Dimension of the Past was originally made in 2016 and Dimension of the Machine was made in 2021. Naturally these addons expect more from a player, like perhaps better aim, better movement, maybe to cause some infighting, and better resource management, etc. The secrets do help, but won't be the key solution to this problem. Some of the maps and mods made over these 25 years are even tougher.

[rane]

https://twitter.com/romero/status/719115335488708608 cool fact

[Gila]

Originally posted by rane:

https://twitter.com/romero/status/719115335488708608 cool fact

"Defaulted on in later update."

Hi John, hope you're doing well. This is incorrect.

[V I D A L]

Wasn't even an option. John Romero constantly remember stuff wrong and people that wasn't there goes with it.

No where in the option menu there was an option to enable mouse look consistently.

The option that existed was "Free look"... which was not a toggle but a key you had to hold. While you hold the that key, then you can free look with the mouse, but that was hardly playable. Most people were still playing keyboard only... when you see footage of people playing with mouse in one of those launching events, don't be fooled by it.. they are using mouse movement, not mouse looking.

[Seamus]

Originally posted by V I D A L:

Wasn't even an option. John Romero constantly remember stuff wrong and people that wasn't there goes with it.

No where in the option menu there was an option to enable mouse look consistently.

The option that existed was "Free look"... which was not a toggle but a key you had to hold. While you hold the that key, then you can free look with the mouse, but that was hardly playable. Most people were still playing keyboard only... when you see footage of people playing with mouse in one of those launching events, don't be fooled by it.. they are using mouse movement, not mouse looking.

No, it wasn't in the menu in ANY version of dos quake. Or glquake for that matter. You had to add +mlook. I think what romero was saying is that one of the later updates added it automatically to the config.

[MASTAN]

If mlook was meant to be a toggle it would be eg "mlook 1". Commands like +cmd and -cmd are meant for press and hold, plus executes on press and minus on release.

[Gila]

Originally posted by Seamus:

I think what romero was saying is that one of the later updates added it automatically to the config.

Maybe he meant it like that, but that is still wrong.

[V I D A L]

Originally posted by MASTAN:

If mlook was meant to be a toggle it would be eg "mlook 1". Commands like +cmd and -cmd are meant for press and hold, plus executes on press and minus on release.

Exactly. The free look key was a hold, not a toggle. Which is why it wasn't even playable.. Very uncomfortable to try to play a game while holding down a key at all times.
So eventually people found out how to stick that key with the +cmd and that's when mouse look gameplay was born. More out of the crafty community than the game designers themselves that somehow take the credit with silly tweets like Romero's. People just believe him because of his developer status... But like I said, he often remember stuff wrong even when talking about maps he designed in many of his gameplay videos.

[ZeppMan217]

DOFP is stingy on ammo, very noticeable on NM. DOMA's more than generous in every aspect. Past is just designed poorly, nothing else to it.

[coffee009]

Originally posted by ZeppMan217:

DOFP is stingy on ammo, very noticeable on NM. DOMA's more than generous in every aspect. Past is just designed poorly, nothing else to it.

Yeah it's definitely Dimension of the Past that made me question if I was going mad or not

[Nate42]

I played a ton of the original dos quake (and glquake, vquake, and quake world) back in the day. There was definitely no mouse freelook on by default, or even a way to turn it on in the options menus. What there was was a mouselook key, which would turn on mouselook while it was held down. And it became pretty common to set mouselook to always on by using +mlook at the console (or in your config file). It became the standard way for to play over time, but none of the original versions of the game supported this without the console command.

[Snufflegrunt]

Secrets are pretty much mandatory, as is proper ammo management.

Originally posted by gila:

(there's a video of QuakeCon from those days and some are even using joystick!)

Interestingly, I grew up playing games with a joystick because most home computer games back in the 80s and early 90s used them too, and I only switched to kbm when I was pretty much forced to. One of the big weaknesses that I found with the keyboard is the digital movement. I'm used to it now obviously, but holding shift to run in other games still feels a bit backwards to me.

[Phoenix]

Ammo is definitely tighter in Machine. Best advice I can give is utilize monster infighting as much as possible. Remember - no other monsters can kill a zombie except a Vore or Shambler, so use that to your advantage.

[Lafazar]

One thing I always wondered was that the three demos that shipped with quake were clearly recorded with constant mouselook. I find it really bizarre that the mouselook option was so badly advertised and so cumbersome to activate when the devs at id clearly played that way exclusively judging by the demos.