Enemy Territory: Quake Wars

Review from Brett - Sunday, 25 November 2007 @ 10:16pm

This is a review of Enemy Territory:Quake Wars for the PC.

Actually, it’s supposed to be a review of Enemy Territory:Quake Wars but instead I’m sure you’d rather read a story about a walrus and some penguins.

The walrus is named Sydney and the penguins don’t really have a name apart from “the penguins”. It’s not that important what the penguins are called anyway, the important thing is that you enjoy the story and maybe learn a thing or two.




‘Sydney The Walrus’ lived in Antarctica sometime before global warming. It was icy and cold and Sydney didn’t have any friends. He wandered the frozen land looking for other Walrus but never found any as they had all been clubbed to death by Japanese Seal Farmers with bad eyesight.

One day Sydney did come across a herd of penguins. The penguins were hungry as they had no way of catching fish since one of the herd had developed a crack habit and pawned all of the groups fishing gear to Cash Converters to fund his addiction. Fortunately he managed to seek some professional help in America before ruining his promising sports career, but unfortunately the ordeal left himself and his penguins friends rather broke.

Sydney didn’t need any fishing gear to catch fish. When you’re a large walrus living on your own in the icy wilderness of Antarctica you can develop skills that help you adapt to pretty much anything except Japanese people with shotguns and baseball bats. Being not only friendless but also a rather nice walrus, Sydney offered to help the penguins catch fish in return for being allowed to join their herd. The penguins agreed and later that day everyone was enjoying the fresh sushi that Sydney had caught for them.




And so, the next few years passed and everyone was happy. That was until one day the group came across a seal named “Dicey”. Dicey was also lonely and also very good at catching fish. Rather than just serve up his fish cold though, Dicey would grill the fish over an open fire. Whilst Sydney was happy that the group had found Dicey, he also felt threatened that he may be left behind now that the penguins didn’t need Sydney for his fish anymore.

Sydney took an exodus from the group. He searched high and low and pondered the mysteries of the universe before finally returning to the penguins with his new offering. Amazingly Sydney had created a deep fryer and could now offer the penguins a new way to enjoy the fish. Once again the penguins toasted Sydney as the smartest and most popular member of the herd and whilst a few of the penguins still enjoyed Dicey’s grilled fish, most of the penguins agreed that Sydney’s fried fish was much tastier.

Months went by and Sydney basked in the glory of being the greatest fish finder and chef in the Antarctic. Unfortunately some of the fame went to Sydney’s head and he barely noticed as the penguins slowly started to change their eating habits to Dicey's new creation, “the fish burger”.

Eventually Sydney did notice that he was once again overtaken as the penguins favourite provider of seafood. He was in a bind. He knew that he had to offer the penguins something new to regain their respect. He began work on his newest creation and planned a grandiose unveiling for later in the year.

As the months went by, the penguins ate fish burgers and lamented the loss of Sydney whilst looking forward to his next creation. Finally the day came for Sydney to release his newest fish product selection. He gave a speech on how his product would be better than Dicey’s because of it’s wonderful Megatexture and let everyone know that he was the big boy when it came to fish product selections (or FPS’s as Syd liked to describe them).

Of course this whipped the crowd of penguins into a frenzy of anticipation. A frenzy of anticipation that would unfortunately for Sydney soon turn into a torrent of laughter at his expense.

All of the penguin media gathered around as Syd unveiled his newest creation, the greatest FPS ever, with amazing Megatexture! Syd proudly gave a speech regarding his new creation and then unveiled it before the penguin herd. Unfortunately for Sydney however, rather than release a product that lived up to his previous high standards, all Sydney had to show for himself was a McDonalds Fillet Of Fish Burger.




The penguins were dumbstruck. Syd had not only copied Diceys fish burger concept but he had also got a third party to make it for him. The megatexture was just marketing hype and whilst the fillet of fish was perfectly tasty, it was not as nice as the already existing Fish Burger or in any way really that different. Syd would be put on notice, the mantle of premier FPS creator had passed him by. Sure he would be able to live with the penguins and some would learn to like the fillet of fish but he would never command the respect that he had once had.

Perhaps the situation was best summed up by two penguins who were sitting out on an ice block one day soon after the event. One penguin turned to the other and asked

“How do you feel about the Fillet Of Fish?”

The other penguin replied: “Next time I won’t get carried away when Sid starts hyping his FPS with megatextures, because the end product will probably end up too similar to Dices."

Pros

Runs ok on a 6600 and a single core, runs great on a 8800 and dual core, Railing people across a large map never gets old, There is plenty of game here, extended playtime with a solid team is rewarding.

Cons

We’ve all played Battlefield and ET, do we need another version of these games? Confusing at first, the strong team play aspect is also a weakness, without the right team the game is painful and beginners are punished. Quake 3 is still a better game, shouldn’t sequels be improving on the original concept?

Summary

Quake Wars is in no way a bad game, it’s well produced, runs ok on lower spec hardware and offers a heap of maps. Unfortunately it’s a game that’s six months late, based on an ageing engine and the blueprint of a game that is already available and free. Check out the demo before you buy, if you enjoy the genre then it’s worth a look but for everyone else I just can’t see enough innovation here to make it worthwhile.