22 June,2009 08:52 AM IST | | Balaji Narasimhan
The original version of the game, which was launched on June 22, 1996, has many enthusiastic followers
When you see an old watch, you wonder what keeps it ticking? This is also a question that one can ask of venerable games like Quake. And the answer to both is the same the quality of the finished product, plus the interest that is shown by the user. The best Swiss watch will be worth nothing if the owner doesn't bestow his attentions upon it.
While Quake owes much to the genius of John Carmack, the lead programmer of Quake, the Quake community has also worked hard to come up with new games that still enthral users. And it is this that still keeps the game ticking.
Thank the net
One of the reasons why Quake initially took off, according to Wikipedia, is that it was released when the Internet was commercially coming of age. Since Quake was playable on the Net as opposed to many games that were released around that time, which could only work on local networks this helped it to blossom in the minds of users.
As time passed, more and more sophisticated games came, but the magic of Quake remained for its fans. While the modern games have better graphics, Quake, with its atmosphere of gloom and evil, gives you a real scare and this no doubt is one of the reasons why the game is still popular.
Do it yourself
One of the nicest things about Quakeu2014and I speak as somebody who has played quite a few games over the years is that it enables you to do what you want and some geniuses have come up with something truly spectacular.
More than just bullets: While Quake relies heavily upon firepower, there are exceptions. For instance, in Cogs of Conflict, to kill the ogre who is throwing grenades on you (a), you step on a switch (b) that activates the spike trap in the ceiling (c) and tears the monster to bits. (Below) In Quakelock Sherlock, since you have very few bullets, you have to solve the puzzle on the wall and kill just one monster out of five to get to safety.
For instance, Neil Manke in the game Soldier of Fortune has come up with an innovation that involves feeding fierce animals to make them your friends so that you can kill another monster. Dustin "Tronyn" Geeraert's Soul of Evil includes superb new monsters that are a treat to fight.
Another nice example is Jean-Philippe Lambert, who created something called Castle of The Dark Ages, which took 50 days and 18 hours to compile (yeah, the computer actually took 1,218 hours non-stop to do it). Jean-Marc Gruninger's The Middle Evil features scary lightning and music that will set your nerves on edge and if you are playing in a darkened room, you will want to turn on the lights.
Avanipaala Praasaada by somebody who only calls himself 'Killjoy' is a joy to play and even features pictures of Ganesha, and finally there is The Marcher Fortress by Kinn, which might be the greatest level ever created for Quake.
While there are hundreds of other great games out there, we cannot cover all of them due to space constraints.
Winning accolades
While it is impossible to give the exact reasons why it is popular, there is no denying that Quake is truly famous. Wikipedia says that Quake was honoured in 2008 Quake at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards for advancing the art form of user-modifiable games. John Carmack accepted the award and he truly deserved it.
More than this award, he shall always have the good wishes of many Quake players, who are forever indebted to him for having created such a great game.
Game counter
According to quaddicted.com, which says it has the 'most complete archive of single player maps for Quake', these are hundreds of maps that have been created for Quake by enthusiastic followers. If one counts the year on which these maps were released, this is what one gets:
1996:u00a0103
1997:u00a0390
1998:u00a074
1999:u00a049
2000:u00a045
2001:u00a052
2002:u00a039
2003:u00a035
2004:u00a031
2005:u00a025
2006:u00a018
2007:u00a029
2008:u00a036
2009:u00a08
