Return to Castle Wolfenstein Ships

Screaming Lunatic writes "Woohoo, Return to Castle Wolfenstein has finally shipped. Check this story out at Yahoo. You should be able to buy it at the regular gaming shops. I highly recommend buying it rather than hacking it, as noted in Graeme Devines .plan file." CD: I am seriously flashing back to the Apple II game with a similar name, hope this doesn't suck like daikatana.

Comments

And that's the way it should be.

[Chasing Amy]

As the guy above pointed out, there will be a Linux client download available. So you're not really SOL. But I put a provocative subject line on my post anyway to get people to consider this.

You see, I'm glad that there appears to be one primary platform for computer games. I don't cae that it's Windows. It could just as well be Linux or Mac or whatever for all I care. But I do care that most new computer games are developed for one given OS.

You see, unlike the console world I don't have to have 3 or 4 different expensive bulky boxes in order to be able to play all the cool new releases. I just have to have one expensive bulky box. And I don't have to boot to 3 or 4 different OSes either--I just run Windows when I want to play a game.

Now, sure, I wish all games came out for every OS. Who wouldn't want to be able to just use whatever he likes, be it a Windows or Linux PC, or a Mac running either OS X or OS 9, and run any game he wants? But that will simply never, ever, ever happen, because there is no money in eating into your thin profit margins to make ports to every OS and architecture in existence. Instead, most developers pick the most popular OS--the one with the most users, that is--and code for that.

The result is a unity in the PC gaming world that will probably never come to the console world. I'd like to be able to just buy one next-gen console, and play all the console games on it. I wish I could buy either a PS2 or Gamecube or even an Xbox and use it to play Luigi's Mansion, Munch's Oddysee, Soul Reaver 2, DOA3, and all the other cool console games that are coming out. But I just can't and that's that.

Comparing it to the PC gaming scene, I'm glad I wouldn't similarly have to have Linux, Windows, and a Mac just to play most of the cool new games. Instead, just having a good PC running Windows means I can run almost every cool new PC game I could want. Rare is the really cool game that's Mac or Linux only. Almost all come out for Windows, and almost always first.

Would it be nice if the primary PC gaming platform were Free Software? Of course. But it isn't and I'm fine with that as long as I don't have to boot between many OSes or worse yet keep several different boxes to play different games. Windows 98SE can play almost every game ever written for the PC from the DOS days of the early 80s to the present, and of that I'm glad because I can and do play many of them, old and new. I'm glad that, as outdated and technologically weak Win9x is, it has kept almost-perfect game compatibility. It's like if Nintendo offered a machine which played all games from every console and region from the NES on through the Gamecube. AS a man who likes his games, I think it's perfect for what it is in that respect.

Now of course soon games will start to be targeted for a newer platform. I wish it were Linux or something else free and Free, but it will be WinXP and again I am fine with that as long as it maintains the sort of unity of platform we enjoy in the PC gaming world. Again, we are lucky that it isn't how it is in the console world, where there are several major platforms with exclusive games, which completely change every few years and with the exception of the PS2 completely break all chance for backwards compatability.

Complain all you want, but we have it easy. I'd never complain about having a near-universal gaming platform with nearly universal backwards compatibility. Neither Nintendo nor Sony are any better than Microsoft either when it comes to corporate behavior, so I count myself lucky and look at the good in this PC gaming platform.

Linux gamers

[Ender Ryan]

For all you Linux gamers, I know you're out there, hopefully in a couple days or weeks or so a Linux binary will be released. When it's released, Tux Games will sell the game with an extra CD with the Linux binaries on it.

If you care about the future of Linux gaming, please, please wait and buy it from Tux Games. If you buy it from your local Best Buy or whatever, if just looks like another Windows sale, but if you buy from Tux Games they will see that it was sold from a Linux games retailer.

My comments

[Sludge]

Well, I got the game yesterday, and played it until 5 am. I then woke up and played it until around now. I'm on mission five, the snowy terrain map. (Note: I go through games very slowly and never miss a nook or cranny. I annoy myself, but I cannot help it.)

Things that are good:

• Anywhere where there is fire, the game is damned beautiful.
• The ghouls and ghosts part of the game is tastefully done, and well integrated so far. I was disappointed when I read that they were going to put this in, but it's been the most intense part of the game yet.
• The stealth mission was a lot of fun. I enjoy killing things before they're aware of my existance. I am personally guessing that there is a routine in the player code that gives them more health when they spot you. The game seems to really encourage killing things while they're still unaware of your existance.
• It uses the Quake 3 engine which means it's familiar, works well and is portable.
• Lots of good textures. A lot of games ship with only decent textures. This game comes close to the texture art in Q3 at points, which is the best out there, in my opinion.
• I think those are authentic Nazi propaganda posters on the walls, that have been scanned and put into the game. Right on!
• The artificial intelligence is really quite good. You can still break it down into different methods in your head, and learn how to react to each mode of attack/defense the AI takes on, but it still manages to deservingly sap your health.

Bad Stuff:

• The developers seem indifferent to putting corridors with lots of doors and gray walls in their game. This makes the first couple of missions VERY stock FPS. In fact, I was downright bored playing at first. It picked up later, but has started to waver again.
• The Nazis speak english, and only english. I want German with subtitles. Talk about an atmosphere reduction.
• You can't kill civilians. To me, this is annoying because of the principal at play here: The game has probably been toned down in an attempt to obtain a softer rating.
• Same principal as above, I have yet to encounter any dogs!
• Enemies don't twitch when they're shot with a machine gun. You'd be surprised at how much satisfaction this takes away when blowing up round after round of bad guys.

Now, for the comparison: Halflife versus Return To Castle Wolfenstein. What if RTCW came out the same day as Half-Life? I would be VERY impressed with the image quality in RTCW over Half Life and the high res textures would be amazing. However, I would still choose Half Life as a better single player game, because the variety of monsters is what made that game so amazing. RTCW seems to have some surprises in store for me, but nothing too exciting yet.

As of the first four missions (each containing four levels) of the game, I would rate this game 7/10. It's a good FPS, but it borrows more ideas from the genre than it gives back to it.

Re:linux

[Afrosheen]

Why the hell would you need winex? There have been linux clients all along...and they're going to rellease a full version linux client soon.

Activation key

[Old Wolf]

Why does nobody object to iD maintaining an internet database of activation keys, but all get up in arms with Microsoft does it?

Re:Graeme saves us from evil pirates

[Anonymous Coward]

Regardless of Graeme's motives, I could make the same point for any other piece of software which is highly unlikely to be legitimate. For example: many so-called Xbox emulators are in fact virus attacks that steal your passwords, or worse, corrupt your files.

And secondly, you're wrong. Pirates using keygens may or may not have valid keys, but THEY DON'T HAVE AS MANY AS THEY WANT. Take, for example, a pirate trying to get a friend online with RTCW over the phone, IRC or ICQ.

At this point, you'd be an idiot to run a RTCW keygen you got from God-knows-where. So I wouldn't say this is a scare tactic, just a dose of common sense.