Life after Newnet?

[Hinata]

[kud]

was esports even a thing 15 years ago? can't really compare equally given the time differences

[vitz^]

[fisk]

CPL Europe 2001
World Cyber Games 2001
World Cyber Games 2002
Clanbase CTF Eurocup 2001
Clanbase TDM Eurocup 2001
Clanbase TDM Eurocup 2002
Clanbase CTF Eurocup 2002
WWCL
UGX2 LAN
Summit
North LAN
Multi Madness

These are just the most known tournaments that happened before UT2003 was released, there was tons of smaller tournaments, especially in Germany that had prizemoney involved.

[Hinata]

[Hinata]

@fisk

This is UT99 tournaments? Ok.
There were tournaments so, it was just less mediated.^^

[Sauron]

I know there were many UT99 local tournaments with plenty of prize money in NA but in 99 00 esports werent nearly as big, even compared to 2004. UT99 had a far superior player base and far more competition, whether paid or unpaid in terms of overall size.

[Sonic|^]

[Hinata]

[vitz^]

[n0mer]

[Hinata]

[Xenoscythe]

Open tournament has the potential to be something huge, not only because of the latest engine, but because its actual gamers building it from the foundations up. The main issue as someone mentioned is the 2k4 influence.
In my opinion providing it keeps more towards UT99 (which in my eyes was way more watchable than 2k3/2k4) and has the right business plan and promotion, it will one day become a game with a real e-sports following, there is a huge crevice waiting to be filled with an arena shooter that's been missing for a number of years. Quake live came close to a rebirth of Q3 but multitudes of server issues and monetary greed killed it.

That said i still think there's a place for an actual UT99 rebirth, a real anti-cheat would go a long way to helping the game come back. It means tournaments for actual money can start again which i guarantee would bring LOTS of people back to the game. LAN's I've been too I've had countless people talking to me about UT and how they always loved it but because of their favourite servers disappearing they gave up and left, these people can easily be brought back by stable servers, with NewNet now released it may be an idea to instead of paying for separate individual servers, instead hire a dedicated rack for essentially the same cost as your current renting costs combined and have way more pug/public servers including ones for NW/LG/NW3/Freestyle SA, etc etc with links to global unreal, captivate people, entice them in and make them stay!
To grow, better promotion would be needed than currently is happening. Not that I'm saying you're all doing a bad job as admins, but REAL voluntary promotion at offline events would go a long way. I intend on making up a few global unreal gaming shirts and some flyers and giving them out at the UK/NL LANs i attend from now on.
An alternative way to access the pug channel without the IRC client would be a huge help in this department as well as although there's a handy tutorial on the site, people want easy access to pick-up games without the hassle/confusion of IRC.

When the master-list servers go down, depending on what epic do, will shape the game as we know it forever. I say force-build a huge community and let us bring the game back to life.

[Riven]

We all know what a game has to have to be the best game ever ...
Unreal Tournament 99 is the perfect fps game and most of us are playing it for over 10 years ... which is a huge part of our lifes ... means we are addicted ... everyone of us ... nobody can deny that
And if a game with unreal engine 4 comes out having the same gameplay as ut99 ... ,,, ...

[TimTim]

I will probably make my own version that is identical to UT99. And I'll also most likely start with InstaGib since it's a single simple weapon.

[Riven]

[Sonic|^]

[tigerclaw1987]

You can use IRC through UT or through the GG site, but to make it easier you could go further and integrate it here too

auto connect to ipug/upug
use registered forum nick
easy access to use guides/FAQ

it'd simplify things, QL was quite an effective format, everything in one place

publics are another matter, you need a noobie player base first before thinking about publics

[Morpheus]

Ut99 is dead. Get your efforts towards other projects. See avatar. @xeno

[Shotman]

For those who don't know I am Shotman a retired UT99 player that used to be very active at the beginning of #ipug/global unreal but went to inactive after I had a 24 hour job. Nowadays I have some free time and I use that time to play Unreal and Thief (2014). Some people from uK brought this topic to my attention.

Anyways, I just want to put my input into this conversation. I know most of you guys want to revive UT99 into the scene and show many people of what is worth. Now TimTim, since your trying to "replicate" UT99 on the unreal engine 4, why not try to make another Unreal with a proper storyline and if that becomes successful than make it to an "replicate" of Unreal Tournament. I say this because the one thing that UT99 became so popular was because of Unreal 1 and Return to the Nali Pa with its nice scenery, weapons, music and storyline. Therefore, I believe a lot of people would want to have a good storyline or freedom when player wants to play a campaign and such. So if you could make a new Unreal, call it a different name so you won't be sued, where it would get picked up from Unreal 1. Where the main person landed on another planet covered with Skaarj and are using Nali as slaves.

Then, you would need to focus of the new players or the new generation. For this to happen, you need to look at the public scene not the pug scene. You would have a higher chance of brining the public scene over to the pug scene. Also TimTim focusing on a one weapon game (IG), is a horrible idea that would just kill a game. You would just bring in the old public from #ipug and it would not help it grow. Weapons is the way to go, not IG.

I would like to add and ask you think FPS games these days suck? For me, I would simply answer that they are pretty much the same thing and use the same movements. None of the games stand out and become very boring. The two examples, which are probably the obvious, is COD4 and Modern Warfare. These two games are exactly the same thing and the only way for a new UT is if it would stand out.

Now the UT3 vs UT99 debate. They are both great games, believe it or not, and UT3 had a lot of potential for being great. If you remember UT3 was really popular and had a lot of people talking because it had a lot of the old mechanics with new mechanics. However the only thing that people forgot about UT3 was Gears of War. Epic pretty much dug the grave of UT3 because they wanted to revive another of their classic games. For those people that are saying that UT3 sucks, if it wasn't for Gears of War, then you would probably be playing UT3 now and they would have been more of UTs. Hell UT3 storyline was good and left you hanging so there has to be a new UT4 in the future.

I agree with Morpheous that UT99 is dead and with Gamespy closing down it might make it worse for the community.

If it doesn't make sense than too bad because I was in hurry and wanted to put my input in this convo.

[RickJames]

[kud]

he's not wrong. ut players were very excited about ut3. i remember, because the atmosphere was positive enough to convince me to upgrade my pc for the demo.

thanks for the post, shotman. a new Unreal campaign in UE4 would be pretty spectacular, I must agree.

[Hinata]

[Sauron]

I remember cheaters immediately wreaking havoc in ut3. Epic didnt care.

[tigerclaw1987]

#UT3 on quakenet had 600+ people online when the demo was released, turned out it was crap...

People still tried to play it, we lost a good chunk of the community when UT3 came out

Not people going over to UT3, just people who were sick of various problems with UT and CB, they wanted UT3 to be a fresh start on a game just as good/better but were let down

Shame