Jamie Hall from Fragcast, aka Genki-Rocket, returns to Three Speech due to a great response to his previous story. Heeeeeere’s Jamie…
Question: Where can you play a Master Chief vs. Marcus Fenix grudge match? How about an Everquest vs. Biker Mice from Mars capture the flag game? Or Cloud from Final Fantasy vs. Spawn? Well, there’s only one place - Unreal Tournament 3.
Released in Europe this spring and well deserving of it’s 85% average review on GameRankings, Unreal Tournament 3 is a fairly unique proposition.
Some things about the game are fairly obvious: For one thing, it’s stunning to look at. The game runs silky smooth and features the gritty high-res textures that are a hallmark of the Unreal Engine 3 that powers it. It’s so beautiful to look at. In fact, that you’d be forgiven for thinking its existence was brought about purely to make a mockery of the numerous Unreal Engine games that have suffered in process of being ported to PS3.
Another thing that’s easy to see right off the bat: It’s old-school. This is a pure, balls-to-the-wall almost ‘twitch’ style death match game, much more frenetic in pace than say, Call of Duty 4.
But what might not be so obvious at first glance is the fact that this game is going to have very, very long legs. Why? Well, what if I told you I currently had eight different characters on top of the multitude of models that come free with the game, 12 free player-created maps, and 3 free maps posted on the PS Store by Epic themselves?
Basically, I’ve acquired more free content for this game in two weeks than a lot of titles come with when bought from a store. It’s quite exciting - and indeed, liberating - to be able to tweak a console game like this. Want a different camera angle? Download a ‘mutator’ and play with a Gears-style over the shoulder view. Think the graphics need a lift? Grab a mod that alters the post-processing and brightens all the colours.
I’m even more excited at what the future might hold - one look on the official website is enough to see that some of the community content for this game is rivalling anything delivered through official sources elsewhere and most, if not all, of these mods will be available free to PS3 owners in due course. Let’s not forget, either, that the PSN currently the only online console environment that can support such content. Not only that, but the process of downloading the mods and installing them is so easy, even a PC-phobic gamer like me can manage it.
This, my friends, is what the future smells like. Pleasing, isn’t it?
There’s a guide up on Fragcast for PS3 owners to see how easy it is to install free content for the game - check it out!
Metal head rodent bikers Vs. man in a tin-can suit….hmmm…the possibilties!
More article writing!
Comment by JohnSketch — Apr 2, 2008 @ 2:03 pm
If you have a load of weird mods and want to play with somone who doesn’t, will it load them into their game for you or does it just say “sorry, no go”?
Comment by TheShirts — Apr 2, 2008 @ 2:06 pm
@TheShirts Some do, some don’t. Generally the mutators that the host is using will be automatically D/L’d by everyone but the maps will not. Also it seems the latest Character Mods have to be D/L’d by everyone in order to be visible.
Comment by Divine — Apr 2, 2008 @ 2:24 pm
This game is the reason I bought my PS3, and have never looked back. But this game thankfully lived up to expectation and many friends who I have got into this game also love the old school fashion of it they have said pure pick-up and play and can just pop in and out, rather than the technique fueled likes of the COD4 and Halo’s. I am not saying UT3 is better, or worse, than those games just a refreshing change. Only thing I have found is that people coming to this from a console ‘background’ dont know where to start with regards to which mods and where to get them from. I have eventually now started my own UT3 beginners blog with one MOD a day, one which I consider the best final version of a mod. Then people can test if for a day, and delete it if they dont like it, and try the next one the day after. I have added instructional videos how to add mods and the best places I feel are where to find the best mods, when people want to venture further on there own.
Finally I took notice of your lurking, but not commenting post, the other day so here is my comment
Comment by Chris — Apr 2, 2008 @ 2:38 pm
what a fight that’ll be, and lovin UT3, excellent game
Comment by E-ROLE — Apr 2, 2008 @ 3:26 pm
If it wasn’t for GT5P and GTAIV coming out this month I would have this game already, i love the idea of the occasional keyboard and mouse deathmatch.
Comment by lxd — Apr 2, 2008 @ 3:35 pm
Everyone should buy UT3 and start filling those servers! It’s a filthy, back-to-basics blaster - just my cuppa. So leave CoD’s silly perks behind and jump in a Deathwalker… FTW!
Comment by rooee — Apr 2, 2008 @ 3:39 pm
As much as it wants to be… UT3 will never be Halo.
Comment by Caleb — Apr 2, 2008 @ 4:19 pm
Sadly I have played this for less than one hour. Such a waste! There is no option for me to customise the controls. All I need is to swap the analogue thumbsticks over. How hard would it have been to include that? Not very. Yeah I can mouse and keyboard it, but that’s only good for at a table, not in my living room. Anyway, I’m thinking that once the DualShock3’s are released, I might crack open one of my SixAxis and rewire the mushrooms around the other way. Then I’d always have a controller for those games where the dev’s have forgotten to include proper control customisation.
Comment by LordOfRuin — Apr 2, 2008 @ 4:40 pm
@ Chris - Email me. Perhaps write a follow-up / reply to this story?
Comment by Three Speech — Apr 2, 2008 @ 4:41 pm
@ 8
For that, we should be truly thankful. I’m tried of every game in this genre trying to be Halo.
It’s interesting that’s ben so long since we had a simple FPS on a console that this feels so fresh in execution.
I like!
Comment by Genki Rocket — Apr 2, 2008 @ 4:41 pm
@ 4… Chris. This is a fantastic idea… it can be a little daunting to be faced with a list of 30 mods and not really being sure what each one does.
Comment by Genki Rocket — Apr 2, 2008 @ 4:44 pm
@ three speech thanks very much will gladly e-mail you
tomorrow if you don’t mind?
@ Genki Rocket Thanks very much glad you like it! Much appreciated.
Comment by Chris — Apr 2, 2008 @ 5:53 pm
nice article, i’ll hopefully be getting UTIII one day, but at the moment i have so many other games i’m working through. i still have UT GOTY edition on my old pc, but to be honest, back then i was more of a Quake fan. the mods though have pushed me over the edge recently.
this month GTA comes out and i’ll get nothing done.
unrelated but:- also read that Fallout 3 is only gonna take around 20hrs to complete!! WTF. that’s just very sad. what happened to the epic nature of Oblivion? do people have no attention spans these days? we NEED more titles that take longer than a wet weekend to finish.
Comment by mobiletone — Apr 2, 2008 @ 6:11 pm
@Chris - nice mod site, consider it added to my bookmarks.
Comment by mobiletone — Apr 2, 2008 @ 6:32 pm
@ mobiletone thanks much I am glad you like it.
Comment by Chris — Apr 3, 2008 @ 7:36 am
UT3 is a cracking game and
Comment by mmb — Apr 3, 2008 @ 10:17 am
d’oh damn these fast & furious fingers of mine..
anyhoo, what I was going to say is that UT3 is a cracking title and it was great to see Epic knock out a map pack and get it onto the store while other devs are umming and ahhing about price and how close they can be released to the 360 versions of the maps.
Comment by mmb — Apr 3, 2008 @ 10:21 am
@ chris
i suppose that you would be a good person to ask.
do u know where i can find the editing kit for ut3?
im not a dev but wouldnt mind giving it a go.
Comment by manley — Apr 3, 2008 @ 11:14 am
@ Manley the Unreal Engine 3 toolset is available with the PC version of UT3, not sure if its available separately I did scour the epic forums and it wasn’t obvious. The tools with which to ‘cook’ the PC mods, you make, so they are playable on PS3 are available from the epic forums.
Comment by Chris — Apr 3, 2008 @ 12:53 pm
@ 8 Caleb - Reply to
@ 11 Genki - follow up on
I agree with Genki its strange how it takes an old school shooter to freshen up the genre again. And also I did find the trying to be Halo comment funny as the criticism leveled at the original Halo, by certain people, was its trying to hard to be an Unreal game.
Comment by Chris — Apr 3, 2008 @ 1:02 pm
@Chris
thanks!!
for and exlurker you have had a busy day.
looks like im buying the pc version then!!!!:-)
Comment by manley — Apr 3, 2008 @ 1:42 pm
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