Nexuiz Vs Openarena

Apr 07, 2009  Nexuiz is a fast paced 3d deathmatch game project created online by a team of developers called Alientrap. It is available for download for Windows, Mac, and Linux (all the same archive). OpenArena and Nexuiz are lighter than Sauerbraten, and the Windows versions do not require an installation; they can be played from portable.

Updated: October 21, 2009

Nexuiz is a free, open-source First Person Shooter running on top of a heavily modified Quake engine. It's a fast-paced game, where players combat online in large-scale battles or pit against witty-tongued bots in a progressive singleplayer mode. I have tried Nexuiz last year and liked it quite a bit. Well, I liked it so much that I featured it in my first article on Linux games, alongside Sauerbraten and OpenArena.

The latest version 2.5.1 was released in May this year, bringing in a load of improvements, including much refined graphics effects, more realistic textures, shaders, and whatnot. Having just recently bought a new laptop with a powerful modern card and running an instance of Ubuntu specially dedicated for games on it, I though this was a great idea to show my new rig plus test the game. Nexuiz has grown fat in the last year. While version 2.4.2 took only about 400MBs, the new release is almost 700MB, the extra 300MB juiced with lots of eye candy and new maps.

Graphics

The game really looks amazing. The impression of how great it looks is not apparent the first time you try the game. Nexuiz starts modestly, with graphics detail set to normal level. To see all the beauty, you need to power up the graphics. Luckily, my Nvidia 9600M GS with 512MB RAM let me do that. I selected the Ultimate setting and stepped into the fight.

The quality of graphics is great. There's glow and blur and reflection in almost every detail, suffusing with depth of realism you do not expect from a free game a fraction of size of the typical modern monstrosity. It's really surprising. The attention to detail is phenomenal. Just for comparison, here's an old screenshot from version 2.4 (left) and one from the latest release (right).

As you can clearly see, the older release looked and felt more cartoonish, less realistic. The 2.5.1 adds the color of life into the killing arena. What more, even at the highest level, the game runs quite smoothly. On older hardware, you can turn off some of the effects.

I am thoroughly pleased with the changes. The improvements are grand, visible and positive. It's exciting to see such major changes take place in such a short span of time. You can extrapolate into the future to guess what kind of new stuff will feature in the future game releases.

BTW, do not forget that Nexuiz runs natively on Linux! Everything is rendered in OpenGL. Which proves that you don't need DirectX to enjoy high-quality graphics. It's the matter of effort only. The technology is not the limitation. The setup is also very simple. Just unzip the downloaded archive and run the binary (executable) that matches your architecture, as I've shown in my Linux gaming how to mega thread. Paradox vector file download.

Singleplayer

Like before, you have the choice between singleplayer and multiplayer. Singleplayer requires that you win the currently played map before the next level is unlocked. This introduces an element of challenge into the game, akin to most common, commercial FPS titles, so if you have a slow Internet connection or you're not keen on playing online, you still have lots of fun in store for you.

Multiplayer

The multiplayer has remained the pretty much the same. You login into a server and start killing people. When I was taking screenshots for this review, there were not that many servers online. Some were filled with bots rather than human players, which kind of spoiled the experience a little. The most embarrassing this is, you start chatting to someone and it takes a few moments to realize that you're trying to talk to a machine. Bots tend to talk a lot and spam the console with pre-scripted remarks of all sorts. As a reasonable, polite human, you're tempted to engage in conversation.

Bots aside, Nexuiz plays well. It's a brutally fast game. You have to be very quick to dodge the rockets and plasma beams. I spent most of my time respawning or watching other players perform wild stunts across the maps.

Earth Wisdom: Starhawk & Jon Young in Conversation with The Pachamama Alliance. The Last Wild Witch by Starhawk.

You have thirteen weapon types to choose from, mostly invented, futuristic stuff, plus some good old machine guns and rocket launchers. Nexuiz offers 24 official maps, plus hundreds of community-developed ones.

If you try to play on a server currently running a map that you don't have, it will be automatically downloaded, saving you the hassle of leaving the game and hunting for map files. Most maps also play music, usually techno-rock titles, adding to the chaotic, boiling atmosphere.

Since Nexuiz runs on a Quake-based engine, it uses the same .pk3 format for the maps, which makes modding quite easy. Converting maps from other Quake-based games like World of Padman or Urban Terror into Nexuiz is relatively easy. Game types include Free For All, Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, and others, so you'll have a decent variety to choose from. Nexuiz is a classic FPS, with good pace and excellent graphics. Nexuiz also allows you to record your own demos. But I have yet to figure out how to do that.

Conclusion

Nexuiz 2.5.1 is a tremendous improvement over old versions and a great standalone game overall. It has everything a young, violent mind needs - good, fast pace, mindless killing, lots of weapons, and graphics par excellence. Singleplayer has shaped up, offering new challenge to the players. The multiplayer mode is as fun as it has always been, quick and brutal. I'm very pleased with this release and looking forward to new ones!

Nexuiz can be download directly from the website. You can also use the software repositories, but they might not always have the latest edition. Playdeb also allows one-click install on Ubuntu. Of course, Nexuiz is also available for Windows and Mac.

Cheers.

OpenArena is a free and open-source video game. It is a first-person shooter (FPS), and a video game clone of Quake III Arena.

Development[edit]

The OpenArena project was established on August 19, 2005, one day after the id Tech 3source code released under GNU GPLlicense.

Its official website includes downloads for Microsoft Windows, Linux, and macOS operating systems. Thanks to third-party efforts, it is also available from the default repositories of a number of open-source operating systems, including Debian, Fedora, FreeBSD,^[1]OpenBSD, Gentoo, Mandriva, Arch and Ubuntu. It is also in development for the Maemo mobile operating system. Ports for Raspberry Pi,^[2]Android^[3] and iOS^[4] are available, too.

An assets 'reboot' named 'OA3' is planned, with the aim of steering the art style away from the classic space and gothic themes to 'something more manga inspired', while also raising its quality and performances standards.^[5]

Gameplay[edit]

OpenArena's gameplay attempts to follow Quake III Arena: score frags to win the game using a balanced set of weapons each designed for different situations, with just minor changes to the rules enabled by default (like awarding a character for 'pushing' another character to their death).

Each match happens in an 'arena': a map where players try to kill each other; some arenas are designed for Capture the flag and similar gametypes, so are built with two bases (usually identical, apart from the colors), for the two teams.

The Quake III style of play is very fast and requires skill to be played successfully online. It's an arcade-style gameplay which allows players to quickly move through maps thanks to 'bouncepads', 'accelerator pads', 'teleporters' and advanced techniques such as 'strafe jumping' and 'rocket jumping'. Some arenas include traps.

The game can be played online (against other human players) or offline (against computer-controlled characters known as bots). 'Singleplayer' mode allows players to play a predefined series of deathmatches, unlocking a new 'tier' of four maps after completing the previous one, or to create custom matches in any game type through the 'skirmish' mode.

Game modes[edit]

As of OpenArena 0.8.8, maps can be played in at least one of these gametypes: Deathmatch (called as Free For All in the game), Team Deathmatch, Tournament, Capture The Flag, One Flag CTF, Harvester, Overload, Elimination, CTF Elimination, Last Man Standing, Double Domination and Domination:

• 'Free For All' is classic Deathmatch, where players are all pitted against each other, and wins the player with the highest score at the end of the match, or the one with the highest number of frags when the time limit is reached.
• 'Team Deathmatch' is a team-based variation of Deathmatch, with two teams of players being pitted against the other.
• 'Tournament' chooses two players and makes them duel, in a classic 'winner stays, loser gets out' setting.
• 'Capture The Flag' is a team-based mode where each team spawns in a base which contains a flag. They must capture the enemy team's flag while keeping their own flag from being captured.
• 'One Flag CTF' is a variation of Capture The Flag where a white flag spawns in the middle of the map, and the teams must bring it to the enemy base, instead of taking the enemy's flag.
• 'Harvester' is another team-based mode played in some Capture The Flag scenarios. Each team spawns with a Skull Receptacle, and there's a Skull Generator at the middle of the map. By fragging enemies, skulls appear in this generator. The players must collect their enemies' skulls and bring them to the enemy base in order to score.
• 'Overload' has both teams' bases spawn a crystal. The players of each team must travel to the enemy base and destroy this crystal in order to win.
• 'Elimination' is a team based mode where both players must frag all of their enemies in a 'Last Man Standing' match of sorts. The team with the highest number of points win the match.
• 'CTF Elimination', as its name implies, is a mix of Capture The Flag and Elimination. Not only do the teams score by fragging all of the enemy team's players, but they also can win rounds by capturing their flags.
• 'Last Man Standing' is a non-team variation of Elimination where all of the players start with a finite number of lives and frag each other until only one of them remains.
• 'Double Domination' is a team-based game which features two control points, and the players must hold them during some seconds in order to score points.
• 'Domination' is also team-based, and has control points scattered throughout the maps; the players must secure these points in order to rack up points for their teams.

Reception and impact[edit]

The game is one of the most popular open-source first-person shooters, particularly among fans of the original Quake III.^{[citation needed]} It has only really been negatively criticized as somewhat incomplete as of yet, with some saying that this detracts from long term play.^[6][7] OpenArena has also been praised for its portability and ability to run on old hardware.^[8] Internet play has also been praised, as well as the number of players found on the average OpenArena server.^[9] The game has also been credited for its creativity in bot design, rather than sticking to more traditional tropes.^[7] OpenArena is also available on macOS, with one reviewer praising it as one of the best free games for the Mac, noting that it is only slightly behind contemporary commercially funded games for the PC and consoles in terms of graphics and artificial intelligence.^[10]

OpenArena has been used as a platform for scholarly work in computer science. Some examples include streaming graphics from a central server,^[11] and visualizing large amounts of network data.^[12]

See also[edit]

• Freedoom, a video game clone of Doom (1993 video game)

References[edit]

1. ^OperaArena FreeBSD Port on FreshPorts.org
2. ^'OpenArena on Raspberry Pi store'. Archived from the original on 2015-11-17. Retrieved 2013-08-20.
3. ^OpenArena on Google Play Store
4. ^Beben III on iTunes Store
5. ^OpenArena 3 page on the official OpenArena Wiki
6. ^OS Reviews - Pleasure to Frag
7. ^ ^abRaiden's Realm - OpenArena Review^{[dead link]}
8. ^'HeadShotGamer.com - OpenArena Review'. Archived from the original on 2016-08-25. Retrieved 2016-08-11.
9. ^Snappy Gamer - OpenArena: Open Source Quake III Fun
10. ^MacApper - OpenArena: Pure Fragiliciouss Fun For Mac
11. ^Peter Eisert and Philipp Fechteler (2007). 'Remote rendering of computer games'. Proceedings of the International Conference on Signal Processing and Multimedia Applications (SIGMAP), Barcelona, Spain, July 2007.
12. ^Lucas Parry (2007). 'L3DGEWorld 2.1 Input & Output Specifications'. CAIA Technical Report 070808A, August 2007.

External links[edit]

• OpenArena on GitHub
• OpenArena at Indie DB
• OpenArena at the Linux Game Database
• OpenArena at Linux Links
• OpenArena at MobyGames