he could not use external models for the keys, either.

You can have your models with a judicious use of brush models. I have been thinking about this sort of scenario for my next map: You put in an objective:

Quake (to player): When you kill the Hell Knight who betrayed me, bring me his decapitated head.

Action: Kill knight, Use a func_wall as a brush model for the decapitated head and set it to appear in the Hell Knight's Arena.

Action: Bring the head back to Quake's communique beacon. // Either kill a func_wall hiding the model, or the brush head model rises too quickly for the player to see it.

Quake (to player): You have done very well, grunt. Now I will ensure your death is quick and merciful. 

I started off in my above post trying to answer your well thought out one, and ended up rambling, as it goes.

Headthump, I did something similar to what you describe with a hub / Lazarus system in Quake2, the hub had a chapel to the war god, bringing back a commander head awarded you a (q2 savable) quad. Bringing back three heads got you a BFG. Shame I never finished it.

Also had an armoury where you collected the weapons - there were none in the maps. Completing more levels opened more caches in the armoury. 

I had this idea to develop a monster in the form of a basic 64x64 cube. It would been disguished as a stone and come alive and act as an endboss. By defeating it the same place it had been placed would become an new exit.
For so far I 've done well, although the lumpyness of the monster made me have my doubts. It took me quiet some time to construkt it. And now I have this wizz thing like...

Monster is in a separated place with the player. As the monster wakes it walks to the player leaving an open exit space, which is covered by a door after the monster spawns. The player attacks the monster untill it dies and opens the door to the exit.

Seems logical to target the door to the monster so it opens the door after its death. Point is that the monster is already targeted by a trigger_once in game to waken it.

So I targetted the door to 30 sec and then it opens. But sometimes the monster isn't killed yet and the player can escape.

Might have placed this on mapping help but as it is a monster using game potential (substituting a door, covered in stealth stand) it's here. 

The trigger targets the monster and the monster targets the door. I don't see the conflict there. 

Indeed, thats how I started. There's something more.

If I trigger the monster with the trigger_once it takes a delay of 4 sec Untill the monster gets out of the wall. So the same trigger I use for the monster I use for the door. This gives the monster time to move and the door (in fact the func_train) time to delay 4 sec.
Then it jumps up to the free coming space and waits 30sec.

But it has to move when the monster dies which is impredictable, The path_corner I can't trigger. So maybe a trigger_delay should work. 

fit very well in Q2 as the player has the role of a marine: soldiers do carry out orders. The original Quake was set in very open universe with all possibilities left open for interpretation; players could let run their phantasy free. One result is that you have far more fan-art, fan-stories etc. in Quake than in Q2.
Players are not and can�t be biased about that aspect, everyone is able to put in their own thoughts, and it all fits.

Personally, I�m always a little annoyed about �center screen messages� in newer Quake maps: they are taking away that aspect of �something undefined� away from me and kill my immersion, or even worse, mappers giving me too much personal input (smart comments or joking with the player).
Except for speedmaps :)
Though in the id maps, I can accept them on the other side(lol?), maybe because seeing that the concept was also quite new at the time in fps games. Otherwise, as someone who has played alot of Quake maps, I�d prefer them to be only there if absolutely necessary for gameplay, i.e. a warning that a bridge might break while standing above lava (indeed screwing with the player�s mind is gameplay).

Enter Half-life: players had to find out everything on their own, no preset objectives, no center messages, one could spend days in those maps and it�d be ok; that was a very clever move to give the game a significant amount of depth, while the gameplay was exactly like Q2.
If it weren�t for that and the immersive and well unfolded story, HL would have been just another Q2 clone.

My conclusion: in today�s developed gaming culture where alot of people play/have played fps games, objectives are ok to achieve a certain setting/theme/immersion, but are not neccessary, as nothing in terms of gameplay mechanic has changed since DooM/Quake. 

learn to appreciate it: hardcore secrets, monsters and weapons. Those turrest are annoying, but it was a (succesful) attempt to give Q2�s gameplay more profile: player is no longer superman who bunnyhops through the maps with ten weapons and tons of ammo on his back (as it still was with Q2).

I see Q2 as id�s vision of a �quakey� reality fps at the time (I remember reading a quote by John Carmack where he stated he was slightly unsatisfied with players bouncing at 2000 mph through maps). Minimalistic, as is id�s style, but with everything it needs to make it believable:

- objectives: (see last post)

- very futuristic/techy/science-fiction sounds, one of the game�s best done aspects

- metallic, tank-like enemies; I had always the feeling to �wear down� monsters in Q2, and not gibbing/smearing them onto the walls like in Quake. That is a more soldier/tactical approach: defeat their defences, cover the flanks etc.

In default Q2, the Medics were too easy. Remember the Doom Archvile, and how much terror it could inflict on the mind of players ? GZ features several battles against the Medic Commanders that are similar: they teleport stuff in to no end, players are either quick or dead quickly. That is true quakyness imo.

And also the final boss: a badass that�s able to teleport in lower ranked minions; maybe nothing new, but well done and the increased challenge was quite fitting for a 2nd missionpack of a game. 

I don't want ALL games to be like that and I certainly like the story elements in modern games. But games from Quakes era don't really need them.

I don't feel you have to bash someone over the head with a story and mash it down their throat, as most modern games do, but that gameplay and enviroments can tell a deep story that the player can discover and claim 'their own'. I feel that approach is more rewarding to all parties, and completely within the scope of Quake, or any type of game.

A dead Quake Marine on the ground tells a potent story, especially if whatever killed him is right around the corner. After Biff released his recent SP map, I suggested to him that he could've up'd the 'storyline' a little if one of the crates you started near was opened on the side you start on, explaining how you may have snuck into the particular base. Placing monsters in a room all facing toward an altar of demonic power tells a story. All these sorts of small things build up, and add richness to the experiance without removing anything that makes Quake fundimentally enjoyable.

A great atmospheric effect can also tell story. Can't remember the map, and think it was likely an oversight of the mapper, but it started in a large empty room. and there was NO ambient sound. none. It increased the feeling of lonelyness in the map, and made it all the more suprising when all of a sudden monsters appeared. A commonly used atmospheric effect is blinking lights, but anything broken can be used to make the player question, if only in the back of their mind, 'I wonder how that happened?'

One of Portal's great story telling aspects is when all of a sudden the player finds themselves on their own after the game having basically shown them what to do thus far. That's not so hard as you may think, something as simple as following a sign on a wall pointing to where the silver key is, only for it to disappear (ala Vaults of Zim) or otherwise not be where it SHOULD be, and now the player must strike out on their own to get it.

In short, story doesn't need to be simply written in a .txt file as the explaination of the level, not does it have to be as heavy handed as a machinima with fancy explosions. But just the smallest details can tell big and powerful storys if used correctly and with style, and don't have to steal away any of the Quakeiness of Quake. 

had a neat little device with the translator and the messages you got near dead bodies.

Sometimes they got too long and repetitive, but done right they added a fair bit without getting in the way of gameplay. 

Ok, but I didn't find the Quake2 enemies scary at all. The Gladiator was pretty vicious, but being basically the q2 Shambler he should have been. The rest were pretty low fear factor because of what you mention - wear em down until they keel over.

I know id tried to make a tactical element to the gameplay - gunners hiding behind those black and yellow barriers in the toxic refinery springs to mind - but they failed dismally when compared to, say, HL1. The soldiers would duck behind cover to throw grenades, run from threats, fire in bursts etc. They didn't need a high health (although they had, as well as stupid bulletproof parts of the model) because they were tactically enjoyable to kill. I think the biggest error Valve made there was needing a full 30 clip to drop a soldier, and the Xen grunts were just stupid in the amount of damage they could take.

Because id didn't have this kind of clever (node) Ai they instead just kept the same as Q1 but gave them more health. Made the whole thing a bit more drawn out.

If I'm hitting a Q2 boss tank (the big one) with a futuristic rocket launcher I'd expect it to die reasonably quickly, but with one false move it'd splatter me all over the walls. The model has two nubs on top of its tracks that look suspiciously like Warhammer 40,000 Rhino grenade launchers. I wonder if there was a chance missed there.

Scampie, that's pretty much what I was trying to get at before. 

I like the combat in Halo. Good balance of AI/Gameplay. The player could move at a reasonable speed, enemies died at appropriate times, they weren't too tough or soft, they weren't too stupid.

Shame, it wasn't as dark as other shooters. A wee bit immature for me... 

http://www.quaddicted.com/wishes.html

The map opens with a simple message.

"You sense danger everywhere."

It's non-linear, in a way that you feel like you're exploring, not lost, as you wander. There's ordinary buttons that do ordinary things, but the subtle mystery of what those buttons could be doing in this level you haven't seen the entirety of yet is enhanced by the centerprints that someone railed against so hard.

"A bridge has extended ..."

That did more to draw me forward and encourage me to explore and discover than any hackneyed dying quake dude with some hackneyed dying message for me that was meant to 'explain' my purpose.

The fun of Quake is the lack of explanation. The fun is in filling in the gaps with your imagination, like metl described. It's eerie and mysterious, because things don't all make sense.

Mexx7-9 had a 'story' that didn't try to override anything that made Quake what it is. Levels were still unexplained buttons and near-senseless architecture, but you were given an overall goal by the level end texts that gave you an umbrella of meaning. The level where you storm the Bishop's tower started with a tower rising above you, and was generally vertical in progression, but it didn't try to make any more sense than that. The rocket launchers weren't explained, the chainsaws weren't explained - that was just the eerie mythos.

There's plenty left to do with Quake, and making it more like Quake2 is decidedly not on the list.

Discrete choices aren't necessary when the absence of linearity has a purpose, which contributes to the design of the map instead of just being choice for the sake of choice. How about a map where Cthon moves? The whole map spans a lake of lava, with islands and pools and antechambers, and he wades through the lava following you, occasionally diving under and resurfacing to keep you from escaping. The entire level is a drawn out series of battles with him, as you scrounge enough cells for your lightning gun to do him in for good.

None of the encounters would be planned, and the map wouldn't be linear - there's just a lot of ground to cover, a lot of lava for him to manifest from, and a lot of monsters and mini-levels between you and each little battery cache. Something like the last level of Contract Revoked, without buttons. 

Ricky:
The player could move at a reasonable speed

haha, crysis, halo what�s next ;) one of the reasons I deleted this abomination halfway through was the ridiculous low player speed, combined with the insufferable mickey-mouse sounds of some enemies.

Ijed:
Ok, but I didn't find the Quake2 enemies scary at all.

uh, where did I say i found them scary ? I just stated that the GZ missionpack was a worthy improvement over vanilla Q2.

I think the biggest error Valve made there was needing a full 30 clip to drop a soldier

indeed, an indication of bad design, all they did was adjust some numeric values because they couldn�t get their gameplay right or whatever. 

How about a map where Cthon moves?

Sssshhh! You're giving it all away...


�_� 

I didn't really like the amount of ammo you need to drop a soldier or combine in the HL games. It's not too bad on normal, and at least grenades and shotgun blasts to the face generally take them out, but it wasn't particularly satisfying to shoot a guy wearing no headgear in the face 10 or so times before he would die.

One thing I hate about the Half-Life difficulty setting is that if you increase it the enemies get stronger, so this is even more of a problem. 

It's not like Half-Life(2) are the only games that suffer from that though, is it?
Stalker is shit for this. Assault rifle wielding 'zombies' that shoot with pinpoint accuracy, even on the lower skill settings, but take 3 shotgun shells at point blank range without flinching?
I mean most devs can't even spell playtesting. 

Quake is more realistic than Half-Life, after all. A shambler takes several double barrel shots to kill because a grizzly bear charging your ass takes several shots to kill, as Meriwether Lewis found out on that fateful trip.

A grunt and a dog go down with a single slug or two, and an enforcer who is more heavily armored takes a few more rounds than that to kill.

Then the fiend, being pretty much a leathery, perhaps eyeless, wolverine also takes many shots like the Shambler. This is due to a constant, likely arcane, adrenaline frenzy. 

I doubt it. 

Painkiller, Serious Sam, etc. Doesn't mean they're better by virtue of being fast paced.

P.S. A lot of interesting replies so far. And quite a few that have strayed away from Gameplay through to Story and Modifications ;) 

doom?? 

There was a nice map, from some speedmap package I think. Player inside a "bird-cage" (a _large_ one) was lowered to some kind of labirinth with fast moving blocks. Map was small, but it took me nice couple of minutes to figure out how to get out and then some more minutes to find the exit. I liked the idea and the scary part "is this the right way?" or "wtf? dead end? *gib*". 

Umm... it's worth to mention I think, one of my favorite maps in the past: The Well of Lost Souls. Good gameplay, few traps, great fight at the end and the start on some graveyard with "Abandon all hope".

And I like the buttons idea. It could be scary if you think about some machine, just standing there for 50 or 100 years, and it _just_ works when you start it. Like one said that there's a knight, standing behind a door. He's not from our world, he stands there for thousand years, covered with the dust, not even blinked once through all this time. But when you open this door, he's immediately ready to kill you. 

Always annoyed by the axe - you're a game stereotype futuristic soldier hitting another with a fireaxe in a two-handed swing.

The only trouble you'd have after the first hit would be dislodging the thing from between his vertabrae - you wouldn't have to smack away at him two or three times.

Maybe the grunts are full of adrenaline or whatever, but it should't give them iron skin. 

it's been a while since i played HL1 so can't recall, but were the skill levels basically like HL2 where a higher skill just meant your weapons had less effect on the enemies & theirs had more on you?

i remember reading this before playing HL2 and went straight for easy skill. i fail to see how either dying more often or increased enemy HP add to the fun factor at all? had the differences been in quantity of monsters (like quake) or enemy AI then i'd want to try it on multiple skills, but as it stands i have no desire to replay it on anything other than easy

i can't say i remember having issues with enemy HP in HL1 so i'm guessing it was the same 

ijed

The Quake dudes axe doesn't look particularly sharp.