"A Polarizing Mess"
"Quake 4" marks a return to the single-player focus of the Quake franchise following the multiplayer-only "Quake III: Arena", and Id Software decided to partner with Raven Software in order to take a backseat approach in crafting a direct sequel to "Quake II". Released during the mid-2000's amidst the ever-expanding wave of dull FPS titles hitting the market, the goal was to make this the hardest hitting entry to the franchise to date by finally bringing "Quake" into the new millennium. With a new engine, a darker tone, and all the motivation in the world, what is Quake 4's legacy? It turned out to be the worst "Quake" campaign!
I knew there was something wrong when I started the game completing the generic “go here and do this” military missions found in many contemporary military shooters of the time. While these missions were hit-or-miss in those titles, I instantly felt they were out of place in this franchise. The lack of player empowerment for directing oneself to the objective was heavy-handed, and it didn’t help that your allies throughout the game take every opportunity to belittle you and your efforts with completing objectives. The role of the player was much less badass than previous entries, despite the game constantly telling you that your character is a “legend”. This issue with tone wouldn’t just focus on the player’s role/legacy dynamic either. The focus on horror elements was completely new, and while I tried to give it a chance it ended up just devolving into the same jumpscare-ridden mess most games of this era tended to try to be. The only decent area that included horror was the “Waste Processing Facility”, where the zombie enemies were introduced. The lighting here was pretty solid, and while nothing “scared the crap out of me”, it definitely contained an increased level of ambience and atmosphere.
The story told here is also painfully dull. The whole plot revolves around an invasion of the Strogg homeworld, but not much is expanded upon with the enemy faction despite their savagery and medical experimentation. There’s a twist where you are turned into a Strogg, but it results in a slight variation in gameplay and some initial backlash toward your appearance. Besides that, no one seems to care too much. This change allows you to bypass much of the Strogg security measures and allows an infiltration of various bases in order to strike back against them. Not a whole lot of character development, and really bad dialogue throughout the whole ride. The setting is also extremely repetitive with factory setting after factory setting thrown at you over and over again. The color palette being so dull doesn’t help this game much, but better level structure could have made the world feel more enjoyable to play in and more interesting in the grand scheme of things.
The shooting also took a huge step back in quality. Guns felt really weak and the sound felt underwhelming throughout the whole experience, and therefore I just never found it that satisfying to shoot things. This is absolutely nuts for a “Quake” title to have subpar shooting mechanics, yet it's boring to engage with just like everything else in this game. Upgrades only make your guns slightly more usable, but you pretty much go through the whole game with a weak arsenal of weapons. Enemy AI is also not very great, and therefore gunfights are equally dull and repetitive. The combination of “meh” weaponry and dull AI led to uninteresting encounters, and the game grinds to a halt even after you become “Stroggified”.
One of the only real positives here is the lighting utilized throughout the game, and even then it's inconsistent and too dark at times. Shadows are fairly accurate to the angle they are created, and this helps add some horror to different sections of the campaign. The textures aren’t the best, but when the lighting is given room to shine it helps make the game look better than it actually does underneath the polish. It's commendable, but with the lackluster aspects surrounding this engine quirk it fails to bring the game any higher.
Level design also felt like it took a big step back. Locations felt linear in approach and the enemy AI didn’t seem to know what it wanted to do in a lot of areas. It became really easy to abuse the AI and its inability to take cover at times, so the campaign was mostly cakewalk with no strategy whatsoever. The vehicle sections, on the other hand, were really stupid. Not only did the audio design fail to make the “tanks” feel like tanks, but arenas were just completely barren and allowed for little cover. This led to these outdoor fights being the hardest in the game, mostly because there was nowhere to go to hide from artillery fire. Compared to the designs in “Quake” and “Quake II”, this was one of the biggest steps back for the franchise.
The game as a whole just failed to captivate me throughout its entire campaign. The shooting felt really weak, the level design was stripped back heavily, and while it has some atmospheric horror moments and solid lighting, its story was as barren as its graphical fidelity. This didn’t feel like a “Quake” game - it felt like some soulless mockery of the series. I would Not Recommend playing this one as it forgets everything that made the previous single-player entries good and opts to try and streamline something that had always stood out for its creativity in design. Sometimes you can fix something that isn’t broken, but this is one of those botched examples where the game lost what made it special…
Final Verdict: 4/10 (Below Average)
"Quake 4" marks a return to the single-player focus of the Quake franchise following the multiplayer-only "Quake III: Arena", and Id Software decided to partner with Raven Software in order to take a backseat approach in crafting a direct sequel to "Quake II". Released during the mid-2000's amidst the ever-expanding wave of dull FPS titles hitting the market, the goal was to make this the hardest hitting entry to the franchise to date by finally bringing "Quake" into the new millennium. With a new engine, a darker tone, and all the motivation in the world, what is Quake 4's legacy? It turned out to be the worst "Quake" campaign!
I knew there was something wrong when I started the game completing the generic “go here and do this” military missions found in many contemporary military shooters of the time. While these missions were hit-or-miss in those titles, I instantly felt they were out of place in this franchise. The lack of player empowerment for directing oneself to the objective was heavy-handed, and it didn’t help that your allies throughout the game take every opportunity to belittle you and your efforts with completing objectives. The role of the player was much less badass than previous entries, despite the game constantly telling you that your character is a “legend”. This issue with tone wouldn’t just focus on the player’s role/legacy dynamic either. The focus on horror elements was completely new, and while I tried to give it a chance it ended up just devolving into the same jumpscare-ridden mess most games of this era tended to try to be. The only decent area that included horror was the “Waste Processing Facility”, where the zombie enemies were introduced. The lighting here was pretty solid, and while nothing “scared the crap out of me”, it definitely contained an increased level of ambience and atmosphere.
The story told here is also painfully dull. The whole plot revolves around an invasion of the Strogg homeworld, but not much is expanded upon with the enemy faction despite their savagery and medical experimentation. There’s a twist where you are turned into a Strogg, but it results in a slight variation in gameplay and some initial backlash toward your appearance. Besides that, no one seems to care too much. This change allows you to bypass much of the Strogg security measures and allows an infiltration of various bases in order to strike back against them. Not a whole lot of character development, and really bad dialogue throughout the whole ride. The setting is also extremely repetitive with factory setting after factory setting thrown at you over and over again. The color palette being so dull doesn’t help this game much, but better level structure could have made the world feel more enjoyable to play in and more interesting in the grand scheme of things.
The shooting also took a huge step back in quality. Guns felt really weak and the sound felt underwhelming throughout the whole experience, and therefore I just never found it that satisfying to shoot things. This is absolutely nuts for a “Quake” title to have subpar shooting mechanics, yet it's boring to engage with just like everything else in this game. Upgrades only make your guns slightly more usable, but you pretty much go through the whole game with a weak arsenal of weapons. Enemy AI is also not very great, and therefore gunfights are equally dull and repetitive. The combination of “meh” weaponry and dull AI led to uninteresting encounters, and the game grinds to a halt even after you become “Stroggified”.
One of the only real positives here is the lighting utilized throughout the game, and even then it's inconsistent and too dark at times. Shadows are fairly accurate to the angle they are created, and this helps add some horror to different sections of the campaign. The textures aren’t the best, but when the lighting is given room to shine it helps make the game look better than it actually does underneath the polish. It's commendable, but with the lackluster aspects surrounding this engine quirk it fails to bring the game any higher.
Level design also felt like it took a big step back. Locations felt linear in approach and the enemy AI didn’t seem to know what it wanted to do in a lot of areas. It became really easy to abuse the AI and its inability to take cover at times, so the campaign was mostly cakewalk with no strategy whatsoever. The vehicle sections, on the other hand, were really stupid. Not only did the audio design fail to make the “tanks” feel like tanks, but arenas were just completely barren and allowed for little cover. This led to these outdoor fights being the hardest in the game, mostly because there was nowhere to go to hide from artillery fire. Compared to the designs in “Quake” and “Quake II”, this was one of the biggest steps back for the franchise.
The game as a whole just failed to captivate me throughout its entire campaign. The shooting felt really weak, the level design was stripped back heavily, and while it has some atmospheric horror moments and solid lighting, its story was as barren as its graphical fidelity. This didn’t feel like a “Quake” game - it felt like some soulless mockery of the series. I would Not Recommend playing this one as it forgets everything that made the previous single-player entries good and opts to try and streamline something that had always stood out for its creativity in design. Sometimes you can fix something that isn’t broken, but this is one of those botched examples where the game lost what made it special…
Final Verdict: 4/10 (Below Average)