Author: Prince GFono
Date: 6/6/05
Rating: 9.25
Platform(s): Mac/PC
Purchase on Amazon.com
Mac
| PC
Recently (if a little over a month counts as recently), I got a copy of Unreal Tournament 2004. Unreal Tournament 2004 is the most recent game in the Unreal series. I haven't played any of the earlier games, however. So, I've had this game for about a month now, and I can pretty confidently say that it kicks ass. Even though I was not previously a huge fan of first person shooters, I was drawn right in to UT's world of killing sprees and vehicular manslaughter.
If you're thinking about getting the game, you might want to check your system specs; UT 2004 requires a massively powerful computer. On the Mac side, you need at least a 933 mhz G4. I don't know what the PC requirements are, but I suspect they are just as high. The game installs off a DVD, and when everything finishes installing (which takes a long time, I might add) the game takes up nearly 6 gigabytes.
When everything finally finishes installing, you can open the game and begin playing (thats what one usually does with a game). First, you are presented with a menu. You'll probably be inclined to click the "Single Player" button. Single Player mode is good if you want a backstory and a little bit of a plot. However, if you don't care about that and just want to go around gratuitously shooting stuff, there is what is called "Instant Action". It is the same as multiplayer, except that instead of playing other people, you play computer players. You can choose whatever difficulty level you like. This kind of mode is pretty standard on most games now.
There are several modes of gameplay. There is Deathmatch, which is just a free for all. Whomever has the most frags (kills) by the end of the match wins. There is also Team Deathmatch, which is the same as regular deathmatch, except that you are, oddly enough, divided into teams.
There is also "Invasion" in which waves of monsters keep appearing and you have to survive as long as possible, and "Last Man Standing" in which you try to be, surprise surprise, the last man standing. "Capture the Flag" is just like the regular outdoor game, but with guns. "Bombing run" is, as MacAddict described it, like "rugby with guns."
In Unreal Tournament 2004, two new map types have been added: "Assault" and "Onslaught." In "Assault," there are several scenarios in which one team takes the role of the attacker, and the other takes the role of the defender. Honestly, I've never been a huge fan of "Assault", but that may have something to do with the fact that I suck at it.
As for "Onslaught", well, it's my favorite mode in the game. In "Onslaught," there are two teams. Each team has a power core, and there are a bunch of powernodes throughout the map. Each team tries to capture all the powernodes in a connect-the-dots fashion. When one team connects all the powernodes, they can attack the enemy's power core, which is the goal of the game. At first, "Onslaught" may seem a bit confusing. However, it is fun as hell. In "Onslaught" there are a slew of vehicles which you can use, including cars, planes, tanks, and a hovercraft type thing, and a massively powerful space rover with room for six people and massive capabilities for causing destruction. One of the most fun things to do in an "Onslaught" game is to run over enemies. Usually if you run over an enemy or land a plane on one, you will get some kind of announcement like "Road Rage!" or "Hit and Run!" or "Vehicular Manslaughter!" (my personal favorite).
The graphics in Unreal Tournament kick some serious ass. Unreal Tournament 2004 has a very advanced engine (which is actually used in several other games) and the result is near-photorealistic, particularly on the landscape models. The character models are slightly more pixelated, but they still look very nice. In some ways, however, I think that the blood-and-gore effects are in fact exaggerated, however. Now, I've never shot anyone with a handheld rocket launcher before, so I wouldn't know how accurate it is. But it is definitely very bloody. Although I really don't deal well with blood in real life, the blood and gore in Unreal Tournament just makes me laugh my ass off. I was particularly amused after I shot someone at a close range with a rocket launcher, causing their flaming body parts to fly everywhere.
The sounds in Unreal Tournament 2004 kick ass, everything from the constant sound of gun fire to the announcers' voices. In single player, I like the way players yell taunts. The music, on the other hand, gets annoying fairly quickly, since its so repetitive. Usually if I want music, I play Rammstein in iTunes while I play.
As for multiplayer: You can play online or you can play on a LAN. I haven't played online, but I *did* play UT2004 at a LAN party and it was pretty good. It's basically the same as single player, except that its multiplayer. Nothing really out of the ordinary. However, everything works the way it is supposed to. There is some kind of speech feature as well, but I haven't used it.
If you are into first person shooters, or if you're just into games, and have a sufficiently powerful computer, I highly recommend Unreal Tournament 2004.