Quake 4 (Xbox 360, 2005)

While Doom was the game that would make id Software a gaming-household name in the early '90s, over the years, the company shifted its focus away from the Doom games. As PC hardware and 3D acceleration became better and better, id became much more focused on engine development. Those engines were the underlying technology that powered the games in the Quake series, which began in 1996. Quake was among the first PC first-person shooters to let you take your multiplayer matches onto the Internet, and over the years, the series has become synonymous with great technology and exciting multiplayer. Now, in 2005, the roles of id's games have reversed a bit. The company's most recent engine is the one built for Doom 3, and Quake 4 runs on this same engine. Furthermore, Quake 4 wasn't even developed by id internally; it instead outsourced game development to the capable minds at Raven Software, who have turned in a fantastic-looking game with a great single-player campaign. The multiplayer, however, is underwhelming.

The single-player will put you up against some crazy-looking foes.

The three previous Quake games have all had very little to do with one another. The first game's story almost felt more like a retelling of Doom, dealing with inappropriately opened portals that spew out all sorts of horrific demons. Quake II ditched that storyline in favor of an Earth-versus-alien conflict that had you crash-landing on the alien homeworld in search of revenge. Quake III Arena was multiplayer focused, with no true single-player storyline other than that a wide collection of warriors--some taken from the Doom and Quake games--had been pulled out of their own timelines and into this futuristic battle arena. Quake 4 doubles back and picks up where Quake II left off. That nameless space marine from Quake II has apparently killed the Makron, the leader of the Strogg forces, and now it's up to you to get in there and try to finish the job. But, of course, things aren't quite what they seem.

In Quake 4, you play as a space marine named Matthew Kane, who has recently been assigned to Rhino Squad. In keeping with first-person shooter storyline tradition, Kane doesn't speak, but the marines around you will more than make up for the lack of chatter coming out of Kane's lips. You're the new guy, and some of the squad's even betting that you won't even survive for one day. With the Makron assumed dead, your squad is taking part in an operation to take advantage of the disarray and mop up the rest of the enemy forces on the Strogg planet. But your drop ship gets hit and comes down hard, killing a large chunk of your squadmates at the opening of the game. From there, you'll pull yourself up out of the muck and get down to business.

Eventually, your squad will get extracted back to a capital ship for reassignment. Here, you'll get to explore the ship, similar to how you could explore Voyager in Raven's Elite Force games. Then you're back out on a new mission designed to disrupt the Strogg communication network. And the story continues from there. While the story itself isn't particularly gripping, it's designed well enough to keep you interested in what's happening. There's also a potentially interesting plot twist in the game that, unfortunately, was revealed by id Software almost immediately, when the company first started talking about and showing off the game. We won't repeat it here, in case you've managed to stay away, because we have to imagine that th

Quake 4 continues the long running series, and ushers fast paced shooting action into the next generation. It succeeds in most areas, but falls short in quality in the most important ones.


Review Breakdown


Gameplay -

Overall, the gameplay can be summed up in 3 words: fast paced shooting. You are usually constantly on the move kicking ass with awesome weapons, which are the games high point. There is a vast array of guns in Quake 4, more than enough to satisfy everyone. Some old favorites return (Nail Gun) along with new guns. You also rarely find yourself out of ammo, so the shooting is almost non-stop, just watch some of the gameplay videos to get an idea. Other than that, the gameplay is linear, and somewhat repetitive. You will find yourself bored a few times until a new weapon pops up to spice things up a bit, but overall only the environments kept me interested, which also isn't saying much. The environments themselves consist of 90% metal structures, and, though awesome looking, get a bit tedious after staring for so long. And long you will stare, as the game is pretty lengthy for a shooter, clocking in at about 15 hours of solid gameplay.



Graphics -

The graphics in Quake 4 are good overall, but misses on a few points, namely the framerate. At times, the frames drop so low that it is down right atrocious. In no way does it completely ruin the game, but it is definitely not what you want to see on your brand new Xbox 360 and is not acceptable at all when you consider the hardware the Xbox 360 possess'. Another mishap is the textures are sometimes bland and mushy looking up close. Other than that, the graphics are great with excellent lighting and shadowing, showing off the advanced Doom 3 graphics engine.



Controls -

The controls are pretty standard. It's identical to the feel of Doom 3, and the button layout is customizable. Overall, it feels great to play this on the 360 gamepad.



Story -

The storyline kicks off right where Quake 2 left off, and is overall repetitive and gives you that same-old same-old feeling. Standard marine space alien story here.



Conclusion -

Upon first reading this review, you may hesitate to buy Quake 4, as I did, but somehow when I played this game all the minor problems seemed to disappear at the sound of guns blazing. If you are a fan of shooters, don't hesitate to buy Quake 4. And for the price of under $20 here on Ebay, you can't go wrong with purchasing Quake 4.

I just bought this game 4 days ago from a local GameStop. The game was good and I enjoyed playing it, more than Perfect Dark Zero which I also bought the same day. The game was short to me, but I did end up playing it for a few hours each day. The save file told me it took 15 hours to complete. I was playing on the easiest mode, but I also don't play FPS much so I still had problems and got lost during some parts. After I beat the game I unlocked the hardest difficulty. There were no additional enemies on screen, no extra health for them, they just hurt you more.

The game play was just like the old Quake 2 game, but I did like Quake 2 a little better. One reason why I liked Quake 2 more was the gore factor. I am not turned on by blood and guts, but Quake games are known for there gruesome Strog. The levels having bodies on the walls with blood and guts being sucked out were in detail. The huge beating hearts were pure eye candy. But when it comes to the real-time acting of NPC's it just isn't as good as Quake 2. In Quake 2 the bodies would stay on the ground, not in Quake 4. Because they were still on the ground you could shoot them till they gibed (when your bored lol), not in Quake 4. Enemies would show damage in Quake 2 by having holes in them, not in Quake 4. Quake 2 had more puzzles and large "easy to get lost in" levels, not in Quake 4. Matter of fact, doors are locked then unlocked during level progress to force you not to get lost. I only got lost once, as I mentioned above, because there was one area that all looked the same so I couldn't tell if I was going forwards or backwards, but there wasn't multiple routes.

The game was fun none the less. Its a simple FPS with nothing special its trying to pull off. It didn't claim to be fun, or a huge FPS to glope over, and thats why I liked it. Halo games were good, but not great. I actually liked Quake games more than Halo, even Quake 4. I just like the feel of a good smooth playing old school FPS, and thats what ID Activision and Raven gave us with this game. I saw buy it since the price is $20 or way below (I got it 19.99 used at GameStop) and it is well worth the money. If you got this game when it was $60, then I say you got ripped simply because the game was short. Quake 2 was at least 3 times as long. So if you dont mind a short 15 hour single player, good multiplayer, and a lowered level of Quake goodness, then get this game because you will enjoy it.

Quake ... the brother of Doom. Now that it is on the Xbox 360 it has to be perfect, right? WRONG!

Gameplay: 7/10

The guns and shooting in this game are well made and have different uses. An example would be you wouldn't use a Shotgun if an enemy is far away or the Railgun if an enemy is close. Yet, out of no where sometimes, the frame-rate lags up a bit..sorry, I mean a lot! It gets so lagged it sometimes probably runs less than 20 frames per second (The more frames, the better it runs)! You get helpful marines most of the time. Some are technicians or medics. The technicians heal your armor and the medics heal your health. Just press the Use button while your marines are out of combat and they will aid you. All in all the gameplay was good, but instead of having a button that centers your vertical view , have a darn melee attack! Why do your fellow marines melee enemies and you can't! On a good note, you can make the controls whatever you want, but when they aren't on the default setting, you cant press the Back button and see the objectives or use the control pad to select a weapon.

Story: 7.5/10

A lone marine has assassinated the Strogg (the aliens that you fight) leader. You are Matthew Kane, Corporal of Rhino Squad. You and fellow marines are now taking the war to the Strogg home world and vie to destroy the Nexus, which harvests Strogg corpses for use. Without it, the Strogg would be in disarray. Yet after about one third of the game, you get turned into a Strogg. Yes, it is all in first person view. Luckily your marines save you before you get brainwashed, which if you were you would forget that the marines are an ally and you would fight for the Strogg. It would have gotten a 10/10 if it just had come out earlier. Games like Halo have plots very similar to this.

Graphics: 8.5/10

The visuals are great. The guns are shiny and the humans are modelled perfectly.
Yet with the power of the Xbox 360, why are there so many load times? They are about 20 seconds or less, yet you get this load time when loading a game, dying, making a multiplayer match, and completing a level. That frame-rate issue shouldn't even be present with the Xbox 360. There are games on on the Xbox like Half-Life 2 and Halo 2 that have similar visuals, but a better frame-rate, Ouch.

Sound: 9/10

When you fight through countless Strogg numbers, you don't really pay attention to the music. But the voice acting is superb. From the first line "Haul *** or die!", to the last line of "Kane, we have another mission for you", you wont need to mute your T.V. at all. ID really outdone themselves, but that is a good thing.

STAY AWAY if you dislike First Person Shooters.

Gameplay:8.5/10

Quake 4 is a solid shooter with a wide variety of weapons to choose from. It misses a point because of the lack of a melee option. Strogg will come at you fast in the game, keeping you on your toes, and I occasionally found myself wishing I could melee my way out of a situation. Other than that, Quake 4 has wonderful gameplay. Controls are responsive making shooting enjoyable rather than clunky like some games.

Story: 8.5/10

You are Corporal Matthew Kane. You and your fellow marines are sent to the Strogg homeworld to make a final push in the war against them. Halfway through however, you are turned into a Strogg yourself, but you are saved before being completely changed. You then fight as a Strogg to complete your mission. The story is told in a first person view. We've seen this type of story many times however; Halo, and of course, Doom have done it before.

Graphics: 8.5/10

Visuals are fantastic. Marines and Strogg are modeled magnificently for coming out in 2005. However there are frame rate issues. When lot is going on, the frame rate will drop and things become clunky. This only happened a couple times to me however, so it was forgivable. Doom 3, made by the same company, has identical graphics if you want something to compare Quake 4 too.

Sound: 9/10

I played this with 5.1 surround sound. Voice acting was amazing, music was subtle and fit each situation perfectly. Gunplay and reloads fit with character actions and Strogg attacks sometimes send chills down your spine.

Overall: 8.5

Replayablity is there, I just haven't felt it yet. Much like it's counterpart game, Doom, this game will surely go down as a classic. A must play.