In 1997 Quake II was released ending the Strogg's collective leader the Makron being killed. Quake III moves away from the Strogg, but the universe's worst cybernetic foes return in Quake IV, ready to be destroyed yet again by Earth's forces. Quake II left the Strogg home planet without its planetary defenses, leaving it open for your attack as part of Earth's new armada. You help deliver the final assault to the Strogg as Matthew Kane, member of an elite squad fighting along squadmates with vehicles and advanced weaponary. Quake IV is based on the Doom III engine, although it is apparent that Quake IV will be a superior modding platform thanks to iD and Raven's efforts in optimizing the netcode, adding vehicles, and general fixes made to the engine since Doom III's release.
This review may contain spoilers
Despite what most people say I think this game is really good. The plot holds pretty good to this day. I like the atmosphere of the combat on unfriendly, harsh world of the brutal Strogg aliens. And you can actually like and befriend your comrades (except for that ******* Bidwell) and feel sad when they get killed one by one in the course of the story. At some point, you are even forced to kill one of them because he was turned into a war machine! That fight was one of the most emotional boss fights I've seen!
As for the enemies, Strogg are real sons'a'bitches from outter space! They are merciless, brutal, barbaric (and highly advanced at the same time) and simply evil. While most of them are pretty much just humanoids in metal exoskeletons, some of their units are very unique and interesting, like the gigantic and intimidating Harvesters.
As I said, plot holds up. There are many moments when I legitimately felt that I'm ******, like when my companions were being killed by aliens, when I had to face Makron himself, or during that infamous stroggification scene.
And there're the weapons. From my favourite, universal SMG, to the overpowered Dark Matter gun, I've enjoyed every single gun in this game. Shooting so hated enemies the Strogg surely are is very entertaining.
There are of course some dumb moments, like the "go there, do that" type of missions, or that one level that totally reminds me of Water Hazard chapter from Half-Life 2, but overall it's a really good game.