Amidst the complex and demanding work on two Hexen mods at the same time - i manage to get yet another mod done...and this one is for Quake II. This surge of passion to revitalize Quake II - came to me due to a number of factors, but most of all - due to a discovery of a graphics engine tailor-made for me...
Quake II has always has been one of my top 3 favorite games of all time, however, while i always praised its flawless gameplay, - i also had 2 big problems with the game, which no matter what - just would not go away. The first one was the graphics. OpenGL engines (all of them, original and modern ones) always generated a look not unlike having a plastic bag put over a monitor: washed out colors and blurs everywhere...while the software mode was too devoid of color, for my taste - especially concerning lights.
For a long while, i did use the passable Quake2Max and ArqLite2 - but, their incompatibility with Windows7 put a serious limitation on their long-term usefulness. Of course, i could have continued to use one of my retro-machines, and play Quake II with the tried-and-true yet less than average engines, but one day, fate had intervened and turned everything from 4 out of 10 - into a 9 out of 10. And it all was the discovery of this: a few years ago, by the time i have long given up on the chance to enjoy Quake II with the graphics that would do it justice - someone came forward and made it possible, by creating a software renderer for Quake II with software-based colored lighting! (Disclaimer: i did not make the graphics engine, - but it inspired me greatly to make my sound mod!)
And this turned out to be ground-breaking awesome! From the first look at the screenshots, i knew this to be good - but only when tested in action, could i truly understand and appreciate what this renderer does. Suddenly, the bland soap-filtered levels of Quake II came alive with steel, stone, rust, alien machines
and time-worn corridors of all kinds. Ominous lights and expanded high-contrast palette gave incredible atmosphere while accurately preserving thematic direction, which Quake II strongly adheres to.
This truly felt out of this world. Almost like Quake II in pixel-art! Well, almost... And for me, properly rendered pixels are the best and ultimate form of game art. 8K textures - mean less than nothing.
On some rare occasions (reactor level, mostly) the 8-bit renderer fell short of capturing the level properly, as its color scheme was just outside the spectrum of colors that the renderer was suited for.
And that was the only reason why would give this project a 9 out of 10 and not 10 out of 10. Yet even so, i cannot recommend this enough, for anyone who isn't hung up on those "modern" made-of-plastic-it's-
fantastic" barbie-doll ports.
Other than that, i knew that now it was my turn to deliver, and solve the other big problem that plagued Quake II since its original release: sound FX (and music). Quake II had some of the worst sound FX design
to have ever been made in an FPS game...and i was far not the only one to notice that. To remedy that, i was using a sound-mod that someone made back in the nineties. But looking at it now, i realize that this
old sound-mod is merely borderline acceptable. And i want something that will truly do the game justice. Some Heavy Metal justice!
And so, about a month and a half ago, i set out to make THE sound mod for Quake II, which would make the game's guns and other SFX stand out with pride and power. The vast majority of the new sounds have been designed via planning, cutting and mixing together several different related and unrelated SFX, and then processing them further in a sound editing software - with EQ, compressor and occasionally even
stereo-designing. Only 3 or 4 sounds come from other games directly, everything else - is an audio-design work. So no, it is far not that simple. After plentiful tests of three consecutive playthroughs - i was extremely pleased with the result...both sound FX, and music! And i do not mean the vanilla saw-mill clanging, which tries to pass for some kind of rock - not at all: this mod throws in two alternate music sets, consisting of some kick-ass real-deal oldschool heavy metal, as well as some ambient tracks. Set 1 is for Quake II, while set 2 is for the mission packs. But, you can switch those around, of course. The music comes from some rare and forgotten console games, much older than Quake II - and that much closer to the time when metal was metal.
Obviously, you need an engine that supports OGG music library to use those in-game. Now the time has come to reap the fruits and enjoy everything Quake II to the maximum extent, and then some!
So, let's get to the final details:
Mod ETA: "Quake II: Heavy Metal" - is in the final days of testing, and the ETA is expected to be in about 2 weeks from now. As soon as i set up a Quake II dedicated webpage on my site (not here, but at HMT), then - a mod page here on Moddb, where i will describe everything the mod does in detail, and finally - a proper presentation trailer for the mod :-)!
Support: The sound mod is a *.pak file, so it should be supported by any Quake II sourceport. The testing of the mod has been done with Quake II unofficial 3.24 patch , Ultimate Quake II patch, Quake2Max 0.44 and 0.46 and KMQuake. (each one separately, of course) But it is expected to work with whatever you like.
Music support: you will need a sourceport which enables OGG music playback. Has been tested with the Ultimate Quake II patch and Quake II unofficial 3.24 patch, - which later became the sole
testing ground for all developments.
Very soon, the battle will roar once again!
Viva la Strogg!
