RTCW Single Player Demo

[AngelOfDeath]

FROM QUAKEWORLD

RtCW SP Demo Today!
Community News | 12/13/2001 | 6:03 PST - Pappy-R
There's tons of Quakers out there still waiting to get their mitts on Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and they'll get a big free taste today! The word from our bud, Hellchick over at Activision is that the single player demo will be released today. The file should be live at FilePlanet around 2pm EST. We'll keep you posted on it's arrival.

[IMJack]

Hellchick at Activision: Classic story of gamer's dreams come true, or real life GameSpy? You decide!

[Lord FlatHead]

File Planet ? God dammit Jim, that shit ain't right.

But at least it's not worse than this :

EXCLUSIVE ROGUE SQUADRON II GAMECUBE FOOTAGE !!
WHO'S THE SHORT MAN WITH NO MONEY ?? I'M HERE FOR YOU MOTHERFUCKERS !

For Christ's sake, someone get rid of these stupid banners. They've been up for the past decade or so and noone has EVER clicked them. Well I certainly haven't.

[AngelOfDeath]

Forget File planet go to the official page and get the demo
I finished it , and i think it will be a great game.

[Linguica]

I played Wolfenstein all the way through. What a disappointment.

First off, my total time was on the order of 6 hours, and that was including all the backtracking and searching I had to do on the levels where I couldn't find the exit.

The difficulty ramps up a LOT -- towards the end of the game you're being killed in two shots from 100 yards by a guy cloaked in both darkness and fog who you can barely see but whom can see you perfectly.

The plot is awful. From the horrendously cliched intro movie to the various missions, this is the sort of thing that we are supposed to be past. Characters appear and disappear with no real explanation or conclusion. The guy you are chasing for the first half of the game escapes and is never mentioned again. The man who is supposedly in charge of the entire operation you are trying to stop is never seen anywhere in the game, either in levels or in cinematics, and is only briefly seen in the ending cinematic.

You don't get to see or kill Hitler.

Gameplay mechanics aren't consistent. Kicking one radio might not do anything, kicking another will blow it up, and kicking a third will unleash a tremendous explosion that gibs you instantly.

Kicking a suit of armor may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

Kicking a wall may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

Especially late in the game, sniping a person directly in the head will usually not kill them.

The character you are playing is apparently a 98-pound weakling as he has difficulty throwing a grenade any further than 10 feet.

You receive a special prototype night-vision sniper rifle, which is made useless by the fact that there is never any areas dark enough to use it, plus the fact that it doesn't have any greater range or power than the standard sniper rifle you receive approximately 100 times more ammo for.

One of the available weapons is dynamite, which I used exactly zero times throughout the game, as generally one does not know where an enemy is going to be in two seconds, much less 45.

The ubersoldats are Tanks from Quake 2. Fucking look at them. Did no one notice?

The final boss uses a melee weapon, and since at that point you have hundreds of rounds of ammunition, it is an extremely simple matter to shoot him until he dies, assuming you can avoid the random falling debris which managed to hurt me more than the actual final boss.

The game has strange upper-torso electric-shooting monsters which can jump at you at 90 MPH and kill you basically instantly when they get near. Because the more you die, the better the game is.

Apparently it has become passe to give any sort of onscreen indication that you are being hurt, because multiple times I would be shot while my back was turned, usually by zombies which were shooting weird ghosty-skull things, and I had no idea I was being hurt until I noticed my health was half of what it used to be.

Despite the fact that everybody near the end of the game has a so-called paratrooper rifle, only once do you actually see any paratroopers.

Etc...

[Zaldron]

I agree on several of these, except :

The difficulty ramps up a LOT -- towards the end of the game you're being killed in two shots from 100 yards by a guy cloaked in both darkness and fog who you can barely see but whom can see you perfectly.

I find this perfectly acceptable.

You don't get to see or kill Hitler.

That was a bit too stupid in Wolf3D. The game's plot is supposed to run parallel to the real events.

Kicking a suit of armor may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

A full medieval armor wheights more than 60 kg. I wasn't surprised when I lost half of my life with the first one.

The character you are playing is apparently a 98-pound weakling as he has difficulty throwing a grenade any further than 10 feet.

Ah, it seems this is a flaw in nearly all FPSs. Only Blood did it right IMO.

You receive a special prototype night-vision sniper rifle, which is made useless by the fact that there is never any areas dark enough to use it, plus the fact that it doesn't have any greater range or power than the standard sniper rifle you receive approximately 100 times more ammo for.

Gamma correction? The crypt is supposed to be pretty dark.

The ubersoldats are Tanks from Quake 2. Fucking look at them. Did no one notice?

And?

I thought it was a "fun" game. Just that. No real revolution, but worth my money. Of course, I've never listened to all the fuzz and hype about this game so I can't say it's a dissapointment. And the MP fucking rules, and this comes from a guy who loathes most multiplayer games, ranging from Tribes to CS to UT.

[deadnail]

Hellz yeah. Caleb could wing them dynamiters. =]

On impact, timer, proximity, remote, anywhere from right under you to a hella distance away. Yeah baby... yeah.

[doomsick]

Especially late in the game, sniping a person directly in the head will usually not kill them.

what??!!!!!111

[danarchist]

You don't get to see or kill Hitler.

So?

Kicking a suit of armor may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

A full medieval armor wheights more than 60 kg. I wasn't surprised when I lost half of my life with the first one.[/quote]60kg...thats about 130 lbs. I could bench that, probably 5 times in a row. How is that gonna hurt that much?

The character you are playing is apparently a 98-pound weakling as he has difficulty throwing a grenade any further than 10 feet.

Übertossing grenades is kinda lame too. I remember playing on a TFC server with the grav turned down. I sat in my teams fort, lobbing grenades across the map to send them raining down on the enemy. I killed quite a few people. It was fun, but a bit rediculous.

I still want to play RTCW...don't spoil it for me.

[Zaldron]

60kg...thats about 130 lbs. I could bench that, probably 5 times in a row. How is that gonna hurt that much?

The thing falls over your fucking head. A fucking pinball steelball hurts in that conditions.

[danarchist]

Good point. Yeah, that might be a little much to be hitting you. But the point is, if I got pinned by it, I could just toss it off of me.

[deadnail]

60kg...thats about 130 lbs. I could bench that, probably 5 times in a row. How is that gonna hurt that much?

The thing falls over your fucking head. A fucking pinball steelball hurts in that conditions.

Dude, seriously. 130 pounds falling on your head would CRUSH YOUR FUCKING SKULL. Dropping 50 pounds of metal on your foot would pulverize bone for Chrissakes.

[Zaldron]

Good point. Yeah, that might be a little much to be hitting you. But the point is, if I got pinned by it, I could just toss it off of me.

Of course, but we all know the guy's too fucking busy holding the weapons with his hands ^_^

[Arioch]

The snooper rifle is a bit more powerful than the mauser. With it I was able to achieve single-shot kills in the later levels. My only complaint with that weapon is the dearth of ammunition, but hey, it's a prototype, so whatever. The snooper rifle is perfect in that night fog level though.

A lot of the other complaints Ling had with the game, I think is perfectly logical and acceptable. Except the zombie skull spirit weapons and the awful grenade throw range and explosion radius ... those are lame.

My one and only serious complaint with rtcw is the final boss. melee only, wtf?

[Lüt]

You don't get to see or kill Hitler.

But he was already killed in the first Wolfenstein. If you returned to Wolfenstein and he's alive again, well, that's pretty silly.

Kicking a suit of armor may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

The character you are playing is apparently a 98-pound weakling as he has difficulty throwing a grenade any further than 10 feet.

Sounds about right :P

The final boss uses a melee weapon, and since at that point you have hundreds of rounds of ammunition, it is an extremely simple matter to shoot him until he dies, assuming you can avoid the random falling debris which managed to hurt me more than the actual final boss.

I wouldn't expect Rob Zombie to be a tough opponent under any circumstance :P

[deadnail]

Rob Zombie... in a first person shooter? HA! He'd fire the shotgun once, fly backwards 2000 feet from the recoil, hit a wall and his whole skeleton would liquify.

Fucking spooky little midget. I hope he starts balding so he'll cut all that pubic hair off of his head.

[Lüt]

Rob Zombie... in a first person shooter?

Yes indeed.

[danarchist]

Did you hear about his movie, House of 1,000 Corpses?
Apparently, they won't let him release it because its the most violent movie ever.

[deadnail]

Jumpin' Jack shit. That sucks. Badly. =/

On the other hand, that proton vibrator with the plasma ben wa balls on it (second pic) looks like a hell of a weapon. I'd sure as fuck run like hell if someone pointed that thing at me. =)

[Lüt]

Did you hear about his movie, House of 1,000 Corpses?

I heard about that a while ago, probably half a year. It sounded kinda stupid when I read about it back then.

If it's "unreleasable" then I'm definately interested :)

[danarchist]

Well, he's trying to release it, but it keeps being set back so the gorey scenes can be cut out.

[Lüt]

Well, he's trying to release it, but it keeps being set back so the gorey scenes can be cut out.

Bah, he's not gonna let them cut the movie up, I hope.

Or at least he'll release the unedited version at some point in time.

[Lost Soul]

Alright, I've been all over fileplanet trying to get this demo of Return to Castle Wolfenstien. but I can't find it dammit!!
someone wanna give a a url as to where I could find it?

[nxn]

http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-10034-100-7205201.html?tag=st.dl.10001-103-1.lst-7-2.7205201 Here you go.

[Lüt]

That's the MP test.

[nxn]

oh, it said demo in the license so I asumed it was the demo. I'll look for the actual URL

[EDIT]http://www.activision.com/downloads/381.asp here's the single player demo.

[dsm]

First off, my total time was on the order of 6 hours, and that was including all the backtracking and searching I had to do on the levels where I couldn't find the exit.

Most modern fps are short, but this game has replay value!

The difficulty ramps up a LOT -- towards the end of the game you're being killed in two shots from 100 yards by a guy cloaked in both darkness and fog who you can barely see but whom can see you perfectly.

And? Most gamers complain that RtCW's too easy.

The plot is awful. From the horrendously cliched intro movie to the various missions, this is the sort of thing that we are supposed to be past. Characters appear and disappear with no real explanation or conclusion. The guy you are chasing for the first half of the game escapes and is never mentioned again. The man who is supposedly in charge of the entire operation you are trying to stop is never seen anywhere in the game, either in levels or in cinematics, and is only briefly seen in the ending cinematic.

Ok, here we go: I find that the plot is a helluva lot more interesting than Half-life's - finally no more "gateway-into-another-diminsion" stuff. The "guy who you are chasing for the first half of the game" will propably return in a mission pack, so that's perfectly accebtable. The man in charge of the operation is a historical person, Himmler, who was caught at the end of the war - he commited suicide by ingesting a cyanide tablet, this game takes a lot of historical data into account.

You don't get to see or kill Hitler.

- Like Zaldron said: That was kinda lame in wolf3d.

Gameplay mechanics aren't consistent. Kicking one radio might not do anything, kicking another will blow it up, and kicking a third will unleash a tremendous explosion that gibs you instantly.

- That's propably a bug - modern games are full of 'em.

Kicking a suit of armor may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

- this has already been covered.

Kicking a wall may cause it to fall over and crush you to death.

- must be another bug (bzzzz), I haven't experienced that!

Especially late in the game, sniping a person directly in the head will usually not kill them.

- It's a game - not a simulator.

The character you are playing is apparently a 98-pound weakling as he has difficulty throwing a grenade any further than 10 feet.

- You obviously don't know how to use the grenades - aim several degrees above horizontal-line to throw 'em farther, looking below the horizontal line will cause you to "drop" the grenade i.e. barely throw it.

You receive a special prototype night-vision sniper rifle, which is made useless by the fact that there is never any areas dark enough to use it, plus the fact that it doesn't have any greater range or power than the standard sniper rifle you receive approximately 100 times more ammo for.

- 1st: It's REALLY useful in fog-covered areas.
second: it's more powerful than the mauser (the other sniper rifle)

One of the available weapons is dynamite, which I used exactly zero times throughout the game, as generally one does not know where an enemy is going to be in two seconds, much less 45.

- useful against zombies and the first boss.

The ubersoldats are Tanks from Quake 2. Fucking look at them. Did no one notice?

- Does it matter? They are more difficult to fight.

The final boss uses a melee weapon, and since at that point you have hundreds of rounds of ammunition, it is an extremely simple matter to shoot him until he dies, assuming you can avoid the random falling debris which managed to hurt me more than the actual final boss.

-making a good boss isn't always easy.

The game has strange upper-torso electric-shooting monsters which can jump at you at 90 MPH and kill you basically instantly when they get near. Because the more you die, the better the game is.

- Again: Most people bitch about this game being to easy. My advice to you: Get used to the sprint button and the venom gun.

Apparently it has become passe to give any sort of onscreen indication that you are being hurt, because multiple times I would be shot while my back was turned, usually by zombies which were shooting weird ghosty-skull things, and I had no idea I was being hurt until I noticed my health was half of what it used to be.

- Listen to the sounds - you typically hear a *thud* when you get hit, but I DO agree that I'd prefer a red flash and a grunt of pain.

Despite the fact that everybody near the end of the game has a so-called paratrooper rifle, only once do you actually see any paratroopers.

- There are plenty of 'em, but they only parachute once.

Etc...[/quote]

[Linguica]

One of the cardinal rules of FPS design, or at least it ought to be, is that you never ever kill the player with an environmental (read: non-enemy) hazard unless:

1) it is meant as a trap, and/or
2) said hazard is clearly marked

Let's see how RTCW abides by this rule.

* The suits of armor, as have been mentioned multiple times. Are suits of armor placed there as a trap? No, they're pretty obviously decoration. I try kicking one just to see what happens, and it falls over and crushes me. Was that expected? No, I figured it might collapse or crumble or something, but the game has just unexpectedly killed me.

* In one of the crypt levels, one section of wall looks a little funny, so I go up to it and the "breakable" icon appears. So I knife the wall a few times, and the whole damn thing falls over on me and crushes me. Was it a trap? No, it was a hidden secret passage, and there was certainly no warning that I was about to die.

* There's one part in the game when you need to destroy up a little communications center or something in order to proceed. So I run into a room where the radio thing on the wall has a "breakable" icon, and when I knife it, the entire damn thing explodes and the room collapses and I am crushed into dust. So why does this one explode like this? Oh yeah, because the level designer wanted this nice scripted sequence, without warning the player that knifing this radio makes everything blow up.

* In one section there's these three traps you need to bypass in order to proceed. One is a pit enveloped with fog, which is fine. Another has buzzsaw things that come out of the wall, which is fine because there are little plates on the floor which look noticably different than the rest of the floor. However, the third trap is activated by a normal-looking switch, which causes the walls on either side of you to zoom inward and crush you in 0.5 seconds with no warning. After I died there I reloaded and looked around the area for some sort of warning that that was going to happen but I couldn't find anything. Deathtraps are fine, but only if the player has some sort of way of noticing the danger and avoiding it.

I know these are relatively minor points, but it's a major pet peeve of mine. There is nothing I hate more in an FPS than being killed because of something stupid the level designer did without giving me any sort of warning. Other things in this vein are random falling debris, burning trash cans that hurt you when you touch them, barbed wire that hurts you when you touch it, etc. It indicates that the level designer was more interested in his precious scripted sequences or pretty architecture than creating a level which is fun and consistent.

Oh yeah, and the game was inane, boring and derivative too.

[dsm]

One of the cardinal rules of FPS design, or at least it ought to be, is that you never ever kill the player with an environmental (read: non-enemy) hazard unless: [..snip..]

Well, Doom has blood that hurts you! And btw, it's easy to figure out that certain things could hurt you (or at least I think so).

But I respect that RtCW isn't your type of game, I just hope you don't bash it to much, because I love it (only thing that bothers me about it is that it reminds me of a Hollywood movie)!

I love the soldiers behaviour (what most people wrongly call AI, thx for enlighting me Zaldron!), they run for cover, crouch while moving backwards, flees when wounded or if you chuck a grenade at 'em and kick your grenade back at you when it lands at their feet.

I love the weapons (especially the Venom gun *drools*), the ability to peek around corners, and the level design (really realistic settings :-)!). And I'm happy that the game includes a few monsters as well (wish there were a little more of 'em, but other fans complain about them being there at all!).

Oh, and being a fan of Wolf3d (apart from being a fan of Doom) I'm also really happy to see that a lot of aspects from the old game is in the new game :-D!

[Lüt]

[EDIT]http://www.activision.com/downloads/381.asp here's the single player demo.

I'd download that except I don't feel like giving them my credit card number to prove I'm 18.

The funny thing is that I've had a credit card since I was 16, so I don't see how they figure having a credit card proves you're 18.