In 2002 I got into my first real multiplayer game that kept me playing for hours: Unreal Tournament 2003. Before that point I was mainly invested in strategy and role-playing game. I don’t remember why, but I picked up the demo version of UT2003 and just got into it. Couple of months later I took the money I got for my birthday and purchased the full retail version.
The main mode I played in UT was Bombing Run. In that mode in the center of the map there is a ball, which you need to get to the other team’s goal to score points- just like football, but with guns. That foreshadowed my multiplayer preferences for years to come, since I didn’t like playing deathmatchs or capture the flag. I wasn’t very good hitting the enemy players so my preferred play style was as support – and I needed game modes that had a place for different roles.
May 2003 saw the release of Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory and that was a game changer. Not only the entire game features objective focus maps which naturally provided a place for supporting players, but it included a class system with the Field Ops type. I would call for artillery and air support to vanquish the enemy and be a valuable member of the team without having to use a rifle.
Unreal Tournament 2004 expended on ideas from its predecessor, offering two new game modes, the Assault and Onslaught, both featured objective based maps (and this time also vehicles) but lack the class functionality, which is why for most of the time I kept going back to ET.
In 2007, Splash Damage released Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, a full retail spiritual sequel to the original ET, which also featured independent vehicle play. It had little innovation, adding a few gadgets and skills to the tested classes, but it was enough for me to keep playing that as well. Sadly, the next iteration of Splash Damage’s formula will be the most ill received. Brink, which came out in 2011, features a true multiplayer story campaign, free-running (“parkour”) movement through the levels, unique aesthetics, and more.
This all brings us to Titanfall. Since my “glory days” of multiplayer games, I really haven’t spent much time on those types of titles. I played a little Tribes Ascend (which is ironic, since the main mode in that game is CTF), some DOTA style games, but really no other FPS (Splash Damage is scheduled to release Extraction this year, and I’m eagerly waiting).
Continue to the next part of our Titanfall beta coverage.
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