Quakeone FREE petition

[gnounc]

If the problem as stated is inacessability, then fix the inaccessability. That said, ultimate quake patch sounds like a very good solution. Johnny Law says the problem with the "patch" is illegally distributing the sounds, and distributing old versions of darkplaces.

The obvious fix for both of these, is scripting. A nice script to download the latest darkplaces build, and a script to convert the quake soundtrack to the requisite file format(ffmpeg?).

**after looking around, I see the point is actually that the steam version doesnt include any form of soundtrack at all. I think a letter to id software and steam requesting the quake music files, or an iso, would be completely within reason, just check your entitlement at the door.

[Mr.Burns]

If you want to survey some of the current solutions:

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The nQuake installer (for ezQuake) has had various strategies for dealing with Steam Quake. I think its current approach is pretty hands-off and just recommends manually copying pak1.pak from the Steam Quake files, but it's been a few months since I last ran it.

Thanks for the info Johnny (and OMac), it's much appreciated as I only ever installed from my original Quake CD and don't have anything to do with this new fangled Steam/Origin black magic .

I'm no Quake expert but it sounds as though if ID don't do the honourable thing and fix the product they are selling, then perhaps the next best thing would be to simply use Steam as a means to obtain the PAKS plus a licensed copy and populate working content (engines/Textures/etc) around that, assuming there were no legal infringements in doing so. I wonder if QuakeNekkid would care to comment? . It's certainly food for thought.

KR's
Monty

[MadGypsy]

Quake is already free. It may not be legit but it is true, and making it legitimately free is only going to accomplish one thing. It will be free on steam. That's really the only accomplishment here. Free steam quake.

[Johnny Law]

If you want to survey some of the current solutions:

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There's an "Ultimate Quake Patch" which is the most popular thing currently for Steam Quakers. It replaces the Steam-downloaded Winquake.exe and GLQuake.exe with DarkPlaces executables, and it also provides the soundtrack in OGG form. The downside is that it's an old version of DarkPlaces from 2010, so it has some known (and potentially game-breaking) bugs and also often doesn't play well with the Steam community overlay hook.

I've occasionally thought about trying to replace or update that, but a few things have steered me away:
* Potential drama about "trying to steal the glory of the Ultimate Quake Patch".
* One more thing I'd have to maintain.
* A bit of copyright angst when it comes to distributing the soundtrack. My own Steam Quake guides already link to several soundtrack downloads from other places, which isn't significantly different, but being an actual packager and distributer of the soundtrack might be a step too far in some Zenimax lawyer's opinion (if they ever decide to care). I waffle back and forth about this one.

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Baker has made installers for QuakeSpasm and ProQuake that dump their exes and libraries into the Steam Quake directory. The executables aren't renamed, so they wouldn't get launched through Steam, but when you run them they will use the pak files that Steam downloaded.

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The nQuake installer (for ezQuake) has had various strategies for dealing with Steam Quake. I think its current approach is pretty hands-off and just recommends manually copying pak1.pak from the Steam Quake files, but it's been a few months since I last ran it.

[OMacKnight]

Oh my god

that was absolutely horrid

traumatic even

sorry for double post bust jesus christ that was like taking a cactus up the bum, and it spouts lava

[OMacKnight]

Well, whilst writing this, NoodleShop gifted the steam version to me.

Time to find out how horrid it is and start coming up with a way to make multiplayer quake more accessible to customers on steam.

I lost the trail of thought of what I was going to say, but a freeQuake.pak could be interesting.

[Johnny Law]

There's nothing specifically interesting about the release of Quake on Steam. It's good ol' Quake. It includes the WinQuake, GLQuake, QuakeWorld, and GLQuakeWorld engines. Probably the only puzzling part is why they chose to provide v0.95 of GLQuake.

Since it's just Quake, you can do any or all of:
- Run it. It still works on modern OSs, even if it's as cantankerous to configure as always.
- Copy the pak files somewhere else and use them with a modern Quake engine like DarkPlaces.
- Dump a modern Quake engine into the Steam Quake directory (next to the id1 folder) and run that engine from there.
- Rename your favorite Quake engine to Winquake.exe (or whatever) so that Steam will launch it when you run Quake through Steam.

The main issue with new folks running Quake these days is that that out-of-the box it doesn't have mouselook enabled, it relies on CD audio for soundtrack playback, and it either doesn't support widescreen video modes (WinQuake) or requires some unintuitive command-line and console-var manipulations to set video resolution and aspect ratio correctly (GLQuake).

[Mr.Burns]

A free version of Quake would be a great shot in the arm for the game and I fully support Mindz's efforts in trying to organise this but, like others have mentioned previously, I wonder how much support ID and co are likely to offer. I'm a great believer in the premiss of "if you don't ask you don't get" so it's certainly worth a try. Perhaps if the petition could be refocussed a little so that ID can see the potential advantages of offering an old game for free, like other companies have done recently, then they may be persuaded to see it as a "loss-leader". In other words, as something to get people back in to the franchise, even if it is in a small way.

It's just a thought, and I have an alterior motive for asking, but has anyone actually identified what is required in order to fix the version being supplied via their site or steam? If we can clarify the problems it might make the petition more concise and give them some idea of the scale and also impact of the problem. Would I be right in thinking that the complete list of issues is as outlined here?

/End of very humble opinion
KR's
Monty

[OMacKnight]

Well, there is a project happening, multiple I think.

I'm personally working on one, although I do remember hearing about another.

(I'm actually going a route golden_boy pretty much described)

[Dutch]

@ golden_boy:

At first I was gonna lash out against your lash out. But I realized you are right. Your presentation is awful, but totally right.

No one has a right to own something they didn't create. If you want something, you need to buy it. That's how capitalism works, and it works great. What is the incentive to make something if you have to give it away for free? Good will? Yeah right.

I'm going to put myself in Zenimax's shoes (previously Bethesda and previously id). If I made Quake, I would want compensation for it, no matter how old it is. If I purchased the company that made Quake, I would want compensation for it, no matter how old it is. I might eventually release it for free if it wasn't generating substantial revenue as a courtesy to the community (and that is entirely up to the owner's discretion), but you also need to plan for the future. Maybe one day when gaming evolves into something else, Quake will be an invaluable classic. I mean, look at PacMan. That game is still making lots of revenue via Xbox Arcade and what not.

I'm thinking the petition should focus more on Zenimax/Bethesda/id revisiting the version currently available for download and make it 100% compatible. But that all comes down to cost analysis: if there isn't enough money to be made (i.e. the man hours required would eat more cash than is generated), it probably won't happen.

Still not entirely sure how this has much to do with Blender and weed though.

[wicked_lord]

Stop smoking weed and start to learn Blender.

Not sure if you really needed to go that route. Actually you didn't need to go that route. Smoking weed has nothing to do with anything about someone wanting to petition quake. If this was a slap toward's Mindz you are completely wrong on why this came up for conversation. For starter's Mindz and I were talking via messenger and i brought up the subject about quake being FREE and asked what he thought of a petition and if it would be worth it. Mindz took this upon himself to make this post. I have smoked weed 2 time's in my entire life when i was 16 year's old and at the age of 19 i became a deputy sheriff. I worked 3 year's before pursuing another career to make more money and get away from politics. Before you come off with ignorant comment's get your fact's. I would much rather have someone smoke pot then drink alcohol any day of the week.

[golden_boy]

You can use the engine, the progs and the map sources.

You can not use any textures or models or sounds, and you cannot just create new versions of those because copies fall under the COPYright. You cannot just recreate the likeness of a copyrighted work, it needs to be sufficiently original. Just like you can't simply make knockoffs of Fender guitars or Porsche cars and give them away for free.

A free Quake would have to look and sound completely different to remain legal, and at that point you might as well make a fully original game that just feels like Quake. Why don't you just fork Nexuiz and throw in some mockup of Quake's weapon lineup. Instead of all this talk, you people should go and learn Blender if you're really serious about this. You can't just make a lot of noise and then expect Bethesda or Captnbubs or whoever to give you free stuff. You either get your hands dirty, or you shut up.

I wonder why there are endless copies of Quake 3 being made (and being played...) but none of Quake 1. Perhaps Quake 1 just wasn't as good to begin with.

Anyway, if you think Zenimax will give up the easy profit from selling old id games, you're mad. You wanted capitalism, so now you've got to roll with it. It will still be sold 20 years from now.

Stop smoking weed and start to learn Blender.

[JDSTONE]

free quake would be cool! they still could make money off of merchandizing it. i want a quake lunch box for my kid and stuff like that. way to take some steps to make it happen much respect!

[Zop]

I'm fairly sure there have been a couple free quake projects in the past, with replacement sounds, textures, and whatnot. I recall Yellow #5 working on one back when the map sources were GPL'd, but who knows where that guy is now.

[R00k]

it would be cool if they did release the assets and textures for the 20th anniversary then they could re-release the whole game using the q3 engine too