Best source port?

[maxrebo6]

I have just reinstalled quake because I have been wanting to play it again so I was wondering.What would you say the best source port is and for what reasons?

[Spirit]

Way too much work. Let's do it like that: What kind of features are you looking for?

[terminus]

Dark Places or Qrack - with the texture packs for both.

Personally, I like Qrack the best. It looks great and plays great, and isn't as resource intensive as DP.

[MH]

It depends on what you're looking for from a source port. DarkPlaces has all the bells and whistles, very much enhanced rendering, but has been known to have some compatibility hiccups (which may or may not bother you) and can be difficult to set up correctly (which also may or may not bother you). QRack tends towards abandoning the ultra-trad look for some OTT eye-candy and also has some nice features. FitzQuake is very trad and focusses on being more robust behind-the-scenes. Enhanced GLQuake is ultra-trad and is stuffed full of features for mappers and modders. ProQuake has lots of neat features for online play and is also a traditional engine. Quore is worth looking at if you're a Linux guy. Modesty almost prevents me from mentioning my own engine (DirectQ), but you might also look at it if you have a 3D card that performs poorly or unpredictably with OpenGL (ProQuake also has a Direct3D version which might be worth looking at).

Of this lot, DarkPlaces, Enhanced GLQuake, FitzQuake and DirectQ also have support for maps and mods that exceed the normal Quake limitations, so if you want to play some of those you will want one of these engines. DirectQ is Direct3D and therefore Windows only and therefore no use to you if you're using Linux. DarkPlaces has ports for just about any OS, so even if you're running AIX or OS/2 on your desktop you should be able to find something that works. Other engines have other ports which are from time to time kept up to date.

You should be able to find something that suits your requirements from that lot. I'm also sure that I may have missed a few. But be aware that these are all standard Quake engines; if you're a QuakeWorlder I don't know what's available there, so someone else will have to make some suggestions.

[maxrebo6]

Do you know any mods that have a bigger limit and if their good becuase if not I will go with proquake.Do you know if there is a mod manager.

[MH]

The Quake Injector should do most of what you want with regard to managing mods. I haven't used it myself (won't allow Java onto my PC) but it's there, it does the job, and is very well liked. It is, I believe, Single Player only at the moment though.

There are quite a few mods and maps out there which do break limits, and many of them have been well reviewed. Warpspasm is probably the most well known, but there are others too. At the very least you owe it to yourself to see the Marcher Fortress, so you'll need an enhanced engine for that. Have a look at Quaddicted for much goodness, reviews, and further descriptions/info.

If it was me, and as you seem to be favouring ProQuake, I would recommend ProQuake for general use and FitzQuake as a backup for anything PQ can't handle.

[maxrebo6]

I installed quake injector why do I have to insert the path everytime,then said it failed whenever I go to install a mod.

[Spirit]

What Operating System do you use. What Java version do you use (Windows-key + R, "cmd", "java -version")? What path? What is the exact error message?

[maxrebo6]

C:\programfiles(x86)\quake. Couldn't write to hard disk! C:\Program Files (x86)\quake\100b2\texts\czg_moon.txt Thats my error I recieve ,I also have to input the patch where the source port is and the game is every time.Hope its easy to understand.

[Baker]

Vista and Windows are very ... um ... crappily designed. To say the least.

It doesn't surprise me that write access is denied. Vista, as far as I can tell, wants all files in My Documents.

The plus of this is security, viruses can't do evil things to your software very easily. The minus is that a great many compatibility problems arise with applications that were written that work fine on, say, Windows XP.

[R00k]

Ah now Windows7 gets better every time i get an update.
On XP my Photoshop 6 complained about some missing dll, in W7 I set the compatibility to w98SE and works again perfectly! I doubt ill reinstall windows xp, im weighing the decision for XP or kubuntu on my other box....

[MH]

Vista and Windows are very ... um ... crappily designed. To say the least.

It doesn't surprise me that write access is denied. Vista, as far as I can tell, wants all files in My Documents.

The plus of this is security, viruses can't do evil things to your software very easily. The minus is that a great many compatibility problems arise with applications that were written that work fine on, say, Windows XP.

Oh yeah, a lot of people seem to forget that security is about letting the good guys in as well as keeping the bad guys out.

In fairness, much of this design is baggage from the old days when viruses weren't so rampant (and those that were around weren't so destructive - pre-internet days), and therefore it wasn't a problem. And unfortunately the baggage has to be carried forward or things will break. Who could have predicted back in the day that a more robust design would have been needed?

[Spirit]

Oh, that might be it. maxrebo6, could you try putting the Injector somewhere else for testing (for example your desktop)?