letter from id software

[kimp]

Wrote a letter yesterday to the lead programmer and CEO of Id Software,
,John Carmack, describing how the QuakeWorld and NetQuake scene currently divides the Q1 community as a whole, and asked if its possible
to develop a server engine that would allow both QW and NQ clients to connect.
Heres the letter and reply:

From: dm tourney [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Tuesday, May 04, 2010 7:35 AM
To: John Carmack
Subject: hey john



We'r some of the 30 or so players in NetQ in Q1 US.

There's also about 30 players in QW in US.

Was wondering, is there some way to modify the server engine so that both NQ and QW players could connect?

Then the player count would double to like 60.


Well anyways,

Hope you have a cool wek.

Good job on Qlive and the NASA endeavors.

Regards,
Daniel


RE: hey john
From: John Carmack ([email protected])
Sent: Tue 5/04/10 10:58 AM
To: dm tourney ([email protected])

It wouldn’t be easy. What keeps you from all using QW for a Quake 1 experience?


John Carmack


RE: hey john
From: dm tourney ([email protected])
Sent: Wed 5/05/10 1:59 AM
To: John Carmack ([email protected])

Well most of the players in NQ are accustomed to their engine - which was designed to connect to the original NQ servers, and would be hesistant to try new engines to connect to QuakeWorld - due to new commands for the engine, having to change the config, etc..
Same goes with QuakeWorld..

However, if there was a server-side engine that could handle both NQ and QW clients, it would allow them to continue using their engine of choice, without having to switch.

There has been a project called FTEQW which had a ruleset that allowed QW and NQ clients to connect, but it requires som coding modifications since the scoreboard doesn't show up for NQ clients, and teamplay doesnt work (frags don't count up). Their site is http://www.fteqw.com.

We've lately been pondering the idea of doing a NQ US all-stars vs QW US all-stars game, but have been unable to obtain a proper server engine to enable it...

Would a new protocol be needed to be written?

Thanks the reply,

Regards,
Daniel

RE: hey john
From: John Carmack ([email protected])
Sent: Wed 5/05/10 10:46 AM
To: dm tourney ([email protected])

It would be technically possible, but not trivial, to have a server deal with both types of clients. It would be very hard to justify the effort.



John Carmack

Currently waiting for a reply to the last email..will keep updated

[R00k]

Why bother him with a simple question like that?!??!!!!

DarkPlaces can connect to both NQ and QW better so than FTE.

Better yet *REQUIRE* everyone to use Darkplaces and protocol DP7 for your tourney and you are set!
Your .tk server's mod will run on DP, end of story.

[MasterSplinter]

Daniel does have a point. I use ProQuake over DP...It's just my preference...

It is harder to force users to change their habits... It's more effective to accommodate for what is already the mainstream.

Daniel is trying to bridge the two dimensions without having anyone compromise their experience.

[R00k]

Oh hail Daniel for asking stupid questions...

Hey Carmack stop everything and bridge our outdated world into 1 pile of shit instead of two!

[badaim]

daniel now??... HIS NAMES KIMP!!

kimp why you bothering carmack?.

[Baker]

possible
to develop a server engine that would allow both QW and NQ clients to connect.

Like R00k said, not only does this already exist with FTEQW but you would find it grossly unfair to NQ clients.

QW physics and prediction allow the usual easy bunnyhopping acceleration and predicted aim so QW clients would have several advantages over the NQ ones.

I don't know why you would bother John Carmack, it's not like he didn't release the Q1 engine source code.

[Cataklysque]

God bless John Carmack's rich back side for responding to emails such as this one. Seriously, ID was recently acquired, I'm impressed he's not 100% checked-out.

[MasterSplinter]

You guys may have a point about the QW vs NQ integration...

But, to sour the ambition and efforts of the idea is unfortunate. You can't really say he is bothering anyone. It's not like John Carmack is your boss, and you don't want to "bother him".

What happens if Daniel inspires John's involvement in the community... All it takes is a tiny bit of attention and luck to turn his cheek this direction.

John is a grown man... let him figure out his own emotions.

[Wolv]

John is a grown man... let him figure out his own emotions.

This is so ironic coming from you. So fucking ironic.

[MH]

Oh dear sweet Jesus and all his wee goblins can we PLEASE stop this behaving like kids in a school playground thing?

Back to the original topic: it should be possible to build a client that supports both QW and NQ for sure, but I'm not too certain if it's even desirable to build a server.

The thing though is that the damage is already done. There are over 10 years of division, and I think it's fair to say that most QW players wouldn't touch an NQ client with a 10-foot pole. Even one that was primarily based on QW but just happened to be capable of supporting the NQ protocol as well would likely be guilty by association.

I could be wrong of course, but that's just the way I see it.

[Wolv]

Don't fight it... it's less painful that way.

Is that what Kimp told you before he shoved his **** up your asshole?

There was a guy a few months back from QW that was playing on NQ servers. I tried QW a few times. It's pretty fun but I can't rocket jump for my life. I think at most there would be four or five players who would try it and probably stop.

[Baker]

You guys may have a point about the QW vs NQ integration...

But, to sour the ambition and efforts of the idea is unfortunate. You can't really say he is bothering anyone. It's not like John Carmack is your boss, and you don't want to "bother him".

Regardless of intentions, there are several things that can be immediately and obviously criticized about this (and probably should be):

1. First, not knowing enough about Quake to know there is an engine that already does this AND sending an email to John Carmack about the topic. You should do your homework first. No excuse.

2. Second, failing to ask at a Quake engine forum like Inside3D about the topic in advance to do the actual homework. Anyone one of several dozen people could have said "already been done". I'd file this under failure to know where Quake resources and use them.

3. Third, not knowing the deficiencies of Quakeworld and NetQuake clients connected to a common server AND emailing John Carmack. Not as huge as the other two, but QW clients would really slaughter the NQ clients. This one isn't so bad as the other two.

4. Fourth, John Carmack is 14 years removed from the original Quake engine and although he wrote it, there are many engine coders far more familiar with the current Quake environment and community (LordHavoc, Spike, R00k) and it is a little ignorant to have the presumption that no one has ever thought about this before AND then to proceed to ask John Carmack such a bizarre question.

What happens if Daniel inspires John's involvement in the community... All it takes is a tiny bit of attention and luck to turn his cheek this direction.

*groans*

This post is meant as constructive criticism, not personal.

But not doing homework, not using available knowledge resources and then bothering an inappropriate person who has far better things to do than answer a question by someone who didn't even bother to do their homework should be frowned upon, in my opinion.

It's not "pro".

Everyone makes mistakes and occasionally fumbles the ball. Not a big deal. I'm just pointing out what I think is wrong about this from my perspective, right or wrong.

[Scribble[SFD]]

Well, there from the man, Carmack, himself, to say that QW is simply better.

[MH]

Depends on how you define "better". Better for MP games for certain, but utterly useless if you fancy a bit of SP. No mission pack support. And then again, some people's tastes just plain old-fashioned differ (that's part of life, get over it). When you think about it, QW is actually a very specialist engine which is good at one thing and one thing only. Very limited in general application, good if your use of Quake is narrowly confined to one area only, but useless outside of that area.

Fair enough if all you want from Quake is what QW gives then by all means it's a better engine. Otherwise it's not.

[Baker]

QW is simply better.

Had they developed Quakeworld fully to support everything NetQuake supported and remove the physics exploits (bunnyhopping) that'd be true.

But Quakeworld only supports a small subset of features that NetQuake supports.

And as a result, precious few modding projects target Quakeworld aside from things like Team Fortress (which Quakeworld does very well).

The ZQuake Quakeworld engine was an interesting jump to give Quakeworld more NetQuake compatibility.