In the summer of 1996, I was a 6-year-old kid who took turns playing "Dooma", "Command and Conquer" and "Duke Nukem 3D". I did not expect that at the same time overseas and in the countries of Western Europe, players were waiting for the new ID Software game, just like a few weeks ago we were waiting for "Cyberpunk 2077". I first came across this game on the computer of an old friend when I was 8 or 9 years old. Then I didn't like the game. I missed the plot and I was irritated by the lack of consistency in terms of too diverse opponents and different boards. What I didn't realize was that I would dismiss titles too quickly when I don't like them after a few minutes. About a year ago, I decided now was the last time to get to know all the games, movies, and anime that I had wanted to watch, play or at least experience over the years, but still had no time for them. "Moment" is an understatement, there are over 100 of these titles, maybe around 200, so it will take some time, at least 2 years. Plus, I started browsing YT's retro-gaming channels even more to make sure I wasn't missing anything. With titles it is more or less like with people - we remember poorly the average ones. We remember most strongly those who piss us off a lot, or those we liked very much, or who stood out from the crowd. Continuing this analogy, mediocre people can find worthwhile personalities or products that have either had no power or were unlucky (like pre- or post-hype games like Cyberpunk 2077, or in the case of movies, the long-awaited, well-advertised blockbuster such as "Avengers: Endgame" which overshadows the rest of the pictures in theaters). Coming back to "Quake 1", one of my favorite gaming channels from several decades ago, Coleslav, posted a video about the history of the game I am discussing. Thanks to him, I bought it on GOG and motivated myself to go through the next few days off. Thanks to him, I understood what "Quake" could be. It could have been an incomparably greater breakthrough for the gaming industry, but due to the lack of time and technological limitations, we had to enjoy what we got, seeing only the seeds of ambitious ideas from ID Software employees. I do not write about it, because I do not have the appropriate knowledge, two that I would only repeat (and in a much worse form) after Colesław. I'll just write my gaming experience by commenting on some of the nuances I found out from his movie. But before I start, I want to thank the author again for this ... Hmm, documentary. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't pay attention to some elements of the game, or at best, I wouldn't understand them.
Unfortunately, there are no English subtitles for this movie, so if you don't speak Polish, you won't understand much (apart from ID staff and newspaper quotes about games).
When I started my adventure with "Quake" a few days ago, at first I complained about it. Not as much as 22 years ago, but I didn't feel the magic. After a few levels, however, I changed my mind, I started to notice more and more things that Colesłav mentioned. For example, this game was not designed to be "evolved, better Doom", but a sort of horror RPG. There are more puzzles that are not limited to finding the right keys or skulls, the atmosphere is darker, some monsters look as if they were role-playing inspired, and the temporary power-ups known from "Doom" have been developed accordingly. Of course, in the case of "Doom" you could also see these elements, but the game was more consistent, and in the case of "Quake" you can see that they have been simplified due to a change of the game's assumptions somewhere halfway. In the case of "Doom" quite an interesting plot was deleted, the AI of the other Marines (yes, the ID could have introduced allies with rudimentary artificial intelligence at that time), but their absence was not so noticeable. In "Quake" we see mish-mash, a combination of gothic climates, levels from bloody dark-fantasy, ghouls, haunted knights, filthy creatures from horror movies with things associated rather with sci-fi movies (computer teleporters, advanced technology, laser weapons, rocket launcher, some enemies, some levels). According to the press materials and announcements of the creators, "Quake" was supposed to be devoid of elements related to advanced technology and be a FPP with a climate similar to "Heretica" or "Hexen". Due to lack of time and too high ambitions, ID decided to make changes to their project - leave what they already did and add the things they had to do with "Doom". It was easier to add some character models, improve the existing ones (e.g. add something like a mix of rocket launchers and a grenade launcher for improved knights) and glue it with saliva with the part already made than to try to implement the rest of the ideas. For the players of that time, it did not matter too much. I don't remember those times, I don't have access to the press back then, and YT doesn't have a lot of material about it in this respect, but I think that if the game is very good even today, then it must have been fucking outstanding.
As mentioned in the previous paragraph, after a few levels, I changed my mind about this game. I did not love it as much as "Doom", but I consider it an incomparably more important and better title. My feelings will probably change over time and I will equate him with my older brother. I am simply enchanted by this title, just like several years ago when I played the 2nd part of "Doom". Ironically, I am much more thrilled than writing a review of my beloved real-time strategy that I recently put on my blog. I would go into every corridor that could be entered, jump into every puddle to find some way out and discover as many secrets as possible. Basically, I tried to see as many things as possible that the ID developers had made. Since I was never a very good FPP player, I didn't discover most of them, sometimes I found more than half, but in most maps I didn't even see half of them. Usually, the story pushes me to do it, but because it was not written on my knee and even pretended to exist, it was motivated by gameplay and a great atmosphere. As for the second aspect, we owe it not only to programmers or level designers, but also to musicians from the "Nine Inch Nails" band. It is true that their soundtrack is not particularly good and I probably won't listen to it in the car, like for example OST for 1 or 2 parts of "Doom", but it works great during the game. Ambients by Trent Reznor and his colleagues fit perfectly into the levels that the developers created. You can feel the emptiness, the omnipresent evil, the severity of Gothic castles, all these are perfectly combined with the sounds made by zombies and other creatures. Sometimes I would stop in place to listen to their sounds combined with these strange sounds that NIN created. Although the graphics are not impressive anymore, playing at night with decent quality headphones on your ears, you can still get scared. However, maybe this only applies to me and other people who are too involved. However, it seems to me that most players got scared during their first encounter with Shambler. Each subsequent meeting was not such an event, but when we see it once, it is difficult to have a different reaction in the situation. We walk slowly, until suddenly we meet a large creature that is not a boss and shoots lightning, like the Lord of the Sith. And he looks scary, especially his "face" and bloody body.
Summing up, I will definitely play this game a second time, but this time on hardy with indestructibility codes. Yes, I know, that's not supposed to be played, but I'm curious how much different it is from the easy difficulty level. The impressions will be different with cheats, definitely less satisfying, but without them I would tire for too long and probably wouldn't finish the game. Before I play the game again, I will play both additions first, because I want to see the Dragon that was supposed to be in the 1st part of the game and the hammer, which was supposed to be the only weapon of our protagonist. If you don't know "Quake" yet or have forgotten about it, I recommend you buy your digital copy on GOG, because it currently costs PLN 10.