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Gothic Revival?
by RawShark
An exploration of Classic Quake to Quake3 map conversions
As soon as it was even hinted at that Quake3 Arena would be using a gothic texture set, literally hundreds of mappers jumped up, tweaked their ears and heard what they'd been wanting to hear for years - there was going to be a gothic revival. As well as plenty of great and not so great maps, these authors have also given us conversions of the original Quake deathmatch maps, and this has been the discussion of great debate and is the topic of this article.
Now, nobody can deny that ID produced some excellent deathmatch maps for Quake. Many people still play Quake online (now in the form of QuakeWorld) and this is chiefly due to the playability of those original maps. I play it myself from time to time. So, I was very interested when I saw that people were producing Quake3 conversions of the classics. This was going to be fantastic! Imagine it, I thought, those excellent classic maps combined with the great new Q3A engine. Oh what fun I was going to have! Then I saw the unoffical conversion of DM6 that some clown had thrown together, and I nearly got sick. Shortly afterwards, a whole string of similar conversions, all equally bad, were released. This was terrible!
You see the problem was this - people were using software available on the net to convert the classic maps directly so that they would run in Q3A. They added no brushes, textures - nothing. This resulted in the maps looking like crap. There was trouble in the community over this. Fans of both Quakes where furious, including myself. After months of this, an author (appropriately) named that_bastard released a conversion of the 'lost' ID map form Quake - DM7. This was the final straw for some people. It even forced the release of this statement by ID level designer Paul Jaquays:
We (id) have taken the position that map converting programs should only be used if a map maker is converting his or her original map designs (created for another game engine) to the Quake 3 Arena Engine. Any textures used to make the conversion should either be textures from an id PK3 file or conversions of the map author's own original textures or other textures that have been created for the purpose of free dissemination. Using textures ripped and converted from other id or non-id games violates the owners copyrights is not to be allowed.
Furthermore, the maps that id created for Quake 1 and Quake 2 are also our copyrighted property and are only to be distributed and used with the games for which they were created. Respect should also be given to the original map authors. Like id, they own the copyright to their works. Any conversions made of maps by designers other than id should either by done by the map maker or with his or her permission.
The other issue regarding converted maps is that maps are designed to work with the physics of the game for which they were designed. As an example, I've run through a mechanical conversion of DM4 for classic Quake. Even though it was a 1 to 1 converion of the original, it sucked badly in Q3. All the proportions were off and the textures looked butt-ugly. By comparison another author had taken the same map and re-interpreted it for Q3A. The dimensions and design of the map were adjusted to work with the Quake 3 physics. The textures and level of geometric detail were brought up to Q3a speed. In the end, it was an
good-looking original work that greatly reminded the player of the orginal classic.
At id, we strongly support that type of conversion.
Sorry if this came off like a lecture. Thanks for supporting our game on your pages.
Paul Jaquays
designer
id Software, inc.
Now, I actually didn't think that_bastard's conversion was bad, but a few very good points were made in this release. The first was that textures form Quake should not be ripped for use in Quake3. Stopping this would help stop the maps looking like dung. Secondly, making conversions of other mappers work without their permission and THEN making a mess of it has got to be wrong. Finally, and most importantly, the whole physics business. If you could get a snap shot of the Quake Guy and see him standing next to any model in Quake3 (this is to save me talking about how the code is written in both games) you would see that the Quake3 models are nearly twice the size of the original model. Hence, a direct conversion of an original map would feel cramped and some areas may even be inaccessible. What's the point of that?!
Amazingly, people started paying attention to what ID had said. I was delighted when I found a recent conversion of DM1 for Q3A that looked simply great - even though the lighting was brighter and the textures were from the Q3A pak file. People were beginning to do conversions properly - true to the original, yet they looked like Q3A maps! Some people who still wanted to create exact conversions started using custom textures to get the desired effect, like in a conversion of DM3 I saw recently. This is also acceptable and I also encourage it. Then, just this week, I saw the future of Quake to Quake3 conversions in the form of QuartZ's new release, QuartZdm0. This is a conversion of DM6 that QuartZ had been working on for some time, and the result is astounding. QuartZ REBUILT the map from scratch, using the original as a reference - and came damn close in terms of architecture, textures and lighting, yet brought a whole feel of Quake3 to the map also. This is really a great accomplishment and anyone considering doing a conversion should first have a look at this masterpiece. True, a LOT of work went into it, but the result was worth it and it proves several points. Firstly, conversions can look and feel great if done correctly. Secondly, there is no need to use software that does the job for you. If you are a true mapper, you can build any map from scratch. Finally, the classic maps still rule and really are the bet DM experience about! I'd love to see all the classics (DM1-DM7) done correctly and released in a pak file. That would make my year :)
So, I'm sure there are plenty of comments to be made by you guys on this matter - some inspiring, some probably quite insulting. Bring them on anyway, I'm immune to abuse. Feel free to mail me if you have any such comment or maybe you have done a conversion of a classic that you'd like me to take a look at? Send one, send all. I love to play anything with DM in the title.
RawShark 7/6/00
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