There are many things that can be wrong with a multiplayer game. It can be filled with bugs, it can have a player base that is way too small or it can have awful spectator functionality. There are many other things that can be wrong and some of them apply to Enemy Territory. I did not see many of these things a year ago because I was too involved in the game. Having stepped out of ET in some way and into what some would call "real esports" I think that I have observed quite a few things that have prevented ET from being what it could be in the past. What could it be? This column will give an answer to that as well. I do not expect everyone to follow my line of argumentation. I expect many to contest it and I'll more than gladly defend my way of thinking. Some will say "Who are you to judge what's wrong with ET?" and they might be right. I am pretty convinced though that what I think is right most of the time so I won't be bothered by anyone questioning the statements I'm about to make.
So much for the disclaimer, now here's what's wrong with Enemy Territory.
Change is good...isn't it?
A good starting point here might be the 5on5 desaster. Now I do not blame the ones who tried to change the team size for the mere idea, I have been folish enough to support it once. I blame them for the reasons they mentioned and the way they tried it. Forcing it upon the whole Nations- and EuroCup lot and hoping that it would be the way to get ET picked still seems like a bad dream. It remained a one time adventure at the PGA, the only time idle got beat in more than one year. The community's resistance was what helped.
Adventures like these make us question the logic behind certain rash decisions. 2007 saw now less than three new maps being added to the map pools of CPC 2 and EC XV in its first three months, frost_final other than the name might suggest still in beta stage, bremen and karsiah tested but very new. battery gets readded in the OpenCup map pool. supply is removed. "This is madness", the Persian messenger would say, "This is the ET community" I do reply in style of King Leonidas. Why do we feel the need to jeopardize the remote possiblity of a map's varieties being worked out into its tiniest details, of new strategies that have to be found for old maps, of the tactically superior team winning a map even if its aim is inferior? Many maps have come and gone and opinions might differ whether one map is better than the other. Unfortunately those in charge seem to be lead by their own opinions rather than just impartial observations. People are still playing dust2 or Lost Temple, there is no need to replace good maps just because someone thinks they're boring or overplayed. And most importantly - there is no need to add random new maps, as good as they might be and as much effort as the mappers might put in, to every cup there is. There will never be consistency or advanced tactics if maps keep changing all the time and with every cup.
As I was talking about new maps I was mainly concentrating on the player side. It is however a fact that ET is difficult to spectate if you're not a player. It is even more difficult to learn if maps (and therefore objectives) are being changed all the time. No newcomer wants to see a new map every time, he'll get confused and in the end leave it be. Spectators have to be taken by the hand, and if TosspoT screams his lungs out at Quakecon, it shows how exciting this game can be, even if you sit there and just wonder what the hell this guy is shouting about. Yet it someone is curious and joins ETTV for some other cup match where two completely different maps (and maybe even a different config) are played, he won't understand a thing.
Oh yeah, the config thing...how good would it be to have a global config? CS does not have one, but it shouldn't be too hard for ET. mg42 still in, mg42 out...we're running two different configs at the same time, isn't that hilarious?
Oh, the players...
They're the heart of every game. They play, they flock, they split...and ET players tend to do it a lot more than others. I don't think it is necessary to mention names here but if we look at the history of certain individuals any reasonable man (or woman) would call it clan-whoring. Now that itself is not bad as such. It becomes bad though when teams and players keep jumping from clan to clan, always in for some quick money, fame or other things. I wouldn't put too much effort into an ET team if I was leading an MGC. They'll probably leave me if someone offers them 50 extra bucks. There are some exceptions, true. Dignitas could have joined up with several big teams in the last year, they stuck with idle and then in the end joined a very renowned organisation. But then there is the case of the old Goliath team who have teamed up with first dmiZe, then aMenti and now TLR, allegedly refusing an offer to join h2k. Come again? Yes, they did not join an organisation that already pays host to a successful team and whose management runs it rather like a family than like a business organisation, at least for the moment. Now we had insignia cadre picking up img, and I hope that they stay together for some time. Unfortunately that seems to be the case for very few teams. A small fight on ventrilo and they split up. The faces stay basically the same, the teams change a lot. I guess it's one of the downsides of not having any player contracts, but it still makes it literally impossible to keep track of anything, not to mention it totally destroys any kind of decent teamplay. The dominance of Dignitas would soon break if there was a team that stuck together with the same players for a longer period than some months. But there are always roster changes, some small and some bigger. Teams with potential break before they can achieve anything. Few are willing to accept losses on their road to the top. Instead they look for others who have lost two matches in a row and could not stand it anymore. They start up a new team and history repeats itself, most ET matches look like nightly scrims these days.
I'm a cheater and I still play ET
Who can say that of himself? I am constantly astonished that certain players are still to be found in competition though they have clearly outed themselves or been outed as cheaters. I can't understand why anyone in his right mind would associate with these people. I still remember when pG|eddy got busted, nobody from the top players wanted to be mentioned in one sentence with that guy anymore. Yet in ET they keep on playing. Does that discredit the community? It does. While some fight an endless battle against cheaters, others don't care and constant suspicion is the natural cause. Not to mention how bad this looks to everyone outside the ET community.
Presenting: "The (un)friendly ET community"
It is clearly a utopia to hope for an online gaming community that is friendly in all its aspects. Where do you send someone who wants to get into ET? If you send him to Crossfire, he's doomed. It's not the fault of the site itself, it's how people act here. Constantly insulting each other, writing useless comments, spamming, leading endless conversations in their native language and not even remotely being aware of something called dignity. Sometimes there are very productive discussions, but mostly it's just awful to read. Newcomers are treated like crap, questions that seem a little silly are immediately taken and used to bash the one who's asking them. It is not a nice place to go if you're a newbie, and there are very few other places. It's the same on ESReality where the elitist Quake community goes on and on about Q3 vs. Q4. It's nothing you can enjoy if you're new. Another example of elitism would be how people constantly flame CwG for being broadcast on ETTV - it's silly and of no use, but it still happens over and over again.
I'm sure this list could be extended. There are many things that go wrong. Some can be changed easily, some need work. As a small community, change is easier than for a big one. I'm sure it can be done though. ET will not be the next CS. But it will be a very enjoyable small player in the big esports game. Accept the niche just like many other players of games like Day Of Defeat already did. Give maps the chance to grow, be friendly to others and newcomers and stick with your team even in difficult times.
Say no to cheaters.
So much for the disclaimer, now here's what's wrong with Enemy Territory.
Change is good...isn't it?
A good starting point here might be the 5on5 desaster. Now I do not blame the ones who tried to change the team size for the mere idea, I have been folish enough to support it once. I blame them for the reasons they mentioned and the way they tried it. Forcing it upon the whole Nations- and EuroCup lot and hoping that it would be the way to get ET picked still seems like a bad dream. It remained a one time adventure at the PGA, the only time idle got beat in more than one year. The community's resistance was what helped.
Adventures like these make us question the logic behind certain rash decisions. 2007 saw now less than three new maps being added to the map pools of CPC 2 and EC XV in its first three months, frost_final other than the name might suggest still in beta stage, bremen and karsiah tested but very new. battery gets readded in the OpenCup map pool. supply is removed. "This is madness", the Persian messenger would say, "This is the ET community" I do reply in style of King Leonidas. Why do we feel the need to jeopardize the remote possiblity of a map's varieties being worked out into its tiniest details, of new strategies that have to be found for old maps, of the tactically superior team winning a map even if its aim is inferior? Many maps have come and gone and opinions might differ whether one map is better than the other. Unfortunately those in charge seem to be lead by their own opinions rather than just impartial observations. People are still playing dust2 or Lost Temple, there is no need to replace good maps just because someone thinks they're boring or overplayed. And most importantly - there is no need to add random new maps, as good as they might be and as much effort as the mappers might put in, to every cup there is. There will never be consistency or advanced tactics if maps keep changing all the time and with every cup.
As I was talking about new maps I was mainly concentrating on the player side. It is however a fact that ET is difficult to spectate if you're not a player. It is even more difficult to learn if maps (and therefore objectives) are being changed all the time. No newcomer wants to see a new map every time, he'll get confused and in the end leave it be. Spectators have to be taken by the hand, and if TosspoT screams his lungs out at Quakecon, it shows how exciting this game can be, even if you sit there and just wonder what the hell this guy is shouting about. Yet it someone is curious and joins ETTV for some other cup match where two completely different maps (and maybe even a different config) are played, he won't understand a thing.
Oh yeah, the config thing...how good would it be to have a global config? CS does not have one, but it shouldn't be too hard for ET. mg42 still in, mg42 out...we're running two different configs at the same time, isn't that hilarious?
Oh, the players...
They're the heart of every game. They play, they flock, they split...and ET players tend to do it a lot more than others. I don't think it is necessary to mention names here but if we look at the history of certain individuals any reasonable man (or woman) would call it clan-whoring. Now that itself is not bad as such. It becomes bad though when teams and players keep jumping from clan to clan, always in for some quick money, fame or other things. I wouldn't put too much effort into an ET team if I was leading an MGC. They'll probably leave me if someone offers them 50 extra bucks. There are some exceptions, true. Dignitas could have joined up with several big teams in the last year, they stuck with idle and then in the end joined a very renowned organisation. But then there is the case of the old Goliath team who have teamed up with first dmiZe, then aMenti and now TLR, allegedly refusing an offer to join h2k. Come again? Yes, they did not join an organisation that already pays host to a successful team and whose management runs it rather like a family than like a business organisation, at least for the moment. Now we had insignia cadre picking up img, and I hope that they stay together for some time. Unfortunately that seems to be the case for very few teams. A small fight on ventrilo and they split up. The faces stay basically the same, the teams change a lot. I guess it's one of the downsides of not having any player contracts, but it still makes it literally impossible to keep track of anything, not to mention it totally destroys any kind of decent teamplay. The dominance of Dignitas would soon break if there was a team that stuck together with the same players for a longer period than some months. But there are always roster changes, some small and some bigger. Teams with potential break before they can achieve anything. Few are willing to accept losses on their road to the top. Instead they look for others who have lost two matches in a row and could not stand it anymore. They start up a new team and history repeats itself, most ET matches look like nightly scrims these days.
I'm a cheater and I still play ET
Who can say that of himself? I am constantly astonished that certain players are still to be found in competition though they have clearly outed themselves or been outed as cheaters. I can't understand why anyone in his right mind would associate with these people. I still remember when pG|eddy got busted, nobody from the top players wanted to be mentioned in one sentence with that guy anymore. Yet in ET they keep on playing. Does that discredit the community? It does. While some fight an endless battle against cheaters, others don't care and constant suspicion is the natural cause. Not to mention how bad this looks to everyone outside the ET community.
Presenting: "The (un)friendly ET community"
It is clearly a utopia to hope for an online gaming community that is friendly in all its aspects. Where do you send someone who wants to get into ET? If you send him to Crossfire, he's doomed. It's not the fault of the site itself, it's how people act here. Constantly insulting each other, writing useless comments, spamming, leading endless conversations in their native language and not even remotely being aware of something called dignity. Sometimes there are very productive discussions, but mostly it's just awful to read. Newcomers are treated like crap, questions that seem a little silly are immediately taken and used to bash the one who's asking them. It is not a nice place to go if you're a newbie, and there are very few other places. It's the same on ESReality where the elitist Quake community goes on and on about Q3 vs. Q4. It's nothing you can enjoy if you're new. Another example of elitism would be how people constantly flame CwG for being broadcast on ETTV - it's silly and of no use, but it still happens over and over again.
I'm sure this list could be extended. There are many things that go wrong. Some can be changed easily, some need work. As a small community, change is easier than for a big one. I'm sure it can be done though. ET will not be the next CS. But it will be a very enjoyable small player in the big esports game. Accept the niche just like many other players of games like Day Of Defeat already did. Give maps the chance to grow, be friendly to others and newcomers and stick with your team even in difficult times.
Say no to cheaters.
"Ok guys, they spawn on 12"
Like that? :]
EDIT: Gratz on 1 year member on CF =)
lolled.
Nice read.
nice read fdj
to come back at
well we had/have our reasons to join TLR in stead of h2k, I'm sure you understand that... its also amazing how this keeps coming back :), "aMenti, the team who refused h2k"...
Also acozz, the reasons why management usualy dont publish the reasons behind their decitions, is due to further adventures. God knows in which position we'll be in let's say 6 months. If/when it comes a day we need to search other sponsorship, or another mgc, publishing this kinda bullshit isnt what will help us.
And no, I am not managing aux.
Point by Point!
I can't see Atarax or irZ flaming DJ like you did, somehow they seem to understand the critics brought up here but you did not and you should take them as an example. Besides, it's not that FlyingDJ was telling lies about team goliath or did he?
moron.
i have to admit that i never heard of sI before, i am 2newschool
nur hurensöhne xD
The maplist for OC for example, with 2 maps such as some_random_shit_b2.pk3 , and a map most team haven't ever played in competition, oh dear fucking god. Are you totally out of your mind?
Conserning the cheaters, there is plenty of people out there who doesn't seem to give a fuck about whether they are associated with cheaters or not. I'd say basicly because there is nothing no one can do about it anyway. Luckily, there is still a few people with an iq higher than 3 who still dont wanna be seen or associated with players that means trouble. Heads up for those!
Further, I'd like to see more teams such as dignitas, with a steady player base. Its getting patethic that the players move from one team to another. Seems like they all are looking for the magical chemistry, known as love at first sight.
Sign, this is a game, magical wonders wont happen within the period of a month.
And your comment about the community, do you really think you are the right person to mention something about the attitude? Funny cause, I dont think you have gotten the fancy nick name "whiningdj" for some random reason.
But I could agree that there is way too much random flame, and the arrogance from the players are way above their heads. Also the rudeness towards new people is absurd.
Quite nice read anyway.
......
[15:44] <FLEX-Frenky> you are nice guy tbh, others say u are a retard:D
Agree about the community tbh.
However, if a cheater does that...
I mean it is as if you took a gun to school, shot your classmates and went back home, but on the way helped an old lady cross the road. Nobody is going to praise you for helping that old lady. Just accept that and vanish.
Helping out a fellow ET player with ventrilo issues, providing coverage for the whole community and what not are all good things no doubt about it. But, at least for me personally, all these good things matter little to nothing coming from a busted cheater.
I have no respect for cheaters whatsoever.
e-t.com
a global config and a global mappool would be great. and remove anti-lag from the configs now! if you dont have th connection to play in a european competition you should play somewhere else.
edit:
you missed Northern-Darkness in Goliaths history
disagree
sound like the worst idea ever :S
With this step ET would just loose more players...
And I dont think that lagging enemies from poland or wherever are such a big problem. You can still hit them, althuogh (little) higher pings may have an advantage.
Remeber NETR pwning at PGA (was it pga? :) ). They still seemed to play better without lag.
get used to play with a high ping or look for a new game.
I'm from Germany by the way.
and it's not whine, it's a fact that people with higher ping have a lot of advantage ingame cause of that crappy anti lag.
I prefer antilag and the possibility to play vs teams from all over europe, with little advantages or not, than ger vs ger, pol vs pol, est vs est games only (I am thinking of EuroCup, ET-Masters, etc here, too).
Another point I thought of reading your comment: You think people with bad connection have an unfair advantage. Without antilag, people with good connection have an advantage, which would surely be higher, because for many people the game would be unplayable. Your answer will be: "buy better connection ffs"
Well, u dont get good connection everywhere, many ETPlayers are 15-18 and their parents are not gonna pay it, many ETPlayers dont want to "waste" their money in internet/ET.
"if your country offers you shit connection we cant solve that.
get used to play with a high ping or look for a new game."
thats your opinion, but a perfect example for the "unfriendly community" ;) And its definatly not the way to get new players.
90% of the ET community doesnt want to do anything for the game.
and why am i unfriendly? im not flaming, i just say that anti lag is destroying the game for people with normal ping. nothing more nothing less.
Thats why Cb is trying to make decisions without asking the community... we're too divided to decide...
and removing anti lag will solve nothing... polish net is better every year[but still poor]... anyway polish teams will be always better than other nation teams :)
do elaborate
anyway, i played a lot of 6on6 now on karsiah. it's a pretty nice map with lots of potential. dunno what to say about bremen or wolken.
(yes I'm a masochist)
cheaters: Fucking r-tards, I can not imagine why someone would play pcw against krp.et or something else "clan" which has all members busted years ago. I personally just ignore those fuckers or tell them to gtfo if they pm me when I'm searching prac. (aye Mind&co. no sense to reply this with something "nazi-Varma" comments, once a cheater is always a fucking r-tard gayface of cheatern00bs in my eyes.)
maps: I disagree about denying new maps from the mappool. Imho bremen example has quite big potential to come great map. It has many stages and many possibilityes to make tacs.
Altought new maps should be played for some time after adding to something like OC/EC. And dropping a map like supply is such so great mistake that I can not understand it.
ps. funny how someones search matches with "6on6 oc-mappool (no karsiah, bremen or plaplapla) ??!?!
enkel u beeldkwaliteit is beter =)
kids need not only rules (which already exists for this site too i think), they need someone who can punish them when they break the rules.. no judgement no learn effect...(same point for cheaters....)
pretty much the only reason cf is a success is because people can't post whatever the want (t a certain extent) in their own journals etc and without that sort of freedom you get such travesties as gtv's blogs which pretty much are ignored.
80% of ET community is made up of flame and whine and useless spammy shit = 80% of crossfire is the same
i agree with you in most of your points for example the point with the global config... its a complete disaster whats going on there.
For every 6o6 Cup/Event a different config.. mg in, mg out...
You also got a good point with the cheater thingy.
Moreover, a good thing to stop the spam and useless comments would be moderators who can delete/edit posts of users.
Ofc, this persons should be responsible-minded and mature enough.
you will see that this ET community consists 90% of e-tards but noone cares really, spamming is fun and nothing else matters....
I agree with most points, but the only one i can see being a problem is cheaters...
1st) How do you know when someone cheats? Often proof/demos etc. are considered 'inconclusive', and people tend to choose that the people they play with are not cheaters...
2nd) People bond with their teammates, having friendly chats on ventrilo, irc convos, sending funny pics over msn, and playing other games together for fun, so when one of them gets caught cheating, people often prefer not to just stop playing with them, and in the end of the day, people prefer a friendship to the game itself, and choose to continue keeping in touch with the player. It may be the internet, but i still choose to believe the friendships you make are real, as cheasy as it sounds.
3rd) People often don't care when people are caught cheating, and choose to think 'Oh, it was only a public' or 'He won't do it again...', and sometimes they can be right, ye, but not always unfortunately...
4th) No offence intended at any people, but when these people don't get banned from competitions and communities, people often choose to believe that hacking won't be punished, and it's not, which is why they continue to do so.
5th) It's hard to get to the top, since this game has been around for so long, and it's not surprising people choose to cheat when there's such as large discrepancy between the skill levels of players. There are some players who've come to this game, and started playing at the highest level after just a few months, and many often choose to believe that they're not cheating...They could be right, but i guess many people often don't just weigh up their chances.
These points you make "have prevented ET from being what it could be in the past" right? I don't see how map changes make ET a worse game? I find it rather boring to watch the same maps being played over and over again.
You're point about "us" being unfriendly, how does that make ET less of a game? Most "pro's" don't post on crossfire and the ones that do don't act like most of the random kiddies here.
The only valid point is about cheaters still being able to play in competition. I for one still play with "busted" cheaters, because I like them. I play ET for fun and I don't expect to win big tourneys or make money out of ET. I like to play with persons I can have a laugh with and wether they're busted cheaters or not I don't care. As long as they don't cheat in competitions.
so true, nice read
every cheater that get's caught are low/med unknown kiddo idiots (aka nC crew stereotypes) who cares about those random morons. well fucking incredible to consider that over the what?.. past 1/2 years people (mostly randoms) have been posting about 6/7 so called bustforumposts on this site. daily every week every month.
lol :x
i find this whole cheatdiscussion so fucking overdone and tiring but really all i see is people still hyping it making a big fucking problem over it =D
Some people get sick of all the 9/11 stuff about the government being involved as "surely it's all bullshit"
but then, hey, what do you know? maybe it isn't all rosey and there are fuckheads out there that are fooling everyone
9/11 is quite a lot more important than some randoms cheating in a multiplayer game imo, especially if u dont have shit to do with them
when neither group really will ever know the truth.
you say no one of importance cheats = your opinion, you cannot guarantee it.
"cheatbusters" think the majority of "better than good" players cheat = pure speculation and it's unlikely they'll ever find out if they are right
It's not RTCW :P
A better story would be "Here's what's right with ET".
Movement
Maps
The general feel of the game was infinitely better than ET too.
I'd like to see you argue against the points i made rather than completely go off topic, then again you can't argue back because you know it's true. :)
quite ironical to hear something like that come from you!
+o @ #cpma.et
I mean - stop comparing ET to CS because there's simply no use and accept it. ET enters its 4th year, so it's not jumping to damn conclusions.
Nevertheless, you mentioned clan-whoring. Foolish not to admit, but take a quick look at the CS scene and you'll notice real whores. Few days ago we had a 24-hour transfer on our CS scene - a guy changed his team to take part in just one training and come back to his previous clan next day. And honestly it was going to be a transfer of the fucking month.
Of course, the longer the team stays together, the better. Problem with ET is that finding a good replacement for one guy is awfully difficult, because it takes time to get used to him. In CS you actually have 5 players who can play individually. One guy in or out - doesn't matter. Skill's what counts.
I wouldn't pay much attention to spectators. If one wants to spectate a game and follow what's going on, he obviously needs to play it first. Same thing applies to the maps. Who gives a damn bout spectators, really?
Anyway, it was a really nice read, but please - cut the whine.
Posted by FlyingDJ on Tuesday 3rd April 2007, 00:24
j.k.
nice column!
- The reason the community is shrinking is lack of new players. This game is near impossible to get started with ever since all that 2.60b stuff.
- And finally, "300" was a crappy movie!
2 solutions
- wait till everyone got through puberty
- just play for fun (WHAT fun? OMG? ye?)
- uninstall
I choose the latter
ET had it's chance to be a somewhat serious competitor in online gaming(no, not the next CS, but at least a game that's known and respected). The changes in Server Configs, and ETPro, should have come 2-3 years ago when the mid+ and highskilled clans were worthy of their repuation. I know it's not fair asking those who develop Server Configs and ETPro for that, but their work would have been more appreciated back then, in form of a community that wasn't accepting cheaters, or infiltrated with those.
It's a shame seeing such talents that this game have produced go to waste. I'm not only thinking of the players that really do earn their respect, but also those that really put an effort into the community with ETPro scripting, shoutcasting, coverage and more.
this column made me wonder why i still play et :o
ps. cheaters suck :(
so there is no removing of anti-lag, nobody would be able to play properly
or smth else pointless i wish to add to this..
i love ET, i agree with alot of the comments, yes the community is crap, unfreindly and full of cheaters.
The community needs to gain more people willing to contribute to the game etc, shoutcasts etc, but it will be hard to flush out the cheaters and so.