Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC) > Reviews (22)

Being a fan of the Unreal Tournament for more than 6 years, I considered it as my responsibility not to miss anything which comes in the Unreal series. It is the same reason that lead me to upgrading my PC and later into Unreal Tournament 2004 years ago. But I completed the game in a week and uninstalled it, but only to realize that I got rid of it too early. Any game of the Unreal series won't be able to go off a gamer's mind too easily, and UT 2004 is just another example of that. What this game has proved is that the Tournament will live forever, and UT 2003 was nothing more than a sample of what was to come. UT 2004 makes its predecessor look like a demo version, as both games look somewhat similiar in graphics.

REQUIREMENTS
Pentium III or AMD Athlon 1.0 GHz processor
128MB RAM
5.5GB HDD space
8X CD-ROM or DVD
Windows compatible sound card
32 MB video card required
DirectX version 9.0b
Internet (TCP/IP) and LAN (TCP/IP) play supported

NO BETTER TOURNAMENT

I started off playing Unreal Tournament as a way to take my frustrations on those bots. But it was only later that it was something more than just a simple shooter. Even if the concept is simple, there may be the need for the use of some brain in the game. The dominating factor is agility though. Even the people who have played the original Unreal Tournament for hours, need to make some variations in their gameplan to dominate the tournament, but just edging ahead and winning won't be too hard. My advice will be not to use the cheat codes, because you can end up in the High scores menu as a cheater even if you have cheated very rarely.

The storyline of the tournament is simple, as you fight some of the most talented and very experienced warriors from all parts of the galaxy with a dream to win the tournament for fame and cash. You will be fighting in a number of arenas with different opponents. The tournament which was started by the Liandri corporation long ago, has become more bloody, with a number of new teams and exciting competitors around. But UT seems to have gone the Quake 3 way with a number of new non-human players introuced in the game.

The gameplay can be considered similiar to the previous versions, but there are certainly some of new additions. We have the concept of double jumping here, which means that the player can jump twice, by simply pressing the jump key again, while in the air. We can also dodge by pressing the strafe button twice, which can be very useful while we are against a powerful weapon. Dodging from a wall is also possible. There is also adrenaline which can be used for some having special powers called adrenaline combos for a limited amount of time. We need to get it to hundred so that the power can be activated. Different key combinations are used to activate, like pressing forward key four times will give you speed and pressing the backward key four times will give you boost which keeps increasing your health and armour.

MORE TO CHEER FOR
The single player leads you through a number of levels with a team selected by you, but there are also matches you should be completing alone.

The final match will be at Hyperblast map, just like the original UT. There are a number of new game modes. The all-time favourites Death matches and Capture the Flag are already there, which needs no introduction. There are players who can't live without a deathmatch a day. The other revolutionary game mode from the original tournament comes back here, the Assault. It puts you in a team, and you have to complete some objectives in certain amount of time and later you have to defend them.

Domination mode is now called Double Domination, which means that you will have to control two control points at the same time for ten seconds to score a point. Later, meet the score limit to win. This means that Domination is now more dependant on the team members, and will consume much more time. The bombing run mode is there, in which you have to get the ball and through it into your opponent's goal post to score. This is another team game which helps you to even pass the ball to your team mates.

The latest of all game modes and may be one of the most interesting ones may be Onslaught. It involves capturing a number of nodes in the right order to make the enemy core vulnerable and destroy it. This game makes more use of various vehicles. Invasion mode involes facing a wave of monsters, and this time staying alive does matter. Mutant game mode makes the first person to score a kill extr apowerful and everyone willhave to team up and hunt him down. The player who manages to kill the mutant will be the next mutant. Last Man Standing mode works as the opposite of the Deathmatch as the player starts with limited number of lives and the one who is left with more lives at the end of a time period or the one who is left alive when all others have no lives left, wins the match.

Mutators change the gaming style even further. The number of maps in the game is huge, and by installing the community bonus packs, this number can be increased. There are also a few maps which were remade from the original UT. The maps like Hyperblast and Morpheus are some of them. The maps differ very much from eachother, some of them are space stations, abandoned industrial areas or research centres and even some mediveal castles or palaces or even farm houses. Some of these maps may be far beyond the imaginations.

The graphics department also doesn't let the gamers down. Some of the maps are just visual treats, and even the pick-ups are well detailed. The characters and the weapons are also pretty good. There are a number of new weapons like Avril and the Link Gun. The use of vechicles also add to the glory of the game. There are tanks, space fighters, and lots more to just drive around. There are also manual and automatic turrets in some of the missions.

Now we have Unreal Tournament 2007 or Unreal Tournament 3 ready for release. The screenshots of the game have been stunning. So we haven't seen the last of UT yet. The only concerning factor might be the system requirements. I strongly believe that it was UT which increased the multiplayer gaming, and there is no doubt as long as my multiplayer gaming is concerned. There are just too much people waiting to play online...

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