03 November 2003
Posted in Games

Review
Installation & Documentation
Ease of use
Value for money
Price (approx)	$75
Operating System	Mac OS X 10.2.6+ 700 MHz G4 processor+ 256 MB RAM 3GB hard disk space
Available from	Apple Resellers

Macguide Issue 12

UT2003 is the sequel to the highly popular first person shooter (FPS) Unreal Tournament, and it's basically the same game with flasher graphics. The premise behind the UT games is that you are a gladiator in a dark future who, either willingly or not, must take part in bloody and deadly combat with a huge arsenal of weapons. Nothing has changed in UT2003; the gladiator combat is still the same, with five main modes in the single player game:

• Deathmatch: in which everyone kills everyone else.
• Team Deathmatch: in which everyone kills everyone that isn't the same colour (blue, red, etc) as them (in theory).
• Capture the Flag (CTF): in which teams of people try to steal the other teams' flag and take it back to their base, while defending their own flag, and trying to kill as many people (on the other team) as possible.
• Double Domination: in which teams of people try to dominate two spots in the arena at the same time for 10 seconds in order to score points while, yes you guessed it, trying to kill as many different-coloured people as possible.
• Finally there is Bombing run: a new type of game, which is basically American football with guns, the point of which is to get the ball and score, while killing people.

GameSpeak

The combination of letters and keys used to spell words, originally used by gamers online but now used by many a geek, has been around for a couple of years. '1337 0|\|3' translates as 'Leet', meaning lite

So as you can see there is a lot of killing people, and some of it can be quite graphic in a silly, futuristic blood-sport kind of way, thus the Mature rating on the box. All and all, the single player game is fun, and the new feature of having a team which you can swap and which improves its skills as you go is novel - but UT has never been about the single player experience.

The meat of this game is online gaming, playing against worldwide opponents via the built-in game finder and proving just who is the 1337 0|\|3 (see panel: GameSpeak) - or just getting beaten horribly by eight-year-old Korean girls (or over a LAN). The game can even keep track of your multiplayer record and share it with the world. The multiplayer component of the game lets you play all the same modes as the single player game, and more, adding mutators and different rules to your games.

What's up?
Now for the final technical stuff; first of all, it looks great! The Unreal Warfare engine behind the game is a beauty, but it has steep system requirements, requiring a 700MHz G4, 256MB RAM, 3GB of hard drive space and a 32MB graphics card at least, and even at this level the game gets choppy when all the lasers and explosions start going off in a five-on-five game. Secondly, it takes ages to install - I am talking hours here, I had to check the box and make sure this wasn't some sort of new Unreal OS or something!

Finally, while it says you can play online with a 33.6kbps modem, it must be joking - you will need at least broadband to enjoy this game properly, unless you are the Ruler of Lagland or something.

 

Pros

Futuristic blood sport is fun!
Great graphics
Great multiplayer

Cons

High system requirements
Long install time
Nothing really new and amazing

© Parkside Media 2003
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