SALvation
12-06-2003, 05:20 AM
Lucky me. Today I got a press CD regarding Painkiller which is different than the beta which should start next week. This CD contains 3 single player maps, along with 2 multiplayer maps, LAN play, and a brief glimpse of the server side settings.
I'm not sure what I can and can't talk about, or even if, but since the CD was marked "press" with no NDA or instructions attached, I'll go ahead and talk about it. I won't however, release any screens or movies.
Keep in mind the code I got was still alpha and highly unoptimized.
I'll start with the multiplayer since that's what you guys are most interested in. In a word, extremely promising (OK 2 words). Where do I even start? The two maps included are very well designed. The first one is your standard destroyed castle looking map which feels very Quake-esque. In Sam terms, its probably the size of The Lost Tomb. The second map is smaller, very open, with destructable barrels. You can almost hit any part of the map from any other spot, even though the map consists of 4 "levels".
The speed? It is definitely fast paced. Walking speed is probably between the speed of Sam running normally, and running with a knife. Bottom line is it just feels right.
Weapons. The ones I've found running around the maps are a stake gun, shotgun, rocket launcher, and your default weapon which is a deadly staff/knife/slicing device.
Powerups. There are your standard armor and health powerups, along with ammo and weapons. Also there is the predator powerup which easily looks the coolest in the game. Its a quad-damage type powerup, but once you get it the screen goes black and white, with all the enemies showing as red ala predator style. Also, frag people and they also drop powerups.
Server side, so far the developers have been listening. There are checkboxes for the following options: Team damage, Weapons Stay, Powerups, Powerup Drop, Allow Bunnyhopping, Allow Bright skins, Allow Forward Rocket Jump. I'm sure more are also on the way.
Single player feels very Sam-like. Tons of enemies, great physics, spooky feel, and fast paced. It looks like there should also be a ton of secrets.
Even though this is highly unoptimized code, I can tell you will need a pretty damn good system to make the most out of the game. I am playing on a:
AMD2000+
512 PC2700
GF3 TI200
And on single player I get roughly 25FPS at 640x480. On multiplayer, I get 50FPS at 800x600. Keep in mind this was also using the highest textures available (Can't turn them down in this build).
The beta for PK should start next week, and by then I'll have a better opinion, but I won't be able to share it because of the NDA attached with it. So far, however, I can tell from this early of a build that things look as good as they can this early. The game will live or die by its net code, and the developer has 4 months to tweak that.
:thumbs: :thumbs:
I'm not sure what I can and can't talk about, or even if, but since the CD was marked "press" with no NDA or instructions attached, I'll go ahead and talk about it. I won't however, release any screens or movies.
Keep in mind the code I got was still alpha and highly unoptimized.
I'll start with the multiplayer since that's what you guys are most interested in. In a word, extremely promising (OK 2 words). Where do I even start? The two maps included are very well designed. The first one is your standard destroyed castle looking map which feels very Quake-esque. In Sam terms, its probably the size of The Lost Tomb. The second map is smaller, very open, with destructable barrels. You can almost hit any part of the map from any other spot, even though the map consists of 4 "levels".
The speed? It is definitely fast paced. Walking speed is probably between the speed of Sam running normally, and running with a knife. Bottom line is it just feels right.
Weapons. The ones I've found running around the maps are a stake gun, shotgun, rocket launcher, and your default weapon which is a deadly staff/knife/slicing device.
Powerups. There are your standard armor and health powerups, along with ammo and weapons. Also there is the predator powerup which easily looks the coolest in the game. Its a quad-damage type powerup, but once you get it the screen goes black and white, with all the enemies showing as red ala predator style. Also, frag people and they also drop powerups.
Server side, so far the developers have been listening. There are checkboxes for the following options: Team damage, Weapons Stay, Powerups, Powerup Drop, Allow Bunnyhopping, Allow Bright skins, Allow Forward Rocket Jump. I'm sure more are also on the way.
Single player feels very Sam-like. Tons of enemies, great physics, spooky feel, and fast paced. It looks like there should also be a ton of secrets.
Even though this is highly unoptimized code, I can tell you will need a pretty damn good system to make the most out of the game. I am playing on a:
AMD2000+
512 PC2700
GF3 TI200
And on single player I get roughly 25FPS at 640x480. On multiplayer, I get 50FPS at 800x600. Keep in mind this was also using the highest textures available (Can't turn them down in this build).
The beta for PK should start next week, and by then I'll have a better opinion, but I won't be able to share it because of the NDA attached with it. So far, however, I can tell from this early of a build that things look as good as they can this early. The game will live or die by its net code, and the developer has 4 months to tweak that.
:thumbs: :thumbs: