Unreal Tournament 2007 screenshots, information

[epmode]

I'd write about how awesome UT2004 and UC2 are, but you idiots ignore me every time, so here are the screenshots:

http://planetunreal.com/images.asp?/...7_050805_1.jpg
http://planetunreal.com/images.asp?/...7_050805_2.jpg
http://planetunreal.com/images.asp?/...7_050805_3.jpg

By the way, UT2007 is being developed by the UC2 team.

"Actually, we don't think 2K4 was very successful," Steve offers. Jim and Jeff nod their heads in agreement, while I'm certain mine is spinning in disbelief. Steve continues, "It wasn't a bad game...I just wish it had been a better game than it was."

Apparently, members of the hardcore UT community agree. "We've paid a lot of attention to what the guys in the community are saying, and we take that feedback to heart. We've got guys that troll the forums every day [and read feedback]," Jim says. What's their biggest critique? "I would say mobility. Mobility and weapon balance. That's more for the hardcore guy who plays every day or on a regular basis, but balancing that out overall will make the whole game feel better, and so everybody will benefit."

That's right -- shouting to each other. Voice command will play a much bigger role in the new game. Rather than simply a means of executing menus, as it is in UT2K4, it will offer you an actual interface for commanding bots.

"In 2K4, the voice-command stuff would basically take the stuff in the voice menus and allow you to speak it instead of do it. But here there are a lot of things that I'd like to be able to have that would be hard to ever do in a menu. For example, each level will have specific locations that you'll be able to use voice command to tell the bots to act on, so you can say, 'Go cover the cavern,' and they'll know what that means. They'll also be a lot more responsive, so you'll be able to ask them questions about their status: 'Is there anybody down in the cavern?' 'No, cavern's all clear.' Or you can throw out warnings like, 'There's a sniper on the tower. Go get the sniper.'"

"The main thing is that they understand what you're saying. The more words you add, the more processing power you have to dedicate to getting it right -- and right now we have the processing power to really do that on the PC," Jeff notes. "Of course, there are little tweaks you need to make. I read one usability report in which the player told the A.I. to go left and he was so amazed that they actually did it, he said, 'Wow, they did the right thing!' And suddenly, the A.I. says, 'Going right!' So you have to tweak it, but given the choice between a menu that they navigate through to give orders versus actually using language, as long as it's not frustrating to use, almost universally, players prefer to [speak rather than type]."

More here.

edit: How on earth does the thumbnail tag work? Does it still exist?

[George]

The first picture is broken, but the second one looks pretty sweet. I haven't played one since 2003, which in my opinion took up way too much room on my computer to be any fun.

[epmode]

The first picture is broken

I'd attach them so TNL could host, but they're a little too big. Give me a minute.

Please don't kill my bandwidth:

edit^2: updated original post with working links.

[Rumpy]

That looks freaking insane.

[dave is ok]

How do they know that this wont look shitty by 2007?

[Revoltor]

I want to see it in action.

Oh, and there's no way in hell this will run on my current PC.

[Brand X]

That fucking rules. The whole article is really interesting, especially the part about how they are building the levels.

But experts and n00bs won't necessarily be forced into combat with one another -- the next Unreal Tournament is slated to include a matchmaking system based on persistent player ratings, so as you strive to better your overall rating and keep track of how you're doing against the rest of the UT world, you can also use your stats to find similarly abled worthy opponents

Havn't we seen this in huge multiplayer FPS before? Either way, I'm glad they're including it, it'll definately make the multiplayer more enjoyable playing against people similarly ranked as you.

[EvilMog]

Looks great now but by late 06 won't everything look like this?

[Brand X]

Looks great now but by late 06 won't everything look like this?

True. They should have released this in 2000.

[Diff-chan]

This is kinda cool, but I hope they put in some fresh gameplay mechanics. The actual gunplay of UT2004 felt lame and stale, because it was exactly the same as UT was in 1999. Onslaught was cool but eh... the series is dangerously close to becoming the PC version of one of Nintendo's stale properties.