Unreal Tournament 2003

"MY LIFE! Where has it gone! Damn you Unreal!"

The faint sounds of weapons as the scrape against your armor. The dry, putrid stench in the surrounding air. Suddenly you hear a firing in the distance. This isn’t warfare, but it’s close enough, it’s Unreal Tournament 2003. After it’s predecessor, Unreal Tournament, single handily changed the way that man looks at deathmatch. Epic games had to fire out another successful hit. Since they didn’t add to the series any by adding a game between the two. There, in essence, was no storyline for them hold up. You’re still the same old joe that wants to kick some ass. Which, is a good thing.

----------- (Updated with the release of the Epic Bonus Pack)

Once you start up the menu, your presented with 5 options. Single player, which will let you play by yourself (Not like that). In single player you make your own profile for which you to compete with. You can choose the skill level . From novice (....pathetically easy) to Godlike (Bück dich). You will then be able to choose your picture/Body. This profile keeps all records such as kills/how many times you get smeared/amount of times killing yourself, etc. Which you accumulate by taking a gun to your enemy. Mine sucks by the way. You will progressive make your way up a series of levels. Each classified as one of the four different gameplays. Since the release of the epic bonus pack, there are two more boosts. One which makes you half your original size. This makes it harder for people to hit you, as they probably can’t even see you. The last one mae

To aid in these game plays are a new set of moves too. When you get adrenaline, from either killing enemies or collecting it, you have a choice of what to blow it on. You can press up four times and make your character run two times as fast. Feeling like you need more protection? Press back four times and proceed to get booster, which lets you gain health every second. After your health hits 199, your shield will begin to grow too. Want to play is 007? Press left twice, then right and become invisible, making it very hard for your oppenent to land a hit on you. Or just head shot them from the back with the lighting gun (sniper rifle). Pressing up twice, then back, will result in your character turning psycho. This is berserk, and it’s by far the best of all the power ups. You guy goes nuts and kills everyone: Bottom line.

Capture the Flag

In this mode you take there flag, and run to get the enemies flag before they get yours. Then hurry your ass back to base. NOTE: When rushing ass back to base, make sure you ass makes it back without hot lead in it. If you do that successfully. Then you are faced with another problem half the time. You were to slow on getting the flag. Now you have to go hunt for the enemy which has it.

Domination

There are two positions on the map in which you choose to play on. One labeled ''A'' other one labeled ''B''. The object of the game you ask? Common sense should tell you. You have to run over the symbols (A and B). By doing so you make the symbol the color which your team is. Get both symbols and TADA!. Then you have to test your skill by holding both them for a 10 seconds. You then score one point. Match's may go from 2-10 points. 10 points not advised. As you would rather listen grandma tell the same story you heard 10 times in your life over again as to play 10 point domination match. Now preceding onto the third type of play in single player.

Bombing Run

What the hell is this you ask? At first sight you may think it's a guy with red around him and a bunch of carnies. Carnies might be easier to kill , though, their really the other teams men guarding the guy with the ball. You see the purpose of this game is to take the one guy out that has the ball. Then you have to make it to their goal and score. Sound easy? My ass it's easy. You get no weapons except a dumb thing that shoots the ball. Why the hell would you want to shoot the ball at the enemy anyway? They take it.... failed logic on that attempt Epic games. Anyway you have to have your teammates help you. That's the problem you see. Did you ever want to do the dirty work reader? Heck no, neither do I. I just let the damn guy run with the ball. Though when you have the ball. Your getting fired at by so many opponents it overwhelming. Though you can also pass the ball by pressing the left button on the mouse This game usually comes down to either luck and/or skill at dodging. Being on a good team with well set skills is a must too. Using adrenaline to get booster is needed too. Running at 2x the speed can make it to where you don’t even have to have protection, just run with the ball. Unfortunately there not much to this game. Coming over to my right we have the fourth and final game of single player mode. You.......... have the Deathmatch.

Deathmatch

What has changed from Unreal Tournament to Unreal Tournament 2003? Nothing at all, other than the graphics. It's like a new strip club. It's all nice and stuff inside. Though once you get to the purpose of it. It's still the same right? (That analogy seemed appropriate enough) Same here. You go around , either by walking or running shooting at opponents. You have an array or weaponry at your disposal may I add. From the flank cannon (my favorite) to a machine gun. Along with a default weapon what plays more tactical purposes, it shoots a green shield that can block weak fire upon your character. Which plays an somewhat important purpose in deathmatch. You can utilize this weaponry to take out you opponents. Better have a good weapon for a long match. Matches can take from anywhere from 5 minutes to one hour. You can select the length of the match in the options menu.

Last man Standing.

As the name implies. Last man standing is just you killing other players to be the last one. Each player starts with 10 lives. You can play all maps that are assessable too deathmatch and Capture the flag along with bombing run. This game is the best for crushing other players egos. If they got one, and they lose, then you can’t taunt them to your death. This is also a way to get others mad at you and quick.

Mutant

Turing into a super-human and killing everything. Having all the weapons, armor, health, adrenaline; at a price. Your health goes down every second, and to keep it up, you must pound everyone else in the room to unrecognizable puddles of blood. Being invisible too helps in making this task easier. Most players will pull their hair out at trying to kill you when you’re the mutant. But, be warned, when you’re not the mutant, you may get mad and just quit all together. I know what you’re thinking? “How do you win this game” It’s just like any kids game, be the mutant the longest in an allotted time and win. How easy is that?

Invasion

Damn them at epic, damn them all. This new game-play mode has eaten a big portion out of my reviewing time for gamefaqs. I often find myself staying up to 4 in the morning on school nights, but I can blame that on the Coke. If you’re getting tired of putting up with the constant bullies (like me) that kill you a lot and laugh at you. Then this if the game for you. It’s more team based than any other Unreal game-play to date. Monster from past unreals make pop up appearances to see to it that you die, again. The monsters attack in waves that can take from 1minute too 10 minutes to get through. The monsters that attack you from wave to wave steadily increase in toughness . You’ll start with little bugs and flying dragon flies. Too flying demons that have auto-aiming rocket launchers. After every wave, the whole team is rejuvenated, which is good for the one player that isn’t to good. This mode is by far the best to train for real life opponents. You can learn how to dodge and fire better, and not make yourself look bad in the process.

Multi Player

Now in your mental mind. Your at the single player selection screen with the 4 modes of play. Go back one and your at the profile. Back one more now were at the menu again. Descend one more option and your at the ''Multiplayer''. Your at a menu that shows what all servers (are up at the time of play. You can choose your fate by picking which on you would like to play on, or what game version you which to play. Interacting with others humans can be fun, as in killing three of them at once. Everything in multi-player has already been explained in single Player. There is no difference other than you play with people online, with new maps occasionally.

Unreal has been know to impress people. From their flashy shadow effects , to their bad ass character models. Unreal has it all. Unreal Tournament is no exception to the rule. More note-able textures that make the game flashy are shadows. The shadows are more toned down since unreal one. They don't look so cheesy, and have more shape to them more than even newer games. Aside from me praising it like a drunk man. There is no slowdown on high end machines. If your pushing a 32MB graphics card. You won't get much at all out of this section. Everything will look bland an dull. Anything under a 1 Ghz MIGHT have some slowdown. Besides the high ''tech specs'' needed for it to look good. Even then it still looks dremcastish on the computer. One thing I do want to point out is that the weapons are very detailed. They have high amount of textures on them. Which makes them look good.

Blah. To say the least. When you start up the game you don't even got a theme song. You just get some crappy orchestral music that they seems to just to throw into the game. Most the levels consist of ''Dun dun.........dun ...bang bang bang dun''. Seems like they totally half assed the music this time. Off the bad music the sound effects are still good. You got the taunts ''Die
*****'' ''I got the flag''. They are easily pulled off this time with the auto-taunt button (thank god). That isn't all that is improved upon the controllers. One of the ways the controllers have improved is that you can now perform dodges easier. First a dodge is were you press any direction twice and do a quick movement in that way. Good evasive technique. Away from that now, you got easier mouse control. That helps with when your getting your butt attacked. You can look down, or around a lot quicker. The mouse as always is equipped with the right and left click buttons. The left one does Main fire. The right one provides ALT fire. Which is usually a slower, though a more powerful attack. The keyboard controls are totally customizable as always. Personally , I like the default better.

Threw all the times I've gotten mad at the game. Started flaming others in Multi Player. Even won over some people on to be kicked out of a server since they're such babies. The game is still fun. I would go Unreal Tournament first though. I find myself playing it till this day more than
Unreal Tournament 2003.

Overview of UT2003

Game Types

Deathmatch- 10
Capture The Flag - 9
Bombing Run - 6
Last Man Standing - 8
Invasion - 10
Team Deathmatch - 10
Domination (team) - 4
Mutant - 7


If your into first person shooter, then pick this up as soon as possible. If you're not into them. At least give the game a shoot and download it at their official website. *Cues final Verdict*

Gamplay-10
Graphics-10
Control-10
Sound-7

Final score-10

The sound is not even near enough to hold this game back. Now, if you don’t mind, I have a life to waste *goes to play more unreal*

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 01/05/03, Updated 07/29/03