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Quake Live Picking Up SteamBy: Jeff "fogh-" Cardoso Posted 2009-04-22 01:07:04 CDTWith the recent open beta of Quake Live, teams are investing some time lookinginto players. A51 is no exception; A51 has picked up Gillz and boots, two up andcoming duelers in the North American scene. Here is what Gillz had to say.What are your expectations for QL?I'll admit my expectations were slightly low during the closed beta, mostly due tothe slow development of the game, and lowered focus on the competitive featureswe wanted. But now, after seeing the massive amount of people in Quake Live, andhearing what some of the developers have commented on, I expect it to be anamazing competitive game for the next few years. It will take some time thoughWhat events are you looking forward?Pretty much all of them right now, Quakecon, and AGP tour. Unfortunately we sawthe destruction of ESWC, but hopefully we can expect ESL to pick it up for their EMevents. I'll be attending both Quakecon and any AGP tour events this yearWho do you think is your biggest opponent at the moment? There’s lots of people right now I'd consider my biggest opponent. If I were togeneralize, I'd say the younger ones. Kids who are in high school with no job livingat home have ten times more time to play and practice than I do.What about professionals such as Fatal1ty, word is he is still practicing daily. As well,other pros like cooller or Forever?
 
I've said this before to people, and I'll say it again. Fatal1ty won't come back tocompeting. He's made his money, and his reputation. He's taken two years off of gaming, and wouldn't risk it for something like Quake Live. He's now trying tocompete professionally in Poker. He had his chance last year to compete, instead hespent it playing FFA in the BYOC at Quakecon. No offense to Jon, he's a nice guy, buthe's not coming back. Forever is someone that liked Quake 4 a lot, and wasn'tstrong in Quake 3. Cooller has been downhill the past year or two, and I honestlydon't even think he'll compete seriously this year.Certain games are continent dominated, for instance Asia dominates RTS throughand through, what are your expectations for QL? Do you see a European dominancelike in Quake3 for the past year and a half or possibly a new powerhouse?With something like RTS games, yes Asians dominate it. With Quake and CS, lookingat accomplishments and results, I'd really have to put money on Euros most of thetime. There's exceptions of course, but Europe has an amazing infrastructure fortheir internet, low pings, lots of tournaments and competition, and lots of players.North America is stuck with awful internet, high pings, and little to no tournaments.With the game being in public beta for a few weeks now, what problems do you feelstill need fixing? The netcode is a bit questionable, but I'm more concerned about the routing andservers. Ping is doubled in some places then it was in Quake 3. It's most likely eitherbad luck with routing in certain areas, or something seriously wrong with the serverprovider. I think the sooner we get dedicated LAN servers, and private servers, thesooner more players can practice. It's frustrating to practice with one partner, withpeople leaving and specing, then refusing to quit once they're in the game. For me,I play a higher tiered player for an hour or two, and in Quake 3 that was easy.Unfortunately, in Quake Live it's extremely difficult. The LG needs a bit of work (7-7-7 anyone?) but it's definitely solid right nowHow are balancing issues in QL so far?
 
 The only issue I really have is the Lightning Gun and the Shotgun at this point.Rockets and Rail are fine, but the shotgun is extremely overpowered. They hadadjusted all other weapons, and not the shotgun. Now it's left very overpowered, alot of competitive players would like to see it toned down a bit. The Lightning Gunalso is questionable. It has a ranged damage, if you're closed to your opponent, itdoes 7 damage per cell, the farther you move back, the less damage it does. It cando either 7, 6 or 5 damage per cell. I had run some tests to see how close you haveto be to qualify for 6 and 7 damage, and it's unrealistic to even use a Lightning Gunat that distance. It's much more practical to use a Rocket Launcher, Shotgun, orPlasma. I think making it 7-7-7 would ideally balance it, even having it at 6-6-6would still make it more balanced then it is now.Are you worried about LAN events not being able to cope with the fact that QL isonline only at this point?Well, the closest LAN event we have is Quakecon, which is in August. At this point, Iwould imagine dedicated LAN servers would be out by then. I'm sure both AGP andESL are pushing them to release it, because who wants to play at a LAN with 20ping? It's not the end of the world, but I think all of the community would beextremely happy if we saw dedicated LAN server programs released beforeQuakecon.Are there any features in QL that you don’t see and would like to?I'd like to see a timeout function, at least for duel. We’re all waiting for them torelease their 5$ a month private servers, which will be extremely helpful fororganized scrims and pickup games. There's a few commands and features fromCPMA that aren't in Quake Live, but I'm sure ID will properly request thedevelopment of most of those commands. Personally for me, I'd like Picmip'dweapons (like the LG), and no LG impact lightning ball. Other than that, it's verygood.I'd also like to see some new maps, and possibly some old ones, like ZTN or Hub. The more the better, but I think we should focus more on developing new duelmaps, not focusing on the old ones.
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