Deathmatch Classic certainly lives up to its name: seven years old and there are still people logging onto Steam - you know, the place with the finest and most polished multiplayer shooters ever made - and playing this antiquated tribute to Quake.  It’s so Ye Olden Times you could run it on a calculator, but it turns out that no matter the polygon count shooting at people
is still fun.

A lot of fun.  But there are a few things you’ll need to know when you log onto a Deathmatch Classic server.  You’re engaged in truculent time travel here, and some things aren’t what you’re used to:

1.  One man’s modification
People still sticking with this when things like Team Fortress 2 are available are impressively dedicated to what they like: expect to download a horde of customized map and sound files, as hardcore users tweak their servers to their exact standards.  Most of these are designed to obliterate whatever pet peeve the host hates, so expect spawn-immunity and anti-camp-countdowns.  The bulk of the rest will be dedicated to making this as close to Quake as humanly possible.  ID Software’s magnum opus still lives strong in gamers’ hearts, and many will do whatever they can to keep playing it (except for actually running the original, which has an engine so dated you could probably find dinosaur bones in it).

The upside?  If you host your own HL:DC Server you can set it up how you like it.

2.  True Deathmatch
NO-ONE is on your side.  Deathmatch does exactly what it says on the tin and everyone you see is trying to kill you (and more importantly, so are the ones you can’t).  You might think you’re used to that, but these are people who’ve been here since 1996 in some cases, so while you’re still getting used to the distinctive “Brown and more brown” Quake graphics the score leader will have lightning-sniped you from midair while invisible.  This isn’t Call of Duty with alternate routes and camo - this is you and twenty murderers in an open room filled with an improbable amount of firepower.

3.  Unbalanced Weapons
Everyone trying to kill you wouldn’t be so bad - it turns out a lot of games have that idea - except you’re appearing with a wimpy shotgun and anyone who’s been alive longer than five seconds has a better weapon than that.  The old-school gameplay mechanics include balance-breaking items like Quad Damage and the Lightning Gun, so if you see somebody glowing purple and spewing thunderbolt death think of them as an angry Thor and run like hell.

Why put up with that?  Because it’s incredibly fun when it’s your turn.  Exploding enemies just by looking at them generally is.

4.  Bunny-hopping
A heavily-armed three-hundred pound space marine leaping and prancing like his feet are on fire is an odd sight, but in Quake-like games they’re exploiting the game’s physics to move faster than running and make themselves far harder to hit.  Oh, and sometimes their feet actually will be on fire:  Old school levels include huge lava floors, “haha you fell off” ledges, and various other items modern games have evolved out of.

Keep these simple tips in mind and you can have an awesome time.  Just remember: rockets beat shotgun, and Quad Damage beats everything.

You already know that Half Life 2 is the greatest first person shooter ever made. If you don’t, whatever reason you think you have is wrong. In fact, the only possible explanation is that you haven’t played it - in which case you should leave right now and start. GO!

HL2 has won more Game of the Year awards than you can name (seriously, name thirty awards). Even if Captain MacPicky teleported in from the Universe of Whining, the only thing he could complain about is that the single player campaign isn’t multiplayer. Which is like saying the Space Shuttle isn’t awesome because it can’t go underwater, but the heroes at Merciless Development are fitting submarine systems to the masterpiece by developing “Folllow Freeman” - Half Life 2 co-operative.

Any game that starts with a Bertrand Russell quote has to be a cut above, and the high standards don’t stop there. The sheer level of work that’s gone into this is apparent from the instant you log into a Follow Freeman Server. You appear in ff_readyroom, an entire (and quite detailed) map built to control the server options and level select - you know, the things most modders just use !server console commands for. When you get to a game level it gets even better, replaying epic battles from the single player campaign with human backup (like the defense of the lighthouse tower). The respawns are intelligent, it’s great to know that your fellow rebel fighters are real people humans rather than NPCs, and wow but those Combine dropships really aren’t ready for co-ordinated fire from multiple rocket launchers.

Which is why you can help them! In “Combine Assassin” mode a quarter of the players can be assigned to the dark side, beefed up super-troopers out to sabotage the resistance and destroy every freedom fighter they see. Moving among your computer-controlled backup/cannon fodder, you can wreak havoc among human players slightly distracted by all the regular baddies. Come on, you’ve always known you’d do a far better job than those grunts - and donning the metal Metrocop facemask to dispense “pacification” is always fun…

There are brand new missions too - bz_trainstation sees you and Combine squadmates in the wake of the demolition of Dr Breen’s tower, desperately repairing the perimeter shield around the train station while fighting off headcrab zombies until you can be evacuated by train.

The experience isn’t yet perfect. It’s based on the single-player engine, so you’ll need a Teamspeak server of your own (there aren’t any in-game chat options - not even typing text!) Attempting to move past each other can occasionally be clunky, and the aim in user-made missions isn’t always as clear as in the converted single player stages.

But it’s a damn awesome concept, and now that it’s in open beta (and free!) it’s a project that deserves your attention. How many cool things can you help just by playing games? There aren’t many FF servers online, but a custom Follow Freeman server is a perfect option for the clan looking for a new way to pass the time - and a great way to make one of the best games ever made fresh again. Everyone will enjoy it, and if they don’t? You need to screen admissions to your clan more carefully.

Goldrush is the most popular map on Team Fortress 2 servers (recent update insanity aside), even pushing the almighty Dustbowl from the top spot. What makes moving a cart along a fixed track so compelling?



It can’t be the novelty - that fades a couple of weeks after each update, along with all the horrible TF2 achievementbox servers (aka “How to turn your favorite game into work in one easy step!”). As well as being added to the main rotation, loads of custom servers have cropped up offering Goldrush 24/7 and most tellingly of all, Goldrush/Dust TF2 servers.

That’s your first hint: the dedicated attack/defense dynamic is tremendous fun. There’s no such thing as a stalemate on a one-way map: if things aren’t moving forward then RED is kicking your weak BLU ass. But with a map so well designed it never becomes an uncrackable Chokepoint Of Death: there are always alternate routes and counter-strategies to however they’re holding you back. Protip: 90% of the time the counter strategy is “You need more medics you BLU dumbasses”. Looking at the win/lose ratio, we can see that this happens a LOT.

Why does RED hold sway on this map so often? Half of any battle is intel, and a look at the valve-provided “Death Map” for the stage reveals a major hotspot:

or as you normally see it:

This one section of corridor is slightly more lethal than a Predator wearing a necklace of nuclear warheads. A great stickybomb point, open to close-range sentries (and snipers from clear across the map), a Heavy buffet of Eety-Beety-victims and so wonderfully custom made for defensive pyros it might as well come with gas nozzles in the walls.

BLU can hide behing the corner and build an uber - but they never do seem to run fast enough when the RED counter-charge comes barreling round that wooden corner. I’ve seen more medics burned up at 90% uber than I care to count - and with so many medikits so close by, there’s really no excuse. Be ready to charge, but be ready to flee with that precious percentage at the first sign of trouble. Remember: a medic life without an ubercharge is a wasted life.

There are other hot spots (the final approach in stage 2 and the terminal corner in stage 3), but none nearly so deadly as that first tunnel. A few hints to help crack any of those hotspots:

- There are other routes. Outside of relay races, spending ten times as long running as fighting is not a good contribution, so don’t just march round the Corner of Instant Explosion trying to headbutt a level 3 sentry.
- Watch your back - and more importantly, watch your medics back! Some of the alternate routes work both ways.
- Are you a spy? Are you in the bottom half of the scoreboard? Then why not try going medic and NOT being hated by the rest of your team!
- If you must spy, be aware that after the first point is capped sapping the tele entrances does nothing but tell them you’re there.
- Don’t be an offensive scout on stage 1. What the hell is wrong with you?