QEXPO - Schedule

 

Friday 20: Classic Mods Day

 

Introduction

 

QExpo's first day is dedicated to all these mods which, with time, became examples to follow and eventually to beat for us modders and mappers. It is almost natural that we should start this week of celebration of our favourite shooter by giving proper credits to all the famous mods and modders which gave the Quake1 community the fame we all know. From Capture the Flag to Holy Wars, Rocket Arena to Team Fortress, it is now accepted by all members of the gaming community at large that the first Quake1 mods set the mood and spirit of many of the mods that were to be built later on other platforms. The huge number of mod conversions to newer games, such as Quake3, Unreal Tournament or Half-Life is there to prove it. Think of Valve's Team Fortress Classic, Unreal Tournament's Capture the Flag or Quake3's Rocket Arena. 

But, while Day One is about looking back at our shooter's glorious past, it is also a look at its future. As you will see throughout the week, QExpo is mainly about the current and future state of the Quake1 community. So today, the first day of a week-long event which will enable surfers to discover the Quake1 mods of tomorrow, is also for us an opportunity to tackle the issues of today's Quake1 modding scene through editorials and articles.  

 

QuakeWorld Events

 

Servers are going to play several multiplayer mods and mini-tourneys will be organized around "classic mods"

Be sure to have as many of these installed before joining (Capture the Flag, Team Fortress, Rocket Arena, Storm the Castle and Holy Wars among others)

Check the site's main page for schedule information, server addresses and mods. 

 

Speed Events : Speed-Tutorial-Writing

 

We thought a speed-tutorial-writing session would be appropriate for the first day of QExpo. Aren't tutorials often the starting points of a modding "career", after all ? Rules are simple: after being given a "theme" (example : "weapon coding"), participants are asked to write a quick (and new) tutorial on this topic which should be helpful to newbies. There will be three fields participants will be able to choose from : map editing, mod coding and engine coding. The aim here is of course not to write a very complex tutorial, but something at the same time simple and useful which could be used by others. 

Check the main page for more information on this speed event and its supervisor.  

 

IRC meeting

 

QExpo's official chat room is #qexpo on innergamer.net. Don't forget to drop by throughout the week for the freshest info, download triggers or simply to chat with other participants, players and coordinators.

Saturday 21 : Recent Mods Day

 

Introduction

 

After Day One's look at mod ancestors, it's time to get our hands dirty and celebrate all the mods released in the past year. To the youngest players and Quake3 or Half-Life fanatics, Quake1's modding scene might look quiet. Day Two is one of QExpo's many opportunities to prove them wrong. With recent advancements in engine coding, the originality and imaginative force of the QuakeC modding core members and the craft of very talented mappers, Quake1 has proven that it still has a lot to offer. Mods of all sizes, from the gigantic Neharha to mods released during and after the mini-mod frenzy, have been flooding the community for months and it seems natural to dedicate a special day to give all the current members of the Quake1 community credits and play their work on-line.

Of course, this day also marks the beginning of a long series of releases during the week. We hope you will enjoy the many maps, mods, mini-mods and engine releases that will grace QExpo and that, if you are not a member of the community, you will learn more about us and try out all the brand-new stuff offered during the exhibition.

 

QuakeWorld Events

 

Unlike what happened for Day One, servers will play exclusively newer mods and mini-mods. 

It's hard to say in advance which mods to install, so be sure to check the main page for more information on which mods will be played, download locations and schedules. It goes without saying that mods released during Day One or Day Two might also be played, so checking booths and news items for download links is also a good idea.

 

Speed Events : Speed-Modding

 

Speed-modding might be a little less known than speed-mapping but it has become increasingly popular among the QuakeC community and there is no doubt it will soon hit other gaming communities as well. The idea is simple: build a QuakeC mod in a given time (usually around 2 hours) and with a given theme (available at the start of the session). Incredibly fun and addictive, speed-modding is open to everyone, be it newbie coders or veterans. At the end of the session, all the mods are zipped into a pack, which is made available for download soon afterwards. 

Be sure to check the main page for more information on this speed event and its supervisor.  

 

IRC meeting

 

Join all the current QuakeC coders, ask them questions or arrange on-line matches with them on Day Two's guest channel : #qc on irc.gamesnet.net.

 

Sunday 22 : Recent DM Maps Day

 

Introduction

 

The Quake1 mapping community has always been very active in keeping ID's classic shooter alive. While some mappers left the community for the eye-candies of games like Quake3, many others either stayed or decided to share their time between Quake1 and other shooters. Today, the number of high-quality Quake1 maps beats any other game hands down. With the help of new texture sets, sometimes of engine novelties (such as the now famous lit files), today's Quake1 mappers create fantastic worlds that have nothing to be jealous of maps for the newer games. Because of its never-failing support of Quake1, it was obvious we should dedicate days of QExpo to the mapping community, Day Three and Day Five. Day Three is about deathmatch maps (regular maps or mod maps), our beloved playgrounds for fast and furious action, be it against bots or the next-door neighbour. Next to on-line meetings, this day should see the release of some new maps as well as new map reviews.

 

QuakeWorld Events

 

While it is very easy to find servers using the regular ID deathmatch maps, it is sometimes difficult to find ones offering people rotations of custom-made maps. It's a pity, really, when one knows the overall quality of the latest. In order to fill this gap, Day Three's servers will be using unofficial deathmatch maps only. A good opportunity to show your fragging skills on different, unusual, brand-new maps :-) 

It'd be a good idea to have most of the newer deathmatch maps installed in your map directory as well as maps which could have been released during these three first days of QExpo. In all cases, be sure to check the main page for information on tourneys, servers and schedules.

 

Speed Event : Speed-Mapping (DM)

 

Speed-mapping has been going on for longer than speed-modding and is popular in other mapping communities, such as the Doom2 one. As the name indicates, speed-mapping is about designing a map as quickly as possible. As was the case for speed-modding, people are given a particular time and all maps are bundled into a pack at the end of the session. Another really fun event you don't want to miss, wether you have the skills of a lego-house builder or that of a cathedral architect ... because, with that little time, ingeniosity often wins over talent ;-)

Be sure to check the main page for more information on this speed event and its supervisor.  

 

IRC meeting

 

Day Three's guest channel is #tf on gamesnet, the regular meeting place of many famous mappers. Be sure to drop by to say "hi", ask questions and tips.

 

Monday 23th : TC Day

 

Introduction

 

Total Conversions (or "TC's"), because they usually involve an incredibly important amount of work, are usually the most impressive and the most representative pieces of work of a given gaming community. While there are a couple of Doom2 total conversions, it's not too much to say that Quake1 is the game that gave TC's their world-wide appeal. For the first time, a game was able to offer its fans tools to transform or change radically all the fields that make the game what it is: maps, code, models, skins, sounds, textures ... etc. A total conversion is a mod that offers changes in all these fields and of these, Quake1 has had many. After the Fall, Zerstoerer, PainKeep and many others have become examples for all the other gaming communities and also showed the way to the ever-growing tendency to build mods in teams rather than on one's own. 

Day Four of QExpo is meant as a celebration of all these Total Conversions, be they old or new. It is also for us the opportunity to see that, unlike what some people believe, there are still quite a few total conversions being designed for Quake1 and that, as they will make use of engine changes, they are bound to rock the gaming scene on the whole for a little while still.

 

QuakeWorld Event

 

Today's on-line meetings will focus on the deathmatch part of famous total conversions for Quake1. It's a good idea to have a couple of them already installed, such as Zerstoerer, Painkeep and Fiend Hunter. Be sure to check the main page prior to the event for information on servers, played mods and time.

 

Speed Event : Speed-Skinning and Speed-Modelling

 

Among the aspects that make a TC what it is, we find of course new characters, be they players or monsters. To build a new character, you need of course to design a new model for it as well as a "skin", a picture that will be textured on it and will give it its final look. Day Four's speed sessions are about building models and designing skins in a limited amount of time. These two sessions will take place at different time and aren't connected (you won't have to skin your model), so you should be able to take part in both. 

Basically, the skinning session will be about creating a skin in a limited amount of time (two hours) following a particular theme and for a model which will be given at the very start of the session. It won't be the regular player model, since there already are hundreds of skins available for it on the net.

The speed-moddeling session will be about designing a model in a limited amount of time (also two hours) according to a particular theme. Given the difficulty of the exercice, you will not be asked to animate or skin it. It would be great if you did, but it is not compulsory.

Be sure to check the main page for more information on these speed events and the supervisors.

 

IRC meetings

 

It's sad to say (and God knows how modders complain about this), but the Quake1 modeling and skinning scenes are as close as dead. If, however, you really want to meet skinners and modelers, today's guest channels will be #skindom and #model_design on irc.enterthegame.com

A good idea would of course be to stick around #qc on gamesnet, where you'll find many coders who are knowledgable on total conversions.

 

Tuesday 24th : Recent SP Maps day

 

Introduction

 

After Sunday's deathmatch maps day, here comes QExpo's singleplayer maps day. The Quake1 mapping world is so big, we felt the urge to cut it in two. While some people believe that the only attractive feature left to Quake1 is its deathmatch side, recent map and mod releases have shown that it is not so. After a long deathmatch mapping frenzy, the Quake1 mapping scene has seen a great revival in the (for some) more demanding art of singleplayer map editing. We are not talking only of maps for great singleplayer mods like Neharha or Operation Urth Majik, but also of single maps or mini-episodes. Pushing Quake1's singleplayer experience to its limits and making good use of tricks learnt all through the years, singleplayer map makers have played a great role in making Quake1 still kick major ass. Forget Half-Life or Unreal's monsters, forget Quake3 bots, take a rocket launcher and go tell some Quake1 grunts "asta la vista". A tribute to singleplayer mapping, Day Five of QExpo is thus mainly about celebrating classic and recent singleplayer maps and map packs, about releasing and reviewing new ones

 

QuakeWorld event

 

Because singleplayer maps are meant to be played by ... well ... a single player, servers will offer, like it was the case Sunday, a rotation of custom deathmatch maps. It's a good idea to keep as many of the newer maps as possible ready in your map folder to avoid having to download them from the servers. Once again, check the main page for information on servers, maps played and schedule information. 

There *might* be a cooperative server available, but arrangements still need to be made about it. Information about it will be posted on the main page if it does take place.

 

Speed Event : Speed-Mapping (SP)

 

Another speed-mapping session for you all to enjoy and have fun with, but this time, focussing on singleplayer maps. 

The rules will be the same as for Sunday, the goal being to build a singleplayer map in a very limited amount of time. Whereas you had to think about weapon placements and room inter-connectivity, your focus will thus be here on general level progression and monster placement. A fun challenge for all newbie and hard-nosed mappers!

Be sure to check the main page for more information on this speed event and its supervisor.  

 

IRC meeting

 

Today's guest channel is #tf on gamesnet, the regular meeting place of many famous mappers, most of whom involved in QMap.org

Wednesday 25 : Vanilla Quake & Booth Babes day.

 

Introduction

 

We are in the middle of QExpo ... it's time for a break and, like FrikaC said, "a little respite from modified stuff days, a time for some fast and furious FFA". When you keep thoughts of modifications away and try to remember the early days of Quake1, you quickly realize that, while having potential for expansion, the game's core is really fun by itself. Remember these sleepless nights spent on trying to download with your 56k modem the "Quake Test" or, later, the shareware version, these hours of fun spent on fragging that guy from the other side of the world on the "Abandonned Base"? Day Six of QExpo is about celebrating un-sweetened Quake1, in other words, Quake1 for the hardcore players and modders, Quake1 as it was at its birth. It's also, as hinted at, a little pause in the week, an opportunity to relax a bit and have fun simply being together ...

As you have noticed, many of the QExpo booths offer "Booth Babes", usually modified pictures of models with an added logo picture on or around them. This feature, which first started as joke and was meant to remind people of the not-so-virtual E3 babes became pretty popular and this day of relaxation was chosen to celebrate them, because, next to Quake1, the best thing in life is surely hanging around nice babes (or blokes, if you're a girl)  ;-)

 

QuakeWorld Event

Servers are free to offer whatever they want, so it's up to you to check the main page and see what is offered. The only thing that is sure is that some will offer the regular deathmatch maps for you to play on and that there will be some tourneys going on. Again, the main page is the place to get info on this aspect of QExpo.

Speed Event : Speed-Babing and Speed-Speedrunning

 

Two very different speed events will grace this fifth day of QExpo.

First of all, a speed-babing competition. Okay, some will probably argue that this has nothing to do with Quake1, but, hey, it has something to do with QExpo, so it can only be good. This time, we do not ask you to build a map, mod, skin, model or tutorial but a babe/bloke! The concept is the following: at the start of the speed-babing session, you are given the name of a female and male model. According to ... erm ... your tastes, you choose one of the two and have to design a proper "booth" picture in one hour. With "booth" picture we mean a picture where the model looks natural (read: he/she could really be posing as a booth model) and where the logo of your modding team, site or mod can be found and looks "real". If you still do not know what we are talking about, check CocoT's booth and you will see. During the session, you're free to use any picture of the given model you will found on the net, as long as there is not nudity involved.

The Speed-speedrunning competition, on the other hand, is about recording the best speed demo on a given map and this, during a given amount of time (two hours). The name of the SP map you will have to play on will be given at the beginning of the session and the demos will be packed at the end of the session. Of course, the quickest one will be given particular attention. A lot of fun and a good opportunity to show the world how good a player you are ...

Be sure to check the main page for more information on these two speed events and the supervisors involved.  

 

Thursday 26 : Engine Day

 

Introduction

 

The recent release of Quake1's source code has marked a very important step in the history of Quake1 modding. The source was indeed the last tool needed by mod developers to transform ID's game into a -fully- customizable game engine. Beside the fact that it brought a lot of fresh air and new faces into the community, it also managed to bring Quake1 to a level where it has little to be jealous of the newer games. As stated in some recent articles on Quake1 modding, anyone who still views Quake1 as an old, pixellized game with no color or fancy effects should revise his/her opinion really quickly. With the titanesque work of engine-coders such as Tomaz, LordHavoc, Xoltan, MrG, Tonik, Heffo and many others, limits keep on being pushed and that good old Quake1 engine is looking better every day. 

A special day devoted to celebrating the new engines and their coders was obviously needed, and Day Seven is that day. All members of the community should be grateful to them. Modders have new features to play around with, mappers have colorful additions to brighten up their maps with, modelers can increase their polygon numbers significantly, texture designers can now play with the same palettes as those used for the newest games ... etc, etc. As mentionned before, Quake1 will still have a lot to offer in the next couple of years, and engine-coding will play an increasingly important role in this process. So today's the day to check the latest engine novelties, screenshots and reviews.

 

QuakeWorld Events

 

Arrangements still have to be made, but it is probable that servers will be using new engines. 

More information will be posted on the main page about these, schedules and maps/mods played. Be sure to check it out.

 

IRC Meeting

 

Today's guest channel is #openquake on irc.gamesnet.net. This is the channel used by engine coders to share ideas and tips and thus definitely the best place to hang around in if you are a would-be engine developer or a modder in need of engine-specific information.

 

Friday 27 : Bots Day

 

Introduction

 

In today's gaming world, it has become almost impossible to imagine a game without some sort of bot included. After GT's decision to include bots in their first episode of Unreal, bot frenzy took over the entire player and modding communities. The release of bot-only games such as Unreal Tournament or Quake3 is a good example of that phenomenon. Bots had been around a long time before these, though, and particularly in the Quake1 community. There are dozens of Quake1 bots available, among which the best known is probably our beloved plug-in bot, FrikBot, but we also ought to mention the Frog Bot, Reaper, Omicron Bot, Zeus and the newbie-modder-friendly Tutor Bot. Artificial intelligence being such a wonderful and mysterious field of modding, we thought it was appropriate to devote a day of QExpo's week to it. We all have played against bots at one time or another and we all were sometimes surprized by their marvellous inteligence, sometimes dissapointed by their non-human behaviour. While there is probably still room for improvement, bots are still a fascinating and demanding part of the modding activity. Today is the ideal opportunity to raise our glasses to the code-gurus who have been able to make computer-controlled opponents a reality, check their latest work and discuss it.

 

QuakeWorld Events

 

Arrangements still need to be made, but today's servers are likely to run custom maps with a couple of bots thrown in. Different servers might be using different bots, so it's a good idea to download as many QuakeWorld bots as possible and install them, just in case you need files included with them. Again, we advise you to check the main page for the freshest information on server addresses, maps and schedules.

 

Speed Event : Speed-Modding

 

After Day Two, here comes another speed-modding session for your enjoyment. This session is not going to be very different from Saturday's, the goal still being to build up a mod in a limited amount of time and using a particular, pre-set theme. The only noticeable difference is that the resulting mini-mod will -have- to contain a plug-in bot and be fully playable against it. As was the case for the last session, all speedmodders who meet the time dead-line will see their mini-mod zipped into a pack and released soon after the session. 

Be sure to check the main page for more information on this speed event and its supervisor.  

 

IRC Meeting

 

If there are only two places to check out for bots, it's without doubt ze0's Botepidemic and Randar's bot site.

Day Eight's guest channel is #botepidemic on irc.gamesnet.net. Even though this channel tends to be visited more by regular QuakeC coders than by bot coders specifically, you should get a chance to meet ze0, who is very knowledgable when it comes to bot on all platforms and FrikaC, author of the almighty FrikBot.

Saturday 28: QExpo Mods Day

 

Introduction

 

Lots of material has been released during this frantic week and it is time to prepare ourselves for Sunday's big QExpo overview. QExpo shows that the community has still a lot of fresh blood in it and that it is not going to stop kicking ass yet. Today is the day to release the last QExpo mini-mods (those running for the competition) and QExpo maps (those using one of the four pre-set themes), because all these will be bundled in large zip packages to be made available by the end of the day. Day Nine is also an opportunity to start building up an index of everything that was released in the week, so that everybody is sure that he/she has not missed anything. 

 

QuakeWorld Event

 

It's time for the servers to showcase the mods released during QExpo!

Wether the released mod is small or big, we will work hard on trying to give it server time. Schedules, server addresses and played mods will of course be decided in the very last minutes, so it's a good idea to check the main page regularly for more info. 

Sunday 29 : Week in review day

 

Introduction

 

Even the best things have to end at one time or another. With dozens of booths and a lot of new releases, and given the fact this is the first time such a gathering of modders, mappers, coders and player is organized in the Quake1 community, QExpo was bound, from the start, to be a success. But how big a success has it been? Today's focus will be on making a huge overview of this very special week, be it through editorials and articles or reviews of the released material. It is also the opportunity to sum up the results of all the various pools visitors have been taking part in during the whole week and thus have a glimpse of what Quakers think about Quake1 and all Quake1-related issues.

Will there be another QExpo? It all depends on you and on how you felt about this first edition. One thing is sure: we, organizers of this year's edition, want to thank all the people who participated in it and wish you had as much fun taking part in it as we had setting it up ;-)

 

QuakeWorld

 

This tenth day is the ideal time for servers to use rotations of all the various deathmatch maps released during QExpo. As was the case for yesterday, schedules, maps and addresses are likely to be posted quite late, so be sure to check the main page from time to time for furhter information on that.

 

Speed Event : Speed-Speedrunning

The last speed event of QExpo will involve the various maps released during the week. The idea is the same as for Wednesday, except that it will make use of one map chosen from those wich have been made available. There is going to be one or two restrictions to avoid people from preparing themselves beforehand, though. So showing off your speedrun skills might be a little more difficult than expected ... Be sure to check the main page for more information on this speed event and the supervisor involved. 

 

IRC Meeting

 

#qexpo on irc.innergamer.net has been throughout the week the official room for everything QExpo-related and we hope you had fun hanging around in it. Since this is the last day, we hope to see even more people than usual there. Many of the QExpo participants will be there to answer questions, so be sure to drop by for the last big QExpo IRC party :-)