What Epic is doing to the franchise that built their company - the very namesake of their engine that powers most of the gaming universe, is beyond baffling to me. In fact, it's rather infuriating to see what Epic have decided to become.
it was pennies to them to keep the master servers up, how is it that valve is still keeping the master servers for their oldest games that peak to 20-30 players every weekend
@@memes_gbc674 Shoot down the master servers, who cares? But let players buy/download the game and dedicated server to be able to continue the fun. I say this even though I did not play UT for more than 15 years.
UT 2004 was THE go-to game for my LAN party group for years. No matter what other, newer, shinier options were on offer, there would always be at least one UT deathmatch running at all hours of the night, and everyone got in on the fun, no matter how little FPS they played otherwise. It has a timeless, pick up and play magic about it, matched only by Mario Kart.
It's hard to explain to younger gamers what a HUGE deal UT2004 was at the time. I was too poor to afford a gaming PC, but my buddy Chris let me play at his place whenever, and it was glorious. I cherish that time so much.
It's just like explaining to younger people now the value of growing up WITHOUT smart phones, with actual real life friends, riding bikes and crap like that. The world had changed very fast and much for the worst. I'm glad we got to grow up in such a time with good honest fun and with amazing games. People now are just used to mediocre to crappy products thinking that's just the norm. Poor bastards.
I had a 1280x1024 LCD monitor at the time but those were so expensive back then. So the PC was too slow to run these on native resolution because I still had a weak graphics. This game eventually convinced me to upgrade.
I had a room in my house set up with 5 PCs in a LAN. Had friends over for playing 2k4, original UT, Serious Sam, etc - it was glorious! I might even have enjoyed that time of my life more than the original arcade scene from the early 80's. Maybe.
It's kind of weird. I remember playing UT99 from my dad... around the time 04 would of came out with no clue about it. Hey, UT99, Tac Ops, and Halo CE worked for a bit until I could spread my young wings further myself. Love the older stuff though. As much as I wanted to play the current stuff, I still appreciated what I had because it was fun. Like even dying seemed more fun then. I dunno if it was just how crazy it all looked, the sounds, or just being young
On Noclip's docummentary on Warframe (made by Digital Extremes), the now CEO of DE, Steve Sinclair starts the conversation on "people tell me 'I hate the lighthing gun what is that horrible thing' and im just like 'yeah, that was me'" hah
The lightning gun has an otherwise unused killfeed line for players who manage to kill themselves with a hit-scan weapon... It includes "PLAYER defied the laws of physics". =P
@@kirkanos3968 Also we could've done all kinds of weird things with them using all kinds of tools that CAME WITH THE DAMN GAME. Almost as if the devs themselves wanted us to enjoy and have fun with their games, rather than begrudgingly tolerate our existence as it is now.
7:46 "... though it has seen better days: it's rapidly aging, and it's darn near falling apart since the mid 2000s, but hey... who hasn't ?" Aww man, right in the feels!!
Ut2004 was my entire childhood. My grandpa had this and for as long as I can remember we always played this anytime we visited. Probably the first real video game I played.
It's amazing how great UT2004 still looks! That era of 3D game just has this awesome aesthetic that wasn't trying to be real life, but also had a bunch of contrast and lights to keep you engaged.
i never got into it much, i played it on a couple of LAN parties and a few times with some mates later using teamspeak or something similar, but it never really hooked me in much, it seemed like just a quick fun thing to do in suuuper short burtsts!
Wow. 20 years ago, I was at a LAN Party. The host left to go to best buy, came back with one copy of UT 2004. Gave it to somebody else. He went into a bedroom, came back later that night, cracked it, and gave us all copies. It was legit all we played that entire time!
It must have been amazing lol. I was born too late for these big lan parties (still played lan with some friends, but mostly out of necessity instead of nostalgia).
It was even crazier later on. From a certain update on, the CD was not needed anymore to play, even in LAN multiplayer. So we were installing the same copy on every PC, installed the latest update back then and were all good to go
I've been doing that a lot this year thanks to movies I watched as a kid or teenager having some big anniversaries this year lol. The matrix turned 25, Shaun of the dead is 20, Terminator is 40, etc.
@@Sum_Yousah hey now, I'm 31! Played the HECK out of this as a child. Looking back, i bet you didn't think that the mf that kept killing you in instagib ctf was an 11 year old girl 😹
UT2004 was peak multiplayer PC gaming. It had absolutely everything in a single package, tons of game modes, an absurd variety of maps, multiple weapons, player skins, mods, high skill ceiling for the hardcore, a 3-hour long soundtrack with D&B music to apocalyptic choirs, etc. No FPS game has come close to the amount of content UT2004 had just on day one.
@@Aggrofool idk dude, servers were constantly full and I remember UT2k4 was a staple for the LAN parties I went to (along with CS2). In fact could still find decent amount of ppl playing in 2010 and beyond (mods really kept it going)
this is one of the best games of all time man i would wake up, and just play this game ALLLLLLL day until i went to bed lmfao its so ahead of its time man its UNREAL. the THOUSANDS of custom maps and game modes/mods.. OMFG..... it was literally a better time to be a gamer!!!!!!
@@Kevalanium LOL did people even play online yet on those consoles? & even if they did, how can they claim to be the golden era when they missed the first 10 years of it 😅
Easily spent over 20,000 hours in the UT Franchise........ mostly 99, but 2003 and 2004 were fun. Amazed how slow some of the video scenes appear compared to the competitive nature we had back in the day, it was so fast on the semi-pro and pro scene. Back when custom mods, maps and skins were all free, no loot boxes, self-hosting servers....... Thank you for the memories.
The ice level and the forest level in UT2K3 blew me away graphically. I remember playing it on my friend's Geforce 3 and being so jealous and awestruck. I also think UT2K3 had great music. I had some of those .ogg files in my playlist for years. Great video, as always!
UT2004 ruled, basically. And this video really just hit home essentially everything about it. Watched this and ended up nostalgic about those days I was almost always at a LAN Cafe that had this and Doom 3/HL2. Though by then, said cafes would play more CS, Korean mmos, and other stuff while Quake and Unreal's popularity dwindled locally, which I still lament. Hell, I hate how the announcer for this got popular in a different WC3 custom map (that spawned a genre lol).
What I remember the most about UT2k4 was the music. There were some absolute bangers that I still listen to today occasionally. Serenity, Rankin, SkaarjAssault
The amount of content right out of the box, and all the numerous options to customize everything you wanted. Damn how I miss that so much. Games used to allow you to just d*ck around, and this is the reason for the longevity and making it legendary.
Yup. I always thought it was funny how UT would ramp me up in a chaotic frenzy, and then I start to coast into that flow state, and finish up feeling totally chill and happy.
Thankfully people who bought it before the takedown can still download it and archive it, but it’s tragic we won’t get any new players until Epic decides to rerelease them.
@@matternicussintroduce new players via the power of piracy. If they're going to commit arson and intentional destruction, torrenting is the natural cure!
So good. Still plays really well. Its fun to see a game thats just "mechanically sound" , no ADS, no killstreaks no silly gimmics classes or odd artificial manipulation of the multiplayer. I admire it's purity.
The Ballistics Mod was good fun, I remember playing it with a duel wielding mod to duel wield flamethrowers. Poor Ripper Gun. Your bouncy discs of serrated fire-and-forget was enjoyed by me.
I don't really consider myself a fan of EDM but with how much I still listen to the Unreal series OST, you'd be forgiven for believing otherwise. Skyward Fire and Forgone Destruction are two tracks that really take me places..
7:50 -"It's rapidly aging and darn near falling apart since mid 2000, but hey who hasn't". I feel personally attacked and also in same time I giggled hard hearing that.
I literally reinstalled the game on my brand new PC two days ago. Still plays amazing and looks beautiful to me. Looking forward to your UT III video in 3 years' time!
This and Halo: CE are the games I always play with my younger nieces and nephews; they really enjoy the sandbox of it all. Something strangely missing in sweaty battle royale games. The eldest one has even gone on to give me a run for my money when he indulges me in my need for nostalgia.
First time finding this channel after feeling nostalgic for the Unreal franchise. I spent so much time with this game in Internet cafes in middle school when I was 13 back in 2004. I didn't have a good PC that could play it. So I had go to one in a local Mall instead.
I loved UT2004. Being in my early teens, my PC was barely able to run the game at all but the sheer scale of it really made me fall in love with the game. Coming from UT99, this felt like a proper sequel.
In my computer tech class at technical high school the teacher would let us have a lan party at the end of some Fridays if we got all our work done. Sometimes on ala Friday we'd be tasked with reformating our drives since we'd mess our computers up with lessons and tests, so we would all reinstall win98 and all associated drivers, ms office, and if you finished faster you could go online or we'd play unreal (the original 99 one).
And the last arena game where I actually enjoyed playing against halfway useful bots in blissful, internet free solitude. Until that last CoD BOps Cold War update...the new botmapping is actually impressive and nobody seems to know about it
God I wish ut2004 was played by literally anyone during my high school time. The only thing they know and care is counter strike, and not even half life death match or even quake
@@dvdlesher Dude. HLDM was the shit, too. My buddy and I had a clan back in the day. We called ourselves TMC.. Two Man Clan. We would get on DM or OG TF and dominate. People would actually leave the map when we got on because we kicked ass. Man that was some fun.
This makes me understand why I love Helldivers 2 so much. It's the same kind of engagement and silliness where they just let the developers do whatever they wanted while never asking for permission or forgiveness.
2:17 you know your old when you reference books like a professional , never played unreal tournement as i was too young at the time but heard much about it , thank you very much for filling in the blanks and damn good work on its presentation
Rip to the goat franchise. A vision of uncompromising competition, ive always loved the gladiator bloodsport vibe of UT. Pure old school twitch skill. Sad to see that unreal is only relevant as the unreal engine these days. A true classic for the pc nerds. Great video!
Back when some geniuses at Circuit City put them on the demo PCs, and were networked...people would have impromptu matches against other shoppers. I think it sold more well-spec'd Compaq and HP computers than anything else
I never owned the full proper game I played the demo mostly exclusively. Only fairly recently picked up the full game on steam. Still have my demo installation files and they still work well too.
My favorite UT of all time. Introduced vehicles (which I preferred over the Halo vehicles) and was much more well balanced than UT3. UK24 > UT > UT3 > UT2003 IMO
Can't believe it's been 20 years I still play UT2004 from time to time , we have a modified trials server where we speed run hundreds of maps against each other down to the milliseconds with a lot of maps and times now being very close to what the community considers humanly perfect. Some footage on my channel from a couple of years ago if anyone is interested. Really is such a shame that Epic removed UT from being purchased digitally and also washed their hands with latest project of UT - UT4 (the epic and community led project). This was a great video though and was really nice to watch your review !
UT 2003 was the first FPS game I've played, UT series has a special place in my heart. I tried the game when I was like 4 our 5 y/o, after watching my dad struggle against Malcolm, I ran to the cair and tried to play. The experience was awesome, a whole new genre so everything was new to me
UT2004 was the first FPS game I seriously played and made me fall in love with the genre. I remember downloading the demo on the internet, which was also a first for me, and being blown away by the Onslaught mode especially. When I finally bought it, I was even further floored by the astounding mapping and modding community and vividly remember all the good times I had with friends I never met in real life on my regular servers. Sure, what Epic did to the series and itself is wholly and irredeemably despicable, but I'll always be grateful to that original team for creating something that brought me joy in a way no other game really has since.
This was a great retrospective and walk through of all the features of this game. I barely ever strayed from onslaught back in those days, but to see how cool everything else was definitely makes me want to revisit and play again. That is AWESOME to learn about the alternative master servers too. I had no idea! This has me stoked. Hopefully I can get this working through Steam somehow lol.
the modding scene for this game was absolutely bonkers and there was so many additions of maps. gameplay mods and so on. I recall how assault mode had some really amazing maps on MP. and invasion was arguably a BIG one too as modders created a whole genre of making it a rpg invasion mode where you now had big monster packs with unique and crazy challenges to them. and you could now level and upgrade and add stats and perks. that stuff was my early teens playing some really popular assault map servers and a few invasion rpg mod servers. it really gave what was pretty decent modes even deeper depth.
@@OpenTournament appreciate the work put into it.I do remember that one of my favorite though not sure if it was the global best AS mode server was nachos and beer. they had some of my favorite maps for it. specifically the C&C maps that had a very unique mechanic made into it using the objective system from the mode. and they hosted maps too where ballistics mod was baked into it too? i was always playing on some favorite modded invasion server or that server for AS mode. Cant venture to guess how many hours i spent on both.
@@killerguythefox Yeah I remember C&C but pretty vaguely, seemed like you need to have played C&C Renegade to fully understand what was going on in those maps/modes
Graphically it sucks. It has a simple rounded poligono abstraction and a modern sci-fi neon/jungle palette but it still sucks.It was already old when it was out the same year of Doom III and Half-Life 2 both in realism and universe building. It was the peak of the refined versions of Quake 3 gameplay with vehicles and all those different kind of modalities and that is why it is still cool
@@sambas9257 Half-Life 2 revolutionized the gaming landscape, while DOOM 3 stood out as a graphical powerhouse. However, a game’s aesthetic extends beyond mere polycounts. Personally, I’d choose the vibrant graphical style of UT2004 over today’s monotonous, microtransaction-laden shooters any day.
There is nothing like the feeling of map domination in Torlan when you position your tank blasting your opposing team as they desperately try to escape their home base after the loss of all their power nodes.
I remember playing the UT03 demo and just being amazed at the ragdoll physics after you got the ball into the enemy goal and you just tumbled down on all those bars.
The music, that intro splash screen along with your hype man makes me wonder what happened do games these days. Developers went all out and just had fun.
seeing you play with that crazy weapon mod around 30:20 really brought back memories, I played UT2004 alot back around 2009-2012 when I lived with my mom and didnt have the best computer, endless hours of fun using those weapon mods in bot matches. Thank you for that little bit of nostalgia
The game is very much still alive and there are still active servers. It's very easy to download and install with a few web searches. If you liked this game you should try playing again! Modern FPS with their character classes and battle royales don't hold a candle to this classic game.
Hey Clint! Long time viewer but first time commenter. What you said about the zen state UT ‘04 gives you hit me hard. It’s the same way I felt growing up as more of a console gamer and playing Timesplitters 2 multiplayer on my GameCube in high school. There’s this beautiful, intense, frenetic flow state that comes from a suitably twitchy and fast paced arena shooter, and it’s something I find lots of modern shooters are missing. Great video as always! You made me want to go find a copy of UT2004 for myself now! I never played it back in the day, so better late than never. It looks like a blast!
I loved unreal tournament and i used to play the one under development on unreal engine before fortnite came out. It was sad when fortnite came out and became huge as development for UT slowed then stopped. Its even sadder to know that Epic games decided to remove all unreal tournament titles from their site and steam. Ill never understand companies and their need to remove legacy games. 😢 i havent finished the video but as soon as i saw the title, i felt sad and happy seing it.
It would cost them nothing and make them money to keep old games in stores. They can simply declare that the game is unsupported and delivered as-is. No cost, but people will buy them.
This was the game that introduced me to FPS games when I was 9 years old. If you ever did a retrospective on Empire Earth then I'd know we had the same childhood
UT2004 was one of my first online FPS. Got it for my 16th birthday (in 2006), and still own the copy. It was a simple single DVD version at that point. Ended also falling into the rabbithole of mods, with Ballistic Weapons being basically a must-install for me even to this day, and playing the original mod-version of Killing Floor.
One of the best games ever made totally needs a remaster I still play it all the time. I'm a modern PC. I just love seeing that logo that you get for having maximum specs versus when you don't
The remaster would have season passes and microtransactions and would be censored to Hell and back and probably a ton of input latency and a ton of autoaim for controller players.
This game is my childhood and the game i compare every other first person shooter to, to this very day. And the Unreal Championship 2 fan made port to PC, is something i'm very much looking forward to seeing to completion.
@@LGR It's a damn shame they never ported UC2 officially to PC if you ask me. The game looks absolutely amazing to play with how melee was integrated in to the gameplay and how characters have their own adrenaline abilities. It could have been the best Unreal game if it a PC version with modding tools and stuff that 2004 had like Assault, Onslaught and Invasion. I'd still be playing Invasion RPG servers as much as i did with 2004 if that was the case.
It always makes me feel super old to see more and more of these 20, 25, 30 years later videos...but god are they always fun! Great job, Clint! Definitely a fun time!
We did the same thing, for whatever reason, the school saw it fit to kit out the CAD and robotics computers with Athlon XP Thoroughbreds and GeForce 4 Ti 4600s. Our IT guy was the shit and had an FTP with all the goodies for us to take advantage of those machines.
It was the reverse for me, I took a CAD class because I used unreal editor. Only at lunch did the unreal fun begin, only a few of the computer could run 2004 so we mainly played 98.
Some of UT2004 music is such a decade-long earworm. KR Hyperblast Redux theme (I guess a legacy from single player 'campaign's last level...) still pops up in my head randomly from time to time And SDG-ONS08 track is so unique and memorable too
I remember the day this was delivered. I was at work, waiting impatiently to return home so i could install this game, and start slaying noobs. I actually forgot about the special edition, which i had. That aluminum sleeve was hefty. Early UT games were fantastic. Absolute classics.
I would honestly love if modern games could still look like this. It takes up less space on your machine, more people can actually run it, it still looks great and the worlds/maps could be massive, reduce development time and cost and much more. Honestly a near perfect looking game in my eyes. I love the aesthetics from games made in the 90's up to the mid 2000's.
@@MaitreMechant I have nostalgia for both styles. The gorgeous and timeless pixel art from the 16-bit era being blended together by a bad composite signal to create effects with the technical limitations, and the blurry low poly mid-to-late 90's look, along with the early-to-mid 2000's look... They all look amazing to me and they charm the absolute hell out of me.
The “boomer shooters” genre has a bit of this. A lot of it runs a little older in style (copying Doom or Quake) but there’s a lot of fun indie options there that might scratch that itch (and all 4-10gb!)
This was such an awesome video, thank you for all the time and work you put into it! Im so jealous of your dos gaming collection lol. Its even worse because you're the one who got me into dos gaming in the first place!
It was the Golden Age of mods and user created maps at the time and I vividly remember playing and loving the mod Checkmate, which would today be a hero shooter ala Overwatch. And that 2 decades ago. And with the Community Bonus Packs the map pool increased with a lot of hq maps with some having such good music tracks, which I still listen today.
UT 2004 was the first FPS game I have played extensively in MP, including mods (especially Frag.Ops, Alien Swarm and Killing Floor but also some SAS: Into the Lion's Den, Air Buccaneers and Carball). Speaking of mods, I used a whole hard drive for UT 2004 later on for custom maps, mutators, mods, skins and models. So yeah, UT 2004 is very close to my hard (even though UT 2003 was the first UT game I've played).
Man I never owned an Xbox myself, I was not prepared for the wave of intense nostalgia. One of my best friends had one back in the day, I spent many weeks staying over at his house. Thanks for the time trip!
It's crazy how much of UT's combat DNA can be seen in Fortnite. The whole "jump and shoot" mechanic continues to be there even though it's not an arena shooter. It was never my jam, but as an enjoyer of games, it's interesting to see how concepts in gaming mutate over time.
UT 2004 and Quake 3 are forever in my heart. Although I liked Quake 3 better and it was more popular in my country back then. UT 2004 was awesome too. Nowadays they don't make such games anymore :(
![I.N "HALLUCINATION" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/n5B5q1Hwt_U/mqdefault.jpg)
What Epic is doing to the franchise that built their company - the very namesake of their engine that powers most of the gaming universe, is beyond baffling to me. In fact, it's rather infuriating to see what Epic have decided to become.
Hear hear!
Its all fornite, battlepasses, titty cartoon characters and gen z now :/
i wouldnt be surprised if they renamed their engine to the Epic Engine@@LGR
That's why corporate types have no business in the gaming world.
Seriously, F*** Epic.
The way Epic handled the Unreal series is truly heartbreaking.
@basicallyhuman UT4 had basically no competition, Epic just decided to chase money with Fortnite instead.
it was pennies to them to keep the master servers up, how is it that valve is still keeping the master servers for their oldest games that peak to 20-30 players every weekend
I’m still not happy about it (I still have my copies of those games before they got delisted tho).
@@memes_gbc674 Shoot down the master servers, who cares? But let players buy/download the game and dedicated server to be able to continue the fun. I say this even though I did not play UT for more than 15 years.
@@fus132 Epic were stupid for putting all eggs in one basket, and cancel UT. Fortnite won't be a money bin forever.
UT 2004 was THE go-to game for my LAN party group for years. No matter what other, newer, shinier options were on offer, there would always be at least one UT deathmatch running at all hours of the night, and everyone got in on the fun, no matter how little FPS they played otherwise. It has a timeless, pick up and play magic about it, matched only by Mario Kart.
Hey this isn’t anime what goin on here? Also UT 2004 is still the most fun I’ve ever had in an FPS
The map and mod support was awesome.
It's hard to explain to younger gamers what a HUGE deal UT2004 was at the time. I was too poor to afford a gaming PC, but my buddy Chris let me play at his place whenever, and it was glorious. I cherish that time so much.
I also had a buddy Chris whose house I would play this at. He had a Mac tower that he got a new graphics card for specifically to play this.
It's just like explaining to younger people now the value of growing up WITHOUT smart phones, with actual real life friends, riding bikes and crap like that. The world had changed very fast and much for the worst. I'm glad we got to grow up in such a time with good honest fun and with amazing games. People now are just used to mediocre to crappy products thinking that's just the norm. Poor bastards.
I had a 1280x1024 LCD monitor at the time but those were so expensive back then. So the PC was too slow to run these on native resolution because I still had a weak graphics. This game eventually convinced me to upgrade.
I had a room in my house set up with 5 PCs in a LAN. Had friends over for playing 2k4, original UT, Serious Sam, etc - it was glorious! I might even have enjoyed that time of my life more than the original arcade scene from the early 80's. Maybe.
It's kind of weird. I remember playing UT99 from my dad... around the time 04 would of came out with no clue about it. Hey, UT99, Tac Ops, and Halo CE worked for a bit until I could spread my young wings further myself. Love the older stuff though. As much as I wanted to play the current stuff, I still appreciated what I had because it was fun. Like even dying seemed more fun then. I dunno if it was just how crazy it all looked, the sounds, or just being young
UT 2004 being on LGR is so wild. In 3 years we'll start seeing Crysis and Bioshock.
Crysis: ruclips.net/video/vpAwptm-O7w/видео.html
I know. It hits home when you see a car from your teenage years, and it has an antique license plate on it.... FML.
It's such a fucking tragedy this franchise was removed from the digital marketplace.
For real. What a weird way to celebrate the 20th anniversary. No idea wtf is happening with Epic.
@@SinisterPuppy They only care about their cash-cow Fartnite that's what's happening with Epic.
You can still get original UT99 from GOG and there are still a lot of servers to play! ✌️
@@SinisterPuppybusiness and finance over everything else is what happened
They could Either offer the games for free in their store or update them to work better with modern systems...
On Noclip's docummentary on Warframe (made by Digital Extremes), the now CEO of DE, Steve Sinclair starts the conversation on "people tell me 'I hate the lighthing gun what is that horrible thing' and im just like 'yeah, that was me'" hah
I feel like Steve had made up for it since then haha. (big Warframe fan here)
The lightning gun has an otherwise unused killfeed line for players who manage to kill themselves with a hit-scan weapon... It includes "PLAYER defied the laws of physics". =P
@@Krynis yeah warframe slaps
What's your favorite frame?
I came here to comment this, that part of the interview is fucking hilarious
Man I miss those days when having 37 maps was seen as not good enough. Now we'd be lucky to have 5 maps and have to pay more for any other maps lol
No kidding, we didn't know how good we had it
And then there were the awesome community map packs too!
Forgot the #1 fact back then we used to own our game we paid for not just buying a license to play them.
@@kirkanos3968 Also we could've done all kinds of weird things with them using all kinds of tools that CAME WITH THE DAMN GAME. Almost as if the devs themselves wanted us to enjoy and have fun with their games, rather than begrudgingly tolerate our existence as it is now.
Xbox fans and old COD players reading this: 😳
7:46 "... though it has seen better days: it's rapidly aging, and it's darn near falling apart since the mid 2000s, but hey... who hasn't ?"
Aww man, right in the feels!!
I loved UT2003 and UT2004! I had the game as a kid and I still love it! Especially the music!
Love how you can always pull out 5 different releases of the same game. A true collector!
I do find it quite gratifying tracking down all the alternate releases and special editions I couldn’t afford back then or never knew about 😁
I do wish you'd give Unreal Championship 2 a proper review, it's one of the many forgotten gems of the OG xbox
That Ball Delivery shot that barely missed... I felt that deep in my soul.
The way my stomach turned when that happened
In my opinion UT2004 is the best vanilla Arena FPS game of all time. An absurd amount of content out of the box.
agreed
Best one was UT99.
@@tech5882 yeah 99 was peak first person shooter.
@@tech5882UT2004 was one of my first fps, UT99 was already too much old school for me at the time ^^
3:13 "Hor-As-! Hor-As-! Hor-As-!" I see I wasn't the only one who did that lol.
Ut2004 was my entire childhood. My grandpa had this and for as long as I can remember we always played this anytime we visited. Probably the first real video game I played.
It's amazing how great UT2004 still looks!
That era of 3D game just has this awesome aesthetic that wasn't trying to be real life, but also had a bunch of contrast and lights to keep you engaged.
Yeah the original style of '04 really shines through. A modern re-release with remastered textures would be awesome.
I love sci fi design of that era
The awesome thing is that the mod tools are all in there! We could make a remake ourselves if Epic doesn’t care about it!
I played SO MUCH Unreal Tournament. It absolutely triggers that "good old days" feeling any time I see or hear anything about it.
i never got into it much, i played it on a couple of LAN parties and a few times with some mates later using teamspeak or something similar, but it never really hooked me in much, it seemed like just a quick fun thing to do in suuuper short burtsts!
@@raafmaat neat. Many of us played it for hours and hours :)
Hi
Wow. 20 years ago, I was at a LAN Party. The host left to go to best buy, came back with one copy of UT 2004. Gave it to somebody else. He went into a bedroom, came back later that night, cracked it, and gave us all copies. It was legit all we played that entire time!
It must have been amazing lol. I was born too late for these big lan parties (still played lan with some friends, but mostly out of necessity instead of nostalgia).
i loved lan partys
It was even crazier later on. From a certain update on, the CD was not needed anymore to play, even in LAN multiplayer. So we were installing the same copy on every PC, installed the latest update back then and were all good to go
So glad to see Onslaught getting some love. I thought I was the only one that adored it and was bewildered that it never got the props it deserved.
ONS and VCTF both! Those vehicles with their physics were so much fun those days!
One of the best larger scale vehicle warfare, would be amazing to have it revived in newest unreal engine
That moment you realise you're now 20 years older
I've been doing that a lot this year thanks to movies I watched as a kid or teenager having some big anniversaries this year lol. The matrix turned 25, Shaun of the dead is 20, Terminator is 40, etc.
iam an old guy now
@@jr2904 im as old as Terminator? fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuq......................
🙄 ffs
@@Sum_Yousah hey now, I'm 31! Played the HECK out of this as a child.
Looking back, i bet you didn't think that the mf that kept killing you in instagib ctf was an 11 year old girl 😹
2004 was such an awesome year for gaming, can't believe it's been 20 years already...
And the last too…
back when you didn't need 10 different game clients eh.....and could put a cd or dvd in a drive!
UT2004 was peak multiplayer PC gaming. It had absolutely everything in a single package, tons of game modes, an absurd variety of maps, multiple weapons, player skins, mods, high skill ceiling for the hardcore, a 3-hour long soundtrack with D&B music to apocalyptic choirs, etc. No FPS game has come close to the amount of content UT2004 had just on day one.
That's absolutely true. TBH it puts most other games to shame
I loved it so much.
Well kinda. By 2004 everyone got sick of arena shooters, Battlefield was the shizz
@@Aggrofool idk dude, servers were constantly full and I remember UT2k4 was a staple for the LAN parties I went to (along with CS2). In fact could still find decent amount of ppl playing in 2010 and beyond (mods really kept it going)
@@Aggrofool battlefield didn't even start getting big until almost 2 years after ut2k4...
this is one of the best games of all time man
i would wake up, and just play this game ALLLLLLL day until i went to bed lmfao
its so ahead of its time man its UNREAL.
the THOUSANDS of custom maps and game modes/mods.. OMFG..... it was literally a better time to be a gamer!!!!!!
Still my favorite FPS game of all time. Great video
Love these retrospectives and throwback to old excellent games.
Thanks, I'm glad to hear!
I worked in a wildlife refuge for months in isolation no Internet no phone....that game was very important to me. It was a great game!!
"Geared up for war" now that you mentioned it, I see the connection.
I chuckled at that part (10:00).
also the GOW hammer of dawn flying by while talking about the orbital laser 27:41
20 years... Shit I feel old. UT2K4 was one of the last of the golden era of gaming.
Thats so incorrect the xbox 360/ PS3 era alone were golden era of gaming.
@@Kevalanium Definetly not. And the golden era was never console gaming.
UT 2004 was best game for lan party oh gosh I feel old but I'm only 30yo lmao
@@Kevalanium LOL did people even play online yet on those consoles? & even if they did, how can they claim to be the golden era when they missed the first 10 years of it 😅
This game was my jam back in the day. Spent so much time on Torlan I probably STILL remember where all the guns are on it.
i still play all 4 games in the series regularly, like a balding man clinging to his last pieces of hair, remembering a once great time
Sorry what was that about hair loss?
Hey!!!! I’m not clinging I’m just lazy 😎
I too am balding
Homer, is that you?
Asking for a friend.. how can you play them today? (legally)
Easily spent over 20,000 hours in the UT Franchise........ mostly 99, but 2003 and 2004 were fun. Amazed how slow some of the video scenes appear compared to the competitive nature we had back in the day, it was so fast on the semi-pro and pro scene.
Back when custom mods, maps and skins were all free, no loot boxes, self-hosting servers.......
Thank you for the memories.
Yeah 120% speed was no exception at all, sometimes even more.
The ice level and the forest level in UT2K3 blew me away graphically. I remember playing it on my friend's Geforce 3 and being so jealous and awestruck. I also think UT2K3 had great music. I had some of those .ogg files in my playlist for years. Great video, as always!
UT2004 ruled, basically. And this video really just hit home essentially everything about it. Watched this and ended up nostalgic about those days I was almost always at a LAN Cafe that had this and Doom 3/HL2. Though by then, said cafes would play more CS, Korean mmos, and other stuff while Quake and Unreal's popularity dwindled locally, which I still lament.
Hell, I hate how the announcer for this got popular in a different WC3 custom map (that spawned a genre lol).
What I remember the most about UT2k4 was the music. There were some absolute bangers that I still listen to today occasionally. Serenity, Rankin, SkaarjAssault
The wonders of Kevin Riepl. A musical genius. The other 2 composers were great too, but KR rose the bar really high with the orchestral style.
The amount of content right out of the box, and all the numerous options to customize everything you wanted. Damn how I miss that so much. Games used to allow you to just d*ck around, and this is the reason for the longevity and making it legendary.
Nailed that "Zen state" thing. Perfectly describes what it felt like, and took me back to those wonderful days
Yup. I always thought it was funny how UT would ramp me up in a chaotic frenzy, and then I start to coast into that flow state, and finish up feeling totally chill and happy.
Such a fun time. It's an absolute travesty UT got wiped from GOG.
Thankfully people who bought it before the takedown can still download it and archive it, but it’s tragic we won’t get any new players until Epic decides to rerelease them.
@@matternicussintroduce new players via the power of piracy. If they're going to commit arson and intentional destruction, torrenting is the natural cure!
Bought Unreal Gold like a month before they took it down. Wtf epic
So good. Still plays really well. Its fun to see a game thats just "mechanically sound" , no ADS, no killstreaks no silly gimmics classes or odd artificial manipulation of the multiplayer.
I admire it's purity.
The Ballistics Mod was good fun, I remember playing it with a duel wielding mod to duel wield flamethrowers.
Poor Ripper Gun. Your bouncy discs of serrated fire-and-forget was enjoyed by me.
I don't really consider myself a fan of EDM but with how much I still listen to the Unreal series OST, you'd be forgiven for believing otherwise. Skyward Fire and Forgone Destruction are two tracks that really take me places..
7:50 -"It's rapidly aging and darn near falling apart since mid 2000, but hey who hasn't". I feel personally attacked and also in same time I giggled hard hearing that.
I literally reinstalled the game on my brand new PC two days ago. Still plays amazing and looks beautiful to me. Looking forward to your UT III video in 3 years' time!
This and Halo: CE are the games I always play with my younger nieces and nephews; they really enjoy the sandbox of it all. Something strangely missing in sweaty battle royale games. The eldest one has even gone on to give me a run for my money when he indulges me in my need for nostalgia.
0:27 Cute coincidental convention, Clint can confidently concur!
First time finding this channel after feeling nostalgic for the Unreal franchise. I spent so much time with this game in Internet cafes in middle school when I was 13 back in 2004. I didn't have a good PC that could play it. So I had go to one in a local Mall instead.
I loved UT2004. Being in my early teens, my PC was barely able to run the game at all but the sheer scale of it really made me fall in love with the game. Coming from UT99, this felt like a proper sequel.
Imagine a current multiplayer FPS loaded with 37(!) maps on release day.
AA games.
UT2004 was the centerpoint of our school LAN parties. Still love it!
In my computer tech class at technical high school the teacher would let us have a lan party at the end of some Fridays if we got all our work done.
Sometimes on ala Friday we'd be tasked with reformating our drives since we'd mess our computers up with lessons and tests, so we would all reinstall win98 and all associated drivers, ms office, and if you finished faster you could go online or we'd play unreal (the original 99 one).
And the last arena game where I actually enjoyed playing against halfway useful bots in blissful, internet free solitude.
Until that last CoD BOps Cold War update...the new botmapping is actually impressive and nobody seems to know about it
God I wish ut2004 was played by literally anyone during my high school time. The only thing they know and care is counter strike, and not even half life death match or even quake
@@dvdlesher Dude. HLDM was the shit, too. My buddy and I had a clan back in the day. We called ourselves TMC.. Two Man Clan. We would get on DM or OG TF and dominate. People would actually leave the map when we got on because we kicked ass. Man that was some fun.
This makes me understand why I love Helldivers 2 so much. It's the same kind of engagement and silliness where they just let the developers do whatever they wanted while never asking for permission or forgiveness.
2:17 you know your old when you reference books like a professional , never played unreal tournement as i was too young at the time but heard much about it , thank you very much for filling in the blanks and damn good work on its presentation
Rip to the goat franchise. A vision of uncompromising competition, ive always loved the gladiator bloodsport vibe of UT. Pure old school twitch skill. Sad to see that unreal is only relevant as the unreal engine these days. A true classic for the pc nerds. Great video!
I have played 1000 hrs of this game's demo on a Dell Dimension PC with my dad.
Amazing times they where.
Hell yes the demo was all you needed
AS Torlan theme must be fried into your brain, just like mine
Back when some geniuses at Circuit City put them on the demo PCs, and were networked...people would have impromptu matches against other shoppers. I think it sold more well-spec'd Compaq and HP computers than anything else
I never owned the full proper game I played the demo mostly exclusively. Only fairly recently picked up the full game on steam. Still have my demo installation files and they still work well too.
Special mention has to go to the UT2003 announcer, who is so memorably over-the-top that he pretty much sells the sports theme all by himself.
Same VA just very over the top sporty performance
easily one of the best multiplayer fps of all time, it's too bad there isn't a true modern successor, but people still play UT2K4!
My favorite UT of all time. Introduced vehicles (which I preferred over the Halo vehicles) and was much more well balanced than UT3. UK24 > UT > UT3 > UT2003 IMO
Still remembering its announcements in magazines and how amazed I was regarding its graphics. To this day it’s one of my favorite Games of all time!
Can't believe it's been 20 years I still play UT2004 from time to time , we have a modified trials server where we speed run hundreds of maps against each other down to the milliseconds with a lot of maps and times now being very close to what the community considers humanly perfect. Some footage on my channel from a couple of years ago if anyone is interested. Really is such a shame that Epic removed UT from being purchased digitally and also washed their hands with latest project of UT - UT4 (the epic and community led project). This was a great video though and was really nice to watch your review !
UT 2003 was the first FPS game I've played, UT series has a special place in my heart.
I tried the game when I was like 4 our 5 y/o, after watching my dad struggle against Malcolm, I ran to the cair and tried to play. The experience was awesome, a whole new genre so everything was new to me
UT2004 was the first FPS game I seriously played and made me fall in love with the genre. I remember downloading the demo on the internet, which was also a first for me, and being blown away by the Onslaught mode especially. When I finally bought it, I was even further floored by the astounding mapping and modding community and vividly remember all the good times I had with friends I never met in real life on my regular servers.
Sure, what Epic did to the series and itself is wholly and irredeemably despicable, but I'll always be grateful to that original team for creating something that brought me joy in a way no other game really has since.
This was a great retrospective and walk through of all the features of this game. I barely ever strayed from onslaught back in those days, but to see how cool everything else was definitely makes me want to revisit and play again. That is AWESOME to learn about the alternative master servers too. I had no idea! This has me stoked. Hopefully I can get this working through Steam somehow lol.
"falling apart since the 2000's, what isn't"
Right in the feelz
Yeah like the Patriot Act and No Child Left Behind.
good times.
YES!
the modding scene for this game was absolutely bonkers and there was so many additions of maps. gameplay mods and so on. I recall how assault mode had some really amazing maps on MP. and invasion was arguably a BIG one too as modders created a whole genre of making it a rpg invasion mode where you now had big monster packs with unique and crazy challenges to them. and you could now level and upgrade and add stats and perks. that stuff was my early teens playing some really popular assault map servers and a few invasion rpg mod servers. it really gave what was pretty decent modes even deeper depth.
Worked a ton on MonsterMash & MonsterEvolution RPG Invasion & Assault. Servers are still running & getting updated content.
@@OpenTournament appreciate the work put into it.I do remember that one of my favorite though not sure if it was the global best AS mode server was nachos and beer. they had some of my favorite maps for it. specifically the C&C maps that had a very unique mechanic made into it using the objective system from the mode.
and they hosted maps too where ballistics mod was baked into it too? i was always playing on some favorite modded invasion server or that server for AS mode.
Cant venture to guess how many hours i spent on both.
@@killerguythefox Yeah I remember C&C but pretty vaguely, seemed like you need to have played C&C Renegade to fully understand what was going on in those maps/modes
Game still looks great in 2024
Graphically it sucks. It has a simple rounded poligono abstraction and a modern sci-fi neon/jungle palette but it still sucks.It was already old when it was out the same year of Doom III and Half-Life 2 both in realism and universe building. It was the peak of the refined versions of Quake 3 gameplay with vehicles and all those different kind of modalities and that is why it is still cool
Whenever I revisit it, that's why I think too. They really were at the top of their game in those years
@@sambas9257it looks fine.
@@sambas9257 Half-Life 2 revolutionized the gaming landscape, while DOOM 3 stood out as a graphical powerhouse. However, a game’s aesthetic extends beyond mere polycounts. Personally, I’d choose the vibrant graphical style of UT2004 over today’s monotonous, microtransaction-laden shooters any day.
Agreed. It still looks good despite the anarchistic art style.
Some of the best weapon animations in gaming. I played the shit out of this. Also, the Scythes on the Scorpion jeep, so dope!
Great work, man!! Your retrospective is accurate and a real treasure for us, nostalgic gamers.
There is nothing like the feeling of map domination in Torlan when you position your tank blasting your opposing team as they desperately try to escape their home base after the loss of all their power nodes.
I remember playing the UT03 demo and just being amazed at the ragdoll physics after you got the ball into the enemy goal and you just tumbled down on all those bars.
The music, that intro splash screen along with your hype man makes me wonder what happened do games these days. Developers went all out and just had fun.
Now they've all converted to the religion of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.
seeing you play with that crazy weapon mod around 30:20 really brought back memories, I played UT2004 alot back around 2009-2012 when I lived with my mom and didnt have the best computer, endless hours of fun using those weapon mods in bot matches. Thank you for that little bit of nostalgia
The game is very much still alive and there are still active servers. It's very easy to download and install with a few web searches. If you liked this game you should try playing again! Modern FPS with their character classes and battle royales don't hold a candle to this classic game.
Just watching the video for the first time and at 17:18 when I heard that description I thought to myself: 'cue Atlantis' :D nice job LGR!
Hey Clint! Long time viewer but first time commenter. What you said about the zen state UT ‘04 gives you hit me hard. It’s the same way I felt growing up as more of a console gamer and playing Timesplitters 2 multiplayer on my GameCube in high school. There’s this beautiful, intense, frenetic flow state that comes from a suitably twitchy and fast paced arena shooter, and it’s something I find lots of modern shooters are missing. Great video as always! You made me want to go find a copy of UT2004 for myself now! I never played it back in the day, so better late than never. It looks like a blast!
I loved unreal tournament and i used to play the one under development on unreal engine before fortnite came out. It was sad when fortnite came out and became huge as development for UT slowed then stopped. Its even sadder to know that Epic games decided to remove all unreal tournament titles from their site and steam. Ill never understand companies and their need to remove legacy games. 😢 i havent finished the video but as soon as i saw the title, i felt sad and happy seing it.
We can build it
@@OpenTournament please elaborate.
It would cost them nothing and make them money to keep old games in stores. They can simply declare that the game is unsupported and delivered as-is. No cost, but people will buy them.
@@LTonyGames2099 Open Tournament is a spiritual successor to the UT series of games
I am drunk, watching this having some snack and God I miss those times. I love you and your content, Clint. God bless you and UT2K4.
This was the game that introduced me to FPS games when I was 9 years old. If you ever did a retrospective on Empire Earth then I'd know we had the same childhood
UT2004 was one of my first online FPS. Got it for my 16th birthday (in 2006), and still own the copy. It was a simple single DVD version at that point.
Ended also falling into the rabbithole of mods, with Ballistic Weapons being basically a must-install for me even to this day, and playing the original mod-version of Killing Floor.
One of the best games ever made totally needs a remaster I still play it all the time. I'm a modern PC. I just love seeing that logo that you get for having maximum specs versus when you don't
a remaster would be PERFECT
dgVoodoo2 is your friend here :)
A remaster would be cool, but it plays and runs so well already.
@@brinksectionz It does. The only problem is the only server is still playable our freeze tag
The remaster would have season passes and microtransactions and would be censored to Hell and back and probably a ton of input latency and a ton of autoaim for controller players.
This game is my childhood and the game i compare every other first person shooter to, to this very day.
And the Unreal Championship 2 fan made port to PC, is something i'm very much looking forward to seeing to completion.
Same, I really want to play more of it but the Xbox original is rough around the edges.
@@LGR It's a damn shame they never ported UC2 officially to PC if you ask me.
The game looks absolutely amazing to play with how melee was integrated in to the gameplay and how characters have their own adrenaline abilities.
It could have been the best Unreal game if it a PC version with modding tools and stuff that 2004 had like Assault, Onslaught and Invasion. I'd still be playing Invasion RPG servers as much as i did with 2004 if that was the case.
Many many many many hours of my life went to UT in all it's forms.
It always makes me feel super old to see more and more of these 20, 25, 30 years later videos...but god are they always fun! Great job, Clint! Definitely a fun time!
Onslaught mode is still one of the greatest multiplayer experiences out there.
Id love something to utilize it again as well as ut2k4 did
The game mode itself was great, I loved it, but the success was mostly due to the well balanced vehicles/physics for both on-foot and vehicle combat.
Battlefield brought some new additions to the genra, but i always missed Onslaught, i still hope it will be revived someday
This was the game I set up on all school computers in drafting class. Oh coach thought we were drafting CAD files!
We did the same thing, for whatever reason, the school saw it fit to kit out the CAD and robotics computers with Athlon XP Thoroughbreds and GeForce 4 Ti 4600s. Our IT guy was the shit and had an FTP with all the goodies for us to take advantage of those machines.
CAD... with guns
UnrealEd is a great intro to architectural design IMO
It was the reverse for me, I took a CAD class because I used unreal editor. Only at lunch did the unreal fun begin, only a few of the computer could run 2004 so we mainly played 98.
UT2K4 was such a big part of my life. Shout out to the great people at Big Battle Servers when that was a thing.
CTF-Citadel was life. At least 50% of my puberty was spent on that map.
Some of UT2004 music is such a decade-long earworm. KR Hyperblast Redux theme (I guess a legacy from single player 'campaign's last level...) still pops up in my head randomly from time to time
And SDG-ONS08 track is so unique and memorable too
I remember the day this was delivered. I was at work, waiting impatiently to return home so i could install this game, and start slaying noobs. I actually forgot about the special edition, which i had. That aluminum sleeve was hefty.
Early UT games were fantastic. Absolute classics.
Oh same. Except Amazon messed up and sent me an Indonesian copy of Farcry instead.
I would honestly love if modern games could still look like this.
It takes up less space on your machine, more people can actually run it, it still looks great and the worlds/maps could be massive, reduce development time and cost and much more.
Honestly a near perfect looking game in my eyes. I love the aesthetics from games made in the 90's up to the mid 2000's.
You will [150GB, SSD REQUIRED], and you will be happy
same, lots of people have nostalgia for retro pixel art but for me it's these kind of graphics that I just love
@@MaitreMechant I have nostalgia for both styles. The gorgeous and timeless pixel art from the 16-bit era being blended together by a bad composite signal to create effects with the technical limitations, and the blurry low poly mid-to-late 90's look, along with the early-to-mid 2000's look... They all look amazing to me and they charm the absolute hell out of me.
The “boomer shooters” genre has a bit of this. A lot of it runs a little older in style (copying Doom or Quake) but there’s a lot of fun indie options there that might scratch that itch (and all 4-10gb!)
@@briandyche I have a lot of them. Can't wait for Selaco!
Thank you that not forget about UT2004! One of my favorite games, play each year. Shame on Epic Games, that forget about Unreal Tournament.
I grew up loving the Christmas Map on 2003. The fact u seem like little toys was too cool to little me
This was such an awesome video, thank you for all the time and work you put into it! Im so jealous of your dos gaming collection lol. Its even worse because you're the one who got me into dos gaming in the first place!
It was the Golden Age of mods and user created maps at the time and I vividly remember playing and loving the mod Checkmate, which would today be a hero shooter ala Overwatch. And that 2 decades ago.
And with the Community Bonus Packs the map pool increased with a lot of hq maps with some having such good music tracks, which I still listen today.
UT 2004 was the first FPS game I have played extensively in MP, including mods (especially Frag.Ops, Alien Swarm and Killing Floor but also some SAS: Into the Lion's Den, Air Buccaneers and Carball). Speaking of mods, I used a whole hard drive for UT 2004 later on for custom maps, mutators, mods, skins and models.
So yeah, UT 2004 is very close to my hard (even though UT 2003 was the first UT game I've played).
The UT2004 soundtrack is "mid 2000s" in a way that nothing else can be. It's incredible.
Its sounds so much like the techno soundtrack of Fast and Furious 1.
That's tracker music for ya. Very distinctive.
@@russelldoty2743 Ironically, UT2004 mostly didn't use tracker music, haha.
Legit cackled and giggled for five whole minutes at the remembrance of PAAANCAAAKE....
Man I never owned an Xbox myself, I was not prepared for the wave of intense nostalgia. One of my best friends had one back in the day, I spent many weeks staying over at his house. Thanks for the time trip!
It's crazy how much of UT's combat DNA can be seen in Fortnite. The whole "jump and shoot" mechanic continues to be there even though it's not an arena shooter. It was never my jam, but as an enjoyer of games, it's interesting to see how concepts in gaming mutate over time.
Indeed, my old UT Onslaught skills carried over pretty well to Fortnite!
Well, other than the quick building mechanic. I was glad when that went away.
@@LGR That's gone away? Might have to try Fortnite again! Thanks for the reply, Clint!
Epic's treatment of this franchise proves that piracy is morally correct.
It only proves that companies can eff off, on the gamer's perspective.
UT 2004 and Quake 3 are forever in my heart. Although I liked Quake 3 better and it was more popular in my country back then. UT 2004 was awesome too.
Nowadays they don't make such games anymore :(
Quake 3 online in those years was amazing, I was fully obsessed
I liked Quake 3 better as well.
Yeah, you had the two camps. Depending on what you touched first. UT99 was obviously an answer to Quake3.
Thank you for doing this video. My god the hours spent at LAN parties multiplaying this game.. such amazing fun time memories
Excellent video, Clint. One of my favorite cult classics right here. I am still partial to OG UT myself but one can’t deny the appeal of 2004.