Bots, graphics, and the PC demo

Speaking of which, the bots in UT 3 should be the best ever programmed for the series. Long time Epic AI programmer Steve Pogue told us that the bots can not only handle thing like Deathmatch and normal CTF but they are a lot better at handling the vehicles and can even pull off some of the special moves like the Scorpian's eject self-destruct feature. He told us that at the AI's higher levels they have been beating Epic's very experienced UT 3 developers team. Since about half of the previous game's players never went online it's nice to know that Epic will be able to give those folks the same kind of multiplayer experience (are you listening, Bungie?).

A quick word on graphics and features; yes, the game does run on both DirectX 9 and DirectX 10 but Epic isn't really using any advanced features for the DirectX10 version; they deliberately wanted to keep system specs on the low side to let as many people play the game as they could. If you have an AGEIA PhysX game physics hardware card installed, UT 3 has an option to offload the game's physics to the card but there won't be any extra effects generated (AGEIA is demoing a custom UT 3 level that does include special effects like destructible environments via a tornado that can destroy and suck up players, vehicles, and even buildings, but Epic is not developing that level themselves).

Players will also be able to customize the looks of the characters (there are four different teams, two human and two alien, each with four different characters) with different helmets, faceplates, armor and so on.



And what about that promised PC demo? Epic told us that the ShangriLa deathmatch level and the Suspense vehicle CTF level will be included alongside a deathmatch level we got to see but not play; HeatRay, an urban city style level that occasionally drops a Necris Dark Walker vehicle via a spaceship for one lucky player to access if he or she is quick enough. The game will support bot play as well as online and LAN multiplayer play. No there won't be a Warfare map in this demo but Epic said if they update the UT3 demo at some point they might put in a Warfare level (they have added content to previous Unreal Tournament free demos in the past).


So will UT fans love UT 3? While we only got to see parts of the final game it's hard to believe that this next game in the series won't be the best yet in this long running franchise. The Warfare style of gameplay is an excellent refinement of Onslaught, the new human and alien vehicles are terrific, and the game looks great and plays really fast. Our only question mark is the single player campaign. Will we want to play it straight through or will we get bored with it and just start playing multiplayer? In any case, Epic has once again loaded up UT 3 with a ton of content that would be enough for three normal games nowadays. Epic still plans to release the PC version of Unreal Tournament 3 this November; that playable demo should be released in a matter of days.