The end of an era

2004 is a big year for PC gaming. The sequels to two of the most influential computer games of the 90s are going to be released. Doom 3's release is now less than a week away. Half Life 2 will out shortly after, along with an updated CounterStrike Source. iD has announced that their next game will be totally new. No more Doom, no more Quake. Raven Software, located in Madison, Wisconsin, is currently developing Quake 4 with the Doom 3 engine. iD, however will not be involved. Will we ever see a Half Life 3?

Electronic gaming is nothing new. It dates back to the 1970s. PC gaming is nothing new either. For many gamers, they have never lived in a period without electronic gaming. The 1990s where, perhaps, one of the most important periods yet in gaming, and certainly in PC gaming.

I believe that we were never again see such a gigantic leap in technology as we did in the 1990s. In the beginning, pc gaming was dominated by archaic strategy games and platformers. Platform games where hugely popular following the success of Super Mario. For the PC, we saw Jill of the Jungle and Commander Keen. Commander Keen, oddly enough, brought to us by iD's legendary John Carmack. iD quickly took the lead in pc gaming with the development of Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Doom.

It wouldn't be fair to focus solely on iD. Following the CD-ROM was a multimedia adventure called Myst. Myst turned out to be one of the best selling games of all time until the Sims stole its claim to fame. Many hardcore gamers remain unimpressed by Myst, yet its influence can not be denied.

After the release of Doom, the pc gaming world was bombarded by "Doom clones." Some where complete disasters, others turned out to be better. Star Wars Dark Forces was one of those. Around the same time as iD released Quake, out came Duke Nukem 3D. While Duke Nukem 3D was based on older technology, while Quake had fully-3D monsters, Duke Nukem 3D remained a worthy competitor.

Both Duke Nukem 3D and Quake were popular multiplayer games. Around this same time an argument began to erupt that we still hear over and over today. Camper! Later down the line, we began hearing lines such as: newb! The modern online first person shooter was beginning to evolve.

Finally, 1999 saw the highly anticipated Quake 3. A year earlier, we saw Half Life. The 1990s brought us all the way from sprite-based platform games to graphic card - accelerated 3D games. Today, in-game graphics look more realistic that much of the box art and cut-scenes of games of the past. Where will we be at the end of the 00s? Things will look difference, but surely it won't be quite a leap as the 1990s brought.