Playing through the early 2000s with a Voodoo GPU

Date:
Fri, 03 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0000

Description:
Out-of-time hardware and wishful thinking werent enough to run Counter-Strike.

FULL STORY ======================================================================

Its hard to pinpoint exactly when I started to assiduously use my PC as a gaming platform. I think it happened around the turn of the century, when I got into gaming magazines and many doors opened.

For some reason, I wasnt crazy about video games during my childhood years; I had a PS1 and often toyed with other consoles when I visited my friends and cousins, but my parents werent pestered by please, buy me the latest hardware demands.

Since I was born in 1992, I made do with what I could access. My disregard
for the latest, trendiest games also meant my gaming diet was kind of unorthodox and lacked many generation-defining titles, such as Final Fantasy VII or Metal Gear Solid. I wasnt a big Nintendo fan either. I simply got closer to PlayStation and PC by chance.

Despite my parents obliviousness to PC hardware, the second PC we had was quite beefy and served me well. It was also the PC that got me into PC gaming through the first half of the 2000s.

I cannot remember all the specifics, but it was packing a Pentium III, enough RAM to handle most games at the time, and an amazing Voodoo3 3000 GPU with a whopping 16 MB of memory.

That rig was perfectly fine for the late 90s and early '00s, but I had to stick with it until 2007 when games were starting to require 256 MB of VRAM
or greater, so I ended up lagging behind and understandably spent more time with consoles until I got a new setup. Alright, Hero. Its time for some Pain (Image credit: Id Software)

The first PC game that really grabbed me was Quake II, but there was no way I was going to be able to run it on our family PC. It wasn't until the third game arrived in 1999 that I got my change. Magazines were raving about Quake III: Arena; it was a huge graphical jump for the saga, and the online tech it was packing set a gold standard for every shooter that came after it.

Back then, I had no idea about system requirements or graphical settings, and I learned about tech-y things on the go on my own, so installing games was just a matter of praying to the elder gods for a positive result the executable not closing itself as soon as it opened.

Quake III was merciful though, as its recommended requirements asked for a Pentium III, 64 MB of RAM, and 16 MB of video memory my PC ran it
comfortably at 800x600. Afternoons were endless in The Longest Yard 24/7 servers, and filling my Q3 folders with custom characters and maps quickly became a hobby. Rei Ayanami railgunning Darth Vader? That was the good stuff. You are mutating (Image credit: Fox Interactive)

If youre wondering about more famous shooters, like Half-Life and Counter-Strike, I slept on them for too long. I tried my luck with Counter-Strike 1.6 around 2005 though; it didnt run on my PC, and I ended up installing it on my mothers laptop, which had a Pentium 4 and 64 MB of video memory.

Nonetheless, most of my time with Counter-Strike was spent in a gaming-oriented cybercafe that me and my friends raided on the weekends. Only God knows how much pocket money we spent there.

Big film franchises have always been a big part of my life, too, and that includes their respective video games. In the case of Aliens vs. Predator, Paul W.S. Andersons film hadnt happened yet, but comic books and some older game adaptations already existed.

I completely missed Rebellions first game in 1999, but the sequel, which was developed by Monolith and released in 2001, was 100% my jam during my early teenage years. It also ran surprisingly well on my PC even though I was just above the minimum settings 32 MB GPUs were quickly becoming the new standard for higher settings.

The asymmetrical FPS gameplay was unlike anything I had played before, and each species had different classes/roles that catered to different
playstyles. I was absorbed by the multiplayer component for the longest time.

Aliens vs. Predator 2 was my first foray into competitive gaming; while it wasnt a mainstream shooter, the game thrived and developed a healthy
community of clans. I met some really nice folks from all over the world thanks to this game, and as a native of Spain, it played a huge role in developing my English language skills. Real time strategy games made me a convert

RTS games were also key to my early development as a PC gamer. The genre was anything but accessible in the 90s, and I vividly remember tumbling my way through Chaos Island: The Lost World, a Jurassic Park title, in 1998.

That wasnt a good first impression, and I didnt go back to strategy games until Age of Empires II, which was and still is a must-play. Even a toaster could run that one, and its UI was a marked improvement over other titles interfaces. I started playing it around 2002, but another RTS soon cemented itself in my mind soon after: Warcraft III.

Blizzards return to the world of Azeroth blew everyone away. It was the
second most-played game in our favorite cybercafe, and (thankfully) ran well enough on my home PC. For a 2002 release, the system requirements were very reasonable, and only the recommended 32 MB GPU was above what I packed too many frost wyrms or tanks in the later stages of a match and my poor Voodoo3 started to cough.

Warcraft III also opened my eyes to RPGs; I hadnt played Diablo II, but some of it bled into Blizzards first 3D RTS heroes were unique units that could level up and obtain objects and equipment. I dug this system, and the first DOTA iteration, which was born as a Warcraft III map, would only make me more interested in RPG mechanics. I spent most of my time playing regular matches with bots though.

Shortly afterwards, a high school friend who was really into RPG and RTS
games told me about Age of Mythology, which marked the franchises jump to 3D graphics. This entry took hold of me with more strength than the second Age
of Empires; the mix of the classic real-time strategy formula with various mythologies was hard to resist, plus the soundtrack is a loop of bangers, making it easily Ensemble Studios best-sounding game. Sadly, I never figured out the online portion of the game it required fiddling with ports and IP addresses, things I didnt bother with back then.

[ Editor's note: the US state of California has recently filed a lawsuit against Blizzard Activision, making serious allegations of workplace harassment. You can read the latest developments in that lawsuit here . ] Satisfying other needs (Image credit: Maxis Studios)

Gaming on a PC during the 90s and 00s without touching a simulation game was literally impossible. They were everywhere, as they took great advantage of personal computers horsepower. Of course, simulation game is a very broad description, as those games have gone in wildly different directions and borrowed from many genres over the years.

Nowadays, most people may describe The Sims 4 as a strategy title, and theyre not wrong. Still, that franchise deals with simulation, and the first one
took the world by storm by offering something previously unseen: taking control over a digital characters daily life. It sounded like most boring video game pitch ever on paper, but everyone became addicted to it. I joined the party a bit later than 2000, but I got there.

The first Sims wasnt a very demanding game. I remember the load times were a bit rough, but you could spend non-stop hours glued to the screen afterwards, so those longer-than-usual wait times were totally worth it. While Ive gone back to The Sims 2 and 3 over the years, The Sims 1 and its amazing expansion packs remain in my memories of the first half of the 2000s, and will probably stay that way. Nostalgia often leads to disappointment, and Id like to avoid that one.

Another series of simulation games that found great success was Zoo Tycoon, Microsofts answer to RollerCoaster Tycoon. This franchise has kind of
survived through the years with sequels, a smaller reboot for Xbox One, and a failed spinoff titled Zoo Tycoon Friends that released in 2014.

None of them have come close to the originals charm. It has aged beautifully thanks to its 2.5D sprites and locked isometric view, which have allowed it
to adapt extremely well to higher resolutions without stability problems. Its expansion packs, Dinosaur Digs and Marine Mania, were also nuts and added completely new systems to the game. I especially enjoyed the latter, and
going crazy with the width and height of the water enclosures never got old. The games that had to wait

Dont get me wrong, I firmly believe theres never been a better time to be
into video games, yet I doubt well remember this age as fondly as those that came before. Of course, nostalgia is doing a bit of the talking here, but there was something inherently comforting about games being simple and
magical spaces that werent changing with every passing week.

As the midpoint of the decade approached, my PC was understandably left behind. Games became too big, graphics too complex, and the digital machinery under their surface too demanding. I did play titles such as Grand Theft
Auto: Vice City or WH40K: Dawn of War on my mothers laptop, but my gaming rig was quickly becoming a dinosaur.

I also received a PS2 soon after it was launched, so I drifted more towards that for a while. But I couldnt help but feel envious when my pals showed me the latest Star Wars Battlefront mods on PC. I was having a blast with that game (and later its sequel) on PS2, but everything was bigger in the PC version.

When I finally got a new build in 2007, I installed that game as soon as possible and loaded it with mods. Then I discovered The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and you can imagine how that went.

MMORPGs also became huge during those years, and World of Warcraft dominated the gaming landscape by the end of 2004. I missed that joyful celebration too and spent too much time looking for something similar that ran on my crusty hardware. This wasnt a matter of money; I simply didnt contemplate asking my parents for a computer upgrade that wasnt obligatory. That changed a couple
of years later, and with my own money, but I cant help but feel I missed out on some good fun.

Its wild to look back at all this and think about how different gaming was back then. Indie titles were almost non-existent, same thing with
free-to-play alternatives, and digital storefronts didnt kick off until Valve launched Steam and everything that came with it.

The lines between genres werent as blurred either. Products were clearly defined (and more expensive), and we spent countless hours with the same
games for years. These days, we tend to get distracted too often, and our backlogs know no end. Its hard to keep track of and keep up with everything that releases.

Dont get me wrong, I firmly believe theres never been a better time to be
into video games, yet I doubt well remember this age as fondly as those that came before. Of course, nostalgia is doing a bit of the talking here, but there was something inherently comforting about games being simple and
magical spaces that werent changing with every passing week. How much bigger can they get before they overwhelm us? Welcome to TechRadars PC Gaming Week 2021 , our celebration of the greatest gaming platform on Earth. Despite the global pandemic and ongoing GPU shortages, PC gaming has never been more vibrant and exciting, and throughout the week well be reflecting this with a selection of in-depth articles, interviews and essential buying guides.



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