The trend that the multiplayer modes of shooters enhance their longevities is not lost on id; forums and fan sites for id's games continue to pester id for improvements long after their games have been released, and these improvements were mostly requests/demands for these games' multiplayer modes.
Yet, some, if not a lot of, long-time time fans would not have expected id to have the third game in the Quake franchise - if it can be called the "third" game - almost completely dedicated to the pursuits of multiplayer, or more precisely matches with participants who approximately have the same capabilities.
Unlike the previous Quake games, which were the first to popularize certain gameplay designs, Quake 3 Arena is slightly late to do so with multiplayer-focused shooters. However, it offers complementary designs that some of its peers, such as Unreal Tournament, do not have.
Like Quake 2, Quake 3 Arena starts with a short CGI cutscene briefly touching on the premise of the game, which is even more otherworldly than any of id Software's previous games. It is about a super-dimensional being abducting fighters from across multiple universes (namely those of id's games) to force them to participate in a tournament of sorts. That is pretty much all there is to the premise.
Single-player mode has the player fighting through the tiers of the tournament against AI-controlled opponents called "bots". Each tier has a few matches to be fought. The first tier has bots with the least aggressive AI. Later tiers will have bots that are gradually more difficult to battle. Every few matches or so, the player will be placed in a duel with one of the models for player characters, which will practically be an introduction to the next tier of bots (and thus the next level of AI scripting for them).
These models apparently have been given additional but limited personalities by id Software through special cutscenes that play when the player has defeated them, and are incidentally the poster-persons for Quake 3 Arena as well. Examples include Sarge and Xaero.
Other than this little bit of unique (if a bit unremarkable) fun, the single-player mode is best considered as a training tool for multiplayer - and as that, it certainly does excel.
AI opponents taunt each other (and the player) and gloat over kills, develop vendettas within a match itself, and even have weapon preferences depending on their models. For example, the model known as "Bitterman" prefers the Shotgun and Rocket Launcher, and will often seek these weapons out first in a match.
Team Deathmatch is where the proficiencies of their AI show off the most, as they will often maintain some semblance of a group and back each other up when called to give support. (AI team members also respond to any calls that the player himself/herself makes.)
However, there are still quite a lot of flaws in their AI, such as not collecting items when they are just a few steps away when it would be prudent to do so but instead opted to keep some distance away from an incoming enemy. There are also some embarrassing ones, such as AI players forgetting that to their back is an abyss that would have them plummeting to their doom.
Ramping up the difficulty of the single-player mode only appears to change their accuracy scripts, as well as alter the ratio of damage that they incur to damage that they can dish out. The sophistication of their AI scripts is dependent on which tier that the player has played to.
On the other hand, in multiplayer, the host has the option to fill empty slots in the roster of players with bots and set the sophistication of their AI. However, there is no option to alter their damage taken/dealt ratio, which is a design decision made to balance multiplayer. (On the other hand, they are pretty much cannon fodder for already experienced players, even at their highest difficult setting.)
Multiplayer mode is the strongest aspect of Quake 3 Arena. It is better integrated into the game compared to the multiplayer mode for previous Quake games, though this has more likely to do with the fact that both modes share the same content and game materials.
The types of matches that can be played are the usual sort that can be found in shooters in the post-Quake era: Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch and Capture-the-Flag. There is supposedly a new mode in the form of Tournament, but it is centered around timed one-on-one duels that only the more patient of shooter fans would like - and such players are rare indeed.
Much like in previous id shooters, hosts create servers for players to join, either over the Internet or in LAN. There is not much advancement in this feature of multiplayer, though it is sufficiently functional.
(As a side note, there were complaints in id's previous shooters that to improve in multiplayer, rookies had to play with more experienced players and suffer a lot of humiliation before they can become skilled enough, if they are not savvy enough to use mods that allow them to set up matches with bots. Quake 3 Arena's single-player mode appears to address this complaint right from its launch.)
From what has been described above, it would appear that both the single-player and multiplayer modes of Quake 3 Arena are not contributing much to the advancement of the shooter genre. Yet, its other game designs are the ones that would make it stand out, and these are ideas that eventually went into the tenets of developing games for the competitive multiplayer subgenre that Quake 3 Arena and its peers will eventually popularize.
One of these game designs is the use of the idTech 3 engine, the successor to idTech 2. This new engine allows the inclusion of new physics-scripting, which is efficient in supporting entertainingly wild translocations of in-game entities across environments that were built using said engine. It also allows the creation of maps with topographies that tie into gameplay much more strongly than previous idTech engines could.
This can be seen as soon as a player's computer loads a map to join a session. A choice screenshot of the map furnishes the loading screen, giving the player a view of the map's most prominent features and (to a shooter veteran) a good idea of how the map is best played.
Wide-open official maps in Quake 3 Arena are designed for fast-paced combat, with plenty of opportunities for players to launch themselves from one end of these maps to another with terrain features that make use of the physics system of idTech 3: appropriately labeled pads and ramps apply sudden and tremendous force onto any player character entity which stepped onto them in the directions that the labels depict, while teleport nodes make use of idTech 3's ability to swap models between locations very quickly and efficiently with little hitches such as collision issues.
(Telefragging still does occur though, and in typical id Software fashion, is a perfectly legal way to slay opponents with.)
Then, there are maps with claustrophobic themes. These limit any attempts to make use of the player character's fantastic mobility (and exploit physics glitches) and encourage a frantic game of cat-and-mouse, which is very different from the hectic running-and-gunning in the aforementioned wide-open maps.
There are also official maps that are designed to be in between these two extremes. These are not necessarily better though, because the two extremes of map designs discourage certain playing behaviors that are frowned upon by many players, such as camping and hogging circuits.
Of course, these maps are only fun to play if they are populated with items that can be collected by players and used against opponents or to bolster oneself with. The latter is another notable game design of Quake 3 Arena.
On paper, they are not immediately remarkable, because many of them are returning items from previous id Software games. However, their notability lies in their design balance.
Each of the weapons in the game is designed with a specific advantage in mind, but little else to compensate for its setbacks. It is up to the player to find other weapons and switch to them as his/her situation changes. This is because there is only one weapon that can be considered general-purpose.
This general-purpose weapon is incidentally one of the two default weapons in the game. It is a new iteration of the Machinegun in Quake II, but without the recoil issues of the latter. More interestingly, it appears to be visually and practically hybridized with the Chaingun of previous id games. It does not have the killing power of the Chaingun, but compared to the Pistols, Blasters and Shotguns used in previous id shooters, it is a lot more effective at killing enemies. Its very tight cone of fire also makes it a viable weapon to use at all ranges.
Yet, while the Machine Gun is surprisingly useful and practical, it is not as effective as other weapons in specific situations.
The other default weapon is a melee weapon, the kind of which has been re-introduced in Quake 3 Arena. The Gauntlet is a new iteration of the Fists in Doom, one that does a lot more damage and has a higher attack rate (two per second). A quick-stepped player can attempt to outmaneuver others to inflict shockingly fast deaths, though the weapon emits loud, perceptible noises as long as it is wielded.
While it is apparent that its main design goal is to encourage the player to use ranged weapons, there are incentives for the player to use the Gauntlet when the opportunity arises. These include special awards for killing enemies with the Gauntlet that stay in the profile of the player, and a loud proclamation from the Announcer that the player has humiliated another with this melee weapon.
(Earlier, beta versions of the Gauntlet have to be charged up to deliver a blow that has the same damage as the default attack of its final version. They were later changed to its final version, which is much more powerful to compensate for its obvious point-blank range requirement for a hit.)
The Shotgun returns in Quake 3 Arena, but similar to the Machinegun, it is an amalgam of the Shotgun and Super Shotgun a.k.a. Double-Barreled Shotguns from previous id shooters. The result is a weapon that is very powerful at point-blank ranges (and thus rewards players who can approach their opponents without being slain by other weapons) and can also be used to pelt enemies that are further away, thanks to its relatively narrow cone of fire.
The Grenade Launcher returns, and its method of killing is even more outrageous now thanks to the physics-scripting of idTech 3. To balance this, they have longer countdowns to detonation, though crafty players can exploit this change to bounce grenades further, as well as lob them over greater distances. On the other hand, they still leave behind a trail of particles that can be traced, and these are more visible now in idTech 3.
The Rocket Launcher is also a returning weapon. It is not much different from the already-balanced version in Quake II, but it benefits from much prettier particle effects for its rockets, which now have trails of smokes that are more pleasant to look at (especially if the player manages to dodge incoming ones). It is also easier to trace than the stream of particles in Quake II.
Another (returning) weapon that appears to have been given a face-lift but little else is the Railgun. However, there are new visual aids that help the player (and other players looking at said player) know when the weapon is ready to fire or when it is being subjected to its long cooldown time between shots. The exaggerated particle trail that it had in Quake II has been replaced by a streak of light that is less obvious, though it is still quite distinctive for any player that managed to spot it on-screen.
id Software's attempts at creating a weapon that produces a stream of particle effects and have the damage application of this weapon being dependent on (or at least visually reflected by) the location of existence of this stream bore fruit in the form of a new iteration of the Lightning Gun, which debuted (in name) in the first Quake.
This weapon goes through its ammunition very quickly, but makes up by having tremendous killing power and the capability to damage multiple opponents in a very short window of time without resorting to splash damage mechanics.
The Plasma Gun from Doom makes a comeback, buffed with new, bright visual effects for its munitions. It fills the gap for a weapon that can fire high-speed (but not hit-scan), high-damage projectiles that also have a bit of splash damage at high rates of fire. However, the default ammo that the Plasma Gun has and the amount of additional shots that Plasma ammo pick-ups provide are very small - too small to sustain a continuous plasma fusillade. In other words, this otherwise devastating weapon is counter-balanced with short supplies of ammunition.
The BFG 10K also returns in Quake III Arena, but this iteration of the BFG is entirely different from the previous ones. It no longer fires a big green orb of doom that floats forward slowly. It doesn't even have the peculiar sight-dependent damage application scripts.
Instead, it can be best described as the Rocket Launcher mated with the Plasma Gun. It may not be like the BFGs of yore at all, but a veteran player who has used it for the first time would realize and appreciate the reason for this drastic change: player characters are faster and more mobile than ever in previous id Software games, and the biggest weapon around has to be able to catch these very fast and plucky combatants effectively.
This is what the new BFG 10K does quite well, though it would be understandable if long-time fans of the BFG would be disappointed by the removal of its unique sight-dependent damage scripts.
Despite the weapons being balanced and having highly situational uses, there appears to be no tutorials for their effective use. There is no single-player campaign to gradually introduce any weapons and show examples of its use, so the player will have to play actual matches with bots or players to familiarize themselves with the weapons.
An id Software shooter would not be one if there are no items other than weapons to be collected. Quake III Arena has most of the usual pick-ups that were seen in Quake II, except that they are now depicted with floating, easily noticeable models.
Health items mostly comprise of the usual pick-up-and-go sorts; the Megahealth buff is also in this game, as well as Stimpacks. There are also some new health-affecting items, such as the Regeneration power-up that automatically restores the player character's health, or even reinforce it beyond the default 100, at a steady rate, albeit temporarily.
There are subtle differences in some returning pick-ups, however. For example, there is only one type of armor now, and it absorbs two-thirds of incoming damage; different armor pick-ups only provide different amounts of armor (thus they are not essentially different from the Armor Shard pick-up).
Invisibility returns, being more useful in this game than it was in previous ones because the AI scripts for Quake III Arena 'recognize' invisibility buffs.
Quad Damage had been criticized as being too devastatingly powerful in Quake II, so it returns in Quake 3 Arena slightly weakened. It only triples damage done by the buffed player character, but considering the new specialized weapons in this game, this is still plenty enough to ruin any opponent foolish enough to run across said player character.
Most importantly, the duration of the buff does not die with the player character if he/she happens to be slain; the power-up simply drops to the ground at where he/she died for the next player character to retrieve it and continue its countdown while receiving the murderous benefits. This certainly makes the Quad Damage a highly sought after and very fun, albeit bloody, power-up.
There are also a few new ones that make use of opportunities provided by idTech 3 for tweaking certain game mechanics and computations.
There is the Battle Suit, which renders the user invulnerable to splash damage from any weapon. It also renders the user immune to the harmful effects of environmental hazards like lava and toxic slime, which incidentally use damage application scripts that are similar to those for splash damage.
Flight is a rare pick-up, which only appears in maps that have tremendous verticality. It practically removes the player character's need for traction and gravity to move around, not unlike a "no-clip" cheat but with collision-scripting still active.
Haste is a power-up that accelerates the player character's computation rates, essentially making him/her/it run twice as fast, shoot twice as fast and even doubles projectile speeds. This is one of the most entertaining new power-ups, with one of the reasons being that few other contemporary shooters have power-ups that can match all of its effects (and consequences on gameplay).
The inventory system in Quake II's single-player mode is somewhat ported over to Quake III Arena. A player character can only hold two types of buffs, however, which can be activated with a button press. One of them is the Personal Medkit, which is a lesser version of the Regeneration power-up. The other is the Teleporter, which when activated, sends the player character over to a random spawning point on the map (possibly telefragging anyone who had just respawned at that very same point).
All buffs with time durations have visual effects that are imparted on the player character. These can be very obvious, making it easy for players to notice buffed opponents from far away.
Graphics-wise, Quake 3 Arena is not very impressive to look at, if its visuals are compared to the pars set by its peers at the time. The idTech 3 engine promises smooth frame rates and fast loading times. It fulfills these promises, but an observer of the development of game engines would notice that it does not have as many bells and whistles as those of other contemporary high-performance game engines, such as those by Epic Games.
Textures in particular appear to have resolutions restricted by limitations in idTech 3. They do not appear to be as articulated as those in other shooters that used a different contemporary game engine. However, idTech 3 allows for a lot of vertices and polygons in models, thus letting game designers create wildly varying models with different hitboxes and skeletons. This is evident in Quake 3 Arena, which have lithe female models, chunky male models, leaner male models or outright inhuman models with multiple limbs and appendages (though only two will be in use). The weapons' visual designs are also good examples.
Of course, the lack of graphical pizazz would not faze those who already have their minds set about liking this game and playing this game in a hardcore manner. For these players, increases in frame rates would be more important than improvements in graphics fidelity. In fact, there are options to deliberately exchange graphical prettiness for more frames per second, such as the option to replace the 3D models for items with simple but still noticeable floating icons.
The sound effects in this game are very beefy, as befitting an id Software shooter. The guns are particularly satisfying to listen to, especially when they are effectively used.
It is disappointing, however, that many of the characters in Quake III Arena lack voice-overs. There are grunts and groans that accompany occurrences like them getting hurt and jumping, but those are pretty much all there is.
On the other hand, the musical soundtrack would be able to compensate for that if the player is after aural incentives for feeling bad-ass. Sonic Mayhem, which made the soundtracks for Quake II, returns in Quake III Arena to provide the heart-thumping music to accentuate matches with.
In conclusion, Quake III Arena doesn't exactly breaks moulds of technology and gameplay mechanics or pioneers them like its predecessors did. However, it does give an excellent example of how shooters that are oriented around competitive multiplayer gameplay should be designed.