Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

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Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

Developer(s) Splash Damage
Publisher(s) Activision
License Freeware
Engine id Tech 3
Version 2.60b (2.60d for Mac)
Platform(s) Linux, Mac (Universal), Windows
Release date(s) May 29, 2003
Genre(s) First-person shooter
Mode(s) Online Multiplayer
Rating(s) ESRB: Mature (M)
Media Internet download
System requirements 600 MHz CPU, 128 MB RAM, 32 MB OpenGL graphics card, 56.6k Modem/LAN
Input methods Computer keyboard/Mouse

Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory (also referred to as simply Enemy Territory, ET or WET) is a free multiplayer FPS set during World War II.[1][2] It was originally planned to be released as a commercial expansion pack to the popular FPS Return to Castle Wolfenstein and later as a standalone game.[3] However, due to problems with the single-player aspect, the multiplayer portion was released on May 29, 2003 as a freeware standalone game.[4] In early 2004 the source code for the game logic (not the game engine) was released to the benefit of its modding community.[5] The game uses a modified RTCW engine, itself being a modified Quake III: Team Arena engine (which has been open-source since 2005).

The majority of Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory servers run various mods,[6] such as Jaymod,[7] No Quarter,[8] ETpub,[9] and ETpro.[10]

Contents

[edit] Gameplay

Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is an online multi-player game, where the players interact with each other over a network in two teams (Allies and Axis) to defend or destroy mission objectives.[3] The game is playable over the Internet or a Local Area Network. Like many online games, cheating and exploit communities exist. To counter this, the game has support for PunkBuster, an anti-cheat solution.[11]

There are six officially released maps (North Africa Campaign: Gold Rush, Siwa Oasis, and Seawall Battery; Europe Campaign: Rail Gun, Wurzburg Radar, and Fuel Dump),[12] as well as hundreds of custom maps made by the internet community.[13] On each map, the offense needs to complete a certain set of objectives within a limited amount of time. The defense needs to keep the offense from completing objectives until time runs out. Some objectives may be optional, and some objectives can be carried out by either team. These minor objectives assist the team completing them. Depending on Game Mode the action will continue on another map (Campaign Mode) or the same map (Objective Mode, Stopwatch Mode, Last Man Standing).

In all but the LMS mode, dead players respawn all at the same time, every X seconds. In the default maps - assuming that the server settings aren't changing it - Allies spawn every 20 seconds and the Axis every 30 seconds, the only exception being Rail Gun where both have a 20 second spawn. With default settings, you can see the spawn timer in the right side of the screen. Experienced players should watch the timer all the time - dying to a 1 second spawn practically means losing your position (and a life, if the server has the rarely used Limited Lives feature enabled) and resetting your health and ammo, while a 30 second spawn can be deadly if there are only a few players. A good tactic is to find out the spawn time of your enemy, for example looking at the mission timer, and time your attacks so that every dead opponent will have to wait a full time spawn.

In the official six-map campaign (most common on public servers), Allies are offense for all but one map. In Stopwatch Mode (most common for locked or LAN servers) two teams - most common setups: 6vs6 or 3vs3 - will play the same map twice, once in each side and the winner is determined of who have the fastest offense (it can be a tie when both teams defense manage to keep the offense from completing the objectives until time runs out).

Players may earn experience points in several skill categories. All character classes may earn points in Battle Sense and Light Weapons. Class skills are generally restricted to the current class, the exception being Heavy Weapons (the Soldier class skill).

Players have certain abilities based on their character class. The player has a Power Bar that provides 'power' for their special abilities. The power bar regenerates slowly. Constructing the Command post speeds up the recharge rate though. Players have up to eight weapon slots, depending on character class. The classes that are available are engineer, soldier, field ops, medic, and covert ops.

[edit] Character classes

Each character class has several unique abilities

[edit] Soldier

The soldier is the only class that can use heavy weapons. They are: mortar, portable machine gun (MG42), flamethrower, and bazooka/Panzerfaust. On the No-Quarter mod the Venom machine-gun and the BAR (Allies) or StG44 (Axis) have been added as well. Leveling up gives the Soldier benefits such as the ability to run with heavy weapons (instead of being slowed down).

[edit] Medic

The medic has the unique ability to drop health packs, as well as revive fallen players with a syringe. They also regenerate health at a constant rate, and have a higher base health than any other class, which makes them the most common class for close-in combat. When a player has achieved skill level 4 in medic, they get Self Adrenaline which enables them to sprint for longer and take less damage for a certain amount of time. Some of the medics act as Rambo Medics. Their emphasis is on killing rather than healing or reviving.

[edit] Engineer

The engineer is the only class which comes equipped with pliers, which can be used to repair vehicles, to arm/defuse (dynamite or land mines), or to construct (command posts, machine-gun nests, and barriers). As most missions require some amount of construction and/or blowing up of the enemy's construction to win the objective, and as defusing dynamite can be very useful, engineers are often invaluable, and one of the most commonly chosen classes. The engineer is also the only class capable of using rifle muzzle grenades.

[edit] Field ops

The field ops is a support class which has the ability to drop ammo packs for other players, as well as call air strikes (by throwing a colored smoke-grenade at the target) and artillery strikes (by looking through the binoculars and choosing where they want the artillery support fired). This class has low initial health, but makes up for having an unlimited supply of ammunition.

[edit] Covert ops

The covert ops is the only class which can use the scoped FG42 automatic rifle, the silenced Sten submachine gun (or MP-34 on some Mods), and a silenced, scoped rifle (M1 Garand for Allies, K43 Mauser for Axis). The covert ops has the ability to wear a fallen enemy soldier's clothes to go about disguised, throw smoke-grenades to reduce visibility temporarily, and place and remotely detonate explosive satchels. By looking through a pair of binoculars, the covert ops can spot enemy landmines, bringing them up on their team-map. The covert ops also shows enemy soldiers on the team-map.

[edit] Vehicles

The game includes several types of vehicles (usually tanks, trucks, or trains). They are not player-controlled; rather, they have a preset path which they will follow when they are in good repair and a friendly player is nearby. Some have mounted machine-guns which players may use.

[edit] Ranking and advancement

Players start off as a Private (Allies) or Schütze (Axis).

Through gameplay, experience can be gained for three categories: Battle Sense, Light Weapons, and a skill determined by the player's current chosen class. Certain class benefits remain with the player even if they change classes, and benefits from the two general skills are available to the player throughout, regardless of class change. Once a player has accrued enough experience points in a particular skill, the skill is automatically advanced to the next level, providing the player with a new ability or advantage. There are four attainable levels in each skill, awarded at 20, 50, 90 and 140 experience points; some mods add new levels. One mod adds five additional levels to each skill for a total of nine levels in each skill.

Depending on the server's settings, a player's experience can be deleted at the end of a campaign, when he/she disconnects, or after a set period of time. Experience can also be saved even upon disconnection. In competitions and select public servers, rankings are disabled, meaning that XP gives no advantage. The meaning of this is to make games faster; as defenders usually get a lot more XP, they would become stronger during the match, making the end game very difficult for the offensive team.

[edit] Mods

In early 2004, the source code for the game logic was released in an SDK, since then various mods have been released to the community: this source code release afforded mod designers a further amount of customization. The actual game engine is still closed source as of early 2009 — the entire source code to Quake III Arena, for example, was released 6 years after the game was initially published. One of such mods is True Combat Elite (TCE) which shifts the scenario to modern warfare between terrorist and counter terror teams. Skins, and weapons are reworked as well as removing the experience system are seen in TCE.

[edit] Enemy Territory Fortress

Enemy Territory Fortress, or ETF, is a Capture the Flag-style mod. It is a sideways port of Q3F, a mod for Quake III Arena, which is in turn an adaptation of the popular Team Fortress mod for QuakeWorld/Quake.

The first public version was released in January 2005, attracting a lot of attention. The last version, 1.6, was released July 20, 2005. The development team announced that further development was discontinued in February 19, 2006.

[edit] Enemy Territory: Quake Wars

A commercially released follow-up to Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory has been developed by Splash Damage, titled Enemy Territory: Quake Wars. It does not carry on the World War II setting from Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory and is instead set in the Quake universe. The gameplay is based directly on its predecessor, but with the addition of features such as larger maps, controllable vehicles and aircraft, and asymmetric teams.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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