Compatible with: Q2PRO (best quality, recommended), Quake 3.24 unofficial patch, Ultimate Quake II patch and KM Quake II. The mod WILL CRASH OR MALFUNCTION UNDER OTHER SOURCEPORTS.
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Quake II: Heavy Metal (Q2HM) is the complete sound effects and music revision for Quake II. Q2HM remakes almost all sound effects of Quake II, giving them power and authority on the futuristic techno-punk battlefields of the game. Do note, that the mod DOES NOT recreate the vanilla-dead FX in some kind of higher quality or whatever. NO. It does not do that. Q2HM ignites the game with a completely different soundscape, which despite having some occasional similarities, - represents MY vision of what should be, and not ID's.
The new effects have been meticulously modded through a great deal of hard work, and are rich, stereo-designed, and provide the most luxurious quality soundscape currently possible for Quake2. It is absolutely on par with my other major sound redesign project (Doom-3-Bravo), although that one has a ton of other features that go way beyond just a sound FX remake.
Q2HM is packed with two alternate soundtracks as well: one for the electronic-atmospheric experience (which works surprisingly fantastic), and the other one is good old hard-rock, which is no less enjoyable. Ground Zero / Reckoning mission packs - are only partially supported (guns only, earlier build).
MOD FEATURES SUMMARY
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REMADE FX:
- All player weapons
- All Strogg weapons
- All Item FX
- All Player FX (damage, jump, land, etc)
- 90% of Strogg voice FX (sight, attack, search, idle, death, etc)
*** Fish, Medic, Iron Maiden and Bosses - retain vanilla voice FX
*** Soldiers and Heavy Infantry have only partially altered voice FX
- Multiple redundant misc/world FX have been either rebalanced or
removed, so they do not to garble the overall soundscape.
Articles
At last, Quake II: Heavy Metal 2.0 - the complete revision and remake of Quake II sound effects - is properly launched. Not only does this version feature a massive amount of new sound FX, but it also remakes or improves upon the vast majority of the ones existing in the previous release. The BFG unleashes with a polished thunderous explosion and revs up to match, fixed single shotgun, new railgun with a railgun recharge, even more oomph to the rocket launcher, further refined the destructive cannonade of the hyperblaster, and of course, - the game's items now sound meaningful and pleasing when you pick them up; just to name a few.
Strogg weaponry has powerful audio upgrades as well: now when you face these enemies, you'll hear that they mean business. Heavy machineguns speak well for themselves, just as good as the rockets do, and a barrage fire from a Tank - will sound exactly like it should. Blaster bolts have a flight and impact FX, which makes them sound even more intense as you dodge and hear the projectiles woosh by and hit the walls around with a becoming bang. I have been keeping things low-key, until i could come up with a proper trailer for the mod. And now, here it is:
Strogg voices also underwent a warlike transformation. To achieve that, i imagined how those cybernetic combinations of man and metal would power up for action. Machine parts whirring, weapon systems activating and loading ammunition, motors humming, jetpacks firing, computer systems running checkups and booting and so on. Juxtaposed with various degrees of each Strogg's ability to speak - led me to create a unique and quite impactful soundscape for (almost) every Strogg warrior, giving them some kind of personality and making them sound formidable and imposing. Even when they are taking damage, they can still maintain such image now. Having that said, i still had to make sure that the voices are unique enough for each of the Strogg and one cannot be confused with another. This is why certain voice fx were kept as they were.
Player action fx went through a modification as well: the annoying whimper and jump sounds have been replaced with something that does not clash with the soundscape flow, which to my vision - solely consists of the atmospheric harmony of music, Bitterman's guns and the Strogg. There are many other subtle sound balance touches, where anything too jarring that breaks this atmosphere - is either subdued or silenced.
On the subject of music, Q2HM 2.0 "Technosphere" makes changes to the version 1.4 music sets, altering the metal set quite significantly with new tracks and going for a more of a hard-rock sound. Also, the second set now consists of dark electronic atmospheric tracks, which work with the game just as good as hard-rock does. The metal set will return with a vengeance, not to worry. But that will only happen in the next version. And speaking of the next version: at the moment, mission pack support remains minimal (limited to player guns only), but that will change in the future. Expect the next version to dot the i's and cross the t's for the maxed out audio-experience of entire Quake II saga.
Let's rock-n-roll, Marine!
Enjoy.
A massive update to the Quake II sound remake project - launches in 10 days!
NewsThe highly ambitious Quake II sound mod finally returns to propel the atmosphere and gameplay experience of this legendary shooter to the ultimate level...
Quake II is revving up with guns, Strogg and Heavy Metal!
News 5 commentsQuake II was not made in seven days...but in seven days it will be reborn! Rediscover your oldschool passion for this masterpiece shooter - with a complete...
Files
Q2HM v2.0 - Full Version
Full Version 17 commentsThis is the real deal: the complete experience. Sound FX AND music. Revel in a top-quality thunderous cannonade of guns. Rock hard with truly powerful...
Q2HM v2.0 Lite
Full Version 2 commentsSame as before: the complete version's little brother: everything is the same, but - without the alternate soundtracks.
Q2HM v1.4 lite
Full VersionThis is like the complete version's little brother: everything is the same, but - without the alternate soundtracks.
Quake II: Heavy Metal (Q2HM) v1.4 - full version
Full Version 7 commentsThis is the full version of the mod: a complete heavy metal experience. Rock on with melodic shred-guitar and powerful riffs as you blast Strogg legions...
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Seems to have some problems with the Re-Release of the game. Most sounds are fine but player weapons are mute somehow
Ah, the "scam version" ;-) hehe. No idea if that even runs on ID-Tech2.
Either way, it is likely to be incompatible for the same old reason: sound engine does not support 44khz stereo. Because a lot of the weapon SFX in the mod - were designed in stereo. That, or some other glitch. It's totally fine by me. I am all for the original Q2 via sourceports + mods. The "remaster" has never happened. Not for me.
Curiosity question: Why do you consider the Remaster a "scam version"?
Very simple: because it does not improve anything that indeed needs improving, and yet dares asking money for such laziness. Take a look at Quake 1.5. That's the way to go. In comparison, this "Q2 remaster" is nothing but a scam.
With a capital "S".
P.S.Q2HM upgrades in the near future.
The remaster is awesome
Excuse me but I disagree. The remaster improves the enemy AI and behaviour so much that it is like a whole new game now, in a good sense. Vanilla Q2 had so stupid and non-agressive enemies with loooooong reaction timings that the game was a cakewalk even on Nightmare (it's seen even in your mod's videos here), yet in Remaster I'm constantly having my *** handed down to me. I geniunely can't enjoy vanilla Q2 anymore because of the stupid enemies. Just this already makes Q2:R a great remaster. Moreover, this new AI is in fact an old AI initially planned by Id for Q2.
And you say "it didn't improve anything that indeed needs improving" which I can't understand at all. I wonder if you actually played it. :)
Yes, we've had "strogg gone mad" mod before, but it's buggy, can't be run on Linux and causes the game to crash frequently, whereas the Remaster is very stable.
Things that need improving:
1. visual FX - as in explosions, fire, gun tracers, particles, water, smoke, blood, dismemberment.
2. Internal and external decorative/architectural design.
3. Sound effects redesign.
4. Music for ALL the levels.
In that order.
As for the difficulty: it is not true that Nightmare has little challenge. If you don't hide behind power shield armor and try to play without taking damage - you'll see that it is pretty challenging. The challenge is simply not implemented in the best of ways. Having more dangerous enemies early on, and combinations of enemies (especially the ones from the mission packs) to up the ante even further - would do the trick. Also,
there are many intuitive ways in which the existing enemies could be instantly adjusted to provide interesting changes.
For example, what if Gunner could fire the machinegun and the grenade launcher at the same time? Or Tank radio for Flyer /Icarus reinforcements after taking a hit? Or if the Medic could resurrect even the dismembered enemies? If Iron Maiden had several rocket attack patterns? And i can go on easily.
Battle design is a modification skill in itself, you know.
But even before all that - when you're revamping the game -
it has first of all to look right and sound right. Only then you go catering to people who can finish Quake2 on nightmare no damage taken - something i have NEVER seen done, and i don't think it's possible.
All the bogus "remaster" does - is introduce cheats into the game: some are for the player - to make it easier, and some are for the enemies - to make up for that. That's all. If you can't see that it did not improve anything that truly needs improving, - then i guess we are on very different shores of the game design galaxy. If you ever decide to make a proper Quake2 revision, then i offer my help gladly and freely. Maybe then we can cross that design chasm in a super-Strogg crusade.
Until then, I will always stand for high standards, high quality in all creative efforts, - and ever against slacking, lazy cash-grabs. The more people are made aware of the scam, the better.
P.S. i practiced those runs on video. I freely admit that. A hundred and one things could go wrong in any split-second there. And it did, couple dozen of times before i got everything just right. And i highly doubt anyone would do the Lost Station level on Nightmare no-damage... So i don't buy all those "no challenge" claims. Poor balancing, now that i can buy. But we can fix it, you and i. Let's cut health and ammo items by 70%, and do the Nightmare run. 100% kills mandatory, or the exit doesn't open. I'll get to Lost Station, you take it from there :-)
I see your point now... Are you trying to tell me "if the game is too easy for you, you are playing it wrong"? :)
What you are offering is to play specific way (no shield, 100% required kills, try to play no damage) to make the game harder. The thing is, Nightmare is the hardest difficulty and it is supposed to be hard whichever way I play, even without self-imposed challenges, isn't it? Otherwise your argument is the same as "you should play Dark Souls only with no armor" or something like that.
Just for the perspective: Quake 1 was in fact quite difficult on Nightmare and gave me much more struggle without having to restrict myself from any of the mechanics.
Game design wise, this "challenge-based difficulty" is just making half the game redundant.
If I shouldn't use shield, why is it in the game? Let's remove it for the sake of "difficulty".
If I require 100% kills, let's make it mandatory, let's make the game have "the last strogg" problem, as it gives sooo muuuuch fun to search for the last one. Besides, what if I'm relatively new player and I don't know the level good enough yet? If I'm still obliged for 100% kills, it's not fun at all. If I'm not obliged to do so (as a new player), where is the difficulty then?
If I require to play with no damage, let's remove the health and armor system, and make it like Hotline Miami. Also let's remove all the medikits, armor and adrenaline pickups, they're not needed now.
As we don't need shield and health now, let's remove a good chunk of the game secrets - they contain health and armor anyway, and we don't use them anymore.
I don't want to play this way, because it will no longer be Quake 2 for me. It will enforce the player to use the "Very Fun" shoot and hide gameplay instead of run-and-gun, and it will make half the stuff I love about this game redundant.
For me this self-imposed restriction playstyle looks like that meme picture where a guy puts a stick in his bicycle's wheel, and not like a challenge of overwhelming the odds. The Remaster gives me that challenge vibe without restricting me in any way and without removing anything from the game, it is still allowing me to use shield, retains the purpose of medikits and giving me space for trial and error. As I said, I'm having my *** handed down to me in Remaster, and this is while i'm ALLOWED to use anything I want to, shield included. I see this as a direct upgrade to the game.
You offer to make more enemies as a challenge (reinforcements and gibbed enemies' resurrection), so let the game become "Serious Sam with stroggs" or something like that. I also hate new enemies from Ground Zero expansion, because (for example) reinforcements-calling Medic is not hard per se, it's just annoying, because it simply enforces me for the specific (and pace-breaking) playstyle. And if I wanted a ton of enemies, I would play Doom instead anyway.
You offer to make more behaviour patterns for the enemies, but be honest to Remaster then, as it does in fact already include new behaviour and attack patterns!
To summarize: I want a difficult game (at least on the hardest difficulty setting) without a need to put that stick in the wheel. Between "Quake with redesigned effects and architecture" and "Quake with proper difficulty and interesting enemies" I would happily choose the latter, and that's exactly why I love the remaster. Judging by the Remaster's reviews and quite favorable reception, I'm by far not alone.(btw, how could the devs decide how exactly should the architecture be improved while still being "quake 2" and without angering half of the community, eh?)
Thanks for your attention, I mean no offense, it's all just a personal opinion.
Your mod is great btw, I love your sound design more than the original one. Sad it's not available for remaster. Maybe I'll use it when some source port will incorporate the new AI changes. :)
Unfortunately, my dear Watson, your conclusions were overwhelmingly erroneous :-) especially when you tried to pass them as MY conclusions. Which they are not, and never were. I would never support "playing the game wrong" fad. I consider it ridiculous. But i am saying that those who say that the game is too easy - are too often too quick to discard it. There is always more game left in there, if you play it with more skill.
Quake1 is harder on Nightmare - because the game is very well balanced, there is no comparison between Quake1 and Quake2, in that regard, sadly. And i did mention that. Quake2 allows too many player mistakes, and that is its key balance flaw. Revising this one parameter alone, would impact the game significantly, and in the best of ways.
Playing with self-imposed challenges - is only reserved for the players who are bored with Nightmare and presume themselves to be "gameplay gods" or something. I never suggested for it to be mainstream - you did. Same goes for any such strangely extreme interpretation.
Power shield is in the game exactly to help the less skillful players who get hit often - to deal with incoming attacks, particularly on harder settings, that's it. Forgoing it, means prioritizing attack and tactics rather than beginner's style soaking up damage, essentially jumping up a skill level.
The rest goes into battle design and balancing, which i am happy to discuss, if you want. But first - don't jump to odd extremes out of nowhere, that does not do you any favors.
Limiting the number of player mistakes - does not mean
removing all health and armor from the game. Just like having to deal with a Gunner and a Gladiator at the same time - instead of a single Gunner - does not turn the game into a serious-sam clone. It just means that if you screwed up, you can't instantly refill health and go on as if nothing happened.
That's not how good game design works. And mission pack enemies are more than on point. They are not one-click cardboard stencils, so some players don't like them. The Heat-seeking Iron Maidens, Phalanx Gladiators and Hyper-Blaster Guards...and those little spiders too - they'll give you a challenge alright. Then there is an issue of placement and sequencing. The enemies implicitly interact with each other: who, when and from where attacks the player - can very much change the whole battle.
Like i said, battle design is a modification skill in itself.
Attack patterns of the "remaster", with the exception of the maladroitly executed Berserker jump (a good idea, which was ID's, not theirs - ID didn't finish it, so the scammers didn't either) - the rest all act like cheats and cheap-shots. Obviously, to make up for the player cheats: the super speed, the machinegun and the weapon switching - allows you to put the fear of Zeus into Strogg with such impunity that even Makron didn't suspect it was even theoretically possible, LOL. That's not new patterns. That's slacking.
Strafing run attack for the Infantry/Flyer/Icarus, multi-shot arc-shot/heatseeker for Iron Maiden, Gladiator firing twice before reloading, Tank and Gunner and GLADIATOR concurrent attacks (wasn't it obvious to put a stop to that Gladiator melee exploit?) - now that would be new patterns that are seamlessly woven to the game.
And bring back the HyperBlaster guards :-) Icarus with Phalanx missiles...?! That sounds scary already...I wouldn't mind a piece of a that. Would be willing to pay triple price of the original price of the original for that.
Quake2 with redesigned effects and architecture - would be perfect, however - at the very least - redesigning the balance would have to be included also. It's not a small matter at all, mind you. And that would require a lot of playtesting, which i am sure a lot of slacker devs are simply not willing to do.
In regards to architecture - easy (that's kind of what i do, just not in Quake2, though i wish i could). First you start with internal decorative design - multi layer textures on walls, windows, specific landmarks and set pieces, use lava and water as decorative elements, build something from the computer terminals, make archways, gateways and roofs look more ornate and more imposing, use existing assets only, but be more creative. Make small steps at a time - and everyone will be happy with your creations.
And thank you, for appreciating my mod. I worked hard on it and gave it my best. Currently doing the same for Aeon of Ruin, only this time i cut into gameplay as well. Who knows, if i ever manage to make the mod compatible with all (or most) fan-made sourceports, perhaps it will work with all kinds of "other stuff" as well ;-). Until then, if you ever decide to make a proper Quake2 revision, my offer of help stands.
P.S. The so-called "Last Strogg" - is a consequence of
lacking level flow design, combined with poor programming.
lets not forget the fact that after 20 years we finnaly get muzzleflashes wich is something that no mod has ever done in all this time and also we get a lot of content not only the mission packs but also a new campaign by nightdive and the n64 campaign lastly the music works right off the gate and doenst take a roundbound way to make it work,all in all the remaster is better than vanilla plus quake 1.5 is a mod for quake 1 and not quake 2 and honestly quake 1 level design is much worse than quake 2 and that mod doesnt fix that oh and also the new compass and weapon wheel.all in all quake 2 remaster is filled with content and qality of life improvements i honestly can never go back to vanilla now its a shame that after the update every mod that we had is broken and as if all that werent enoug,if you already owned quake 2 you got the quake 2 remaster for free so i have no idea what this gentleman above is talking about.
Muzzle flashes are not a huge deal, especially when the explosions and gun tracers look as bad as they were. There is a priority there. Same goes for the nonexistent visual effects of every kind in the same department. Although muzzle flash on the hyperblaster (as in non-gunpowder weapon) always looked laughable to me. And the Phalanx shot besides still looking ugly AF - it STILL comes from the center of the screen, and not from the weapon's barrel...are you serious,lol?! N64 campaign is nothing to brag about, if anything - they should've taken the PSX campaign, but no - the low hanging fruit is just closer, i guess. Compass and weapon wheel...i don't see point of that. With the same success they could just add a full on GPS: "turn left in 50 meters. Strogg ahead. Press fire now".
As for Quake1 level design - people argue about it this way and that, i'll suffice to say that each of the two games takes a different approach, and cannot really be compared. Q1 more extensive and more vertical, while Q2 goes with smaller areas that comprise a hub. Art direction is also very different, as is the use of textures and detailing elements. Apples and oranges, that's my take on it, always was. With Quake1.5 - you're missing the point: that mod is a representation of a very high level of commitment, understanding of game design (in this case - redesign) and quality work. It is a perfect example of a properly done job and can be cited in regards to anything. That mod is not only the pinnacle of what Quake1 will ever be - but a stand up example of a stellar modding work, and work ethics. Point blank. The "remaster" may indeed have its share of "content", just not the kind that the game actually benefits from. Not in the presence of sourceports, that is.