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Have you been playing Quake all alone? Does Unreal run so slowly you find yourself wondering if you can turn the video off? Read on... By Ruffin Bailey Published: 2/2/99 |
This is the first in a series explaining how to set up your Mac to play multiplayer Quake. Today, we deal with Classic Quake multiplayer set-up for a LAN party. (Part Two deals with using QuakeWorld.) |
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By this time, we all know that a Mac version of Quake 3 is slated for a concurrent release with
Windows Quake 3. We have been moved to tears seeing beautiful pictures of Unreal stream across
the web, running on the Mac. We have read twenty conflicting reviews on whether or not Dark Vengence
is worth the purchase. And we have combed the xlr8 pages up and down looking for the best combination
of G3 upgrade card, 3D acceleration graphics card, and RAM cards so that we can actually play these
games faster than four frames a second at a resolution of 320x200!!!
Quake Classic MulitplayerThe first thing you need is a warning. This is not going to be the cheapest venture you even attempted. You are going to need four important items, none of which are real cheap. If any of the below items do not make sense, just click on that item to get a quick javascript-powered explanation!
Once you get all your computers in one room, take the ethernet cables and network everyone through the hub. Again, there is nothing fancy here. Just plug 'em in! There are actually four different networking protocols supported by Quake: Appletalk, IPX, Modem/Serial and TCP/IP. Appletalk would be a great choice if everyone used Macintosh computers, but there is no reason to limit your LAN parties to Macs. PC users are fun to frag. Trust me. IPX is an older networking protocol created by Novell, but has since lost favour in the working world and has generally been replaced by TCP/IP. Modem play would be nice, but we are looking for more than one on one deathmatches in this series. Since TCP/IP is going to be the protocol most people are familiar with cross-platform (Mac, PC, Linux), it is TCP/IP I will be using in this example. If you have had your Mac more than two minutes (and if you are reading this online within those first two minutes, I am right impressed!), you know where the Apple Menu is located. If you have had your Mac more than a half-hour, you have used the Apple Menu to get a hold of some misbehaving Control Panel. But just in case, here is what things look like: 
We are going to have to delve into the deep recesses of the Control Panels to set up a TCP/IP Quake game. First open up the cleverly named TCP/IP panel from your Control Panels folder. If you are hooked up to the internet from home, you would be well served to write down all of the pertinent information that this panel contains, like your name server's address and your search domain. Alternately, if you have Mac OS 8.5, you can hit the apple key (also known as the clover-leaf key) and "k" to bring up your Configurations window. Duplicate your current setting, rename it "Quake LAN" or something similar, and hit "Make Active". Now you need to make sure your settings are good for a LAN. Your "Connect via" should read "Ethernet built-in" and your "Configure" setting should read "Manually". Now you need to manually assign everyone in your LAN an IP address. On the internet, this number is given to you by a PPP server, but for the LAN, you will do this yourself. The IP address is essentially your computer's name on the LAN. If two computers have the same name, Quake will have some real problems! To keep things simple, everyone should have the same first three numbers. In the below example, I have "10.10.10.2" as my IP address. Other players would simply have "10.10.10.3", "10.10.10.4", etc. Just remember to keep the last number unique! Everyone should also enter in "255.255.255.0" as their "Subnet Mask". We will not go into details right now, but this basicly tells the networking software to just look at the last number in your IP number. Here is an example of a "properly configured" TCP/IP control panel: 
Quake SettingsNow start up Quake. Hit the esc key to open up the Quake menu. Under options, you will see a four tabbed form. Click on "Mulitplayer". "Host Name" is the name that would be shown if you were hosting a game off of your computer. "Your Name" is your Quake handle, so to speak. In the picture below, you can see the menu for "Max. Players". Depending on how much RAM you have, you can choose anywhere from four to sixteen players. In your group, pick the computer with the most RAM and get them to pick the exact number of players that are going to be playing in your game.Finally make sure that "Enable TCP/IP" is checked. If you have not been playing Quake Classic online, this box is probably unchecked. When you break up your LAN party, you will probably want to uncheck this box again. If it is checked, Quake looks for a TCP/IP connection when it is started up. If it does not detect one, it takes a look at the TCP/IP control panel and tries to open one. If you have finished your Quake party and switched your TCP/IP control panel's settings back to the settings you usually use to connect to the internet, every time it is started, Quake will try to dial-up your ISP. A little aggravating. Here is a Multiplayer option screen ready to play some Quake: 
After you've made your changes, quit out of Quake, and start it back up. You are just about ready to play! If you have the most RAM, you should be set up to host the game. Hit esc to bring up the Quake menu, and choose Multiplayer. Then choose "New Game". From this control panel you can choose the level you want to "serve up" and what sort of game you would like to play. Hit "OK" and the game has begun. 
If you are not going to host the game, hit "Join Game" from the Multiplayer options. Make sure you have TCP/IP selected, and then type in the IP address of the computer that is going to host your game. Alternately, you can just hit the "Find Local Game..." button and if the host has a game running, it will automaticly be displayed. Just join up! 
That is all for today's installment. In Lesson Two, we will discuss where to get QuakeWorld and how to set it up for both LAN and online play! | ||||||
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