Quake: Multiplayer games

Multiplayer games (Modem play, Internet play, LAN play)

Before you start

It is advisable that all the players have the same version of Quake. Although different versions of Quake may well work together, they could produce odd results (especially if the server is running the later version). Many people will probably have version 1.01, but version 1.06 was also widely available, and Mission Packs 1 and 2 upgraded the program to versions 1.07 and 1.08 respectively. If you want to connect to an Internet game, a later version (1.07 or 1.08) is highly desirable.

If you want to play a user-defined level (or one of the Mission Pack levels) then every player must have that level (or Mission Pack) installed on their PC.

Starting a game

This is done using the "Multiplayer" menus (surprise, surprise): if you're connecting to a game, rather than hosting it, you'll need to follow the "Join a game running at..." menu option.

Don't forget to set your options (e.g. shirt colour) before connecting.

Once connected, you'll be in "observer" mode: press your JUMP key to get into the action!

Serial port not working?

For multiplayer games across modem links (or direct serial cables), Quake may not work properly if your serial port (or modem card) is fitted with the older 8250 or 16450 serial driver chips. This is only likely to be a problem for users of 486 or very early Pentium PCs: if your machine is less than 3 years old it will almost certainly have a 16550 (or 16650) serial chip fitted, and all should be well.

There are three ways of telling which sort of serial driver chip you've got:

If Quake is running, type the console command COM1 (or COM2 if your modem is on COM2). Quake will tell you what sort of chip it can see.
If you're using DOS, enter MSD at the DOS prompt. Next, press C (for "COM ports...") and look for the UART line near the bottom.
If you're using Windows 95, double-click on My Computer, then Control Panel, then Modems. Flip to the Diagnostics page, click on your modem, then click on More Info. Look for the line near the top that says UART.

If you've got an 8250 or 16450, buy another serial port (or modem card) with a 16550 or 16650 fitted. Most ports/cards made in the past 4 years will be suitable.

Modem play (1)

If you want to use serial/modem connections, you are STRONGLY advised to upgrade to Quake v1.01 or later: check out the FTP sites for the latest version.

Here's a suggested method for modem play using version 1.01 of Quake, from NNet:

Disable error correction and compression in your INIT string. For the USR Sportster, try "AT&F1&K0&M0" which sets to hardware handshaking defaults and disables ec and compression.
Let the faster machine be the host. Didn't matter for us but good practice in general. Also set baud rate to 38400 but don't think it matters.
**VERY IMPORTANT** on the host side, you MUST set the SYS_TICRATE variable to 0.1 in the console. Just hit the ~ (tilde) key and enter "SYS_TICRATE 0.1". To verify your setting just enter SYS_TICRATE" and it should say "SYS_TICRATE is '0.1'"

The normal SYS_TICRATE is 0.05, or 20 updates per second. Setting it to 0.1 halves the number of system updates to force the host more in line with what the client's getting in terms of updates. It also reduces bandwidth requirements, as half the number of updates need to be sent through the modem.

Have the host start the game, and have the client dial in. When you connect, hopefully the connect string will verify the lack of error control and compression: on a USR Sportster the string you should get is "CONNECT V34/NONE"
That's it! My game had almost *no* key lag, a first for any Quake modem game so far, and the host didn't seem to have a tremendous advantage due to greater number of screen updates.

Please note: Your Mileage May Vary. In particular, it might be worth leaving modem (V.42bis) compression switched ON, but I have not tried this.

Modem play (2)

If doing a head-to-head modem game (i.e. with a listen server, not a dedicated server) and the client gets jerky you should ask the server player to downsize their screen. Apparently this helps (perhaps because the server treats screen updates as more important than network traffic).

Internet play using the DOS PPP stack

I regret this section has been withdrawn as I have been informed that the PPP stack was commercial software and hence could not be distributed.

This means that you need Windows 95 for Internet play. Sorry.

LAN play: Setting up an IPX network under DOS

The manual (and "techinfo.txt") only contains information on how to get your network going under Windows 95. What follows is for you lucky people with DOS and an Ethernet card in your sweaty palms.

First off, if you've got your network card working for multiplayer DOOM, exactly the same setup should work for Quake. Stop reading and start playing!

We'll start with the basics. You need one Ethernet card per machine, and either an Ethernet hub (if using UTP cable) or some T-pieces and terminators (if using "thin Ethernet" coaxial cable).

Many Ethernet cards have more than one socket on the back, for the different cable types (Thick/Thin Ethernet etc). Make sure the "right" socket is enabled: some cards do this automatically, but sometimes you need to change switch settings on the card or run a setup program. Check your hardware manual for details.

Now we come to putting it all together. An Ethernet hub merely requires you to wire each of the cards to the hub using UTP category 3 (or category 5) patch cables.

There's a bit more to "Thin Ethernet" coaxial. Here's a diagram, showing a 3-computer network:


   T-piece            T-piece               T-piece
      |                  |                     |
      |   RG58 cable     |     RG58 cable      |
     *T==================T=====================T*
   ---------         ---------              ---------
   | Card  |         | Card  |              | Card  |
   | on PC |         | on PC |              | on PC |
   ---------         ---------              ---------

The asterisk (*) at each end of the cable indicates a 50-ohm terminator. As can be seen from the diagram, for 3 PCs you need 2 terminators, 2 pieces of RG58 co-axial cable (fitted with BNC connectors), and 3 T-pieces. Extra PCs can be added by introducing an extra piece of RG58 cable and an extra T-piece (make sure the two terminators always live at the extreme ends of the co-axial cable run).

IMPORTANT: You must use RG58 (50-ohm) coaxial cable, and the terminators must be 50-ohm (Ethernet) terminators. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO USE RG59 CABLE, OR 75-OHM TERMINATORS: THEY WON'T WORK!

Now we come to the tricky bit: setting up the software!

The instructions below assume you're using a Novell NE2000 card (this is a popular card, and many other cards have an NE2000 compatibility mode).

Firstly, you'll need three pieces of driver software: LSL.COM, IPXODI.COM, and the card driver (e.g. NE2000.COM). The card driver is usually supplied on a floppy disc with the card itself (the driver you want is usually in a directory called DOSODI or something similar). If you're lucky, you'll also find LSL.COM and IPXODI.COM there as well, but if not you can download them from here.

If you're not using a "real" NE2000 card, the card driver may well have a different name (for example, a "plug'n'play" card I bought in PC World has a driver called PNPODI.COM).

Now, create a new directory on your hard drive to hold the above 3 files, plus a couple more described below. I suggest you call it something snappy like \NET.

Besides the above 3 files, you'll also need a file called NET.CFG in your \NET directory. This is a text file, and for an NE2000 card would look something like this:

LINK DRIVER NE2000
   INT 2
   PORT 300

   Frame Ethernet_802.2
   Protocol IPX E0 Ethernet_802.2

Note the indentation of the lines: it's important!

Obviously, if your NE2000 card is using a different interrupt or a different port address, you should use those values instead (and if it isn't a real NE2000 card you may not need those two lines at all). Also note that the name on the "LINK DRIVER" line must agree with the name of the card driver program: for the plug'n'play card I mentioned previously, it would say LINK DRIVER PNPODI.

Just to confuse matters, an IPX network can be set up to use different Ethernet frame types. The example above was for "802.2" frames. If you wanted/needed to use the (less common) "802.3" frame type instead, the last two lines would look like this:

   Frame Ethernet_802.3
   Protocol IPX 0 Ethernet_802.3

Either frame type will work equally well, but all PCs in the network must be using the SAME frame type!

(Any systems using Ethernet_II or Ethernet_SNAP frame types should be taken outside and shot).

The last(!) thing you need to do is to set up a batch file to load everything up in the right sequence. I suggest you call it NET.BAT, and it should contain the following lines:

    CD \NET
    LSL
    NE2000                 (or your card driver, if different)
    IPXODI
    CD \QUAKE_SW

Once you've finished playing, you may want to unload the network drivers. The following sequence of commands will do just that:

    CD \NET
    IPXODI /u
    NE2000 /u              (or your card driver, if different)
    LSL /u

Recording multiplayer demos

From albert:

First and foremost, it does NOT appear to be possible to record a game client-side. So recording deathmatches on the CIX server seems to be out of the question. Secondly, the dedicated server console does not accept "stop", "record", "playdemo" etc as valid commands. So that appears to be out too - only a machine with the graphics subsystem initialised can record.

That leaves listen servers, which we all gave up years ago (except for serial-based games). This requires a bit of fiddling as well, because typing "Record Test.DEM E1M1" causes it to spawn a local server. To let other players join, I needed to type "Listen 3" or whatever number of players I want.

After that, it seems to work OK. But no player switching or anything.

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