You know you're old when games you still play quite regularly turn up in retro reviews! The community master server is still pretty well populated, as are UT '99 servers. These games are still the pinnacle of their genre. No micro transactions, no DRM, no pay to win. Just you, your shock rifle, and as much amphetamine as your nerve endings will take. As the reviewer says, the level design and game mechanics are legendary at this point, and players of any ability can quickly get into a flow state that modern games can only dream of. These are fine wines in a world of cheap lager. New gamers should drink deep from the pc games of the 2000's.

Oh god... I never bothered to consider Unreal Tournament 2004 was 20 years old. I still consider it the "newer" unreal tournament compared to the OG and 2003...

hundreds and hundreds of hours squashing people with the Manta

I remember playing on a RPG invasion server and it was one of the best gaming experiences up to that point. It was PVE where you'd get XP for every monster you killed and wave you'd survive and you could use it to upgrade your weapons and stats. Sadly just a few days after discovering it, the server went offline and I haven't found another one like it.

I still remember the outrage when they announced 2004 wasn't a free upgrade for 2003 purchasers. Stores did their best to mitigate that, but all my friends were peeved and kept to UT99 because of it.

This game was really awesome! I spent so many hours playing online with whoever. It had several awesome arenas.

Now you make me want to play it again!

This was amazing. I remember having LAN parties first with UT99 then with Counter-strike and UT2K4.

Those LANs were peak gaming for me.

Wait a minute...

Is the Dog Days map just one of DE's old UT maps converted to their new engine?

This made me reinstalled ut2k4. Used to play the demo with orbital2 instagibCTF slomo low gravity. Good times.