Thread:Deathstalker666/@comment-1496755-20180827202615/@comment-1496755-20190809112756

Quite true, having many monsters on screren and wide open areas were the idTech 4 engine's biggest weaknesses at the time (maybe not so much on modern hardware). But they started working on fixing this, and the improvements were already visible in Quake 4 (more enemies + more spacious outdoor areas without losing framerate).

My musical history goes a bit more into the past, obviously, but don't think this makes it more exciting - the 90's were a musical wasteland. Not due to lack of music, of course, but rather due to the general lack of means to play it (being in a poor ex-communist country and all). My folks had somehow managed to get a very decent semi-professional tape player/recorder and a semi-professional amplifier that goes with it. They were old, surely, but still pretty good for the time. CD players were still very, very rare and expensive at the time, so getting one was unthinkable. An important note: my father has a particular disdain for devices with a handle (i.e. portable), considers them inferior and doesn't like listening to music on them. He would only buy one if it were for someone else, but never for use at home. Since we only had this tape player at home, listening to music was a family affair, so I listened to what they listened (mostly classic rock). There was some variation, though - my dad is more into the older stuff (Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, Rainbow, etc.), while my mom was more open to the newer stuff, including what is currently known as "hair metal". An example of a song she enjoyed at the time. I was pretty lonely in my musical bubble - most of my classmates at the time listened to whatever commercial swill was popular at the time. I didn't know anyone who liked heavier music, and this made the feeling of a "wasteland" even stronger. I didn't meet an actual metalhead until high school, but the guy was quite a snob and I could never really discuss music with him (I was way too "below" him, I guess). I should mention the musical TV shows around this time - in the mid to late 90's (and early 00's), there were a few late-night shows (late, so that they can show "forbidden for minors" stuff, e.g. Rammstein's video to Engel) and I remember them fondly because they played serious music (not that popular swill). The one I remember most vividly was "Какафония" ("Cacophony"), which played both Bulgarian and foreign music. I loved watching it, often in secret because I was supposed to be in bed early (because school).

The year 2000 was a time of great change. Several factors came into play - first, the ability to finally play CD's (on the PC's CD-ROM device, actual CD players for music were still not affordable to us). Second, the internet and the discovery of MP3 (it took a long time to download them, of course, dial-up connection and all). Third (and that's very important) - "New Rhythm", a local music magazine which was ahead of its time (very detailed and professionally made) - we read about many new bands from it, it was from its pages that I first learned about the existence of Slipknot, Marilyn Manson and many others. It also had this very convenient section that kept track of current albums, helping us know when the bands we liked released something new (or pick new things to try out). Last but not least - musical channels via satellite, especially the German ones (they didn't suck back then!), which allowed us to actually HEAR all those bands we read about in the magazine. It was on one such German channel (Viva Zwei, which didn't survive for long, sadly) that I first watched/heard Rammstein (this clip) and Slipknot (this one). My folks got to like Rammstein quite a bit, especially the album Mutter. As you probably know, nu metal was at its prime during this time, so this is what I listened to most of the time. Most of the kids at high school were crazy about Limp Bizkit (ugh), but my favorites were Linkin Park (and I still like them quite a bit). My mom burned me a nu metal song compilation on a CD... and I still keep it to this day. Speaking of CD's, I finally got my own CD player around 2001 or 2002 (hard to say). Not a portable thing with a handle, naturally - are you crazy?!? It currently resides in my new home, I couldn't possibly leave it behind. And, of course, I have to mention music helped a lot with building up and polishing my English ;)

By 2004/2005, I was mostly on a stable diet of nu metal, M. Manson, Rammstein, Alice Cooper and a few others. I even made slight forays into power metal (Manowar) and black metal (during my angry teenage periods), mostly Norwegian stuff like Dimmu Borgir (an example). Then high school ended and I found myself in college with two very nice roommates (two brothers). Having grown up in a village, their childhood had been dominated by folk music (the horror!), but they developed a taste for heavier stuff thanks to me (the younger brother had already become a fan of Iron Maiden during his high school years). Like mentioned before, there was a lot of System of a Down involved, Lacuna Coil, Metallica, Disturbed, and Therion (which is how I discovered symphonic metal). Other stuff included Symphony X, a bit of Prodigy (thanks to a guy from my home town that I became friends with because he was also an avid oldschool gamer), and and a whole mess of single songs from various artists thrown into the mix. This hodgepodge was our audio background for three years. There was this other guy too during the first year... but he was a fan of Oasis (ugh), which I don't like...

Things are a bit hazy after graduating in 2008 because life's pace picked up, lots of stuff happened, I lived in another city for about a year and a half (returned home eventually), was unemployed for a while, had some health issues at one point... so it's hard to keep track of how I evolved. I know I got a bit more into Muse (example), Nightwish, Avenged Sevenfold, Dream Theater, etc. Since 2005 I had mostly listened to music on my laptop with headphones (feels more private). I still kept track of my old favorites - LPark (though their style often went in directions I didn't like), Manson (the old dog still has some spark in him), and Rammstein. Then at one point I joined some Wiki online and met a crazy American who showed some cool new metal stuff ;)

I hope your eyes didn't start hurting from all that text.