Quake 4

Quake 4 keeps the old arena-shooter rhythm but wraps it in a heavier single-player campaign with corridors, guns, and armored Strogg enemies. By our assessment, it is strongest when it is simply letting the player push forward, trade fire, and read encounters quickly; the shooting has that crisp id Software feel, even though the game is usually remembered more as a follow-up to Quake II than as the series peak. Its limit is the same one many shooters of that era hit: the campaign can feel linear and the spectacle does most of the work. In practice it is all about constant movement, ammo juggling, and the slightly old-school pleasure of learning a space by shooting through it. The name Quake 4 fits a game that is more competent than daring, and that is why it sits comfortably in the middle of the genre rather than above it.