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Saturday, May 24, 1998
Big "thank you" to those Kiwis who have emailed in response to my call in yesterday's news for a NZ ISDN partner and said they'll see what they can get together. There are a few possibilities in the pipeline, ranging from ISP's, to private companies, each having in common the fact that they already have ISDN. Remember that Challenge.AU is proposing to make an international call to your New Zealand ISDN modem, which means we pay the cost of the call (i.e., we won't call "collect" :P). But you guys will have to organise the server, and also you have to organise some strong Kiwi Players.
A Brief History of New Zealand Quaking:
In response to my asking for some info on the New Zealand Quake scene, Juju emailed me and answered a lot of my questions. Thank you, professor Juju :-) NZ Quake has a population of around 150-300 people, with around 60 who play regularly. The LAN scene appears to be very healthy, with Juju knowing of several LANs which occur weekly. The majority of the NZ Quake communtiy are in Auckland (which has about 2/3'rds of NZ's population). Juju finds that location doesn't make too much difference to PINGs on the Kiwi servers (for the Kiwis), with most Players getting PINGs ranging from 200-300ms.
The main NZ server is netnet, which is : 203.29.160.153:27000. That's ctf, and quake1. The main competition league is Bloodrain, which is at http://bloodrain.netnet.net.nz. You'll find a list of all the clans there. THMC, Or The Happy Muffin Clan, which is Juju's Clan, is probably the "most respected clan in NZ, not buy skill but by attitude". They made the semi-finals in the last Bloodrain, but didn't quite make it to the finals :) ESM (Evil Space Monkeys) are the current champions, who bet NFC (No Friends Club) in a good final. The Bloodrain1 champions were Hurricane, who bet HO (Hades Orphans). TIG (TIGger's Friends) are probably the oldest running Clan.
The main NZ news sites are AB's (www.quakenews.co.nz) and The Faultline (www.faultline.gen.nz). The Main Quake IRC channel is undernet, #quakenz.
If anyone thinks Juju has missed stuff out or (omigod) made a mistake somehow in his take on NZ Quake, feel free to email me your own views. But I hope he doesn't get a hard time for offering his help like that. Once again, thanks, Juju :-)
Cld an Aussie do the same for us?:
If you're a New Zealander wondering about Australian Quake, there's some History you may be interested in being recorded here on this website. Otherwise, if you want to know what's going on at the moment I'll need to ask a few ppl to help out. GUYS, is there some Aussie Quaker out there who would like to email me the same sort of info that Juju provided?
Friday, May 22, 1998
Challenge.AU celebrates today as the day that we got our ISDN connection installed =) It's been a slog to get to this point. What does it mean? Basically, we are in business. Challenge.AU is ready to play. We only now need someone in New Zealand to provide three things:
- a Kiwi ISDN modem we can make a direct call to;
- a Kiwi server connected to the ISDN modem that we can play on;
- and Kiwi Players, of course. How they connect to the server is up to them. You could be sitting in the same room :P
If we can't arrange for another ISDN modem in New Zealand to dial into, the only other option is for us to use the Internet. That means I have to get an Internet account configured for ISDN (not cheap). I could use Ozemail or BigPond, for instance. The actual hourly rate is not too steep - about A$10 per hour. But the set-up fee is very expensive.
But that is not even the main problem with that option. It's not really workable folks. Even with ISDN, going over to New Zealand via the Internet still means making several "hops" and they add up to serious packet loss, even if your PING is good. Here's two tracerts we did tonight using ISDN over the Internet, both to popular New Zealand servers:
Tracing route to 203.97.1.216
1 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 203.26.5.2
2 24 ms 4 ms 9 ms 203.26.5.1
3 95 ms 66 ms 33 ms 203.26.5.1
4 40 ms 38 ms 37 ms 203.2.192.129
5 69 ms 142 ms 50 ms 203.108.0.50
6 39 ms 38 ms 45 ms 139.130.32.17
7 124 ms 46 ms 40 ms 139.130.249.229
8 418 ms 552 ms 776 ms 139.130.33.166
9 597 ms 545 ms 562 ms 203.98.4.186
10 2196 ms 892 ms 541 ms 203.97.2.243
11 708 ms 432 ms 508 ms 203.97.1.216
Trace complete.
Tracing route to 202.27.184.4
1 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 203.26.5.2
2 4 ms 3 ms 4 ms 203.26.5.1
3 256 ms 34 ms 35 ms 203.26.5.1
4 480 ms 263 ms 40 ms 203.2.192.129
5 67 ms 40 ms 41 ms 203.108.0.50
6 177 ms 74 ms 38 ms 202.139.0.45
7 40 ms 39 ms 38 ms 192.65.89.30
8 93 ms 71 ms 67 ms 202.139.7.190
9 71 ms 241 ms 79 ms 202.37.245.57
10 172 ms 68 ms 69 ms 202.37.245.46
11 122 ms 153 ms 262 ms 202.27.184.4
Compare that to what is possible with a 128K direct, digital connection, and you begin to see what we have in mind.
Tonight, however, while we were mucking around testing stuff, we went "over the Internet" (using one of my sponsors' other ISDN modems with an existing Internet account). We used only one of our two 64K channels (128K is available in total).
GreySeer was doing pretty well when he got PINGs like the one illustrated below:
PING is deceptive however, the packet loss was still pretty high. There's no two ways about it - New Zealand - we need a counterpart over there, we need a team who will put together the three things mentioned above (ISDN modem, server, Players). This will enable high-quality, fast connections for regular (perhaps monthly) international matches between our two countries. Life will never be the same again :P
I've been in contact with both CLEAR and XTRA about this. It is possible for one or both of them to supply us with an ISDN line to call, and a server that we could use for the matches. Kiwis would connect to the server through their own Internet accounts as per normal. We're also in contact with some other potential Challenge.NZ partners - gamers like us who are thinking about creating a set-up like the one we have. If you're interested in this idea, please me. Australia is READY to challenge New Zealand - where are you guys?
For Kiwi Writers:
Juju emailed to let me know that Bloodrain is the name of the CTF competiton, not a Clan - sorry about the mixup. I must admit to being a little in the dark about NZ Clans and who's who. For example, who the heck are the "Muffins"? How many Clans are there, and where are they in NZ? Do Auckland and Wellington Players have a good enough connection to each other that they can have inter-City matches?
Got an idea :-) How about someone over there write a FEATURE article on NZ Quaking? It'd help us Australians to figure out what's going on over there. If you're thinking - I can't do that cuz I'd just cop a heap of flak - why not find a partner? If 2 ppl do it, and if you make sure to get some feedback on it from NZ Players before you email it to , then I'm sure you won't cop flak. How about it?
Thursday, May 21, 1998
GibCon'98, the large 200 Player Sydney LAN which will be running for two days from Saturday, the 25th of July, has challenged New Zealand to send its top Players across for some fragging :-)
Announcing that GibCon'98 is "laying down the gauntlet", ASSASiN invited the Nzrs to send over their finest Quake Players:
"We here at the GibCon team rekon Aussie Quakers are some of the best in the world. Hell, what am I saying, there isn't a better Quaking nation to be found [we're proud, damnit!]. And to put a no-finer point on it, we rekon our lads would put some smackdown on them NZ boys. Those NZ guys are talking about getting some Quakers from here over to there, and well, thats a mighty fine idea. And to reverse it we'd love to see some of those "NZ Champs" over at GibCon'98, and we'd like to see how they hold up over on of OUR lans. :) Wheres this leading? Well, if the NZ guys can get organised, and produce us 2 names who stand out above the rest, we'd be happy to give them some VIP tickets to GibCon'98 and see how well they stand in perhaps the toughest competition yet."
Accomodation will not be a problem. Go check out all the details at GibCon'98, you can email the organisers at .
ISDN Ready for Testing:
I'm really happy to say that has joined the Challenge.AU team :-) The first thing we'll be doing is to test our own ISDN connection, which we get connected tomorrow morning. We'll be checking it out for Internet Quaking performance on Friday night (Sydney time) :) If you have an ISDN that we can make a direct, international call to, let us know and we'll literally "give you a call". =)
AGN Oz Team update:
Will make some updates on this over the weekend, but basically I've been developing the rough plan that can be found in the Features section. If you want to help, please me. Meanwhile, to make life easier, I've added some links to the MENU at left - including AusQuake II and the main Kiwi and Australian Message Boards.
Quake DownUnda:
Grey sent me this, which now becomes the first screenshot posted at Challenge.AU taken by an Australian on a NZ server :P
Saw on Abaddon's NZ Quake News that a get together is being organised on Clear for Friday night: " is organising a big game at Clear QW (quake.clear.net.nz:27500) tomorrow (Friday) night. Some visitors connecting from Australia are expected, and Trigga warns that troublemakers will be kicked. While on the subject, I think these organised open games are a great idea - Tonto's Q2 CTF bash the other night was great fun, and this should be too. Great stuff!"
Players are ready to play :-) --- >from Clan Arena (check out traydogg's Australian Clan Arena League site) to CTF ---> see Clans like the Frightened Old Codgers and AoD). The Australian Flag community, in particular, are fortunate to have discovered that CTF is very popular in NZ. Australian CTF gamers are currently in contact with a NZ CTF Clan called "ESM", who won the NZ CTF Championship, beating "NFC" :P. Another good Kiwi ctf Clan is Bloodrain. A number of Kiwi demos are available on their Clan site at http://www.kaoz.net/eraser/demopage.htm.
There are also a number of Australian DM Clans looking for some action, including the Mohicans, and lots of adventurous individuals. If you're an Australian looking for a Kiwi Clan to contact, you could try AWOL, whose contact is "J" [M'o'D, Dictator of Clan AWOL, NZ]. J can be reached at: or ICQ UIN 256437. If you just want to make yourself known, your URL, what you're looking for and an email address, and I'll create a contact list.
Wednesday, May 20, 1998
Some special stuff from a couple of great contributors to the Australian Quake scene. I'll stick these in the History section soon. You will enjoy this pic of Baz, sent in by his dad The pic is from a SMH article about QuakeZone (now Multiplay). Check out the date - September 3, 1996 (click on the thumbnail):
And this t-shirt, which (who ran the excellent Melbourne CIC and is shortly to be doing some more interesting stuff :-) has locked away in a safe somewhere. NZ Quake, those are names you will come to learn about :-) (Also, those are the full compliment of iD Software signatures on the left arm) (click on the thumbnail):
Topic: Us vs Them. Comments:
"Well it looks like those blokes over in Au. are quite keen, they've got a site all about figuring out how to play us: http://www.challenge-au.com/ It'd be pretty cool if they made it over to AGN". (anon Kiwi).
Camperon, yet another Nzr, also offered this idea on the Kiwi message board today: "We can have a vote to choose 8 players and divide them into two teams. We then get them to have good connections by some way (e.g., ISDN or VERY GOOD modem connection from sponsors like Xtra:). We can then have the two 4v4 Team DM teams to play against the Aussie then".
This is actually what this site - Challenge.AU - is all about. Right from when I first asked to host the webpages back on March 6 (see the Challenge.AU Archives) to now, when there is talk of organising a national Aussie team to go over to the NZ A Gaming Nation LAN in late September.
For the record:
With respect to the Oz national team, I am trying to spread the word about the A Gaming Nation LAN, and I have gotten together a rough plan (see Features). But I am NOT, as of yet, "officially" organising any Oz team. I'm prepared to lend my full support, including the use of this website, but think we need a pretty good-sized team in Australia to swing behind it. In particular, I think these sorts of ppl are needed: (by no means an exhaustive list :P)
- national organising group, with a couple of reps from each of the States
- someone to get on IRC and ICQ and drum up some debate on the rough Plan and progress - ask is that what ppl want etc? Sort of a communications/ feedback person
- few ppl to offer to organise State LANs for QLD, WA, SA, NT and/or TAS, or at least to ask around for potential candidates. (We have potential LAN organisers for NSW, VIC, and ACT).
- someone at AusQuakeII to get involved - it's likely to be mostly a Q2 LAN (see further). (I'm in contact with :-)
- --- > I need help cuz I have a full-time job, a wife, a dog, and this website :P <
Also, in terms of what Challenge.AU is all about:
- I'm installing ISDN, and want to make a direct, international call to a USA and a Kiwi ISDN modem. This is my main project =). To be reaallly precise, I don't actually want to go over the Internet or connect to an Australian ISP in order to get to NZ or USA. I don't want to go through ISPs, and I want to avoid analogue-to-digital conversion. It's OK to dial into a Kiwi ISP's ISDN though, if that is where the server is located/hosted or if there is a very fast connection between the NZ ISDN modem and the final server.
- I want to feature matches between top Players - and the focus is on the Players. That's the goal. Players can come from anywhere - Clear, XTRA, Multiplay, GolSyd, Wireplay, it don't matter. I'd like to record demos, and do interviews, and publish features and commentary, and more...
Why the explanation? I noticed a lot of "hits' from NZ over the past couple of days =) That stuff is for you guys! You can read some background shit here on Challenge.AU if you like :-)
Back to the news. SkyLark, the Kiwi who took that historic (:P) screeny from yesterday, emailed me just now to say he has a couple of ISDN lines at work :-) Isn't that cool? Unfortunately, Telstra OnRamp told me that the installation of my own line has been delayed due to the recent Sydney rain (liney's don't like getting electrocuted, they said). I've been told Friday. Soon as it's up let's have a go :-)
Another Kiwi, "", from Clear Communications in Auckland, announced on that Nzr board that he was "trying to get a group of quakers onto quake.clear.net.nz:27500 by 7pm tonite!!! ... we should have a group of Aussies there as well, Malby is letting the Aussies know as we speak!!! Help our QUAKE Scene!!! Jump on so we can test the quality of the CLEAR server for future games!!" Apparently, connected via 256K ISDN over the Internet to Clear earlier today and got a ping of 500ms.. I haven't heard what happened at 7:00 Kiwitime (5:00 pm our time).
Regarding the AGN. Heard from , AGN tournament Nazi and Proud Member of Clan Hurricane - NZ's first CTF Champions ( - this is for you - CTF Ohhh YEahhhh !!!! ). I asked him if the AGN would be Quake or QW. He said: "Up until this week, I would have said QW. But with all the problems with v2.2... hmmm. Three options, the way I see it. (A) Stick with Plain Quake. (B) QW v2.0. (C) Wait ‘til the bugs are sorted. I assume they will be sorted before September :-)". Verdict - not sure. He also added that the LAN would probably focus on Q2.
"I believe the focus should be on quake2..." But, if is had to be quake1, then QW - more customizable, controllable. Reason: quake1 is getting old, also our top players are playing more and more q2".
Finally, in response to my question about the team format, he said: "First - depends on how many there team is... if we said 4 (nice round number), then I'd say "4-on-4 team Dm in quake2" would be the way to go. We also have a CTF league, but I'm not sure on what your focus is.... like I said above Team DM is cool. Hell, here in Wellington, people play JailBreak (on my ISP's server, but not too many other places)". So there you go. This means the organising team for any Aussie Challenge that flys over to the AGN LAN should be focused on Q2. as well as Q1.
Tuesday, May 19, 1998
"Juju", a Player from NZ, appeared on Malby's message board and posted the following message:
"Hope you fellaz are ready for yet another beating from us :) If your wondering what im on about goto http://www.challenge-au.com/ and read the news. So, what have we beaten you at? umm, Rugby (International and Super 12), League (twice...), Womans rugby world cup etc.... :) Have fun kiddies ."
It would be irresponsible of me to suggest anyone go over to the Kiwi message board and say anything inflammatory, so I won't. Instead, I'll just say - check their board out at NZ Quake news. Another Kiwi, Lark, posted this on the same NZ message board. It is to my knowledge the first screenshot from a Kiwi Quaker in Australia.
Welcome, Kiwis, to Challenge.AU :-) Have you noticed we also have a Challenge.US, but not a Challenge.NZ website? There's an opportunity there for someone to take up ;-)
Here's the PING stats one Kiwi got when he connected to 203.57.20.3 (GolSyd): 15 packets transmitted, 15 packets received, 0% packet loss, round-trip (ms) min/avg/max = 210/299/381. Not bad, but I just want to remind you that Challenge.AU is installing ISDN, and we would LOVE to be able to dial direct to NZ, and join one of your servers for international Quake on a high-speed connection. Your best Players against our best Players, in regular, monthly dust-ups. Pls think on it :-)
Our own GreySeer has been doing some similar stuff on the Kiwi servers at XTRA. Recently he wrote this on their message board:
I have found that I get an acceptable connection to XTRA from Sydney ( avg 300ping 5-10% p/l ) and I have in fact been beating up some New Zealanders occasionally on XTRA. Unfortunately there's harldly ever anyone there. I would like to try to hold a clan game on an XTR server and I emailed Wolverine about it about a week ago. I haven't got a reply yet. If I should be contacting someone else pls let me know. Othwise, keep an eye out for me on XTRA :)
The door is open, it won't be long before the party starts :-) I got so excited I wrote this editorial.