ETQW Blast from the Past: DomMafia’s Open Beta Interview

With Enemy Territory: QUAKE Wars turning five this week, we thought it’d be fun to dig up a few goodies from ETQW’s early days. Enter DomMafia’s Open Beta interview. The slightly older gentlemen and women among you will remember that QUAKE Wars had an extensive beta phase – first a seekrit Closed Beta, and then an Open Beta with some 60,000 participants. During the Open Beta, Dommafia quickly climbed to the very top of the leaderboards and became one of the most famous faces of the QUAKE Wars community.

In this interview originally conducted way back in September 2007, Dommafia shared his experiences during the Open Beta along with plenty of advice for new players looking to enter the world of Enemy Territory: QUAKE Wars. Time machine, begin!

The Open Beta hadn’t been running long before the ETQW statistics page made it clear there were some fearsome players involved. One player, DomMafia, soon pulled clear of the pack… a long way clear. By some distance the highest ranked ETQW Beta player, DomMafia has dominated the ETQW stats board, and has even found the time to post demo videos (hacking the Shield Generator on Valley and flying the Strogg Tormentor). We tracked DomMafia down and forced him to explain himself.

Tell us a little about yourself.

I’m 25. I was born in the Dominican Republic and moved to the United States when I was 13. I have 2 jobs (well almost 3, my wife can be a pain in the ass sometimes :P). I like to play basketball with my cousins whenever there’s good weather. I also spend time helping my old lady with her school work. Then there’s the usual stuff, mall, movies, and lots of MERENGUE and BACHATA (Dominican dance styles).

I started really getting into console gaming ever since I landed on USA soil. I was introduced to the beauty and fun of online PC gaming by C&C Tiberian sun. C&C Renegade was my first fps multiplayer game and Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory was the mother of all FPS experiences for me. W:ET really took over a lot of my free time. It was the most fun gaming experience I have ever had. ETPRO mod really made an already excellent (and free!!1one!) even better. I tried Battlefield 2 for a while but “Battle flags” got boring really fast. Counterstrike Source would be a close 2nd favorite game.

What rank have you achieved in the ETQW Beta?

General. It took about 267 hours. It would have been sooner had I not gotten addicted to the Constructor + Tormentor combo 😉

I’m sure I’ll see some very lovely comments regarding this, but I’m a happily married gamer with no regrets about my gaming time 😉

How about your other achievements and skills?

Well I feel very good about Kill/Death ratio and the totals 😀

What do you like most about ETQW?

I really enjoy the amount of different ways that you can play the game. I can be a reviving medical god and then decide to go on a rocket soldier rampage to get rid of any deployables and enemy armor. Too many enemies camping a spot heavily fortified by deployables? It’s Hammer time! Favorite class would have to go to both Engineer and Medic class. My favorite weapon is the Assault Rifle without a doubt, Rocket Launcher a close 2nd, and sniper 3rd.

My favourite tactic is using the Tormentor to keep all those artillery-happy Field Ops in a very bad mood by constantly destroys their deployables. I also like to be GDF Medic and revive teammates on the run while they complete objectives. Then there’s the cheapest of them all, ramming everything in sight with a Hog, very satisfying.

What are your favourite locations in the maps?

I would say on Valley I enjoy close games that come down to the Contaminator building, on defense or offense.

What mistakes do people make when they start out?

Tapping out when a Medic is 1 foot away from them. Using Hammer missiles on 1 single target. Not using Supply Drops. And last but not least… airstriking their own objective, killing countless teammates. There are too many to mention 😀

What advice would you give to beginners, and intermediate players?

Go to Ifurita’s site and learn the basics, learn the maps, learn the best way to get from one point to another. I think a lot of new players always take the straight path to the Objectives and don’t take advantage of the many paths available on the maps. Learn when to change to a different class if only to achieve one particular objective that can help out your team.

How did you put together your Tormentor video?

The introduction of the REPLAY function to the ETQW Beta made it a lot easier. I recorded my games (F12) and I chose the best moments from each and recorded them with Fraps while watching them in replay mode. I wanted to show that the Tormentor wasn’t the useless, hard-to-control bug that just sat on the pad (t-pad? :P) in the Sewer map. It took a while to get used to the default controls, a lot of practice is the only way to get better. There’s a lot I still have to learn and perfect. Dogfights will be very interesting once more people get the hang of the flying birds of prey 🙂

At first I was somewhat disappointed that we aren’t able to rebind the ROLL control to the mouse axis instead of the keyboard, but I changed my mind after I had a long talk with Locki who was nice enough to take the time and explain all the reasons behind that decision and I was very impressed with the level of detail he provided.

Looking forward to the ETQW Demo and full release version. What can players who haven’t already played the Beta expect?

They can expect to be floored by the amount of fun that can be had in this game no matter your skill level.

What impact do you think ETQW will have on the multiplayer community?

If SD continues listening to the community with the same level of dedication they have already, it will be the best multiplayer experience around. I’m a diehard ET player, I’ve played many games since ET came out (bf2, CS:S, quake 4, C&C 3, World In Conflict Beta to name a few) and none had ever been able to keep me away from W:ET for more than a month. I haven’t played ET for more than 2 hours total ever since I got into the quake wars beta, ’nuff said??

What are you most looking forward to in the final version?

The other maps, SDK, and the countless new players I’ll be able to Torment! xD

I’m especially dying to play the Island map, which will have a different objective style. You have to carry an objective a la Goldrush, one of my favorite ET map.

Thanks for taking the time to talk to us, DomMafia.

Thanks! Also, I’d like to give a shout out to my cousin LITO and the great players I’ve met: who|nutz, Fo0, JiggaJigga, Carzyconker, aPissedGuy, meyerinchains, Doug the unforgiven, .:. clan, that hater PROPHET and the rest you know who you are!

2nd I’d like to thank Splash Damage for making a great game and for the unparalleled level of feedback seen daily from the SD team. You guys have broken the mould from all the other developers I’ve Beta tested for. It’s refreshing to see the developers get involved with their community at this level. It was an honor to be interviewed by the very same people responsible for making my favorite 2 games 😉

Now it’s over to you, Community. What are your stand-out moments from the Enemy Territory Open Beta? Share them in the comments!