Ajax, (May 1998)
The Raven has been talking to a number of top Kiwi Players, as well as getting together a clan match between Phoenix and a Kiwi clan called "IP". Looking forward to bringing you some coverage of that :-)

Among those Raven talked to was Immortal, perhaps the most legendary of the NZ Players. Immortal said that he'd "love to play some friendly games against you Aussies, [but] I have to decline for now ... I havn't been playing much Quake at all of late... I'll probably wait until AGN before I start getting back into Quake, and give your guys some good games :) At the moment I only play game of clan arena in Q1 & Q2 on LANs with mates, just for fun".

Another Kiwi Player he spoke to, Ajax, has a really strong rep in NZ and would love to play some Aussies. He lives in Auckland, though, so we need to get that ISDN connection happening in Auckland. (Message to potential ISDN partners based in Auckland - "come on guys - do you want Wellington to be always ahead of you on this one" :-Þ ). As soon as we get an ISDN partner in Auckland we can get some games going with Ajax :-). Meantime, following our successful test yesterday, we are going to get an "international" organised with the Wellington crew, to be hosted by our cool capital city partner - Paradise.net :-).

Raven did this cool interview with Ajax, hope you enjoy it :-)

Raven Talks with Ajax (NZ)

<Raven> So what do u think of the quaking scene in nz?
<Ajax> Well.. its very strong considering we have a relatively small population here.. we have a tonne of good ctf players and also lots of great deathmatchers. Its kind of different from the scene in most other countries I would say because everyone tends to know everyone else.. especially in Auckland, where a lot of the best quakers live, we have a lot of regular lans, and all the top players get together.

<Raven> So how big would you estimate the nz quake community, quake is very strong here in australia
<Ajax> We had a recent lan event in auckland which attracted about 350-400 quakers, and that would have included the top 50 or so players in the country.. I would say there are another 200 or so players who didnt come.. so maybe 600 quakers in total, although some of them are pretty inactive.

<Raven> I've noticed on your Xtra server, i dont seem to play many of the big names I've heard of. Do you think this is to do with nz being such a tight knit country and the good players just play LAN's together?
<Ajax> Most of the 'names' that I know play mainly on lans now.. a lot of people are fed up with the lag on modems, although you still see alot of the good players turning up on internet servers for clan matches and that kind of thing. Also, everyone tends to use aliases :) Its totally out of hand here, you can log onto a server and have a bunch of total strangers, all of who seem really good ;)

<Raven> Is there any one person, who kicks your butt constantly?
<Ajax> Hmm.. I've lost a few games to Immortal in the last few months but thats all I can think of.

<Raven> We've heard a bit of Immortal here in oz, who's the main player you've heard of from oz?
<Ajax> I've seen a few demos of Bro, and his name seems to come up alot as the best player in Australia.

<Raven> Have you ventured onto any over the aussie servers yet? I've seen some screenies of people from nz playing on aussie servers
<Ajax> Nope, the lag from my isp to the aussie servers I've tried has been terrible.. usually in the order of a consistent 600ms plus ping.. which is hopeless for quake. As for the screenshots, well I think its pretty pointless logging onto a server, kicking a bunch of unknown guys and newbies, and then posting a screenshot. Posting shots of good scores against known players would have some value.

<Raven> Agreed :) What do you think of Quake 2, it seems us aussies haven't really taken to it
<Ajax> Personally I dont like the feel of it. I have not been able to get excited about it yet, I dont like the weapon balance and the controls.. to me even playing it on Lan feels like Quake with a 200ms ping. But I think Q2 rocket arena is quite fun with a group of mates. Also, my favourite type of quake is 1 on 1 games, and I think Quake 2 is awful for that.. large maps, and long drawn out fights.

<Raven> The CTF scene in nz seems quite strong, i know here in oz, we play a lot of TF. Why do you think it's so popular in nz?
<Ajax> i think theres a pretty simple explanation. The first few quake servers in NZ, back in '96 and early '97 were all running the CTF mod. We had pretty much no choice of what to play :) So everyone got good at ctf. Later on as quake became more popular, a large proportion of the new servers continued to run ctf, and so its really taken off here.

<Raven> Whats you favourite map for 1 on 1?
<Ajax> I love both dm4 and dm6.. I cant separate them, I think they are both near perfect 1v1 maps. Dm2 is also a great map, although I wish it had a lightning gun :)

<Raven> Us aussies are a bit of rocketeers, whats the most popular weapon over in nz?
<Ajax> The rocket launcher dominates here as well. Its the most versatile and easy to use weapon by far. I'm also noticing people starting to use the LG more and more, but mainly on lans.

<Raven> Are there any female quakers in nz?
<Ajax> There have been maybe half a dozen that I have heard of since I have been playing. There are probably a few more too, but its almost totally dominated by males.

<Raven> If you could go a few rounds with any quaker in the world, who would it be?
<Ajax> Interesting question.. I'd like to play some of the best USA players like Thresh, Gollum or Reptile. I have a feeling I would take a beating, but it would be an interesting experience. I'd like to play some of the Aussies as well.

<Raven> AGN looks like its gunna be huge, do you think we might see your name up in the leader board?
<Ajax> heh, well I'm not sure. AGN is going to be more Quake 2 based than Quake 1, but I will definately play in the quake 1 tournies.

<Raven> I heard of someone arranging a party of kiwis to come and take on australia's best for Gib Con '98. Do you think we might see you over here?
<Ajax> I'm not really sure whos organising that, but probably not unless that person wants to pay airfares and stuff ;)