Mark Shaw <
mshaw@panix.com> wrote:
Jay Morris <morrisj@epsilon3.me> wrote:
https://xkcd.com/3294
I don't get it. Someone 'splain?
https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/3294:_Asteroid_Mission
This refers to noclip mode in videogames: "A cheat that allows players
to pass through normally impenetrable objects ? walls, ceilings, and
floors ? by disabling clipping". In most online games this results in a
ban. In others it disables achievements, or requires enabling cheats.
Often it functions from a built-in developer console, such as in
{w|Source (game engine)} games such as {w|Half-life (video game)} or
{w|Portal (video game)}. Or, a hacked client, in most cases.
Aha. No wonder I didn't get it; I haven't played video games since
the Quake days.
Sounds like you played the game that is the trope namer? :-)
I guess you could argue the trope namer is really Doom II which came
out two years earlier, also by id Software but I'm going with Quake,
it was what made it universal.
Brief history of "noclip" and a possible Usenet connection:
Some claim the first game with "noclip" was id Software's Commander
Keen 4-6 (1991) though it's triggered by a keyboard combination.
It's... possible but I'm sceptical.
Doom (1993) by id Software had a "console" where commands could be
entered to change settings (graphics setting, difficulty, map
debugging, lots more) - the command to disable clipping was
"idspispopd". This name for the command supposedly comes from an
Usenet post on comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action [1].
But everyone kept referring to it as "noclip" and so when Doom II came
out only one year later (1994) id Software rolled with it and switched
to using "noclip".
It was also used in the original Quake (1996) and most? all? future id
Software titles has both a console and a noclip command (single-player
only for obvious reasons).
Quake was influental enough that pretty much every game that had the functionality and a console after that used this term.
1.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vHV5B77RM8&t=127s
--- PyGate Linux v1.5.19
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)