I'm a member of Team Reaction. They were pretty notorious amongst fans of id Software's video games.
Team Reaction created a number of mods, the ones I played are:
Each of these mods ran on Quake II (Q2). Each of them brought revolutionary gameplay to the ever-popular first person shooter genre. There were also sequels made , Q3Jailbreak and Q3pong that ran on Quake III: Arena (Q3A).
With each release Team Reaction became stronger. Gameplay became increasingly innovative. Design became ever more beautiful and complex, ultimately looking better than the game on which these mods were based (in my opinion). This isn't to say that the programmers and designers were better than id Software. Far from it. Give id Software incentive to release new content on their 3 year old engine and you'd have astonishing results. In fact, id artists did release content for Q3A more than a year after its release. The art was definately impressive, and their seniority on their own platforms is clearly established with releases such as those.
Every artist hits engine limitations eventually though. Team Reaction's artist hit them, as id Software's did (or would). If you're not convinced of my mod team's talent yet, then you probably won't be. It's hard to look back on history and declare works to be ahead of their time when you weren't involved and the work wasn't documented for posterity.
Suffice it to say, they were the premiere mod team in the id universe once Valve bought Team Fortress Software. They remained so throughout Quake II's life. In fact, people still play Quake 2 Gloom to this day. Every now and again, you hear about servers getting started with their other mods out of nostalgia. I've never heard people disappointed with the gameplay to this day. These mods really are classics.
Wirehead Studios was the runner-up in the days of Quake 2, they were working on a mod that incorporated all elements of gameplay from all of id's releases to that date. Due to legal concerns expressed by id Software, development was halted. As far as I know, Wirehead Studios retreated to discuss their next mod.
(It should be noted, at this point, that id Software did not threaten Wirehead Studios with legal action. To my knowledge, their request to halt development came after much deliberation, very regretfully. As I understand it, the communication was very respectful. Wirehead complied because they respected id, and id respected them, and neither wanted to cause trouble for the other. This was the way things were in the Quake modding community. If Kenny, Dr. Jones, or anyone else from Wirehead wants to correct me or has something to add, please do so. These are the events as I recall them being an outside observer at the time.)
When Quake 3: Arena was released, Team Reaction got to work, and so did Wirehead Studios. Ultimately both teams met with great success. Team Reaction released Q3Pong, and Q3Jailbreak, even as a recent competetor released Prisoners of War on the same engine with similiar gameplay. I feel it necessary to mention that the makers of Prisoners of War, Black Knight Productions, consisted primarily of former Quake 2 Jailbreak players that didn't agree with politics of how Team Reaction interacted with thier community at the time. It is so necessary to point out because the mods were ultimately merged into Jailbreak: Prisoners of War. It was a great mod, the ultimate realization of that type of gameplay. Once again, illustrating the nature of the Quake modding community. Rivalries can be fierce but are short-lived. Everyone wins when everyone cooperates. Developers in id Software's world know this, it's a universal.
As it turns out I was quite the rogue. Disgruntled with the constructive peace talks occuring between Black Knight Productions and Team Reaction at the time, I left to join another venture. My second chance to square off with Team Reaction was with the mod Tremulous. This mod was being pitted against the rumored Quake 3 Gloom before Team Reaction even publically announced it. This time we were going to make things very different from the original mod, a merge wouldn't be possible. However gameplay would be nestled securely in Quake 3 Gloom's realm. I wound up being removed from that team, along with almost everyone else, in a move that infuriated me at the time. I still think my removal was in err, but the animosity between Timbo (lead developer) and myself is gone these days. I congratulated them this year when I spotted them on the front page of digg. The dedication of the new team is impressive, and I wish them luck in future versions and whatever new projects they choose to undertake.
In the meantime, Wirehead Studios had released a beta version of Generations Arena. It was well recieved, and continued to attract increasing attention all the way to their 1.0 release and beyond. Quake 3: Arena's assets included all the intellectual property from all the previous games except Castle Wolfenstein. This made it possible for them to realize the unification of more than half a decade's most popular deathmatch titles into one game! This is another amazing mod, still played today, with outstanding features. Weapons, physics, and art are all faithfully recreated in this huge mod. I highly reccomend trying this out, the minor differences between the various universes represented give the game a huge and dynamic range of gameplay experiences.
Thus we have a brief description of two of the greatest mod teams in Quake history. Members of both Team Reaction and Wirehead Studios were "sniped" by professional video game development studios over these years. They've already left a legacy.
It is my hope that this isn't the end of their legacy. But before I continue with Team Reaction and Wirehead Studios, it is necessary to introduce another mod team to define the situation they're both in today...
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