28 Years Later, Let's Look At Quake's Lore

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So, today, I was playing Quake 1 and 2, and something ocurred to me, that hadn’t ever ocurred to me in the 28 to 30 years that these games have been a thing: I’ve never fully understood what in the hell the story is supposed to be. Obviously, we’re going to skip Quake 3, not because it isn’t good (it’s one of the greatest arena shooters of all time), but because its story is more that of Unreal Tournament. In that, it’s just people from different dimensions fighting in nonstop deathmatch.

But … if you’ve ever seen those memes online where people poke fun at games where they’re like, “Hey, who’s John Darksouls?” and someone’s like, “He’s the main character of Dark Souls, cousin of John Halo.” … You’re going to love the story behind Quake 1.

The background, according to the Wiki.

You get the phone call at 4 a.m. By 5:30 you’re in the secret installation. The commander explains tersely, “It’s about the Slipgate device. Once we perfect these, we’ll be able to use them to transport people and cargo from one place to another instantly.

“An enemy codenamed Quake, [sic] is using his own slipgates to insert death squads inside our bases to kill, steal, and kidnap.

“The hell of it is we have no idea where he’s from. Our top scientists think Quake’s not from Earth, but another dimension. They say Quake’s preparing to unleash his real army, whatever that is.

“You’re our best man. This is Operation Counterstrike and you’re in charge. Find Quake, and stop him … or it … You have full authority to requisition anything you need. If the eggheads are right, all our lives are expendable.”

But that’s not all!

While scouting the neighborhood, you hear shots back at the base. Damn, that Quake bastard works fast! He heard about Operation Counterstrike, and hit first. Racing back, you see the place is overrun. You are almost certainly the only survivor. Operation Counterstrike is over. Except for you.

You know that the heart of the installation holds a slipgate. Since Quake’s killers came through, it is still set to his dimension. You can use it to get loose in his hometown. Maybe you can get to the asshole personally. You pump a round into your shotgun, and get moving.

And that’s it! I mean, obviously, it continues a bit into the actual game, where you’re traversing different dimensions and collecting runes … killing enemies like something out of Lovecraft, but in its most basic sense, and I mean no offense to those who worked or work for ID Software and on this game, but if I didn’t know what Quake was, I would assume this was a sixth grader’s creative writing homework. I mean, it just starts talking at you, as if you already know what’s going on? It starts out in 2nd-person perspective and never leaves that narrative. And then there’s “Operation Counterstrike,” which makes me wonder where the original devs behind CounterStrike got their game’s name from.

Especially because Team Fortress was originally a Quake multiplayer mod made by the community (in the 90s).

I wanted to read through all of this, because I also didn’t understand the connection between this game, and the second game, where we’re suddenly invading the Strogg’s home planet, and there’s me thinking, “Who the heck are the Strogg, again?”

The short answer to that question, is: The Strogg and Quake 2 have almost nothing to do with Quake 1. It’s a restart, and I kind of found that a little disappointing. The theme of Quake 1 is really cool, and it feels a bit more linked to Doom in the way it handles its world … even if the lore really leaves something to be desired.

Quake 2’s basic lore (via this Wiki):

Quake II takes place in a futuristic sci-fi environment. During the single player campaign, you take the role of a Marine called Bitterman, taking part in “Operation Alien Overlord”, attempting to save Earth from the Strogg invasion by counter-attacking their planet, Stroggos. During the first attack on Stroggos, the Big Gun strikes down most of the Marine pods with a powerful EMP blast. This causes most of the pods to crash land (many miles from their target landing zones). Most of the Marines are captured or killed, but Bitterman is one of the lucky few to survive. He finds himself many miles from the Big Gun in a Strogg base on the outskirts of the city.

It almost sounds like they retconned the enemy’s name to be Strogg, (pronounced stroeg), rather than John Quake, the main antagonist of planet Quake, from Quake.

And I guess, if you think of it in that way, it makes a little more sense. The Strogg invasion of Earth … could be considered parallel to “Quake’s” invasion of a military base, and therefore … Earth. Maybe. But, I’m just kind of inserting my own canon into something that’s been over and done with for decades.

The subsequent games all follow strings of lore from Quake 2 (mostly), and I think only Quake 3 acknowledges Quake 1. Which, again, is a shame. I definitely feel like ID should come back for another full Quake release, and give us some continuity here. Even if it only matters to like … five people.