Quake

Quake is a 1996 first-person shooter video game developed by id Software and published by GT Interactive. The first game in the Quake series, it was originally released for MS-DOS and Windows, followed by Mac OS, Linux, and Saturn in 1997 and Nintendo 64 in 1998. The game's plot is centered around teleportation experiments, dubbed slipgates, which have resulted in an unforeseen invasion of Earth by a hostile force codenamed Quake, which commands a vast army of monsters. The player takes the role of a soldier (later named Ranger), whose mission is to travel through these slipgates in order to find and destroy the source of the invasion. The game is split between futuristic military bases and medieval, gothic environments, featuring both science fiction and fantasy weaponry and enemies as the player battles possessed soldiers and demonic beasts such as ogres or armor-clad knights. Quake heavily takes inspiration from gothic fiction and in particular the works of H. P. Lovecraft. The game went through many revisions during development, and had originally been inspired by a Dungeons & Dragons campaign held among id Software staff. The successor to id Software's Doom series, Quake built upon the technology and gameplay of its predecessor. Unlike the Doom engine before it, the Quake engine offered full real-time 3D rendering and had early support for 3D acceleration through OpenGL. After Doom helped popularize multiplayer deathmatches, Quake added various multiplayer options. Online multiplayer became increasingly common, with the QuakeWorld update and software such as QuakeSpy making the process of finding and playing against others on the Internet easier and more reliable. Quake featured music composed by Trent Reznor and his band Nine Inch Nails. Quake is often cited as one of the best video games ever made. Despite its critical acclaim, Quake's development was controversial in the history of id Software.

Source: Wikipedia CC BY-SA 4.0 — Quake (video game) · retrieved October 19, 2026

Text is shortened from the original article; the full version is linked.

Developer

Id Software, Nightdive Studios

Publisher

Sega, Midway Games, Activision, Bethesda Softworks, Atari, Inc., MacSoft Games, ClickBoom, Macmillan Inc.

First release

June 22, 1996

Series

Quake

Cover

Official thumbnail

Record ID

Q217423