BFG10K

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The BFG10K or BFG10000 is an extremely powerful fictional weapon appearing in the first-person shooter computer games Quake II and Quake III Arena (though the Quake II and Quake III versions of the weapon are considerably different). The weapon is named in homage to the BFG9000, a weapon in Doom and Doom II, games which are considered precursors to the Quake series. According to the Doom film, the abbreviation BFG stands for "Bio Force Gun", though the abbreviation originally stood for "Big Fucking Gun", and is described in the Quake II game manual as a "Big, uh, freakin' gun".

[edit] Quake II version

The Quake II version is similar in stature and function to the BFG9000 of Doom. It resembles a cannon, and is a two-handed weapon. When fired, it takes a few seconds to charge, and then launches a large, glowing green plasma ball (visually identical to Doom's) that travels slowly through the level. The plasma ball fires green lasers at nearby enemies, which inflict damage comparable to being in slime. On impact, the plasma ball explodes, throwing splash damage to anything near the point of explosion, and inflicting massive damage on anything it hit directly.

It also inflicts a 'special effect' which is calculated like so: at the moment of impact, for each enemy a virtual triangle is "drawn" between the enemy's location, the point of impact, and the location of the player who fired the weapon. If all three lines are unobstructed by level geometry (walls, etc), then the enemy receives some amount of damage in addition to any other damage it may have sustained. In deathmatch, if the player dies before impact, the "special effect" still occurs, and in fact if the player respawns before impact, he/she can be affected by the "special effect" of his/her own shot (This does not occur if the player does not die.)

The BFG also yields considerably greater recoil than other explosive weapons such as the Rocket Launcher; with sufficient health, one can "BFG-jump" by firing the weapon into the ground and jumping at the moment of impact, letting the recoil from the explosion propel the player higher into the air than a conventional rocket jump (though taking considerably more damage). One can also combine this with a "handgrenade-jump" fairly easily due to the timing of both weapons: throw out a hand grenade (without holding onto it), immediately switch to the BFG while walking on top of the grenade, and fire as soon as possible; the BFG plasma ball will impact at almost the exact same moment as the hand grenade explodes, yielding even greater heights (but with even more self-damage). If one has invulnerability, performing either a regular BFG jump or a BFG+handgrenade jump is painless, and it also opens the possibility of doing these things with the Quad damage powerup for long-distance traveling. Lowering the gravity level of the map aids in this prospect.

[edit] Quake III Arena version

The Quake III version, though it bears the same name, is a considerably different weapon. Quake III's BFG is a rapid-fire weapon, firing out bursts of fast-moving plasma at a rate of about 3 shots per second, which inflict damage and splash damage several times more powerful than that of the rocket launcher.

Though most chide the weapon for being too powerful and unimaginative, the weapon does eat through its ammunition very quickly (and replacement ammo is generally scarce) and getting the most out of the weapon does take some skill. One must overcome the instinct to unload the weapon all at once, and instead use short controlled bursts (usually of one shot at a time), aiming and treating the weapon much like a Rocket Launcher but with the inherent faster rate of fire (and faster-flying shots). This makes the weapon's ammunition last longer.

[edit] Trivia

• In Quake II as well as Quake III Arena, if the player holding the BFG10K kills themself with it, the game displays "<Player> should have used a smaller gun!".

• When killed with the BFG10K, the computer player based on the Doom marine sometimes quips, "That toy is no BFG".