Quake Champions is not a true Quake game by any stretch of anyone's imagination.
I'm a longtime fan of the Quake series. I love every Quake game except for this one. I own and have beat every single quake game, and have had great times in all multiplayer experiences Quake has to offer, except for this sorry excuse for a game. This game shouldn't even have "Quake" in its title. This isn't remotely close to being as good as any other quake game. I would rather beat my head against a wall playing Quake 2 for a week straight than look at this washed up trash. The quake title isn't something you can slap on anything, It's something that must be earned, and this game is a living demonstration of that point.

Nothing about this game feels right. The sensitivity settings are very ambiguous and don't translate from other quake engine games at all. Rocket jumping doesn't feel like anything is connecting, it feels like you are just floating, not ascending and descending. The rocket launcher also feels really stupid. It's nothing like any of the other quake games where it hits for considerable amounts of damage, and can have great jumping mechanics. Rocket jumping feels floaty and alien compared to all other quake games (and quake-likes/quake engine games). Most other weapons appear to lack their utility in certain situations, too.

The servers are another huge issue with this game. They are absolute garbage, and from what I can tell there is no performance based matchmaking at all. You are either going to steamroll your opponents, or they will steamroll you. Neither one is fun at all. There is no neck-and-neck gameplay. There is also no netgraph option/command either. I want to have the ability to see where and how the servers are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ up. Not only would a netgraph benefit the developers (because of feedback), but it would also benefit the players. I'd like to see real concrete analytics instead of the bare minimum: ping. There is so much that goes into networking. Ping is a very arbitrary value in the grand scheme of networking metrics. What is the tick rate? What is the rate, the cmdrate, the jitter, the in/out traffic, and most importantly, loss. TF2 was released in 2007 and it had these features available to me day 1. There is no reason why a game released 10 years later can't offer simple stats.
Another issue this game has is weapon balancing. Most weapons in this game are not viable whatsoever. Most weapons hit like used tissues, while only 3 of them hit like actual Quake guns. The only truly viable weapons in this "Quake" game are the Rocket launcher, the rail gun, and the lightning gun (with the rare exception of the shotgun). Use anything else and you're toast. There is no competing against the meta. The DPS disparity between weapons is somehow worse than it was in Q3TA.

Why did they add abilities? Abilities don't spice things up. Abilities make the game damn near impossible to balance, and trust me, the developers of this game obviously don't care about balance. Every character in this game has passive and active abilities that give each character a tide turning 0 skill instant kill crutch. Abilities provide no expression of skill and they are nothing but a useless gimmick that completely ruins the balance and experience of playing the game. For the love of god, at least have a game mode where its more like Quake Live or Quake Team Arena III, no abilities, everyone can bhop, classic (proper) physics mechanics, and the list goes on. It's quite obvious that this game was NOT made for the fans. The developers of this game have totally sabotaged the entire franchise, and ruined the Quake reputation to the largest and most profitable audience, which would be what I refer to as the fortnite "mommy's credit card" infinite money glitch.

There is not a quake game in the series that feels as awful and unresponsive as this one.
Rocket jumping doesn't feel right. Bhopping doesn't feel right because very few characters have the overwatch superhero passive ability to do it properly. That's right. Bunny hopping has been restricted to an ability tucked behind P2W characters. There is no excuse for the ranger, the very character who bunny hopping and rocket jumping was discovered by, not being able to bunny hop. Bhopping is such a crucial part to ALL movement and arena shooters, so why would these incompetent developers restrict such a crucial mechanic? It's obvious that this game wasn't made by quake fans or anyone who has ever played Quake. There is no excuse for the newest installment in the Quake series to be objectively worse than all previous titles.

Give me one solid reason why this game needs loot boxes. You can't. Everything should be unlocked from the start like how it was in quake III. Nobody wants to spend stupid amounts of money on cosmetics.

Quake Champions is a disappointment. All these slimeball developers care about is money, and they sabotaged a legendary franchise just for the sake of it. Quake Champions should have never been free to play. Better yet, they should have never even made this game. The whole copy-and-paste battle pass and loot box system are blatant proof that this game is, and never will, be anything other than a cash grab.

By all of the reasons above, and more, there is not a better way to show your customers, and fan base which spans decades, that you simply do not care about them or your own franchise. What a disgusting bastardization of the legendary Quake series. The developers should be deeply ashamed of themselves.

3/10 - This is NOT Quake.