Original storyline

The game's original plot focused on the player character, later known as "Ranger" in Quake III Arena, who travels across alternate dimensions to stop an enemy code-named "Quake". The game takes place in a Lovecraftian setting with a mixture of dark fantasy, pseudo-medieval, and science fiction.^[3][4]

• Quake (1996)
  • Quake Mission Pack No. 1: Scourge of Armagon (1997)
  • Quake Mission Pack No. 2: Dissolution of Eternity (1997)
  • Quake: Dimension of the Past (2016; chronologically set between Quake and its two expansions)
  • Quake: Dimension of the Machine (2021)

Quake II storyline

Shifting the series to a science fiction theme, Quake II and its sequels chronicle the war between humanity and the cybernetic alien race known as the Strogg.^[5]

• Quake II (1997)
  • Quake II Mission Pack: The Reckoning (1998)
  • Quake II Mission Pack: Ground Zero (1998)
  • Call of the Machine (2023; expansion created by MachineGames for the enhanced edition of Quake II)
• Quake 4 (2005)
• Enemy Territory: Quake Wars (2007; a spin-off of the series and a successor to Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory, with a storyline set before the events of Quake II)

Arena series

Quake III Arena and its successors focus on competitive multiplayer rather than a single-player experience. These games de-emphasized the setting of the first two installments while still retaining continuity with them and crossing over with id's Doom franchise. Quake Champions, in particular, is heavily influenced by the mythology of the original game.^[6]

• Quake III Arena (1999)
  • Quake III: Team Arena (2000)
  • Quake Live (2010; an updated version of Quake III Arena originally designed as a free-to-play game launched via a web plug-in)
• Quake Champions (2017)

Controversy

Like Doom, the Quake series initially received controversy due to containing high amounts of graphic violence. Public and media outcry over Quake and other violent video games peaked after the Columbine High School massacre occurred on April 20, 1999, and it became known that perpetrators Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were avid players of both Doom and Quake. This finding prompted claims from media outlets that violent video games caused negative psychological effects on children that made them more aggressive and accepting of violence.^[35][36]

id Software co-founder John Romero later stated in a 2013 interview that the company and its developers had never intended to "offend people or shock people" with their games.^[37]