Quake Live reports intermittent outages due to DDoS attack

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Quake Live has reported that it is suffering through a DDoS attack, and that players may experience intermittent outages while it works on resolving the problem.

"Quake Live is experiencing issues due to a DDoS attack, and may be down intermittently while we seek to address the problem," a brief message on the Quake Live site states. "We apologize for the inconvenience." The DDoS warning was actually posted last night but users on the Quake Live forums are still complaining about difficulty connecting to the game, and according to Blue's, the Quake Live site itself has also been forced offline at times.

I'm compelled to take a moment to note that a DDoS attack—Distributed Denial of Service—is the lowest form of "hack" that a person can undertake, essentially the digital equivalent of setting a bag of dog poop on fire and leaving it on someone's front porch. Worse, actually, because at least the poop is only going to be stomped on by one particular person, who's presumably caused you some sort of irritation; a DDoS attack is tedious, indiscriminate jerkery that accomplishes nothing.

Okay, got that off my chest. No other information about the attack has been released, but I've had trouble reaching the Quake Live site myself this afternoon: Sometimes it will load, and sometimes the connection simply times out. A Bethesda rep echoed the message posted on the Quake Live site, saying, "The game will be down intermittently as we address the DDoS attack," but offered no suggestion as to when the matter might be resolved. We'll let you know if and when we hear more.

Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.

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