Feels kinda cheeky of Machine Games to call this Episode 5 of Quake, given nobody involved has any real connection to the original product beyond working for a sister company of id Software. As far as I know, John Romero's SIGIL is the only collection of Doom maps that has dared to call itself Doom's "Episode 5" - such is the holiness of these games. Romero's already hinted that he wants to do a SIGIL 2 for Doom 2 and a SIGIL 3 for Quake, so it's gonna be awkward when he wants to claim he's made the fifth episode of Quake and finds out a bunch of crazy Swedes decapitated BJ Blaskowicz and then fucked with his final id baby.

Anyway - fan-mapping politics aside, Dimensions of the Past is an alright little compilation of Now That's What I Call Quake maps, but it's more of an Episode 1 - 4 grab-bag than a standalone entry in Quake's episode canon. Love it or hate it, Episode 4 was very much its own twisted annoying fucked up little thing that stood apart from its sibilings. This isn't - doing Shub-Nigguarth's Pit again but this time there's a ton of Shamblers and all you can really do is scramble around for the hidden Quad Damage is just as esoteric and annoying a final boss as the original Shub's telefrag trick. C'mon! Let's just admit that Quake boss maps aren't possible...