if you’ve played Quake2 you’ve seen the cool but retro looking lazer beams, rocket smoke trail sparks and blood splater used in the game for paticle.
I’d like to learn how to simulate this effect in blender for a game I’m working on. if somone has an idea on how to do this please let me know. any kind of feedback would be appreciated! 
cookie monstA
Use the add object actuator and alpha mapped planes.
And press the halo button in the UV panel.
Use Alpha Planes. For blood: Use A Shadow Mesh. For Smoke: halo mesh.
I’ve seen this mentioned around here but I dont know how to set a face as a shadow. Since blender_rox brought it up…how do you set a face to shadow?
Same panel of buttons where you set it to alpha.
As far as I remember the “particles” in quake II were like… little colored squares… just use the add actuator, and add plenty of colored planes.
(if the particles didn’t look like this, hmm, maybe my Graphics Card was crappy)
TO make these planes alwasys look at the camera, goto edit buttons (F9) then press the “F” key over the 3D window to enter “UV Face” select mode. left click on the face (the square) and from the buttons on the bottom click “halo” this will make the little square ALWAYS look at the camera. Here you can also set the face into other modes, such as shadow, etc etc etc…
Thanks for the reply so soon! this is a really helpful board 
I’m still learning blender modeling… I have yet to really underestand ge.
I do have another question… Is there a tech demo trailor, a demo that displays the capability of the latest GE update? Do you thinik it’s on par with Genesis3d or maybe quake3 engine?
Appreciate the helpful advice!
0okay comparing gE to Q3 engine is a bit off lol but would blender match up to quake 2 engine at solid frame rate?
The quake 2 engine as run in software mode or in Hardware/openGL/Glide mode? (biiiig difference there), as for getting the same amount of frames/second on BGE and Quake2… I wouldn’t care as long as it stays above 20 for strategy games and around 60 for first person shooter. But the basic features of both engines are the same.
In short: Yes I would say BGE is at the level of Quake2 game engine, visually speaking, however customising the BGE is a LOT easyer than Q2
(edit) wooooops, and with programmable shaders it’s waaaay better than Q2 actuallly…ok I’ll keep my mouth shut before I start drooling again.
that’s basicly what I expected of bge. q2 isn’t a bad engine really …especially at 6ofps. it seems like bge would have better lighting in game than q2e but I could be wrong.