Happy chinese new year too all. Wheres my red packet?! LOL. CA1 is right next week, snuck up on me again. I seem to never notice important things till the last minute. Hope I do well. Not very confident about aything now.
Moving on, I got my cousin Bryan's Steam acc and since he has the CS anthlogy, I can download them, FOR FREE! The anthology includes Counter-Strike, CS:CZ, Deathmatch classic and Ricochet. When I played CS, I was shocked at the skill of most of the players. With an AWP (Powerful sniper rifle) they can stil do CQB (close quater combat). Keep getting owned by players I can't see or got headshot by some Ak-47. (Headshot 100dmg) How do people get so pro? Still, I managed to get some kills and win a few rounds. Very hard to find a server here though. I'm doing better in Deathmatch and Richochet, which is more fun but you will get fatigued and bored after playing for a long period, unlike CS. Very few servers but easy to connect, unlike CS.
Moving on, I had a fun chinese new year (CNY). Visited my cousins' houses, collected red packets etc etc. Collected abt $400 in total.
Well, sleepy nitey nite
pics
Friday, February 23, 2007
Thursday, February 15, 2007
...
Its official, my maths stink! Scored horribly for two tests. I'm not gonna delve into details. The bright side is that I make the mistakes now and not during the upcoming Ca1. I hate exams.
Its been a horrible week for Leon. He got punished like every day larhs, poor poor leon.
Btw, I just noticed I had subscribed to Animax on digital cable. Been watching the shows. The bad part about most anime is that it's a really tight series and If I miss one episode I'm missing alot. My favourites so far are "Black Jack", Candidates for Goddess"(ended) and "Galaxy Railroad" All of them are quite easy to watch and doesn't have that many complex storylines. I wish I found this channel earlier.
Moving on, I downloaded two game demos, Darwinia and DEFCON off steam. DEFCON is the best out of the two. DEFCON is a streamlined RTS with no resource collection or unit development. You just place your units and start a thermonuclear war. Here are the basics(off wiki of course): [edit] Overview
In DEFCON, players are given a dehumanised 1980s vector graphics computer-themed world map, a varied arsenal of nuclear weapons, and a primary objective: destroy as many of the enemy's population as possible. A typical game will see "innocent" casualties numbering in hundreds of millions (megadeaths) while players try their hand at annihilating their opponents. Attacking is a very risky strategy that leaves oneself wide open to attack.
In most games, all sides take heavy losses, but the player with the highest score wins. Players' scores are determined according to one of three schemes: Default (gain 2 points for 1 Megadeath caused, lose 1 point for 1 Megadeath suffered), Survivor (gain 1 point per million survivors in your territory) or Genocide (gain 1 point for each Megadeath caused); though functionally identical in a one-on-one conflict, each scoring scheme suggests subtle differences in strategy in larger multiplayer conflicts.
Gameplay time can be varied by configuring the speed at which events progress from real-time to 20× real-time. Most games last 30 to 40 minutes while real-time gameplay can last more than 8 hours.
The game offers six territories that may be selected by a player or assigned to an AI opponent. These include:
North America: Includes all of the contiguous United States, Canada, and Alaska.
South America: Includes Mexico, Central America, and all of South America.
Europe: Includes all of Europe except Russia and Turkey.
Africa: Includes all of Africa.
USSR: Includes all of contiguous Russia.
Asia: Includes all Asian countries except for Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia and the south-east Asian islands.
Territories that cannot be selected or that would normally be part of the above six, but aren't, include: Australia, Greenland, Oceania, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Caribbean, and the south-east Asian islands.
DEFCON is a streamlined RTS, with no unit production, resource collection, or technology tree upgrades. Players choose and position their forces at the beginning of the game. A countdown system prevents games from disintegrating prematurely. Gameplay begins at alert level DEFCON 5 and counts down to DEFCON 1 (the highest alert level). Each upgrade in alert level brings more possibilities, ensuring that issuing orders fastest will provide as little advantage as possible.
Once DEFCON 1 is reached, the game proceeds until a certain percentage (80% by default) of the total number of nuclear missiles available to all players have been launched or destroyed. Once this occurs, a victory countdown begins (45 game "minutes" by default) and the final score is announced when this countdown runs out.
A DEFCON game can host up to six human or AI players. Alliances can be formed, broken, or renegotiated at will with human players. Alliances with CPU controlled players can only be set at the start of the game. Allied players share radar coverage and line of sight, but there is no allied victory and there is only one winner. This means that almost all alliances are broken by the end of the game. Lead designer Chris Delay explains:
“We've seen alliance members shooting overhead friendly planes down because they believed the planes were scouting the area for targets in preparation for a strike. This results in arguments in the chat channels, followed by skirmishes at sea, followed by retaliation, before finally the whole alliance collapses and everyone starts nuking the hell out of each other. It's awesome.”
The chat system features a public channel, in which all players may communicate, as well as channels private to specific alliances, and direct player-to-player private messaging.
In a game with the Diplomacy option, all players start as members of a single alliance, and attempt to stay on top as the alliance disintegrates. Score is determined by survivors at the end of the game.
In Office mode, the game runs in real time and cannot be sped up. The game can be quickly forced to the background making the computer available for another use, or simply to make it appear the gamer is actually working. While the game continues to run in the background, a system tray icon will notify the gamer of certain events as they occur. The office mode hotkey, sometimes referred to as the boss key, is activated by striking the escape key twice in rapid succession. A game in office mode lasts no more than six hours. In fact, the boss key is available in all game modes, but it is designed for this mode in particular.
DEFCON uses a real-time line of sight system common to traditional RTS games, where only enemy units within radar coverage may be seen. However, a nuclear missile launch from a silo or submarine is automatically detected by all players (though the missile itself is not, and must be detected by radar), which reveals the location of the unit launching the missile. A nuclear missile launch from a bomber, however, does not reveal the location of the bomber.
Most units have several operating modes for different functions, and require several minutes to switch modes. For instance, ordering a missile silo to switch from offensive launches to missile defense will leave it inoperative while it switches.
Ground units
Ground installations are immobile, and can be destroyed by nuclear attack.
Radar dishes provide broad radar coverage (though most units have some radar capability), but they are destroyed by a single nuke. Often they are among the first targets, because they enhance other defense installations; for instance, a missile silo's firing range far outstrips its radar range. A radar dish can be destroyed if a fighter or bomber runs out of fuel or is shot down directly over it, even before DEFCON 1.
Missile silos have two modes: launching nuclear attacks or shooting down incoming missiles and planes. In the attack mode, a silo has ten ICBMs that may be fired at any target in the world, though doing so alerts all players and reveals the silo's position. On defense, a silo automatically fires anti-air missiles effective against enemy planes and missiles – however, the limited rate of fire means the silos may be overwhelmed by many incoming missiles. Unlike most units, silos are hardened against nuclear strikes, taking three hits to destroy, although each strike eliminates half (rounded down) of the silo's nuke stockpile.
Airbases house bombers and fighters (starting with five of each) plus a complement of five spare SRBMs to reload bombers that have launched their missile. They launch planes and provide a landing point for orphaned aircraft, and also build new fighters automatically throughout the game. Airbases take two hits to destroy; on the first hit, half of the airbase's currently landed aircraft and missiles are destroyed.
Ships
Naval units are organized into fleets of up to six ships which move and fight together. Fleets must be placed in territorial waters at the beginning of a game. Ships may move through the ocean, albeit slowly.
Carriers act as mobile airfields, scrambling fighters and nuke-equipped bombers. They are also the most powerful anti-submarine warfare escorts, armed with sonar and depth charges that quickly sink nearby subs. With no surface guns, they are helpless without their complement of planes.
Battleships are tough and carry powerful guns effective against surface fleets and aircraft. They are vulnerable to sub and bomber attacks, so are safer with carrier escorts.
Submarines carry torpedoes and an arsenal of five nukes. Sub attacks are dangerous against enemy ships, though subs are easily killed by carriers. Subs are invisible to radar but carry no radar of their own; they may use active sonar at the risk of exposing their position. Their real power comes from their missiles, which can devastate coastal cities, or quickly hit defenses before a full-scale strike. Subs must surface to fire nukes, leaving them open to counterattack before they can fire all their missiles; the launch also alerts all players to the sub's location.
Aircraft
Aircraft are launched from other ground and sea units. Typically they operate autonomously after launch, but bombers and fighters can also be controlled while airborne.
Fighters are light and fast, making them good at reconnaissance and interception. They are most effective against other aircraft, though they can attack ships as well. They have a fairly short range, forcing them to return to a base or crash for lack of fuel.
Bombers carry a single SRBM missile that may be fired at a nearby target. Bombers have a long range to deliver this payload, but are vulnerable during the trip. Unlike silo- and sub-based nukes, firing the missile does not alert everyone to the launch, making it a stealthier option. They also have a conventional attack that does heavy damage to ships.
Missiles deliver a devastating payload. A direct hit on a city will kill half of the current living civilians. Missiles can only be shot down by enemy silos in defense mode – several hits will cause them to crash harmlessly. Once launched from a silo, sub, or bomber, missiles cannot be retargeted, though they can be disarmed in mid-flight.
Its a really cool game but I'm not very good at it. I suffered a crushing defeat last time. score:-45. Well I'm still a newbie. I think my stratergies are too offensive.
Oh yeah, I also launched a new MV. Deviating away from my normal Halo themes, I made a World War 2 themed MV. Clips were from computer games Red Orchestra and Day of Defeat.
URL:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKk12BHAtCw
watch my Halo movies too!
Well, I guess thats all.
Its been a horrible week for Leon. He got punished like every day larhs, poor poor leon.
Btw, I just noticed I had subscribed to Animax on digital cable. Been watching the shows. The bad part about most anime is that it's a really tight series and If I miss one episode I'm missing alot. My favourites so far are "Black Jack", Candidates for Goddess"(ended) and "Galaxy Railroad" All of them are quite easy to watch and doesn't have that many complex storylines. I wish I found this channel earlier.
Moving on, I downloaded two game demos, Darwinia and DEFCON off steam. DEFCON is the best out of the two. DEFCON is a streamlined RTS with no resource collection or unit development. You just place your units and start a thermonuclear war. Here are the basics(off wiki of course): [edit] Overview
In DEFCON, players are given a dehumanised 1980s vector graphics computer-themed world map, a varied arsenal of nuclear weapons, and a primary objective: destroy as many of the enemy's population as possible. A typical game will see "innocent" casualties numbering in hundreds of millions (megadeaths) while players try their hand at annihilating their opponents. Attacking is a very risky strategy that leaves oneself wide open to attack.
In most games, all sides take heavy losses, but the player with the highest score wins. Players' scores are determined according to one of three schemes: Default (gain 2 points for 1 Megadeath caused, lose 1 point for 1 Megadeath suffered), Survivor (gain 1 point per million survivors in your territory) or Genocide (gain 1 point for each Megadeath caused); though functionally identical in a one-on-one conflict, each scoring scheme suggests subtle differences in strategy in larger multiplayer conflicts.
Gameplay time can be varied by configuring the speed at which events progress from real-time to 20× real-time. Most games last 30 to 40 minutes while real-time gameplay can last more than 8 hours.
The game offers six territories that may be selected by a player or assigned to an AI opponent. These include:
North America: Includes all of the contiguous United States, Canada, and Alaska.
South America: Includes Mexico, Central America, and all of South America.
Europe: Includes all of Europe except Russia and Turkey.
Africa: Includes all of Africa.
USSR: Includes all of contiguous Russia.
Asia: Includes all Asian countries except for Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia and the south-east Asian islands.
Territories that cannot be selected or that would normally be part of the above six, but aren't, include: Australia, Greenland, Oceania, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Caribbean, and the south-east Asian islands.
DEFCON is a streamlined RTS, with no unit production, resource collection, or technology tree upgrades. Players choose and position their forces at the beginning of the game. A countdown system prevents games from disintegrating prematurely. Gameplay begins at alert level DEFCON 5 and counts down to DEFCON 1 (the highest alert level). Each upgrade in alert level brings more possibilities, ensuring that issuing orders fastest will provide as little advantage as possible.
Once DEFCON 1 is reached, the game proceeds until a certain percentage (80% by default) of the total number of nuclear missiles available to all players have been launched or destroyed. Once this occurs, a victory countdown begins (45 game "minutes" by default) and the final score is announced when this countdown runs out.
A DEFCON game can host up to six human or AI players. Alliances can be formed, broken, or renegotiated at will with human players. Alliances with CPU controlled players can only be set at the start of the game. Allied players share radar coverage and line of sight, but there is no allied victory and there is only one winner. This means that almost all alliances are broken by the end of the game. Lead designer Chris Delay explains:
“We've seen alliance members shooting overhead friendly planes down because they believed the planes were scouting the area for targets in preparation for a strike. This results in arguments in the chat channels, followed by skirmishes at sea, followed by retaliation, before finally the whole alliance collapses and everyone starts nuking the hell out of each other. It's awesome.”
The chat system features a public channel, in which all players may communicate, as well as channels private to specific alliances, and direct player-to-player private messaging.
In a game with the Diplomacy option, all players start as members of a single alliance, and attempt to stay on top as the alliance disintegrates. Score is determined by survivors at the end of the game.
In Office mode, the game runs in real time and cannot be sped up. The game can be quickly forced to the background making the computer available for another use, or simply to make it appear the gamer is actually working. While the game continues to run in the background, a system tray icon will notify the gamer of certain events as they occur. The office mode hotkey, sometimes referred to as the boss key, is activated by striking the escape key twice in rapid succession. A game in office mode lasts no more than six hours. In fact, the boss key is available in all game modes, but it is designed for this mode in particular.
DEFCON uses a real-time line of sight system common to traditional RTS games, where only enemy units within radar coverage may be seen. However, a nuclear missile launch from a silo or submarine is automatically detected by all players (though the missile itself is not, and must be detected by radar), which reveals the location of the unit launching the missile. A nuclear missile launch from a bomber, however, does not reveal the location of the bomber.
Most units have several operating modes for different functions, and require several minutes to switch modes. For instance, ordering a missile silo to switch from offensive launches to missile defense will leave it inoperative while it switches.
Ground units
Ground installations are immobile, and can be destroyed by nuclear attack.
Radar dishes provide broad radar coverage (though most units have some radar capability), but they are destroyed by a single nuke. Often they are among the first targets, because they enhance other defense installations; for instance, a missile silo's firing range far outstrips its radar range. A radar dish can be destroyed if a fighter or bomber runs out of fuel or is shot down directly over it, even before DEFCON 1.
Missile silos have two modes: launching nuclear attacks or shooting down incoming missiles and planes. In the attack mode, a silo has ten ICBMs that may be fired at any target in the world, though doing so alerts all players and reveals the silo's position. On defense, a silo automatically fires anti-air missiles effective against enemy planes and missiles – however, the limited rate of fire means the silos may be overwhelmed by many incoming missiles. Unlike most units, silos are hardened against nuclear strikes, taking three hits to destroy, although each strike eliminates half (rounded down) of the silo's nuke stockpile.
Airbases house bombers and fighters (starting with five of each) plus a complement of five spare SRBMs to reload bombers that have launched their missile. They launch planes and provide a landing point for orphaned aircraft, and also build new fighters automatically throughout the game. Airbases take two hits to destroy; on the first hit, half of the airbase's currently landed aircraft and missiles are destroyed.
Ships
Naval units are organized into fleets of up to six ships which move and fight together. Fleets must be placed in territorial waters at the beginning of a game. Ships may move through the ocean, albeit slowly.
Carriers act as mobile airfields, scrambling fighters and nuke-equipped bombers. They are also the most powerful anti-submarine warfare escorts, armed with sonar and depth charges that quickly sink nearby subs. With no surface guns, they are helpless without their complement of planes.
Battleships are tough and carry powerful guns effective against surface fleets and aircraft. They are vulnerable to sub and bomber attacks, so are safer with carrier escorts.
Submarines carry torpedoes and an arsenal of five nukes. Sub attacks are dangerous against enemy ships, though subs are easily killed by carriers. Subs are invisible to radar but carry no radar of their own; they may use active sonar at the risk of exposing their position. Their real power comes from their missiles, which can devastate coastal cities, or quickly hit defenses before a full-scale strike. Subs must surface to fire nukes, leaving them open to counterattack before they can fire all their missiles; the launch also alerts all players to the sub's location.
Aircraft
Aircraft are launched from other ground and sea units. Typically they operate autonomously after launch, but bombers and fighters can also be controlled while airborne.
Fighters are light and fast, making them good at reconnaissance and interception. They are most effective against other aircraft, though they can attack ships as well. They have a fairly short range, forcing them to return to a base or crash for lack of fuel.
Bombers carry a single SRBM missile that may be fired at a nearby target. Bombers have a long range to deliver this payload, but are vulnerable during the trip. Unlike silo- and sub-based nukes, firing the missile does not alert everyone to the launch, making it a stealthier option. They also have a conventional attack that does heavy damage to ships.
Missiles deliver a devastating payload. A direct hit on a city will kill half of the current living civilians. Missiles can only be shot down by enemy silos in defense mode – several hits will cause them to crash harmlessly. Once launched from a silo, sub, or bomber, missiles cannot be retargeted, though they can be disarmed in mid-flight.
Its a really cool game but I'm not very good at it. I suffered a crushing defeat last time. score:-45. Well I'm still a newbie. I think my stratergies are too offensive.
Oh yeah, I also launched a new MV. Deviating away from my normal Halo themes, I made a World War 2 themed MV. Clips were from computer games Red Orchestra and Day of Defeat.
URL:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKk12BHAtCw
watch my Halo movies too!
Well, I guess thats all.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Tommorow's the start of another week, time passes too fast.
I've been reading some HL2 comics and there are some really funny ones. The funniest (and longest) is Concerned. Concerned (Full title: Concerned: The Half-Life and Death of Gordon Frohman) is a webcomic by Christopher C. Livingston, parodying the popular first-person shooter computer game Half-Life 2. The comic was constructed from game screenshots, with characters posed using Garry's Mod (or Gmod for short) Its a really funny comic. Here are some panels. 
I've also finished reading the book Holes.
Here's the intro. (off Wiki as always)
The story's protagonist, Stanley Yelnats IV, is wrongfully convicted of stealing a pair of sneakers donated to a charity by Clyde Livingston, and is sentenced to 18 months of service at Camp Green Lake, a boy's juvenile detention center in Texas. There, each inmate must spend his day in the dry desert (which was originally a lake) digging a hole five feet deep and five feet in diameter.
well thats all for now.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
More stuff i guess
Ok, I guess yesterdays post had too little info. (besides Smod of course)
We built Sumo bots in Robotics and it was hectic. Now I remember why I love robotics. The pressure of building in half an hour, the suspense before a match, the excitement of the robots fighting, the fear of losing, the joy in winning. Overall, we were bloody unlucky. We won only twice out of 4. Jeffrey's team were horribly lucky. Our robots were stuck together, then they kept spinning round and by the end of 20 seconds, both robots were on our side so we lost. Well, it was a good competition with lots of good robots from all teams.
Moving on, I hate my art teacher! Mdm Ling sux! She tells us to buy a scrapbook which is so damn expensive. Then when the class was supposed to paint some stupid colour thingie, I did on a notepad, when I was half-done she said, "Aiyo! Redo!" (or something like that) Then her instuctions were like very unclear. When I redoed she told me to redo again. Crap teacher.
Oh yea, this week's English/Science supplementary was damn fun. First we were doing work in the robotics room. We were laughin so hard about all the odd mistakes in the situational writing. After that, we went down to the field to do some science. We were supposed to draw an animal. I said,"Lets just draw an ant." Then Marvin said,"No Kevin, find a crocodile." LOL! Then, the next day, he was still asking for the croc.
Well, I guess thats all.
We built Sumo bots in Robotics and it was hectic. Now I remember why I love robotics. The pressure of building in half an hour, the suspense before a match, the excitement of the robots fighting, the fear of losing, the joy in winning. Overall, we were bloody unlucky. We won only twice out of 4. Jeffrey's team were horribly lucky. Our robots were stuck together, then they kept spinning round and by the end of 20 seconds, both robots were on our side so we lost. Well, it was a good competition with lots of good robots from all teams.
Moving on, I hate my art teacher! Mdm Ling sux! She tells us to buy a scrapbook which is so damn expensive. Then when the class was supposed to paint some stupid colour thingie, I did on a notepad, when I was half-done she said, "Aiyo! Redo!" (or something like that) Then her instuctions were like very unclear. When I redoed she told me to redo again. Crap teacher.
Oh yea, this week's English/Science supplementary was damn fun. First we were doing work in the robotics room. We were laughin so hard about all the odd mistakes in the situational writing. After that, we went down to the field to do some science. We were supposed to draw an animal. I said,"Lets just draw an ant." Then Marvin said,"No Kevin, find a crocodile." LOL! Then, the next day, he was still asking for the croc.
Well, I guess thats all.
Friday, February 02, 2007
stuffys
well, I guess another week has passed quickly. Quite an eventful week. I downloaded this cool mod. Its called SMOD and its really fun. Here's a description (off Planet Half-Life of course)
So, you've completed Half-Life 2 and decided to play through it again. You love the storyline and the gameplay, but the problem is that you've already beaten the game in hard mode, you know where all the scripted sequences occur, and you know where all the enemies are located. What you need is for Half-Life 2 to throw surprises at you. If only the game could randomise the enemies or the weapons, give the enemies new abilities, or mess with your expectations a bit, eh? Not to worry! SMOD does all of this, and more!
SMOD doesn't add a new storyline or maps. To this you may say "Huh? What DOES it add then?" And I guess the simple answer is… whatever you want it to. SMOD has the special effects and gore of F.E.A.R, realistic weapons you'd expect to see in Counter-Strike or Day of Defeat, crazy weapons you'd expect to see in Worms, tools you'd expect to find in Garry's Mod, and also plenty of original features of its own. Nearly every feature that SMOD adds is an optional element that you can switch on or off using console commands or, if you are more ambitious, by the simple editing of a config file with a text editor. If you wish, you can make the game virtually identical to normal Half-Life 2, a wild roller-coaster ride of strange experiences, or even a nice compromise between the two.
Many of the game's maps have got new enemies, allies, weapons or items added. Most are placed in specific locations, but others are randomly placed within a map, guaranteeing that no two experiences of the game will be the same. If you use the exec level_smod or exec level_hard commands, then as well as being given new weapons, some soldiers will be given portable Combine shields that will protect them from frontal attacks, unless you waste enough ammo to smash the shield. The exec level_hard command will add both shielded soldiers and also some wearing red or dark blue armour to indicate that they much tougher than their normal counterparts. Which soldiers are given these upgrades is randomly determined as you encounter them. If you are very unlucky, you'll encounter a soldier in coloured armour who's also protected by a bullet-proof shield! If you wish you can even use the command npc_randomize_weapon 1 to randomise the weapons that enemies carry.
Later sections of the game include soldiers wearing optical distortion camouflage that renders them nearly invisible, and a new type of Combine Elite soldier that moves quickly and leaps high into the air, landing in various unexpected locations. There are special Combine scanners that fire lasers rather than just photographing you, and even stalkers, the much-anticipated, mutilated, human slaves that will be appearing in HL2: Aftermath, armed with welding lasers. There's even a few of the old Half-Life houndeyes thrown in to the mix for good measure. During the Canals section of the game, the Combine will steal your airboat and you'll have to drive a buggy through the canals until you can track down the thieves. This section also features a scripted sequence in which you are chased by a Combine APC and a gunship, and one of the Highway 17 chapters includes an APC that drives around and fires rockets at you as well as an added Combine drop ship that delivers an extra squad of soldiers. If you decide that you don't like some of these additions, you can rename or edit the appropriate text file in the 'mapadd' folder.
That is a pretty extensive feature list, but I haven't started on the new special effects or player abilities. The exceptionally good "bullet-time" causes each slow-moving bullet to leave a distorting vortex in the air. It's customisable, so you can adjust the speed of enemy bullets or your own bullets (and thus the difficulty of the game), and choose whether to have extra funky screen effects that make it look like you are in some kind of time warp. If your computer is good enough, you can switch on the option to have explosions cause distorting shockwaves in the air. The "Gordon kick" key allows you to relive Duke Nukem 3D by attacking enemies with your mighty boot while still holding a gun, or to effortlessly kick objects or corpses out of your way. You can activate more blood and gore, bodies twitching after death, or corpses causing pools of blood in water. There's gibbing—causing enemies to splat into chunks if heavily damaged. SMOD also allows you to adjust the rag-doll physics between: the half-life 2 defaults, 'realistic' ragdolls, and 'funny' ragdolls that go spinning and flying all over the place.
You can press a key and use iron sights, meaning that you actually look down the barrel of your gun instead of simply using the crosshair. The command r_zoomlenseffect 1 adds a lens distortion effect if you use a weapon's scope. Speaking of weapons, this game has a butt-load of 'em! As well as the normal arsenal, during the course of the game you'll also find AK-47s, MP5 sub-machine guns with grenade launchers, SVD sniper rifles, Alyx's automatic pistol, WWII grease guns and rifles, Worms banana bombs, deadly scissors that ricochet off walls and laser guns that get their power by draining your HEV armour. The laser is definitely a unique touch—it seems ludicrously powerful, killing entire squads of enemies in seconds… until someone actually manages to damage you and depletes your HEV power; you then find yourself holding a weapon without ammo! If you do think the laser is too powerful, you can always adjust how much damage it does with a console command.
You can aim more accurately with scopeless weapons by aiming down the gun barrel and using the iron sights.
If you use cheat codes like impulse 101, you'll gain access to an even wider range of weapons, including a new physics manipulator, a strider's cannon that can vaporise almost everything (even furniture or huge vehicles), laser-triggered mines, a flare gun that will set enemies on fire, a sticky bomb launcher, a PSP that ejects deadly exploding UMD discs, and a powerful shovel to bash your enemies with. My personal favourite of the 'cheat' weapons is the "stuff launcher", which normally launches watermelons at lethal velocities, but its alternate fire is a beam that disintegrates almost any object or character. Then when you press primary fire, you'll launch copies of that object! Now you can flatten enemies with litter bins, cars, combine drop ships, or fill a map with a thousand explosive barrels and detonate them in a orgy of destruction that will also totally kill your frame rate. Alternatively, you can create rather than destroy, cloning yourself an army of allies… though they will appear unarmed, you can simply drop a gun on the ground and then use the stuff launcher to clone the gun a thousand times, and watch your army pick up the weapons scattered around them.
Ok most of that may be jargon to you but who cares?
Moving on, my two books and two CDs off Amazon.com just arrived. "The Art of HALO", "Half-Life 2 Raising The Bar" and the Cds Halo soundtrack and Halo 2 soundtrack volume 2. Listening to it now. The songs are really nice.
Ok, I guess thats all for now.
Signing off
So, you've completed Half-Life 2 and decided to play through it again. You love the storyline and the gameplay, but the problem is that you've already beaten the game in hard mode, you know where all the scripted sequences occur, and you know where all the enemies are located. What you need is for Half-Life 2 to throw surprises at you. If only the game could randomise the enemies or the weapons, give the enemies new abilities, or mess with your expectations a bit, eh? Not to worry! SMOD does all of this, and more!
SMOD doesn't add a new storyline or maps. To this you may say "Huh? What DOES it add then?" And I guess the simple answer is… whatever you want it to. SMOD has the special effects and gore of F.E.A.R, realistic weapons you'd expect to see in Counter-Strike or Day of Defeat, crazy weapons you'd expect to see in Worms, tools you'd expect to find in Garry's Mod, and also plenty of original features of its own. Nearly every feature that SMOD adds is an optional element that you can switch on or off using console commands or, if you are more ambitious, by the simple editing of a config file with a text editor. If you wish, you can make the game virtually identical to normal Half-Life 2, a wild roller-coaster ride of strange experiences, or even a nice compromise between the two.
Many of the game's maps have got new enemies, allies, weapons or items added. Most are placed in specific locations, but others are randomly placed within a map, guaranteeing that no two experiences of the game will be the same. If you use the exec level_smod or exec level_hard commands, then as well as being given new weapons, some soldiers will be given portable Combine shields that will protect them from frontal attacks, unless you waste enough ammo to smash the shield. The exec level_hard command will add both shielded soldiers and also some wearing red or dark blue armour to indicate that they much tougher than their normal counterparts. Which soldiers are given these upgrades is randomly determined as you encounter them. If you are very unlucky, you'll encounter a soldier in coloured armour who's also protected by a bullet-proof shield! If you wish you can even use the command npc_randomize_weapon 1 to randomise the weapons that enemies carry.
Later sections of the game include soldiers wearing optical distortion camouflage that renders them nearly invisible, and a new type of Combine Elite soldier that moves quickly and leaps high into the air, landing in various unexpected locations. There are special Combine scanners that fire lasers rather than just photographing you, and even stalkers, the much-anticipated, mutilated, human slaves that will be appearing in HL2: Aftermath, armed with welding lasers. There's even a few of the old Half-Life houndeyes thrown in to the mix for good measure. During the Canals section of the game, the Combine will steal your airboat and you'll have to drive a buggy through the canals until you can track down the thieves. This section also features a scripted sequence in which you are chased by a Combine APC and a gunship, and one of the Highway 17 chapters includes an APC that drives around and fires rockets at you as well as an added Combine drop ship that delivers an extra squad of soldiers. If you decide that you don't like some of these additions, you can rename or edit the appropriate text file in the 'mapadd' folder.
That is a pretty extensive feature list, but I haven't started on the new special effects or player abilities. The exceptionally good "bullet-time" causes each slow-moving bullet to leave a distorting vortex in the air. It's customisable, so you can adjust the speed of enemy bullets or your own bullets (and thus the difficulty of the game), and choose whether to have extra funky screen effects that make it look like you are in some kind of time warp. If your computer is good enough, you can switch on the option to have explosions cause distorting shockwaves in the air. The "Gordon kick" key allows you to relive Duke Nukem 3D by attacking enemies with your mighty boot while still holding a gun, or to effortlessly kick objects or corpses out of your way. You can activate more blood and gore, bodies twitching after death, or corpses causing pools of blood in water. There's gibbing—causing enemies to splat into chunks if heavily damaged. SMOD also allows you to adjust the rag-doll physics between: the half-life 2 defaults, 'realistic' ragdolls, and 'funny' ragdolls that go spinning and flying all over the place.
You can press a key and use iron sights, meaning that you actually look down the barrel of your gun instead of simply using the crosshair. The command r_zoomlenseffect 1 adds a lens distortion effect if you use a weapon's scope. Speaking of weapons, this game has a butt-load of 'em! As well as the normal arsenal, during the course of the game you'll also find AK-47s, MP5 sub-machine guns with grenade launchers, SVD sniper rifles, Alyx's automatic pistol, WWII grease guns and rifles, Worms banana bombs, deadly scissors that ricochet off walls and laser guns that get their power by draining your HEV armour. The laser is definitely a unique touch—it seems ludicrously powerful, killing entire squads of enemies in seconds… until someone actually manages to damage you and depletes your HEV power; you then find yourself holding a weapon without ammo! If you do think the laser is too powerful, you can always adjust how much damage it does with a console command.
You can aim more accurately with scopeless weapons by aiming down the gun barrel and using the iron sights.
If you use cheat codes like impulse 101, you'll gain access to an even wider range of weapons, including a new physics manipulator, a strider's cannon that can vaporise almost everything (even furniture or huge vehicles), laser-triggered mines, a flare gun that will set enemies on fire, a sticky bomb launcher, a PSP that ejects deadly exploding UMD discs, and a powerful shovel to bash your enemies with. My personal favourite of the 'cheat' weapons is the "stuff launcher", which normally launches watermelons at lethal velocities, but its alternate fire is a beam that disintegrates almost any object or character. Then when you press primary fire, you'll launch copies of that object! Now you can flatten enemies with litter bins, cars, combine drop ships, or fill a map with a thousand explosive barrels and detonate them in a orgy of destruction that will also totally kill your frame rate. Alternatively, you can create rather than destroy, cloning yourself an army of allies… though they will appear unarmed, you can simply drop a gun on the ground and then use the stuff launcher to clone the gun a thousand times, and watch your army pick up the weapons scattered around them.
Ok most of that may be jargon to you but who cares?
Moving on, my two books and two CDs off Amazon.com just arrived. "The Art of HALO", "Half-Life 2 Raising The Bar" and the Cds Halo soundtrack and Halo 2 soundtrack volume 2. Listening to it now. The songs are really nice.
Ok, I guess thats all for now.
Signing off
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