Forum posts

You only gave two, you lying cow!

So I did... what a cunt I am.

I don't know about five but I can certainly give up my all time top three. Mostly SP focused.

1. Everything should have a purpose. Even a facility as large as Black Mesa shouldn't waste space with their rooms and hallways. Also, these spaces would be used to transport things other than people. Water supply, power, ventilation, they all need to get around. Suddenly you'll find yourself piling on the detail!

2. Every character has a story. Not necessarily to be narrated to the player, but the level designer should consider every npc, corpse and decal. How did they get where they are?

Fixed it. Literally gave the whole unit a good shake and wiggled the tubes a little. Turned the PC back out and it let out a God awful burbling noise like an old man clearing his nose or THAT poo after a good curry.

CPU sitting at 26 degrees at time of writing.

There's a good chance I'm going insane...

I hate not having access to a PC at home. It's where all my entertainment lives.

It's even worse when you have no indication of what the problem is...

So last Thursday, my PC just shuts off. Try turning it back on and it goes insane with the beeping. Apparently there was an issue with the CPU temp. Either way, the system still continues to boot and once windows has loaded I check RealTemp.

I had just enough time to see all 3 CPU temp sensors reading 110 degrees before my PC shut off again.

Naturally, PC is moved to the dining table, stripped, gets a complete clean out and last but not least, I remove the liquid cooling system. I clear off the bone dry thermal compound, go through my drawer to find that my tube of AS5 has done a runner...

Cut to Tuesday (yesterday) when my new AS5 arrives, reapply to the CPU, reinstall cooling unit, move PC back to desk. PC goes on, RealTemp is fired up, temp goes from 60 - 101 degrees in about 7 minutes and PC cuts off.

"FFFFFFFFUUUUUUUU..."

Cooling unit is given a thorough inspection while the PC is running and the CPU is hovering around 98 degrees. The unit over the CPU is hot. Really hot. The pipes to the fan/radiator, very cool. The radiator itself. Just below room temp... Does that sound like the pump has gone? I certainly hope so.

"Right," I think "Best thing to do is replace the original heatsink for the processor and see if the temperature continues to sky rocket. If it does, then the sensors on the mobo are going doo-lally or the CPU itself is bollocksed."

Go to the mobo box in my cupboard containing spare cables and parts from when the PC arrived over three years ago but... "OH! OF COURSE! I'M A FUCKING MORON AND HAD THIS RIG CUSTOM BUILT."

Not only did the company that put this machine together do a really shitty job, they also kept all of the standard parts that were taken out to put in the custom ones. I never got the original heatsink for the i7-970, I never got the case fan from the back panel where the liquid cooler radiator is now, I never even got the pissing panels from the front of the case where my card reader and CD drive went...

So, come payday (Friday) I will be ordering a new heatsink which will arrive on Monday... God damn...

Hopefully, the pump is the issue and the heatsink will do the job for the time being. If not, I'll try shooting myself in the face.

Moral of the story is: do it yourself. Seriously, this time last week I knew next to nothing about hardware. I have learned so much in the last 6 days that I am itching to build my own rig from scratch. (not any time soon because money amirite?)

I'm also happy to hear any suggestions you guys have regarding my predicament.

Just FYI, materials.txt is mod specific. I know this because we've got over 600 custom textures in a certain project we're working on and it was my job to go through and assign material values for them...

I would do this, go into the game to check, then come back and make adjustments. Absolutely nothing to do with the compilation process. Same as skill.cfg for changing health and damage values for enemies.

Your post above this sounds like the best solution.

Game OSTS (I'm an old man. Brace yourself for some 16-bit / MIDI stuff)

1. Final Fantasy 7 - PSX

Nobou Uematsu is a legend. The fact that a lot of his pieces stuff from FF7 is performed regularly by the Tokyo Orchestra just goes to show how amazing some of this stuff is.

Official Favourites:
1. Interrupted by Fireworks
2. Still More Fighting
3. Aerith's Theme

2. Empire of Steel - Sega Megadrive

A lot of the early stages of this game are fair generic in terms of BGM. Then you start getting into the thick of things and the plot (NOTE: This is a Japanese shoot em up with a steampunk style so for the most part is paper thin.) starts to ramp up to a big assault on an enemy city. The music from here on just get's you pumped up.

Official favourite
1. Assault on Kahn

3. Sonic and Knuckles - Sega Megadrive

Sonic games have always had amazing music in my mind. However, I remember playing this on Christmas day immediately after getting it. Shortly afterwards, my older sister came into the room to find out what I was listening to.

Some of the tracks had an amazing metal quality to them which I've since learned the Megadrive excelled at over the SNES.

Official Favourites:
1. Flying Battery Zone - Act 1
2. Act 1 Bosses
3. Sandopolis Zone

4. Puggsy - Sega Megadrive

An under appreciated Gem from British developers Traveller's Tales (making lego games now, urgh) and Psygnosis (now Sony's Pigs :P) The guys in charge of their BGM were fucking geniuses.

Official Favourites:
1. Water / Snow Stages
2. Aztec Stages
3. Redwood Stages

5. Alien Trilogy - PSX
One of the first, truely eerie sets of in game music I had ever heard at the time. Stalking the dark hallways in the game with this stuff playing in the background made this my first truely terrifying gaming experience. Doom never scared me. If anything, it was funny. But this? Fuck...

Personal Favourites:
1. Stage One
2. Theme

• - - -

Honourable Mentions
Mass Effect Series
Oddworld Abe's Oddysee and Abe's Exodus
Final Fantasy X
Hitman: Blood Money
Deus Ex
Half-Life Series
Orcs Must Die 2

Half-Life
I shouldn't need to explain why Half-Life is a great game should I? Well, for the hell of it, this is where gaming turned serious for me. I played quake and quake 2, bit of doom from time to time, Duke Nukem 3D. Yeah yeah yeah.

Then... what's this? Training? But... but... I don't start with a gun in my hand? The environment can harm me? I have FRIENDS!? HOLY SHIT!

Blew my mind when I was 14. Continues to today with the devoted community. I play tested a new upcoming mod for HL1 not one hour ago and I was blown away for what must be the billionth time by this old little engine.

DOTA 2
Online game of choice at the moment. This spot would have been taken by Battlefield 4 or some shit but I think I've clocked more hours in DOTA than I have in every BF game combined.

I'm not the smartest player and I do really stupid shit most of the time. However, with Archie's leadership and Digi's occasional flare in support, this game can make me grin like an utter moron as I ruin 5 other people's games.

It's also, more recently, put me back in touch with an old colleague who has been in the majority of my games since.

Fallout: New Vegas
Open world post apocalyptia. This game is absolutely dripping with lore and atmosphere. The gameplay is rarely fast paced but that's only because exploration and interaction are just as rewarding as the combat. This is one of the few games where the addition of ironsight aiming was actually beneficial.

Taking all the good elements from Fallout 3 and adding in factions, meaning for every friend you gain, you become an enemy to someone else. Some settlements will turn you away because you run with the wrong kind. Others will welcome you. I have only done one full playthrough of this game so far, which means there are probably thousands of different stories and locations I am yet to find.

You create your hero, you walk your own path. I've annihilated an entire race of tribal warriors. I sent a cultist group of ghouls into space. I tracked a group of brutish roman-esque legionaries to their camp and freed their prisoners. Instead, I could have saved the tribe, launched the ghouls into the ground and joined the legion. Or, I could have done something else entirely!

However, it's been dumbed down for the console generation. Just playing with the editor tools for a few minutes makes you realise just how much potential the game had.

Mass Effect series
Bioware. You beautiful bastards. Commander Urby Shepard is one hell of a guy. And he looks just like me! And he handles things the way I would if I were a Spectre (special agent) for the Citadel Council (government) on the brink of total extinction (OH FUCK!)

The story, characters and atmosphere are the stars in this series. I've lost count of how many times I've had to sit back and say: "Oh fuck"

Just when you're starting to come to terms with a massive plot twist, you get hit with another one right between the eyes. One particular moment in ME2 had me feeling genuinely uneasy. The music was eery, the location was dark and haunting, then suddenly, you learn something about the enemy that you've been fighting for the last few hours and you shit an entire towns worth in bricks.

Mind blowing.

Final Fantasy VII
Again, I'm a sucker for RPG games with massive story lines and God damn if this isn't the longest storyline in any game I've ever played. Seemingly much less choice on how you tackle situations and you can only name the characters and chose their weapon and armour. No face / hair customisation here. However, you soon notice that choices you made WAAAAY back at the start of the game have consequences you don't actually encounter until hours, days, months or years later.

Turn based JRPG combat isn't one of my favourite things to do, but you got a damn sight more options back in 1997 than you do these days.

I've never finished it, but not because I don't want to. This game gets tricky as all hell later on.

I can see one!

...

I'm sorry, I feel bad. I was lying just now when I said I could see one.

Fair point.

Maybe working on the Core for 4 years(or however the fuck-long it's been) has made you even more snooty than normal, Urbles? (being British already, of course)

Not being snooty, just observing as a somewhat experienced mapper that the carve tool appears to have been used.

The first thing I learned after joining TWHL was that the carve tool is the Devil's work and people who use it go to Hell.

Haha, seriously? There is literally no detail in the base map. I would attempt this but...

...was the base map intentionally made badly? There is a lot of evidence that... shudder... carving was used.

The prize is literally useless to me as well... guess I won't bother after all.

Man's got a point. Other than that it looks incrediballs!

1. Freeman's Mind
I can't think of any reason why any fan of Half-Life shouldn't already be aware of and loving this series. It's hilarious. Gordon Freeman is awesome in that he is a blank slate and you can apply any personality you want to him. Ross Scott made him a back-talking ass hat who loathes stupidity and finds himself surrounded by it.

2. Battlefield Friends
A 4 man squad made up of the 4 Battlefield 3 classes play straight man (3 of them at least) to the growing insanity of glitches and gameplay bullshit that is Battlefield 3 and 4. You're likely to get more out of this if you actually play the battlefield games, which I do.

3. Zero Punctuation
I still watch ZP every Wednesday without fail, even if I'm not familiar with the game. Yahtzee is a dry, sarcastic bastard who simply cannot be pleased with any game even if he enjoys it. Basically a poor man's Charlie Brooker if Charlie Brooker did a weekly show about video games every week. (Not including Gameswipe by Charlie Brooker which is definitely worth a watch too by the way)

4. Bravest Warriors
Archie got me into this... THANK YOU ARCHIE! Seriously though, as he already mentioned, the first season was good but not great, and then towards the finale it got super deep. Season 2 blew me away in pretty much every episode.

5. Epic Rap Battles of History
Aaand... another one introduced to me by Archie. There are a load of other series out there that I watch on a regular basis but ERB is the only one I can think of that I actively wait for every couple of weeks and during the cripplingly long breaks between the half seasons.

I'd recommend models for plants.

Also, I'm assuming GoldSource single player?

Inddedy. I only truly enjoy sven coop when it comes to HL online.

I knew. I prefer the single player aspect of the HL series

It always catches me off guard when Australians say "bollocks." I guess I'm just used to Americans not saying it.

What a wonderful word it is too.

Sorry, resume topic.

I wouldn't consider OP4 to be an expansion so much as it's own game?

Today with Steam? Yes.

Back in the day, you needed HL1 installed to play it. Was the same with Blue-Shift

I STILL haven't even played op4 or blueshift

Mind = Blown. Seriously, you HAVE to play Opposing Force. It might not have the same impact nowadays, what with sooo many mods for HL1, but when I first played OF it blew my nuts off. Blue-Shift is essentially just a map pack for Half-Life. A bloody good map pack mind you, featuring Duke Nukem's voice actor Jon St. John.

1. Duke Nukem 3D: Killaton Edition
2. Half-Life: Opposing Force
3. Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge
4. Fallout New Vegas: Honest Hearts
5. Fallout 3: Point Lookout

Duke Nukem 3D: Killaton Edition
Duke Nukem 3D was probably my favourite game before Half-Life was released. The Killaton Edition came in a massive box full of concept artwork, posters and 3 Disks including the original side scroller games and every expansion for Duke Nukem 3D, including Life's a Beach (Caribbean Setting) and Nuclear Winter (Christmas edition). While the latter was something of a cheap reskin of existing maps and enemies, Life's a Beach added a load of new enemies, including reskins of originals and all the maps had a tropical theme, including a water park, theme park, cruise liner and a hotel. It was pretty amazing.

Half-Life: Opposing Force
Already covered by a couple of guys here. What is there to say? More Half-Life but from a different perspective and mapping that far surpasses the original.

Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge
Red Alert 2 is probably my favourite RTS game to this day, especially when concerning LAN games. When Yuri's Revenge came out, I shit my pants. It added new life to the series for me and really kicked up our LAN games a notch when the 3 of us could all play a different faction.

Fallout New Vegas: Honest Hearts
Moves away from the brown wastelands of Vegas and takes you to the orange wastelands of the Grand Canyon. Puts you in the middle of a war between two tribes and ultimately puts the fate of both in your hands. Also, features a burning spirit bear called Ghost of the She which you have to take down.

Fallout 3: Point Lookout
Familiar Lump of BrainYeah, got knocked out, got my head shaved and had chunk of brain removed. Had a very trippy dream which really kicked up Fallout's DARK sense of humour a few notches. Then, I found the guy who did it to me and beat him to death with a Fertilizer Shovel. Loved it.

Looks incredibly Scottish there IM.

(See: British, with bigger hills)

Looks a tad warm

You'd better hurry. Doesn't the server rental expire soon?

I'll wait for the next list. I barely watch TV and definitely don't have a top 5 of currently running shows.

Older ones sure:

1. Game of Thrones
2. Red Dwarf (up to season 9)
3. Bottom
4. My Mad Fat Diary
5. ...

yeah

[edit]I clicked "edit" dag nabbit!

I'll wait for the next list. I barely watch TV and definitely don't have a top 5 of currently running shows.

Nintendo seems less relevent than PC at the moment... They just cannot keep up in terms of next gen games. The new Xenoblade looks 10 years old.

I'm fairly sure that the link they showed was female

Welcome to anime boys

Destiny looks less interesting than it did last year... not sure how they managed that.

BF games aren't interesting or fun anymore. I miss the old ones and Bad Company.

As far as I know, Bad Company 2 is as active as ever.

MS actually interests me the least, but I'm sat here, waiting for the stream to start.

Nice predictions Pb.

...Aaand they open with Call of Duty. Shocker.

Ignore me. Read a news post about E3 2013 because I'm a giant penis with arms and legs.

Yeah, the Witcher looks ok. You can pre-order it on Steam already

I'm glad that the next gen consoles are out now. Last years E3 was way too focused on the upcoming systems so it will be nice to actually hear about some games this time...

My predictions: Loads of stuff nobody asked for - more social media buggery in games, or something like Mafia III, The Sims 4 or a new bloody Call of Duty game. Hell, even Battlefield has gone down the path of shit nobody wanted. Battlefield Hardline for example...

I am looking forward to more information about The Division, Far Cry 4 and hopefully a Fallout 4 reveal (unlikely)

You can actually edit your last post... but you just blocked yourself.

Yeah, you can download and play for free now until level 20. Should be enough to get it out of my system.

I'm totally broke and can't afford any new games. As such, I've been indulging in a guilty pleasure... Not paying for it though, fuck that shit.

On the subject of right click texture application again.

Sorry to harp on about this but now that I've tried this out with the "apply texture and values" but this seems to work in the same way as alt + right clicking, aligning the texture to be perpendicular(I think is the right word...?) to the face selected which is certainly useful but isn't always necessarily what you want...

I'm being really picky, but it's what I'm used to...

Had a good giggle at that Jeff. Couple of my colleagues gathered round as well. Good video.

Doesn't mean he likes you... or anyone for that matter.

He's just a generally hateful guy.

In other news, DM_VoidTemple is now available.

Here's hopes you don't set the next event during world cup

All events should be set during matches. Might as well play HLDM while TV is being awful.

Hey, I'm impressed and officially migrated. Just in time for

...

That's really going to bug me.

It's a small world aint it MrGnang.

I'm not sure about your first question but the master thing should be pretty straight forward.

Normally, this is just a case of assigning a name to the breakable glass and then entering this name in the master field for the button / door in question.

I've used masters quite a few times for locked doors which require keys and such.

I imagine the secret room has to go to free up entity allowance for the snark cave.

So Rincewind, maybe.

Probably lolled a little louder than I should have at that...

That's a lovely little sprite as well.

Man, I haven't played SvenCoop in so long. Looks like I might have to look into it again soon.

Urby to Strider - 2009
Sweet holy fuck thats beautiful.

Urby to Strider - 2014
Sweet holy fuck that's beautiful.

To sum up, in the last 5 years I got me some punctuation.

Hahaha

I'll be testing sledge on a PC not really built for mapping / gaming (basically my work PC)

I'll let you know if there are any problems.

Can't see that being a hit with most DM players...

I can see a reasonable amount on dm_quakearena but whenever it comes up in the rotation almost everyone else complains about the darkness and we change map.

GoldSource through and through, textures scaled to 0.5 to bodge the lightmap grid.

Heh, it's just vluzacn's.