$flags 256? Created 8 years ago2015-08-11 02:53:20 UTC by CalicoCanvas

I found this when I decompiled the Alien Controller, does anyone know what this does?

You should give us more info.
Where did you have found that exactly? In the qc or in the smd?

The full file on Pastebin would help.

SABLEYE

In the .QC file.

Took a look at it but I don't really know what that means. Maybe Penguinboy can help you out.

Did a quick Google and got: "This is undocumented Half-Life magic."

The actual flags information is hidden in the GS engine, and there doesn't appear to be any documentation in the SDK or game code.

This is the best information I found, it's from the Xash3D project, so I'm not sure how many are supported in vanilla GS:

#define STUDIO_ROCKET 1 // leave a trail
#define STUDIO_GRENADE 2 // leave a trail
#define STUDIO_GIB 4 // leave a trail
#define STUDIO_ROTATE 8 // rotate (bonus items)
#define STUDIO_TRACER 16 // green split trail
#define STUDIO_ZOMGIB 32 // small blood trail
#define STUDIO_TRACER2 64 // orange split trail + rotate
#define STUDIO_TRACER3 128 // purple trail
#define STUDIO_DYNAMIC_LIGHT 256 // dynamically get lighting from floor or ceil (flying monsters)
#define STUDIO_TRACE_HITBOX 512 // always use hitbox trace instead of bbox

So, I would guess $flags 256 tells the engine to use the "STUDIO_DYNAMIC_LIGHT" behaviour of getting lighting from the ceiling (maybe because regular models use the closest surface, which might not be good for flying monsters?)

I've seen references to the 512 flag in HL models. It seems that you should use this flag for large monsters, such as the tentacle.

Neat.