[Help] Sparks Above NPCs Heads Created 10 months ago2023-06-04 02:56:33 UTC by Wibble

So I am using the SamVanheer Half-Life Updated Master (https://github.com/SamVanheer/halflife-updated) and I have a bizarre issue with sparks appearing above NPCs heads.

Here is a video to prove that I am not insane:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SkyvvS5uqI

This issue is completely random, you can use an NPC 10+ times without it happening, it also happens at complete random whenever an NPC is moving. It is extremely distracting during scripted sequences and I am at a point where I'm just going to dump the Updated Master all together.

This issue appears in all my maps and all my test environments, I have absolutely no idea what causes this. If anybody knows how to fix this I would appreciate it or maybe there is a better master file for creating mods, I dunno.

This is related to the custom game code you're using. The sparks appear whenever the npc begins an action. Usually when the npc starts speaking.
It is - it was for testing purposes of the coder to see whether their modifications made to the code were working and the npcs starting to speak as intended.

Unless you can code yourself or at the very least read lines of code you could remove that particular line which spawns the sparks over npc heads yourself and then recompile the code. If you can not so ask around perhaps one of the coders browsing on this site might be willing to help you out on this one. For them it should be a mere matter of minutes to find the specific line, delete or exclude the line and recompile it.

The code you're using is still being actively worked on so keep that in mind.

This only shows up if you use debug builds. Make a release build and it won't happen.

It's also vanilla HL SDK behavior, not specific to HL Updated.

Alright thanks, I didn't realize there was a Debug build and Release build option.