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Introduction Installation Summoning The Chosen Using The Chosen Communicator Alternate-Hand Firing Toggle Multi-Player Options BloodFeud The Bugs Credits Introduction I played Blood2 and was disappointed with certain aspects of the gameplay, so I decided to code this MOD to make Blood2 more "fun" to play again. I have enhanced existing features, coded all-new features, put back into the game several features that were unfinished and added some unused graphics and sounds that you already have installed within Blood2 but weren't used in the released game. Whatever the reasons for Blood2's premature and un-finished release, I still look upon it as containing the best weapons, weapon effects, animations, sound effects, music, movement and actual "action" of any 3D First-Person Shooter available. Please make sure you downloaded the correct version of DarkAct for your Blood2 installation, Standard Blood2 or Blood2: The Nightmare Levels. Also make sure you have Blood2 patched up to version 2.1. You can get the upgrade patches from: http://www.the-chosen.com/ NB. the very latest patches above version 2.1 will not make any difference as DarkAct is based on the 2.1 source code. Source code for the latest version is not available. THIS IS NOT A COMMERCIALLY PRODUCED ADD-ON. Installation Simply unzip the REZ file into the "custom" folder within Blood2, then select the REZ file from the customize dialog when launching the game. Due to the new inventory items, Saved Games from previous versions are no longer compatable - you should start a new game. You may get crashes if you don't. Summoning The Chosen You can Summon randomly selected Chosen characters to fight alongside you as was expected from the original game (although they will still also appear in the cut-scenes when playing the original levels as Caleb). I have built upon the existing routines and coded several new states so that they can be commanded by the player using the Chosen Communicator. They DO NOT follow you across level changes (yet). They communicate with you via the Comm-Link to respond to orders or tell you something like they've run out of ammo. They drop their weapons when they die, but are not damaged by your weapon fire and vice versa so you can't kill them for their weapons (or accidently). They will fire on any enemies who come within sight and turn to look around when idling or guarding. To Summon First you must find a Summoner inventory item... these will randomly replace other items in the game. Make sure there is some space infront of you, then activate it. The Summoner creates a Rift to pull a being from "Beyond". You can repeatedly Summon a previously killed Chosen character again and again. You can summon all the other three chosen members individually - using a fourth summoner in a level will pull through an enemy from Beyond the Rift. You will get other Chosen characters depending on which character you are playing so it will never bring out another 'you'. You can only carry three Summoner's. Using The Chosen Communicator With the Chosen Communicator you can send orders to the Chosen from anywhere in the world you are in. Press C to activate the Communicator and Character Select page. Press the Number Key of the Character required and the Orders page is displayed. Press the Number Key of the Order you want to send. They will respond with a message that describes the order carried out, and a suitable vocal comment. The Communicator can be cancelled at any time by pressing 0. There are Nine orders you can send to the Chosen: Follow Far. They follow you around, but keep at a slight distance. Follow Close. They follow you more closely and turn the same direction you are facing when idling. Guard. They stay and Guard their current location. Scout. They run to a position directly off in the direction you are currently looking searching for enemies, then return to you and switch to Follow Close. If they spot any enemies they will fire, then return if they kill them. Really useful for ordering them out from behind a wall or into a room full of enemies. Advance. The same as Scout, but instead of returning to you they will switch to Guarding when they reach their objective or have a fire-fight. It's important to remember that when issuing the Scout or Advance orders, look in the direction you wish them to go to as you press the order key. Advance Far. The same as Advance, but they will run further. Change Weapon. Makes them switch between their two guns. Means you can get their more powerful weapons out anytime, and conserve ammo when you come across easier kills. Pickup Ammo. Normally, the Chosen will only search for ammo when they run out for both of their weapons. Use this order to tell them to pickup any extra ammo lying around that you don't need. They will only pickup Ammo PowerUps, not guns or new weapons. They only look for the type of ammo they can use. IE. Caleb will only look for BulletAmmo and FuelTanks. Teleport. If they've got stuck, can't follow you into or through the scenery, or you just want to summon them back to you (perhaps after guarding an area on the other side of the level) you can now instantly teleport them to your position. However, if you are sending Ishmael orders, as he doesn't use any ammo and can't change weapons, you get two different options: Cast Shockwave. Ishmael casts his Zealot Shockwave attack. Handy for taking out enemies around corners or behind walls. Cast Healing. Ishmael casts his Healing Spell on himself. Useful as he always tends to take more damage than the others due to the slower firing rate of his Orb attack. Quick-Command Keys Instead of using the Chosen Communicator you can use these commands as a quick way of sending Orders. Toggle Follow/Guard. Go near to your Chosen teammate and press your Use/Open key. This toggles their Orders between Follow Close and Guard. Re-Do Last Order. Press R to repeat the last order sent with the Chosen communicator. What happens when they get stuck? Navigating Blood2's complex 3D worlds is hard work - so I have made it so they instantly Teleport to your position when they get stuck! - this also means they can follow you anywhere in the level, up ladders, over jumps or through holes, as they will always appear next to you again. I'm still working on this, and they still get stuck sometimes, or just dont realise they are going the wrong way or have got stuck in the scenery - moving around a bit or backtracking to find them usually gets them going again. Try to bring them out in the more open levels and where it would be easier to get around or not get killed. If you see only their gun in mid-air, they are "In Limbo" awaiting a clear space around you in which to Teleport into, to appear. Alternate-Hand Firing Toggle (Woo Mode) Press W to switch between Alternate-Hand Firing and Normal Firing. Multi-Player Options All the DarkAct options are on a seperate Multi-Player Wizard page. Drop Weapons. You can drop your weapons as you would do in the single player game. This also means that you drop your current weapon when you get killed, losing that weapon for the duration of the game (unless you pick it, or another of any type, up again). As you can now pickup weapons in BloodBath, you can pickup a dead players weapon for Akimbo guns (or even switch weapons), which also deprives them of the chance to reacquire their lost weapon... unless they kill you to get it back! You can only pickup another weapon if it's for Akimbo, and you always drop both guns if Akimbo when killed. Your weapons are restored back to your starting selection when the next level starts. In standard BloodBath, you cannot pick up weapons for ammo, in BloodFeud you can. Allow Akimbo is mainly for Drop Weapons rules. In standard BloodBath, you could not pick up weapons even if they were in the level. With Drop Weapons I also enabled picking up of weapons so you can reclaim/change weapons, but this also means that if weapons are in a standard BloodBath game you can also pick them up. This option controls if you can pick up two weapons for Akimbo Guns. Start Akimbo lets you start the game with all your Dual-Handed weapons Akimbo (IE. Beretta, Flare Pistol, Uzi, Sawn-Off Shotgun and Assault Rifle). Allow Akimbo must be checked for this option to function. Random Levels means that instead of playing through your selected levels in order, your level list is randomized. You won't get the same level twice in a row, or levels repeated before all your levels have been played. BloodFeud If you've played the Skirmish or Co-Op games in Aliens VS Predator, you'll have an idea of what BloodFeud is all about. It's like a mad BloodBath (or Bot) game with AI Enemies from the Single Player game constantly attacking you (and sometimes each other). But it's not just BloodBath with Enemies... I've added Extra Scoring to keep track of your kills of each enemy type, an Enemy Count Bar and several options so you can tune the gameplay to your preferences. Enemies repeatedly spawn in pre-defined positions, but they spawn randomly, or from pre-defined types, with different weapons and in different sequences, all dependant on the level design... no two games will ever play the same. Of course, this means BloodFeud will only run on specially designed maps, such as defending a bunker, in a zombie-infested cinema or a western shoot-out... just spawn in, get to the action and mow down the next wave of attacking Cabalist's!! You can always play Single Player as well by just Hosting the game locally and getting on with it. BloodFeud Options Enemy AI's Drop Weapons. Controls if the enemies drop their weapons when killed, like in Single Player. This makes the game harder if it's Off, as there's less ammo around, but may give less network lag. After 10 minutes you'll have guns lying around everywhere - if they don't drop them, the server doesn't have to keep track of all the extra objects. Allow friendly fire. Checking this allows you to kill other players. Usually Off as it's a sort of team-based game... Players VS AI's. You don't usually want to accidentaly kill your mates. Score Negative frags for friendly fire. If friendly fire is allowed, this is the same as the Team game option, which denotes if your score should go down for hitting a friendly player. Use Player Setup Weapons. Normally, you start a BloodFeud game with only your Knife and a single Beretta. You pick up weapons in the level which you retain when you respawn, so you gradually acquire a set of weapons. If this is checked, you will start with your previously defined set of weapons for BloodBath, from your config file, instead. Do Extra Scoring. I've put this option in, so you can turn off scoring on the Server, which may give less network lag. This also automatically controls the display of the Enemy Count Bar. When each AI is killed they send a message to all Clients to do the scoring, with this off, the message count is thus reduced. Show Extra Scoring Kill Messages. This controls the display of the Kill Messages, that show the enemies each player is killing. Only relevant if Extra Scoring is ON, it may give less Client-side slowdown with these turned Off. Enemy AI Level. Set's the strength of the Enemies to their Single Player equivalent - Genocide, Homicide or Suicide level. Max Enemies in Level. You can set the amount of enemies (including players as they are treated as Cabal members) that will ever appear - helps for slowdown and can be used to simulate a BOT game. Tuning BloodFeud for Better GamePlay If you want to improve the speed of the game reduce the Max Enemies in Level. Try turning Extra Scoring, Kill Messages, and Enemy AI's Drop Weapons Off for a possible benefit. Play over the Internet is NOT recommended, and I can't say what the framerate would be like - I have developed BloodFeud mainly for LAN or Host-Yourself games. The Bugs Please read the information about this MOD on the website Updates pages and understand the bugs that exist. I've tried to minimise the bugs associated with the changes I've made, but I haven't yet fixed everything. I'll be constantly fixing bugs and including new features during the time I'm working on this MOD and posting new versions on the site as and when I complete them. - Sometimes, if you are on zero health the enemies will not see you - Bombs and Gibs can be thrown through doors - Scientists on the "Research and Development" level don't die properly - their corpses fall through the floor. (Early level bug?) - There is an indestructable Thief on the "Meat Packing Plant" level (Early level bug?) Sometimes this causes WonkyVision on each re-load but I think I've got around this now. - Bullet Holes and Spark/Splash effects don't work properly on the "Power Station" level. (Early level bug?) - A Chosen Buddy may remain on the Chosen Communicator list when they are not in the level. This is very rare and usually connected to either cutscenes concerning Chosen AI's or using the Custom Level select cheat (the player characters are not set up correctly when using this cheat). - AI's still run into walls... really the whole AI routine needs re-coding to be less recursive - it causes itself problems by continually looping around and around without any "get-out" clause, but this is really too-big a job - my time on the MOD is better spent in the new features I've been incorporating. - Thief's, BoneLeech's or Hand's killing other AI's may cause crashes. - Client-side Smoke Trails get attached to the wrong objects (even Players!). - In BloodFeud, sometimes a kill may not be registered. - In BloodFeud, sometimes the enemies stop appearing. (Go back to the start of the map to trigger them again) Credits DarkAct MOD Design, Code and Graphics by guzz. Modified M16, Left-Handed M16 and Modified Beretta Models by Tren. DeathSkins by The Dead. Please see the DarkAct MOD Project page at: http://planetblood.com/darkact for more information and the latest updates. |  | Features *New for v 1.8 Limbloss Summon The Chosen Zombie SoulDrudge Akimbo-Alt Fire Alternate-Hand Firing (*Now with Toggle Key) Improved Hit Location Enhanced AI *DeathSkins Shikari ChestBurster *Send Orders and receive messages via the CommLink New BloodBath Options *New Multiplayer Game: BloodFeud Disarm Cabal Members No Bullet-Gibs More Directional Damage More Gibs & Bloodsplats *Blood, Gibs, Debris, Corpses and Bullet Cases Fade-Out Fixed Player Speech No Item or Ammo Glowing New Orb-Cam Colour New Eyeball-Cam Colour Akimbo Assault Rifles Drop your Knife New Death-Cam position Weapon Damage Changes Weapon Model Changes Enemy Behaviour Changes Stronger Suicide level enemies Secret MAIM effects More NightGoggles Time New NightGoggles Colour Improved Flashlight Blood 2: The Chosen by Monolith Productions DarkAct MOD by Email guzz