Kendo
15th October 2005, 08:55
Now I know there is already a "New Players Please Read" sticky (see link), but I felt that a proper FAQ is needed, so here we go.
Q: I stumbled across this mod and want to know, what "Hidden-Source" actually is...
A: Hidden-Source, or "H-S" for short, is a mod for the game "Half-Life 2" with two sides: The Hidden vs. IRIS, a squad that wants to recapture the Hidden. The Hidden side consists of only one player at a time and has to fight against the rest of the server. Unlike Beta1a, Beta2 is EXTREMLY team based and tactical. Rushing in as the Hidden is now pretty much suicide and the new IRIS goodies are great too. You're going to enjoy every little bit of it.
Q: One man against the rest of the server - are you crazy?
A: Well, it does sound crazy, but technically it isn't. Firstly, it might be a good idea to explain what the "Hidden" actually is. The Hidden was a normal person, like you and me, yet then a company called "Infinitum Research" had the idea of doing some experiments. They grabbed a random guy and..experimented with him. Outcome: A creature that is nearly invisible, faster than a normal person and extremly deadly.
Q: So with which weapons does the Hidden fight the IRIS team?
A: The Hidden has 2 weapons - a knife and a Pipebomb. With the knife, you can either slash (primary fire) or the Pigstick attack (secondary fire). The Pigstick will kill your target in one hit, providing that you hit him, but it requires a 1.3 second "charging" time. The Pipebomb is for long range. You will have 3 Pipebombs and you throw them. Then they go ka-boom. The Hidden also moves very fast - faster than the IRIS squad members. It can also use Pounce, making it leap a few feet at a time.
Q: Any extras the Hidden has?
A: Yes. For one, there is the "wall cling", where you can cling to a wall for a maximum of 5 seconds. To do that, you have to pounce at a wall, then when near it, tap pounce again. Note: If you are crouching while at the wall, you won't "wall cling".
There's also the ability to feed on a corpse, regaining your health. To do so, you must slash at a corpse (primary fire with mouse) that is dead, yet intact (meaning killed by slashing. A pigstick or a pipe bomb blows the marines to smithereens).
You can also pin the corpses that are in one piece to walls. To do so, you must press "use" on the corpse, picking it up. Then go to a wall and use the "pig stick" and it will hopefully stay there (might need some practice. You're going to need to be roughly facing the wall straight on).
All these abilities are also explained in the tutorial that comes with the mod.
Q: I can't "pounce" after a short while. What's going on?
A: There's a stamina bar that drains itself when you wall cling or pounce. This is mainly to stop the good Hidden from being TOO good and gives the game an interesting touch. You're going to have to be more stealthy and careful if you want to survive. A head on fight with a group of marines is now as good as crazy.
Q: Sounds hard. How do you kill it?
A: Well, when you're an IRIS team member, you can choose from 2 weapon groups (or a random mix up). The two weapon groups you can choose from:
1 P90 SMG + 1 Five-Seven pistol with a normal size mag and a normal refire rate. The P90 has a hard recoil, so small bursts should be used
1 Pump Action Shotgun + 1 FNP9 automatic pistol with a bigger size mag and a faster refire rate.
You also get a flashlight to lighten up the darker areas in the rooms. Both pistols come with a laser sight (green, not the standard red) instead of the crosshair. NOTE: The laser sight does not get refracted through the Hidden. You'd wish that, wouldn't you? ;)
Q: What game modes are there?
A: Well, at the moment there are two - The normal game mode and Overrun. In the normal game mode, as said above, you normally spawn as an IRIS team member and have to kill the Hidden. When you do, you become the Hidden and have to kill the IRIS team.
The Overrun game mode is slightly, yet not majorly different. At the start it's pretty much the same, yet the Hidden only has the knife he can use. Once he kills an IRIS member, the killed one becomes another Hidden as well. After only a few IRIS marines are left, it's them against all the other Hidden, who have 15 seconds to kill the rest of the IRIS team. If they fail, one of the survivors becomes the Hidden. You only get to be the Hidden for 1 round though, before you then go back to being an IRIS team member. When a Hidden is killed, he'll respawn as a Hidden in the same round. This will not happen when the 15 second Survival/Hunt time has been initiated. Overrun is faster than the normal game mode and because of the bigger chance to become the Hidden, it's a great oppertunity for the newer players under you to get a chance.
Q: I'm having trouble seeing the Hidden. Please help!!
A: Remember: This Hidden is as good as invisible, yet not quite. When it moves, you will see a slight flickering in the air, like the hot air on the street on a hot summers day. It also has a small, round shadow.
Q: I still can't see it! Is there something wrong with my PC?
A: That depends on what kind of system you have, yet one thing is for sure: You have to have "Shader Quality" on High. Otherwise you will not see the Hidden. Also, you will need a graphics card that supports DX8 at least.
Q: The whole game is stuttering like crazy, even if I thought I had a somewhat decent PC, any tips?
A: Only one. In the console, type "mat_bumpmap 0" and press enter. That way bump mapping is turned off and your computer doesn't have to render as much. You should get a few more frames per second.
Q: Alright, so now I'm on the server, but I can't play as that Hidden thing!!!
A: When you join a server, you can only choose the IRIS team side. To become "The Hidden", you have to kill the person that is currently it. When you do, the round ends and in the next round you are "The Hidden". You will continue to be "The Hidden" until you die, reconnect or if you don't manage to kill all of the IRIS team members before the timer reaches 0 and the round ends.
Q: I'm getting this wierd error:
Engine error
OnGameRulesCreationStringChanged: missing gamerules class 'CSDKGameRules' on the client
A: That's not particularly an error, it's just that you downloaded the dedicated server files, used to host a server, instead of the client files, used to play the game/mod. Just download the proper files and there you go.
Q: When I try to connect to a server, it says that my map differs from the one on the server..
A. Ah, that's because the server you're trying to connect to is running an older version of the mod. Try to find another server and it should work without a problem.
Q: So how many maps are there?
A: Well, there are 14 in total (2 Tutorial and 3 Overrun map clones included). Here are the maps:
Normal Hidden maps:
hdn_derelict
hdn_docks
hdn_discovery
hdn_traindepot
hdn_sewers
hdn_highrise
hdn_executive
hdn_manor
hdn_stalkyard
Overrun maps:
ovr_derelict
ovr_docks
ovr_executive
Tutorial maps:
htr_tutorial
mtr_tutorial
That's about it. If there are any other questions, then go right ahead
-Kendo
Q: I stumbled across this mod and want to know, what "Hidden-Source" actually is...
A: Hidden-Source, or "H-S" for short, is a mod for the game "Half-Life 2" with two sides: The Hidden vs. IRIS, a squad that wants to recapture the Hidden. The Hidden side consists of only one player at a time and has to fight against the rest of the server. Unlike Beta1a, Beta2 is EXTREMLY team based and tactical. Rushing in as the Hidden is now pretty much suicide and the new IRIS goodies are great too. You're going to enjoy every little bit of it.
Q: One man against the rest of the server - are you crazy?
A: Well, it does sound crazy, but technically it isn't. Firstly, it might be a good idea to explain what the "Hidden" actually is. The Hidden was a normal person, like you and me, yet then a company called "Infinitum Research" had the idea of doing some experiments. They grabbed a random guy and..experimented with him. Outcome: A creature that is nearly invisible, faster than a normal person and extremly deadly.
Q: So with which weapons does the Hidden fight the IRIS team?
A: The Hidden has 2 weapons - a knife and a Pipebomb. With the knife, you can either slash (primary fire) or the Pigstick attack (secondary fire). The Pigstick will kill your target in one hit, providing that you hit him, but it requires a 1.3 second "charging" time. The Pipebomb is for long range. You will have 3 Pipebombs and you throw them. Then they go ka-boom. The Hidden also moves very fast - faster than the IRIS squad members. It can also use Pounce, making it leap a few feet at a time.
Q: Any extras the Hidden has?
A: Yes. For one, there is the "wall cling", where you can cling to a wall for a maximum of 5 seconds. To do that, you have to pounce at a wall, then when near it, tap pounce again. Note: If you are crouching while at the wall, you won't "wall cling".
There's also the ability to feed on a corpse, regaining your health. To do so, you must slash at a corpse (primary fire with mouse) that is dead, yet intact (meaning killed by slashing. A pigstick or a pipe bomb blows the marines to smithereens).
You can also pin the corpses that are in one piece to walls. To do so, you must press "use" on the corpse, picking it up. Then go to a wall and use the "pig stick" and it will hopefully stay there (might need some practice. You're going to need to be roughly facing the wall straight on).
All these abilities are also explained in the tutorial that comes with the mod.
Q: I can't "pounce" after a short while. What's going on?
A: There's a stamina bar that drains itself when you wall cling or pounce. This is mainly to stop the good Hidden from being TOO good and gives the game an interesting touch. You're going to have to be more stealthy and careful if you want to survive. A head on fight with a group of marines is now as good as crazy.
Q: Sounds hard. How do you kill it?
A: Well, when you're an IRIS team member, you can choose from 2 weapon groups (or a random mix up). The two weapon groups you can choose from:
1 P90 SMG + 1 Five-Seven pistol with a normal size mag and a normal refire rate. The P90 has a hard recoil, so small bursts should be used
1 Pump Action Shotgun + 1 FNP9 automatic pistol with a bigger size mag and a faster refire rate.
You also get a flashlight to lighten up the darker areas in the rooms. Both pistols come with a laser sight (green, not the standard red) instead of the crosshair. NOTE: The laser sight does not get refracted through the Hidden. You'd wish that, wouldn't you? ;)
Q: What game modes are there?
A: Well, at the moment there are two - The normal game mode and Overrun. In the normal game mode, as said above, you normally spawn as an IRIS team member and have to kill the Hidden. When you do, you become the Hidden and have to kill the IRIS team.
The Overrun game mode is slightly, yet not majorly different. At the start it's pretty much the same, yet the Hidden only has the knife he can use. Once he kills an IRIS member, the killed one becomes another Hidden as well. After only a few IRIS marines are left, it's them against all the other Hidden, who have 15 seconds to kill the rest of the IRIS team. If they fail, one of the survivors becomes the Hidden. You only get to be the Hidden for 1 round though, before you then go back to being an IRIS team member. When a Hidden is killed, he'll respawn as a Hidden in the same round. This will not happen when the 15 second Survival/Hunt time has been initiated. Overrun is faster than the normal game mode and because of the bigger chance to become the Hidden, it's a great oppertunity for the newer players under you to get a chance.
Q: I'm having trouble seeing the Hidden. Please help!!
A: Remember: This Hidden is as good as invisible, yet not quite. When it moves, you will see a slight flickering in the air, like the hot air on the street on a hot summers day. It also has a small, round shadow.
Q: I still can't see it! Is there something wrong with my PC?
A: That depends on what kind of system you have, yet one thing is for sure: You have to have "Shader Quality" on High. Otherwise you will not see the Hidden. Also, you will need a graphics card that supports DX8 at least.
Q: The whole game is stuttering like crazy, even if I thought I had a somewhat decent PC, any tips?
A: Only one. In the console, type "mat_bumpmap 0" and press enter. That way bump mapping is turned off and your computer doesn't have to render as much. You should get a few more frames per second.
Q: Alright, so now I'm on the server, but I can't play as that Hidden thing!!!
A: When you join a server, you can only choose the IRIS team side. To become "The Hidden", you have to kill the person that is currently it. When you do, the round ends and in the next round you are "The Hidden". You will continue to be "The Hidden" until you die, reconnect or if you don't manage to kill all of the IRIS team members before the timer reaches 0 and the round ends.
Q: I'm getting this wierd error:
Engine error
OnGameRulesCreationStringChanged: missing gamerules class 'CSDKGameRules' on the client
A: That's not particularly an error, it's just that you downloaded the dedicated server files, used to host a server, instead of the client files, used to play the game/mod. Just download the proper files and there you go.
Q: When I try to connect to a server, it says that my map differs from the one on the server..
A. Ah, that's because the server you're trying to connect to is running an older version of the mod. Try to find another server and it should work without a problem.
Q: So how many maps are there?
A: Well, there are 14 in total (2 Tutorial and 3 Overrun map clones included). Here are the maps:
Normal Hidden maps:
hdn_derelict
hdn_docks
hdn_discovery
hdn_traindepot
hdn_sewers
hdn_highrise
hdn_executive
hdn_manor
hdn_stalkyard
Overrun maps:
ovr_derelict
ovr_docks
ovr_executive
Tutorial maps:
htr_tutorial
mtr_tutorial
That's about it. If there are any other questions, then go right ahead
-Kendo