Maybe May... news - Exterminatus Mod for Half-Life 2

Exterminatus

Half-Life 2 mod | TBD

Exterminatus : Destruction of all life on a world by the Imperium of man. This mod is set in Games Workshop's, great Warhammer 40,000 ( 40k ) universe. Each map pits Imperial Space Marines against the Tyranid swarm, competing in a series of mission objectives, culminating in a battle to decide the fate of the planet.

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May news update for the Warhammer 40,000 themed mod for HL2, Exterminatus. 4th round of beta testing has begun on the Orange Box version of Exterminatus. New In-game action footage. Thanks to Crynid and Farseer for their contributions. A conundrum, to be solved by next month.

Posted by ChromeAngel on May 23rd, 2009 digg this super bookmark

This month we completed our model trade with Renegade 40k, a couple of high detail RenX weapons, for one of our Tyranids. The weapons models should come in handy for a later release, we're not planning to add any more weapons to the the first version of Exterminatus as we've frozen the EX feature set to focus on balance. In the weeks since our last news post we've conducted a seven small scale beta tests, which have improved the stability of the Orange Box version and balance and learning curve of the maps.

Exterminatus model contributor and beta tester Farseer17 would like to thank Micheal "Cryrid" Taylor of XSI Forums and Cryrid.com for his help. Here you can see an in-game shot of a prop Farseer built for Typheron's latest map "Thunderhawk".

We have some minor loose ends to tie up, however I (ChromeAngel) have the feeling there is not much more we can do with closed Beta tests. With some time consuming, real life, commitments coming up I foresee one of two things happening:

1) A full playable public beta release of EX next month, allowing us to gather feedback on large scale games, the work so far and maybe attracting a few new contributors.

2) EX "goes silent" during this busy period (possibly lasting several months) and until I get time to polish up the mod to a more public friendly, playable version.

Now, because I would be busy their wouldn't be much in the way of support for the Beta and as it stands the EX Beta *might* permanently deter the more demanding or optimistic players if I were to go down that route. The decision hasn't been made yet, so watch this space...

Comments

Bird_of_Prey May 23 2009, 12:22pm says:

Great news! Looking forward to playing it. ;)

+1 vote reply to comment

lad May 23 2009, 1:09pm says:

Yes i can t belive it, we have a release next month WOOOOOOOOT!!!!

+1 vote reply to comment

metalspy May 23 2009, 2:18pm says:

Oh wow.. I hope this doesn't "go silent" and that we get the chance to play a public beta!

+1 vote reply to comment

CommanderPT May 23 2009, 2:33pm says:

I thought this mod was dead. Nice to see that I was wrong.

+1 vote reply to comment

Commander1985 May 23 2009, 7:59pm says:

Great to see that this hasnt died!
I really would like to play the Beta, i hope you guys release it :D

+1 vote reply to comment

sauerfreak May 24 2009, 8:18am says:

Hmmm, an FPS version of DoW? Sweet.

+1 vote reply to comment

johnny21 May 24 2009, 9:42am replied:

*droooooooooooooooooooool*

+1 vote reply to comment

Altus_Arcus May 24 2009, 11:31am says:

honestly, if it's going to be several months before you work on it again, you should release. most people will assume it has died and you will lose players anyway.

if there are no major balancing issues, no major gameplay bugs, and few map problems you should definately release.

Its 40 frickin K people will put up with a few bugs for the chance to chainsword their friends to death.

+2 votes reply to comment

Typheron May 24 2009, 4:02pm replied:

the fear is theres a bug that ruins the game in some way, something we have not been able to spot as yet.

example, what if we released and someone found an exploit where they could kill at range with the Tyranid claws, or attack while cloaked as the Lictor. Something like this would be extremly bad for the game as it would be an easy win for one team and no one would want to play as the other team.

Worst of all as were going into a busy period for all the Dev members, we would be unable to properly address any bug and patch them accordingly. It could be several months before Chromeangel is free to code a solution.

The playerbase and community would surely die during that time of broken game. Its quite the Dilema.

+1 vote reply to comment

Altus_Arcus May 24 2009, 10:15pm replied:

on the other hand, it IS 40k and it IS on source. it is bound to be popular, and a few coders might be willing to do bug fixes if they like the game.

if we could get some coders willing to do minor bug fixes would it help you make your decision?

on the other hand, you dont want people who use those exploits(a.k.a. griefers) in your community anyway.

+1 vote reply to comment

hOMEr_jAy May 24 2009, 12:41pm says:

Indeed, I fully agree with cyber_spaced. If ther current version is playable you should definately release it before people start to lose interest in the mod because they assume it´s dead.

+1 vote reply to comment