Q1: What is the story behind the development of "MISERY"?
A: Ceano has done a great job in compiling a long list of awesome CoP mods. He then made some cool downloadable options for this. His mod is named "Call From Pripyat" and it is great work.
I took all of that and added "Absolute Nature", "Absolute structures", "S.C.O.P. Realistic", "Variation Mod", "Alundaio's various AI Mod v1.07", "Sclera Musical Addon" + I made lots of content and alterations on my own to create a final concept to my personal taste. That mod is named "I Work Alone" compilation mod. When "I Work Alone" got to version 1.2 I had a very stable and strong mod concept which I'm quite proud of. Then I decided to further develop this into a new concept that I named "MISERY".
Q2: What is the concept/idea of "MISERY"?
A: After my own playthroughs of "I Work Alone" I needed something extra. Something more challenging and with an even more dramatic setting and evironment. A stronger feeling of miserable environment in a harsh survival condition. Inspired by movies like "The Road" and "I Am Legend" plus the game "Metro 2033" i came up with the concept of "MISERY". Few ressources and an almost constant dramatic weather condition. Clear weather with sunligth will be a rare but comforting experience. I also wanted expand the aspect of weaponry in the zone.
Q3: Who will enjoy this concept?
A: Everyone who likes the idea of a good challenge or even moral dilemma when it comes to the extreme situation of lacking crucial supplies like food, water and ammunition in a constant dramatic and miserable setting. And also everyone who would like to play around with new weaponry.
This is a very thorough and serious review of version 1.1 by TheReviewer
Q4: What are the mod features of version 1.0?
A: Read them all here.
Q5: Why don't you implement a magazine system similar to what is seen in other mods?
A: Micromanagement of ammunition and magazines is processed off-screen in Stalker per default as many other actions are. MISERY already expands the aspect of equipment management quite alot by introducing unique features such as many new tradeable items, armour attachments and artifact container handling. If we were to add in a detailed manual player-handled magazine management in addition to all of this we would break the balance of realism and a good game flow by forcing the player to have too much focus on recurrent and tedious inventory handling.
Q6: The weather in "MISERY" is named "AtmosFear Unique"; why?
A: Core weather system is based on AtmosFear 3 but the mod features more than 35 altered horizons/skies textured specifically designed for this concept. Also weather behavior will be conceptualized (and not include radioactive fallout).
Q7: Will I be able to edit, merge or add additional mods on top of the final mod version?
A: Your adding of another mod might overwrite usual gamedata files - but I might have scripted the mod to use alternative files in many cases - which leaves you with an unwanted result of merging or even constant crashes or bugs. Merging, altering or editing of the mod data is at own risk and will not be supported or guided by me. Correspondances of editing are welcome on the profile though.
S.M.R.T.E.R. mod and Complete can not be merged with MISERY as they mod many similar aspects.
MISERY is a complete game overhaul and so is Complete and SMRTER. So it doesn't even make sense to want to merge them. You can put a saddle on a horse but not a horse on an elephant.
If you ask because you want the new areas from SMRTER in MISERY then please see Q20.
Q8: Will you release a version with english dialog and no helmet vision/hud, etc...?
A: I'm always open for constructive criticism that fits within the concept. These mentioned examples points in a unrealistic direction and they are therefore someting that I will not do. The mod data is open to any kind of further editing based to personal taste and dislikes. Dynamic helmet vision, bullets tracers, FOV, anything ... Such correspondances of editing are welcome on this mod profile but I will not be involved in any modding guidance in these matters.
Q9: Does "MISERY" work with Steam version of CoP?
A: Yes it is. It has been confirmed that this mod is compatible with the Steam version of the game. Read this
Q10: What are the system requirements?
A: High! 64bit OS is recommend as the mod is very RAM consuming with all the textures.
If you have crashes then try this:
1) Turn off background music
2) Disable enhanced lightning and use static lightning mode
3) Install the Texture Optimization package: Mediafire.com
4) Close all programs running in the background (Windows)
5) Do not use quick saving/loading but only regular saves and loads
Note: Having Stalker companions corrupts your saves. So don't save when using them as allies.
Personally I've had many memory crashes with WinXP but NONE with Win7 as it supports more RAM.
- - -
The things that are most RAM/FPS consuming are (in priority):
- antialiasing
- shadows
- sun rays
- dynamic lightning
If you experience memory crashes or serious stutter/lag try to lower these setting.
Turning off background music also helps under certain circumstances.
Also, ensure that no other programs are running in the background.
Q11: Will there be a LITE version of the mod for lower end rigs?
A: Yes, that is the plan. The LITE version will only have a slight reduction of visual quality and will contain all modded features. Slight increase of bugs can be expected from the LITE version.
Q12: Which people shall be credited for participation of this production?
A: MISERY dev team: Trojanuch, Alundaio, N.Aaroe, Cromm Cruac, [TZP] LoNer1, _xXxTWiST3D_xXx_, r_populik, Damjancd, Homunc, ponney68, BioShocker, David.m.e., Simbalime, mark009vn, 0800, Setakat, Trikzter, Spetznaz_Reaper, rickpnick, Kyle_K_ski SUPPORTER CREDITS:
Smrtphoneuser, ScarabParamit, Pmase01, Gannebam, Smurth, Rulix a.k.a. Bak, xStream, Ceano,
Kaplan994, Rvsty, Derranged, imperialreign, Angrydog, Darkenneko, Gtzz FeLa, Vandrerer, Smurth, timnwells, Blakluma, Xero350, DrHaggiz, Nerfwaffle, JPJ5624, Mr Jackal, Sowexly, Dorian23Grey,
Jketinyu a.k.a. Swartz, MacBradley, DarkStarMarineCorps
Q13: I dislike the STAMINA/ENDURANCE edits and I want to be able to SELL DAMAGED equipment.
A: To reduce the minimum condition of a weapon that a trader will buy:
Goto all files in gamedata\configs\misc\trade and if they have a line with "buy_item_condition_factor", change it to the desired fraction (0.90 is 90%, etc). Please note that this will make it MUCH easier for you to make money, so I suggest only making a minor change. You can always go to gamedata/configs/creatures/actor.ltx and change the following lines:walk_power = 0.000005
walk_weight_power = 0.000005These numbers are the game's (not the mod's) default attributes.
This will affect the loss of stamina with running. Higher numbers mean it drains quicker.
Lower numbers like 0.000000001 means it drains slower.
Q14: I dislike the changes made to the MEDKITS and FOOD. How do I make them more effective?
A: If you want to chang the health restore for medikits go to gamedata/configs/misc and open "items" with your wordpad or editor. After that search for the "boost_health_restore" line and change the values to your own needs (example: 0.020) dont know the exact vanilla values so you need to play a little with it. After that you can do the same for "medkit_army" and "medkit_scientic" by doing the previous step. I would suggest giving the normal medikit the lower value for health restore and going up on the army and science one. I suggest doubling their values (if it's 0.02 then make it 0.04 i.e.)
There are few medkits available so use the medic often and buy as many from him as possible.
If you want to make the eatable items more satiating do find the file gamedata\configs\misc\items.ltx and raise their "eat_satiety" levels. Like finding "[bread]:booster" and changing its "eat_satiety" level from 0.15 to 0.3 - That will make the bread twice as effective/satiating for the actor.
Q15: Why is MISERY developed for CoP and not CS or SoC?
A: By the time when CoP was released SoC and CS already had several decent mods. Seeing that visual and audio standards had not improved from SoC to CoP I was a bit disappointed to say the least. But several new and unique features developed for this third game along with its lack of good full concept modifications made it an obvious choice for me. The potential for overall game improvement was by far the biggest for this third installation in the series
Q16: How about adding some artifact powered weapons and ammo?
A: Have a look at his Dev Team dialogue. It tells you something about the core concept guideline of MISERY that goes in the exact opposite direction of anything sci-fi. So the answer would be a 'no'.
Q17: Have you considered using some of the free custom map material?
A: Yes. However, actual rebuilding and/or adding of maps is something that we might look into for a future version and not version 2.0. That way we can take our time to do things right and have a-life support and interact with the whole thing.
Q18: What is the estimated time of release for MISERY version 2.0?
A: Q2. If we run into scripting obstacles or experience weird CTD's in BETA testing then it will be prolonged. We would like to deliver a polished product so if we need more time we just postpone the release... so there are no promises other than we just want our current features completed properly with no bugs.
Q19: Should I wait for version 2.0 or just play the version 1.0 first?
A: Wait for 2.0. The storyline is intact so playing 1.0 will make the 2.0 version less interesting for you if you know about the quests. The wait will only be until the end of 2012 unless some very unexpected and unlikely obstacles should occur.
Q20: Might we hope to see new maps in a future update to MISERY?
A: The main objective for MISERY is to provide as solid, deep and interesting a version of the original Call of Pripyat as possible. I would say that adding new levels to this gigantic mod concept would pretty much exclude the idea of a release of version 2.0 in 2013. I do have contacts to make this happen some day I suppose. But we might as well just have version 2.0 released within reasonable timelines. And then we will see what happens after that. As of now I can't really imagine that I would loose interest in this gem of a game universe but if new quests and areas are to be added they need to live up to the standard of the vanilla (modded) ones.
Q21: Do you guys accept donations?
A: Thanks for your support but donating is against the ethics of modding. We are mainly building on a game core so raising any funds on that would not be fair.
Q22: I have crashes - please help
A: First of all: did you alter or edit the gamedata in any way or did you install unofficial addons to MISERY? *Cause if you did it is no longer fair to expect that the main installation of MISERY it the reason for your troubles. If you have a clean installation of MISERY then we can talk...
It's the "Crash Logs" that tells us what seems to have caused a crash to desktop and we need this to have a clue what caused the crash. If you are using Win XP or Win 7 you will find your crash log here: C:\Users\Public\Documents\S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Call of Pripyat\logs
- - - - - - -
Only the last part of the text file after "FATAL ERROR" is relevant.
Copy this part and send it the MISERY dev team in a PM.
If you want to provide us with the best material possible please explain the situation of the crash ingame and upload your savegames for us. Then you can expect to be taken seriously.
- - - - - - -
So, please follow this guide:
1) Copy the log bit after 'FATAL ERROR'
2) Paste this in a PM to the MISERY dev team
3) Add explanation of what was going on ingame
4) Add your savegames in the PM (upload through Sendspace or similar)
Using Steam version of the game? Read this: Moddb.com
Q23: Why is there no minimap in version 2.0?
A: Most experienced Stalker gamers already know the maps of Call of Pripyat well, making the minimap a dynamic irritation in the FPS visuals. That being said... Even if we didn't know the maps well, I find the minimap a 'babysitter of guidance' that is already found in your PDA as it should be in real life.
Without this constantly turning map you pay more attention to your surrounding, environment and the stunning visuals of Call of Pripyat. The overall navigation philosophy of immersion is actually explained quite well in Damjan's blog here. We will not provide a minimap'ed version of the mod.
Q24: Do you provide wallpapers and high resolutions formats of your Stalker artwork?
A: Some time ago I used to upload such formats but I soon realized that the more images I provided the more were requested for. So I've settled for an approach of 'what you see is what you get'.
Not because I don't want to share but because my time for my beloved Stalker modding is limited.
But we never know what the future holds do we.
Q25: Why is the actor not entering the Zone equipped like a modern USS operative?
A: We generally approach a matter of loadout not in a way: 'what would veteran military operative generally have with him on an extremely challenging mission?' - as in that case I think Degtyarev should be send to Zone in exo with hi-end weapon and tons of cash etc. We rather approach it like this: 'what would veteran military, who wanted to stay in-cognito and appear like an averege rookie take with him on an undercover mission?'. So even at the very core one has to realise that the Major purposely does not have the best equipment which army could equip him with. Instead he carries common weaponry of average condition to not attract any unwanted attention right from the start.
Q26: Where can I get more insight and info?
A: N.Aaroe of the MISERY dev team has been interviewed at The Game Bastion.
Best regards
N.Aaroe
Holy Toledo Batman, I cannot wait till this is out. Keep up the good work..
Thanks for the learning of that new phrase
I caught the part about worse weather a darker more bleak outlook on the zone but about the combat. can we expect more firefights and to run into more mutants thatn in iwa 1.2 or will it be the same deserted zone of iwa? loved it by the way walking through a dangerous deserted place great work keep it up
Good question. You are touching an aspect that is not finally decided.
Status right now says that you will encounter the exact same amount of 'varied action' as you do in "I Work Alone".
But your foes will be slightly more deadly to you now.
(One of the aspects of higher difficulty in comparison to IWA v.1.2)
In my opinion, there have to be even less humans to be met. The Zone... Radiated wind... Сloudiness... Wild dogs... And only a few stalkers on the trip...
no dude!! humans are greedy we are greedy!! no matter what are the dangers if we smell money we search for them!!!
If you decide to keep the same amount of enemy spawning as there is in 1.2, is there a way that I could ramp that up? I love your mod, but I would like to see the zone a bit more populated. I like to kill!!!!
I am all for ultra realism and a good challenge. To that end will the HUD and cross-hair be removed?
I was actually thinking about trying to script something myself that could detect when the player was in danger (like the game does with the dynamic music) and show very minimal health and stamina bars only while in danger mode and when not it danger the hud disappears all together.
That script sounds interesting! I never use crosshairs myself.
MISERY will contain pretty much the same minimal hud as I Work Alone but it will look slightly different.
How can I remove the HUD altogether? I liked the RCOM mod immensely for that reason.
I personally liked Ceano's unaltered HUD. I think having an ammo counter was unrealistic, as you wouldn't always know how many bullets are in your magazine, leaving you to keep track of it by yourself. Also, I think the minimap is a cheat, being able to see that there are friends around you before you see them on-screen. To an extent, that's why I liked RCOM; you had utterly no idea where the next bullet would fly at you from or whether the stalker shooting in your direction is your friend shooting at something/someone behind you or if he is shooting at you.
I agree and this minimap doesn't show enemies (That goes for I Work Alone as well)
What I meant was I don't like being able to see friends or neutrals either. Perhaps you could have the minimap only show traders, medics, mechanics and so forth?
I think the mapping should be done by the PDA, and the minimap should be removed altogether. The ammo counters should also be removed. If it were possible to show the health/stamina bars only when in danger that would be great but otherwise could they be even less intrusive than the IWA ones.
I actually changed IWA after playing for a while to make those bars thinner to suit my liking better. :)
Loving this, I will play Misery 1.1 HUD_draw off from now on
Have you ever played Redux? It has a HUD indicator of which direction you're facing. For example, "90°E". That's something I would've liked in I Work Alone, and I think it'd be fairly realistic. Makes sense that a Stalker would carry a compass.
I'm most anxious to see how this new mod will be. As I did quite like the "I Work Alone" one you did.
Every time I stepped out of the safe houses of Yanov and Zanton, It was always a difficult battle to avoid mutants and bandits while I reached my objective.
I take it when I finally play Misery I won't be prepared for what I might encounter every time I set out during each mission in the zone ?
I'm afraid to disappoint you on that one. "I Work Alone" tries it best to shuffle the encounters and vary your gameplay. But if you were dissatisfied with IWA on this point chances are that you also will be on MISERY.
Oh, I didn't mean to say IWA was bad in anyway. I do recall an earlier issue when I was at Skadovsk all the non-important stalkers kept leaving the boat to engage a dozen zombies in the swamp that kept showing up every day. Mostly never coming back.
I suppose maybe in Misery if you help assist Beard and Owl they could afford some sort of mercenary stalker sniper that could deal with mutant and zombie groups sniping them on the top of Skadovsk ?
Which version of AtmosFear is your weather system based on in Misery?
It's based on ver.2.1 currently but I'm planning to use ver.3 instead. It's just one of the last things for me to do because it requires at least 1 playthrough afterwards to see if I did it right and it didn't cause any bugs.. Regarding sky boxes: as I understood you only changed the visuals for the nighttime boxes? I have altered every daytime box of ver.2.1 so that means that I can just overwrite the ver.3 boxes when I implement the whole thing to get my MISERY sky look
Unfortunately not. All the sky-boxes in AF3 have been re-rendered according to proper sun position so you would need to do your alterations again.
When you will be integrating AF3 don't forget to remove all traces of AF2.1 (configs/textures). If you don't do that the textures from AF2 will be loaded but not used causing RAM problems.
If you need any assistance on merging AF3 don't hesitate to contact me.
Thanks Cromm!
Is it going to be English only? I know a lot of gamers would most likely appreciate it in the original language too.
English interface only and russian ingame speech for immersion
Would anyone who's working on this have a good idea how well this mod will cooperate with Steam? I had a great number of problems with I.W.A, and it still crashes every time I try to travel to Yanov Station. But that's beside the point, I'm just wondering if it's come across at any point.
Rekon i could merge Smarter Pripyat with misery?
That sort of thing would not only require days og merging but also some choices between doubled content.
Is there a way I can get my helmet to show in 3rd person?
Hey, just started playing the mod tonight. Loving it so far, except for the constant hunger. I don't think I should be getting hungry every hour; which lines do I change to slow it down a little?
There're a few lines that mention satiety, but I don't want to go changing the wrong one.
Is there some way to uninstall/reinstall the mod, if I want to start a new game as assault instead of recon, or sniper instead of assault?
Have you tried just installing it over your current installation? Seems to me like you wouldn't have any conflicts, seeing as it's just calling a few different parameters (starting gear, abilities, couple of menu changes).
Help me please. Ive killed some stalkers in the area of Zanton and now no one at skadovsk will talk to me, i can't even get back to yanov :/
Is there anyway to get them talking to me again? Ive tried staying away from skadovsk for a couple of days but that doesn't work. Is there anything i can configure to reset skadovsks "talking" status?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Other than that this is currently my favorite mod ;)
I have the same propblem beard pilot own...wont talk to me
and appear to be enemies because i killed some stalkers...
i was wondering if anyone has found a xm8,ump45 or a aug and if so where , any help would b greatly appreciated.... lovin this mod its awesome..........
Are there a torrent i can download? It says it takes 2 days to download right now!!!
OWL's inventory is very small. He doesn't have all the weapons shown in the display image about all the weapons. He has roughly 10 or so, maybe 7.
Does his stock rotate, or do I need to do a quest or what? Because I'm a sniper and all he has are a few rifles, a shotgun, armor, missile and a machinegun...DERP, and a revolver.
Helps?
Google 'Call of Pripyat Weapon Creation'.
It's the first link. Check the table of contents and look for 'Adding weapon to trader'.
I find that difficult to understand.
Is there a simpler way? Like, does it unlock after the main missions, or something?
I noticed some of the bandits' weapons have improved.
Question for 1.1, anyone have an idea how many of the butchered / mis-aligned iron sights will be fixed? Also, will the weapons with permanent red 'dot' sights work in unlit conditions as well as the Cobra? I'd love to see it done.
Hi
I'm currently playing your Misery mod for the past few days and I must say it is absolutely wonderful and I love it. I always wanted more harsh environment and the uncertainty of my own survival in my Stalker experience.
After reading this FAQ and knowing that version 2.0 will come out I guess I will stop playing and wait for a bit longer.
Hello N.Aroe
I've started playing your mod and it's really great, but I have one issue.
I noticed this has already been asked, but I really, really, can't play with the helmet obscuring my view. I do like the idea that if my helmet is damaged, I can't see properly, but it's the outer frame that I can't stand. I know you wont release a version without the helmet view (which is very understandable), but can you please tell me which file modifies the view so I can remove it myself?
I have some experience at modifying mods, and I just need a few pointers.
I really hope you reply, and any help from anyone will be very appreciated.
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Thanks for this mod! Brilliant artwork...
Every trip outside of a "safe habor" be a survival trip, i love this innovation so much^^
Hi,
first, I read about your mod when it was praised on kotaku.com as mod of the year, and that was a good reason for me to visit pripyat again. I had other mods installed and got an error message, so I installed the game anew and then the mod, everything worked fine.
I really, really enjoy your mod. That's a little bit masochistically speaking. I like it when a game pushes me to my limits (in a satisfying way), even if that means that I have to feel despair quite often (Dark Souls anyone? ;) )
Your artwork and teaser pics of things to come are a bliss to watch, just like smelling and drinking good scotch whisky. You really have a talent for creating something entertaining and refining it by presenting it in a most sophisticated way.
So much for the praises, originally I wanted to report constant crashing with gamesaves where I had a companion, but then I read that you already know that. Maybe make it more obvious or easy to see because it is a real pain if one happened not to know it.
Another time I crashed during a tempest where lightnings strike down, these vertical ones with orbs in the middle, which can harm you. I have graphics on maximum on a rather mid-end rig, while the game runs fluid and I have 8 GB ram, it might be because of the limits of my system.
Besides that, I think the game is much more stable and less laggy than without your mod, despite the much better looks. Congrats for that.
I can't wait for 2.0, since I already know the story I'll have no problems starting anew with 2.0 after having finished the game with 1.0. For me, it's much more about the feeling, the scavenging and the fear than about the story.
Thanks for that awesome experience and even more to come.
very cool looking forward to playing this. thank you!
(buried)
does this modification require stalker call of pripyat? cause i hope it doesnt require it.
Are you stupid or something?
I understand that English dialogue is unrealistic to you, but is there any way I can at least get it back? I hardly understand what anyone is saying to me because they are all speaking Russian.
Same thing here :/ I really really REALLY love this mod, and can't wait for the V2 ( but I don't have the choise... So, I do ^^ ) ... But just the possiblity to choose the ingame language would be totaly great ! Or most awesome : subtitle ! :P ... Or at least, can someone can say me how I do this by me-self ( I supose it's possible to copy/past some files for save the language we want )
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