Alright, so let's start at the beginning.
You don’t need to be worried with paying for anything, the official game is FREE for download, and also the program that we use to play. Just fyi, this is copied from the GCVets new players page.
1. The basics
To join us you will need two things:
- Ground Control
Once you get there click over where it says “Download Now”
In case you have problems downloading from Moddb try this mirror. - Balance mod (latest version)
Due to popular demand we are currently modding the game to balance factions.
It will also add the Joxer’s basic pack of multiplayer maps.
You’ll find a list of (outdated) changes here.
To install it just download the file and overwrite the data2.sdf in your GC\data folder. - GameRanger
Download it and create an account. - Discord
We have a Ground Control Community Server on Discord to help with matchmaking and voicechat. Highly recommended you join!
Optional graphics stuff: dgvoodoo and the gc resolution enhancer. For dgvoodoo place the exe and MS/x86 dlls into your GC install, and for the options, use the maximum vram available, force anisotropic 16x, disable mipmapping (if your pc can handle it, it'll look great though), Bilinear DD/CPU and fast video memory access. Don't force vsync (GR doesn't like it) or a resolution (use the resolution enhancer instead). Widescreen 16:9 is the highest and recommended resolution - you can go higher with an additional plugin, but the UI will be shrunk ever smaller.
OK, now you have the tools to join us, but let’s go back a little so you can understand why we use an extra program (GAMERANGER) to play this game. Ground Control is a very old game, released since the year 1999, and since that year a lot of things have changed as you can imagine. The server provider (won.net) for the Ground Control Multiplayer got shut down not allowing us to play, that is why we use GameRanger, it allows us to host games by using the LAN protocols therefore we have no need to use the original multiplayer, in other words it’s like having a LAN but that lan is online giving you the chance to play with everyone you want outside the LAN.
Another important thing is that we are few players at the moment and we have jobs, family, friends to attend to, so we have agreed on an hour and days to meet which is at 10pm UTC/GMT (GMT is Greenwich Meridian Time and is the same as UTC) on Fridays and also the rest of the weekend, anyhow we still have games during the week, though on Fridays is the time most of us join up.
Don’t hesitate to log into GameRanger during normal weekdays, sometimes there is people that host matches, so if you can’t make it during the Fridays or Weekends, do log when you can!
2. Tips and tricks, Unit descriptions, Maps, etc..
After the basics you can already play with us, nevertheless there are more things that need your attention:
We try to be a dynamic community and some players contribute with making new multiplayer maps for us to play online, during matches all must have the latest map packs in order to play, else we play the usual standard maps that came with the game.
In the GC maps page, you have information on how to install the maps and also the links to download them. Besides this information there is also a link for map a making tutorial and the map editor download(GenEd), though there's a complete SDK download here too.
You probably also want to check these sections on our website:
- Tips and tricks ( strongly recommended )
- GC units
Stay with us!
The Vets Team.
P.S: Use the ingame console and put in lod_bias 30 increase the lod of important stuff, like mines! You can set it even higher than that, if you want. And, while you have the console active, increase your far_plane distance as well. I set mine to 7000.
