Greetings everyone! I'm proud to present the newest release of foxMod, a small pet project for Unreal Tournament III that aims to improve the game's AI while also adding hor+ FOV widescreen support and 4-player splitscreen support with enhanced gamepad control. Play UT on the couch with your friends!
Some of the more noteworthy additions in this release include new risk-based pathfinding routines for the AI, which allows them to choose potentially longer, but safer routes when on route to an objective (such as running the flag) and make more effective use of level geometry as cover during combat.
Also of note is a redesigned audio system for splitscreen that fixes all of the previous splitscreen audio issues, as well as improved campaign mutator support (no more console commands). Finally, full network play support and stability improvements across the board round out the release.
Interested? Check it out here on ModDB!
Enjoy!
~fox
Changes in v0.7 (09/08/13):
General:
- Support for new CBP3 content
- Drop Flag / Weapon control, which will now toss your weapon when held
- Proper vehicle FOV support (wasn't being calculated correctly before)
- Proper campaign mutator support (including splitscreen)
- New Force Translocator mutator to force Translocator in any game mode (will disable Hoverboards)
- "DisplayPortrait Accessed None 'VoiceInterface'" bug fix
- Team-colored death messages for all modes
- Fixed voting in a 3-4p splitscreen games causing a crash (from v0.5 - oops!)
- Gamepad autoaim now only activates if gamepad input has been used exclusively for the past few seconds (using tandem gamepad+mouse setups will no longer grant autoaim)
- Vehicle control type now reliably set for network clients
- Gamepad autoaim now reliably set for network clients
- Various bug fixes and code cleanup, particularly with networking support
- Sounds now only play for the closest player in splitscreen (fixes all known splitscreen audio bugs). Removed volume normalization as it's no longer needed.
- Fixed non-looping action music in DM-Deck (and any map that uses GoDown as music)
- New Look to Steer control code that factors in movement stick/keys in addition to camera orientation (allows driving and looking in two different directions at once when using "relative" steering control)
- Weapon Switcher Quick Peek is now also shown if the weapon bar is hidden
- Fixed an issue where the voting screen could become unresponsive if the 2nd, 3rd or 4th player won the match
- Server-configurable FOV clamps
AI:
- Support for new CBP3 content
- Configurable max default orders
- Further general anti-stuck improvements
- AI now attack any visible part of objects (helps tremendously on attacking Power Nodes / Cores -- AI can now complete Confrontation with the Leviathan)
- Avoidance Mapping system that allows bots to choose potentially longer, but safer paths when running an objective
- AI make better use of level geometry as cover during fights
- AI avoid lifts if they have already been used and would need to wait
- AI no longer attempt to snipe when actively under fire
- Further improved hoverboard usage - AI now hoverboard more often in Warfare
- AI now attempt toss the flag to stronger teammates closer to the base
- AI now attempt to toss their weapon to weaker teammates, such as recently respawned teammates
- Greater avoidance of areas where there have been a lot of deaths that match
- Hold Position order sticks after a bot dies (AI now store their HoldSpot)
- Greatly improved vehicle healing behavior for AI (always heal nearby vehicles if not in combat)
- Necris and Krall bots no longer randomly spout human speech (particularly incoming vehicles)
- AI now prioritize vehicles they're already heading towards (similar to vanilla behavior)
- AI now understand towing in Warfare
- AI now slightly prefer fast vehicles over slow ones
- AI now slightly prefer artillery
- AI now check if they're close to the ground before hoverboarding, getting out of a vehicle to heal, etc.
- Better combat checks for hoverboards and non-combat vehicles
- Major code cleanups
- AI now always attack the power core if they have line-of-sight to it
- Improved "devious" behavior checks
- AI now longer reuse routes as often
- AI Titans that are stuck now attempt to crouch out of their spot, and failing that just suicide (better than them uselessly sitting there)
- Attacking AI now only use defensive vehicles (turrets etc.) when threatened, and get out after the threat is eliminated
- AI can now bail from low-health turrets
- Major improvements to AI vehicle handling when stuck
- Small fixes to help bots play on maps like ONS-Hostile
- AI can now attack locked enemy vehicles to thin out base defenses
- Improved vehicle usage in non-objective game modes
- Improved vehicle usage in combat
- AI vehicle gunners no longer randomly shoot at the wall
- Improved orb handling ability
- Improved Warfare teleporter usage
- AI now only grab vehicles within range of leader
- AI now grab items within range of leader
- AI now taunt and give praise on cool actions (flag captures, multi-kills, sprees, etc.)
- Improved shootable door behavior (like on Turbine) - use Enforcer or other weapon guaranteed to open door if possible
- Use Impact Hammer on invulnerable or heavily shielded enemies to knock their powerups off if appropriate
- More configurable options for AI
- Added a small configurable easter egg :)
what was wrong with the original fov settings in the vanilla game?
The FOV setting did not change as aspect ratio increased, which is generally undesired in games (though it's better than just stretching the image). There were methods to manually override this, but foxMod does this for you by setting a desired 4:3 FOV and doing the calculations from there.
Additionally, vanilla UT clamped the FOV between 80 and 100 degrees, which was not high enough for some users. Generally, for sitting at arms length away from your display, 90 degrees FOV at 4:3 (or ~106 degrees at 16:9, above the vanilla limit) is most comfortable, whereas 75 degrees at 4:3 (or ~91 degrees at 16:9, about UT's default setting) is best for sitting several feet away from the display (such as a TV in the living room).
See En.wikipedia.org and Youtube.com for more detailed explanations of this. :)
Split screen is disabled if I use Action Cam or any other 3rd Person view mutator. Do you know why that happens?
It's likely an incompatibility of some sort. I'm unfamiliar with Action Cam and how it works, but if there's a conflict I'd say it's a good bet it's attempting to modify the same code classes that foxMod is. Try opening up Config/UTMutator_foxSplitScreen.ini and setting bPlayNice=False - this will likely end up with Action Cam not functioning (as if it were inactive in the first place), but it's worth a shot.
oh yeah unreal is back
the best FPS ever :)
Awesome job!
I guess this wouldn't be compatible of the bat with other Unreal Tournament 3 mods would it?
Thanks! As for compatibility, it depends on what exactly the mod changes - if it's a new gametype, it probably won't work, as those typically have custom AI and Player code (SquadAI and PlayerController classes, respectively), which would not be aware of foxMod's changes. However, things such as new weapons, powerups, etc. (provided they're coded reasonably) should work fine. Of course, large mods or total conversions will include all of these things and more.
If you're code-savvy, take a look at the mod source code - particularly the CBP extensions in the Src/foxMod_CBP and Src/foxMod_AI_CBP folders. Those packages essentially "wrap" the foxMod changes on top of the new CBP classes (for Domination, specifically).
Hopefully that was somewhat clear and useful. :)
Oh, thats very cool!
Is it possible to incres, when you give a bot. And order like, cover me. That he cover you well just like UT99. Cause they dont cover you to well in UT3. And I have the last version 0.8
Please see my comment under Moddb.com - thanks!
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