|
We take the BASH webcast this week on a retrospective journey, one which has us take a longing look back at the roots of Call of Duty.
What put us in the mood to look backward and not forward, was undoubtedly all the buzz about the Call of Duty Hall of Fame. Look at the nominees sent in by our listeners and readers and you will see a large portion of them had something to do with today's topic: the grandaddy CoD mod, Heat of Battle.
Episode 36 of BASH looks at HoB: it's past, it's present and it's future.
And what a future is in store!
I cannot think of anyone more suited to talk about this mod than our guest this week.
He's a legend in the CoD community.
Currently he is a moderator on the codboards, on mikesmarauders and on RGN, where you can read his autobiography .
Guessed yet?
Yup, BritishBulldog1 is on the show.
If there is an issue out there in FPS gaming, BB1 as he is called, will certainly have an opinion for it. It was that outspoken character that led BB1 to take part in the CoD Community Action that shut down CoD2 servers worldwide a few years ago and forced IW to acknowledge the problems they were having with the game and fix them.
If anyone is interested in understanding why Heat of Battle did not become a CoD2 mod...this event might be a good starting point.
All we know is, if there was ever one to have in your corner in a scrap, Tony would be my guy. He was certainly there for the community when a shoddy CoD2 threatened its demise.
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls welcome to the program.
My name is Jock Yitch, that's Yitch with "Y" of the first person shooter gaming webcast BASH.
I'll be your congenial host for the next 30 minutes of noob fragging excitement, information and entertainment....yes yet another episode of BASH - a webcast unlike any gaming webcast you have ever heard.
First off let me say that we now have a long list of nominees for the Call of Duty Hall of Fame. We have pinned that list onto the BASHandSlash.com site and you can have a look at it there. Of course we're still accepting names for the Hall and will be so as long as there are Call of Duty games.
Now our senior council on the BASHandSlash.com Boards who are responsible for selecting the inductees are right now arguing over who should get the big honor of being the first in.
These first inductees will be voted in using a relative voting process - where we pick and choose the most worthy. After the first inductees are selected we revert to a normal voting process where each nominee is chosen on their own merits.
Stay tuned...we're set for a special upcoming BASH where we announce the first inductees.
Also, I must tell you that we have a special guest audio enginner today. DJ Skeebo from mycallofduty.com. And as a treat, he's created a special outro for this program. So hang in there for that.
Our usual audio engineer, DJ X has given of his time to fly off to IRAQ to entertain the troops over there. A really generous thing to do ...if it wasn't for the fact that we are all Canadians here and our troops are actually in Afghanistan.
Um...Chico...no one bothered to tell him that right? Afghanistan...i think its that country near Pakistan...one of the stans...i can't really remember.
Ya...he'll be ok. I saw him leave with a big wad of cash and he's got his cell right?
Well on with the show.
Today, with the future of CoD4 about to explode onto store shelves in about 40 or so days, we thought we would actually take a longing look back to our past. Specifically back to the days of the original Call of Duty and CoD UO.
The big mod back then was the Heat of Battle mod. To talk about the HoB mod, its past, present and it's future - yes i said future, is none other than CoD legend BritishBulldog1.
DJ Skeebo...slide me into the interview dude.
With us today is the Development Team Leader from the Heat of Battle Mod at www.heatofbattle.net: Tony! A.K.A. British Bulldog1
Thanks for coming on here Tony! You're also a moderator on a few boards right?
Q1. Where do you call home?...give us a short gaming bio.
Until early this year, I was merely an enthusiastic player, who
promoted the mod. In November 2006, I was asked if I would like
to be the publicity relations rep for HoB, a job I was pleased to take
on.
Q2. What attracted you to CoD? What other FPS's do you play?
Q3. What is the "Heat of Battle mod"?
What is the Heat of Battle and what is in it? are basically the questions. Well, here goes.
1. There are 3 styles of play in Heat of Battle and all revolve around
capturing objectives a) Both sides can capture, B ) Axis defend already
flagged objectives and allies have to take them all and c) progressive
spawning/linear attack. A HoB first
a & b are fairly self explanatory. C however, means that you have
to capture the objectives in a set order, starting with the one closest
and then moving to the next location. The first team to cap the middle
objective will find that their spawn has moved from the furthest point
from the enemy, to the middle of the map, increasing their advantage.
(It makes it harder for the losing team, but I've seen it turned around
where the advantage was lost). A HoB first
2. Points system;- There are no points for kills that are not close to
or in a capture zone, but additional points are awarded for those that
complete a capture. (server side variable). A HoB first
3. Capturing an objective;- being a team based game, it usually takes
at least 2 players, and sometimes as many as 5 to capture an objective.
Servers can be configured to dynamically adjust the number of people
required to capture an objective based on how many people are online at
the time so that a map that might require 5 people to capture a
partiuclar objective when the server has 20 people on it would only
require 2 people to capture when the server only has 4 people on it.
Some maps have single person capture zones, but they are the exception
rather than the rule. A HoB first
Q4. What is the history of this mod?
- who came up with the idea?
- who was involved with the original programming?
- Giovanni -------> Reaper DEV LEADERS
- which flavor of CoD was this originally built for?
Q5. Reaper's departure finally culminated in you taking over the reigns of HoB. How did this happen? And why no CoD2 HoB?
"Unfortunately, because of things said to the original team leader,
during an interview on the coD round table, this left a sour taste in
the mouths of the original development team. This was so bad
that, originally, it was intended to never work on an IW product again
and the decision was made to move to the HL2 source engine. Much
work has been done on this, but, it would seem that interest had waned
to the point that it is unlikely that the source version will be
completed, although there is still some hope.
Eventually, Giovanni (the original Dev Team leader) decided, due to work commitments etc that he no
longer had the time to lead the team and handed the reins over to a
reluctant Reaper. With a lack of progress on the Source version
and again to other personal commitments, Reaper has also stepped down
from the role of Development Team Leader. However, as I was the
one who has virtually kept the CoD version alive througout it's life as
a CoD1 mod and as the instigator of the UO conversion, I was asked if I
would like to take over the reins for the CoD franchise of HoB.
Something I had never asked for, not expected, but am pleased to take
up the challenge. Some may ask why BB1? Especially as I am
not a modder. To which I can only answer that it has been my
steadfast support for the mod and all things HoB related. I am
also fairly well known within the CoD community, via my activities on
many of the various forums related to CoD."
Q6. What was the reaction from the community in regards to you taking over the mod - and you not being a scripter?
Q7. What are the detailed features of the mod?
GAME FEATURES - note ALL these features first appeared in HOB, the very first CoD mod to be released.
1. Cookable and non-cookable nades, with American and British Nades, you can press M to switch between the two different types. A HoB first
2. Additional weapons compared to the original CoD. SVT40, Sten Mk V and greasegun spring to mind. A HoB first
3. Deployable and working bayonet on SVT40 (press M) A HoB first
4. A dynamically deployable Bar - deploys anywhere at the right height, not just mappers choices. (much better animation too) A HoB first and exclusive
5. Fall to the ground when shot in the foot. (server side variable) A HoB first
6. Shoot weapon from the hand of the enemy. (server side variable) A HoB first
7. Burning rubble actually hurts you (mapper variable) A HoB first
8. Barbed (razor) wire also hurts you (mapper variable) A HoB first
9. Improved blood puffs (courtesy of Merciless MoD)
10. Hear the enemy scream when shot. A HoB first
11. Shell shock. A HoB first
12. Improved sniper reticule (sight) (now back to standard UO)
13. NO CROSS HAIRS. A HoB first
14. Easy to use squadding system with squadding commands. A HoB first
15. Choice of being squadded or not. A HoB first
16. Your location automatically given to team members when using team say "Y" or squad say "V". A HoB first
17. Weapons tweaked to be more relective of real life (but not to the point of destroying game play). A HoB first
18. Blowable walls and doors with set charges and nades. A HoB first
19. Ask the HoB team a question and they will answer (unlike IW)
20. SPRINT has been added in the V 1.0 install
Other new features added in V1
This release represents the culmination of years of effort from dozens of mappers, coders, artists and testers as well as years of amazing support from you, the community.
New features:
Sprinting
Integrated admin tools to facilitate tournament play. A HoB first
New map: Junobeach (by Televinken)
New map: Maaloy (by Televinken)
Re-introduced & updated map: Offensive
Updated maps: CR44, Defiance, Village
Fixes:
Capture code reworked
Portals added to a number of maps to increase performance
Several potential server crashes fixed (particularly for Linux servers)
Player death count at end of round corrected (thanks, Jim!)
Point penalty for switching teams removed if autobalance would have assigned you to the other team. I.e., you're no longer penalized for balancing the teams.
Other minor fixes...
Q8. Where can we go to play it?
As the lead moderator on codboards, I was also able to gain
the backing of gameservers.com and we currently have a 64 man HoB
server courtesy of them. I must also extend my thanks to
mikesmarauders for sponsoring the mod throughout the initial years,
without them and the server they provided, I doubt I would ever have
taken to the game the way that I did.
Q9. Is the gametype suitable for competition? It seems like S&D is the current defacto competition game...could HoB add more wrinkles to current tournament competition gameplay?
Q10. What are your impressions of CoD4?
Q11. What are your impressions of what IW has been doing in trying to win over the PC community?
Q12. Where do you want to take this mod?:
BB1:
"I have been an out spoken Critic of IW, but believe that they really do want the best for the modding community, inspite of the enormous "modders weren't there" gaff by Grant Collier. This belief is now being converted into action with the announcement that the team intend to take HoB into CoD4. First, it will be the gameplay. This will give us a fairly fast launch of the mod. Second will come the conversion back to WWII. Naturally, this is all dependant upon rebuilding the dev team. We still have coders and a modeler/animator - but we need more. I want to see if we can make the game era map dependant and then perhaps introduce a couple of WWI maps, then move on to theatres like Korea and Vietnam. I also want to be able to introduce other countries and teams, but this will all take time and if we can pull it off, it will keep adding new stuff and keep it fresh and alive for the players."
|
