Messages posted by: Ess-Jay

Well, you're the guys with the sun! If we want a cold one, we just leave the beer on the table and watch the ice build up on it...

Hey, I'm sorry if it sounded like I was shooting off. And yes, I can understand that policing every different culture is rather akin to that old needle and haystack saying!

In retrospect, I guess it's all about respect. Although the offending word may have some bad effects when spoken amongst certain cultures, the majority rules. The minority have to respect that, and the majority have to respect the minority in the same way. We're all here for fun, so I do apologise for bringing a bad cloud to the whole affair. All I was doing was voicing my concern, and I hope you can respect that. Swearing doesn't offend me in the slightest, so I can pretty much live with it.

Anyway, who's for a cold beer?

As I said above, the name really doesn't bother me at all. I've never been online when Wanker has been playing, so I really can't comment on his conduct. I'm sure he's a good guy judging from the replies in this thread.

The only thing I do find dubious is how the rules don't seem to apply here, yet they apply to everyone else. Yes, I can understand that many people in the US won't know what it means. But the trouble is that I find that quite a xenophobic attitude to have. To assume that every player who frequents the Disastrous Consequences server is American is ridiculous! The online UT2004 community is an International one, and if you do want to impose rules upon them such as the 'no swearing' rule, you need to adhere to all users. To excuse someone because they're a friend is a breach of the agreement presented to the user on their first visit to the server.

Let me give you an example. My signature below was censored by Druid, a quote from the move 'They Live', due to the original inclusion of the 'A' word instead of 'butt'. I'm fine with this as a) the word in the UK has lost all negative connotation, thus no longer rendering it a swear word, but I can understand its status in the US and so might offend some viewers, and b) it conforms to the rules set down by Druid and Shantara.

This is in no way a personal attack on HYA Wanker.

My guess is that they really don't know what it means! Try walking around a street near me in the UK and calling someone 'Wanker'...

It doesn't bother me in the slightest, but I guess the rules are there for everybody.

That guy has some serious talent there!

I did find a concept render this guy did for a Predator based skin that was simply stunning to look at. I don't think he ever finished it, which is a big shame. I can't remember the link for that right now, but I'll post it when I find it.

And like Mystic, I've downloaded pretty much all of this artist's skins onto my computer. I shudder to think how large my C:\UT2004 folder is at this present time, what with all the custom maps, mutators and skins/models filling up the frame.

Shantara wrote:

But what about the llamas?

I think you'll find them here:

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/llama.php

Bender's having a rest at the moment, but Martian from Mars Attacks! has gladly taken his place:

http://skincity.beyondunreal.com/?section=models&action=show_infos&id=425

EDIT: I see Mystic has him as well!

I personally don't find the chat spamming to be that bad at all. It's actually nice to play on a server where the members are actually friendly with each other, not just a list of silent players on the scoreboard.

The only spammers which do irritate me are the arrogant players. They're either mid-teens and think they're the dogs (UK expression for amazing) or they're old enough to know better and violenty defend that they're really not camping the redeemer, just making sure they get a go of it by standing around it for 10 minutes or so...

There's a mutator for INV games available from Fraghouse that adds updated skins to the current monsters. Nothing amazing, but certainly more attractive than the current skins. Would you consider using this on the server?

Screenshots:

http://fraghouse.beyondunreal.com/gallery/index.php?parent=33

Download link:

http://download.beyondunreal.com/fileworks.php/fraghouse/ut2004/2k4_sharpskins.zip

When was the monster pack rolled back, Druid? I'm asking as this happened to me again last night, shortly after the players on the server decided to have a map vote (current one was rather dull), and once before that whilst on a general wave.

I was pretty underwhelmed with HL2 as well. As you said, the eye candy was gorgeous, and the general presentation was superb. But it just... well... wasn't up to the hype. It's too short, has a rather underwhelming storyline, and the gravity gun was far too much of a gimmick. You'd get the gun, go "Wow! Cool!", and then go back to shooting things, save a few puzzles which required the new physics engine.

My advice to Valve and others who utilise this engine would be to push its real-world physics into the background. Subtly create a real-life atmosphere for us, carefully blending those touches into the background so that we get a sense we're in a playable environment.

Anyway, I'm rambling. Good luck with the uninstall!

I'm just plucking ideas out of the air right now, but could STEAM be having a negative affect on your UT2004? Could its internet verification system interfere with your connection to the UT2004 servers? It might be worth searching Google.com to see if anyone else is having this problem with HL2 and UT2004 running side by side.

Just a thought...

It happened to me the other night (game disconnecting every couple of minutes or so, freezing, jitters etc etc), but all I did was disconnet my DSL connection, reboot my pc and start again. Presto - lag-free connection to the server. But if you're getting this each time you connect to the server, that solution really won't help you. What's the performance on other servers like? Have you tried any other RPG servers?

Firewall shouldn't be a problem at all. Just make sure you allow UT2004.exe access to the internet and you should be fine. I'm running Mcafee and haven't experienced anyhting other than the one off problem listed above. My AVG anti-virus also runs happily alongside the game.

I'm not sure you'd want to admit to this, but are you running any torrent downloads? Although they're sometimes paused to allow the full bandwidth of your connection to be taken up by UT2004, they still hog CPU resource (around 2% per torrent). Try closing those down completely if you have any as UT2004 relies heavily upon CPU performance.

One possibility would be that the lower level players would have a higher chance of getting a unique weapon than the higher players, possibly in increments of .2%. As you progress, the less likely it is for you to pick up a unique weapon, although the loaded weapons ability would still cater for your needs. This would certainly balance teams out as the vast majority of games seem to have an immense cross section of varied level players.

Other than that, what about a weapon spray ability? The first level increases splash and spray damage for your weapons, such as the Flak having a wider spray, and each further level increases those further (max level 3).

In theory, the 1-on-1 maps could be an absolute blast. The problem is that people aren't grasping the concept of spawn points (i'm talking about the casual users of the server) and are happy to walk over them to prevent the monsters from spawning. When everyone huddles together in one particular spot and blast away, you do get a terrific game on your hands.

I suppose they'd be better off removed as they seem to cause more arguments and bad feeling than anything else.