Bluehawk

I think the particle-based fog from the skybox (?) is being rendered accidentally everywhere and possibly duplicated. This is what I see in the opening exterior, looking up at the sky with r_showTris 1 and 2 respectively. And just down the shaft with the broken ladder, if I crawl into the corner of the little maintenance tunnel/platform and stare at a corner where there should be relatively little going on, this is the result I get with showTris. Notice that the particles are being occluded but still rendered. One last example: shortly after passing the first set of cameras, the entrance hallway with the bulletin board on the left and water tank on the right. In this case, there seems to be a lot of overdraw for level geometry, as well as the flurry of particles.

I also find "mansion_tense02" and '02a" to be annoying ambient tracks, because of their high dynamic range from quiet to loud. Not only can it obscure necessary sounds like guards' movements and the player's own foot steps on surfaces, but it also interrupts my train of thought if I'm talking out loud

Does anything happen after finding or is there any way to interact with

Most people have said she looks like Heather from Silent Hill 3.

Ah, this might be the problem actually. I followed the link on the official release announcement to download the new 'tdm_installer' linked here under Windows (32-bit) - https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/20460-new-tdm_installer-and-dev-builds/ ...But when I extracted it to my folder, the file had a "date modified" of 01/01/2000 (a little strange considering its "date created" is in 2021), so it got lost in the directory and looked like an old file. I absentmindedly used the older "tdm_update.exe" from 17/06/2020 which looked comparatively newer. That might be what caused the conflict in the first place.

I had what sounds like the same black screen menu with working sound and an apparently functional cursor hidden from view that Jedi_Wannabe had after I updated my old 2.08 installation to 2.09. I tried deleting the config and other obvious things and it didn't work, so I put the updater in an empty folder and downloaded a fresh install of Dark Mod 2.09 to see if it would work on its own, and it did, so it's not driver-related on my end.... but now I need to download all the FMs again and rebind my controls. Rather than be foresighted and keep the old install intact for further testing, I unfortunately deleted everything but the screenshot folder and ported it over. Now I feel silly for being unable to help. If you can't find out what's causing the conflict, consider this brute force solution (deleting everything and downloading a fresh install) as a last resort.

You can access the Apothecary's...

It's almost merciful though, because they would've had him reading an awful script.

And maybe if you shine it in an opponent's eyes, they can be disorientated briefly like a weak flashbomb. Or not, but modelling a "bullseye" style lantern would put a nice Victorian twist on the typical flashlight functionality.

The first time I played this mission... So I fell in love with the mission's aesthetic, layout and concept... then my love soured pretty badly. But having replayed the mission and knowing the "rules" so to speak going into it, I have to say it's one of the better entries in TDM and it would definitely make any short-list of recommendations if I wrote one. I don't want to spoil anything for new players except to say that it might be in your best interest to go easy on the knock-outs.

I don't know if it's been suggested already, but I thought it could be helpful to have the player's weapons and ammo (arrow types) appear on the inventory screen, maybe along the bottom opposite the loot at the top, or on the left-hand side opposite the scroll buttons (when the inventory is full of enough stuff). It would spare the player hitting all the number keys to check what they have and what the don't if it were just summarized visually on the inventory screen,. Maybe clicking on the ammo types with the cursor could also switch to that weapon/ammo-type like hitting the corresponding number key. Here's a a crude mock-up of what I mean. The exact layout of the text and icons isn't important, so long as it consolidates the information on one screen.

In the flooded waterworks, I found some bugs with the reflections. I apologize if these have been reported already. When standing in certain areas, some of the prefab objects, lights, particles etc. stop rendering in the reflection. The three areas I found were in the corner by the C1 and C2 switches, an area that extends a little into the middle of the room; by the three bulkhead doors around the machinery; and directly underneath the control room. Typically the archways and moss stencils continue to render, but the brick walls do not and neither do the coloured lights. Under the control room is especially funny looking because you can see the walls, doorways and windows of the room above, but not the floor, ceiling or assets within it. When I first played this FM last night, I could see a bright blue skybox in the reflections (which is how I noticed the bug) but now when I go back to take screenshots, all I get is black. Go figure. The rest of the mission looked great, ran well, and had just the right balance of difficulty I like (although I have no idea how you can snatch the coins off the table of the two playing cards without them noticing). A solid FM.

The dream team. I really enjoyed the special effects at the end and their implications about what sort of person Bolero is. His little adventure in Volta 2 might not have been so unusual.

One piece of loot I saw but could not reach was

The haunted house was interesting, but the lonely shopkeeper was creepier.

Oh, that's embarrassing. Apparently I can't read. ?

Applefinger's note names 3 locations for gems and I found them all, or I think I have, but the objective didn't trigger.

This is a really beautiful and well-rounded mission with plenty of options for entry to the main objective and organic hidden objectives to discover. Not to mention the extra challenges, which I'm going to attempt now that I've run through the mission normally. This is an instant classic, I think.

The original 2033 had a 4-stage light sensor on your watch where red was completely visible, yellow was moderate, green was well hidden and black (no light) was completely hidden, but I found the AI to be very temperamental and they would spot you in a second from across a large room even at green. You were better off breaking line of sight whenever possible and ignoring the light system unless you absolutely had to cross open ground. I'm not surprised they streamlined it into a binary system for the sequels, because it felt binary in practice.

I finally found the 6th secret I was missing. I thought at first it must be related to a certain "mist"-ical item that can be found down by the docks and spent a good hour trying to frob things with it, but it turns out it was just..

I've found all the loot, but only 5 out of 6 secrets. Is that working as intended? I only ran into one little bug. When I stand near to the statue in the intersection between the church and the tavern, the skybox flickers. If I move out of the intersection in any direction, it appears fine. Could it be z-fighting between two intersecting 'ceilings'?

It seems to be working correctly. Active portals are green, adjacent inactives are red, and all others are are not drawn until you move close enough. No flickering or other visual aberrations on my end. Here are two screenshots from the beginning alleyway in "A New Job", the new-ish official mission bundled with TDM. I hope that's helpful. Cheers on the patch, guys.