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We are proud to announce the release of: The Dark Mod 2.12 ! The 2.12 development cycle introduced many large code overhaul projects. Most of these were to lay the groundwork for future fixes and optimizations. The final release is yet another leap in performance over the already impressive 2.10 and 2.11 releases. A full changelog can be viewed here, but some highlights include: The Dark Mod 2.12 is a major step forward for mission designers! The culling system has been extensively overhauled to ensure that your CPU and GPU are not wasting resources rendering unseen geometry, lights, and shadows. Some of our best map optimization experts have achieved similar performance gains to what this new culling system does but it is a rare skill and we have even managed to improve performance on missions that were generally regarded as “well optimized”. Mission authors both new and old can follow standard mapping practices with no need to dive deep into sophisticated optimization techniques even for some pretty challenging scenarios such as wide open areas and long views. Players will immediately notice many missions that have made their system struggle with FPS now may be running much more smoothly! Smoother controls for players! Also during the 2.12 development cycle, work has been done to make controls more seamless and accessible. Frob can now use hold or click actions to use items. Once you get used to the mechanic, it will be hard to go back to using a separate “use key”. Mantling is now smoother, faster, and less prone to cause the player to clip through geometry. Leaning is now more subtle and less prone to cause motion sickness. To reduce the tedium of shuffling knocked out AI around to search for loot, you can now configure TDM to automatically loot any frobbed AI. A special thanks must go out to community member Geep! Over the course of 2.12 development, Geep has created subtitles for nearly all AI barks along with developing testing tools and procedures for this gargantuan task! You can see these changes in action by changing the Subtitles setting to “On” ( rather than “Story” ) on the Audio settings page. Geep also provided substantial feedback for our GUI and subtitle design process and edited font data to improve text quality overall. Datiswous has complimented the massive work by Geep to create AI bark subtitles by creating mission story subtitles for a large number of missions. Thank you! Turrets are now natively supported in The Dark Mod and can be paired with Security Cameras! Finally, the nasty 2.11 bug that caused AI to allow arrows to pass through them at certain angles was fixed by Joebarnin! Your assassin style play-throughs should be far less frustrating. See also, our 2.12 Feature discussions: To UPDATE, simply run the tdm_installer.exe file in your darkmod folder. Note that tdm_update.exe is no longer supported, but you can download the new installer from the Downloads page if you don’t have it yet. Please be aware that old saved games will not be compatible with 2.12, so finish any missions you might be in the middle of first! Also, some missions created prior to 2.12 may need to be updated so they will be playable in 2.12. Use the in-game mission downloader to check for updates.

Inn Business It's business, at an inn, over three nights. Development screenshots: Download: https://drive.google...dit?usp=sharing Update 1.48 uploaded March 8th, 2014, one change: patches key rarely not being frobable in one of its possible spots Big thanks to my beta testers: Airship Ballet, Kyyrma and AluminumHaste! Development supporters of note: Sotha, Springheel and Obsttorte. Also thanks Sotha, for urinating in my mission. ;-) And thanks Kyyrma for the title screen! My appreciation to all forum/wiki contributors, without whom, this wouldn't exist. Thanks to positive commenters on my previous mission too, extra motivation helps! :-) Note this uses campaign features, what you use the first night, impacts subsequent nights. And to quote a tester, "...the level is maybe best experienced in more than one sitting". If you do pause between nights, please be sure to save, you can't begin partway through effectively. (If you accidentally start a night you already completed, just fail the kill objective to switch to another night.) If your frame rates are too low facing the cemetery, please reduce your "Object Details LOD" setting. It was designed with "AI Vision" set to "Forgiving", to be able to sneak through with minimal reactions, if you want more/less, adjust your settings accordingly. There are several random, conditional aspects, and ways of going about things, so others might have slightly different experiences. Post here if you discover hidden objectives for extra points! My condolences to loot completionists, I made a bit on the third night hard, you've got your challenge cut out for you! Speaking of which, there's a TDM bug that mission complete totals too high, here are the real amounts per night: 2026/970/202. Oh, there is something that in the U.S. would be rated PG, in case you play with kids in earshot. I hope you enjoy playing it, feel free to let me know you did, and I'm glad to respond to inquiries (like how stuff was done, nothing was scripted). (Note which night you are referring to if it's something specific.) (Please remember spoiler tags to not expose things meant to be discovered by playing.) Like so: [spoiler]secrets[/spoiler] Developed for TDM 2.01. PS: Thiefette, good news, no spiders! Springheel, if you find an optional objective you can skip...you might find it immersion breaking. Others, no undead! There are a couple other interactive critters though. :-) Edit note: Some posts below were from users of an unreleased version of TDM 2.02 which broke several things, they do not reflect regular game-play.

Ah, pity I wasn't reading the forums back in February. I'm fond of that game, along with Bugbear's other early title, Rally Trophy. I was never too good at FlatOut, but it was always a hoot to play.

If T1 wins then I suggest people also have the option of doing something with story from the dark mod to make it more relevant to the community.

Since I'm bored and haven't posted in a while and yet still finished Thief 4 a few times, I feel compelled to post. In response to a number of observations @Rio_Walker made: Seeing your hands and all the animations newGarrett would do was fun... at first. But given all the looting and environmental interactions the game has it really did slow things down a lot, especially when the game would occasionally realign the player just perfectly before playing an animation to open a drawer. If they had an option to disable these animations or speed them up significantly I'd have been happy. I've played using the Custom difficulty with the option to disable focus and the experience is kinda mixed. While it does make things a bit more traditional without the superpower ability to find loot more easily, it does seem like the game is designed very much for focus and disabling it can hide things you never even knew were present. If it weren't for the focus for example, I would never have noticed the "special" candles hidden around the city that talk when you light them. This game reminds me of a movie that has been reshot several times with footage from separate reshoots blended together with bad editing. It's painfully clear the story has been chopped and changed over the many years of its development and there's assets in the game that clearly had greater importance in a previous iteration but for which their plot points were cut. The most obvious example is the automatons. There's a dude who provides missions on obtaining pieces for one he's building, but apart from that there's also signs in other areas they had more importance (e.g. you see rooms full of them when going up an elevator, the Baron has disassembled ones on tables in his cutscene, etc.) Some plot elements just feel not fleshed out because they had to cobble together something to create this Frankenstein's monster of a game from so many elements. The ending sucks and is incredibly abrupt. Do we even know what the deal is with that half-built ship? Probably another abandoned plot point. With all of its problems, I still kinda like it in so far as its general gameplay. But it doesn't have the longevity of something like TDM or the classic Thief games especially with all the user missions available for them. Oh well, maybe I'm just pining for what it could have been in the hands of a better developer.

When talking about a possible libre version of TDM (https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/22346-libre-version-of-tdm/) it seems we believe all media/gamedata included in TDM is licensed CC-BY-NC-SA. I am not familiar with how the process of adding new media/gamedata works today; I have seen files uploaded to the bugtracker which developers then commit to SVN, but I don't know if there are other ways. It may be a good idea to implement a process that when new components (media/gamedata included in TDM) are added, the contributor is asked to be explicit about the license (a choice which may defaults to their previous preference, for usability). It won't fix the past, but it may help in the future. This will make it easy for contributors to add future data under a more permissive license if they choose. Libre media can be added and its license can be tracked, rather than assumed to be CC-BY-NC-SA. I suggest looking at how Wikimedia Commons has implemented this: the contributor state the source and license at the time the data is uploaded. This can be done either by providing urls or by saying "It's my work and I choose this licsense". The first step could be to add a way to keep track of each filepath in SVN, author, license, sources. Start by setting the value for each file's license to "(default/legacy CC-BY-NC-SA)". Possible implementations for a user interface for new additions are: * Use our own wiki, which runs Mediawiki (same as Wikimedia Commons). I see several benefits of this, but we also need a way to accept uploads of batches, not just single files. * Look at how other open source projects have solved this. There may be more appropriate solutions available. ... but I'll leave the implementation open. Suggestions are very welcome! If the author of each file already in SVN can be tracked, then it may be possible that the author is willing to give a blanket permission for all their past files in one statement, and all their files in SVN can be updated in one commit. A productive contributor willing to release some of their work under a more permissive license could make a big change. If Dark Radiant would support letting mappers search media/gamedata by license (does it already?), it would make it easier for mappers to create a completely libre mission, which would help facilitate a TDM-libre release. If I understand things correctly. This post does not address all details and it may contain misunderstandings or assumptions, but it's a start. Also relevant: * Is there a compiled and maintained list of recommended or deprecated resources for mappers to use? * https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/20311-external-art-assets-licensing/

Angling along alleyways, gliding among gamblers, fleecing the financiers, and lip-locking the ladies... Here's the prequel to the earlier-released "Away 1: Air Pocket". That was a bite-sized nautical adventure, but this, the back story, is a full-featured offering. Version 2 (V2) Now Available (2022/03/24). Also BONUS illustrated document: Making of Away 0's Video Cutscenes Why Version 2? V2, built under TDM 2.10, is primarily a spit-and-polish release with little impact on the storyline. While a few of the many changes will be obvious to someone doing a re-visit, most are minor improvements. Also, you can now replay cutscenes without needing a workaround. For more, see the Release Notes. Probably you should wait until after you've played the game at least once to check the docs below out, to avoid getting too many hints. if you get stumped, the Maintenance Guide may be helpful, or the forum thread here. Additional Documents, Available Here and Within the .pk4 These are also included within the .pk4 in the /supplementals/docs/ folder: Away 0 V2 Credits & Acknowledgements.docx Now crediting those with suggestions about V1 Away 0 V2 Maintenance Guide.docx Includes information for potential translators Away 0 Use of Historic Paintings.docx Unchanged from V1 Additional Documents, Available Here Only Away 0 V2 Release Notes - Changes from V1 Release.docx Of most interest to folks giving feedback on V1 BONUS (and NSFW): Making of Away 0's Video Cutscenes.docx Alternative Downloads It is recommended to simply use your installed TDM's mission downloader menu to get this FM (now V2). But if you want to bother with a manual install, here's a link to fetch it: away0.pk4 Version 2 While Version 2 is dmap'd under 2.10, it should still work under 2.09; there are no 2.10-only features used. If you run into problems under 2.09, you can reinstall the old version from here (for a while): away0.pk4 Version 1 (original). Does not includes the Dec 16 2021 patch for then-upcoming TDM 2.10

Story: Thanks: Thanks to my beta testers datiswous, Cambridge Spy, Aluminum Haste, Acolyte Six, madtaffer, wesp5, SuaveSteve and prjames. Additional thanks to Dragofer and Bikerdude who helped with scripting and assets. Download: Gallery: Thank you for playing! What did you think of the mission? I look forward to your honest feedback! Hints, Tips, Walkthroughs, Spoilers(!): - This mission will greatly reward those taffers who like to explore a mission thoroughly. It is possible to go directly for your objectives, but you will be missing a lot of content. - Many windows are openable, leading to new areas or private residences. - If an area seems hard to navigate due to patrols, chances are you can circumvent it. - Those who like a challenge and some extra replay value owe it to themselves to visit the apartment high above the tunnel entrance at Cobb St. (above the last pic in the gallery) FAQ: Disclaimers, Player Information.

http://k.min.us/jCfGA.jpg "At night, they say, the Builders' hand comes loose from his mighty hammer and creatures wander out from their hiding places while he slumbers. But tis this night, above all others that unholy vapours cloak the land with gloomy curtains and night creatures dance and sing in the twilight. I can't say I'm looking forward to my endeavors this night.... I've been given a job by a Priest to retrieve two holy artifacts from an abandoned cloister in Eldin woods north of the city, simple job I thought, but the priest failed to mention the placed was haunted." Build Time: - version 1.0 was about 5 weeks, but we are now upto version 3.11. Thanks: Respect to the Dark Mod team for putting up with all my questions and knocking up the various updates in short order!. Special thanks to Flanders and Springheel for their models and my testers for helping me squash all the bugs etc. Testers: Flanders, Jaxa, nbohr1more, Aluminumhaste, Baal,l Oldjim, Cookie, Obsttorte, lux, Mat99, AluminumHaste, thebigh Readables: Darkangel/Flanders/b1k3rdude with special thanks to Flanders for his original story.. Resource: Flanders/Springheel - art direction and models. Misc: This is a homage to the original Thief2 mission from 2001 (The Cathedral of the Damned) Download: - The latest version is now available via the in-game downloader. Info: This version has been heavily updated from the original, this came about as a result of need to be compatible with TDM 2.10+ Repeat after me, "Read and explore, Read and explore" The mission is fully l10n ready. (thanks Tels) The mission now has EFX Reverb The mission now has Volumetric Light effects The mission now uses LOD settings for different detail levels There is now a script event related to the "Curse" A few new surprises... Known issues: This mission will have less than optimal fps at a few points on the map, but most of my testers with lowish end rigs (P4/HD4650) are getting 30fps+ at the worst spots) For very low end PCs I recommend the following settings: V-sync is off, AA is off, Aniso is 4x or lower, advanced settings are simple/default & Post processing of disabled and as a last resort the command line arg ' r_skipFogLights 1 ' (turns off the fog)

Type of mission: Mansion/Estate/Horror Story: Lord Blackgrove recently purchased a rare expensive artifact. The whole family has now disappeared leaving the manor empty. Time to check out the manor and see if the artifact can be found. Build time: My first map ever, 300 hours (5 months). Credits: Kingsal - Breaker script for light switches and elevator Dragofer - Ambience Track 'Intent' Springheel and Sotha - Video Tutorials (those videos really helped) Feedback and testing: Cambridge Spy, Dragofer, nbohr1more, Acolytesix, wesp5, Shadow, Zerg Rush, AluminumHaste, prjames The whole community. Download (1.03): https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wZc_nqHoX7kQvzfg08EpoRy2hyuH7mw3/view?usp=sharing Edit: Version 1.02 provides large performance improvements in the outdoor areas. Be sure to set TDM Object Details (LOD) to Normal (or lower) to take advantage of some of the optimizations. Edit: Version 1.03 further improves performance around hedges thanks to HMart's alternative hedge model. I’ve had a mission like this in mind for years. My main influences and inspirations are: Deus Ex - Chateau DuClare (https://youtu.be/9QLT_l8aH78) Clive Barker’s Undying - Main Mansion (https://youtu.be/t8PyXhCQB3Q?t=90) Thief Deadly Shadows - Shalebridge Cradle (Almost everyone should be very familiar with this one) (https://youtu.be/Rw4YZuRUgXA) In case anyone gets stuck and needs help, I’ve listed some questions and answers below that will hopefully help. FAQ

I think this is probably "it depends". If a single AI is giving a story monologue, it may be implemented as a single .ogg file, just broken up into subtitles. So this would all be in the same slot. (Likewise, there are some long barks in a single .ogg file too). But the story could be in multiple .ogg files, delivered by one or several AI. Then, the slot could vary, if there also barks happening that scrambled things up. I could be wrong about this. I recall there was some chatter a long while ago about making what slot an particular AI uses somewhat sticky. That's interesting, about volume (or distance) threshold triggering of subtitle display. I'm guessing no threshold test is applied for story subs.

Thanks for your nice answer me too upps - love lovecraft (what a fine name /makes me think for "Good Will Hunting ) i don´t know this special Story , and i surely prefer his darker Chutullu works : but most of all is Algernon Blackwood´s "The Willows" ( a TDM of that would be Incredible ; but like it had been said about a Dune-Film ; i think it´s not possible ---- but give it a try )

This is a great first mission and a neat adaptation of Lovecraft's short story. I especially loved the start - the streets after dark, the door that slams shut as you approach, and the house's silhouette against the starry sky as you walk up the road. The atmosphere was so thick one could practically cut it! Once inside the house, I kept expecting the inevitable, and my enjoyment of finding loot was matched by my paranoid dread of encountering the terrible old man. The end was not unexpected but definitely well done.

The time has finally come for me to release my 5th mission for The Dark Mod. This project started sometime around 2015-2016 (couldn't find any old files to confirm) with me starting poking on a city mission and for some time I built quite randomly without a plan. I expected I could plot a story later; You can never go wrong with a city section, eh? I had a hiatus and did other projects in my life with model painting and skydiving and mapping became more and more scarce. Now and then I felt an itch to map and some kind of responsibility towards the mod team to produce something, to provide and give something back, if you will. At the start of the pandemic I started building more focused on this misson, but still no exact goal on what I wanted to achieve. Finally I decided I wanted a mission where you follow a person and the mission continued to grow in a linear fashion. I am not the quickest mapper and have severe problems on how to imagine a scene without building it first. This means that I often have to redo scenes and lots of stuff gets unnecessarily built just to be removed later, hence the almost absurd build time (about 1900 hours all in all). Betatesting came about and I got very good tips and feedback and decided to redo a lot of the mission. This need for a rework could have killed my motivation but fortunately, as the map was designed, it only required a modest amount of work and the mission became so much better for it! Sometimes I believe I'm somewhat of the uncrowned king of missions with a bit more unusual and experimental playstyles and this mission also have some elements that isn't used that much. In contrast to some of my other missions though, this one isn't depending on any quirky meter or sun shining down on the player (Reap as you sow *cough*). As mentioned, it is a sprawling city mission with lots of exploring that I hope will satisfy you! So DeTeEff gives to you: Who Watches The Watcher? ver 1.0 https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YYoJJnxr2UbGxemTR-WoWmH64fbazusH/view?usp=sharing The night is creeping over Bridgeport. You squint in the street lights as you trot down the small alley to where you're about to meet your contact. As a man who straddles the line between lawful and outlaw, it's not often you have peaceful interactions with the City watch but as you're about to learn, this time they have more problems on their hands than to deal with petty thieves like yourself. You see the trademark silhouette of a City watch helmet approaching and you make a last take of your immediate surroundings, should you have to flee if things get awry. The guard presents himself as Albert and you listen carefully to his story and you quickly realise that you don't have much to fear from this man; The Citywatch has wrestled with some internal problems lately with missing reports and evidence that disappear. Albert strongly believes they have a mole on the inside that works for the Greynard RoughBoys; a band of ruthless thugs that doesn't hesitate to maim anyone who oppose them. You learn that he thinks the mole is no other than a Sergeant named Clerwick. Your mission will be to find this man, and collect intelligence on his doings for the night. And as it is payday, you should of course also help the inhabitants to carry some of their heavy purses. Mission type: Creepy elements? Undead? Spiders? Thanks to: My wonderful girlfriend who endures my constant talking about mapping and for helping me with readables and story design and some voice lines. Dragofer - Scripting help Springheel - All those modules Sotha - Hangman model Henrik Swenson for providing some ambients Digiffects Sound Library for some custom sound bites Betatesters: Acolytesix Datiswous Duzenko Jaxa Mezla Nort Prjames Shadow Thebigh Wellingtoncrab Wesp5 And a big thank you to the community for keeping the mod alive! I hope I haven't forgotten anyone... Known bugs: -The AI in TDM is inaccurate in some ways. They will sometimes behave strangely when returning to their original routes after being alerted, like sitting on chairs in weird ways or turning in places, especially if they meet another AI in narrow places. I have done my best to adjust these weird behaviours but with the complexity of everything that's going on and the player making different desicions/noise, it's probably impossible to adjust for everything. I believe I have ironed out the last wrinkles I can, with respect to my knowledge/skills. -Frobbing out of boxes/chests/drawers has always been a pain but I think this is largely an error within the code and how frobing works as the frob highlight wants to lock onto the box itself and not its contents. -There seems to be some kind of bug with the skybox, especially in places where there is water reflections present; The Sky/water volume switch between an opaque variant to a more translucent one. Neither is straight up ugly, but it's jarring to see the sky switch (as it seems randomly). I don't know what is causing this, and I have decided to let this one pass (if any players knows what is causing this, please let me know so can I squash this annoying bug. PLEASE POST ANY QUESTIONS/SPOILERS IN SPOILER BRACKETS

Announcing the release of the second William Steele mission! Summary Home Again takes place in Bridgeport when Steele returns home from the north. He finds that something terrible has happened, and he must begin a quest to find the perpetrator and why he did it. Most of this mission is spent on the rooftops. The William Steele Missions Home Again is the second of several Steele missions. Altogether they'll tell a story of corruption, greed, and revenge. At some point, I'll start packaging them as a campaign, in addition to the single missions. If you haven't played WS1: In the North, I suggest you start with that, then come here. Download Home Again is available through the in-game downloader. Build Time 16 months. I18n Home Again is ready for translation. Thanks Thanks to the TDM team for creating a terrific platform for storytelling and stealth gaming. Thanks to my beta testers: AluminumHaste, Bikerdude, Mr. Tibbs, Xarg, lowenz, Lux, plotzzz, and Deadlove. Thanks to Goldwell for providing voice work for a key part of the story. And thanks to YOU, for playing! Known Issues This is a large mission. To ease the burden on older systems, consider shutting doors and windows behind you as you go. Some players have experienced savegame crashes when playing large missions with TDM 2.01. This problem is under investigation. Until it’s corrected, I suggest you make frequent saves. There are a few spots where long sight lines will cause framerate drops, possibly even pauses. My apologies to anyone who experiences these. If you experience low frame rates, please consult the Performance Tweaks page on the Wiki. Performance Tweaks For very low end PCs I recommend the following settings: V-sync is offAA is offAniso is 4x or lowerAdvanced settings are simple/defaultPost processing is disabledAnyone having performance issues with TDM missions can put the following cvars into their Darkmod.cfg file. This will improve the framerate and stutter/chop when in-game, but may increase loading times a little. image_usePrecompressedTextures "1" image_useNormalCompression "2" image_useAllFormats "1" image_useCompression "1" image_preload "1"Important This mission requires TDM 2.01 or later. I rely heavily on readables to tell Steele's story. Please try to read every readable you find. Most Importantly, Enjoy! Screenshots WS3: Cleighmoor Steele's story continues with Cleighmoor, which you can find here.

If by this you mean a series of missions in one pack, like the recent Thief Gold Black Parade campaign I'm a billion percent for this!! No offence to DM FM creators, I know one mission takes a lot of hard work, but I'm fed up of the 'one mission and out' type of missions to be honest. I crave a proper story for once with a series of missions and stuff, not just random associate says steal thing because reasons, oh and you have to steal all this loot but you can't spend it.

@snatcher I understand that when you feel your work doesn't live up to your goals that you don't want it out in the wild advertising your own perceived shortcomings but that leads to a troubling dilemma of authors who are never satisfied with their work offering fleeting access to their in-progress designs then rescinding them or allowing them to be lost. When I was a member of Doom3world forums, I would often see members do interesting experiments and sometimes that work would languish until someone new would examine it and pickup the torch. This seemed like a perfectly viable system until Doom3world was killed by spambots and countless projects and conceptual works were lost. I guess what I am trying to say is that mods don't need to be perfect to be valuable. If they contain some grain of a useable feature they might be adapted by mission authors in custom scenarios. They might offer instructive details that others trying to achieve the same results can examine. It would be great if known compelling works were kept somewhere safe other than via forum attachments and temporary file sharing sites. I suppose we used to collect such things in our internal SVN for safe keeping but even that isn't always viable. If folks would rather not post beta or incomplete mods to TDM's Moddb page, perhaps they would consider creating their own Moddb page or allow them to be added to my page for safe keeping. Please don't look at this as some sort of pressure campaign or anything. I fully understand anyone not willing to put their name next to something they aren't fully happy with. As a general proviso, ( if possible \ permitted ) I just want to prevent the loss of some valuable investigations and formative works. The end of Doom3world was a digital apocalypse similar to the death of photobucket. It is one of my greatest fears that TDM will become a digital memory with only the skeletons of old forum threads at the wayback archive site.

Announcing the release of the third William Steele mission! Summary Cleighmoor takes Steele inside Cleighmoor Gaol, where Warden Fielder likes nothing better than a glass of wine and some cheese, while watching a miscreant hang from his gallows. Steele is tracking down the evidence of his parents’ murder. The mission starts in the sewers, and progresses to Cleighmoor’s compound. The William Steele Missions Cleighmoor is the third of several Steele missions. Altogether they'll tell a story of corruption, greed, and revenge. At some point, I'll start packaging them as a campaign, in addition to the single missions. If you haven’t played WS1: In the North, or WS2: Home Again, I suggest you complete those before playing WS3: Cleighmoor. Download Cleighmoor is available in the in-game downloader. Problem with Suicidal AI Occasionally, someone reports that a distant AI commits suicide. Since one of the mission objectives is to kill only in self-defense, this fails the mission when it occurs. To avoid that, I've created a replacement *.map file that you can obtain here. After you've downloaded and installed the mission, create a new folder named "maps" so that you have: darkmod/fms/ws3_cleighmoor/maps/ Unzip the replacement *.map file and place the new *.map file into the maps folder. So now you have: darkmod/fms/ws3_cleighmoor/maps/ws3_cleighmoor.map This should solve the suicide problem. A new version of the mission will be released after TDM 2.05. Build Time Nearly 4 years. (This was my first attempt at a mission, and it sat on the back burners until being folded into Steele’s story.) I18n Cleighmoor is ready for translation. Thanks Thanks to the TDM team for creating a terrific platform for storytelling and stealth gaming. Thanks to my beta testers: AluminumHaste, Bikerdude, Goldwell, Xarg, Lux, Moonbo, Deadlove, and plotzzz. Thanks to Goldwell for his voice work on the conversations. And thanks to YOU, for playing! Known Issues This is a large mission. To ease the burden on older systems, consider shutting doors behind you as you go. If you experience low frame rates, please consult the Performance Tweaks page on the Wiki. Performance Tweaks For very low end PCs I recommend the following settings: V-sync is off AA is off Aniso is 4x or lower Advanced settings are simple/default Post processing is disabled Anyone having performance issues with TDM missions can put the following cvars into their Darkmod.cfg file. This will improve the framerate and stutter/chop when in-game, but may increase loading times a little. image_usePrecompressedTextures "1" image_useNormalCompression "2" image_useAllFormats "1" image_useCompression "1" image_preload "1" Important This mission requires TDM 2.01 or later. The William Steele story is heavy with readables. Please try to read every readable you find. Most importantly, Enjoy! Screenshots WS4: The Warrens Steele ventures into The Warrens, a dangerous area near Bridgeport's docks. You can find it here.

Congrats on the release! Remember to check ThiefGuild as well as the DarkFate forums (via Google Translate) for additional feedback.

Just curious, based on this discussion: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/19239-soft-r-gamma/?p=427350

Author Note: This is a brand new mission and a new entry into the accountant series. There are some different than usual puzzles in this FM, so if you find yourself stuck try to think about your pathway forward in a logical manner. And if you're still having troubles then pop by this thread and ask (preferably with spoiler tags). This FM is brand new and serves as the first installment in The Accountant series, a few years back there was a small prologue style mission released however I felt that it did not represent The Accountant series so I decided to go back to the drawing board and do a whole new mission that's larger, has a better level design and has a story that lines up closer to what I plan to do with the accountant series. The mission is medium sized and you can expect between 30-90 minutes to complete it depending on your playstyle. Beta Testers Captain Cleveland Crowind Kingsal PukeyBee Skacky SquadaFroinx Voice Actors AndrosTheOxen Epifire Goldwell Stevenpfortune Yandros Custom assets Airship Ballet Bentraxx Bob Necro Dragofer DrKubiac Epifire Kingsal MalachiAD Sotha Springheel SquadaFroinx Available via in-game downloader File Size: 233 MB - Updated to v 1.1 (01.06.2018)

Complaint From Players The player must pick up candles before extinguishing them, and then the player must remember to drop the candle. The player must drag a body before shouldering it (picking it up), and the player must remember to frob again to stop dragging the body. The player finds this annoying or easy to make mistakes. For players who ghost, some of them have the goal of returning objects back to their original positions. With the current "pick up, use item, and drop" system, the item might not return easily or at all to its original position. For example, a candlestick might bounce off its holder. (See player quotes at the bottom.) Bug Tracker https://bugs.thedarkmod.com/view.php?id=6316 Problems to Solve How can the "pick up" step be eliminated so that the player can directly use or interact with the item where it is in the game world? How can so much key pressing and mouse clicking be eliminated when the player wants to directly use an item? How can candles be extinguished and lanterns toggled off/on without first picking them up? How can bodies be shouldered without first dragging them? Solution Design Goals Make TDM easier for new players while also improving it for longtime players. Reduce tedious steps for common frob interactions. Make it intuitive so that menu settings are unnecessary. Do not introduce bugs or break the game. Terms frob -- the frob button action happens instantly. hold frob -- the frob button is held for 200ms before the action happens. (This can be changed via cvar: 200ms by default.) Proposed Solution Note: Some issues have been struckthrough to show changes since the patch has been updated. Change how frobbing works for bodies, candles, and lanterns. For bodies: Frob to shoulder (pick up) a body. Second frob to drop shouldered body, while allowing frob on doors, switches, etc. Hold frob (key down) to start drag, continue to hold frob (key down) to drag body, and then release frob (key up) to stop dragging body. Also, a body can be dragged immediately by holding frob and moving the mouse. For candles/lanterns: Frob to extinguish candles and toggle off/on lanterns. Hold frob to pick it up, and then frob again to drop. Frob to pick it up, and then frob again to drop. Hold frob to extinguish candles and toggle off/on lanterns. For food: Frob to pick it up, and then frob again to drop. Hold frob to eat food. For other items: No change. New cvar "tdm_frobhold_delay", default:"200" The frob hold delay (in ms) before drag or extinguish. Set to 0 for TDM v2.11 (and prior) behavior. Solution Benefits Bodies: New players will have less to learn to get started moving knocked out guards. With TDM v2.11 and earlier, some players have played several missions before realizing that they could shoulder a body instead of dragging it long distances. Frob to shoulder body matches Thief, so longtime Thief players will find it familiar. Second frob drops a shouldered body. Players still have the ability to both shoulder and drag bodies. Compatible with the new auto-search bodies feature. Dragging feels more natural -- just grab, hold, and drop with a single button press. There is no longer the need to press the button twice. Also, it's no longer possible to walk away from a body while unintentionally dragging it. Set "tdm_frobhold_delay" cvar to delay of 0 to restore TDM v2.11 (and prior) behavior. Candles: New players will have less to learn to get started extinguishing candles. With TDM v2.11 and earlier, some players didn't know they could extinguish candles by picking them up and using them. Instead, they resorted to throwing them to extinguish them or hiding them. Hold frob to extinguish a candle feels like "pinching" it out. Once a candle is picked up, players still have the ability to manipulate and use them the same way they are used to in TDM v2.11 and earlier. For players who ghost and have the goal of putting objects back to their original positions, they'll have an easier time and not have to deal with candles popping off their holders when trying to place them back carefully. Set "tdm_frobhold_delay" cvar to delay of 0 to restore TDM v2.11 (and prior) behavior. Solution Issues Bodies: Frob does not drop a shouldered body, so that might be unexpected for new players. This is also different than Thief where a second frob will drop a body. "Use Inv. Item" or "Drop Inv. Item" drops the body. This is the same as TDM v2.11 and earlier. This is the price to pay for being able to frob (open/close) doors while shouldering a body. Patch was updated to drop body on second frob, while allowing frob on doors, switches, etc. Candles: Picking up a candle or lantern requires a slight delay, because the player must hold the frob button. The player might unintentionally extinguish a candle while moving it if they hold down frob. The player will need to learn that holding frob will extinguish the candle. The player can change the delay period via the "tdm_frobhold_delay" cvar. Also, when the cvar is set to a delay of 0, the behavior matches TDM v2.11 and earlier, meaning the player would have to first "Frob/Interact" to pick up the candle and then press "Use Inv. Item" to extinguish it. Some players might unintentionally extinguish a candle when they are trying to move it or pick it up. They need to make sure to hold frob to initiate moving the candle. When a candle is unlit, it will highlight but do nothing on frob. That might confuse players. However, the player will likely learn after extinguishing several candles that an unlit candle still highlights. It makes sense that an already-extinguished candle cannot be extinguished on frob. The official "Training Mission" might need to have its instructions updated to correctly guide the player through candle manipulation training. Updating the training mission to include the hold frob to extinguish would probably be helpful. Similar Solutions In Fallout 4, frob uses an item and long-press frob picks it up. Goldwell's mission, "Accountant 2: New In Town", has candles that extinguish on frob without the need of picking them up first. Snatcher's TDM Modpack includes a "Blow / Ignite" item that allows the player to blow out candles Wesp5's Unofficial Patch provides a way to directly extinguish movable candles by frobbing. Demonstration Videos Note: The last two videos don't quite demonstrate the latest patch anymore. But the gist is the same. This feature proposal is best experienced in game, but some demonstration videos are better than nothing. The following videos show either a clear improvement or that the player is not slowed down with the change in controls. For example, "long-press" sounds long, but it really isn't. Video: Body Shouldering and Dragging The purpose of this video is to show that frob to shoulder a body is fast and long-press frob to drag a body is fast enough and accurate. Video: Long-Press Frob to Pick Up Candle The purpose of this video is to show how the long-press frob to pick up a candle isn't really much slower than regular frob. Video: Frob to Extinguish The purpose of this video -- if a bit contrived -- is to show the efficiency and precision of this proposed feature. The task in the video was for the player to as quickly and accurately as possible extinguish candles and put them back in their original positions. On the left, TDM v2.11 is shown. The player has to highlight each candle, press "Frob/Interact" to pick up, press "Use Inv. Item" to extinguish, make sure the candle is back in place, and finally press "Frob/Interact" to drop the candle. The result shows mistakes and candles getting misplaced. On the right, the proposed feature is shown. The player frobs to extinguish the candles. The result shows no mistakes and candles are kept in their original positions. Special Thanks @Wellingtoncrab was instrumental in improving this feature during its early stages. We had many discussions covering varying scenarios, pros, and cons, and how it would affect the gameplay and player experience. Originally, I had a completely different solution that added a special "use modifier" keybinding. He suggested the frob to use and long-press frob to pick up mechanics. I coded it up, gave it a try, and found it to be too good. Without his feedback and patience, this feature wouldn't be as good as it is. Thank you, @Wellingtoncrab! And, of note, @Wellingtoncrab hasn't been able to try it in game yet, because I'm using Linux and can't compile a Windows build for him. So, if this feature isn't good, that's my fault. Code Patch I'll post the code patch in another post below this one so that folks who compile TDM themselves can give this proposal a try in game. And, if you do, I look forward to your feedback! Player Complaints TTLG (2023-01-10) Player 1: TDM Forums (2021-03-13) Player 2: Player 3: TDM Forums (2023-06-17) Player 4: TDM Discord (2021-05-18) Player 5: TDM Discord (2023-02-14) Player 6: Player 7: Player 8:

I could move the text down 1 pixel more, but then the text descenders don't have much to breathe. The overall problem is that the bottom-most subtitle slot, if moved further down, begins to conflict too much with other HUD items. For wider story subtitles, this is the corner inventory and weapon items. For all subtitle types, it is the lower informational messages that can appear above the breathe bar. Keep in mind that all these conflicting HUD elements can be enlarged at user discretion through Settings. One solution is to have the engine change the order in which it fills empty subtitle slots. Currently it is: 0 (lowest), 1, 2. If instead it did either of these policies: Fill order: 1, 2, 0 for all subtitle types; or Fill order: 1, 2, 0 for story subtitles. 0, 1, 2 for non-story subtitles Then the frequency of conflict would be significantly lessened - particularly with (1) - since having 3 subtitles shown at the same time is rare. With a revised policy, the backing fields could be made taller, allowing more widget room, with slot 0 (and slot 1 to a lesser extend) lowered

Well, that's interesting. So the fundamentals of automap already exist, but most mappers choose not to use it. That's a personal choice. Too bad. I guess it doesn't really affect the story telling or the pacing so it's ignored as unnecessary.