You use this software at your own risk. It probably won’t work on your system. It probably won’t do what you or I expect. It’ll probably corrupt your saved games. Then it’ll erase your copy of Unreal, followed by your entire operating system. It will then cause your monitor to exploded killing your family, friends and favourite pets.
Why are all characters the same? Why shouldn’t some characters have certain advantages/disadvantages over other characters? And why must all battles be equally balanced out? This is the basic premise behind Cosmic Unreal. Sometimes one player will have an advantage over you. Sometimes you will have an advantage over another player.
Cosmic Unreal (CU) is a special mutator for Unreal Tournament that allows for different mutations to be applied to different players and bots. So instead of a mutator affecting everyone/everything on a level in the exact same way, it allows for mutators to affect individual players. Note that because CU is itself a mutator, it can be used with other mutators and with ANY game type.
As a very simple example: In a deathmatch, one player can run fast, one player can jump high, one player is stealthed, and one player does more damage. Of course this is just the beginning. In a team game, one player could have extra knowledge and be a leader, one player could lay landmines around important goals, and the last could even be a team doctor.
Double click on the Cosmic10.umod. Follow the instructions provided to complete the installation process. This will install the Cosmic Unreal mutator and the original package of individuals. This help document will also be installed under the help directory.
To run Cosmic on a server you'll need to edit the UnrealTournament.ini file. Open it in your favorite text editor, and find the section titled [Engine.GameEngine]. Add another line saying "ServerPackages=Cosmic" at the end of the list if it is not already there. If you experience problems with CU in the future, it may be because another mutator has over written this entry.
Cosmic Unreal uses a special class of mutators called "Individuals Mutators (IMs)". Currently IM's are only distributed with CU. A separate developer's document exists that describes how mutator authors can make there own IMs and add to the CU universe.
First of all, (most of) these Individuals are also basic mutators. They will appear in the regular mutator selection process. When IMs are selected through the normal mutator selection process, there effects will be applied to all characters in the entire game. For example: an IM that changes the speed of the player could be applied as a normal mutator to effect the speed of all players.
Second, these individuals can be applied to separate players. So the speed increase IM could be applied to only player one. Although most individuals are also regular mutators, that does not mean that regular mutators can also be applied as individuals. Only individuals can be applied to separate players and bots. Hopefully mutator authors will be willing to apply that little bit of extra effort to turn any applicable mutator into an individual mutator. Of course not all mutators are candidates for this process. A mutator that replaces all the MedPacks with Redeemers doesn’t really make much sense when applied to an individual. However, if a mutator author wants everyone to jump three times as high, then they should also make an individual. This way it can be applied exactly the same as a regular mutator affecting everyone, or it can be added to Cosmic and it could only effect certain players.
To configure CU, bring up the unreal desktop and select "Cosmic Configuration" under the "mod" menu item. If the "mod" menu selection wasn't there before, it will be there after you install Cosmic. Selecting this menu item will bring up a dialog as shown below. The dialog consists of the following controls:
Equal Teams: This selection will force Cosmic try to make the teams even. If there's a large unstoppable death machine on red, there will be a large unstoppable death machine on blue. This happens only when the game starts up and powers are assigned. In game types where players can change teams, it will not effect the power assignment.
Duplicates Allowed: This is really only important when powers are randomly assigned. This just means that you can have more than one type of individual in the game.
Assign to Each: There are two choices: player, or team. This will tell CU to assign an individual powers to each players or to each separate teams. If "team" is selected then every player in a team will have the same power. This way you could have the team of "Terrorists" vs. "Beans".
Assign Powers: Again there are two choices: Randomly, or In-Order. When "randomly" is selected as each player or team joins they will be randomly selected a power from the list. If "Duplicates Allowed" is selected (above) then the same power can be randomly chosen, otherwise a unique power is selected. If you assign powers "In-Order" the powers will be assigned one after the other as the players join. So the first player will get the first power, the second the second power…etc.
Available Individuals: This lists all the individuals installed that you can play with. To move an Individual from this box to the "individuals selected" double click on your choice.
Individuals Selected: These are the individuals you selected to play the next game with. Entries can be added here from double-clicking on the "Available Individuals" box. And entries can be removed by double-clicking on the individual. There are two important things to note. First an individual can be added more than once. Second the order in the list box can also be changed. By selecting on an individual power and dragging the name up or down, the order in the list can be changed. This is only of importance if "Assign Powers" (above) is set to in-order.
Add All: This adds a copy of all the available individuals to the selected individuals listbox.
Clear: This removes all entries from the selected individuals list.
OK: Will accept these changes and save them to disk.
Cancel: Will discard all changes, and use the previous configuration.
Unreal will play just like a normal game of any type. When you start the game and every time you die, the name of your power will appear in the message box. This will be your power for the game. Figure out how to use it to the utmost. All other players will have different (or possibly the same) power as you. Try to figure out each player's weakness and strength. Currently all ‘individuals’ are completely automatic. None of the powers need to be activated or have any activation button. Perhaps in the future an action button will be added that the IMs will be able to use.
So start playing. Finish off the Freeze, but not before Poison gets a lucky shot in while you're frozen. As your health slowly decreases, chase Poison down the hall and kill him. Grab the closest MedPack to replenish yourself only to find that it was trapped by the Terrorist. When you respawn use your Flash power to quickly find the terrorist and get your revenge.
This were a few quick first attempt. There hasn’t been that much play testing (at least not against humans). Some powers may be too powerful. But that's part of the game. Run away from those that are too powerful, or team up against them.
|
Beans |
You have the power of gas |
You will occasionally…umm…release gas. All those that are close to you will suffer damage |
|
BloodSucker |
You have the power of the life force |
You gain 25 health for every kill you make. |
|
Dalek |
You have the power to exterminate |
Your slow, but you do extra damage. About half the speed and 2.5 times damage |
|
Flash |
You have the power of speed |
Simple: You’re twice as fast. |
|
Freeze |
You have the power of ice |
If you hit someone and they are high in health that player will stop moving for a few seconds. |
|
Glass |
You have the power of crystal |
You are a little transparent and therefore hard to see. |
|
Healer |
You have the power to lay hands |
You can use the Impact hammer to heal people. Why you may ask? Well don’t forget that this modification can be used with team games. As a side benefit, impact jumps are free and you can heal yourself by shooting the ground. |
|
Poison |
You have to power of arsenic |
When you hit someone with any weapon, they become poisoned. They will slowly take damage overtime until either you or they are dead. |
|
Reincarnator |
You have the power to be reborn |
You start with one of the other powers. Every time you die you get rid of that power and get a new power. |
|
Roo |
You have the power to leap |
You jump three times as high. |
|
Sapper |
You have the power to kamikaze |
When you die, you go boom! You explode with a bang, taking anyone too close with you. |
|
Slug |
You have the power to ooze |
You leave behind a trail of slime. It’s easy to follow you but hard to chase you. And you can also try running circle around someone. |
|
SpacePod |
You have the power to snatch bodies |
If you kill someone you take there power, and they become the SpacePod. This way powers get traded around. |
|
Terrorist |
You have the power to boobytrap |
For every MedPack you touch you lay an invisible trap. If another player grabs that MedPack (or even walks over where the MedPack was) then it will blow up. All bombs are cleared when you die. |
|
Void |
You have the power of nothing |
All damage you do to someone is permanent. It is taken away from there maximum health. Your victim will not be able to grab health packs to increase there health past this level. This will last until you die or you kill the victim. |
|
Yellow |
You have the power to run away |
When your health gets really low, you will automatically teleport away. |
First of all. Numerous more individuals can be added. This set of individuals tends towards more humorous and fun powers, but I'd love to see a pack of individuals that concentrate on creating more realistic and well balanced team games. Perhaps creating infantry, artillery, snipers, and commanders all with different attributes, abilities and weapons. But I'd also love to see people just make more individuals in general. A few individuals I created didn't make this cut, but will appear in a future IM release package.
Other plans include for a more robust UI that can handle more configuration options, including assigning multiple IM's to an individual. How about going up against a "poison-void"?
Currently Cosmic Unreal does not have a homepage but that should change soon. If you wish to contact me personally with questions, suggestions, comments, or ideas then e-mail me at:
Please put the word COSMIC somewhere in the subject line.
See the disclaimer at the beginning of this document.
You must ask for my permission to distribute this version of Cosmic Unreal. Please see the contact details above to send your request.
Cosmic Unreal must be distributed with this document ("UnCosmic.doc" or "UnCosmic.html").
Thanks go to Jean for not being here and giving me the free time to finish this project. But hurry back…I'm done now.
Thanks to Robin for watching, testing, and providing ideas.
Thanks to the creators of the original "Cosmic Encounter" board game and the fans that supported it, for the inspiration that created this mutator.
Thanks to JbP, drunken master, meltdown, Brandon Reinhart, and Tim Sweeney for tutorials, references and other documentation. And thanks to the nameless others who have written tutorials that I have probably forgotten to thank.