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[Tilla]

I've been getting REALLY into a bunch of unique mods lately and thought a thread to share some of the more inspired works here would be in order.

First and foremost are the works of research team Chinese Room (http://www.thechineseroom.co.uk) who have been experimenting with doing things outside the norm with FPS engines. Best of these is their Half Life 2 mod Dear Esther, which is a very haunting experience. From the site:

A deserted island... a lost man... memories of a fatal crash... a book written by a dying explorer. Dear Esther is a ghost story told using first-person gaming technologies. Rather than traditional gameplay, the focus here is on exploration, uncovering the mystery of the island, of who you are and why you are here. Fragments of story are randomly triggered by moving around the environments, making every telling unique. Features a stunning, specially commissioned soundtrack. Forget the normal rules of play; if nothing seems real here, it's because it may just be all a delusion. What is the significance of the aerial - What happened on the motorway - is the island real or imagined - who is Esther and why has she chosen to summon you here? The answers are out there, on the lost beach and the tunnels under the island. Or then again, they may just not be, after all...

In a similar but very differently executed vein is their other Half Life 2 project, Korsakovia. It is likewise a horror-themed game but ore in the traditionally frightening vein than the eerie not-quite-right-ness of DE.

Korsakovia is an experimental mod about madness, reality and the end of the world. You play as Christopher, a psychiatric patient suffering from the rare condition Korsakoff's syndrome. Christopher believes the world has ended. His consultant neurologist, Dr Grayson, is beginning to believe he may just be right.

Last of their (current) projects is Conscientious Objector, a Doom 3 mod that speaks for itself:

Conscientious Objector is an experiment in two parts. Firstly, it attempts to keep all experience of playing a fast, action-packed game like Doom 3 whilst turning the underlying mechanics and politics on their head. In short, in Conscientious Objector, you get the big shotgun but it's only loaded with rubber bullets. You can shoot all you like, but you can't kill anything. Secondly, rather than casting the player as a hero, you get to play the lowest of the low: a convict being used because they are expendable, steered around the environment by an NPC who is not afraid of telling you he's rooting for the zombies.

[Kagus]

I remember playing Dear Esther.  Indeed, quite a unique experience.  I highly recommend it.

I think I was mostly just impressed at the quality of the voice acting, considering it is a Source mod...  It's really quite good in that aspect.  I guess being British just innately helps.

I'll make sure to check out Korsakovia, and to see if CO agrees with my version of Doom 3.

[Tilla]

Well, I've got another one for you all. It's even more in the games as art vein, but includes some novel concepts and surprisingly deep story (and very high production values too).
 Radiator is a series of short semi-episodic single player Half-Life 2 mods with unorthodox gameplay mechanics used to artistic ends - the first person shooter without any shooting.

The current chapters deal with interpersonal relationships interestingly.

http://www.radiator.debacle.us/

[Funk]

the .13 mod for Jagged Alliance takes a 10 year old game and gave it  a multiplayer mode, more guns than you can count.

[Sensei]

Mount & Blade has a forum chock full of good mods- including black powder guns, warcraft themed everything, WH40k mod, and Peleponnesian (300) wars . So do Morrowind and oblivion, but you already knew about those.

[Kagus]

I tried out the Radiator mods, and they're somewhat interesting...  Polaris was cute, Handle With Care is insanely hard if you're trying to sort everything in the right places.  And, to be perfectly honest...  I really don't know which ending is "the good one".

It's weird...  Both the therapist and Dylan seem like seriously lame people, and so I wouldn't want to subject this guy to dealing with them by their standards.

Furthermore, I find repression of memories to be dreadful stuff...  But I'm not really sure if filing them or smashing them counts as repression.  The responses make everything so confusing..

I will admit though.  Just starting out, before I knew any of what was to come?  Freakin' hilarious.  "Id" magazine, the clean and mechanical representation of the inside of the guy's mind, it was all wonderful.  In fact, I'd really like to see some more stuff where you play as one of the workers inside some dude's head.  Preferably with the controls available to wreak some serious havoc on the outside world.


Korsakovia was also rather interesting, I'm still playing through it.  Rather atmospheric, and I have to admit...

Spoiler: This IS actually a spoiler, don't read this if you haven't played it yet (click to show/hide)

 the first time I saw one of those "clouds" it scared the hell out of me.  Later, when I found another one and found out that they can actually hurt you, I was freaked out even more.

Unfortunately, now I've just started seeing them as regular, if rather annoying and difficult-to-hit enemies.  In fact, I have a hard time seeing them as anything other than the fast zombies they are.

Haven't had a chance to check out CO yet.


EDIT:  Alright, that does it...  Korsakovia just isn't doing it for me.

It started out as a fantastically atmospheric and immersive experience, then devolved into an aggravating jump-puzzle smack-the-invisible-thing stupidfest, with some incredibly poor level design.

And it just crashed on me, but not until it somehow lost contact with all the soundfiles.  I have no idea how much of the storyline I missed out on before it finally keeled over dead.

And that's another thing...  There were several instances where a story progressions soundclip would play just as I was being attacked.  So I'm trying desperately to hear what's being said over the cacophony of crowbar thwacks and the baddie screaming as it tried to rip my face off.

Just...  No good.  It starts out as a beautiful work of art, and then destroys itself.  I'd love to find out the rest of the story, but I can't be bothered to play the damned thing.

Next up, CO...

EDIT:  Which, thanks to Doom 3's fantastic mod support, cannot be run on either of my installations.  Bugger it.