I've recently installed and am playing the excellent Pulp Fiction mod - the FF version, not the FFvTTR version. In one of the early missions, AGENT OF TRUTH, I defeat both gangs, as requested - but the mission doesn't end, nothing happens. Am I missing something, doing something wrong, is it a glitch... what's the (pardon the pun) Truth on this one?
I haven't played the Pulp Fiction Mod. But in the DCU Mod, on the Gotham City Riot level, the mission didn't end when I thought it should. Turned out that I missed one lone rioter who was hiding out in a distant corner of the map. Once I found and took care of the straggler, the game proceeded.
Thanks Checkmate! I don't think that's the case, because i've looked everywhere, but I'll try another time - one can never be too sure :)
Hi Naathez,
PF was mine so let me see if I can help. Sorry for not responding sooner but I don't make it here very often. Too busy working on a much much better mod. :)
Agent of Truth should end successfully based on a number of people being able to play it through without a problem. Checkmate's suggestion is likely correct -- bear in mind, it's a very dark level and very hard to see the thugs. If you end up with 1-2 thugs left and they're in the same gang, they won't be fighting anyone but you. If you're out of range, you may not be able to find them, especially if they get stuck on a roof or something (happens from time to time, especially if you blow stuff up). They'll just stand there with nothing to do.
So for example, I just now replayed the level. I use a gun and run strategy -- hit them with hypnosis and run, then turn and gun down whomever is closing in on me; I keep doing that until I can thin the ranks enough to safely shoot it out with who's left. If I get lucky, they kill the tommygunners; if not, I can usually pull it off if I wait until they're low on energy. After doing this until I was out of foes I saw, I checked using the console and had 4 bad guys left. I found and killed 2 of them. I could not find the other 2, although in wandering about, they found me. I killed them and it went to the closing cutscene with the thugs and Agent Lane. No glitches.
If you want to know for certain, activate your console in your init.py file (let me know if you need to know how to do that). Go into the level and hit the tilde ~ key to turn the console on. With the console on, type:
print getAllBaddies()
and hit enter.
Type it exactly as you see it there as it's case and space sensitive. If you get any list of villain names, you haven't killed them all. If you get [] as a response, you killed everyone and there's a glitch I would need to investigate further. But as far as I can tell, the level should work fine and you're just not piling up a high enough body count, probably because someone is hiding in the dark out of range of the AI's detect radius. You might try walking each block and pausing in the middle of it for about 10 seconds to see if anyone finds you. Also check roof tops, see if anyone is blocked in by a car, etc. They should have enough AI to want to come find the Truth and kill him, but sometimes just can't find the path.
Riddle Me This (rmt)
P.S. -- The :ff: version is much better in my opinion. The :ffvstr: version was a conversion and except for giving Dreamweaver a cone attack, added nothing in my opinion. I hated the physics engine so badly that I quit modding for that version altogether. My other work was not released publicly due to size (mods of 100, 150, and 290 levels respectively) but was always for FF1.
My only regrets in the whole thing were that I used that smoke screen for an intro (slows my Windows 7 system to a crawl) and that I never got around to making Pulp Fiction 2, where I was flirting with the idea of crossing this pastiche universe in with the "real" one -- Sandman, Shadow, Phantom, Green Hornet, Doc Savage, Avenger, etc. Never enough time...
RMT, thank you! Actually, on FFVTTR, the mission worked perfectly on the first time. I'm now stuck on a later one -blushes- ... the one where You have to kill all the ants afer waking up in the desert, after the claw has teleported you away. I have no big problems in making short work of the ants, what with the gun and the lasso, but after they're all dead, and after even trying to destroy the anthill... nothing happens. May I impose on you again and wonder if you have any idea what might be not working?
PS -I agree on the smokescreen opening not being a great idea :D But in general, I love your work! Though I like FFVTTR better than FF, sincerely.
You know RMT, I really want to see some more Pulp-style mods from you. There is a distinct lack of that kind of FF awesomeness.
Well said Benton!
(I'm starting up your SUPERPOWERS mod THIS VERY MOMENT... coincidence? :) )
Sorry gents but more pulp from me is probably not in the cards. Project: Asgard (American Superhero Generator and Resource Datafile) became my life for too long. I don't know if it will ever be released beyond the test group because of all the rules here (not to mention that it's almost 4gb zipped!), but it's the last mod either way. I'm looking at maybe just releasing it via torrent or through a resurrected version of Lightning Man's hub. Or something. Anyway, it's more of a tool, a mod set of > 1700 characters including DC, Marvel, Project: Superpowers, and many Golden Age companies (Prize, Holyoke, Nedor, MLJ, etc). I've made 38 mods for it so far, about 8 levels each. No cutscenes, just action. But highly modular. New mods can be knocked out in a weekend (or if they don't need background art for some reason, a half hour...). But despite all the characters, I do need to add some like the Agents of Atlas (hence the recent Tommyboy mesh choices), and maybe some other modern characters to take on the Dark Avengers, like the more modern Thor. I'd love to include the last version of Thunderbolts or the current Guardians of the Galaxy, but not sure that's in the cards. There are some modern folks, but it's mostly a 30's-80's range, with only a little 90's and 00's mixed in.
Anyways, back to the question at hand. Ignoring the blasphemy of preferring vttr to FF1 ( :P ), I'll take a look at the ants level. But I'll need to do so on FF1 as I don't have vttr any more. I'll post back my results shortly.
Oh, and Naathez, I don't mind helping if I see the messages but one thing that will help in the future is if you can tell me what level number it is (if you know). My saved games are numbered but not described unfortunately, so it takes me a while to find the right level. No biggie if you can't.
Edited to add, this is "Mission 15" so if you can keep count from here out (there are only 21 plus a closing cutscene), that will help me immensely in providing any future guidance.
Ok, after getting killed once (yeah, yeah -- I'm rusty), I played through without a problem the second time. The level ended when I destroyed the ant hole, which was after killing the ants. I played through a third time using the peace cheat to disable the ants. The level ended after I killed the last ant, having first destroyed the ant hole. Looking at the script, which is painfully simple, there's a variable called bodycount that starts at 0 and has to hit 6 to end the level. The 6 things that count towards it are the 5 ants and the ant hole. So you have to destroy all 6 items, but the level should end at that point.
Possible theories:
1) You are not destroying the ant hole. Is it possible that you thought you destroyed it because you did enough damage to trigger the next version of the object mesh, but didn't finish it off? You would know based on what it does when you pass your cursor over the object. If it has any hit points, it does not count as a kill even though the object may appear destroyed. Best thing to do is to kill the ants first, then have Sam attack the ant hole with an overpowered Western Whack attack and don't interrupt him. He should finish it off on his own.
2) You are not destroying all 5 ants. Maybe one is getting lasso pulled into a pocket of the map or the knockback from the pistol left it trapped or something. Count them manually to make sure you get all 5 killed.
3) There is a glitch on your end that isn't hitting on mine for some reason. Best way to explore that is for you to play the level until you think you're done. Then exit Freedom Force. Look for a file called script.log in your main (not the mod) Freedom Force directory -- usually c:\Program Files\Irrational Games\Freedom Force -- and e-mail it to me at
r i d d l e m e t h i s f f [at] g m a i l [dot] com [no spaces of course]
Hopefully that's enough obscuring of the address to beat the web crawling bots. Anyway, I can take a look at the log file and determine if the game is reporting any errors on that level. Depending on what I see, we may need to have you play around in the console to see if anything is alive, very similarly to what I suggested for the gang war level except a little different because the ant hole wouldn't show up as a baddie.
Let me know how it goes. I'm off work tomorrow, so I'll try to remember to check back here periodically until we get you squared away.
Oh, P.S. -- for #3, script log from vttr should be fine, though I don't recall 100% if it's the same named file in the same directory. I think it is but am not positive. Benton, can you confirm?
RMT, you're so kind I don't know how to thank you...
I'll try again tonight - but the problem was that, after killing all the ants, I attacked the anthill and, when it first changed appearance... I could no longer target it, in any way. This prevented me from destroying it, I understand from your message (while I earlier thought it WAS destroyed, since I couldn't target it).
I have no idea why this happens. Anyway, I'll try again tonight and see if i manage to pull out the file you mention - you're so kind!
And it's a pity you don't want to mod for FFVTTR. My friends and I are playing a superhero RPG campaign starting rfom the 20s and going forward, and trying all nuances... and we're currently in the 20s with pulp heroes. And I want to make a mod of our pen and paper campaign for FFVTTR, but you'd make SUCH a better job than I ever can dream to...
Kind words but nonsense. I have no real background in coding and other than the occasional encouragement and troubleshooting from folks like Alex, Tommyboy/man, and Crusader/Saracen, no real training. All you need is patience and drive and you can be a much better modder than I. Trust me. :P
I have vague recollection of targeting issues with the ant hole, but can't recall if it was vttr specific or not. In FF1 at least, I can kill the ants first, tell Sam to attack the ant hole with his punches (not his gun), and he will do it as long as it takes until it is destroyed. He runs out of energy, but once he recharges, he goes back to banging away at it. I'll keep working with you until we find a way to get past it, either legitimately or just cheating you past it. Sorry it's being a pain in the butt. While there are no doubt flaws in both versions, vttr is less polished in general since it was a conversion and some things just didn't translate quite as well. Seems like there might have been problems in the death marker for knocking people off buildings and having them fall to their deaths. But it's been too long for me to remember very specifically to warn you as such.
My main problems with vttr are the physics engine (less of a problem with Pulp Fiction, but kills me to see superheroes throw cars at each other and get no knockback) and the dumbing down of the range of overpowered and underpowered attacks. That was half the "strategy" of PF. For example, using underpowered pistol volleys when a gang member escapes the hypnosis cloud in the level that was originally the subject of the thread. Normal or overpowered attacks tend to leave you at the straggler's mercy. Underpowered tends to be just enough to knock him down and run away to keep the strategy alive, with enough energy to use your next attack. Then when he's relatively low health, a double overpowered shot will finish him off. ;)
It worked!!!!
I couldn't target, but I let Sam beat on it and he continued beating even if i cold no longer target it after the first change in appearance. Thank you SO MUCH!!!
De nada!
Finished the mod today. Great work, Rmt!
Glad you liked it. Now if only someone would make the sequel instead of me... :P
Scene one would have been Nurse O. Nicks and Dr. Klops, just as in the ending of PF1. They hear a noise over by the patient's bed. As they go to check on him, they see the Sandman (SMT version) hovering over the bed of Tyler Sloane. He spins towards them, fires his gas gun, and says only "Sleep...". Cue a nice alternative version of Misirlou, like maybe the Martin Denny version that Mad Men used, as the opening credits play.