natural selection game

~~craig588~~ · Jan 1, 2003, 03:22 AM

I recently discovered this game about a month ago, you can check out its web site here: http://www.natural-selection.org/

It's a free mod that has some of the best gameplay of any game I have seen. Although it is based on the now terrible Half-Life engine (lets face it half-life was based on a heavily modified version of the quake one engine that was made in 1995, it was great for its time but now its 2002, actually few hours away from 2003) the graphics are pretty good, and there is almost no cheating.

ToshiroOC · Jan 1, 2003, 10:02 AM

Site is down ATM - do you have a mirror of it, or can you copy/paste the info that you already download for us until the site goes back up?

~~craig588~~ · Jan 1, 2003, 06:33 PM

I don't have any information on it from the site but I can give you a general run down of how the game works.

There are 2 teams the aliens and marines, they both play completely in different styles. The aliens start out as a weak tiny alien called the skulk it has 70 life and a bite attack that can kill a marine in 2 hits (not as good as it sounds because the marines can shoot you from a distance) To get stronger the aliens need to build hives (large structures with no defenses that cost 80 resource points to build, ill go into resource point in a bit) they can only build a hive on a specified spot on the map (each map has 3 spots for a hive) To build something you need to evolve(having more hives lets yuo evolve into stronger things) into a gorge. (the only thing you can evolve into without any hives) The gorge has a menu where it can select from different structures it wants to build (ex:offense turrents to attack marines, defense chambers to heal them selves, movement chambers that let them teleport to another movment chamber) the only way a gorge can build something is if it has enough resources. Resources are given to you automaticly every few seconds, you can get more resources given to you by building a resource tower on top of a resource point (a resource point is just a place where you can build a resource tower) each resource tower will give you an additional 2 resources every few seconds. It may seem like you are gaining resources very fast but, the resources are shared thoughout the team so if you had 6 resource towers you wouldn't be gaining 25 resources in a few seconds, your team will have 25 resources evenly distrubuted to each member, so if you had a team with 10 people on it each person would only be gaining about 3 resources. Back onto the subject of hives, the more hives you get the more attacks for each from of the aliens you get so when/if you get all 3 hives your previously weak skulk now has a attack that can do 200 damage, your geoge that was only good for building before can make mini skulks that have the same attack but it does 50 damage. With your 3 hives you also get new forms to evolve into at one hive you get a lerk, it can fly has a biting attack, a weak shooting attack and a very powerful poison gas attack, at 2 hives you get a fade that has a missle attack that does 80 damage to marines but only 40 to buildings and they have a grenade attack that does 120 damage to building but 60 damage to marines, at 3 hives you get an onos that can do over 1000 damage with its charge attack and 120 with its bitting attack. The aliens also can get small upgrades, like regeneration, enchanced armor, cloaking, fast run ect... When you are the aliens your goal is to destroy all of the marines structures and all of the marines.

I still missed alot of information there but I cant remember all of it.

Now I'm going to the marines. They are much simpler then the aliens. you have one guy that plays the commander, it's alot like playing starcraft when your the commander, you need to build structures and give orders to your marines. the marines need to build structures (you just push your use button on something the commander has placed and you start building it) and follow the orders given. The commander can give you weapon and armor upgrades, he can also get you jet packs and motion tracking that lets you see through the walls. The commander can build mounted guns too, the mounted machine guns are pretty much just like your machine gun but they will auto shoot at aliens, but the seige cannons are the strongest weapons in the game, they can kill any structure other then a hive in one hit. (they cant target aliens just their structures)

Just because I don't feel like re-editing the message here are the life totals of the different guys alien skulk: 70 life 10 armor alien gorge: 100 life 150 armor alien lerk: 75 life 75 armor alien fade 150 life 100 armor alien onos: 500 life 150 armor, marine with light armor: 100 life 100 armor marine with heavy armor: 100 life 275 armor. Acctually when I'm looking back at the number I'm not sure if they are entirely correct but they are in the general area.

ToshiroOC · Jan 1, 2003, 07:01 PM

Wow! Thanks for taking the time to give a complete and total reply. I'm still at the Rose Parade, but once I get home I'm going to try to access the site again. If it works, I'll download it and start trying it out. What s/n do you use during this game (when I get it installed, I'll use ToshiroOC as I normally do)?

~~craig588~~ · Jan 1, 2003, 07:07 PM

I use my clan tag and my name its: [omc]craig588

ToshiroOC · Jan 1, 2003, 07:12 PM

Cool - I'll probably get started in a few hours - do you know of any good servers (the fun ones with the honest players with low latency)? I have a cable connection that pings at 20-30ms anywhere on the West Coast, so now that I'm away from 56k (yes! free!) I'm starting to care about the quality of the server I'm on...

~~craig588~~ · Jan 1, 2003, 07:38 PM

Well I usually play on the cononas in space server it usually has 22 people and I can ping in the single digets even when the server is full.

ToshiroOC · Jan 1, 2003, 07:47 PM

Sounds very good - hope to see you there! (just need to re-install Half-life on my new partition and download the MOD, which, BTW, is sounding really really cool). Anyone else here at DH gonna try this too? Sounds like one of those kinds of mods that is great but undiscovered...

mbeeston · Jan 3, 2003, 03:08 AM

i play it alot too i'm -=C=-Tetrisphere it's hl version of starcraft broodwars

Renegade[CSR] · Jan 4, 2003, 08:09 AM

It has been out for a while now and is anything but undiscovered. I know that the server count is at or above 500 and the player count is quite high.

It is indeed alot of fun, although I have heard people say that it resembles starcraft in some ways, but that definately cannot be a bad thing

I have had lots of fun playing this game, but it takes alot of teamwork on both ends, which makes challenging as well. To note, it has some of the best graphics that I myself have seen in a half-life mod

If you have half-life or counter-strike retail, go download this! You won't regret it.

ToshiroOC · Jan 4, 2003, 09:23 PM

Hmmm... the website still appears to be down. Are you sure that you have the right link for it? I have tried from 3 different IP's (incase I was being blocked for some reason) and I haven't been able to access it...

~~craig588~~ · Jan 4, 2003, 10:56 PM

Well it works for me so I dont know what to tell you.

ToshiroOC · Jan 4, 2003, 11:08 PM

It's ok now - it just started working for me in the past hour. I don't know why, but it did. OK, time to get playing!

ToshiroOC · Jan 6, 2003, 04:11 AM

Oh yeah - this is such a fun mod! I started my first game (unknowingly) on an ns_eclipse only server, and since the marine team was full I ended up on aliens - and was promptly yelled at for being a gorge

So know I know eclipse like the back of my hand, and barely know the other maps

however, it is still very fun, especially as alien, as I don't have to worry about my commander refusing to upgrade me because he doesn't like azn's or anything (which happened once... "Toshiro sound like one of those jap names - fuck you, leave the server"... too bad too, as FF was on...), but anyway, thanks for the hookup! I'm going to tell all of my friends about this mod... oh, and can I have the IP of that server? I only see about 150 servers at any given time online because I'm not patient enough to let all of the servers load from list, and I haven't seen it listed yet (the Auria Pelikasta servers are the one's I've been on so far... bad pings though, as they are European...)

ToshiroOC

Zerthr · Jan 7, 2003, 06:58 PM

sounds pretty good... but would kill me with my 56k... is it worth the download? at like 4k per second?

ToshiroOC · Jan 7, 2003, 10:24 PM

It's really hard to say - I would say that IF you already have Half-life or Counterstrike retail, and you are really into 3d gaming online, esp. with Half-life looking mods, then it would be worth the download... though I would suggest that you simply look around the site and see if it interests you enough to make you willing to endure an overnight download

Krazach · Jan 16, 2003, 02:02 AM

The game is very fun, especially at LANs. At times it seems unbalanced, but that is more the teams and skill rather than the actual game. If you have two teams of equal skill its fairly close to balance, which they are still working on with the latest 1.4 server patch, and the 1.1 client patch. I hope they keep going; they have really stretched the half-life engine to its max, and made it fun imo.

Azhreal · Jan 16, 2003, 07:55 AM

this game is so unbalanced its not even funny.. and every time they try to balance it they overcompensate.

ToshiroOC · Jan 16, 2003, 08:03 AM

Well, when the two different sides are so very different in structure and gameplay, I can't see balancing being an easy job

However, a good team can always beat the other team, regardless of whether they are aliens or marines...

Vampyromaniac · Jan 16, 2003, 08:11 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by ToshiroOC
I would say that IF you already have Half-life or Counterstrike retail, . . .

Actually, NS won't run on CS Retail. But I've heard there's a fix you can do for CS retail, don't remember where I heard about it, though

ToshiroOC · Jan 16, 2003, 08:15 AM

It won't? I remember pretty distinctly reading on their site that you can use the NS mod if you have CS retail or half-life... if it turns out I'm wrong , I'll edit this post - I'm going to go check up on this

EDIT:

Quote:

Lastly, you'll need a copy of Half-life or Counter-strike retail. If your machine runs one of these well, it should run Natural Selection comparably.

Vampyromaniac · Jan 16, 2003, 08:23 AM

Well, I found the fix on their site's forums . . . apparently it affects "a handful" of CS retail users.

http://www.natural-selection.org/for...ST&f=18&t=8223

It say it's usually non-English versions that need the fix, but a buddy of mine who uses English CS Retail needed to use the fix. So, more

ToshiroOC · Jan 16, 2003, 08:28 AM

Well Vampy, if you are interested, I'll meet up with you on some server with NS - I'm really liking the game ATM (oh, and offer is open to all members!)

Vampyromaniac · Jan 16, 2003, 08:32 AM

Oops, guess I didn't mention I don't play NS

But I may try it out one day . . . till then . . .

ToshiroOC · Jan 16, 2003, 08:33 AM

Aw, too bad... might I suggest that there is never a better time to try something new than now

If you are ever interested in a game, just PM me - I'll give you a server and a time

WyreTheWolf · Jan 17, 2003, 03:26 AM

very nice! Thanks for the heads up!

ToshiroOC · Jan 17, 2003, 07:14 AM

Can I expect to run into you at some point on NS servers (all 400 of em...) Wyre?

Jan 1, 2003, 03:22 AM	#1
~~craig588~~ Banned Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: In clothing Posts: 3,510 Rep Power: 0	natural selection game I recently discovered this game about a month ago, you can check out its web site here: http://www.natural-selection.org/ It's a free mod that has some of the best gameplay of any game I have seen. Although it is based on the now terrible Half-Life engine (lets face it half-life was based on a heavily modified version of the quake one engine that was made in 1995, it was great for its time but now its 2002, actually few hours away from 2003) the graphics are pretty good, and there is almost no cheating.

Jan 1, 2003, 10:02 AM	#2
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Site is down ATM - do you have a mirror of it, or can you copy/paste the info that you already download for us until the site goes back up? __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 1, 2003, 07:01 PM	#4
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Wow! Thanks for taking the time to give a complete and total reply. I'm still at the Rose Parade, but once I get home I'm going to try to access the site again. If it works, I'll download it and start trying it out. What s/n do you use during this game (when I get it installed, I'll use ToshiroOC as I normally do)? __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 1, 2003, 07:12 PM	#6
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Cool - I'll probably get started in a few hours - do you know of any good servers (the fun ones with the honest players with low latency)? I have a cable connection that pings at 20-30ms anywhere on the West Coast, so now that I'm away from 56k (yes! free!) I'm starting to care about the quality of the server I'm on... __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 1, 2003, 07:47 PM	#8
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Sounds very good - hope to see you there! (just need to re-install Half-life on my new partition and download the MOD, which, BTW, is sounding really really cool). Anyone else here at DH gonna try this too? Sounds like one of those kinds of mods that is great but undiscovered... __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 1, 2003, 06:33 PM	Thread Starter #3
~~craig588~~ Banned Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: In clothing Posts: 3,510 Rep Power: 0	I don't have any information on it from the site but I can give you a general run down of how the game works. There are 2 teams the aliens and marines, they both play completely in different styles. The aliens start out as a weak tiny alien called the skulk it has 70 life and a bite attack that can kill a marine in 2 hits (not as good as it sounds because the marines can shoot you from a distance) To get stronger the aliens need to build hives (large structures with no defenses that cost 80 resource points to build, ill go into resource point in a bit) they can only build a hive on a specified spot on the map (each map has 3 spots for a hive) To build something you need to evolve(having more hives lets yuo evolve into stronger things) into a gorge. (the only thing you can evolve into without any hives) The gorge has a menu where it can select from different structures it wants to build (ex:offense turrents to attack marines, defense chambers to heal them selves, movement chambers that let them teleport to another movment chamber) the only way a gorge can build something is if it has enough resources. Resources are given to you automaticly every few seconds, you can get more resources given to you by building a resource tower on top of a resource point (a resource point is just a place where you can build a resource tower) each resource tower will give you an additional 2 resources every few seconds. It may seem like you are gaining resources very fast but, the resources are shared thoughout the team so if you had 6 resource towers you wouldn't be gaining 25 resources in a few seconds, your team will have 25 resources evenly distrubuted to each member, so if you had a team with 10 people on it each person would only be gaining about 3 resources. Back onto the subject of hives, the more hives you get the more attacks for each from of the aliens you get so when/if you get all 3 hives your previously weak skulk now has a attack that can do 200 damage, your geoge that was only good for building before can make mini skulks that have the same attack but it does 50 damage. With your 3 hives you also get new forms to evolve into at one hive you get a lerk, it can fly has a biting attack, a weak shooting attack and a very powerful poison gas attack, at 2 hives you get a fade that has a missle attack that does 80 damage to marines but only 40 to buildings and they have a grenade attack that does 120 damage to building but 60 damage to marines, at 3 hives you get an onos that can do over 1000 damage with its charge attack and 120 with its bitting attack. The aliens also can get small upgrades, like regeneration, enchanced armor, cloaking, fast run ect... When you are the aliens your goal is to destroy all of the marines structures and all of the marines. I still missed alot of information there but I cant remember all of it. Now I'm going to the marines. They are much simpler then the aliens. you have one guy that plays the commander, it's alot like playing starcraft when your the commander, you need to build structures and give orders to your marines. the marines need to build structures (you just push your use button on something the commander has placed and you start building it) and follow the orders given. The commander can give you weapon and armor upgrades, he can also get you jet packs and motion tracking that lets you see through the walls. The commander can build mounted guns too, the mounted machine guns are pretty much just like your machine gun but they will auto shoot at aliens, but the seige cannons are the strongest weapons in the game, they can kill any structure other then a hive in one hit. (they cant target aliens just their structures) Just because I don't feel like re-editing the message here are the life totals of the different guys alien skulk: 70 life 10 armor alien gorge: 100 life 150 armor alien lerk: 75 life 75 armor alien fade 150 life 100 armor alien onos: 500 life 150 armor, marine with light armor: 100 life 100 armor marine with heavy armor: 100 life 275 armor. Acctually when I'm looking back at the number I'm not sure if they are entirely correct but they are in the general area.

Jan 1, 2003, 07:07 PM	Thread Starter #5
~~craig588~~ Banned Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: In clothing Posts: 3,510 Rep Power: 0	I use my clan tag and my name its: [omc]craig588

Jan 1, 2003, 07:38 PM	Thread Starter #7
~~craig588~~ Banned Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: In clothing Posts: 3,510 Rep Power: 0	Well I usually play on the cononas in space server it usually has 22 people and I can ping in the single digets even when the server is full.

Jan 3, 2003, 03:08 AM	#9
mbeeston HardwareHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: alberta, canada (thats north of the usa people) Posts: 1,037 Rep Power: 68 System Specs	i play it alot too i'm -=C=-Tetrisphere it's hl version of starcraft broodwars __________________ R.I.P Roadee - you will be missed T_T peace,love, and war... 3 things people look for... "if your going off the deep end, show off, do a cannon ball!" - me

Jan 4, 2003, 08:09 AM	#10
Renegade[CSR] DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: Undisclosed Renegade Location Posts: 396 Rep Power: 0	It has been out for a while now and is anything but undiscovered. I know that the server count is at or above 500 and the player count is quite high. It is indeed alot of fun, although I have heard people say that it resembles starcraft in some ways, but that definately cannot be a bad thing I have had lots of fun playing this game, but it takes alot of teamwork on both ends, which makes challenging as well. To note, it has some of the best graphics that I myself have seen in a half-life mod If you have half-life or counter-strike retail, go download this! You won't regret it.

Jan 4, 2003, 09:23 PM	#11
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Hmmm... the website still appears to be down. Are you sure that you have the right link for it? I have tried from 3 different IP's (incase I was being blocked for some reason) and I haven't been able to access it... __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 4, 2003, 10:56 PM	Thread Starter #12
~~craig588~~ Banned Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: In clothing Posts: 3,510 Rep Power: 0	Well it works for me so I dont know what to tell you.

Jan 4, 2003, 11:08 PM	#13
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	It's ok now - it just started working for me in the past hour. I don't know why, but it did. OK, time to get playing! __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 6, 2003, 04:11 AM	#14
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Oh yeah - this is such a fun mod! I started my first game (unknowingly) on an ns_eclipse only server, and since the marine team was full I ended up on aliens - and was promptly yelled at for being a gorge So know I know eclipse like the back of my hand, and barely know the other maps however, it is still very fun, especially as alien, as I don't have to worry about my commander refusing to upgrade me because he doesn't like azn's or anything (which happened once... "Toshiro sound like one of those jap names - fuck you, leave the server"... too bad too, as FF was on...), but anyway, thanks for the hookup! I'm going to tell all of my friends about this mod... oh, and can I have the IP of that server? I only see about 150 servers at any given time online because I'm not patient enough to let all of the servers load from list, and I haven't seen it listed yet (the Auria Pelikasta servers are the one's I've been on so far... bad pings though, as they are European...) ToshiroOC __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 7, 2003, 06:58 PM	#15
Zerthr DriverHeaven Junior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Posts: 19 Rep Power: 0	sounds pretty good... but would kill me with my 56k... is it worth the download? at like 4k per second?

Jan 16, 2003, 08:23 AM	#22
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 77 System Specs	Well, I found the fix on their site's forums . . . apparently it affects "a handful" of CS retail users. http://www.natural-selection.org/for...ST&f=18&t=8223 It say it's usually non-English versions that need the fix, but a buddy of mine who uses English CS Retail needed to use the fix. So, more __________________ *Digitalis 3.3* Athlon 64 3000 // ASUS K8V SE Deluxe // 1024MB PC3200 (2-2-2-10 1T) ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 Pro // 20" Dell 2005FPW (DVI) M-Audio Revo 7.1 + Philips Acoustic Edge // Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 320/16 Western Digital WD3200KS + 120/8 Seagate 7200.7 NEC ND-3550A 16x DVD±RW + Lite-On 52x24x CD-RW Antec Sonata case // 480W Antec TruePower personal bests \|\| Aq'3: 46796 \| 3D'01: 20461 \| 3D'03: 6336 \| 3D'05: 2677 \| PC'04: 4605 \| PC'02: 7691,9092,1250

Jan 7, 2003, 10:24 PM	#16
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	It's really hard to say - I would say that IF you already have Half-life or Counterstrike retail, and you are really into 3d gaming online, esp. with Half-life looking mods, then it would be worth the download... though I would suggest that you simply look around the site and see if it interests you enough to make you willing to endure an overnight download __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 16, 2003, 02:02 AM	#17
Krazach DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Jan 2003 Posts: 12 Rep Power: 0	The game is very fun, especially at LANs. At times it seems unbalanced, but that is more the teams and skill rather than the actual game. If you have two teams of equal skill its fairly close to balance, which they are still working on with the latest 1.4 server patch, and the 1.1 client patch. I hope they keep going; they have really stretched the half-life engine to its max, and made it fun imo. __________________ -Krazach

Jan 16, 2003, 07:55 AM	#18
Azhreal DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Jul 2002 Posts: 15 Rep Power: 0	this game is so unbalanced its not even funny.. and every time they try to balance it they overcompensate.

Jan 16, 2003, 08:03 AM	#19
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Well, when the two different sides are so very different in structure and gameplay, I can't see balancing being an easy job However, a good team can always beat the other team, regardless of whether they are aliens or marines... __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 16, 2003, 08:28 AM	#23
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Well Vampy, if you are interested, I'll meet up with you on some server with NS - I'm really liking the game ATM (oh, and offer is open to all members!) __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 16, 2003, 08:32 AM	#24
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 77 System Specs	Oops, guess I didn't mention I don't play NS But I may try it out one day . . . till then . . .

Jan 16, 2003, 08:33 AM	#25
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Aw, too bad... might I suggest that there is never a better time to try something new than now If you are ever interested in a game, just PM me - I'll give you a server and a time __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)

Jan 17, 2003, 03:26 AM	#26
WyreTheWolf Wolfish Bastard Join Date: May 2002 Location: Cave; Ozark Mountains Posts: 2,110 Rep Power: 0	very nice! Thanks for the heads up!

Jan 17, 2003, 07:14 AM	#27
ToshiroOC Unbiased. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 4,812 Rep Power: 0	Can I expect to run into you at some point on NS servers (all 400 of em...) Wyre? __________________ [img][/img] [color=White]Peace be with you, Joe.[/color] Driverheaven Staff Member (Supermoderator)