Garry's Mod
From Gfwiki
Contents |
Overview
Garry's Mod is a popular Single and Multiplayer addon for Half-Life 2. What makes the mod unique is the fact that it has no fixed or structured gameplay - instead, players are sent into a "build arena", and can then spawn items from the Half-Life 2 singleplayer missions into the game - from wooden crates, to scrap cars, to the infamous explosive barrel. These items can then be used to build various machines or contraptions using the provided "tool gun", which allows the player access to a number of tools and options pertaining to construction, physical constraints, object properties, graphical post-processing and server administration.
The upshot of all this is that Garry's Mod is essentially the ultimate geek's playground - sort of a cross between Half-Life 2 and Scrapheap Challenge. Build anything you can think of, then do whatever you want with it - use it to destroy other players, NPCs, other contraptions - or just blow it all up spectacularly.
Comics and Character Posing
Another common use of Garry's Mod is to use the spawnable ragdolls and character manipulation tools - such as the PhysGun, Face Poser, Statue Tool etc. to create and pose a comic scene. Several popular webcomics have sprung up from this practice, including the popular Concerned, detailing the progress of Gordon Frohman along the path of the player in the Half-Life 2 singleplayer missions.
Garry's Mod is also sometimes associated with Machinama, despite the fact that the mod itself is incapable (as of its current revision) of creating scripted animated scenes. The Source engine is, however, one of the most popular candidates for Machinama productions.
Co-Operative Gameplay
Not only can a team of like-minded players collectively build monster contraptions in the standard "build mode", but a group of two or more players could, in theory, play through the entire Half-Life 2 singleplayer storyline using Garry's Mod. Whilst being generally more fun to play the game as a team, several problems exist in this mode of play, the most obvious of which are single-person puzzles that are built into the levels of Half-Life 2, or other logical obstacles. In this case, one player must proceed ahead whilst the others remain behind. However, in certain sections of the game (such as those based on vehicular transport), logic problems can be overcome by spawning additional vehicles or props using the GMod menu, in order to accomodate all players. Nevertheless, in some places logic problems are unavoidable and thus the team must be forced to either noclip through the problematic section of the map, or skip the level entirely.
When one player advances to the next level, the entire team moves along.
Another problem with this mode of gameplay is the temptation to abuse the GMod toolgun or weapon set in order to complete levels easily or overcome difficult puzzles in seconds by "cheating". It is the responsibility of the server admin to disable such exploits if he intends to host this form of server.
Scripted Weapons, Lua Mods and Third Party Content
Garry's Mod is by nature highly customisable, and thus details on how to script your own weapons, create ingame mods or include new spawnable models are provided on many Garry's Mod community websites. However, for those who do not know Lua code, or are unsure how to integrate new content into GMod there is a vast library of Lua mods, SWEPs, Models, Ragdolls, Vehicles and Maps contained within the Garry's Mod forums.
Third Party Game Modes
Finally, Garry's Mod can also play host to alternate gamemodes, or mini-mods which were created using the Lua script language - an integral part of Garry's Mod.
Popular gamemodes that are included with the mod include "Build to the Top", "Melon Racing" and "Hide and Seek", although a vast and lively community churn out new Lua minimods almost every day.
GMod and GamingForums
Rookie_42, a self-confessed GMod addict, once organised a GMod "build-off" in the Spam Forum. Several contestants were challenged to build a catapult using Garry's Mod, provide a video of their handiwork in action and then submit their contraption to other GamingForums members for evaluation. The member with the most number of votes wins the competition, and is then given the honour of setting a new challenge for another set of players. The thread was quite popular for a while, however the rather steep learning curve of Garry's Mod was likely one of the reasons why only a few rounds of the competition took place.
