DoD Legacy Mods (Pre-Steam): Beta 1.3b, 2.1, 3.1 and Version 1.0

[SpecialistK]

Hi all,

Anyone interested in playing some of the legacy versions of Day of Defeat (as in the pre-Steam Half-Life mod beta versions like 1.3b and 3.1)? I've spent some time finding and getting the mods up and running on original Half-Life / HLDS (both client and server installs with bots) and would like to spread the wealth if anyone is interested. If people are curious I'll write up a few guides. Thanks!

- SpecialistK

Update 1 - I created a new DoD Beta 1.3b client/server setup guide here:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=457742360
Update 2- I created a new DoD Beta 3.1 for Steam client/server install guide here:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=462193147
This version works with the latest Steam version of Half-Life. I'm planning on hosting a community event very soon once I test out my server with a few friends.

[Jormund]

Besides the point, but maybe you could give me a DoD history lesson?

[LiveWire]

Are you running these though steam? I thought you could not use the original Half-Life when they shut down won.

[SpecialistK]

Originally posted by Ernest Wolf:

Besides the point, but maybe you could give me a DoD history lesson?

History lesson! OK here we go (most of this was from Wikipedia which someone recently edited out. I've recovered it for just such an occasion):

Overview:
DoD began as a Half-Life 3rd party mod in 2000. Later, the DoD team joined Valve Software and produced a standalone version published through Activision. DoD (version 1.0) was officially released in May 2003. It was converted over to the Steam delivery system in version 1.1. Steam is now required to play DoD (version 1.3). Day of Defeat: Source was released on September 26, 2005.

Beta / Official Release Info:
With the initial release of the game (when classes included only Support Infantry, Sergeant, Rifleman or Sniper), choosing a class determined your speed. Rifleman moved the fastest and Support Infantry moved the slowest. Sergeants moved at a medium pace.

With the release of Beta 2.0 in October 2001, players witnessed the expansion of character classes and the speed differential was eliminated. This version added the Allied Staff Sergeant who carried an M1 Carbine. The Axis Sniper Rifle from the Beta 1.x releases (the Gewehr 43) was replaced with a scoped model of the Karabiner 98k, to more effectively balance the Axis and Allied sniper classes. Furthermore, both sides now received machine guns (.30 caliber for the Allies, and the MG34 and MG42 models for the Axis), which added a new tactical element to the game. Also, so called head-bobbing or gun-sway was introduced, so players could no longer simply point and shoot while moving, but now had to stand still for improved accuracy. Gun recoil was also introduced, and kneeling and lying down alleviated this and made a player's shot more accurate.

Beta 3.0 was released in July 2002 and added the Allied Sergeant, who carried a M3 Grease Gun, as well as the para gameplay mode which was similar to Counter-Strike in that players did not respawn until the end of the round. The Germans could now also choose between two models of the powerful and deafeningly loud FG 42 (bipod/scope) and the Gewehr could now be selected as a class, to compete with the semi-automatic Garand rifle the Allies used.

Valve then made Day of Defeat an official valve mod and released 1.0v in May 2003 which featured a lot of changes. Activision distributed a retail version of the game though it could still be downloaded for free if you had Half-Life. 1.0 included quite a few new features - the pace of the game was increased. Friendly-fire was made non-default, an on-screen map where one's allies and thrown grenades were displayed was added, as was a Battlefield-style flag hanging over the head of friends and foes for identification. Pop-up help messages, spoken by a dog wearing a helmet (in the same vein as Microsoft's Office Assistant), also appeared in v1.0. Bleeding - a key feature of the betas - was removed. Night time battlefields were removed as they tended to be the least-played of the beta maps. Version 1.0 also included auto-reload (which defaulted to "always on"), some new maps and major modifications to some old maps (e.g. Anzio). British Troops were also issued in 1.0, but were only featured in 3 maps and had only 5 weapon classes. Version 1.0 also introduced the bipod for the BAR, allowing for it to be deployed in the same locations as the machine guns and FG42s. Later version 1.1 became the first Steam release. The American Bazooka, German Panzershreck and British PIAT became independent classes in 1.2v and Mortar-classes were proposed, but never got released. Para-maps were kept, but the special gameplay was removed and replaced by the traditional Flag-capture or objective gameplay.

In September 2005 Day of Defeat: Source was released.

My 2 cents:
I started playing around the 1.3 beta stage (1.3b for short). It was fantastic and easily solidified itself as the #2 mod right after Counter-Strike. The community was huge (had tons of personal friends playing nightly). Games were fun, fast and hectic. The maps were fantastic (dod_oslo, dod_caen, dod_hill). My favorite server was the 95th Rifles DoD Server. I felt as though all the way through the betas the mod kept improving with new classes, weapons and features (including CS style maps and even cutscene videos as described above). Anyone remember dod_hedgerow? Then Valve got a hold of it and it became an official mod (version 1.0). They removed many of the old features and IMO took the soul out of the game. That and I'm not sure if anyone remembers but when Steam first came out to replace World Opponent Network (WON) it was awful and everyone hated it which I think turned off a lot of players for a while. After version 1.3 they just stopped updating the game. Then a year later DoD:Source came out, and it was especially polarizing for those of us who remember the good ol days and the community suffered even more as more and more people left.

IMO the two best versions of the mod were 1.3b and 3.1b (most people would probably say 3.1b since it was most balanced / had the best features).

DoD 1.3b video:
(Notice the no weapon sway. Weapons had a "cone of fire" accuracy. And lots of blood): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KcqH7M-uPQ
DoD 3.1b video:
(Weapon sway / recoil. You'll see a bunch of new classes / weapons (especially the MGs). New HUD as well. Most of this was introduced in Beta 2.0-2.1): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yef6PlCYzx8
I've searched the net for old copies of the mod and got them working for myself and some friends who wanted to play again.

Originally posted by -LiveWire-:

Are you running these though steam? I thought you could not use the original Half-Life when they shut down won.

I've got the beta 1.3b, beta 2.1, beta 3.1, and 1.0 versions of the mods working with my original Half-Life 1 CD installation (which I legally bought back at EB games probably in 1999? ha). The install is completely separate of Steam. All the files I used were obtained legally: Half-Life 1 CD install, free HL upgrade patch, DoD mod files, and the Half-Life 1 dedicated server install which I know was / is legal to standup on your own (it's how all servers were setup back in pre-Steam days). I have guides on setting up client / dedicated server installs including working bots for each version. WON was shutdown when Steam came out so the issue is that you wouldn't be able to find other servers (if you went into the in game server browser) since the mods / Half-Life are still hooked up to those old WON channels.

As far as hosting so others can find them outside of a local LAN I was able to set the servers up on the WON2 network. I have guides on how to do that as well but I'm not 100% sure of the legality of that whole network so I might not be able to post those here.

I'm in the process of investigating installing these mods with a Half-Life Steam installation and then (I think?) being able to use Steam to host / find the dedicated servers. I originally tried this approach but ran into a game breaking bug with 1.3b which I tried setting up first (so I switched to using dedicated servers / WON2). I'll look and see if any of the later versions would work with Steam.

I'll post the setup guides this weekend if you guys are interested in setting up your own server / messing around / reliving some history. I'm just hoping to preserve the legacy of one of the best Half-Life mods ever created. Thanks.

[SpecialistK]

Quick reference guide on the version history:

Version history (Complete)
Alpha 4 (April 8, 2000)*
Alpha 6 (September 27, 2000)
Alpha 6.5 (October 15, 2000)
Alpha 6.5 (October 16, 2000)**
Alpha 6.7 (October 28, 2000)
Alpha 6.8 (November 6, 2000)
Beta 1.0 (January 12, 2001)
Beta 1.1 (February 14, 2001)
Beta 1.2 (April 5, 2001)
Beta 1.3 (June 4, 2001)
Beta 1.3b (July 27, 2001)
Beta 2.0 (February 6, 2002)
Beta 2.1 (May 10, 2002)
Beta 3.0 (July 11, 2002)
Beta 3.1 (August 8, 2002)
Version 1.0 (May 1, 2003)†
Version 1.1 (November 14, 2003)‡
Version 1.2 (May 19, 2004)
Version 1.3 (July 7, 2004)

*Alpha 4 was the first public release. The readme.txt file lists "fixes" from previous private versions.
**Alpha 6.5 was re-released under the same number with some "missing wads and sounds"
†First available for retail purchase, but still available (and always) available as a free download add on to half-life. Retail purchase eliminated the need of owning half-life.
‡First release on the Steam content delivery system.

[Jormund]

Woah, SpecialistK. Thanks for all of the info you provided me here. Was a good read and will save it right now, because this will definitely might come in handy. Do you still play Day of Defeat?

[SpecialistK]

Originally posted by Ernest Wolf:

Woah, SpecialistK. Thanks for all of the info you provided me here. Was a good read and will save it right now, because this will definitely might come in handy. Do you still play Day of Defeat?

No problem thanks for the feedback! I don't play the current version (1.3 Steam version) because I was never a huge fan of the changes Valve made when they brought the mod retail.

What I am interested in is playing the old mod versions (and hopefully getting a little community going). I've done some research and there is a way to play / host beta 3.1 using Steam. I'll be setting up a server this weekend and writing up a guide here on installing the client so you can play.

As far as the older beta versions (2.1 and 1.3b) unfortunately there is no way to use Steam to play / host those games as they rely on some code from the original Half-Life WON version. Something was removed in the steam version of Half-Life which causes crashes when dying while holding a TNT object. I do however know how to setup dedicated servers for those mods on the WON2 network (that works completely fine with no crashes). Those guides will be coming after. I figure start with beta 3.1 since it's easiest to setup and keeps people on Steam.

More coming soon!

[SpecialistK]

Alrighty an update! So I was successfully able to create and host a beta 3.1 server via Steam (yay). Server even shows up on the Internet games tab. Client install is also working perfectly. Next is to update the server with some bots and Admin mod and i'll begin hosting a couple of days a week for anyone who wants to play.

[Shakespeare]

I'm in. Added you SpecialistK.

[Tanegashima]

Weren't there some maps which had in-game intro cutscenes?

[SpecialistK]

Originally posted by Animefreak:

Weren't there some maps which had in-game intro cutscenes?

Yes sir! The "paratrooper maps" (dod_glider, dod_hedgerow, etc.). They were CS style maps where you had 1 life per round. Each map had an intro cutscene when the map first loaded. Pretty neat.

Originally posted by Shakespeare:

I'm in. Added you SpecialistK.

Thanks for the add! So I ran into a snag with getting working bots for the Steam version of 3.1 beta. Seems like the bots (Sturmbot) are NOT compatible with the current Steam HLDS version. Unfortunately the bot creator passed away a few years back so I doubt we'll get a compatible version (however he did create bots for the 1.0 Steam version so that would be an option if we wanted to play that).

Two main options I'm looking at for playing 3.1b:

1. I have the dedicated server (and setup guide) done for playing and using the 3.1b Steam version. Using this version allows your dedicated server to be listed on the Valve master servers (so other players using the 3.1b client can find your server in the server browser). This option also keeps everyone in Steam as well and the setup is much easier (there is an actual Windows installer for it that a guy named Wickit created to keep things simple). Problem is that I can't get the bots to work for this version (as stated above) so we'd have to start recruiting :)

2. I create a 3.1b server using a older HLDS version and host it on the WON2 network (I've been able to do this before with other versions of the mod). Plus side is the bots will work. Downside is setup for both the client and server are a bit more involved (not that bad really just some more steps which I'll create a doc for). So we don't have to go out and buy a WON (CD version) of Half-Life (or go and find your Half-Life CD) I actually found some steps for downgrading your Steam version of Half-Life to the proper version for playing on WON2.

I need to investigate this to see if downgrading will actually work. I'll be spending some more time on it this weekend. I'll send out some more updates on what I find out.

[General Jason]

I would love to play that 1.3b sometime, even just stand alone with bots, I cant believe how awesome the blood, and gun sounds were in that version! Amazing! Any advice for getting and running that version?

[SpecialistK]

Originally posted by General Jason:

I would love to play that 1.3b sometime, even just stand alone with bots, I cant believe how awesome the blood, and gun sounds were in that version! Amazing! Any advice for getting and running that version?

I spent some time this afternoon and published a guide for getting a server up and running so you can play with bots. Let me know if you need any more help!

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=457742360

[General Jason]

Thank you very much, i really appreciate your time and effort doing that. I will dig into the guide now. I will report back if I have any issues. :)

[SpecialistK]

New guide for setting up DoD Beta 3.1 for the Steam version of Half-Life has been added).
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=462193147
Community event coming soon! Recommend those of you who don't have Half-Life to go buy it now since it's on the Steam Summer Sale for $2.49.

[Rocker]

Wow. Brings back memories: When I ran CoFR (2000-2003) a fraction of our group (200 soldiers) did sole source testing, and the kids that made the game didn't listen to a lot of our recommendations... still play it, but it could have been better if they listened to us old farts! Now, if you are looking for some real history, go quiz cliffe and gooseman on CounterStrike because this game would not exist if it were not for their coding!

Any of you experienced gamers remember Crusty old Fossil Rockers? MOTTO: One foot in the grave, the other on your neck!

Gen. Rocker, slightly retired