The Specialists (mod)

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The Specialists is a multiplayer mod for the popular first-person shooter computer game Half-Life. It is currently at version 2.1.

The game was created by Filippo "Morfeo" De Luca & Lorenzo "John_Matrix" Pasini. The Specialists 1.0 was first publicly released on October 2002, and is as of April 2004 at version 2.1. In the future, the development team plans to release its next and final version 3.0, which has been in development for some time.

The Specialists, or TS, is a multiplayer action movie mod/total conversion for Valve's best selling first person shooter Half-Life. It is intended to resemble a generic action movie, and is often compared to the film Face/Off, though several of the default models and some of the gameplay elements appear to be references to The Matrix. It contains over 29 weapons and many powerups. The object of the Deathmatch game mode is to get as many frags as possible.

One of the features that The Specialists is known for is "Bullet Time", the ability to manipulate time to pass in slow motion. "Bullet Time" has been implemented in other titles such as Max Payne, but is typically found only in single-player titles, whereas The Specialists is a multiplayer only modification. The game also makes heavy use of stunts, even rewarding players with scoring bonuses for stunt combinations, and also has a simple kung fu system for melee attacks. Although it is far from the first shooter to include stunting and kung fu (a notable spiritual predecessor The Opera), The Specialists is the first to combine them with a multiplayer slow motion gameplay.

• Agent - Clad in sunglasses and suit, one of the characters from the famous movie "The Matrix" making an appearance in The Specialists. Though it may be a generic agent of a government agency.
• Castor Troy - From the movie Face/Off
• Gordon Freeman - Half-life's famous action hero returns, with a black trenchcoat.
• The Hitman - Ruthless assassin dressed in a business suit. Based on Agent 47 from the Hitman series of games.
• Laurence - Laurence Fishburne portraying his Matrix character, Morpheus.
• Merc - The first of two original The Specialists characters.
• Seal - The other original The Specialists character, the Navy SEAL.

The various stunts that can be performed are all dependent on the gauge to the left of players cross hair. He/She will notice that when he/she moves the mouse up and down, the dot in the gauge will move up and down as well, depending on where he/she looks. The position of this dot when he/she perform a move dictates the kind of stunt he/she can do. Because the gauge is split into 3 categories, those are called high, medium and low moves.

Flips: These are performed by tapping the jump key twice in quick succession. They will cause the player jump forward or sideways (depending on the direction of movement) and perform a flip in mid air. If this is performed when the player has zero or backward momentum, the result is a back flip that will cause damage to other players if the other player is near enough. The back flip is only available if the player has 60 or more equipment weight slots free.

• High: Full flip, lands on feet, brief direction penalty upon landing. [Player may not change direction until penalty period is over]
• Medium: Forward jumping flip, lands on back.
• Low: Short flip, lands on back and slides forward.
• Backflip: Full flip, lands on feet, no penalty.

Dives: A dive is performed by pressing the stunt key. Pressing the key once will launch the player forwards, sideways or backwards, depending on which way you are moving. The player will then land on the ground and stay prone until either jump or the stunt button is pressed again, at which point the player will rise to their feet. If the stunt button is held down when the player hits the ground after a dive, a forward roll will be performed and the player will rise straight to their feet, allowing much more freedom of movement.

• High: Long dive capable of clearing obstacles.
• Medium: Straight forward dive.
• Low: Short dive which causes the player to slide along the ground.

Rolls: Rolls are mainly used as an evasive maneuver, they can be performed by Double Tapping the duck key, when player do this he/she will roll in the direction he/she is currently moving. As previously mentioned, after a dive a roll may also be performed by holding the stunt key as the player hits the floor. Rolls can be performed regardless of free slots.

Climbing: Player can climb up most walls for a short distance and even move along them. To do this player has to stand next to a wall and double tap jump key and he/she will pull himself/herself a short distance up the wall, holding down jump will cause him/her to do this again. If the player has 60 or more slots free, this move can be performed three times in succession. If the player has less slots free, the maximum number of climbs is two. To climb an object successfully the player must be looking at the object with his/her cross hair. If the object is lower in your field of view than the cross hair then the player will perform a flip instead of climbing

Gainer: A forward moving backflip. Performed by jumping once, turning the field of view 180 degrees while airborne so that the player is now traveling backwards, and jumping again in midair at approximately the apex of the first jump. While more complex than the standard high flip, the gainer reaches nearly the same height and speed without incurring any movement penalty upon landing.

Bullet Dodge: When stationary, in either Slow Motion or Slow Pause, tapping the stunt key will make the player perform a bullet dodging move. A very useful move, however, he/she cannot fire while performing it and after doing so you will be on lying prone on the floor. This move can also be performed while airborne, as long as the player has no horizontal momentum.

Wall flip: It is possible to perform wall flips simply by running into a wall and pressing the stunt key, players character will run up the wall and flip backwards off it, as well as looking very stylish, this can be a useful escape move. Players may perform up to three consecutive wallflips by bouncing between two objects. This move is only possible with 60 free slots or more.

While a player may only perform a maximum of three wall climbs or wall flips, the total limitation for such maneuvers is four. Thus, a player may combine wall climbs and flips at will [flip-flip-flip-climb or climb-flip-climb-flip]. This only works for stunts involving wall usage.

Weight is a very important part of The Specialists, as it determines a large part of how you can play the game. Those who enjoy carrying vast amounts of firepower around with them will be very limited in the number of stunts that they can perform and the speed at which they can move. Whereas players armed with only knives or a pistol will be able to move very quickly and perform more stunts.

When you have no weapons you have 81 free slots (This has been changed to 100 in version 3.0). From this weight and down to 60 slots, you can perform all available moves. When you have weaponry that reduces you to under 60 slots, you can only perform moves in the medium and low category only. If you have less than 40 slots available, only low moves can be performed. If you want to know the kind of stunts that are available to you with your current configuration, just glance at the stunt gauge for the answer. You will notice that it will be either all white, or portions of it will be shaded red, to indicate in which area stunts are unavailable.

The Specialists contains a variety of powerups. These can be separated into passive and active powerups.

Passive powerups do not require activation: they last until the character is killed, and maintain their effect for the entire time.

Kung Fu: This powerup doubles the amount of damage that any kung fu attack deals, thus making one attack (the back kick) a one hit kill. This powerup is given to you when you reach the status of Specialist.

Super jump: The Super jump ability allows the character to make massive leaps. Useful for maps containing large buildings and outdoor scenes (ts_fall, ts_lobby, etc.). The longer you hold jump while superjumping, the higher you go. Sometimes you will receive falling damage if you jump too high. This powerup is also given to you when you reach the status of Specialist.

Health: The Health powerup boosts your health up to 150 points, allowing you to take a lot more punishment before dropping. Once collected, your health will drop by 1 point per second until it returns to 100 or you get damaged to 100 or under it.

Grenade: Grenade powerup provides you with one frag grenade. After the 5 second delay, the grenade explodes and some pieces of shrapnel fly out and wound or kill anyone hit by it. Primary fire causes you to lob the grenade up and over obstacles, whilst secondary fire causes you to roll the grenade across the ground. This powerup is only available in Deathmatch games, and will also take up 15 slots in your inventory.

Kevlar: A Kevlar vest that gives the player increased protection against damage from bullets to the body, but it doesn't give any extra protection against melee, other forms of attacks, or headshots. Kevlar can either be found in the open as a powerup, or bought from the buy menu in certain teamplay maps. If you die while wearing Kevlar, any remaining Armor points are dropped, and another player can pick them up as a bonus, adding the amount of Kevlar you had left to their character.

Active power ups must be activated to have an effect. Active power ups last for three or five seconds depending on which power up is used. Active power ups can be particularly devastating when used with an appropriate weapon. One may only carry one active power up at a time.

Infinite Ammunition (Max. 3 Seconds): While this power up is active, the amount of ammunition remaining in the player's gun does not decrease, regardless of how many shots are fired. One cannot fire with an empty weapon, however. In version 3.0, this power up will be replaced by the "Double Ammo" power up. This power up gives the player's currently held gun a magazine of bullets carrying double the bullets that the magazine normally carries. It will have this effect even if there are zero bullets left in the gun. Unlike the other power ups, Double Ammo can be used in conjunction with any of the other power ups.

Slow Motion (Max. 5 Seconds): This power up allows one to enter 'bullet time' in a manner similar to that of Max Payne computer games and The Matrix movies. Time appears to slow down in the game, with all players slowed down to the same low speed.

Slow Pause (Max. 3 Seconds): Similar to Slow Motion, but far more effective. Under the effect of this, enemy characters come to a near total halt, while you can move almost as fast as if it weren't slow-motion. Bullets travel even slower than in Slow Motion, while thrown knives hang in mid air.

Double Fire-Rate (Max. 5 Seconds): When this power up is active, all ammunition in the player's gun is fired at double the normal rate of fire. If a player is wielding a semi-automatic weapon (such as the Glock 20, Five-seveN, or the like), it is converted into an automatic weapon for the duration of the power up. If a player is wielding a melee weapon, such as a katana, that weapon is swung around twice as fast, and knives can be thrown one after the other by holding the secondary fire button.

The vast assortment of weapons featured in The Specialists use different kinds of ammunition. When a player runs low on ammunition, they can obtain more from fragged players' ammo vests.

An alternative, user-created mode of play involves role-playing in the game. There is an extreme variety of things that constitute role-play in TS. The most predominant form of role-playing involves server plugins (not supported by the TS development team or Valve Software) that add an economy system, much like an RPG. Usually, servers that run these plugins don't allow players to spawn with weapons, but they must receive income (jobs are given by server administrators). Additionally, the plugins may include hunger, which usually kills the player when they attain 100% hunger. However, many servers remove the hunger script as it may crash their servers, disrupting any current role-play situations. However, the first economy-driven plugins for TSRP servers began appearing in mid-to-late 2004. Before that time, role-play servers usually ran no plugins, or a simple TalkArea plugin which adds two forms of chat: limited-area chat for in-character speaking, and server-wide chat for out-of-character speak. Few servers run without economy plugins, creating a "classic RP" environment, and servers such as this are usually frequented by more experienced role-players or those who do not favor plugin-driven role-play. Another alternative method of role-playing is "Zombie" role-play, where a server spawns with unarmed, AI-driven bots with "zombie" models and the players' objective is to kill zombies.

As of late 2005, the RP servers (together with other alternative gameplay servers) dominate the TS online multiplayer server list, to the dismay of deathmatch fans, as the number of regularly available TS deathmatch servers has steadily been dwindling since early 2005. The amount of alternative TS servers has been known to confuse new players, who find the vast majority of the servers sporting gameplay much different from the official website's description of the mod. A notable incident, and prime example of this confusion, occurred when a game review site featured an article about The Specialists, and described TSRP as an official gametype.

• Half-Life
• Steam
• List of Half-Life mods
• Valve Software

• Official website for The Specialists