ProjectReclaimer/project-reclaimer-releases v0.9.21

on GitHub

New features

Switch a co-op lobby between Halo 3 and Halo 3: ODST, and between ODST's campaign and Firefight

A co-op lobby switches games in place, its players kept, as Halo 3's lobby switches between multiplayer and campaign. On the lobby's mission page, the campaign list has Halo 3: ODST's campaign and its Firefight beside Halo 3's campaigns: choose one to make the lobby a game of it, or choose a Halo 3 campaign from an ODST lobby to go back. An ODST lobby that came from a multiplayer lobby has MULTIPLAYER on its heading to go back to that game. As for Halo 3's campaigns, a lobby with players in it keeps to the game they joined for, though an ODST lobby can always step between its campaign and Firefight.

Firefight options

ODST's Firefight page has FIREFIGHT OPTIONS beside the game type: change the team's lives, the most lives it may hold and the time limit, turn each skull on or off for the whole game, for each round, for each set or for the bonus round, and change every player's traits (shields, damage, weapons, speed and more) over the game type's own. Co-op lobbies use them for all their players, the game remembers them for next time, and dedicated servers set them with options in their odst = { … }.

Skulls, the modifiers page and story characters for Halo 3: ODST's campaign

ODST's campaign has its fourteen skulls now, gold and silver, on the same Campaign modifiers page as Halo 3's, which replaces ODST's modifiers window (on the Campaign page's ODST view, and from the co-op lobby's MODIFIERS row). A new CHARACTERS choice, on the Campaign page and in the co-op lobby, picks between Your troopers (everyone plays as the trooper they chose in Customize's Looks, as before) and Story characters (everyone plays as the mission's own characters: the Rookie in the city, Buck, Dutch, Mickey or Romeo in their flashbacks). Dedicated servers set them in odst = { … } with modifiers = { skulls = … } and story_characters = true.

Sprint in Halo 3: ODST's campaign

ODST's Campaign modifiers page has Sprint now, with its speed and stamina, as Halo 3's campaign does. With it on, every player runs faster while holding Sprint and running forward; on a controller, click the left stick while running. As in Halo 3, a meter shows the stamina left and the weapon lowers while you sprint. A co-op host's choice applies to everyone in the lobby. Dedicated servers set it in odst = { … } with modifiers = { sprint = true }, plus sprint_speed_percent and sprint_stamina_seconds if wanted.

Films of Halo 3: ODST's games

ODST's campaign missions and Firefight games are now recorded like Halo 3's, and appear under THEATER. WATCH plays them back with the same theater bar, keys and controls (Escape). As with Halo 3's campaign films, an ODST film only plays forward: back to the start plays it again from the beginning. Record my games in Settings covers ODST's games too.

End a Halo 3: ODST co-op game and go back to a lobby together

The host of an ODST co-op or Firefight game has END GAME in the Game Menu, as in Halo 3's games, and BACK TO LOBBY on the card a finished game ends on. Either ends the game for a new lobby of the same game, and the players still in it follow by themselves, as a dedicated server's players do when it opens its next lobby. A passed vote to end the game does the same. Before, the host could only leave, which sent everyone back to the menu.

Set your own frame-rate limit

Settings → Graphics → Frame-rate limit has Custom after the usual limits. Choose it and set any limit from 30 to 1000 FPS on the Custom limit slider below it, such as a few frames under your display's refresh rate for a G-SYNC or FreeSync display. The slider starts at your display's refresh rate, which a mark on its track shows. The arrow keys and D-pad move it a frame or so at a time.

Chat while you Customize in a lobby

Customize opened from a lobby shows the lobby's chat over the lower half of the character's stage, as the lobby shows it over its own, and T, Y and U open the chat entry there.

Changes

• Third person on foot uses the close shoulder camera again. In third person on foot, the camera sits close behind your character's right shoulder again, as it did before 0.9.19, instead of Halo 3's multiplayer Spartan camera. Your shots leave from where the camera is, so they go where the crosshair points, with a centered or a lowered crosshair. Every player's game, the host's and films too, still fires each player's shots from that same place, never from behind a wall you back against. Characters with a third-person camera of their own keep it.
• Choosing where a mission starts. On the Campaign page, Start from is a single row whatever the mission: the start you chose with how many there are (2 / 7), arrows for the one before and after, and a click lists them all, with what each one is. Halo 3: ODST's missions with many rally points no longer crowd the difficulties and the buttons below.
• Smaller pictures in character packs. Character packs keep armor icons cropped to what they show and fit to 128 pixels, and a mod's other pictures fit to 256 pixels, each keeping its shape, so mods with many icons fit in a pack. Packs built before keep their old pictures until they are built again with the customization editor's Build packs.
• Everyone in a game needs 0.9.21. Servers admit only players on exactly their own version, so players and servers on 0.9.21 can't play with those on 0.9.20 or older. The server browser's Version column shows a server on another version in red. Update dedicated servers and players together.

Bug fixes

• Campaign mods such as Cursed Halo 3 take your characters again. Campaign mods whose missions leave the player characters' names empty, such as Cursed Halo 3, took no characters from character mods. Playing their missions as Your characters works again.

• Character mods show in the main menu and Customize. Some character mods dropped out of the main menu with a message that a page "was not packed for the merge", and characters from character mods sometimes didn't show up in Customize. Both show their characters now.

• Teams given Halo 3's characters by game options play as them. Teams whose game options give them Halo 3's characters now spawn as the Spartan or Elite the options choose, or as the player's own Halo 3 look, instead of the character they picked from a mod.

• Typing in the Forge menu no longer sets off Forge keys. A box in the Forge menu lost the letters and digits that Forge keys are bound to. Typing 2 into a position box closed the menu, because 2 opens Object properties, and X closed it from the search. Now a box you are typing in takes every letter, digit and symbol. Escape still closes the menu. On the Objects tab the search starts with the first letter you type, and until then the Forge menu keys close the menu as before.

  Searching for objects also narrows the list for every letter now. Before, letters such as "red" listed every object.

• Forge objects no longer vanish on maps with many frozen objects. On a map with a couple of thousand frozen objects, an object you placed or moved in Forge could disappear from view. It was still there: players bumped into it, and saving the map kept it, so it came back when the map was loaded again. The game had run out of room to note where in the map each object stands, and an object it couldn't note was never drawn. That room is now sixteen times larger, enough for a full 5,000 frozen objects beside everything else, and frozen objects always leave the rest of the game the room it had before.

  • Up to 3,072 objects in view are now drawn at once instead of 768, so looking across a map built with thousands of objects no longer makes pieces disappear and come back as you turn.
  • This also fixes the game keeping track of objects past the first 2,048 in memory meant for other objects, which in games with that many objects could make some of them be drawn or found wrongly.
  • Films recorded and campaign games saved by earlier versions still play back and continue. A film plays back with the room the game had when it was recorded, so it plays out just as it did.

• Menus and loading screens no longer tear. With Frame-rate limit at No limit and VSync off, the menus and the map loading screen could flicker, cut across by horizontal lines wherever they changed, mostly on G-SYNC and FreeSync displays and in exclusive fullscreen. Menus and loading screens now wait for your display's refresh, as with VSync on, whatever your settings. Games keep your frame-rate limit and VSync setting.

• Halo 3: ODST's audio logs and clues no longer close the game. In Mombasa Streets, using a phone booth or one of the other audio log terminals around the city closed the game, and so did finding one of the clues that lead to a flashback mission, as its cutscene began. In co-op, the host's game closed and took everyone's with it. Both work now.

• The server console lists Firefight scores. On an ODST server, players in the server console left out each player's score and kills/deaths, which Halo 3 servers show during a game. It now shows them in Firefight (and in a campaign with scoring on), as ODST's own scoring keeps them.

• Discord groups the players of a Halo 3: ODST game. On Discord, players who joined an ODST co-op or Firefight game now show in the same party as its host, with Join for others when the server is listed, as in Halo 3's games. Before, each player who joined showed in a party of their own.

• Halo 3: ODST plays from the menu in exclusive fullscreen again. In 0.9.19 and 0.9.20, with Settings → Graphics → Display mode set to Exclusive fullscreen, the game closed as soon as a game of Halo 3: ODST started from Halo 3's menu, whether a campaign mission or Firefight, and again when one returned to the menu or moved on to its next mission. These now play on, and each game goes back to exclusive fullscreen once it's up.

• Friendly fire off works in Halo 3: ODST's Firefight. Host Settings > Friendly fire off kept players from hurting each other in ODST's campaign but not in Firefight, where the setting showed and did nothing. In a Firefight game it now stops players from damaging each other, as in Halo 3's games and ODST's campaign; dedicated servers' friendly_fire = false too.

• Halo 3: ODST follows the HUD settings. Settings > Hide helmet visor and Crosshair size (with Scale crosshair with FOV) changed only Halo 3's HUD. They now apply in ODST's campaign and Firefight too: the frame of the trooper's helmet can be hidden, and the crosshair is drawn at your size. ODST's HUD also reaches as close to the screen's edges as Halo 3's does, instead of the retail game's narrower frame. In a vehicle's third-person view, ODST's crosshair keeps your on-foot size.

• Halo 3: ODST's co-op lobby has Customize and names its host. ODST's co-op lobby has CUSTOMIZE beside SETTINGS, as Halo 3's lobby does: change your trooper in Looks while you wait, and you play as it once the host starts. Players who joined see who hosts the game under its name, as in Halo 3's lobby.

• Halo 3: ODST's co-op lobby starts as Halo 3's does. In an ODST co-op lobby, the host can cancel the countdown by choosing it, as in Halo 3's lobby. While the game starts, the lobby's choices can't be changed: before, a mission, difficulty or Network change made then looked applied but the game started without it. Start game waits for what Halo 3's lobby waits for, and the lobby's status and anything that went wrong show under it. Host Settings open with the lobby's current settings: they could show an older draft, which Apply changes then put back, undoing a Network change.

• Lower weapon works in Halo 3: ODST's games. The Lower weapon key and button (unbound unless you set them) lowered and raised your weapon only in Halo 3's games and did nothing in ODST's. They now work in ODST's campaign and Firefight too, for split-screen players as well. As in Halo 3, firing, melee or a grenade raises the weapon again.

• Max ping is back in Host Settings for Halo 3: ODST's games. Host Settings in an ODST co-op or Firefight lobby had no Max ping, though Halo 3's lobby has it. A limit set in Halo 3's Host Settings still turned players away from ODST's games, with no way to see or change it there. ODST's Host Settings show Max ping again (from 50 to 500 ms, or No limit), and it works as in Halo 3: players whose ping is over the limit as they join are told so and can't join, and the Server Browser shows the limit.

• Proximity voice and chat work in Halo 3: ODST's games. In an ODST co-op or Firefight game, proximity voice (N by default) and proximity chat reached nobody, though the Game Menu and Host Settings offered them: the game never said where its players were. Players near each other now hear and read each other as in Halo 3's games, from where they are in the world, inside vehicles too.

• Halo 3: ODST's Game Menu has the Server Browser. ODST's Game Menu has SERVER BROWSER, as Halo 3's does. ODST's game runs on its own engine, so the browser opens on Halo 3's menu: choosing it asks first, then leaves the game for the browser, where you pick the next server.

• Halo 3: ODST servers take the remote console's game commands and keep their moderation. On a Halo 3: ODST server, the remote console's map, mode, load and nextmap answered that a game was queued, and stopped the lobby's countdown, but nothing changed. They now switch between ODST's missions and Firefight maps (maps and modes list them): in the lobby at once, otherwise for the next lobby. endgame and votes to end the game end it, its players moving to the next lobby. status says where the game stands, and configuration reloads apply as on Halo 3's servers rather than with the next game. A server's mutes, kick waits, vote cooldowns and the console's servername, password and maxping carry from one game to the next, as on Halo 3's servers. An odst = { … } setting whose modifiers turn on third person, which is Halo 3's, or Firefight with modifiers, is refused rather than ignored.

• Split-screen players in Halo 3: ODST's games: Start, rumble and notices. In an ODST game, a split-screen player's Start now opens the Game Menu, their controller rumbles as the game asks, and notices about split-screen players coming and going show over the lobby and menus, as in Halo 3's games. Before, only the first player's controller did either, and the notices never showed.

• Talking players and faded names in Halo 3: ODST's games. In ODST's co-op and Firefight games, a player talking over voice chat shows the speaker icon beside their name over their head, as in Halo 3's games, and Settings > Fade distant player labels fades the names of far-away players there too.

• Halo 3: ODST's games show who is talking. In an ODST co-op or Firefight game, the top-left corner didn't show who was talking, as it does in Halo 3's games. It does now: a line for each player talking, you included, with their name and emblem.

• Vote with F5 and F6 in Halo 3: ODST's games. In an ODST co-op or Firefight game, the vote keys (F5 and F6 by default) did nothing: a vote to kick showed with its keys, but could only be answered from the Game Menu. They answer it now, in the lobby and in play, as in Halo 3's games, and the game itself no longer sees them or the chat keys.

• Weapon position settings apply in Halo 3: ODST. Settings' weapon position offsets (for all weapons, or one weapon at a time) moved the first-person weapon in Halo 3's games but not in ODST's. They apply in ODST now too, split-screen players' own included.

• Two character mods with same-named parts no longer crash a game. Character mods that ship parts under the same names, such as RAMP Spartan and Reach Spartan, shared those parts in a game with both, which crashed the game while it drew a character. Each mod now keeps its own.

• Players in big third-person games stay in third person. In games of more than about a dozen players whose mode puts players in third person, such as UNSC vs Covenant, players' views no longer flick to first person and back for a moment, and their characters no longer briefly lose their class's size.

Install

The game client requires Halo: The Master Chief Collection with Halo 3 installed; no game files are included.

Double-click project-reclaimer-client-v0.9.21.exe to start the game. It finds Halo 3 in any Steam library and opens without a console window; its log is Documents\My Games\Project Reclaimer\Logs\client.log.

For remote server administration, double-click reclaimer-rcon-v0.9.21.exe, enter the host, RCON port and password, and connect. The RCON client needs no game installation. See the attached RCON.md for setup and commands.

To make a customization mod, double-click reclaimer-customization-editor-v0.9.21.exe, open the mod's folder and pick each player character's armor, colors and camera bones. It writes the mod's customization.json.