Unreal Tournament 2004
From MonsterLANWiki
Also known simply as UT2004, Unreal Tournament 2004 is Multiplayer based First Person Shooter developed by EPIC games and Digital Extremes as a joint venture following the release of Unreal Tournament 2003. UT2004 is the third game in the UT series, released in Australia in March of 2004.
For a thorough run down on it's history and makeup, check out Wikipedia UT2004.
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UT2004 @ MonsterLAN
In one form or another UT2004 has been present at every single ML event since it's release. Tournaments have been held in DM, TDM, CTF, ONS, and shortly even Clan Arena.
Tourament Play
When running a tournament for UT2004 it is almost an absolute requirement to utilise the UTComp mutator. This will assist in inumerable ways and just generally make life better for tournament admin and player alike.
Server Configuration
It is necessary to pre-configure servers for UT2004 when running a tournament. This is best done by editing an initialisation file and then triggering the server with that ini file. By default there will be a Default.ini file within the UT2004/System directory which will perform admirably as a starting point for the tournament configuration.
To begin with it is best to create a copy of this file. Due to the nature of the information in the file and that which is exposed to the command line to be adjusted during a trigger, it is necessary to put server identification information in the ini file. So a seperate ini file will eventually be created for each server instance that will be run during the tournament. Keep in mind these are game server instances, not physical server instances.
Much of the ini file is machine/client specific data that is used when a local game client or listen server is created (things like render settings and so forth) as is thus irrelevant to a dedicated server. However it harms nothing for it to be left in there and also helps to make the file useable during testing on a local instance listen instance of the game.
Server Scripts
This is the windows batch file used to start the UT2004 servers. It is placed in the MLComp directory under the "/UT2004/System/MLComp/" where the server ini files are also kept.
@echo off rem // variable 1 is the server number. // rem // variable 2 is the round number. // rem // Using 0 for both will trigger the public server. // :servercheck rem // which server should we start? // IF %1 == 1 GOTO roundcheck IF %1 == 2 GOTO roundcheck IF %1 == 3 GOTO roundcheck IF %1 == 4 GOTO roundcheck IF %1 == 5 GOTO roundcheck IF %1 == 6 GOTO roundcheck GOTO else :roundcheck rem // which round should we start? // IF %2 == 1 GOTO roundone IF %2 == 2 GOTO roundtwo IF %2 == 3 GOTO roundthree IF %2 == 4 GOTO roundfour IF %2 == 5 GOTO roundfive IF %2 == 6 GOTO roundsix GOTO else :roundone echo ::: STARTING SERVER %1 - ROUND %2 ::: cd .. start /high ucc server ONS-Torlan?LinkSetup=Default?BonusVehicles=false?Game=Onslaught.ONSOnslaughtGame?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=False?NumBots=0 -lanplay -server -log=server%1.log -ini=MLComp/Match%1.ini -port=770%1 cd MLComp GOTO end :roundtwo echo ::: STARTING SERVER %1 - ROUND %2 ::: cd .. start /high ucc server ONS-Dawn?LinkSetup=Default?BonusVehicles=false?Game=Onslaught.ONSOnslaughtGame?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=False?NumBots=0 -lanplay -server -log=server%1.log -ini=MLComp/Match%1.ini -port=770%1 cd MLComp GOTO end :roundthree echo ::: STARTING SERVER %1 - ROUND %2 ::: cd .. start /high ucc server ONS-Primeval?LinkSetup=Default?BonusVehicles=false?Game=Onslaught.ONSOnslaughtGame?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=False?NumBots=0 -lanplay -server -log=server%1.log -ini=MLComp/Match%1.ini -port=770%1 cd MLComp GOTO end :roundfour echo ::: STARTING SERVER %1 - ROUND %2 ::: cd .. start /high ucc server ONS-RedPlanet?LinkSetup=Default?BonusVehicles=false?Game=Onslaught.ONSOnslaughtGame?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=False?NumBots=0 -lanplay -server -log=server%1.log -ini=MLComp/Match%1.ini -port=770%1 cd MLComp GOTO end :roundfive echo ::: STARTING SERVER %1 - ROUND %2 ::: cd .. start /high ucc server ONS-ArcticStronghold?LinkSetup=Default?BonusVehicles=false?Game=Onslaught.ONSOnslaughtGame?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=False?NumBots=0 -lanplay -server -log=server%1.log -ini=MLComp/Match%1.ini -port=770%1 cd MLComp GOTO end :roundsix echo ::: STARTING SERVER %1 - ROUND %2 ::: cd .. start /high ucc server ONS-Crossfire?LinkSetup=Default?BonusVehicles=false?Game=Onslaught.ONSOnslaughtGame?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=False?NumBots=0 -lanplay -server -log=server%1.log -ini=MLComp/Match%1.ini -port=770%1 cd MLComp GOTO end :else echo ::: STARTING PUBLIC SERVER ::: cd .. start /high ucc server DM-DE-Grendelkeep?BonusVehicles=false?Game=XGame.xDeathMatch?Mutator=XWeapons.MutNoSuperWeapon,utcompv16a.MutUTComp?RedTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Hellions?BlueTeamSymbol=TeamSymbols_UT2004.Team.Skaarj?bAutoNumBots=True?NumBots=2 -lanplay -server -log=public.log -ini=MLComp/Public.ini -port=7701 cd MLComp GOTO end :end echo ::: BATCH FILE COMPLETE :::
Server Packages
The first section needing to be adjusted is the [Engine.GameEngine] area. It is necessary to ensure that the UTComp mutator was correctly installed. If so there should be a ServerPackages=utcompv16a line within the server package declarations (note that the specific version of utcomp may be different). Without this the server will not accept any UTComp commands or allow you to use it as a mutator other than server side only restarts and so on. Likewise clients will not be able to stream any client specific data down from the mutator as it will not show up as a package for them.
Uplinks & Advertising
The next section to be examined is the [IpDrv.MasterServerUplink] area. This section details how you server plays with others in a network. Whether it will 'uplink' to a master server; this determines whether the server information should be published to EPIC's server data repository, allowing internet users to quickly receieve information about it and join in the browser. Also whether the server data should be sent to GameSpys' master servers for the same reason. And the last relevant attribute is whether the server should try to broadcast it's availability across the LAN.
In our case we do not want any of the uplinks to be running, as under no circumstances should internet players be allowed into the tournament. And we would to ensure that the LAN broadcast is active, otherwise LAN players will not see the server in their server browser.
Replication
Next we need to setup how the server will appear to our clients, this is set under the [Engine.GameReplicationInfo] section. What follows is an example of a server's replication information for a MonsterLAN tournament.
[Engine.GameReplicationInfo] ServerName=MonsterLAN UT2004 Comp (Server 2) ShortName=UT2 Server ServerRegion=0 AdminName=Rogue AdminEmail=rogue_2005@hotmail.com MessageOfTheDay=MonsterLAN UT2004 CTF 5v5 Comp|SERVER TWO|.:.|Make sure you are in the correct server!
As you can see the server number is entered several times in an effort to make players blatently away of which server they are in. This is vital as many players are quite clueless, so need as much encouragement as they can get.
Web Control
If you would like the ability to administer your server through a web interface - something which is especially useful for seeing the players currently in a game, kicking players, banning players, unbanning players, changing maps, etc all without needing to use a UT2004 client - then you will need to enable it in the [UWeb.WebServer] section. Simply set the bEnabled=False switch to True.
Basic game settings
Oddly there appears to be a section which contains game settings that are used for practice games/singleplayer yet are also used partially for servers and other mutiplayer games. They are located in the [Engine.GameInfo] section. The important values are as follows.
MaxSpectators=4 MaxPlayers=12 GameSpeed=1.000000 bChangeLevels=False bStartUpLocked=False bNoBots=True bAttractAlwaysFirstPerson=False TimeLimit=0 GoalScore=0 MaxIdleTime=0.000000 bAllowBehindView=False bAdminCanPause=True bWeaponShouldViewShake=True
Here is where the player caps for clients and spectators are set. Always allow at least 2 spectator slots so that a machine connected to the projector can jump in and scope out the action. Likewise even for a 5v5 game, always leave one or two extra players slots so that when clueless players join the wrong server they don't prevent real team members from joining.
Keep in mind that some of these settings appear to be overwritten by the gametype specific ones lower, but it doesn't hurt reiterating them here. Most are pretty self explanatory.
External Links
Categories: FPS | Tournaments | Games
