GMod, also known as Garry's Mod, is a "sandbox" mod for the first-person shooter computer game Half-Life 2. It allows the player to manipulate objects, often with interesting results thanks to the game's Havok physics engine. This includes any object that has physical properties, ranging from cinder blocks and seagulls to decrepit automobiles and washing machines and much more. The construction of complex machines within the game could be said to be a contemporary spin on the Rube Goldberg machine principle.Features (as of version 9.0)
GMod, a successor to the throne of the original JBMod (which has been updated, just not very well since the release of Gmod), is a simple modification created by Garry Newman. While it does not have any actual gameplay value (before version 9), it functions as a huge sandbox, where the player is free to manipulate most of the objects and features of the Source engine. This has allowed an extensive community to build up and creating mini-games with Gmod, therefore creating a "Game in a Game" of sorts.
A key note for those who wish to download gmod one must have Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Deathmatch, and Counter Strike: Source downloaded within their Steam account.
- The ragdoll poser is, according to members of the GMod community, the feature that boosted GMod in popularity in the beginning. The tool, which allows ragdolls to be manipulated and frozen in midair, has led the way to various comedic pictures and very popular comic strips.
- The face gun gives the player the ability to adjust the faces of ragdolls and NPCs, and was first added in version 6a.
- The paint gun is a tool which gives the player the ability to paint blood, bird excrement, beer splash, alien blood, and other substances onto different surfaces such as walls, objects, and ragdolls.
- The player can bring items into the sandbox by using the spawn menu. This menu gives the player access to every single physical object and character ragdoll in the game.
- The camera does not only make it simpler to take good screenshots, it also has the ability to change the depth of field — a blur effect that simulates how a camera focuses. There are several levels of blurs ranging from "too much heroin" to "subtle". It should be noted that not all graphics cards support this feature.
- Players can also rope or weld objects together, create pulleys between objects, put objects on an axis, and create ball-socket joints with objects.
- The balloon gun attaches floating balloons to all kinds of objects. There are several different grades of balloons, varying in how strong of an upward force the balloon has. The balloons themselves are watermelons that have been altered to fall upwards, i.e. as if they were filled with helium. They've also had their appearance altered so they look like actual balloons, as opposed to previous versions where they were merely watermelons with different colors.
- The thruster gun attaches thrusters that can be controlled by the numpad. This is how moving vehicles are made.
- The wheel gun attaches rotating wheels to objects and ragdolls. Once applied, the player can control the direction of the wheels. There are many different kinds of wheels, ranging from actual car tires to sawblades.
- Due to the many different combinations of objects and controls, a large community has developed for GMod. Many different "Mini Mods" have been made including the incredibly popular "Wood Wars." The player makes a drivable vehicle out of wood, thrusters, and any other objects, be it air or land, and then add weapons. Weapons can be made up of anything, from gas canisters with thrusters on, to shells launched from "home made" cannons. This amazingly varied use of the mod has sprung up to hundreds of mini-games like Wood Wars. The current version of GMod contains lua scripting, which allows custom gametypes, greatly increasing its versatility.
- GMod is now being used as a powerful map editor, thanks to many plug-ins from various programmers, "mappers" have been using GMod to add furniture and small items to their maps. This lets them graphically interact with their map, and place small items and various effects through a 'physical' 1st person interface, much easier then with "Hammer" the Source engine's SDK
[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for GMod ]
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