Monolith Productions - Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

lost_soul on 8/9/2012 at 02:52

Yep, both games had SDKs. I've spent time playing with both of them but I never produced anything of quality. There were a reasonable amount of multiplayer maps made (nowhere near a Quake/Unreal), and a couple of single-player missions released as well.

There was a fansite that had all of the mods and stuff, but it disappeared a wile ago.

The SDKs also included full documentation, which was very helpful. There were sample maps released as well. Its a shame when you think about the devs' effort to create that stuff and 90% of the players never touched it.

redrain85 on 8/9/2012 at 04:38

Interestingly, the games were referred to (internally at Monolith) as: The Operative and The Operative 2. So that might be the title they would end up with for another follow-up. "Cate Archer in The Operative", or "The Operative starring Cate Archer".

Quote Posted by lost_soul

Also, whats the story with source code? I seem to recall that some code was released for NOLF and NOLF 2. Was it just the game logic and not the engine? Perhaps they could release Lithtech's source code?

Partial source code came with the NOLF SDKs. The full source code to NOLF 2 was leaked, and you might be able to find it if you scour the internet. But it's illegal to have in your possession.

The same happened for Aliens vs. Predator 2, although in that case: Sierra released it themselves by mistake. Somebody's head must have rolled for that.

Quote Posted by lost_soul

The SDKs also included full documentation, which was very helpful.

Sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with that statement. Virtually all the SDKs released by Monolith for their games, were pretty terrible. Which leads to . . .

Quote Posted by lost_soul

Its a shame when you think about the devs' effort to create that stuff and 90% of the players never touched it.

The reason why 90% of the players never touched it is - again - because the SDKs were terrible.

It wasn't for a lack of wanting to, that fans didn't produce much content for Monolith titles. It's because the tools, sample maps, models, and code were lacking, and the documentation was mostly awful. The only decent SDK they produced was for FEAR, which actually resembled something useful.

Case in point: I've been working on mods for Tron 2.0 on-and-off for almost 10 years, and it's only now that myself and the team I'm part of are finally getting to grips with the engine and producing some decent content for it. We've even had to write our own tools, because the Tron 2.0 SDK was severely lacking and the worst of all of them. It can't even be called an SDK.

If we'd had what we needed 10 years ago, when it really mattered, high-quality fan content could have been released back when 2.0 was new and when people would have appreciated it more. Now we're finally producing some decent content, but it's a little late to help extend the life of the game: considering pretty much everyone has moved on or forgotten it exists. And as you pointed out, sadly, the NOLF community has even packed it in altogether.

P.S. The best single player add-on for NOLF 1 was probably "Showdown", if anyone is interested in fan-made content for the NOLF games. I could also recommend some SP mods for NOLF 2, again if anyone is interested.

henke on 8/9/2012 at 19:12

Quote Posted by redrain85

Interestingly, the games were referred to (internally at Monolith) as: The Operative and The Operative 2

Not just internally, it says "The Operative" right on (http://media.giantbomb.com/uploads/0/1987/692975-nolf_front_smaller_super.jpg) the box cover. They dropped that part of the sequel though.

If they made a third installment I think it'd be cool if it was in third person. Cate is such a distinctive character, and the kind of gameplay the NOLF games have - skulking around and karate-chopping dudes in the neck - would lend itself well to a third person perspective.

Too Much Coffee on 9/9/2012 at 18:40

I agree the "NOLF" label is not necessary to revive Archer and company.

Much like James Bond films, the title could always be different, but the central character is the same, as are many of the themes and secondary characters. NOLF has been away for so long, it's not like many gamers who moved on to consoles are fixated on the "NOLF" title. It's not like it would be naming Call of Duty something else which would make the console world go into meltdown.