Review: Translocam

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Jesco

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Jul 7, 2001
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[ Transcript of review for Translocam | Posted by Jesco on 2002-11-02 | Score: 9 ]
Don't you ever wish you could be in more than one place at a time whilst playing UT? Don't you just hate waiting for a powerup to respawn, only to go back and find it respawned long ago and was taken again? Well, your worries are now over, with your own personal Translocam prototype 100! This mod adds a video feed from the translocator disc to the player- perfect for keeping an eye on whatever you want. The translocator will still function as it used to, so you can still use it to teleport.

This mod was originally developed long ago for use with the demo version of Unreal Tournament(!). However, I've never used it in the demo, and it works perfectly respectably in the full version, so why not let this little gem have it's share of the limelight before it becomes totally obselete with the advent of UT2003?

Setting up this mod is as simple as dropping the Umod file into your Umod installer, starting up UT, and then selecting the mutator from the mutator list. I know this sounds stupid, as it's how mutators are supposed to work, but after the number of mutators I've seen which have been unnecesarily complicated, it's a pleasure to find one which installs so easily, with the minimum amout of fuss.

Once in game, the video feed is not visible until you select your Translocator. This keeps you from being distracted whilst you are using another weapon, but I'd still like to see an option to switch your Translocam on and off. When you select the Translocator, a small box for the video feed appears in the top left hand corner of your screen. I'm not overly happy about the positioning of the video feed, as it obstructs the speech box. It would be nice to be able to chose where it should appear.

Before you throw the Translocator disc, the feedback screen is fuzzy, like a badly-tuned TV. Once you have launched the disc, it relays video feed from it's location to the box on screen. Since you can't guarantee that the translocator disc will land facing the way you want it to, you can remotely control the direction in which it points. To do this, you simply switch to the Translocator, and crouch. Now when you move your mouse, the Translocam's point of view will move instead of your's. This may sound complicated, but once you get used to it, there's no better system.

Should your Translocam become damaged, it will flash a warning at you via the feedback screen, so you know not to try to teleport. This is useful, though I think the warning could stay a little longer.

I have a couple of other gripes, though they're not exactly game-stopping. Firstly, when you are holding the translocator, lights appear in weird places- see the screenshot taken behind a crate on the top deck of DM-Deck16][. Secondly, the resoloution of the video feedback is a little small. It's difficult to make out what's what sometimes. It would be nice to be able to zoom in and out using a couple of keys. Of course, the further you enlarged the box, the less you'd be able to see of your own screen... Lastly, when playing with the Translocam mutator, you can't change your HUD settings.

Overall, it's very good. A nice concept, and fairly well designed. Some more additional features such as those mentioned would improve it greatly. Those bugs should be fixed too- they're not too noticeable, but it would be nice to have them out of the way. Considering it was designed for the demo version of Unreal Tournament, it's done quite well.

-Doobin.