Hack 90. Spend Some Time with the Zombies

Undeadlong is a Headlong mod by MrMurder.

MrMurder started modding about a year after Halo came out for the Xbox. He credits tools such as Halomaptools, HaloHackTool, and Spark Edit for sparking (pardon the pun) his interest in Halo modding. He started modding because he wanted to make his own projectiles and make Halo levels less barren. He began with a Sidewinder mod called NightWinder. He spent a good deal of time making NightWinder and then as he learned new things from the modding community he spent an even longer time keeping it updated.

He didn't plan on modding Halo 2 until more tools had been released, but after meeting up with the Uded Clan in the Team Xlink Halo 2 tourney, he found the motivation he needed to start modding Halo 2.

The clan also introduced MrMurder to the Dawn of the Dead game type. MrMurder decided to start modding Halo 2 levels so that they would be better suited to a zombie versus human showdown. He chose a Headlong mod since the name Undeadlong popped into his head and the city in ruins was a perfect place to start. MrMurder uses The Swamp Fox's ADI [Hack #50] utility to mod. He feels that it gives him the most options in a single program.

To create the Undeadlong mod, he added fog to the level. He did this by injecting the [SKY] texture's [Hack #72] metadata from Lockout over Headlong. Then he edited the level's lightmaps using the DDS plug-in for Adobe Photoshop. This gives the city its nighttime effect (see Figure 12-1).

Figure 12-1. The Undeadlong atmosphere

To clarify the division between zombie weapons and human weapons, all of the human weapons are standard projectiles, whereas the zombie weapons are toxic plasma and infection based.

Walking around Undeadlong, you will see that details, such as bits of The Flood and funny signs, have been added here and there (see Figure 12-2).

Download the Undeadlong map from http://files.halomods.com/viewtopic.php?t=24717.

Figure 12-2. Undeadlong fusion cores are toxic