Differences between best versions for WON and Steam?

Starting this topic for two reasons, one because several runners have requested a mod or something to be made that replicates the best WON version (1107 for HL, 1104 for OF, 1001 for BS) but can be used with NGHL or Steam in order to set a more ‘legit’ standard for runs with the ability to record continuous demos and have better load times etc. Secondly because I think it’d be useful to have a list of differences between the two official engines/versions for future reference and to help runners decide which to use by knowing the potential of each.

I’ll start off by listing some differences I’ve noticed, then others can contribute. Notes with (?) marks next to them either need explaining in further detail or are questionable.

[Engine] = Difference is based on the engine
[DLL] = Difference is based on the client/server DLL

**Half-Life (1.1.0.7 vs 6153)
**
[ul][li]Unlimited FPS in Steam, capped to 100 in WON (fps_max) [Engine][/li]
[li]Crowbar is stronger on the first hit in WON, the second hit within 1.25s will be half the damage [DLL][/li]
[li]Uncapped bunnyhop in WON, capped in Steam [DLL][/li]
[li]Quickgauss trick exclusive to Steam [DLL][/li]
[li]Demo recording uninterrupted by level transitions in Steam, interrupted in WON [Engine][/li]
[li]Switching to satchels has a longer delay in WON [DLL][/li]
[li]Soldier AI differs (example: at IHD, in Steam you can use the ARNade through the window to scare the soldier, in WON you can only use the handgrenade throw through doorway)[/li][/ul]
Other notes:

• WON DLLs are compatible with both NGHL and Steam builds.
• 501fps slowdown trick in Steam not working since February 2013, but in turn there is unlimited fps.

**Opposing Force (1.1.0.4 vs 6153)
**
[ul][li]Unlimited FPS in Steam, capped to 100 in WON (fps_max) [Engine][/li]
[li]Reduced maxspeed is slower to take effect when crouching in Steam than in WON [DLL][/li]
[li]Wrench is stronger on the first hit in WON, the second hit within 1.25s will be half the damage [DLL][/li]
[li]M249 reloading glitch exclusive to WON [DLL][/li]
[li]Uncapped bunnyhop in WON, capped in Steam [DLL][/li]
[li]Solid tripmines exclusive to WON [DLL][/li]
[li]Demo recording uninterrupted by level transitions in Steam, interrupted in WON [Engine][/li]
[li]Switching to satchels has a longer delay in WON [DLL][/li]
[li]AR grenades disappear after saving and loading in Steam, but not in WON [DLL][/li][/ul]
Other notes:

• WON DLLs are compatible with both NGHL and Steam builds.
• 501fps slowdown trick in Steam not working since February 2013, but in turn there is unlimited fps.

**Blue Shift (1.0.0.1 vs 6153)
**
[ul][li]Unlimited FPS in Steam, capped to 72 in WON (fps_single) [Engine][/li]
[li]Uncapped bunnyhop in WON, capped in Steam [DLL][/li]
[li]Demo recording uninterrupted by level transitions in Steam, interrupted in WON [Engine][/li]
[li]WON version is a standalone game that runs by itself, Steam version runs as a ‘mod’ under original Half-Life just like Opposing Force.[/li]
[li]Crowbar is stronger on the first hit in WON, the second hit within 1.25s will be half the damage [DLL][/li]
[li]Switching to satchels has a longer delay in WON [DLL][/li][/ul]
Other notes:

• WON DLLs are not compatible with either NGHL or Steam builds.
• 501fps slowdown trick in Steam not working since February 2013, but in turn there is unlimited fps.

Bunnymod note: Continuous gauss and grenade charging through transitions does not exist in any official version.

Clarification on this one, in post-WON versions (HLSDK 2.3 already has the issue) they introduced a bug where no crowbar hit registers as the first one, so every crowbar hit gets the lowered damage.

SMG obviously is much accurate in WON than in Steam
Steam:

800×600 39.8 KB

800×600 40.2 KB

Just a WON/Steam separation will be tricky since there is dozens of versions of both WON and Steam. Gotta make sure we refer to the same versions.

1107 for HLWON (1104 for OF, 1001 for BS), 6027 for Steam (since it’s the latest that still has _special)?

You might want to note this as well: the 501fps slowdown trick no longer works on steam since February 2013. This is actually the price you pay for unlimited fps, due to the way valve implemented things.

Not in 4554 though.

Seeing as NGHL is just an older Steam build, which build is it?

NGHL is 3248. You can find out by inputting “version” in the console.

According to this, 4554 was released before 2013. If you do not update it then of course things will not automatically change by themselves. I don’t think it has unlimited fps either.

Looks like this applies to Opposing Force’s wrench too, as well as Blue Shift’s crowbar.

Tested this a few times, didn’t notice any difference, perhaps it has something to do with your framerate (you’re using 60fps in Steam and 83fps in WON)? If not, which WON version are you using there? I didn’t notice it in 1107.

After doing some testing, discovered that WON DLLs are compatible with both NGHL and Steam builds in Half-Life and Opposing Force. However this is not the case with Blue Shift, presumably because it ran as it’s own standalone game and so has some differences of it’s own when compared with the other WON games anyway.
[hr]

It would be useful to know differences in other versions, something along the lines of patch notes.
For example in 1.00 you can quick reload by switching weapons twice during a reload, mostly just useful for the RPG. Quad and I decided this wasn’t worth including/preserving in the version we used for HL21 since it was such an early bug most players never got to experience it, kind of separating itself from the bulk of the hours communities experienced playing this game and its mods, 1998-2004, it was barely useful as well, ie. didn’t add much or have many pros associated with it.

Also pretty sure the crowbar first hit damage was reduced from 12 to 10 in patch 1.08. We decided to preserve this as 12 since it makes runs notably faster, smoother and more enjoyable for players and viewers. (first 2 panes of glass mostly) Also, there was no reason this damage needed to be changed or nerfed, if anything good game design would have wanted it a tad higher, so why go along with a random Valve employee’s choice to modify poorly.

In one of the early patches OP4 trip mines had their collision detection removed. (1.04?)

And generally later versions were less prone to randomly crashing; though, I believe it was due some poor steam builds around 2004-2007 that caused crashes nearly ever time when waiting for portal to xen to load or approaching the 2 sets of tentacles after Gargantua on interloper. There’s also no mouse cursor permanently stuck in middle of screen bug in any steam version but is possible in every WON version. Maps load much faster every WON version compared to any steam version, and the steam version loading times very quite a bit with the ones from ~2005-2011 being extremely slow, not sure about newest versions since valve actually starting “trying” to “fix” some things in their old games. cough they pretty much just did more harm than good.

In a patch where Valve introduced the weapon prediction system, they overlooked an impact the said system had on the crowbar code which lead to no crowbar hit registering as the first one (and the first hit is the one getting the full damage, every consequent hit (before +attack is released) gets half of the original damage) which made the default crowbar damage of 10 (which never changed) not enough to break the said glass (which has 15 HP, and, considering that breakables get twice as high damage from the crowbar, while 10 * 2 = 20 damage is enough to break it, 5 * 2 = 10 is not).