| Blockland Classic Mod | |
|---|---|
 Poster of Blockland Classic Mod | |
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Creator(s): |
Eric "Badspot" Hartman |
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First release: |
17 July 2015 |
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Engine: |
Torque Game Engine 1.5.2 |
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Current release: |
12 (released 16 June 2018) |
Blockland Classic Mod, also called BCM or Blockland Classic, is a heavily modified modification for Blockland Vanilla. It was made by Dennis Lamers and first released on 17 July 2015.
History[]
Years ago, Return To Blockland was abandoned. It was played by hundreds of players between 2005 and 2007. After the release of Blockland Retail, Return To Blockland decayed away and became a modification for Blockland Retail including a new add-on system, features and much more.
Blockland Classic Mod - Final development
A teaser before version 5 was released, known as 'the big upgrade'
On 5 February 2012, Kompressor announced to remove the interior and terrain maps from Blockland Retail. Many people protested against this but the plans went on and in August 2012 the new shadows and shaders update was released. This was the point where Blockland veterans began to leave the game.
Development[]
The idea to make a modern modification for Blockland Vanilla came from Blockland users who wanted to have terrain and interiors maps back. Changing Blockland Vanilla to a much more modern look wouldn't only make Blockland Vanilla attractive but it would also blast a new life into the old game.
The first phase was to edit Return To Blockland to a modern mod, keeping all of it's original features. The first phase was abandoned and quickly the Blockland Mods 1.6 was used to build the Blockland Classic Mod on. Blockland Mods is a very clean edit of Blockland Vanilla with basic features such as saving/loading persistence, bricks inventory and weapons. From this point the progress started in early July 2015.
The Big Upgrade[]
Version 5, or also called the big upgrade, is a version that was currently in heavy development. Most of the problems that occurred in the original Blockland Vanilla like crashes and lag was solved. The big upgrade also stood for porting the older Blockland Vanilla version to the latest version of Torque Game Engine (1.5.2). New features like a modern Mission Editor and GUI Editor made it easier for people to edit/create GUI's (Graphical User Interface) or maps.
Quickly after the release of version 5, version 6 and 7 followed.
The Big Change[]
A classic city made by a player.
Version 7 was named the big change, a lot of fixes and features were added. Since the release of version 7, Blockland Classic Mod is now the most modern and best modification out there after Return To Blockland 1.045.
- The player model, hammer and spray can were updated
- Saving and loading builds was fixed
- Hammer and spray can removed in all maps and can be used with the hotkey Q and R, these tools must be enabled in the Administrator menu first
- Floating bricks enabled by default
- Roads, 32x32 building plate, seat, pine tree, 1x1 glass brick, and much more bricks added
- Hat items work now
- Army Helmet and Afro hat item updated by Vitawrap
Blockland Classic Mod - Official Trailer
Ultra Improvement[]
Version 9 and 10 was given the name ultra improvement by the introduction of Add-Ons, new features, sounds and fixes. Making and executing Add-Ons became easier, more sounds were introduced, save builds could be loaded into any map, map lighting was fixed up, jetpack, escape menu, confirm messages to take action to clear bricks and much more.
Chill-out Update[]
Version 12 was released on 16 June 2018, introducing yet again new features such as new chathud, Bedroom and Kitchen maps. Ever since the original Kitchen and Bedroom was kept in game from Blockland Vanilla, the interiors were too old and lacked a lot of detail.
Action was taken immediately to introduce a brand new Bedroom and Kitchen in the Chill-out Update. A new big feature was the way of saving and loading builds. Players can see a list of saved builds in game in a list with preview image.
Gameplay[]
Blockland Classic Mod is a non-linear (modification) game with no set goals, giving players the freedom to design and construct elaborate structures. Styled as a tiny mini figure, players build inside of the virtual world using bricks reminiscent of toy blocks. These structures can be built in either a single-player or multiplayer (either online or through a local area network) setting.
Massive city build in Nations RP server.
With tools such as a hammer and spraycan the player can color bricks or destroy misplaced bricks.
Future of Blockland Classic Mod[]
The large Fallout Heerlen map build in Blockland Classic Mod by using Torque Constructor.
Since the release of version 9, ALL scripts were secured into .DSO files to protect the game from stealing. This was the first step in making the standalone modification superior to other Vanilla modifications. There were modifications for Vanilla in the past that had hidden scripts inside the secured DSO files to execute commands to remove Return To Blockland, tracking logs of people who bought Blockland Retail or becoming an administrator on the server of players.
Blockland Classic doesn't contain any harmful scripts and it gives people the freedom to make and execute their Add-Ons faster and above all, having full control of their own server
Bricks lag[]
Back in the old days of Blockland Vanilla, building cities with a lot of bricks was painful. As bricks were static shapes, they caused a lag when there were 900 bricks placed in the server. There have been plans for a long time to solve the brick lag by generating them as rectangles in the engine and caching it into a file, instead of the map. Research began in mid 2016 by understanding how Blockland Retail generates a brick as a series of rectangles, caching the brick into a file and loads it into the server.
To the present day it is still unknown how Eric Hartman and Kompressor solved the problem in the engine source.
Sounds[]
Since the introduction of version 9 and 10, sounds have become an important feature in the game. It makes the game pretty alive and resembles the earlier years of Blockland Retail.
Big maps[]
Since the beginning of Blockland Classic Mod in The Big Upgrade version, two big maps were in development.
Doradus Universe[]
Doradus Universe was actually a map build in 2012 for Peekarica. It was never released to the public and was put on the dust shelf for later use. When Blockland Classic Mod upgraded to the latest Torque Game Engine version, exporting Torque Constructor models into the game became possible. The Doradus Map was quickly digged out of the dust, improved with new high defination textures and released to the public. It has become a favourite map by people who played The Planets map in Blockland Retail.
Fallout Heerlen - The 100 intro
Fallout Heerlen[]
The development of Fallout Heerlen began in late December 2015 before version 5 of Blockland Classic Mod was released to the public. The map survived a lot of versions and is still in massive development. In the map, the player explores one of the many abandoned cities after World War III. Heerlen has been devastated by the massive nuclear war, buildings have been decayed and it's up to the player to rebuild the civilization in a new world full of dangers.
The map contains a lot of easter eggs and even comes with a pre-war map of Heerlen. Spoken about Fallout Heerlen, the release dates have been delayed many times. The more times it was delayed, the more beautiful screenshots were released how the map improves over time.
Community[]
The Blockland Classic Mod community is still a small amount of players who actually support the project too. Despite of advertising the game, the hundreds of download hits, the game hasn't grown out to a large commnity yet. With the release of version 10 it should give players the best Blockland experience.