In a typical first-person shooter (FPS) deathmatch session, players connect to a shared
computer network in a
peer-to-peer model or a
client–server model, either locally or over the Internet. Players may also communicate with one another during gameplay, commonly through voice chat systems. Deathmatches have different rules and goals depending on the game, but a common format in FPS games is a free-for-all structure, where each player competes against all others. The game begins with each player being spawned at random locations selected from a predefined set of spawn points. Being spawned entails having the score, health, armor and equipment reset to default values, typically including zero score, full health, no armor, and a basic
firearm along with a melee weapon. After a session has begun, players may join or leave the game dynamically.
Players In this context a
player is either a human-controlled character or a character operated by a computer software
AI commonly referred to as a
bot. Both human players and bots typically share the same base visual model, although in most modern games players may select a
skin, a cosmetic graphics model that operates on the same set of movements as the base model. Human-controlled characters and bots usually share identical physical properties, including initial health, armor, weapon capabilities, available maneuvers, and movement speed, differing only in their control logic. For novice players, the difference between a human opponent and a computer-controlled opponent may be minimal. For experienced players, however, the absence of human decision-making is often noticeable in bot behavior, even when compensated for by enhanced accuracy or reaction speed. However, some systems deliberately inform the player when inspecting the score list which player(s) are bots and which are human (e.g. OpenArena). In the event that the player is aware of the nature of the opponent it will affect the cognitive process of the player regardless of the player's skill. Modern implementations allow for new players to join after the game has started.The maximum number of players is defined by the game, map, and rule set, and is typically configurable by the server. Some maps are designed for small numbers of players, while others support larger player counts.
Deaths The goal for each player is killing the other players by any means possible which counts as a frag, either by direct assault or manipulating the map, the latter counts as a frag in some games, some not; in either case—to attain the highest score—this process should be repeated as many times as possible, with each iteration performed as quickly as possible. The session may have a time limit, a frag limit, or no limit at all. If there is a limit then the player with the most frags will eventually win when the session ends. The health variable will determine if a player is wounded; however, a wounded player does not entail reduced mobility or functionality in most games, and in most games a player will not bleed to death. A player will die when the health value reaches equal to or less than 0, if the value is reduced to a very low negative value, the result may be
gibbing depending upon the game. In most games, when a player dies (i.e. is fragged), the player will lose all equipment gained and the screen will continue to display the visible (still animated) scene that the player normally sees, and the score list is usually displayed—the frags. The display does not go black when the player dies. Usually the player can choose to instantly
respawn or remain dead. The armor variable affects the health variable by reducing the damage taken, the reduction in health is
in concept inversely proportional to the value of the armor times the actual damage caused; with the obvious differences in various implementations. Some games may account for the location of the body injured when the damage is deduced, while many—especially older implementations—do not. In most games, no amount of armor causes any reduced mobility—i.e. is never experienced as a weight issue by the player. The lost equipment (usually not including the armor) of a dead player can usually be picked up by any player (even the fragged player, respawned) who gets to it first.
Simulation Newtonian physics are often only somewhat accurately simulated, common in many games is the ability of the player to modify the player's own vector to some degree while airborne, e.g. by retarding a forward airborne flight by moving backwards, or even jumping around a corner. Other notable concepts derived from the physics of FPS game engines are i.a. at least
bunny-hopping,
strafe-jumping and
rocket-jumping—in all of which the player exploits the particular characteristics of the physics engine in question to obtain a high speed and/or height, or other attribute(s); e.g. with rocket-jumping the player will jump and fire at rocket at the floor area immediately under the feet of the same player, which will cause the player to jump higher compared to a regular jump as a result of the rocket blast (at the obvious expense of the health variable being somewhat reduced from self-inflicted injury). The types of techniques available and how the techniques may be performed by the player differs from the physics implementation as is as such also game dependent. Most modern deathmatch games features a high level of
graphic violence; a normal modern implementation will contain high quality human characters being killed, e.g. moderate amounts of blood, screams of pain and death, exploding bodies with associated
gibs are common. Some games feature a way to disable and/or reduce the level of gore. However, the setting of the game is usually that of a fictional world, the player may resurrect in the form of mentioned
respawning and the characters will usually have superhuman abilities, e.g. able to tolerate numerous
point blank hits from a machine gun directly to the head without any armour, jumping extreme inhuman distances and falling extreme distances to mention a few things. These factors together may make the player experience the game less real as the game contains highly unreal and unrealistic elements.
Powerups All normal maps will contain various
power-ups; i.e. extra health, armor, ammunition and other (more powerful than default) weapons. Once collected by a player the power-up will respawn after a defined time at the same location, the time for an item to respawn depends upon the game mode and the type of the item. In some deathmatch modes power-ups will not respawn at all. Certain power-ups are especially powerful, which can often lead to the game rotating around
controlling power-ups—i.e. all other things being equal, the player who controls the strongest power-ups (collecting the items most often) is the one that will have the best potential for making the best score.
Sessions If the session does have a frag or time limit a new session will start briefly after the current session has been concluded, during the respite the players will be allowed to observe the score list, chat and will usually see an animated
pseudo overview display of the map as background for the score list. Some games have a system to allow each player to announce they are now ready to begin the new session, some do not. The new sessions might be on a different map—based on a map list kept on the server—or it might always be on the same map if there is no such rotating map list. Common in many games is some form of message broadcast and private message system; the broadcast message system announces public events, e.g. if a player died it will often be informed who died and how, if fragged, then often by what weapon; the same system will also often announce if a player joins or leaves the game, and may announce how many frags are left in total and other important messages, including errors or warnings from the game; instant text messages from other players are also displayed with this system. The private message system, in contrast, only prints messages for individual players, e.g. if player A picks up a weapon, player A will get a message to confirm that the weapon was picked up. == History ==