|eGo|Clan a No One Lives Forever (Game) Clan

NOLF 2 as LAN & Top Fraggers of September

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: October 2024

Hello fellow Ego members,
Hello fellow NOLF'ers,

NOLF 2 LAN session at Tomocon / Tomofair -Nijmegen, Netherlands
After a long time I played Nolf 2 with other people in a LAN session. Through the Nolf Discord channel of Spawnsite.net, dedicated to the Nolf series, I've met "Little Tijn" who is renting out computers for events. On those old computers he runs the Nolf1 and Nolf2 in LAN mode (of course with the modernizer mod). End of September, there was a fair in Nijmegen called Tomofair (28/29th September 2024), a convention which describes itself as the biggest indoor Japanese market of the Netherlands. It has several booths selling (manga-)comics, anime, gadgets, workshops... a place that is also visited by lots of cosplayers. Our Nolf player Little Tijn was there with his computers (through his company SnackGames.nl he rents them to events), he was running various games like Outlaws (I don't remember others, sorry), but also Nolf 2. Nolf 2 was running in multiplayer mode. I visited Tomofair already in earlier years, but this time I specifically came for Nolf.

Some impression photos of Tomofair

It was really awesome to see Nolf 2 out in the wild. I played Nolf 1 in a LAN session somewhere in 2005 with |eGo|Rinti, |eGo|Alien & |eGo|Megahulle and others - good old times. But I never played Nolf 2 in LAN. Since it was a while ago that I played Nolf 2 in general (maybe 10-15 years ago??) I stayed with Nolf 2 - although Nolf 1 would have been an option, too. At first there were only 2 other players, but we quickly grew out to like 7-9 players. Random strangers sitting down and game with others, some of them stayed for 10 minutes, others stayed waaaay longer. All of them playing the game for the first time. And it worked out pretty well. In the end it's a simple shooter, with a quick learning curve. After a few minutes you can already have some kills. Players who figured out how the "Banana" worked, used it for their strategic advantage to make another nolf player temporarily indisposed (mostly me

)

Some impression photos the game room & Nolf 2:

The computers were placed in the smallest and ugliest side room possible, something that Little Tijn can do very little about.
On one of the photos you see the player name "Vieze Oude Man" is dutch and means "Dirty old man" - a character played by the youngest in the group, he was like 12? 13? years old. This is already hilarious

- I'm also sitting there on one of the photos

It was nice to see how other people discover Nolf for the first time. Like good old times I heard the screaming, shouting, laughter next to me - the joy of playing, killing and dying together again and again. Killing each other in a huge snowmobile fight is still a huge banger as it was when Nolf 2 came out. Curious: girls were the majority of the players and not the guys (most of the time)! Despite the screaming, shouting - from fun of course - I don't think that they would come back. I think they do not know that they played No One Lives Forever. Yes, Tijn put it on a piece of paper next to the computer and had a screen whith a short story of Nolf and how to play it. Yet once you're inside the game, you don't see the name of the game. Maybe some piece of paper placed onto the screen frame would get more attention? Personally I also think that Nolf1 is better for new players, it really shows the flair of the game: the lipstick, the sleeping gas, the briefcase the zipcord, the photo-glasses, the taunts ("You look like you need a monkey")... Nolf2 has only the banana. Nolf2 is generally a more serious game, the gameplay is more modern. Nolf1 with its bunny hopping is directly more goofy and silly and shows the flair of the game better!

I told Little Tijn on discord that I want to be informed whenever he's at similar events in the Netherlands - playing a retro game like nolf in a LAN session is still awesome - I can only give a positive review about it, our fellow nolfer Little Tijn / SnackGames.nl put it well together. Next time I would be playing Nolf 1 and try to promote Nolf 1 and the |eGo| clan

Since it was a fair and the computers played only a small part, people left and new people came. A constant exchange of players.
When I took a photo of the people playing, my seat was directly taken by the next person so I grabbed another computer and continued playing...

Top Fraggers of September 2024
October is over, that means the announcing the top killers of past month. This time we a on the #1 spot a newcomer: KillerCate (aka Legbat) is ranking for the first time as the top killer. Congraz! In september I was again busy with work than playing nolf, I've only reached the #4th position. Luckily I'm not the only |eGo| on the list, |eGo|Starship, |eGo|Shiipka and |eGo|Homeknopf are there, too. I hope to see other players, too?

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time
1	KillerCate	949	7 h, 20 m
2	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	777	3 h, 26 m
3	Crack Moses	609	5 h, 14 m
4	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	580	3 h, 02 m
5	\|eGo\|Starship	476	3 h, 11 m
6	Zaza	430	3 h, 01 m
7	Dr.Doomsday	387	3 h, 03 m
8	mac	381	2 h, 24 m
9	OhKayTea	365	2 h, 01 m
10	redrays1	319	2 h, 48 m
11	Tealc	260	1 h, 25 m
12	DanceOrDie	246	3 h, 12 m
13	Sky	229	1 h, 30 m
14	Inspector Hole	227	2 h, 16 m
15	NJ	205	2 h, 57 m
16	lab rodent	152	1 h, 27 m
17	\|eGo\|Shiipka	122	1 h, 33 m
18	\|MiLF\| lab rat	116	1 h, 13 m
19	Fisto	115	1 h, 11 m
20	Peter	89	0 h, 35 m
21	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	75	0 h, 17 m
22	Player	33	2 h, 24 m
23	CANADA	26	1 h, 39 m
24	Buddyman198	23	0 h, 58 m
25	Bicknool	22	0 h, 04 m
26	etunreal	10	0 h, 07 m
27	Zdenek	5	0 h, 53 m
28	OneEyedJack	4	0 h, 32 m
29	PAPS	4	0 h, 03 m
30	BreakinBenny	2	0 h, 11 m
	Total	7238	59 h, 57m

Reminder: Please use the same name, otherwise you'll appear several times on the list and you will have it more difficult to make it to the top!

Discord
As you can see we're still playing No One Lives Forever 1.

Join us on the discord channel to find other Nolf players. We usually play on sundays (8pm Berlin, 2pm New York), but also on other days. We can also help with troubleshooting!
You can also visit the nolf community website Spawnsite.net

Greetings,
Icepick

Top Fraggers of July & August and strange rooms in the single player modes...

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: September 2024

Hello fellow Ego members,
Hello fellow NOLF'ers,

Strange rooms & Cheatcode lets you find some easter eggs
Despite of nolf being really old there are still new things to discover. Strolling around single player missions will make you find some strange things. Especially if you play nolf not in the way its meant to be: using cheatcodes. In my opinion cheatcodes just spoil the experience, one can became quickly bored. However some players reported on discord some strange finds, or should I call them Easter Eggs? I don't think that there were meant to be found.

|eGo|Starship found while "flying around" in the spectator mode on "Safecracker, Scene 1" mission this strange green box.
And inside of the green box some strange men:

Pursision found on the "Low Orbit" mission this room:

"gT" on Discord assumes that these are storage places for enemies. Whenever an enemy is needed on the single player mission, it gets teleported right out of this box to the corresponding spot on the map. I tend to agree with him. I did have the feeling that the enemy sometimes appears out of thin air. With these boxes it is now safe to assume that they indeed literally appear out of thin air: they are beamed whenever needed.

Top Fraggers of August 2024
Congraz to Genesis, you won this time!

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time
1	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	992	7 h, 32 m
2	mac	903	6 h, 10 m
3	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	782	5 h, 47 m
4	KillerCate	606	4 h, 41 m
5	Crack Moses	570	5 h, 39 m
6	Zaza	402	4 h, 02 m
7	Sky	275	2 h, 28 m
8	\|eGo\|Shiipka	237	5 h, 22 m
9	Dr.Doomsday	153	3 h, 28 m
10	Rannek	133	1 h, 22 m
11	\|eGo\|Starship	94	1 h, 40 m
12	OhKayTea	87	1 h, 03 m
13	NJ	84	1 h, 43 m
14	LittleTijn	79	1 h, 03 m
15	redrays1	76	1 h, 26 m
16	\|eGo\|Rinti	72	0 h, 58 m
17	Teal'c	62	0 h, 54 m
18	DanceOrDie	46	1 h, 40 m
19	[FUUU] iPoppy	42	0 h, 27 m
20	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	24	0 h, 15 m
21	Player	11	1 h, 32 m
22	Mif	11	0 h, 46 m
23	Fantomas cze	4	1 h, 06 m
24	DrB	3	0 h, 03 m
	Total	5748	61h, 07m

Top Fraggers of July 2024

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time
1	mac	520	4 h, 27 m
2	Zaza	513	4 h, 54 m
3	redrays1	305	2 h, 23 m
4	Fisto	263	1 h, 58 m
5	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	258	1 h, 27 m
6	OhKayTea	246	1 h, 27 m
7	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	216	1 h, 56 m
8	\|eGo\|Starship	216	1 h, 22 m
9	\|eGo\|Rinti	152	1 h, 43 m
10	Dr.Doomsday	146	2 h, 12 m
11	Sky	141	1 h, 18 m
12	KillerCate	129	1 h, 37 m
13	dtv	125	6 h, 46 m
14	Tealc	116	0 h, 52 m
15	Sander	102	0 h, 40 m
16	DanceOrDie	101	1 h, 20 m
17	Zdenek	70	0 h, 44 m
18	\|eGo\|Shiipka	49	0 h, 46 m
19	met	46	0 h, 45 m
20	Player	43	3 h, 05 m
21	NJ	43	1 h, 48 m
22	Rannek	24	0 h, 34 m
23	88m	18	0 h, 30 m
24	reyalP	8	0 h, 16 m
25	Bicknool	4	0 h, 01 m
26	CANADA	1	0 h, 04 m
	Total:	3855	44h, 55m

Wanne play with us too? How to find players?
We play usually every sunday, join the discord channel of spawnsite.net to find out the exact times.
We also play during the week!

Greetings,
Icepick

Rumors of a revival of an old clan? Top fraggers of June, April & May!

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: July 2024

Hello fellow Ego members,
Hello fellow NOLF'ers,

Ready for a clanwar? Revival of =|FI|=
I should have your attention now with the word "clanwar". It seems that a revival of a former clan of Nolf1 will take place. I'm talking about the =|FI|= clan.
It seems that =|FI|=Genesis is busy with a revival of the clan. =|FI|=Muerte was the clanleader in the past, but just like many clanmembers (other nolf players) it seems that he vanished into the uknown. As the last one of his clan, he wants to bring =|FI|= back to its former glory. Upon confronting him if he's really doing that she shortly answered "Yes". I also heard from other corners of nolf that there is a possibility of a clanwar. =|FI|= vs |eGo| ? We would accept the challenge and would gladly play. The last time we played against a clan was on 31st July 2009, almost 15 years ago!
=|FI|= The game is on!!

Server Update Rambos Server
Rambo, former clanleader of [Champ], informed me that his servers will stay down. As some of you have noticed there are three servers missing, The "Rambo GER Server", "Rambo US Server" and the well known "Rambo Control Server". In the control server you as a player could use commands to change settings of the game, like fraglimit or change map. A simple textmessage like "$fraglimit 15" was seen as a command changed the fraglimit. That was a well used server, because users could dynamically change the conditions based on the amount of players.
His servers will remain offline until november, he needs the computer power of his servers for other projects.

Where to find nolf players?
We're still playing nolf, just look at the statistics below, we are still active and kicking it in nolf.
Join the discord channel of Spawnsite

Top Fragger of June 2024
I'm sorry for the delay, I got caught up in work and didnt get to update this website in a timely manner. Writing an post here happens old school in code, not like a wordpress site where I can login, so it costs a bit more time to update it. So here the frag scores of past three months, starting with June.

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time
1	mac	743	5 h, 41 m
2	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	640	3 h, 51 m
3	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	547	3 h, 15 m
4	redrays1	418	2 h, 30 m
5	Zaza	358	3 h, 39 m
6	Sky	293	2 h, 00 m
7	OhKayTea	270	1 h, 27 m
8	KillerCate	256	1 h, 20 m
9	\|eGo\|Starship	251	1 h, 48 m
10	Hagen	220	1 h, 42 m
11	DanceOrDie	164	1 h, 45 m
12	Sander	103	1 h, 06 m
13	\|eGo\|Shiipka	65	0 h, 41 m
14	SpicyMcHaggis	47	1 h, 10 m
15	Crack Moses	27	1 h, 09 m
16	DuzaumPadilha	21	0 h, 34 m
17	samuel	15	0 h, 18 m
18	Scheme	14	0 h, 04 m
19	etunreal	10	0 h, 14 m
20	Player	4	1 h, 13 m
21	dtv	2	3 h, 03 m
	Total	4486	38h, 30m

Top Fragger of May 2024
And here is the frag list of May 2024

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time
1	[FUUU] Im OK	579	6 h, 28 m
2	mac	388	4 h, 14 m
3	[FUUU] iPoppy	366	4 h, 36 m
4	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	189	1 h, 48 m
5	Zaza	185	1 h, 50 m
6	KillerCate	90	0 h, 43 m
7	Shaft Dickens	66	0 h, 49 m
8	plattypus	61	1 h, 25 m
9	\|eGo\|Shiipka	37	0 h, 35 m
10	Fisto	35	0 h, 44 m
11	Player	21	1 h, 01 m
12	BreakinBenny	14	0 h, 26 m
13	OneEyedJack	4	4 h, 21 m
	Total	2035	29h, 0m

Top Fragger of April 2024
And here is the frag list of April 2024

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time
1	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	858	5 h, 56 m
2	mac	820	6 h, 37 m
3	\|eGo\|Starship	694	5 h, 19 m
4	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	668	5 h, 22 m
5	Vader	611	3 h, 17 m
6	[FUUU] iPoppy	579	7 h, 05 m
7	[FUUU] Im OK	571	6 h, 49 m
8	redrays1	484	6 h, 06 m
9	Fisto	460	5 h, 14 m
10	DanceOrDie	413	5 h, 08 m
11	gruntilda	411	3 h, 47 m
12	KillerCate	358	3 h, 31 m
13	Zaza	283	3 h, 02 m
14	Ferrick	196	1 h, 23 m
15	\|eGo\|Shiipka	190	3 h, 36 m
16	Rannek	156	1 h, 47 m
17	Crack Moses	74	0 h, 31 m
18	Spawn	69	0 h, 34 m
19	LittleTijn	46	0 h, 52 m
20	Djamba	40	0 h, 40 m
21	Bicknool	17	0 h, 08 m
22	NJ	11	0 h, 27 m
23	Player	7	0 h, 55 m
24	Dimitrouille	3	0 h, 10 m
	Total:	8019	77h, 16m

The next newspost & statistics will be posted in a timely manner - it's on my ToDo list, trust me :)

Greetings,
Icepick

Top Fraggers of March '24 & NOLF3 Petition

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: April 2024

Hello fellow |eGo|-Members,
Hello fellow NOLFers,

No One Lives Forever 3
The dream of NOLF3 will continue. An ongoing wish of the entire nolf community and of the |eGo| Clan to have one day NOLF3, with the physics, game characteristics, weapons and the fun storyline of NOLF1 and NOLF2 (personally I'd prefer NOLF1 over NOLF2).
There is one studio who chasing the rights behind NOLF: NightDive Studios, they are trying to collect the IP (Intellectual Properties) from the various owners of NOLF. NOLF was made by several studios and each of them did/do own some of the rights, some of the studios were sold and merged with others, sold again and merged again - the contracts where written on paper (not digital) and got "lost" somewhere in the past 23 years since its release.

Stephen Kick is founder & a developer at NightDive Studios, he posted in march on Twitter (some people call it X, but since we cling on old things like NOLF, I refuse to call it X!) some kind of petition:

Like this post on twitter to increase the chance of NOLF3:

Hey @wbgames can we @NightdiveStudio do a remaster of No One Lives Forever, please? Signed, everyone who likes this tweet. https://t.co/D5N0WVr90P
— Stephen Kick (@pripyatbeast) March 19, 2024

Read more about thos petition here
The |eGo| Clan, the last surviving Clan of NOLF, and I hope that NightDiveStudios will manage to aquire the rights and to bring out NOLF3 - I'll be the first person to buy it!
May the blue sleeping gas and blue mines return one day!

Top Frags of March
Sorry for the delay I was caught up in work, and I used the little free time to play nolf. I played a lot of nolf in march and when I look at the statistics it seems that others did the same. Now in April it looks that people have just like me also less free time. If you look closely you'll notice that I managed to get #2 by surpassing Genesis with just a few more kills than him. And the "few more kills" where accomplished with an epic fist fight with Mac & Vader

Congraz to Mac to surpass the 2000 kills border!

The stats:

#	Name	Total Frags▼	Online Time	Previous
1	mac	2.256	19 h, 23 m	1
2	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	1.767	12 h, 26 m	2
3	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	1.762	18 h, 01 m	3
4	KillerCate	1.428	9 h, 42 m	4
5	Vader	839	6 h, 13 m	New
6	Crack Moses	792	6 h, 51 m	Returned
7	redrays1	528	5 h, 13 m	12
8	\|eGo\|BlackCatz	471	2 h, 36 m	Returned
9	\|eGo\|Shiipka	453	4 h, 42 m	7
10	Spawn	440	4 h, 53 m	Returned
11	DanceOrDie	407	3 h, 53 m	11
12	Hagrid	405	4 h, 44 m	New
13	Teal‘c	356	3 h, 06 m	Returned
14	[FUUU] iPoppy	346	2 h, 11 m	10
15	Rannek	275	3 h, 39 m	New
16	OhKayTea	247	2 h, 41 m	16
17	\|eGo\|Starship	240	1 h, 51 m	5
18	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	214	1 h, 08 m	13
19	NJ	214	8 h, 09 m	Returned
20	gruntilda	190	1 h, 56 m	New
21	Zaza	189	1 h, 22 m	6
22	DJ	182	5 h, 26 m	New
23	[FUUU] Im OK	177	1 h, 10 m	9
24	Djamba	152	2 h, 26 m	Returned
25	Triggerhappy	148	1 h, 26 m	New
26	Nuno\|Agent	116	1 h, 08 m	New
27	Player	93	4 h, 07 m	25
28	Nicknam3	88	0 h, 23 m	New
29	\|eGo\|Gruenchen	64	0 h, 54 m	22
30	Partizan	57	0 h, 33 m	New
31	Fantomas cze	55	2 h, 01 m	New
32	KawaiiNekoGirl	50	0 h, 47 m	New
33	Bicknool	42	0 h, 26 m	8
34	etunreal	36	0 h, 42 m	New
35	CANADA	32	1 h, 29 m	Returned
All 41 Players:		15.164	151h, 14m

Greetings,
Icepick

NOLF1 Review from a 2024 Nolfer
Written by \|eGo\|Icepick / Vostroyan55th - Posted: March 2024
Hello fellow \|eGo\|-Members, Hello fellow NOLFers, There are people who discover NOLF for the first time, more than 20 years after its release. One of them is a player with the name Vostroyan55th. He discovered NOLF1 in December 2023. He wrote on the discord channel of spawn a short review that got my attention, I asked him if I can publish it on the Ego site. He agreed, but only if he can work on it a bit more. It started with a few sentences but it became a full grown review. So here it is: The Operative: No One Lives Forever 1 review by Vostroyan55th Introduction The Operative: No One Lives Forever is an Action-Adventure First Person Shooter with Stealth elements in it and it’s made by the American developer Monolith using their Lithtech engine. It’s the best spy game you never played or even heard of this is all due to the problematic status of the IP [Intellectual Property] that has Activision, Fox Interactive & Warner Brothers all not wanting to get involved unless a lot of money is being talked about to settle it but even then it’s a very complex matter. But that’s alright the series is technically abandonware meaning it’s all free with the community keeping the series alive even for modern hardware/software with modernization patches not just download links. Without spoiling the superb story too much because seriously you have to play through it yourself though let me give a brief synopsis of the plot to begin this review! The storyline You play as the amazing Cate Archer a Scottish super spy working for the international anti-terrorist organization called UNITY assigned on her first serious high risk mission to figure out what happened to their agents who either went missing or died. The new terrorist organization HARM is suspect so it’s up to Cate Archer to figure out their evil plans before it’s too late! The story would roughly be at least 16 hours or more with a ton variety as you’ll be trotting land, sea and air to different biomes even at space on foot or in a vehicle to either go loud assaults or silently sneak to make your way to the objectives with the occasional crazy stunts to end them in daring escapes. With a colorful cast of characters in a parody of the spy genre itself inspired by big names like 007, A Man Named Flint, Get Smart, Mission: Impossible and much more The Operative: No One Lives Forever is so brilliant that fellow fans would argue the sequels can’t beat the first game! From Easter Eggs to references to big plot twists to a lot of well made jokes and much more set in well-paced linear to more open levels that have different challenges to accomplish all in the spirit of the 60’s disco era. Gameplay & features The gameplay is similar to many games of its era but with a bit more emphasis on stealth although it’s not as intricate as the Thief trilogy or Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell series it’s consistent enough to encourage you to keep at it especially to hear the humorous dialogue a lot of the NPC’s say or to avoid gunfights altogether even hear for useful information. Another interesting little feature is that you can choose what Cate Archer says with some dialogue tree options although its just 2 options for a sassy/intimidating or respectful/understanding Cate you will get a good laugh or different outcome with what you pick at least. The game has good armory variety although though there are some overlapping types but almost all weapons can use alternative ammunition types especially to counter body armor. Gadgets are themed after lady’s fashion items to follow the super spy idea ranging from deadly explosives to utility items like a picklock. Equipment are passives that you can only select one of to provide you with a bonus to a certain element or aspect like stealth for fuzzy slippers. The AI is quite sophisticated as they will take cover, intercept noises, backup their buddies and etc. with nice class variety from assaulters to snipers and heavy weapon specialists. After you played through the story at least once you can equip the new unlockables to use them to access inaccessible areas in your next playthrough! There are also intelligence items you can collect but their placements are always random but you should be able to collect a good bunch if you do some exploring and some of them are so funny or informative even both. One of my most favorite levels is called “Trouble in the Tropics” and here you start of infiltrating the high security submarine docks indoors where you can either open fire or use suppressed weapons to make your way to the elevator. As you go upstairs the level opens up to a large outdoor environment ranging from hiking trails to ancient ruins to large bodies of water that don’t just have regular guards but also marksmen as well as grenadiers on watchtowers covering their buddies as they go out on patrol. Upon finding a secret entrance hidden inside a mountain you have to put a stop to an experimental test before you get cooked alive to make your way to the secret launch facility that has different paths leading multiple objectives that have some civilian scientists in the way who will alert the guards if you’re spotted. That’s just an example of how a mission would flow separated into different chapters each with more than one scene but that’s as much as I’m spoiling. Multiplayer After you completed the main story maybe you want to play some more so that’s what multiplayer is there for DM, TDM and their version of CTF (HARM vs UNITY) modes at crazy map selections ranging from community made or inspired by the story mode. And there’s a lot of interesting and fun mods around that you can easily install to use in its mod loader! Performance, specs & outro As the game is set in the 60’s everything and anything is made to look, sound, operate and feel like the groovy age you’re in from the art style to the music to even your armory (although the lasers and other high-tech shenanigans are for spoofs of the retro sci-fi future). Even if the game is old it still looks great like the good old days vintage style as every asset is well made with even the devs are proud of their work as Cate herself has at least 1,700 polygons alone and for the time it was an insane achievement! Of course don’t set your expectations too high but for how everything mixes together it makes a great visual feast! The sounds are alright for its era but where the game shines well are its top-notch voice acting and the most unique 60’s soundtrack that’s adaptive not just ultra-groovy to match any situation flawlessly but all made without the use of brass instruments imagine! So far running it on my desktop PC The Operative: No One Lives Forever with the modernization patches and the fan updates runs very, very well I haven’t encountered any issues but be sure to keep your screen resolution as close to the original default ones to avoid some weird cutscene bugs as well as the anti-aliasing to a minimum to avoid some engine performance issues and lastly VSYNC On to avoid any physic related problems as for all old games. If you do get the invisibility glitch online then simply rejoin server to fix it. Overall a true hidden gem that deserves your attention as you’re missing out on a vital piece of history that needs more players to help spread the news that Cate Archer is back! A proper spy game and comedy game done right that we will never see ever again that has all the retro goodness one can expect and more! Vostroyan55th writes over his online character on discord this: "The Vostroyan Firstborn are an Imperial Guard Regiment. Vostroya is a world in the Halo Zone beyond the Eye of Terror, which swore allegiance to Mars during the Age of Strife." Greetings, Vostroyan55th & Icepick

NOLF1 Review from a 2024 Nolfer

Written by |eGo|Icepick / Vostroyan55th - Posted: March 2024

Hello fellow |eGo|-Members,
Hello fellow NOLFers,

There are people who discover NOLF for the first time, more than 20 years after its release. One of them is a player with the name Vostroyan55th. He discovered NOLF1 in December 2023. He wrote on the discord channel of spawn a short review that got my attention, I asked him if I can publish it on the Ego site. He agreed, but only if he can work on it a bit more. It started with a few sentences but it became a full grown review. So here it is:

The Operative: No One Lives Forever 1 review by Vostroyan55th

Introduction
The Operative: No One Lives Forever is an Action-Adventure First Person Shooter with Stealth elements in it and it’s made by the American developer Monolith using their Lithtech engine. It’s the best spy game you never played or even heard of this is all due to the problematic status of the IP [Intellectual Property] that has Activision, Fox Interactive & Warner Brothers all not wanting to get involved unless a lot of money is being talked about to settle it but even then it’s a very complex matter. But that’s alright the series is technically abandonware meaning it’s all free with the community keeping the series alive even for modern hardware/software with modernization patches not just download links. Without spoiling the superb story too much because seriously you have to play through it yourself though let me give a brief synopsis of the plot to begin this review!

The storyline
You play as the amazing Cate Archer a Scottish super spy working for the international anti-terrorist organization called UNITY assigned on her first serious high risk mission to figure out what happened to their agents who either went missing or died. The new terrorist organization HARM is suspect so it’s up to Cate Archer to figure out their evil plans before it’s too late! The story would roughly be at least 16 hours or more with a ton variety as you’ll be trotting land, sea and air to different biomes even at space on foot or in a vehicle to either go loud assaults or silently sneak to make your way to the objectives with the occasional crazy stunts to end them in daring escapes. With a colorful cast of characters in a parody of the spy genre itself inspired by big names like 007, A Man Named Flint, Get Smart, Mission: Impossible and much more The Operative: No One Lives Forever is so brilliant that fellow fans would argue the sequels can’t beat the first game! From Easter Eggs to references to big plot twists to a lot of well made jokes and much more set in well-paced linear to more open levels that have different challenges to accomplish all in the spirit of the 60’s disco era.

Gameplay & features
The gameplay is similar to many games of its era but with a bit more emphasis on stealth although it’s not as intricate as the Thief trilogy or Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell series it’s consistent enough to encourage you to keep at it especially to hear the humorous dialogue a lot of the NPC’s say or to avoid gunfights altogether even hear for useful information. Another interesting little feature is that you can choose what Cate Archer says with some dialogue tree options although its just 2 options for a sassy/intimidating or respectful/understanding Cate you will get a good laugh or different outcome with what you pick at least. The game has good armory variety although though there are some overlapping types but almost all weapons can use alternative ammunition types especially to counter body armor. Gadgets are themed after lady’s fashion items to follow the super spy idea ranging from deadly explosives to utility items like a picklock. Equipment are passives that you can only select one of to provide you with a bonus to a certain element or aspect like stealth for fuzzy slippers. The AI is quite sophisticated as they will take cover, intercept noises, backup their buddies and etc. with nice class variety from assaulters to snipers and heavy weapon specialists. After you played through the story at least once you can equip the new unlockables to use them to access inaccessible areas in your next playthrough! There are also intelligence items you can collect but their placements are always random but you should be able to collect a good bunch if you do some exploring and some of them are so funny or informative even both. One of my most favorite levels is called “Trouble in the Tropics” and here you start of infiltrating the high security submarine docks indoors where you can either open fire or use suppressed weapons to make your way to the elevator. As you go upstairs the level opens up to a large outdoor environment ranging from hiking trails to ancient ruins to large bodies of water that don’t just have regular guards but also marksmen as well as grenadiers on watchtowers covering their buddies as they go out on patrol. Upon finding a secret entrance hidden inside a mountain you have to put a stop to an experimental test before you get cooked alive to make your way to the secret launch facility that has different paths leading multiple objectives that have some civilian scientists in the way who will alert the guards if you’re spotted. That’s just an example of how a mission would flow separated into different chapters each with more than one scene but that’s as much as I’m spoiling.

Multiplayer
After you completed the main story maybe you want to play some more so that’s what multiplayer is there for DM, TDM and their version of CTF (HARM vs UNITY) modes at crazy map selections ranging from community made or inspired by the story mode. And there’s a lot of interesting and fun mods around that you can easily install to use in its mod loader!

Performance, specs & outro
As the game is set in the 60’s everything and anything is made to look, sound, operate and feel like the groovy age you’re in from the art style to the music to even your armory (although the lasers and other high-tech shenanigans are for spoofs of the retro sci-fi future). Even if the game is old it still looks great like the good old days vintage style as every asset is well made with even the devs are proud of their work as Cate herself has at least 1,700 polygons alone and for the time it was an insane achievement! Of course don’t set your expectations too high but for how everything mixes together it makes a great visual feast! The sounds are alright for its era but where the game shines well are its top-notch voice acting and the most unique 60’s soundtrack that’s adaptive not just ultra-groovy to match any situation flawlessly but all made without the use of brass instruments imagine! So far running it on my desktop PC The Operative: No One Lives Forever with the modernization patches and the fan updates runs very, very well I haven’t encountered any issues but be sure to keep your screen resolution as close to the original default ones to avoid some weird cutscene bugs as well as the anti-aliasing to a minimum to avoid some engine performance issues and lastly VSYNC On to avoid any physic related problems as for all old games. If you do get the invisibility glitch online then simply rejoin server to fix it. Overall a true hidden gem that deserves your attention as you’re missing out on a vital piece of history that needs more players to help spread the news that Cate Archer is back! A proper spy game and comedy game done right that we will never see ever again that has all the retro goodness one can expect and more!

Vostroyan55th writes over his online character on discord this:
"The Vostroyan Firstborn are an Imperial Guard Regiment. Vostroya is a world in the Halo Zone beyond the Eye of Terror, which swore allegiance to Mars during the Age of Strife."

Greetings,
Vostroyan55th & Icepick

Top Fraggers of February & New Players!

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: March 2024

Hello fellow |eGo|-Members,
Hello fellow Nolfers,

New players?!
Yes new players find their way to No One Lives Forever 1!
More than 23 years after its release there are players returning back to nolf, and once in a while there are people brand new to nolf. A french youtuber who reviews old games also stopped at nolf, you can watch it here but its in french https://youtu.be/byreCv5JkEY?si=yL_H-B5eOI3vt7E1.
However the biggest increase of new people joining the discord channel of Spawnsite.net (Link to join: https://discord.gg/s2EfcXb) was after nolf player Bruno posted about it on Reddit. That was end of February and since then a lot of people joined! I hope to see them also in Nolf online!

Somewhere in January =|FI|=Genesis found his way back to nolf, and I see on Discord [JAB]Blue and some names from [BoS] also appeared there.
And for your nostalgia: the original website of [BoS] is back online https://www.angelfire.com/dc/bosclan/Home.htm Make sure to check it out, and that time of nolf they were looking for somone with a T1 connection to host a server. Thats 1 Mbit/s, every cellphone has nowadays internet thats several times faster than that! How times are changing !!

When do we play?
We play usually on sundays, because everyone lives in different timezones: 07:00pm Berlin time / 01:00pm New York time. If you're new don't forget to download the mappack from Spawnsite.
On the right you see some screenshots from different matches throughout February.

Top Fraggers of February 2024
Here it is. The list of the top fraggers of February 2024! Yes Mac managed to keep me off from the #1 place on that list. Our fellow player Vostroyan55th expects that his computer will be soon break, so if we don't see him online anymore... we'll know... but he promised to be back, just be patient! |eGo|Rinti is currently travelling around Europe, so he's also not around in Nolf.

THE LIST:

	Name	Kills ▼	Total Online time	Previous
1	mac	1.486	14 h, 53 m	1
2	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	1.120	20 h, 09 m	6
3	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	856	8 h, 46 m	3
4	KillerCate	778	7 h, 37 m	12
5	\|eGo\|Starship	704	8 h, 03 m	2
6	Vostroyan55th	569	9 h, 24 m	10
7	Zaza	544	5 h, 12 m	8
8	\|eGo\|Shiipka	506	8 h, 41 m	11
9	Bicknool	423	4 h, 00 m	New
10	[FUUU] I'm OK	396	6 h, 16 m	4
11	[FUUU]iPoppy	390	5 h, 53 m	5
12	DanceOrDie	389	6 h, 35 m	7
13	redrays1	384	5 h, 09 m	New
14	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	260	2 h, 32 m	15
15	\|TFM\| DeMolT	123	0 h, 55 m	New
16	ham	102	2 h, 28 m	9
17	OhKayTea	75	0 h, 34 m	16
18	plattypus	66	1 h, 03 m	17
19	Bunghole	53	2 h, 14 m	New
20	OneEyedJack	49	1 h, 17 m	19
21	DigBick	34	0 h, 37 m	New
22	Bruno	26	0 h, 35 m	New
23	\|eGo\|Gruenchen	24	0 h, 33 m	New
24	KATRINA	17	0 h, 03 m	New
25	mason	15	2 h, 26 m	22

Greetings,
Icepick

Top Fraggers of January 2024 & Backup Server

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: February 2024

Hello fellow |eGo|-Members,
Hello fellow NOLFers!

The first month of the new year is already over! For those ones who have doubts and think nolf is dead, here the top killers of January.

Top Killers of Janaury 2024
I had a lot of work to do in January, so I couldn't play as much as I wanted to play. That's why you'd find me on the list only #6.

	Name	Total Score ▼	Total Online Time	Previous
1	mac	1212	19 h, 26 m	3
2	\|eGo\|Starship	894	11 h, 25 m	4
3	=\|FI\|=GENESIS	885	14 h, 42 m	New
4	[FUUU] Im OK	848	11 h, 41 m	1
5	[FUUU]iPoppy	817	11 h, 00 m	2
6	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	588	7 h, 02 m	7
7	DanceOrDie	447	10 h, 03 m	5
8	Zaza	391	4 h, 01 m	9
9	ham	358	5 h, 52 m	New
10	Vostroyan55th	342	7 h, 34 m	8
11	\|eGo\|Shiipka	185	5 h, 27 m	13
12	KillerCate	94	1 h, 42 m	6
13	Player	91	3 h, 39 m	10
14	\|eGo\|BlackCatz	86	1 h, 27 m	New
15	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	81	1 h, 00 m	12
16	OhKayTea	80	0 h, 43 m	New
17	plattypus	61	2 h, 31 m	New
18	Trouser_Freak	60	4 h, 59 m	New
19	OneEyedJack	47	1 h, 23 m	New
20	Spawn	36	0 h, 46 m	New

New Backupserver
Yeah I can't let go of the Nolfserver story. It may seem that the dedicated server I've rented is only for the Ego Nolf Server, but that is not true. The server is for work, I'm the sole owner of it and pay for it. Despite I'm using it more and more for my work, there are plenty of resources left to run NOLF on it. No worries. At peak times the CPU only reaches like 30% usage, and plenty of bandwidth capacity are also available. However the infrastructure on the server became so critical for my work, that I've rented a second server with identical specs and program configuration. So whatever happens Ego will be always able to host a nolfserver and we will be always able to run the statistics website. The main server is located in Falkenstein Germany(🇩🇪), and the backup server is in Helsinki, Finland(🇫🇮). Both of them are rented at the company Hetzner - click here to learn more about the specs.

Greetings,
Icepick

Happy New Year & Top Fraggers of December 2023

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: January 2024

I wish everyone a happy new year!
May some more players find their way back to nolf! I can't express this enough: we're alive and killing it!

Top Fraggers of December 2023

#	Name	Kills	Total Online Time	Previous
1	[FUUU] I'm OK	613	8 h, 22 m	5
2	[FUUU]iPoppy	605	7 h, 21 m	4
3	mac	564	5 h, 17 m	1
4	\|eGo\|Starship	465	5 h, 37 m	3
5	DanceOrDie	268	5 h, 25 m	8
6	KillerCate	245	2 h, 42 m	12
7	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	242	3 h, 36 m	2
8	Vostroyan55th	176	3 h, 26 m	New
9	Zaza	171	1 h, 59 m	6
10	Player	126	2 h, 58 m	18
11	Atomkraftzwerg	80	2 h, 15 m	New
12	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	70	1 h, 04 m	9
13	\|eGo\|Shiipka	59	1 h, 40 m	7
14	BreakinBenny	56	1 h, 19 m	New
15	\|eGo\|Gruenchen	42	1 h, 01 m	20
16	\|eGo\|Rinti	35	0 h, 23 m	10
17	Bicknool	34	0 h, 34 m	New
18	Zuzia	33	0 h, 26 m	New
19	DJ	25	1 h, 36 m	15
20	NJ	19	1 h, 47 m	17
	All Players Total	3937	59h, 14m

Unfortunately we're missing couple of days of statistics, because of the failed server move. (See previous post)

Nolf Server "|eGo|Santa's Workshop"
Since Christmas is now really over, I've decided to take down the Nolf Server Santa's Workshop. I have replaced the server under its original name with some original & custom maps. However some of the snowy & icy maps will remain, because January are some cold months.

Greetings,
Icepick

Merry Christmas & New Server!
Written by \|eGo\|Icepick - Posted: December 2023
I wish everyone a Merry Christmas! Good it's done, now to clan business: Old Server In my previous post I said that our serverhoster DashServ.io would move the physical server we've rented from the datacenter in Eygelshoven (Netherlands) to Düsseldorf (Germany). The estitmated offline time was supposed to be 6 hours. Well, guess not. The Server was offline for 91 hours and even after it had for another 72h severe routing problems, and couldn't be reached from every corner on this earth. And those ones who could reach it were then kicked off minutes later due to "server not found". Two weeks have passed and there is still no official excuse (via email) from the server hoster. Well I'm sorry for the nolf statistics downtime & offline time of NOLF. Our Nolf servers need to be reachable at all times with no lag or downtimes. I didn't want to deal with small hobby hosters anymore, who are just subrenting elsewhere and are prone to the network of someone else. New Server The new server is hosted at Hetzner. A company that builds their own datacenters, their own servers and their own connection to the outside world. The location is in Falkenstein, Germany (Google Maps). Our server is standing somewhere inside that building on that photo on the right side. It is a dedicated server, no virtualisation. The Hardware & Internet speed? Click on the Serverinfo Button to find out on what hardware our nolf-servers are running. Despite the website & server costs a membership at the \|eGo\|Clan was and will be free!! Greetings, Icepick

Merry Christmas & New Server!

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: December 2023

I wish everyone a Merry Christmas! Good it's done, now to clan business:

Old Server
In my previous post I said that our serverhoster DashServ.io would move the physical server we've rented from the datacenter in Eygelshoven (Netherlands) to Düsseldorf (Germany). The estitmated offline time was supposed to be 6 hours. Well, guess not. The Server was offline for 91 hours and even after it had for another 72h severe routing problems, and couldn't be reached from every corner on this earth. And those ones who could reach it were then kicked off minutes later due to "server not found". Two weeks have passed and there is still no official excuse (via email) from the server hoster. Well I'm sorry for the nolf statistics downtime & offline time of NOLF.
Our Nolf servers need to be reachable at all times with no lag or downtimes. I didn't want to deal with small hobby hosters anymore, who are just subrenting elsewhere and are prone to the network of someone else.

New Server
The new server is hosted at Hetzner. A company that builds their own datacenters, their own servers and their own connection to the outside world. The location is in Falkenstein, Germany (Google Maps). Our server is standing somewhere inside that building on that photo on the right side. It is a dedicated server, no virtualisation. The Hardware & Internet speed? Click on the Serverinfo Button to find out on what hardware our nolf-servers are running.

Despite the website & server costs a membership at the |eGo|Clan was and will be free!!

Greetings,
Icepick

Christmas Server & Server Moving & Top Fraggers of November '23!

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: December 2023

Christmas Server "Santa's Workshop"
To put everyone into the christmas mood, Nolf Server admin |eGo|Starship looked for all nolf maps that are related with winter or Christmas. So it was a search for all maps that have snow or ice in them. Some maps were bit of a stretch - there aren't that many maps that have snow & ice, so |eGo|Starship got a bit creative.

Current mapcycle of |eGo|Santa's Workshop & |eGo|Low Health mod

=|FI|= White_Xmas
Winterberg
[AC] Artic Commands
Chillkill
Frosty
[AC] Frozen Lodge
Guns & Hockeypucks
Northernfights
Ego_Club
Abduction

Server Moving & Vacation
On 9th of December the server, the physical server, will be moved. Our serverhoster decided to move all their physical servers (including ours) from Eygelshoven (Netherlands) to Düsseldorf (Germany). That step is for our serverhoster necessary, because of the increased energy prices in the Netherlands. When they started in the Netherlands, it was cheaper there, but now the tables have turned.
The day of the move is a saturday, there is a chance that it will be for nolf-evening on sunday offline: The serverhoster estimates that the move will take 6 hours (if everything goes to plan). During that time all the nolf-servers will be offline, keep in mind that statistics website & tracking system will offline too! Moreover: I guess the offline time will be longer, because I'll be on vacation during that time, and I cannot say how fast I'd be able to set everything up. It is not known yet if our dedicated server will get a new IP adress.

Top Killers of November '23
Congratulations to mac to kick me from the #1 position!

#	Name	Kills	Total Online Time	Past month
1	mac	1466	18 h 44 m	3
2	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	1162	17 h 51 m	1
3	\|eGo\|Starship	930	10 h 55 m	2
4	[FUUU]iPoppy	916	15 h 10 m	10
5	[FUUU] I'm OK	846	15 h 24 m	6
6	Zaza	584	6 h 15 m	8
7	\|eGo\|Shiipka	514	7 h 37 m	5
8	DanceOrDie	480	9 h 31 m	7
9	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	353	3 h 46 m	4
10	\|eGo\|Rinti	121	1 h 39 m	9
11	TJ	85	1 h 13 m	New
12	KillerCate	75	0 h 54 m	New
13	OhKayTea	71	1 h 51 m	12
14	Spawn	67	0 h 49 m	14
15	DJ	43	2 h 38 m	New
16	etunreal	40	0 h 34 m	New
17	NJ	35	2 h 43 m	New
18	Player	33	2 h 51 m	17
19	Bruno	23	0 h 36 m	16
20	\|eGo\|Gruenchen	20	0 h 30 m	13

Greetings,
Icepick

New Website!
Written by \|eGo\|Icepick - Posted: November 2023
Hello fellow Ego members, Hello fellow NOLF'ers, Welcome to our updated website. I found the old website, all that grey, a bit dull. We kept that site for 8 years or so, but NOLF is still going on and we still play. So, time for an update: I looked at other clan pages (of modern games) to get some inspiration, but all I could see were quite generic websites. Nothing clan-specific, or worse, game-specific. NOLF is colourful, so let´s embrace it - I went on full NOLF mode! I looked at old clan pages (with the "WayBack Machine" you can view websites as they were 10-20 years ago). Some veteran players may notice that the colours are similar to the old nolfgirl.com website. I made a new clan page that reflects the flair of the game. The website is also responsive and works well on different screen resolutions, though it is still a bit buggy on phones (I'm working on that). One thing I took over from modern clan pages: each player is there with a "photo" of themselves, go and have a look at it ;) We however are still alive and we still play. Wanna play too? Download the game with the community update to v1.006, including widescreen patch, a new in-game master server, high resolutions, 64-Bit and Intel Integrated Graphic card support. Greetings, Icepick

New Website!

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: November 2023

Hello fellow Ego members,
Hello fellow NOLF'ers,

Welcome to our updated website. I found the old website, all that grey, a bit dull. We kept that site for 8 years or so, but NOLF is still going on and we still play. So, time for an update: I looked at other clan pages (of modern games) to get some inspiration, but all I could see were quite generic websites. Nothing clan-specific, or worse, game-specific. NOLF is colourful, so let´s embrace it - I went on full NOLF mode! I looked at old clan pages (with the "WayBack Machine" you can view websites as they were 10-20 years ago). Some veteran players may notice that the colours are similar to the old nolfgirl.com website.

I made a new clan page that reflects the flair of the game. The website is also responsive and works well on different screen resolutions, though it is still a bit buggy on phones (I'm working on that). One thing I took over from modern clan pages: each player is there with a "photo" of themselves, go and have a look at it ;)

We however are still alive and we still play. Wanna play too? Download the game with the community update to v1.006, including widescreen patch, a new in-game master server, high resolutions, 64-Bit and Intel Integrated Graphic card support.

Greetings,
Icepick

Player statistics from October 2023

Written by |eGo|Icepick - Posted: November 2023

Hello fellow Ego members,
Hello fellow NOLF'ers,

Here are the top fraggers of October 2023:

	Name	Kills	Total Online Time
1	\|eGo\|L.Icepick	1565	31 h, 32 m
2	\|eGo\|Starship	780	11 h, 28 m
3	mac	711	9 h, 55 m
4	\|eGo\|Homeknopf	669	9 h, 53 m
5	\|eGo\|Shiipka	655	14 h, 16 m
6	[FUUU] Im OK	536	8 h, 47 m
7	DanceOrDie	393	8 h, 09 m
8	Zaza	359	5 h, 14 m
9	\|eGo\|Rinti	317	3 h, 30 m
10	[FUUU] iPoppy	314	6 h, 11 m
11	\|eGo\|BlackCatz	269	1 h, 40 m
12	OhKayTea	203	2 h, 26 m
13	\|eGo\|Gruenchen	171	4 h, 27 m
14	Spawn	55	1 h, 44 m
15	redrays1	54	0 h, 48 m
16	Bruno	36	0 h, 36 m
17	Player	19	2 h, 17 m
18	Tealc	18	0 h, 32 m

Greetings,
Icepick