It's the third anniversary of The Dark Mod's release today. What better way to celebrate than to present our most significant update ever?

The 1.08 update contains nearly a year's worth of updates and improvements. So many, in fact, that it's hard to remember them all. Some of the improvements, like getting TDM ready to go standalone, are fairly transparent to the user. Others will have a noticable impact on your game.

IMPORTANT: Because of changes to the way TDM is run now, (in preparation for going standalone) the first time you run TDM 1.08, you will need to reset your keybindings and other settings. Additionally, "tdmlauncher.exe" no longer starts TDM. Users will need to change any shortcuts to "darkmod/TheDarkMod.exe", in Windows, and "thedarkmod.x86" for Linux users. As always with an update, saved games from earlier versions will no longer work, so finish any missions you're in the middle of!

Richer audio: TDM 1.08 should provide a much more immersive sound experience. We've added over 200 new impact sounds, as well as two new vocal sets. Many things that used to be silent now make appropriate noises. Falling bodies now make impact sounds, arrows have sound as they whiz past you, and AI make rustling noises as they move based on what they're wearing.

AI Improvements: The lightning-fast reactions of AI have been toned down, so that they don't leap immediately to combat after a half-second glimpse of you down the street. AI now react to things getting thrown at them, and can be knocked out by heavy things being dropped on their head. AI are smarter about using elevators and will use them while searching now. Several new AI character models have been added, including the Builder Acolyte and the Elite Citywatch.

Additionally, the Training Mission has been revamped by Bikerdude for 1.08, with a few new sections and beautiful improvements to the visuals. The team's second demo mission, The Tears of St. Lucia, has also been updated for 1.08 and is now included with the mod by default.

There have also been dozens of new art assets added, an entire series of new light entities, improved flame particles, performance improvements, additional animations, fixes to some physics issues, and well over 100 other bugfixes. You can see a full changelog here: http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=What%27s_new_in_TDM_1.08

To get the update, simply run tdm_update.exe in your darkmod folder. If you've never downloaded TDM before, visit our Download page for full instructions: http://www.thedarkmod.com/download-the-mod/

Thanks to our new coder, Taaaki, who did a great deal of work on this update preparing TDM to run standalone. And special thanks to grayman, without whom the update would never have happened at all.

Hope you enjoy!