How to Record and Playback gameplay in COD4

[TurboX]

I finally joined the 'new' forums (yes, I'm that NJ Turbo (mascot)).

In the past, I went on a stint for a few months or so and was recording demo after demo while in spectator mode to record 'suspected' players and I recall, I was to the point where I got pretty good at doing it without 'alarming' the suspect.  One strategy I'd employ was to start playing for a while once initially joining the server.  After a short while, I'd start the recording while I was still playing.  Then I'd  go spectate then proceed to wait for a good 'window of opportunity' to settle in on the suspect players view.  Sometimes I'd go spectate then settle in on the suspect player's view but I would only start the recording just as soon as the suspect player 'died'.  Why?  Because over time, I learned that recording someone presents that player with a certain amount of additional lag.  So it comes down to common sense that that lag would be 'felt' right away if said player was in the middle of running or firing the weapon.  Didn't seem to alarm the suspect player when starting the recording during the suspect player's transition of dying and respawning.  

It's easily googled but I found that the internet spots out there are very old and most were missing 1 or 2 key points about the process.  My goal here is to empower the regular players with a way to record suspect player's gameplay then proceed to review that gameplay offline, then give players the option to post that demo along with a report of a suspect player to Net Jam's Report forums.  It can be time consuming and I didn't think it was 'fun', but it made me feel pretty positive whenever one of my reports and demos managed to get a suspect player banned.  

 

Alas, the steps:

1) Using COD4 'console' is required for this to work.
Access the main menu or press ESC in-game. Click Options --> Game Options and activate the console.

2) Activate the console in-game by pressing key '~', press ESC to exit console

3) Enter "/record" into the console to start recording a demo. 
To give the demo a specific filename, use "/record DEMONAME" instead. (without the double quotes)

4) Top stop the recording, enter "/stoprecord" into the console. (without the double quotes)

5) The recording will go into the \main\demos folder off the main Call of Duty 4 folder

6) To watch the demos COD4 will not find the demo filename where it recorded it (doh!), instead - follow these steps:

- MOVE or COPY recorded demo file into \Call of Duty 4\Mods\ModWarfare\demos (make 'demos' folder manually if not there already)
- Launch game then load mod 'ModWarfare'
- Enter /demo DEMONAME into the console. (NOTE: you do not need to add the file extension of the overall filename, just the name before the 'dot')
- enter 'quit' into console to exit demo playback and go back to desktop

NJ Admins are very detailed oriented when reviewing these. If there is ANY doubt from yourself, then a ban will most likely not occur by an admin reviewing the demo later.  
You will want to really be sure before posting a demo and reporting a player and not waste the admin's time.  

Lastly, I made shortcuts to both the default recording location (\main\demos) AND the playback folder (\Call of Duty 4\Mods\ModWarfare\demos) on my desktop so I can easily manage the demos quickly.

 

Turbo

 

 

 

 

[Gryphus_1]

Welcome back Turbo.

Your timing sucks by the way. I just went and wrote this a few days ago: https://net-jam.com/faq/#2-16

A couple additions if I may:
You can auto-complete demo names with TAB.
If demos are in the correct location for the base game, you don't need to launch Modwarfare to view them.
And a correction:
The server sends the client information on whats happening, while the client is sending the same kind of info about what they're doing to the server which is in-turn distributed to all other clients. When you spectate another player, you're spectating the server and what the server is "seeing", not the other persons client. Combine this with the fact that demos taken and stored locally, there's physically no way for a player to know they're being spectated much-less recorded.

[TurboX]

Thank you Gryphus.

 

No that's OK, always good to have other write-ups offering different, yet similar, advice on things.  Sometimes there's gold in them thar hills.....

 

Thanks for the additional tips too!

 

Turbo