Unmissable Mods Month: Garry’s Mod

You saw this coming right?

Let’s get one thing straight from the outset: Garry’s mod isn’t even mod in the normal sense of the word; instead it is a continually evolving toolset. Instead of making a sandwich Garry has provided the community with a vast array of ingredients, tools and pickles.

In many ways I’m not really sure what I should write here. I was originally going to run down the amazing things that you can do with this toolset, but then I stopped myself because I couldn’t help but rattle off a list that would no doubt have had many crying foul when I have failed to notice their magnum opus (and I’d hate for that to happen), so instead I think I’m just going to explain a few of the great scenarios that I’ve put in motion.

When it first came out I must’ve been in my late teens, my knowledge of how to actually create anything  in this amazing sandbox was sorely lacking and I contented myself with spawning endless antlions and enough weapons to put an army to shame. This was, you must understand, a purely social tool for me at the time. My best friend, who happens to be Andrea, one of the other contributors to this website, and I spent a vast amount of time and effort laughing at what could be done with the mod – but neither of us really understood it at the time.

Now I’m a little more grown up and I frequently set in motion grand battles. At one point I held a “grand tournament” of all the NPC entities that you can possibly spawn. Naturally, my total lack of any skill led to this rapidly devolving into a farce. I think that I just about managed to get them all in one room looking at each other with menacing/bored looks – but with a singular lack of actual combat. Luckily I am not the only person in this community so we can rely upon others to use the mod to create some spectacular works of art. Some people make games, others movies and most dick around but without a doubt there are few people who would doubt that this is one of the most influential mods of the past few years. Screw that, there are few who doubt that this should not be considered as a milestone in the generation of a community of modders.

I leave you with this, my personal favourite of Garry’s Mod’s children.

Clear Skies from Ian Chisholm on Vimeo.

Why is this on our list?

Because without it we wouldn’t have awkward Gman romance films.

Is it easy to install?

These days you have to buy the mod off Steam. I considered disqualifying it for that very reason, but the early iterations were free and it is still a mod. So yeah, pretty easy to install.

Where do I get it?

Steam you fool! Go forth!