Killable Merchant Restoration

The Merchant was killable at some point during development, but it was cut before the game's release: he protests when you point a gun at him, and if you shoot he goes down and stays down, closing that shop for good. This mod restores it. Almost all of it is still in the game with no way to reach it, and his cut voice lines are still on the PS5 launch disc.

What the remake kept:

The Merchant's behaviour tree still has a state called Die that plays a four second collapse animation. Nothing in the game can enter it: it has no transition in and none out.

Everything under it works. Once a flag is set, his own code notices on the next frame, switches him to his dead routine, turns his collision off and, on your next visit, switches him and his stall off. The flag is written into your save, per shop, and nothing ever clears it. The only missing piece is whatever used to set it.

• Point a gun at him and he protests.

• Restores four voice lines that are not in the PC version at all, taken from the PS5 v1. 00 launch disc: the two protests, and two takes of him groaning as he dies. Neither the audio nor the text for them is in the PC game, in any language.

• You can aim at him. The game will not let you point a weapon at the Merchant at all. That block is now lifted for him only; Ashley and Luis keep it.

• Shoot him and he goes down. One hit kills him by default, like the original. His health is a slider in the REFramework menu.

• He dies with his own cut groans and the game's collapse animation, and his body stops being solid.

• He stays dead. The kill is written into the game's own save data. That shop is closed for the rest of the save, and his table and his lamp are gone with him.

• Each shop is its own Merchant. Killing one does not close the others.

• Flash grenades and eggs stay harmless, exactly as in vanilla.

• Every launch language: his voice in all nine dubs, his subtitles in every language the game launched with.

What is restored and what is recreated/reconnected:

Restored, the game's own:

• The death animation itself, and the part of the game that knows how to play it.

• Everything that happens after: he goes down, he stops being solid, and he and his stall are gone when you come back.

• The fact that your save remembers it, and remembers it for that one shop.

• His four cut voice lines and the two protests' subtitles, both taken off the PS5 v1. 00 disc. The recordings are the originals and the text is the game's own translation; the PC build had both scrubbed out.

• The game's own way of speaking them: it puts the subtitle on screen, moves his mouth and swaps between the two lines. The mod only asks it to talk.

Recreated, rebuilt from what was left behind:

• The trigger. Nothing in the game decides he is dead any more, so the mod decides it. Everything after that is the game doing its own thing.

• Getting him into the death animation. It is sitting there, but nothing leads into it, so the mod puts him in it.

• The moment the protest fires. The lines and their subtitles are the game's, the timing is mine.

• The death groans being played at all. They are stage directions with no line of dialogue to belong to, so they come straight from his voice, with no subtitle.

• Being able to point a gun at him. Without that, his own protest lines could never be heard.

My own addition:

• His health. The game left nothing of it behind, so one hit is my own choice.

How to use:

Aim a gun at him and he will tell you what he thinks of it. Shoot him and he is gone from that shop for the rest of the save.

Health: open the REFramework menu, Script Generated UI, Killable Merchant Restoration. The panel shows how many Merchants are loaded, and a health slider from 1 (one hit, like the original) to 3000.

Known issues:

• Once he is gone, his stall area can still block you. That invisible wall is part of the room itself, not part of the Merchant, so getting rid of it would mean editing the level. This mod does not touch the level.

Installation:

1. Install REFramework.

2. Download Fluffy Mod Manager (If you already have it, update in case it's an old version! You got a button for automatically updating it in the top left).

3. Place the mod archive into the Mods folder inside the manager's directory.