An automated spectator for Battlefield 2 written in Python 🐍
Battefield 2 might be an old game that is known for sometimes having more dust than hit registration. But it's still around after 15 years and people still play it. So, why not support this game and community with an automated spectator that makes it easy to, for example, stream this game around the clock so people can (re-)discover it via a live stream.
The goal is to provide a fully automated, fire-and-forget spectator for the game. However, this project is currently in a beta-like state. Thus, some monitoring of the spectator and any live stream is strongly recommended.
- automatic start of a BF2 game instance (can be disabled to attach to an existing instance)
- automatic account login
- automatic server join (only by server ip; custom ports and server passwords are supported)
- automatic spawning in game to enable "spectator mode" (see supported maps/sizes below)
- automatic rotation between players of spectator's team
- restart spectating after round restart
- purge server history before launching the game via bf2-conman
- in game error detection and handling
- game freeze detection and handling
- support for 720p (1280x720) and 900p (1600x900) game window size/resolution
- (optional) remote control using bf2-auto-spectator-controller
- (optional) control live stream via OBS WebSocket
| Argument | Description | Default | Required |
|---|---|---|---|
--version |
Output version information | ||
--player-name |
Name of bf2hub account | None | Yes |
--player-password |
Passwort for bf2hub account | None | Yes |
--server-ip |
IP of server to join | None | Yes |
--server-port |
Port of server to join | 16567 | No |
--server-pass |
Passwort for server to join | None | No |
--server-mod |
Mod of server to join | bf2 | No |
--game-path |
Path to BF2 install folder | C:\Program Files (x86)\EA Games\Battlefield 2\ | No |
--game-res |
Resolution to use for BF2 window | 720p | No |
--tesseract-path |
Path to Tesseract install folder | C:\Program Files\Tesseract-OCR\ | No |
--use-controller |
Use a bf2-auto-spectator-controller instance | ||
--controller-base-uri |
Base uri of controller instance (format: http[s]://[hostname]) | ||
--control-obs |
Control OBS via WebSocket | ||
--obs-url |
OBS WebSocket URL (format: ws://:password@hostname:port) | ||
--debug-log |
Add debugging information to log output | ||
--debug-screenshot |
Write any screenshots to disk for debugging |
You can always get these details locally by providing the --help argument.
| Map name | 16 size | 32 size | 64 size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dalian Plant | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Daqing Oilfields | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Dragon Valley | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| FuShe Pass | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Great Wall | Yes | Yes | n/a |
| Gulf of Oman | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Highway Tampa | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Kubra Dam | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mashtuur City | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Midnight Sun | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Operation Blue Pearl | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Operation Clean Sweep | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Operation Harvest | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Operation Road Rage | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Operation Smoke Screen | Yes | Yes | n/a |
| Road to Jalalabad | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Sharqi Peninsula | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Songhua Stalemate | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Strike at Karkand | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Taraba Quarry | Yes | Yes | n/a |
| Wake Island 2007 | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Zatar Wetlands | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Map name | 16 size | 32 size | 64 size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Devil's Perch | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Ghost Town | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Leviathan | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mass Destruction | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Night Flight | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Surge | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| The Iron Gator | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Warlord | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Map name | 16 size | 32 size | 64 size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Black Beard's Atol | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Black Beard's Atol - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Blue Bayou | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Blue Bayou - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Blue Bayou - Zombie ¹ | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Crossbones Keep | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Crossbones Keep - Zombie ¹ | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Dead Calm | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Frylar | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Frylar - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Frylar - Zombie ¹ | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Lost At Sea | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| O'Me Hearty Beach | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| O'Me Hearty Beach - Zombie ¹ | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Pelican Point | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Pelican Point - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Pressgang Port | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Pressgang Port - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Sailors Warning | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Shallow Draft | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Shallow Draft - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Shipwreck Shoals | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Shipwreck Shoals - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Shiver Me Timbers | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Shiver Me Timbers - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Storm the Bastion | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Storm the Bastion - Zombie ¹ | n/a | Yes | Yes |
| Stranded | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Stranded - CTF | n/a | n/a | Yes |
| Wake Island 1707 | Yes | Yes | Yes |
¹ spawning on zombie versions of maps may fail if the spectator happens to be a zombie, since the zombie class is not always selected by default
| Map name | 16 size | 32 size | 64 size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rocky Mountains | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Yukon Bridge | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Map name | 16 size | 32 size | 64 size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dalian 2v2 | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Daqing 2v2 | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Dragon 2v2 | Yes | n/a ¹ | n/a ¹ |
| Sharqi 2v2 | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Alpin Ressort | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Blitzkrieg | Yes | n/a | n/a |
| Christmas Hill | n/a | Yes | n/a |
| Frostbite | Yes | Yes | n/a |
| Frostbite Night | Yes | n/a | n/a |
| Snowy Park | Yes | n/a | n/a |
| Snowy Park (Day) | Yes | n/a | n/a |
| Spring Thaw | n/a | Yes | n/a |
| Stalingrad Snow | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Winter Wake Island | Yes | Yes | Yes |
¹ the spawn menu is broken on these sizes of the map
- Download and install Tesseract v5.0.1.20220118 from the Uni Mannheim server (be sure to use the 64 bit version, direct link)
- Download and extract the latest release
Setting up an extra bf2hub account for the spectator is strongly recommended in order to not mess with your existing account's settings/stats.
Any settings not explicitly mentioned here can be changed however you like.
- Under "game options"
- Enable "auto ready"
- Enable "opt out of voting"
- Set all transparency values to 0
- Under "controls"
- Remove crouch binding and airplane/helicopter free look binding (and/or any other
left ctrlbindings) - Bind
left ctrlto console
- Remove crouch binding and airplane/helicopter free look binding (and/or any other
- Open CMD or Powershell (recommended)
- Enter the path to the controller.exe (can be done by dragging & dropping the .exe onto the CMD/Powershell window)
- Enter required command line arguments (see above)
- Enter any additional command line arguments (optional)
- Hit enter to run the command
If you want to stop the spectator, hit CTRL + C in the CMD/Powershell window at any time.
Please note: You cannot (really) use the computer while the spectator is running. It relies on having control over mouse and keyboard and needs the game window to be focused and in the foreground. You do, however, have small time-windows between the spectator's actions in which you can start/stop the stream, stop the spectator etc.
- Windows display scaling must be set to 100%
- game locale/language must be set to English
- some elements of your English locale must be somewhat standard (team names, kick messages, menu items etc.)
- the camera and it's movement around the player are controlled by the game
- the spectator is taking up a slot on the server, since it is technically a regular player