ZPause

Synced co-op pause for Black Ops II Zombies (Plutonium T6)

by Xep

Any player can pause. Any player can unpause. The state lives on level, so it's identical for everyone — there's no per-client state that can desync.

• Zombies stop where they are, and stop spawning
• Players are locked and can't be hurt
• The match clock, powerup timers, effect countdowns and bleedout all hold
• Resumes on a 3‑2‑1 countdown with a short grace period

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Requirements

Plutonium T6 (Black Ops II), zombies. No other mods or dependencies.

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Install

Two packagings of the same file are included. Plutonium only lets you enable one mod at a time, so the script version is usually the better choice — it coexists with whatever mod you're running.

Script version (recommended)

Drop zpause.gsc into your T6 storage scripts folder:

%localappdata%\Plutonium\storage\t6\scripts\zm\zpause.gsc

On newer Plutonium builds the path is under raw:

%localappdata%\Plutonium\storage\t6\raw\scripts\zm\zpause.gsc

If you aren't sure which your build uses, put it in both — only the one that exists will be read.

Mod version

Copy the zm_pause folder into your mods folder:

%localappdata%\Plutonium\storage\t6\mods\zm_pause\scripts\zm\zpause.gsc

Then pick zm_pause from the in-game Mods menu. The folder name must keep its zm_ prefix or it won't show up in the zombies mod list.

You don't need to restart the game to reload a script — just end the current game and start a new one.

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Usage

Action	Input
Pause / unpause	type !pause or !p in chat
Unpause only	type !unpause, !resume or !u
Pause / unpause	hold crouch + melee together for ~0.3s

The button combo keeps working while you're frozen — freezecontrols() blocks movement and weapon use, but button state still reaches the server. That's what lets a frozen player resume without opening chat.

Resuming runs a 3‑2‑1 countdown with everything still frozen, then releases the whole game at once and gives players 2 seconds of invulnerability so nobody eats a hit from a zombie that was mid‑swing.

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Configuration

Every setting is at the top of the file under zp_load_config(), and each one is also a dvar of the same name. The script creates each dvar with its default on load, so you can set them straight from the console:

zp_countdown 5

The config is re-read at the start of every pause, so a change takes effect on the next pause — no map restart needed. Anything already set in your config.cfg before the map loads is left alone.

Dvar	Default	What it does
zp_allow_short_words	0	Also accept bare p / u / pause in chat. Off by default so normal conversation can't pause the game.
zp_button_combo	1	Enable the crouch + melee combo.
zp_button_hold_time	0.3	How long the combo must be held.
zp_countdown	3	Seconds of 3‑2‑1 before play resumes.
zp_grace	2	Seconds of invulnerability after resuming.
zp_cooldown	2	Minimum seconds between toggles.
zp_max_pause_time	0	Auto-resume after N seconds. 0 = unlimited.
zp_engine_freeze	1	Use disablezombies() / enablezombies().
zp_drift_guard	1	Snap back any AI that still manages to move.
zp_freeze_anims	1	Put zombies in a standing idle pose instead of looping their last animation.
zp_godmode	1	Make players invulnerable while paused.
zp_control_guard	1	Re-apply the player freeze every tick, so a map script can't hand controls back mid-pause.
zp_freeze_clock	1	Hold the match timer.
zp_freeze_powerups	1	Stop ground powerups timing out.
zp_freeze_effects	1	Hold insta-kill / double-points countdowns.
zp_freeze_bleedout	1	Stop downed players bleeding out.
zp_blackout	0	Black out everyone's screen while paused (anti-scouting).
zp_blur	1	Blur everyone's screen while paused. Clears when play resumes.
zp_blur_amount	1.5	Blur strength. 4 is the blur the game runs when you buy a perk.
zp_show_hint	1	Tell players how to pause when they spawn.
zp_pause_sound	zmb_zombie_go_inert	Played when the game is paused. "" = silent.
zp_countdown_sound	zmb_tombstone_timer_count	Played on each countdown tick. "" = silent.
zp_resume_sound	zmb_zombie_end_inert	Played when play resumes. "" = silent.

Sounds

All three are stock aliases, so both packagings stay a single drop-in file. A custom sound would have to ship as a fastfile and be installed by every player rather than just the host, so ZPause uses the game's own audio instead.

The defaults are what the game itself uses them for: a zombie plays go_inert and end_inert when it drops dormant and wakes back up, and zmb_tombstone_timer_count is the game's own once-a-second countdown tick. Other aliases worth trying, all of them played by core zombies scripts and so present on every map:

Alias	What it is
mpl_ui_timer_countdown	The plain UI beep from the end-of-match clock.
zmb_tombstone_timer_out	The sting when that timer runs out.
zmb_perks_power_on	Power switch coming on.
zmb_cha_ching	Points.
zmb_box_poof	The magic box vanishing.
zmb_whoosh	Short whoosh.
evt_perk_deny	Buzzer.

Swap one in from the console:

zp_resume_sound zmb_perks_power_on

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How it works

Treyarch already shipped a working full-game pause in T6 zombies. It's what runs during a host migration. The stock script maps\mp\gametypes_zm\_hostmigration.gsc does exactly this:

disablezombies( 1 );            // engine-level AI freeze
flag_clear( "spawn_zombies" );  // the spawner's own gate
player freezecontrols( 1 );     // lock players
player enableinvulnerability(); // nobody can be hurt
locktimer();                    // hold level.discardtime so the clock stops

…and the exact inverse to resume. ZPause uses that recipe rather than inventing one, so the spawner, the round counter and the match clock are all stopped the way the game expects:

• disablezombies() / enablezombies() are engine builtins — the same calls host migration uses.
• flag_clear("spawn_zombies") is the flag _zm.gsc's spawn loop actually blocks on, so spawning stops at the source instead of being fought.
• level.discardtime is subtracted from the match clock, so pushing it forward by the elapsed time holds the timer still.

On top of that, ZPause covers what host migration never has to because it only lasts a few seconds:

• An AI enforcer that re-freezes anything appearing mid-pause, keeps ignoreall pinned, and snaps back any AI that drifts. It's a safety net — if the engine freeze does its job it never fires, so there's no jitter.
• A player enforcer. Map scripts that carry a player somewhere lock the controls for the ride and call freezecontrols( 0 ) when it ends — Ascension's lander is the one that bites. That release lands mid-pause and hands one player free movement around a frozen game. freezecontrols() has no getter, so the guard re-asserts the freeze on a tick rather than testing it, and re-pins godmode and ignoreme while it's there.
• The stuck-zombie watchdog. round_spawn_failsafe() kills any zombie that hasn't moved 24 units in 30 seconds (15 on Origins and Mob of the Dead), assuming it's stuck outside the playspace. A paused zombie trips it every time, and the "put it back in the spawn queue" compensation is skipped for anything with ignoreall set — so those zombies are gone for good, counted as killed, and the round advances while everyone's away. ZPause keeps the barrier-chunk timestamp fresh, which all three variants honour, so the watchdog loops harmlessly instead of firing and still works normally afterwards.
• Ground powerups. powerup_timeout() is a plain wait() and can't be paused, so the thread is cut and restarted on resume.
• Insta-kill / double points. Their HUD countdowns are held still. The 30s wait() driving the real effect keeps running underneath, so on resume a bounded thread holds the effect on until the frozen countdown genuinely runs out, then forces it off — without that, the effect would stick on for the rest of the game.
• Bleedout is pinned so a downed player doesn't bleed out.
• Late joiners and respawns are frozen on spawn, and everything is torn down on end_game so nobody is left frozen at the scoreboard.

Why not timescale?

timescale 0 looks like the perfect pause — it would freeze everything, timers included. But GSC wait runs on server time, so the unpause loop freezes with it and the game can never be resumed. The server also only runs a frame once enough scaled time accumulates, so snapshots stop going out and clients drop with Connection Interrupted. Slow motion (timescale 0.05) avoids the disconnects but isn't a pause.

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Notes

• Round transitions. Pausing between rounds doesn't stop the next round from beginning — its delay is a plain wait(). No zombies spawn until you resume.
• Ground powerups get a fresh timer on resume rather than their exact remaining time, so you'll never lose a Max Ammo to a pause.
• Zombies stand idle rather than freeze solid. zp_freeze_anims puts them in the game's dormant-zombie pose so they don't run on the spot, but it's an idle animation rather than a hard freeze. A true animation freeze isn't reachable from server-side GSC, and the same applies to player animations.
• Scripted rides keep running. Pause inside Ascension's lander and it still lands and opens underneath the pause — the guard only stops it releasing your controls early. Resuming hands them back normally.
• Scripted boss sequences (Brutus spawn-ins, Panzers, ghosts, the Avogadro) are held in place, but a scripted move already underway can still finish.
• Not held: magic box close timer, teleporter cooldowns, trap durations, and Easter egg step timers.

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Testing

Tested in live co-op games, including on custom map ports.

It's also compile-checked with gsc-tool 1.4.10 targeting t6/pc against the stock script tree, and round-tripped through compile → decompile. Every external function it calls exists in the stock T6 script corpus.

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Changelog

v1.1

• Fixed: a map script releasing a player's controls mid-pause — Ascension's lander landing and opening — let that player roam around a paused game. New zp_control_guard, on by default, re-applies the freeze every tick.
• Added: zp_blur, a light screen blur while paused, on by default and adjustable with zp_blur_amount. Softer than the existing blackout.
• Added: separate zp_pause_sound and zp_resume_sound alongside the countdown tick, all three defaulting to fitting stock aliases. zp_countdown_sound was silent by default before.

v1.0

• Initial release.

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Credits

• Xep — author
• Treyarch — _hostmigration.gsc, the pause recipe this is built on
• plutoniummod/t6-scripts — stock T6 script reference
• hima_simple — earliest BO2 zombies pause script
• DED2SIN — Plutonium pause script building on it
• MufaDOOM — BO2 co-op pause mod
• Resxt — Plutonium T6 chat command conventions