3d Object Convertor supports Darwinia

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Cyberdyne Systems
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3d Object Convertor supports Darwinia

Postby Cyberdyne Systems » Thu Apr 30, 2009 7:48 pm

This program supports Darwinia, I used to use it when Darwinia first came out (*.ase) and asked the author to support Darwinia shape files. He replied yes in the future and I then forogot all about it. Just found the program again, and it now does, mostly.

http://web.t-online.hu/karpo/

Its shareware though, you can open a lot of the Darwinia shape files in the unregistered version, but it fails on a few. I suppose a bug report to the author should sort it out though. Can't save to Darwinia shape format in the unregistered version.

Supports hundreds of file formats, both saving and loading.

Now before I'm buying this, I want to make sure it can open and save every type of shape in Darwinia. So bug reports here I come.

Regards.
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Phelanpt
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Postby Phelanpt » Fri May 01, 2009 1:35 am

I think there was a converter for darwinia shape files created by a forum member.
Edit: Well, not a converter per se, a Blender format import/export script: http://forums.introversion.co.uk/darwin ... php?t=3916
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briceman2
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Postby briceman2 » Sat May 09, 2009 11:33 pm

... FYI, the .shp files (and the shapes themselves) are so simple that you can do the imports by hand for anything you really want to edit. Search this forum for mention of .OFF files and read the threads concerning PaladinofKaos' Blender export script. TGF and I posted lots of info (some of mine originally wrong, but TGF corrected) about converting .shp to .off format which Blender can directly import. Requires a little bit of spreadsheet-fu and a text editor.

You only need to import once. So paying for import is a bit of a waste imho.

Often you can just lift the point lists from the .shp file and create a quick and dirty .off file which lists only the points (with no faces). The buildings are so simple that you can rebuild the faces in Blender faster than doing the conversion in a spreadsheet. (The issue in .shp files is that the points in the "position" list are rearranged by the "vertex" list before being referenced by the face list. The .off format which Blender can import requires the points be listed in the real order the faces use them.)

Blender is cross platform and free everywhere. A bit of a pain to learn, but very powerful once you do. The newer versions are even pretty.

Hope this helps you decide,

-brice
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Postby nihilesthetics2 » Sat May 30, 2009 4:50 pm

Hi Cyberdyne. You may remember me from such failed mods as the Collaboration Project :) I think its excellent that the 3D Object Converter guy added Darwinia shapes to his list of supported formats. Did you explain the format to him or did he figure it out himself?

Funny thing is I see support was added in 2005 according to the release log! I keep coming back to these forums occasionally and Darwinia shape creation and conversion is one of the most sought after and researched topics in the history of the Darwinia modding community. Solutions have appeared in many and increasingly more sophisticated guises over the years. If only we had known about this sooner lol.

On a different note, I remember you sent me one of your musical tracks a few years ago that was pretty damn good. You still doing that kind of stuff?

N2
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Marquise Fishy TGF McGraw
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Postby Marquise Fishy TGF McGraw » Mon Jun 01, 2009 5:52 pm

Well given that it's shareware, and only really available in the registered version in the most useful capacity, I'm not surprised that there's been little/no mention of it.

I think maybe the reason it's mentioned so much is because it's more considered the sort of magical holy grail that everyone wants because they think it'll make their mod awesome, but it would still be nice to have had more native support from an earlier stage.

Anyway, oh hi Brice and Nihil, long time no see.
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Postby nihilesthetics2 » Sat Jun 13, 2009 6:52 am

Marquise Fishy! How far you have come - I remember you when you were plain old TGF :)

Sorry to bring up this old chestnut again but I'm out the loop. Are you still lobbying (perhaps not the correct term, but you know what I mean) to get the Darwinia source released or is that dead horse well and truly flayed to a pulp ? I suspect I know the answer. Shame.
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Postby xander » Sat Jun 13, 2009 3:48 pm

nihilesthetics2 wrote:Marquise Fishy! How far you have come - I remember you when you were plain old TGF :)

Sorry to bring up this old chestnut again but I'm out the loop. Are you still lobbying (perhaps not the correct term, but you know what I mean) to get the Darwinia source released or is that dead horse well and truly flayed to a pulp ? I suspect I know the answer. Shame.

I don't know what TGF is up to vis-à-vis the Darwinia source, but I would imagine that IV won't release it any time soon. The Uplink dev CD was, I think, an act of desperation on the part of IV---a way to make money until they could get their next game out the door. IV do not seem to be that desperate at this moment in time. Furthermore, Darwinia is tied up with Steam and the XBox, which implies that IV have made some deals to get it onto those systems. These may include not releasing source code.

xander

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