Future Modding Features Revived

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Major Cooke
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Future Modding Features Revived

Postby Major Cooke » Fri Jul 16, 2010 8:27 pm

Okay. I figured it'd be best to start a whole new bag o' bones instead of compounding a three-year-old thread despite the fact that it's a sticky/announcement... To me that doesn't count because it's still old as phuck and I'm going to assemble a list of to-do things here.

Feel free to post your requests, and depending on how much time or how useful it may be, may or may not get added to this list.

To Do:

  • Team Ally/Enemy system - includes color setting, up to 8 teams (if possible, don't get too excited), and viral coloring
  • Sprite changing - Darwinians will be able to change their sprites based upon if threatened, scared, angered, idle, objectivated, praying, goddishing, or following an officer's orders. Also, each team will have their own unique sprite sets which you can modify by name types (i.e. team 0 will have darwinian0-idle, darwinian0-objective, etc)
  • Avatars - Basically the same thing Icepick was working on. I'm going to be as flexible as possible with it though so you can determine for yourself what range of pics with the same name base you want to display during a cutscene and the likes. A code snippet for how it's planned for functioning is below.
  • 3dconnexion spacenavigator support - Well, to be fair, I love to use it in Multiwinia. I have no more reasons to complain to the IV staff of it not being in Darwinia since the source code for that, and the SDK for the integrated mouse is already inside of Multiwinia. I don't think it'd be too hard to implement... but that's just me talking out of my ass.

Done:

  • Cheat window activation. Yes, there were a few debugging tools which Introversion purposely hid from us, but what's to stop us from bringing it out, eh? Besides, it's one hell of a useful tool for testing out maps and certain situations.

The planned ChangeAvatar function:

Code: Select all

ChangeAvatar "nameofavatars_01.bmp", "nameofavatars_08.bmp", IsRandom(1/0), picTimer(int), zoomFactor(int), offsetX(int), frameTime(int)
-StartBitmapRange: Name of the file you want to serve as the "first", or "minimum" boundary.
-EndBitmapRange: Name of the file that will serve as the "last", or "maximum" pic number to go to.
-IsRandom: Specify if you want to play through the sequence via random picking, or via numerical order from lowest to highest. Default is 1.
-picTimer: How long each pic in the sequence will stay on the screen before switching. Default is 4.0f.
-zoomFactor: How much to zoom in and out. Default is 0.
-offsetX: How much to shift the picture right or left. Default is 0.
-frameTime: How long it takes each pic to "fade" to the next. 0 means instant switching. Default is 0.25f.


This is going to take a while, but hey... It'll be worth it. Right now I'm working on teams and making custom coloring abilities.

If you guys feel like you want to help out and know anything about C++, or have a developer status, let me know. I'll share my contact info with you.

Other smaller tweaks and fixes that are/will be added:

  • Double the radius of the GOTO officer command
  • All Research items (except for Darwinians, Officers, and Lasers) now scale with each version level accordingly, i.e. engineers gain 10 to maximum spirit capacity per level, rockets gain(1.5f/4) seconds of lifetime, grenades fly further, etc.). Those that aren't scaleable have their program defaults set to level 4 if above the regular cap instead of 0.
  • Darwinians now have lasers at level 2, grenades at level 3, and rockets at level 4. They can alternate however they like, and will mostly use rockets for airborne enemies (spore generators).
  • Create a new building called the AINoZone. This acts as a "fear" zone which any/all darwinians will treat with the same threat as a grenade, unless inactive. Also will force other entities to move out of the region if possible. Comes with a "silent" and "team" options. Silent acts as if an invisible officer is standing at the location, and orders them to the nearest spot outside the radius of the zone. Disrupts officer orders as well for those who get "feared".
  • Other tweaks that I will mention at some point or another.
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Postby Shwart!! » Sat Jul 17, 2010 7:38 am

Concerning the tweaks:

I question arbitrarily doubling the GOTO radius. Is there a compelling reason to do so?

Engineer research mostly worked well, I think. Granted, balance is of little concern in this case, but I think a progression of (10,15,25,40) is fine. I know the first 3 are as Darwinia had it, IDK about the last one. But I do think that +10 per level, above level 4, would be a good value.

I really question globally changing the Darwinian weapons like that, as that would greatly change game balance. I think a script command to set DG weapons would make far more sense, but with the values you listed there, they'd be overpowered. (I assume you'd be including the ability to fire rockets in the v4 DG research...)

Otherwise, I don't see anything to comment on, but I repeat my offer of testing. I have a decent amount of programming experience, including some C++, but I do not currently have dev status.

Shwart!!
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Postby Major Cooke » Sat Jul 17, 2010 11:33 am

I accept your offer. Got MSN, steam, or anything like that?
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Postby RabidZombie » Sat Jul 17, 2010 12:20 pm

Hey, if you are going to do this, leave out any balance changes. They're unnecessary. Opening them to scripting is more than welcome though.
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Postby Major Cooke » Sat Jul 17, 2010 1:38 pm

...true, and very good point.

Rabid, you have msn as well, don't ya?

Send it to me in a PM if you want.
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Postby Shwart!! » Sat Jul 17, 2010 6:44 pm

I am most easily reached via Steam, where I have already sent you a friend invite.

Shwart!!
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Postby xander » Sun Jul 18, 2010 1:13 am

Major Cooke wrote:I accept your offer. Got MSN, steam, or anything like that?

Just be careful not to violate the license that you agreed to when you purchased the code, especially in terms of sharing code with people that have not agreed to that license. There is a reason that there is a developer subforum now.

xander
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Postby Jordy... » Sun Jul 18, 2010 1:46 am

Why take these NDA words so seriously, surely Chris or any of the IV staff would be bothered with this. Words are just there con convoy a concept, not a concept in them selfs. That's why law can be such a jerk at times, cause they attach to much worth to words.
Words... no longer for me, I'm starting to work on my telepathic abilities, can you hear me now...?
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Postby Shwart!! » Sun Jul 18, 2010 4:38 am

The license is not being violated, xander; I'm testing builds reliant on an actual install of Darwinia, and I have no access to the code. And I doubt IV would mind one of their testers testing the mods.

Shwart!!
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Postby Major Cooke » Sun Jul 18, 2010 3:08 pm

xander wrote:Just be careful not to violate the license that you agreed to when you purchased the code, especially in terms of sharing code with people that have not agreed to that license. There is a reason that there is a developer subforum now.

xander


I will. Giving off the .exe builds is something we can do for everyone, so long as we dont provide things like the .dat files or the .dll files. Luckily, all our modifications only affect the .exe build too.

Sharing source code, of course, only happens with those who have the badges.

Speaking of testing, xander, would you like to help test some of my builds?

I'm going to be doing some modifications here soon, perhaps you would like to experiment with team color modifications? I know you've been wanting to implement team colors for your main mod, so I figured I'd ask ya.

Jordy, I'm afraid your only speaking to yourself on this one mate. We're not talking NDA here, we're talking EULA... something far more serious, because I actually paid for the source code. This is something which if I don't follow, my ass could get sued.
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Postby xander » Sun Jul 18, 2010 7:44 pm

Major Cooke wrote:Speaking of testing, xander, would you like to help test some of my builds?

Only if you are making Mac builds.

xander
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Postby Major Cooke » Sun Jul 18, 2010 10:53 pm

I'll see what I can do about it.
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Re: Future Modding Features Revived

Postby Stormchild » Mon Jul 19, 2010 10:31 pm

Major Cooke wrote:Okay. I figured it'd be best to start a whole new bag o' bones instead of compounding a three-year-old thread despite the fact that it's a sticky/announcement... To me that doesn't count because it's still old as phuck and I'm going to assemble a list of to-do things here.

Feel free to post your requests, and depending on how much time or how useful it may be, may or may not get added to this list.

To Do:

[list][*]Team Ally/Enemy system - includes color setting, up to 8 teams (if possible, don't get too excited), and viral coloring


I've had a poke around at this, and once you figure out how it currently works, its fairly trivial to load this data from the mission file instead of having it hard-coded. My working copy has 8 teams, each of which can have its colour set per-mission, and the alliances between teams likewise set per-mission. :)

What I haven't got worked out yet is how to edit this data in the editor. Currently I have to save the mission, then go into the text file and manually make the changes (though the editor loads and preserves the manually inputted data, it just lacks an interface to display or edit it).

Viral colouring is a one-line change :)


Currently having fun poking around to see what can be done with units and buildings. Managed to knock up a little building that spawns darwinians (sort of an incubator/anthill cross), and which occasionally spawns tame ants who go out and gather souls for it :P Even got it to have hovering souls, incubator style.
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Re: Future Modding Features Revived

Postby RabidZombie » Mon Jul 19, 2010 10:56 pm

Stormchild wrote:
Major Cooke wrote:Okay. I figured it'd be best to start a whole new bag o' bones instead of compounding a three-year-old thread despite the fact that it's a sticky/announcement... To me that doesn't count because it's still old as phuck and I'm going to assemble a list of to-do things here.

Feel free to post your requests, and depending on how much time or how useful it may be, may or may not get added to this list.

To Do:

[list][*]Team Ally/Enemy system - includes color setting, up to 8 teams (if possible, don't get too excited), and viral coloring


I've had a poke around at this, and once you figure out how it currently works, its fairly trivial to load this data from the mission file instead of having it hard-coded. My working copy has 8 teams, each of which can have its colour set per-mission, and the alliances between teams likewise set per-mission. :)

What I haven't got worked out yet is how to edit this data in the editor. Currently I have to save the mission, then go into the text file and manually make the changes (though the editor loads and preserves the manually inputted data, it just lacks an interface to display or edit it).

Viral colouring is a one-line change :)


Currently having fun poking around to see what can be done with units and buildings. Managed to knock up a little building that spawns darwinians (sort of an incubator/anthill cross), and which occasionally spawns tame ants who go out and gather souls for it :P Even got it to have hovering souls, incubator style.


Have you gotten shape-using enemies to change colour yet. I think I probably overlooked where the colour for these are set. But white virii and black Darwinians alone made the Dev kit worth it. :P (Maybe this should be in the Dev forum...)
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Re: Future Modding Features Revived

Postby Major Cooke » Mon Jul 19, 2010 11:19 pm

Stormchild wrote:
Major Cooke wrote:Okay. I figured it'd be best to start a whole new bag o' bones instead of compounding a three-year-old thread despite the fact that it's a sticky/announcement... To me that doesn't count because it's still old as phuck and I'm going to assemble a list of to-do things here.

Feel free to post your requests, and depending on how much time or how useful it may be, may or may not get added to this list.

To Do:

[list][*]Team Ally/Enemy system - includes color setting, up to 8 teams (if possible, don't get too excited), and viral coloring


I've had a poke around at this, and once you figure out how it currently works, its fairly trivial to load this data from the mission file instead of having it hard-coded. My working copy has 8 teams, each of which can have its colour set per-mission, and the alliances between teams likewise set per-mission. :)

What I haven't got worked out yet is how to edit this data in the editor. Currently I have to save the mission, then go into the text file and manually make the changes (though the editor loads and preserves the manually inputted data, it just lacks an interface to display or edit it).

Viral colouring is a one-line change :)


Currently having fun poking around to see what can be done with units and buildings. Managed to knock up a little building that spawns darwinians (sort of an incubator/anthill cross), and which occasionally spawns tame ants who go out and gather souls for it :P Even got it to have hovering souls, incubator style.


Please tell me you have MSN, Steam, or something... I could really talk to you right now.

And yeah, I've been busy trying to make it external-coded but that ain't working out so much...

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