Author Topic: Let's talk, HLP!  (Read 82136 times)

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Offline Spoon

  • 212
  • ヾ(´︶`♡)ノ
Woah, hi Snail
Urutorahappī!!

[02:42] <@Axem> spoon somethings wrong
[02:42] <@Axem> critically wrong
[02:42] <@Axem> im happy with these missions now
[02:44] <@Axem> well
[02:44] <@Axem> with 2 of them

 

Offline Torchwood

  • 27
  • Mechanical Templar
Welcome back Snail, glad I'm not to only one who decided to come back.

I'll be sure to do my part for the Freespace 2 resurgence. Expect some new content soon.

 
 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
  • 214
  • i wonder when my postcount will exceed my iq
Umm... Hi. It's Snail. I'm hoping a few people remember me. It's been a while. About once every year I decide to have a look at that one website I used to visit literally every day and... Man, it's always weird. My life has changed so damn much since I stopped coming, but this place is always still here (with the exact same front page and forum interface). It seems like nothing at all has changed, everything's just gotten slower. Which I guess is the issue being addressed in this thread. The new home page looks great and I really hope the social media stuff gains some traction. I'll add that I think Reddit's a good place to start if we want to draw new people in. And that standalone things like Wings of Dawn or TCs based on existing IPs like Fate of the Galaxy seem like a great way to gain some mass appeal for exposure.

Honestly, I don't really have much input other than that, and I don't want to derail the thread with my nostalgia or anything, so I'll just add some general positivity and good vibes: I'm really ****ing glad you guys are still here. This game and these forums were such a huge part of my life and some of my best memories are of me in my bedroom or at my grandma's house playing Inferno and Blue Planet and of course ****posting on these forums (or embarrassing myself on IRC). It seems like a different world to me now, but as long as HLP is around it's never really gone. I hope that's always the case. While I'm saddened to see that things have slowed down significantly compared to the scene 4-6 years ago, I'm really glad that you guys are actively working on it. I've always been in total awe of how uniquely intelligent and hardworking the community here has been, and based on that alone I'm confident there's a way to breathe some life back into this place. I'm not sure if I'm in a position to contribute to the great FreeSpace resurgence of 2017 myself, but I'll just say I wish you all the best. Love you guys. :D

Holy **** you're alive

 

Offline jr2

  • The Mail Man
  • 212
  • It's prounounced jayartoo 0x6A7232
    • Steam
Snail!  Hi!  I've always wondered if / when you'd come back.  :)  Great to see you!

 

Offline Snail

  • SC 5
  • 214
  • Posts: ☂
Yes, I am alive. It's good to see all of you too. :P

  
Knossos is a Steam / GoG Galaxy style combined launcher... [snip]

I don't post on the forums much, but I come here for the Highlights, to see what has been released. THIS IS AWESOME. DO IT.  I urge that HLP runs with this, feature a "web version" of this on the HLP front page, similar to that seen at https://www.technicpack.net/modpacks if you need a case example, integrate Knossos and your HLP Forum Account. But don't require people make accounts to download. I try to get my friends to get something and they're often like "oh god another launcher **** this" or "I don't want to make an account **** this".

In short, HLP: Mods, Assets, Music, etc, all tabbed, with nice images, a working search, hash tags to categorize by type (Serious, Humor, Anime, etc), all with download buttons, description of license type / credit requirements, etc. Then have a Community section with links to the Forums, Discord, etc etc. Put the Content up front, community second.

I should caution that if you all succeed in getting HLP more "visible," HLP will have an increased chance of getting hit by a Lawsuit/C&DGreen#Home for some of its hosted mods' use of copyrighted or trademarked material; e.g. BP's use of copyrighted commercial music (Origa comes to mind) and the Starfox mods/content assets. Nintendo in particular is extremely aggressive about nuking fangames (Metroid AM2R comes to mind). Hell, even Doom the Roguelike was smashed down by Bethesda recently; they had to rename themselves to "DRL".

My biggest problem with getting new people (OR MYSELF) to play FreeSpace is the annoyance of setting it up. Gamers these days are lazy, I myself am spoiled rotten by how easy it is to set up more modern games. Especially in multiplayer (which, after fixing netcode, could really benefit from the ability for dedicated servers to change maps on the fly, run with AI bots as "players" when none are available, and other modern features).

 

Offline Mika

  • 28
Alright, so this is the thread were the plans for the new forums were released. Next time I'd really consider putting it to GenDisc, but then again I don't have the thread reading statistics.

Along the 22 page discussion came up the question why isn't the game played?

Some people have already given feedback on how outdated installation instructions are. With a launcher, this point would become considerably easier. Eagerly waiting for that.

And now about why I haven't played the game for 10 years as of now: I played the main campaign through thrice with varying difficulty levels. Then I played Blaise Russell's Derelict and a couple of other vanilla game add-in campaigns (Boomerang, something starting with A too). All good back then. Unfortunately what happened next was a long hiatus of campaigns that were just around the corner (Inferno, Diaspora, Blackwater Operations), but did not get released, or have been recently released. A number of total conversions did happen, but I'm not particularly interested playing those (never watched Babylon) without knowing the source material, or that I feel I played the originals already (Star Wars X-Wings and TIEs). Conversion to Wing Commander could be interesting, but I also played the hell out of WCII at the time it was released.

I did learn FREDding back then, and created several missions. I actually still have the campaign structure A4 yellowing on my desk. But what happened was Microsoft. My Windows XP license somehow reset itself necessitating a complete re-install of the operating system. And I thought I had made back ups of the FRED missions, but unfortunately I was mistaken. It was all lost with that formatting. With no interesting campaigns in sight and getting depressed by losing a couple of good missions, I shifted towards other games. But I never picked up the releases as my go to HLP address refers to the forums as it was done back then, and not to the main page.

But tell you what: if you get that launcher running, I might actually pick up the game again. And if I get inspired, actually finish the plot for my own campaign and start FREDding when my business allows it. Remaking those missions could actually be interesting, if I recall playtesters (Mongoose and someone else?) were having fun with them.
Relaxed movement is always more effective than forced movement.

 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
  • 214
  • i wonder when my postcount will exceed my iq
Lol you skipped the entire golden age of FS2 campaigns. Well played.

 
I mean, the installer really isn't that bad if you're willing to put some time in. Don't let it stop you from enjoying the best user-made content for FSO.
If you previously went through installing FSO by hand then the installer will only make things easier for you. It's only too complex to attract people not familiar with freespace who might give up or not know where to start.
[19:31] <MatthTheGeek> you all high up on your mointain looking down at everyone who doesn't beam everything on insane blindfolded

 

Offline The E

  • He's Ebeneezer Goode
  • 213
  • Nothing personal, just tech support.
    • Steam
    • Twitter
But tell you what: if you get that launcher running, I might actually pick up the game again. And if I get inspired, actually finish the plot for my own campaign and start FREDding when my business allows it. Remaking those missions could actually be interesting, if I recall playtesters (Mongoose and someone else?) were having fun with them.

The launcher is running. Ball's in your court.
If I'm just aching this can't go on
I came from chasing dreams to feel alone
There must be changes, miss to feel strong
I really need lifе to touch me
--Evergrey, Where August Mourns

 

Offline Mika

  • 28
I have never actually installed FSO. It's the vanilla game sitting on my hard disk.

So let's see:
From FS2 Open Coding thread, 3.8.0-RC1 release

Quote
All platforms:  wxLauncher (ongoing project for a unified launcher)

Now what's that launcher? I thought I saw a launcher with a different name in this thread?

What's the difference between x64 and x86 builds? I'm really not interested in MS-DOSesque battles of getting something or keeping something running, had enough of those that I could probably quote the entries in CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT from the heart up to this day. The way it's written there it looks as if I should go with x86 build with x64 Windows.
Relaxed movement is always more effective than forced movement.

 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
  • 214
  • i wonder when my postcount will exceed my iq
Just run the FSO installer. fsoinstaller.com

 

Offline Mika

  • 28
FSOpen installer works.

I can't believe that my Freespace CDs still work, but the vanilla game won't actually run on my computer any more. 16Gb of RAM is apparently too much.

Should the main menu screen be changed? I didn't expect you guys would have kept the original, but it does state FSOpen version something in the left bottom corner. I suppose the original start up video also is as it is?

There's an issue with the wxLauncher with respect to screen size. It does not scale properly for 4K resolution (I use 4K desktop resolution, but typically game at 1080p). Does not stop me from playing, but makes it difficult to see what graphic options actually do. Pictures available upon request.

Since the installation was way larger than I expected (like 21 Gb) and it's a street dance jam today I'm participating, I'll check the campaign tomorrow.
Relaxed movement is always more effective than forced movement.

 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
  • 214
  • i wonder when my postcount will exceed my iq
Play with MediaVPs enabled for enhanced graphics, play the Blue Planet mod and select 'FreeSpace Blue' to play with lightly remastered missions/rebalanced weapons and functioning TAG.

 

Offline SypheDMar

  • 210
  • Student, Volunteer, Savior
    • Minecraft
And Gen Disc. (or something like it) should, and almost certainly is, staying. We're trying to grow HLP's userbase, not drive people away.
You say that like Gen Disc. doesn't actively drive people away (and if you were planning on saying it does not, there are people who only use IRC and stay off the forums specifically because Gen Disc. is a ****hole who would disagree with you).
I got on IRC one day just to complain about  Gen Disc after lurking, so yeah, this is real.

e: Now that I've read through the entire thread since that post, here's a few things of note:

  • Snail! ♥
  • I think multiplayer is essential for TCs. Like chief said, if we're trying to get, say, Star Wars fans to actually play FoTG for longer than a month, we HAVE to get multiplayer working.
  • Battuta, I get why people think you are sniping other users. The way your posts were typed seemed belittling. You're very knowledgeable, but you came off as an ass in the thread. I'm speaking as a lurker who clicked the link in the topic because the title was catchy. I'm not offended, and I do need to play FreeSpace again.
  • We need to axe the **** of of GD. Barring that, it needs to be an opt-in. Sure keep the three good threads, but burn everything else. Also, admins and mods cannot have privileges that regular members don't have. If an admin is an ass or ignorant, ban said admin from GD as well. I'm still not touching GD with a 10-foot pole.

I think I'm a target audience who hasn't played FSO in a while. The initial thing that got me interested in FreeSpace was that it was listed as an open source game on Wikipedia before they cleaned up the page (a bit). This was of course before GoG was a thing and FreeSpace was essentially abandonware. And also when Ubuntu was cool and almost becoming a thing.

So first, I think another avenue to market FreeSpace is actually the open source gaming community. FSO is not an open source game engine, but FreeSpace 2 with MediaVPs looks and plays better than most open source games, and there are Linux gamers who just want to run a "AAA"game on their computers. That's not to mention the promotion with actual free TCs.

I'm currently in the process of using the 2016 FSO installer and updating everything, including downloading a few mods that I've never played/used before. Thinking about it, I might have to replay the retail campaign just to feel comfortable with everything. That's not a good feeling for me since I updated the files to play the mods, not retail.

As for why I've not been playing FreeSpace recently (nearly a year but before I replayed it was almost another year too): A lot of my issues come from my favorite mods that I've played are ones that are still WIP -  BP being the standout. I want to play FS more, but not all campaigns are created equal, and my taste is sometimes selective. There's a not a draw for me to open up FSO when other games are more complete and frankly more accessible.

I hope I gave some insight as to why I'm not here frequently.

 
BtA is more polished and much more modern than BP in terms of both mission design and all the little extras like the system map. Whether it's "better" is up to you to decide but it's definitely worth a playthrough for anyone who cares about FSO. JAD 2.22 was released 2 months ago and it was... more JAD. It's got cool VN segments and big bossfights so if you enjoyed previous JADs you'll probably enjoy this one too.

If you're getting back into FSO after a year you should definitely play those 2.
[19:31] <MatthTheGeek> you all high up on your mointain looking down at everyone who doesn't beam everything on insane blindfolded

 

Offline karajorma

  • King Louie - Jungle VIP
  • Administrator
  • 214
    • Karajorma's Freespace FAQ
We need to axe the **** of of GD. Barring that, it needs to be an opt-in. Sure keep the three good threads, but burn everything else. Also, admins and mods cannot have privileges that regular members don't have. If an admin is an ass or ignorant, ban said admin from GD as well. I'm still not touching GD with a 10-foot pole.

All the political stuff is now in it's own separate forum. So Gen Dis should be perfectly safe to visit now.
Karajorma's Freespace FAQ. It's almost like asking me yourself.

[ Diaspora ] - [ Seeds Of Rebellion ] - [ Mind Games ]

 

Offline SypheDMar

  • 210
  • Student, Volunteer, Savior
    • Minecraft
BtA is more polished and much more modern than BP in terms of both mission design and all the little extras like the system map. Whether it's "better" is up to you to decide but it's definitely worth a playthrough for anyone who cares about FSO.
That's actually one of the campaigns I've downloaded! I'm very excited for it.

 

Offline deathspeed

  • 29
  • i can't think of a good avatar
    • Steam
First off; thank you for allowing Gen Disc to appear again in my unread topics!!

Second, has any more thought been given to a "general tech discussion" forum, like suggested by JR2?  http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=93249.0

I agree that it would be a way to possibly be seen by those who actively avoid Gen Disc.
Maybe someday God will give you a little pink toaster of your own.