Hard Light Productions Forums
Hosted Projects - FS2 Required => Blue Planet => Topic started by: General Battuta on May 04, 2009, 09:08:50 am
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Ladies, gentlemen, I am a fortunate man. I've recently had the chance to spend some hands-on time with the War in Heaven alpha, including an early build of the campaign.
Age of Aquarius took ten months to complete, start to finish. War in Heaven has been in the works for longer than that, and it shows. This campaign, my friends, is a different beast.
I won't be talking much about the story, but I will say there's been a tonal shift since Age of Aquarius. This is not a family-building interdimensional adventure of self-discovery. This is a war story. It is grim. It is gritty. You aren't going to be concerned with destiny and fate, you're going to be concerned with the spillage of live ammo on the hangar deck that's keeping your reinforcements from launching.
And it is unquestionably awesome.
I have seen remarkable things. Darius has put a lot of effort into building a new, more cinematic style of combat for AoA. Everything is faster and more lethal. UEF ships fire volleys of tracers like something out of a World War II newsreel. GTVA (Tevs, as the Earth pilots call them) fighters seem more brutally competent than anything in the retail campaign. They look downright fearsome: Myrmidons and Persei break into the merge spewing long, gorgeous streams of Balor fire, while the nimble little Kulas harries with four-bank Prometheus volleys. Once the dogfight really kicks off, the Tev pilots almost seem like they're actually switching targets and covering each other. I usually play on Insane, but this is definitely a campaign for Medium if you want to avoid being gunned down again and again.
The UEF gets beautiful toys as well. Their fighters are generally more specialized than GTVA counterparts - light and swift, their fragility compensated for by the use of modular armor repairs from UEF support ships (much like in 'The Procyon Insurgency.') Instead of bombers, they have gunships, which mount fearsome rotary cannons, packs of missiles on external racks, and enormous mass drivers capable of breaching destroyer armor. These gunships are death-dealers - unless a Myrmidon or Kulas gets in behind you, in which case you're Balor food.
The dogfights are also more tactically interesting than in the retail campaign. GTVA fighters sometime use Morningstars to push you away from a target you're escorting. Bomber wings are almost always accompanied by fighters for protection, and a lot of them are packing Helioses.
On both the tactical and strategic level, Darius has put a lot of effort into addressing what we might term 'The Mobius Question': how to make the GTVA seem like a competent, aggressive enemy, instead of an organization of buffoons. GTVA front-line warships seriously outclass their UEF opponents, and when a Hyperion or a Bellerophon enters the scene, the UEF's mainstay cruisers and frigates have no chance in a straight-up fight. To compensate, the UEF ships sometimes use cluster munitions on their missile launchers, spewing wave after wave of low-yield swarm munitions to occupy Tev AAA beams - but, to be honest, it's going to take a hard fight to bring down the more advanced GTVA ships. One advantage the UEF has is the Narayana artillery ship, which they mostly use to chase off big foes like Raynors and Titans (the Tevs are smart enough to jump out if in danger of being destroyed.)
Fortunately, the Tevs still use the Aeolus cruiser and Deimos corvette, and these ships are on more even footing with UEF capital ships.
A good example came up when I was ordered to disarm the forward beam cannons of a GTVA corvette. "Oh boy," I thought. "Disarming forward beams? What a shockingly original task, Darius!" But two Aeolus cruisers were positioned to cover the entire approach to those forward beams with their AAAfs, and I found that if I charged in too early, defensive fighters pounced on me. These are not Shivans - they are calculating, prepared opponents.
Development is ongoing. Right now, the UEF's higher-end fighter weapons are extremely powerful, and Darius is working to correct that. The storyline is also being iterated again and again to bring out the tactical and strategic details of the war.
Oh, and the music? AoA's exhilarating electronica sound has been enriched by a set of orchestral, epic tracks that go well with the 'Total War' feel of this new chapter. Darius custom-builds music tracks for missions at an impressive rate.
I've made a few suggestions for the project. One thing we're playing with implementing is squadron names for all the GTVA fighters, to give them a bit more character. This may show up in some or all of the missions.
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I won't be talking much about the story, but I will say there's been a tonal shift since Age of Aquarius. This is not a family-building interdimensional adventure of self-discovery. This is a war story. It is grim. It is gritty. You aren't going to be concerned with destiny and fate, you're going to be concerned with the spillage of live ammo on the hangar deck that's keeping your reinforcements from launching.
I heard from Darius that there will be a different player character in this campaign and that Samuel Bei might not even be getting an appearance. Will this new character be given the same amount of depth of Samuel Bei, or will the storyline focus on the 'bigger-picture' rather than the individual soldiers?
I have seen remarkable things. Darius has put a lot of effort into building a new, more cinematic style of combat for AoA. Everything is faster and more lethal. UEF ships fire volleys of tracers like something out of a World War II newsreel. GTVA (Tevs, as the Earth pilots call them) fighters seem more brutally competent than anything in the retail campaign. They look downright fearsome: Myrmidons and Persei break into the merge spewing long, gorgeous streams of Balor fire, while the nimble little Kulas harries with four-bank Prometheus volleys. Once the dogfight really kicks off, the Tev pilots almost seem like they're actually switching targets and covering each other. I usually play on Insane, but this is definitely a campaign for Medium if you want to avoid being gunned down again and again.
Sounds like some serious modding work goin' down here. I saw in the trailers some seriously cool looking weapons (like those salvo turrets I drooled at) and the heavy railguns included in the AoA modpack were quite a lot of fun... Seeing them in action looks to be a real treat...
When this comes out I'll probably be looking through the tables to figure out how it was done... :drevil:
The UEF gets beautiful toys as well. Their fighters are generally more specialized than GTVA counterparts - light and swift, their fragility compensated for by the use of modular armor repairs from UEF support ships (much like in 'The Procyon Insurgency.') Instead of bombers, they have gunships, which mount fearsome rotary cannons, packs of missiles on external racks, and enormous mass drivers capable of breaching destroyer armor. These gunships are death-dealers - unless a Myrmidon or Kulas gets in behind you, in which case you're Balor food.
I saw also in the trailer for the Solaris that these ships had multiple primary and secondary slots with some pretty unique weapons... And the armor repair ships are sure to give some new freedom to lengthen important missions... Sounds like an entirely new gameplay dimension here. Balancing this must have been a real *****...
The dogfights are also more tactically interesting than in the retail campaign. GTVA fighters sometime use Morningstars to push you away from a target you're escorting. Bomber wings are almost always accompanied by fighters for protection, and a lot of them are packing Helioses.
I trust it's balanced in such a way that it doesn't become frustrating for rubbish players like me... :P
On both the tactical and strategic level, Darius has put a lot of effort into addressing what we might term 'The Mobius Question': how to make the GTVA seem like a competent, aggressive enemy, instead of an organization of buffoons. GTVA front-line warships seriously outclass their UEF opponents, and when a Hyperion or a Bellerophon enters the scene, the UEF's mainstay cruisers and frigates have no chance in a straight-up fight. To compensate, the UEF ships sometimes use cluster munitions on their missile launchers, spewing wave after wave of low-yield swarm munitions to occupy Tev AAA beams - but, to be honest, it's going to take a hard fight to bring down the more advanced GTVA ships. One advantage the UEF has is the Narayana artillery ship, which is they mostly use to chase off big foes like Raynors and Titans (the Tevs are smart enough to jump out if in danger of being destroyed.)
'The Mobius Question'... This makes the guy sound like some kind of philosopher...
I guess these ships, weapons and tactics will be used to create unique gameplay situations then. It should be a contrast to the chaotic, relentless attacks the Shivans showed in AoA. In WiH I assume there will be some more tactical advances done by the GTVA. Sounds like much fun, and very different to AoA...
Development is ongoing. Right now, the UEF's higher-end fighter weapons are extremely powerful, and Darius is working to correct that.
Bring balance to the force?
I've made a few suggestions for the project. One thing we're playing with implementing is squadron names for all the GTVA fighters, to give them a bit more character. This may show up in some or all of the missions.
So will this bring a more "morality" type dimension to the conflict? If you're shooting people with names and families, does that contrast to shooting faceless Shivans?
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Wow, great response, Snail. I appreciate it.
I heard from Darius that there will be a different player character in this campaign and that Samuel Bei might not even be getting an appearance. Will this new character be given the same amount of depth of Samuel Bei, or will the storyline focus on the 'bigger-picture' rather than the individual soldiers?
In the initial drafts, the storyline was extremely big-picture, and the focus is still definitely more on fleet movements and the heartless grind of war. But Darius is now doing a character pass through the campaign to build up emotional attachment. At the moment, he's FREDding short stories to get inside the heads of the characters.
Sounds like some serious modding work goin' down here. I saw in the trailers some seriously cool looking weapons (like those salvo turrets I drooled at) and the heavy railguns included in the AoA modpack were quite a lot of fun... Seeing them in action looks to be a real treat...
When this comes out I'll probably be looking through the tables to figure out how it was done... :drevil:
The capital ship fights are a treat. One thing I really admired is the way the UEF and GTVA arsenals balance each other. Beams are overwhelmingly powerful, but railguns are much harder to disarm and have a slight range advantage.
I saw also in the trailer for the Solaris that these ships had multiple primary and secondary slots with some pretty unique weapons... And the armor repair ships are sure to give some new freedom to lengthen important missions... Sounds like an entirely new gameplay dimension here. Balancing this must have been a real *****...
Armor repairs were added so that we could make GTVA fighters more threatening. When six Myrmidons come in to attack your wing, each one of them armed with Balors and Tornadoes, they have the potential to do a ton of damage in very few seconds. We didn't want that to necessarily ruin a player's entire mission if he, say, got hit right off and had to hide from beam cannons.
I trust it's balanced in such a way that it doesn't become frustrating for rubbish players like me... :P
I've been pushing Darius to up the difficulty on most of the missions so far. You may want to play on Easy. That said, we're trying to avoid insta-fail scenarios like the Abel's attack on the Temeraire in 'Forced Entry'. If you die, it'll be because some GTVA pilot got in behind you and nailed you, or because you got too close to an Aeolus or Bellerophon.
I guess these ships, weapons and tactics will be used to create unique gameplay situations then. It should be a contrast to the chaotic, relentless attacks the Shivans showed in AoA. In WiH I assume there will be some more tactical advances done by the GTVA. Sounds like much fun, and very different to AoA...
Yes. Darius has been trying to avoid the use of waves for the GTVA, for instance. 'Darkest Hour', which was previewed, involves the GTVA launching multi-directional bomber strikes against a UEF installation. Two groups of bombers approach from different angles to confuse the fighter escort, and at least one of those groups is always guarded by space superiority fighters.
You're also going to see missions where the GTVA wins battles, sometimes in a devastating fashion. This may include every mission of the entire campaign. ;7
So will this bring a more "morality" type dimension to the conflict? If you're shooting people with names and families, does that contrast to shooting faceless Shivans?
That's the hope. Every time you go into battle with a GTVA squadon, we want you to think: "That could be me over there. This could've been another GTVA campaign." You'll sometimes get intercepted transmissions from GTVA pilots - for instance, a Tev corvette was getting battered brutally, and I heard the tac officer transmit "We're taking heavy fire from those Fed warships! You need to disarm those turrets, pilots!"
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On both the tactical and strategic level, Darius has put a lot of effort into addressing what we might term 'The Mobius Question': how to make the GTVA seem like a competent, aggressive enemy, instead of an organization of buffoons. GTVA front-line warships seriously outclass their UEF opponents, and when a Hyperion or a Bellerophon enters the scene, the UEF's mainstay cruisers and frigates have no chance in a straight-up fight. To compensate, the UEF ships sometimes use cluster munitions on their missile launchers, spewing wave after wave of low-yield swarm munitions to occupy Tev AAA beams - but, to be honest, it's going to take a hard fight to bring down the more advanced GTVA ships. One advantage the UEF has is the Narayana artillery ship, which they mostly use to chase off big foes like Raynors and Titans (the Tevs are smart enough to jump out if in danger of being destroyed.)
[mobius]First of all, thank you for considering my opinions. When I posted them I got stormed by complaints.
Before reading this part of your post, I was afraid. No, my personal security hasn't been threatened - I was afraid because I thought we would have seen the classic, dumb enemies in WiH. Fortunately, things are going to be different. :)
Back in INFR1, the Earth Alliance was a tremendously easy-to-defeat faction. You could see EA destroyers being eliminated with ease throughout the campaign and only the Nemesis seemed powerful enough to face the might of the GTVA. I hoped INF SCP would have been different, and Rampage amazingly posted on the public forum that the EA will be a much tougher opponent in INF SCP. As soon as I joined INF SCP, I applied Rampage's thoughts to the letter... the EA is a damn powerful foe now that shows the power to take over the GTVA. I hope the GTVA would be damn good when facing the UEF. :cool:
One of the things I don't like in custom campaigns is how the player is supposed to turn the tide of any war. I'm a great fan of the Ace Combat and Colony Wars series, where the player has tremendous powers and capabilities even if compared to Alpha 1, but after over 10 years of playing I started to question the validity of this style. Should an original and realistic campaign be based on how a single fighter or bomber can take down a lot of spacecraft and capital ships? I don't think it should.
That's why I'd really love to see missions (other than the ones I FRED :D) showing how the player's capabilities are so limited compared to those of entire wings and, more importantly, of warships. ;7[/mobius]
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Could you PM me a few of the ideas you used for the EA, Mobius? (In case you didn't catch it in the other thread, you're not on my ignore list.) I'd really like to hear them.
Additionally, general tips for making enemy fighters and bomber attacks seem smarter?
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[mobius]Oh right... I forgot to mention the EA's tactics in bombing runs and such... :D
What do you want me to tell you, exactly?[/mobius]
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Eeeverything! Bombing runs, enemy fighters, capital ship placement, attacks on stationary installations...just any general ideas you have.
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[mobius]They're kind of an INF exclusive, but I'd be glad to help you out. :)
EDIT: Check your ignore list, please. I can't send the message.[/mobius]
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Gah. I am a failure.
It should be fixed now.
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[mobius]You're not a failure.
THIS (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,62752.0.html) is a failure.[/mobius]
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Wow, great response, Snail. I appreciate it.
TBH my first response was "FIRST POST!!!!!!" :nervous:
In the initial drafts, the storyline was extremely big-picture, and the focus is still definitely more on fleet movements and the heartless grind of war. But Darius is now doing a character pass through the campaign to build up emotional attachment. At the moment, he's FREDding short stories to get inside the heads of the characters.
Wow. Sounds like another nice balance between storytelling and gameplay. I really like how in AoA there was an emotional attachment to your wingmen. While it doesn't work for all campaigns, it worked really well there. It would be amazing if this happened in WiH - But there would be another dimension given that you're killing other people who have names as well.
The capital ship fights are a treat. One thing I really admired is the way the UEF and GTVA arsenals balance each other. Beams are overwhelmingly powerful, but railguns are much harder to disarm and have a slight range advantage.
Darius must be an epic modder if he can balance stuff like this. :nod:
Armor repairs were added so that we could make GTVA fighters more threatening. When six Myrmidons come in to attack your wing, each one of them armed with Balors and Tornadoes, they have the potential to do a ton of damage in very few seconds. We didn't want that to necessarily ruin a player's entire mission if he, say, got hit right off and had to hide from beam cannons.
That's a big problem with a lot of campaigns, I get through a long mission and then get smacked in the face by Goober and can't be assed to redo the mission (we all know what I'm talking about ;)). Sounds like I'll get a second chance in WiH...
I've been pushing Darius to up the difficulty on most of the missions so far. You may want to play on Easy. That said, we're trying to avoid insta-fail scenarios like the Abel's attack on the Temeraire in 'Forced Entry'. If you die, it'll be because some GTVA pilot got in behind you and nailed you, or because you got too close to an Aeolus or Bellerophon.
I liked the insta-fail plot events though... :(
Yes. Darius has been trying to avoid the use of waves for the GTVA, for instance. 'Darkest Hour', which was previewed, involves the GTVA launching multi-directional bomber strikes against a UEF installation. Two groups of bombers approach from different angles to confuse the fighter escort, and at least one of those groups is always guarded by space superiority fighters.
Nice to see the enemy using actual tactics. It's something that is seriously underused in campaigns...
That's the hope. Every time you go into battle with a GTVA squadon, we want you to think: "That could be me over there. This could've been another GTVA campaign." You'll sometimes get intercepted transmissions from GTVA pilots - for instance, a Tev corvette was getting battered brutally, and I heard the tac officer transmit "We're taking heavy fire from those Fed warships! You need to disarm those turrets, pilots!"
I hope there's some begging involved. :nervous:
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sorry but since you didn't directly mention it I have to ask... you play as a UEF pilot right?
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Plot and character discussion are things I should leave up to Darius, but I will say that he wanted to move away from the 'chosen one' angle for this story.
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That's good to hear. I'm interested to see what Darius can do with a less one-sided narrative.
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That's good to hear. I'm interested to see what Darius can do with a less one-sided narrative.
Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
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Sounds good. I can't wait to see the Fed ships in action.
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That's good to hear. I'm interested to see what Darius can do with a less one-sided narrative.
Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
If you're interested in talking shop with Ransom, would you mind if I tagged along? I've not really proven myself, but I'd like a chance to start. Ransom knows a bit of my writing prowess, so hopefully he'll vouch for me. I have a lot of well-developed and interesting ideas that I want to share and I'll be willing to craft a few short stories if you need me to demonstrate my abilities. I've been wanting to get more involved and do something creative with myself lately, and I can think of no better way than to toss my chips in with an incredible campaign.
Oh, and by the way, I'm going to pick my preferred corvette to voiceact for in a day or so. Just so you know, Battuta.
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That's good to hear. I'm interested to see what Darius can do with a less one-sided narrative.
Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
If you're interested in talking shop with Ransom, would you mind if I tagged along? I've not really proven myself, but I'd like a chance to start. Ransom knows a bit of my writing prowess, so hopefully he'll vouch for me. I have a lot of well-developed and interesting ideas that I want to share and I'll be willing to craft a few short stories if you need me to demonstrate my abilities. I've been wanting to get more involved and do something creative with myself lately, and I can think of no better way than to toss my chips in with an incredible campaign.
Oh, and by the way, I'm going to pick my preferred corvette to voiceact for in a day or so. Just so you know, Battuta.
FoxtrotTango, I'd love to speak with you on IRC sometime. While Darius is the writer for the main WiH storyline, there's enough room in this war for us to tell a lot of stories, and I've been considering proposing a side campaign to Darius to accompany some mission ideas I frankly don't think will fit in the main campaign.
We could get it released alongside WiH, or even a bit later.
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Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
Speak for yourself Mr Battuta. ;)
I think collaborating for other stories is a great idea. The story is too large for all of it to be told in one campaign, and I think it can only get enriched by it.
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Sorry, sir! I grovel and genuflect, sir!
What I meant was that I totally want to sit in on that IRC conversation.
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Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
Atmospheric, perhaps. But I claim the plot title for ST:R! :nervous:
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I would happily include ST:R in such a list.
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Yay!
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I relished the IRC chat we had, General Battuta. Next time we do it, there needs to be a way to transcript it. I could have sworn that I lost about half of the good parts in translation when I tried to copy it into a Word document.
Don't worry, the ideas are still bright and fresh in my head, I just wish I could have a full concrete copy as well.
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Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
I worry that such a conversation would become more of a debate than a discussion. Based on Age of Aquarius and things like 'character passes', I'm not sure we have much common ground. But if Darius wants to organise something I'm happy to oblige.
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Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
I worry that such a conversation would become more of a debate than a discussion. Based on Age of Aquarius and things like 'character passes', I'm not sure we have much common ground. But if Darius wants to organise something I'm happy to oblige.
Well, I want to emphasize that my comment's on Darius' writing are not necessarily actually the way Darius writes - I don't think he's going back through the story and adding character bits in to a preexisting plot. I don't want to give the idea that he's got some kind of rigid technique...'character pass' was just a rhetorical flourish! It should not be the basis for assessment.
Now I feel dumb. :nervous: Got a bit too enthusiastic.
In any case, I think anything as formal as this is sounding would probably be a bit awkward, so let's just leave it up to the coincidence of folks stumbling into other folks.
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Just to sate my curiosity, from looking at the WiH alpha, can there be any estimates on when WiH can be released? ;7
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Just to sate my curiosity, from looking at the WiH alpha, can there be any estimates on when WiH can be released? ;7
When it's done :)
What I meant was that I totally want to sit in on that IRC conversation.
You're not alone :P My interests may not be far from "Blowing sh*t up" but watching the two greatest campaign writers to date on HLP discuss anything is worth wagging school and the extra homework :lol:
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Armor repairs were added so that we could make GTVA fighters more threatening. When six Myrmidons come in to attack your wing, each one of them armed with Balors and Tornadoes, they have the potential to do a ton of damage in very few seconds. We didn't want that to necessarily ruin a player's entire mission if he, say, got hit right off and had to hide from beam cannons.
no pierce shields flag was not an option? :)
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It would've seemed a little double-standard at the least.
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When it's done :)
Classic reply. ;)
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Ransom, are you ever on IRC? I bet Darius would be interested in talking plot with you. Although you two are stylistically very different, you both produce the most plot-heavy work in the community.
Atmospheric, perhaps. But I claim the plot title for ST:R! :nervous:
How can you claim something that isn't yours? Don't get me wrong, you filled in some important gaps left by Volition, to make things more coherent. However, the filling wasn't much more than natural conclusion.
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ST:R had a very heavy 'mainstream' plot in the tradition of FS1 and FS2's design. Transcend and Blue Planet both branched out to do different things, so it's hard to compare them.
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Transcend and BP splits from the generic faceless Alpha 1 which I quite enjoyed. Don't get me wrong thinking that I hate generic Alpha 1's but it was good to see that Alpha 1 actually has a story.
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And in Transcend, it's not even ALPHA 1, it's KAPPA 1 ;)
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Wasn't it Omicron Wing?
Wait no, that's later...
What was Marcel's wing designation after transfer? Omicron 4?
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Only during operations. Outside of a cover story, he was Kappa 1 until Omicron 1...leaves.
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Only during operations. Outside of a cover story, he was Kappa 1 until Omicron 1...leaves.
Thanks for summing it up. I was quite confused about that actually as I played the campaign.
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Narayana artillery ship
Is that the ship on the sidebar of the music page on the website, or is that image something not previously mentioned? :nervous:
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It's a sekret! :hopping:
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:mad: Stop that. You'll only make me want to ask more...
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:lol: my repeated refusals should be having the opposite effect...it should be twigging that that's what the pic is...
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Mmh. I suppose. Anyway, good luck with the final stages of this campaign and ironing out the kinks. It seems that everyone who has seen it or had a glimpse of some of the material is quite excited, and I can't to see the next chapter in the Blue Planet series.
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If you want somebody for bughunting and testing I'm up to it ,I'm a modder so I can also try to fix the bugs (of course after reporting it). I tend to play user made campaigns on easy difficuty ,I don't know if I'm good enough to test such awesome campaign like WiH ,but I have patience and enough time for testing (not to mention playing this campaign will be my top prority ,beta or not).
On a side note ,have you received my PM ,Darius?
The Steve'o's ships and Stratcomm's fleet pack makes me think the only ship that WiH is missing is the Amaretsu (and maybe Daegon ,but it's not as good as Amaretsu).
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Can't beleve I missed this. >_<
Anyway, I hope I still have to time to play this when it comes out.
Gameplay sounds to be very good and also unique. ^_^
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Do you guys need a hand with WiH gameplay testing? ;7
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Do you guys need a hand with WiH gameplay testing? ;7
Lol even i can say "Nice try" to that one... Though it would be rather cool if they threw us a demo-bone =3
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Do you guys need a hand with WiH gameplay testing? ;7
Lol even i can say "Nice try" to that one... Though it would be rather cool if they threw us a demo-bone =3
Not really it wouldn't, it would delay the release.
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Do you guys need a hand with WiH gameplay testing? ;7
Lol even i can say "Nice try" to that one... Though it would be rather cool if they threw us a demo-bone =3
Not really it wouldn't, it would delay the release.
I prefer delayed awesome over immediate crap.
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Anything BP-related and written by Darius is not crap.
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I think you're going to be pleased, Sparda - the UEF hardware lives up to your expectations.
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My standards for mods are pretty low. If it has lots of pretty explosions and cool battles or is funny as hell, then to me its a good mod. I'm quite the GFX/SFX whore.
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You'll love what Steve-O's done then :P
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:sigh: if only his ships weren't so buggy and didn't use so many textures...
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Is that why BP crashes once in a while?
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Shouldn't be. None of Steve-O's are ingame in anything you have, correct?
If you're getting crashes, run a debug build and post the spew.
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I will, but only when I feel like playing BP again. Real life is in full swing for me right now. :)
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:sigh: if only his ships weren't so buggy and didn't use so many textures...
yeah, looking back that damn boolean function caused a lot of trouble. i'm kicking my self in the butt now days, especially when i go back to my older models and try to hammer out the glitches and cut back the polies. heh, i cant stress enough now days EXTRUDE EXTRUDE EXTRUDE! dont union. one day they will be perfect. even if i have to rebuild from scratch (the hyperion has been slated for a ground up rebuild, the geom is hideous, and it can benifit from more detail.)
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Good to hear :) Don't get me wrong, your ships are beautiful, they just have a few issues.
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My thoughts exactly.
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Are the old ships like a Deimos or Hecate going to be upgraded in WIH
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I don't believe so, though I'm not on the team so I don't know for sure. Based on the "Darkest Hour" preview video, it looks like the armament is basically the same, at least for the Deimos.
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really, thats odd
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Well, the only real upgrades you could make to those ships would be the addition of the new post-Capella Sathanas-killer beams. And I don't think the powergrids on those older-model ships would support that.
Think of the Deimos and Hecate in WiH as akin to what the Leviathan and Orion were like in FS2: old, but in many ways still useful. There might be as many Deimoses around now as there were Fenrises then. So in that sense, it's an upgrade. The Hecate, meanwhile, has a ton of fighter space, which means it's still a great carrier and command ship.
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And there are many Hecates left as opposed to super-expensive Titans.
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It's speculative at the moment.
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Is anybody upgrading Steve'o's ships textures?
They are missing shine and normal maps ,without them UEF is going to be inferior to GTVA not only in millitary strenght. :)
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I can verify that the Karuna, at least, is both shiny and normal (this from a quick glance at the shiplab.)
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Update the pics at your website then ,they are out of date if your current textures look comparable to ones in Mediavps.
Your ships have shinemaps indeed ,but I don't see a thing that suggests normal maps (on UV mapped areas ,tile textures have normals of course).
I hope Darius received my proposition about making normal maps for WiH.
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Uh, you should probably PM Darius. He's the man with the plan. I just test and FRED and do voice acting stuff.
Keep in mind that Darius has exams and stuff in the next few weeks. But I'm guessing that if you can do normals, then that would be really awesome.
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That's exactly what I done - I PMd him and now I'm waiting for answer.
I'm already doing some experiments with normal maping Steve'o's fighters (and Hyperion too ,it's a bit harder than making fighters) ,so I can wait.
(http://www.fotoload.pl/123aa19/1b9f6c87cbc75c91416ba771393b5b646315_min.jpg) (http://www.fotoload.pl/index.php?id=1b9f6c87cbc75c91416ba771393b5b64140)
This is the first version of updated Lancer ,with shine and normal maps.
I hope you like it ,I nearly compleated normal maps for other fighters (it ,as well as other fighters ,have glowpoints ,I will be also adding some more to Hyperion).
And you can tell Darius that I wish him good luck with his exams. :)
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Wow, that's pretty nice! I really like it. I can't speak for Darius, though. (I hope it won't murder performance on large missions...Steve-O's ships are already pretty burdensome...) I'm not an artist, but to my fannish eye, those normal maps look awesome.
I assume you mean the Hyperion/Karuna, not the Hyperion cruiser from the StratComm pack (which is used by the GTVA in WiH)? If so, that's excellent.
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Yes ,I mean Karuna (Stratcomm's Hyperion is entirely tile textured).
And just because of curiosity ,how many turrets UEF transport is going to have? (original model had 68 of them ,which IMHO is little to much for ship of this size ,at least in FS universe)
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Thanks Dragon. I didn't notice you had PMed me because the settings had been reset and so my messages were appearing at the bottom instead of the top like I normally have it. :mad:
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Thanks Dragon. I didn't notice you had PMed me because the settings had been reset and so my messages were appearing at the bottom instead of the top like I normally have it. :mad:
You didn't read the news, did you? :rolleyes:
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Of course I read the news.
I didn't know the default setting for PMs is to put the newest message at the bottom, and it's been a few years since I first personalised my settings.
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Just want to say that I'm ecstatic after reading through some of this. I played AoA for the first time about a week ago, and was sad to see the end of the campaign, and wished there was more. Now that I know its in the works, I'm going to have a hard time waiting for it!
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Of course I read the news.
I didn't know the default setting for PMs is to put the newest message at the bottom, and it's been a few years since I first personalised my settings.
Good point. I added some further detail in the news.
Now back to your regularly scheduled thread.
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Just want to say that I'm ecstatic after reading through some of this. I played AoA for the first time about a week ago, and was sad to see the end of the campaign, and wished there was more. Now that I know its in the works, I'm going to have a hard time waiting for it!
Thanks, Wolfen! Would you mind posting some of your thoughts here in the BP forum?
I'm not actually the guy who made BP (Darius gets all the credit), so I am free to collect motivation for him to keep working on WiH.
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To be perfectly honest, I could really go for just a continuation form where AoA left off... The story was quite good, and I think even at the end of AoA, it still had a lot of potential. However, I would equally as much enjoy a more Big Picture campaign of the war between the UEF and the GTVA, as long as the story of the war is as well told as the story of AoA.
Also, I can offer my services as a tester if that would help out any...
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Darius is the guy in charge of stuff like that. I'm not sure we're in a position where we really need testers right now (maybe FREDders...we'll see.)
If you wanted to post a lengthier set of praise/criticism, though, that'd be awesome. I collect that stuff for PR purposes and to fuel the Fearless Leader's engines of creativity.
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For the love of god (or whatever deity these earthers worship), fix the smoothing on those models! As of now, it is fail.
And in case you have no idea what I'm talking about, see this post: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,62933.0.html
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Not quite so simple. I've had trouble even getting some models, including the Karuna/Hyperion into Blender without it crashing.
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if there is still time time be had I'll have a new version of the hyperion/karuna rolling soon. i went through and remodeled it from the ground up. hopefully the end result will cut back drastically on the polies and eradicate smoothing and general mesh errors.
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Good to hear :)
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if there is still time time be had I'll have a new version of the hyperion/karuna rolling soon. i went through and remodeled it from the ground up. hopefully the end result will cut back drastically on the polies and eradicate smoothing and general mesh errors.
I'd bloody hope so :P