[WMCoolmon]

I think he means making the movie as an .ani file and using it + the sound as a command briefing.

[Vasudan Admiral]

no, i ment that just making a command briefing ani as another last-resort option-instead of a voice-over, have the movie sound

what i ment initially was that you make the move and save it as a windows .avi, then using the source code make a "play movie" fred2 sexp to play a specified  avi movie before the briefing somehow. it *might* work
fixed really stupid mistake.

[Inquisitor]

As far as I know, any non Interplay mechanism for playing MVE's is expressly (it's early, raining, and I forget how to spell)  illegal. I may be snivelling, but I am right

We do still need someone to write the DivX player, any takers?

[penguin]

So how does this sound for a solution that hopefully doesn't offend anyone (neither here nor at Interplay)...

We include a DIVX player.  People who write new campaigns can put DIVX-formatted cutscenes and all is good, they play normally where they should.

But in the main FS2 capaign, when you get to a point where a cutscene would be played (e.g., before mission SM1-09 there is a "Briefing Cutscene: colossus.mve"), the show_movie routine instead looks for "colossus.dvx"  If it's found, we play it, else we continue silently.

That way if the person playing the game has the (gray-market) MVE converter and really wants to see the cutscenes, he can convert it on his own and they'll show up in the game correctly.  But we (the developers) don't get in trouble because we are ignoring MVE files.

Fair enough?

[Zarax]

Can a (half) newbie put his humble opinion?
Did you ever think about game cutscenes using the engine itself?
It is a widely used solution and you just need to add a few automation routines in the source code...
Even (if i'm not wrong) Homeworld and Starlances uses engine cutscenes, at least in part...
Could be a good solution, and you can add some sexp in fred, allowind most modders to make their cutscenes...
If you want to use real movies then try Windows Media, wich is free as Divx and has much better quality...

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Zarax

If you want to use real movies then try Windows Media, wich is free as Divx and has much better quality...

I think some people would like to convert FS2 to Linux, which sort of rules out WinMedia... I betcha MS has some little code that makes it windows only, like the they tried to do with Java (amongst others)

[Zarax]

Windows media also supports ISO MPEG (wich is even more portable than Divx) and in this case quality will be more or less Divx level.
It is more flexible than you would think, you can  even download for free tools for placing it in various digital devices (x86 code also is supported, wich means that a good programmer can make a mini player even for linux if you want).

[Kazan]

MPEG[Quality/Bytes] < DivX[Quality/Bytes]

[Zarax]

If you support windows media you can add Divx codecs later, it's really simple to do it.
And, as i already said, a good programmer can add windows media support even for linux.
If you want to compare their quality i can put two streams on the internet and you will see...
I will just add that windows media VCDs are 90 - 95% quality of the original DVD and don't need resize...
Divx simply cannot do it.

[Kazan]

Zarax that's crap, i've have a Divx copy of congo here that shows that the format CAN do it i've never seen any other format able to preserve the quality that well

DivX resizes great also.. as for the resolution, that copy of congo only takes up somewhere around 1/4 of my 1600x1200 screen when im not stretching it to fullscreen [thought it is in 16:9 widescreen]

[Zarax]

Kazan, i'm talking about reasonable sizes, remember that video cannot be 200mb+ giants otherwise no one would download them.
Anyways, windows media is a professional video format even used by big producers like columbia and so on...
And, please don't tell me what is crap and not because video formats are my work...
Just to go back to my original post...
What do you think about using the game engine for cutscenes?

[Kazan]

-rw-------    1 Kazan    Kazan    722209280 May 13 19:36 congo_[divx].avi


see that, look at the size - that's the ENTIRE movie - congo in impeccable quality at a resolution of 640 x 368 - and it has no problem strectching up to 1600x920 to run fullscreen.. and i only have a measly 600mhz PIII

[Zarax]

I have done Matrix on CD, 720x576 try to resize it as much as you want, i can't go over 2048, it has no problems.
Oh, i almost forgot... 700kbs audio+video bitrate...
Any codec, given enough bandwidth can make lossless video compression.
Thousands sources proved that Windows Media is the best quality/bitrate codec available.
Don't let anti - microsoft prejudice fool you.
And, let's drop codecs, ok?
I posted about using the game engine instead of ANY video codec, ok?

[Kazan]

my hatred for microsoft is not clouding my judgement of the quality of their codecs - it will stop me from supporting any usage of their codecs - but it doesn't keep me from doing a real analysis of their codecs

like i said DivX[Quality / Bytes] über alles

[Zarax]

Ok, i will not waste other words with deaf ears...
Now, what do you think about the usage of the game engine itself for the cutscenes?

[Kazan]

as in the playing be integrated? that's logical

[Zarax]

As concept it's simple and widely used.
A few sexp can be added to manage it, basically the game needs to disable player control and move the camera/make the ships perform actions.
Controlling everything trough sexps most fredders will make with ease.
It's a simple, clean, time and space saving system.
It may be not as spectacular as video cutscenes but with optimization you wouldn't miss them.
Just watch games like HW or Starlancer and the way they uses them...
If a decent programmer wants to make it i'm sure it can be done in less than a week.

[Kazan]

doing THAT? um no

[Zarax]

Yes, as most data is already present.
As i said, you need to add a few sexps, and it's a thing quick enough to be done, and the camera control code needs only a few changes...
Maybe about one hundred code lines?
Maybe a little bit more but it's much easier than it looks

[vyper]

Didn't DaveB say something about a video-in-game thingy being in there already? Couldn't that be adapted?