Modding, Mission Design, and Coding > FS2 Open Tools

The Future of PCS2 Development

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DahBlount:
In light of some recent discussion on the Discord, PCS2 and its current state needs to be discussed.

The PCS2 source code is, to put it lightly, in a pretty sorry state. Having not been actively developed in over 6 years, the libraries it uses are no longer maintained, so the likelihood of being able to continue development is fairly low.

Several ideas have been tossed around (a few being options in this poll) but with little action as it's not easy to come to an agreement. We would appreciate the input of as many people as possible.

chief1983:
Is there really overlap between PCS2 and QtFRED?  I could see taking what was learned from QtFRED and moving PCS2 into the Qt ecosystem, but combining them all in one app seems a bit of a stretch to me.  Perhaps even bringing the model editor directly into the FSO codebase, if there is enough overlap to warrant that making things easier or simplified.

Nyctaeus:
PCS2 will exist no matter what we do, because it's easy to use, lots of modders edit their pofs using it and it's best tool for quick jobs like editing firepoints etc. It is not my workhorse for converting things, as I arrange lots of pof data in Blender, but I still use it frequently for small and quick editing. It's like Paint.NET to Photoshop for me. No need to roll destroyers to hunt a wing of Maras.

Still it makes me surpised, that mods like Aftermath: Reboot were made by using only PCS2 to edit assets o__O.

Ideally I would like to have a Blender addon, to make all pof data in Blender. I always forget some hardcoded object names and other stuff. I would like to have all the PCS2 options conviniently converted to Blender, so I can combine options of moving, rotating etc. with adding pof data.

But even considering the fact that Blender is "industry standard" of the HLP, not every asset creator use it and it will always remain quite complex for majority of community members, remaining effectively outside of their capabilities.

QtFRED seems to be too complex option too. I have no idea how many people use it instead of standard FRED and what options does it provide, but PCS2 and FRED are completely different things made for different purposes.

So to sum things up... I picked "Other" in the poll for Blender addon, but the most plausible option for the community will be fixed PCS2. Or... PCS3?

chief1983:
I think a dedicated app that moved into the FSO ecosystem and could borrow things like the F3 renderer and existing model code, and therefore be better kept up with updates to the model format, texture code, etc, would work well.

DefCynodont119:
Honest question: Who is even using QTFRED? No one I know has mentioned using it.



I agree, PCS2 is it's own app, what it does has absolutely nothing to do with FREDing.



--- Quote from: Nyctaeus ---the most plausible option for the community will be fixed PCS2. Or... PCS3?
--- End quote ---

^^^^^^^

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