Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: Zanar on September 29, 2010, 10:07:18 pm
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I have been playing Freespace2 for 5 years now and i am quite familiar with mods and the Decent Manager Tools and all... and i had had my share of FREDing and i also tinkered with the GTD Hades to make it become a player ship...
It was hilarious to drive the thing as i made it so it would fly like a Pegasus (Before i played Transcend that is... I'm now terrified of them lol.....I'm sure that many people are..) :lol:
Well anyway i also tried making my own ship but failed miserably :sigh: and ive also made loads of weapons like: fighter beams(Before i knew FSO :eek:) capital beams,primaries,missiles etc so i am familiarized with the TBL,TBM files and POF
But what i really want to do is make my own proper mod with the free space open files so i can make weapon mods with the graphics already there but i don't know how to open the format they are in... so can someone give me a head start on how i can view those files so i can use them
But if i am not allowed because this is considered "plagiarism"... does anyone have any suggestions on how i can make my own effects
Any help is appreciated
also ill be working on my GTD Hades Fighter... and try it against the colossus!!! and the SJ Sathanas and SSJ Gigas from INFERNO this is gonna be so awesome!! :D BTW im gonna pack it with LRB Greens and BF Reds and throw the occasional shivan super lazer :P
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Please visit the Wiki's modding portal. (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Portal:Modding) I would also recommend joining the #hard-light IRC channel (link in my sig). There are usually at least a few people around who know stuff about FSO.
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K Thanks very much! :)
I hope i can find stuff i need
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Ohh, another modder! welcome :yes:
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also ill be working on my GTD Hades Fighter... and try it against the colossus!!! and the SJ Sathanas and SSJ Gigas from INFERNO this is gonna be so awesome!! :D BTW im gonna pack it with LRB Greens and BF Reds and throw the occasional shivan super lazer :P
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOkay.
You know, it's actually completely fine for a beginning tabler/modder to make an epic ship than can pwn everything. In fact, doing that can teach you some valuable things.
But players using huge ships...
Blue Planet tried it recently, and did a damn good job of it too. But it's far, far more difficult than you would at first believe. Freespace is geared towards fighter combat, and destroyer battles are largely supposed to be setpieces- the best a fighter can do is intercept bombs and destroy subsystems.
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Yeah, the problem is, FreeSpace is more geared towards treating Destroyers as parts of the background. Flying one isn't as much fun after a while, and making missions where you can fly one and still have fun are relatively hard to make.
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Your thread header is a little confusing.
You want help to become a modder, but apparently from what you've done you already are. :)
What you are really asking is buried in the following:
i am quite familiar with mods and the Decent Manager Tools and all... and i had had my share of FREDing
Well anyway I also tried making my own ship but failed miserably :sigh: and I've also made loads of weapons like: fighter beams(Before i knew FSO :eek:) capital beams,primaries,missiles etc so I am familiarized with the TBL,TBM files and POF
But what I really want to do is make my own proper mod with the free space open files so I can make weapon mods with the graphics already there but I don't know how to open the format they are in... so can someone give me a head start on how i can view those files so I can use them
also ill be working on my GTD Hades Fighter...
You don't need to access the files if you know how to use the tools (VP VIEW) with the DDS plugin you can look at each of the files just like then you click on a pof and modelview opens the model file.
The Nvidia DDs plugin should open the static Image or texture files. (but not animations).
Plaguarism is claiming someone else's work as your own, and or not crediting them!
No one should jump down your throat for the FS2 files, BUT if you use files from a specific MOD, best to ask them first and anything ported like that should be mentioned in the READ ME if you make such modifications publicly available...
(Modding 101)
Making a cap ship flyable is easy. Why doing it is complicated cause for arming you'd make it a fighter not a Cap ship. Others have done it but I have never successfully make a turreted Cap ship usable (nor see why to do so in the first place) This is the completely wrong engine for that sort of thing. Just wanted to point that out, not tell you to stop.
So what exactly do you need help with?
You're familiar with the tools, you've altered tables (tweaked ships), made weapons...
What else is there? You said you "failed with your own ship" but didn't give specifics???
Please be a bit more specific in your information requests. :D
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Making a cap ship flyable is easy. Why doing it is complicated cause for arming you'd make it a fighter not a Cap ship. Others have done it but I have never successfully make a turreted Cap ship usable (nor see why to do so in the first place) This is the completely wrong engine for that sort of thing. Just wanted to point that out, not tell you to stop.
War in Heaven would like a word with you!
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Karuna Command is pretty awesome, ayup.
Shame some of the targeting stuff still doesn't work quite properly (or has that been fixed?)
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It's been fixed, and we will deploy the fix with the next update. Unfortunately, it needs a nightly build to work.
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Eh, I need a nightly build to even have sound, that's fine. :P
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Hehe i guess soo but the only prob i have now is making music cuz i keep on lookin a the freespace wiki music.tbl info and i cant get the musics workin...... :mad:
but what i can make out is the way the tbl is formed... ;)
so anybody know a easy way to put your own music on fs2
thanks everybody for your replies it makes me feel wanted lolz :lol:
any whoo i await any helpfull tips :)
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I just do the "cut the track into half" thing for time per measure or w/e, seems to work fairly well, given that your tracks are short.
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oh for your info
makin cap ships is actually quite funny and i have succeeded making it turret friendly with all of them beams working..
tested it on a lucifer....
and ya the only reason i started doin this was cuz i was bored and thinking of a GTD Hades in a dogfight would be epic
(and it was) :D but what is sooo anoying is that the warpin out of mission part is realy messed up the ship goes down to like 30s and it takes ages to warp out :jaw:
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oh droid so i gets some short tracks and then whut? :confused: lolz im am such a NOOOOB :P
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Basically, just copy one of the retail ones, but change the entries to this
$Name: <FILENAME>.ogg <HALF OF TIME IN SECONDS> 176400 ;
And example:
#SoundTrack Start ; SoundTrack 8
$Soundtrack Name: C8-Scavenger
$Name: Scavenger_AMB.ogg 7.0 176400 ; * Ambience
$Name: Scavenger_EAr.ogg 0.65 176400 ; * Allied Arrival during Normal
$Name: Scavenger_EAr.ogg 0.65 176400 ; * Enemy Arrival during Normal
$Name: Scavenger_Btl1.ogg 6.05 176400 ; * Battle 1
$Name: Scavenger_Btl2.ogg 23.60 176400 ; * Battle 2
$Name: Scavenger_Btl3.ogg 17.48 176400 ; * Battle 3
$Name: Scavenger_EAr.ogg 0.65 176400 ; * Allied Arrival during Battle
$Name: Scavenger_EAr.ogg 0.65 176400 ; * Enemy Arrival during Battle
$Name: Scavenger_Vict.ogg 4.5 176400 ; * Victory 1 ( goal completed )
$Name: Scavenger_Vict.ogg 4.5 176400 ; * Victory 2 ( all enemies dead, goals completed )
$Name: Scavenger_AMB.ogg 7.0 176400 ; * Goal Failed
$Name: Scavenger_AMB.ogg 7.0 176400 ; * Player dies
#SoundTrack End ; End SoundTrack 8
Where, say, Scavenger_AMB.ogg is 14.00 seconds long. (check it with something accurate)
Not the best way to do it, but the lazy way. (Who the hell wants to count measures!?)
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OMG that makes sense thanks man! :D
oh now i gets it....
lolz im stuck talkin like that deimos corvette from Deus Ex Machina...
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um hi i already asked this question and I'm a bit embarrassed to ask again but does anybody out there have a clear understanding of how to add your own music to fs2? I know people have done it but i cant seem to get any of it right......
also in the freespace wiki it is not clear of what i must do to get it working. it just shows the file structure and all...
so anyone got a easy way to do this?
and how to find samples of measures and number of measures (even tho i have no idea what these are or what they do.) :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused:
i am looking forward for any replies :) :D
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Threads merged.
Droid explained the necessary steps already. Be aware that music needs to be in wav or ogg theora format for the engine to read it.
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hmmm ive tried ogg aand wav...
maybe that it doesn't read it because it is in the data folder?
and if that is so should i build it with the original retail fs2 warble vp?
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wat. No. Under no circumstances should you alter the retail vps. You should put custom data in a separate mod folder, like this:
1. Create a new folder in your fs2 directory. Call it mymod or whatever.
2. In that folder, create a new text file named mod.ini. Paste the following text into it:
[multimod]
secondarylist = mediavps_3612;
3. Create a new directory here called data.
4. In the data directory, create a folder structure as explained here: http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/FS2_Data_Structure
Note that you do not need every directory listed there; for now all you need are the tables and music directories
5. Put your custom music tbl in the tables directory (if you have one) and the music files in the music directory
6. Start FRED
7. Make missions using your custom soundtrack (Note that the game will not automatically play your new sounds; You need to alter the missions to do that explicitly)
8. Have fun
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also ill be working on my GTD Hades Fighter... and try it against the colossus!!! and the SJ Sathanas and SSJ Gigas from INFERNO this is gonna be so awesome!! :D BTW im gonna pack it with LRB Greens and BF Reds and throw the occasional shivan super lazer :P
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOkay.
You know, it's actually completely fine for a beginning tabler/modder to make an epic ship than can pwn everything.
What is a tabler? Obviously (I'm guessing) they make tables. Which brings me to my next question. What is a table? :P
If you're wondering why my questions must seem so stupid is because I am VERY new to the world of programming.
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Tables are something specific to Freespace.
You may want to read this :
http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tables
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Tables are something specific to Freespace.
You may want to read this :
http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tables
Ah ok. So they aren't used for all mods, just the Freespace ones. Bummer, I was hoping that would be the case for all games :P
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What the TBL/TBM for FSOpen is,is the XLI for "Rule the rail!". Its a definitionfile that orders the FSO-engine,what models/sounds/ai´s with what properities,has to load.
Peter
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most games use a table system for storing information but they are usually stored in a computer code format, games like FS where the information is in human readable format is rare and can be quite inefficient on a processing stand point
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most games use a table system for storing information but they are usually stored in a computer code format, games like FS where the information is in human readable format is rare and can be quite inefficient on a processing stand point
Hmm, that sort of explains it I guess :P Is there a more layman term you could put that in? Sort of like an analogy? Or is is one of those, "If you don't get it this way, you probably never will" things? :P
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Okay, let's see.....
In FS, most information about the game, the ships and weapons, and other gameplay options, is contained in simple text files. Apart from a few instances where binary files are necessary (models, images and sounds), everything there is to know about a mod can be discovered by reading the table files.
Of course, this means that modifying said data is rather easy, as you can use a text editor to do it.
Now, headdie said that this can be inefficient. He's wrong. Parsing this information is a one time operation that you have to do on startup anyway, and I would say that error-checking a human-readable file is easier than hunting for errors in a binary.
Other games, however, store the same information in binary files that require specialized editing tools to read and edit, which makes modding extra hard if those tools aren't available.
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Okay, let's see.....
In FS, most information about the game, the ships and weapons, and other gameplay options, is contained in simple text files. Apart from a few instances where binary files are necessary (models, images and sounds), everything there is to know about a mod can be discovered by reading the table files.
Of course, this means that modifying said data is rather easy, as you can use a text editor to do it.
Now, headdie said that this can be inefficient. He's wrong. Parsing this information is a one time operation that you have to do on startup anyway, and I would say that error-checking a human-readable file is easier than hunting for errors in a binary.
Other games, however, store the same information in binary files that require specialized editing tools to read and edit, which makes modding extra hard if those tools aren't available.
Hey I learned something! =D
So I'm guessing that's what games like Fallout 3 are so easily moddable? Because the devs released the right tools for it.
Cheers ;)
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Ty to all ur help i will see that i actually make the musicz work hopefully......
annnyyywhoo im looking forward to finishing my mod and sharing it wif all of you :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)