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Well, summer has either ended or is just starting for us all. We now find ourselves in the Transcending month where creepy stellar eldritch abominations come to destroy us from the inside out. Or really like any other month in the FreeSpace universe.
Before we get into the newsletter, do you like FreeSpace? If so (and I have a feeling you might), you might want to check out this FreeSpace 2 Retrospective Podcast (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88452.0) the guys at SpaceGameJunkie did with our very own Goober5000!
Now onto the news!
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Can you smell that? It’s the smell of delicious progress coming from mjn.mixael's kitchen. I mean look at this trailer video for Between the Ashes he posted.
Could something be arriving soon? He was also looking for voice actors… What could it mean?!
Rheyah's continuing to expose the Shetland/Ephesus campaign (http://hidden terrors behind his [url=http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=85125.msg1763482#msg1763482) with some more status updates and chilling words.
We had lost eight hundred when one of the starboard magazines went up as we fled for the node. A third of the crew was injured or incapacitated. With most of the standing forces either destroyed or defecting, all we had was a handful of cruisers, a few fighter wings, the Ephesus herself and the GTCv Manchester. All of them were carrying wounds.
I don't know much about what the politicians did during that time. I mean, they must have known, surely! You don't just annex three systems and forty percent of the Terran standing fleet without some kind of warning. There must have been something they saw that could have tipped them off as to the bottle of antimatter brewing in the outer colonies, but then we didn't see it either. We were right next door and we only found out through our brass.
BTA is revamping his fleets for Dusk Wars (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=87512.msg1764893#msg1764893) so they're a little less stock FS2 and a little more community built ships. It's win-win for all of us!
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014OctDuskWars.jpg)
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by niffiwan
Welcome to October! Month of National Day in the PRC, Gandhi Jayanthi in India and Oktoberfest ... oh, coding related news you say Axem? In that case, 3.7.2 is still creeping closer to release. I can see 17 mantis issues (http://scp.indiegames.us/mantis/search.php?project_id=1&status_id%5B%5D=10&status_id%5B%5D=20&status_id%5B%5D=30&status_id%5B%5D=40&status_id%5B%5D=50&status_id%5B%5D=60&sticky_issues=on&target_version=3.7.2&sortby=last_updated&dir=DESC&hide_status_id=-2) still targeting 3.7.2 final. Lets get them triaged and resolved!
New Features List!
- Add scripting function to play cutscenes - Parias (part of Parias's project for improved co-op multi)
- Allow beams to use Damage Factors - niffiwan (requested by WoD, it allows more flexibility in designing new beam weapons e.g. convert the Akheton to a beam!)
- Make the $CD: token for cutscenes.tbl optional - MageKing17 (Useful since a majority of assets no longer require physical CD's)
- Allow AI ships to attack/disarm/disable others on the same team - Goober500 (requested by BtA)
Here's the current bugs scoreboard. The bugs on mantis have gone down, and Coverity stayed the same.
| | |fixed | |new | |delta | |outstanding |
| ---------------------------- | |---------- | |---------- | |---------- | |-------------------- |
| Coverity (this month) | |1 | |1 | |0 | |395 |
| ---------------------------- | |---------- | |---------- | |---------- | |-------------------- |
| Mantis (last 30 days) | |15 | |11 | |4 | |157 |
(Mantis includes 29 feature requests (not including HPC), so outstanding bugs is really 128)
Moving onto other coding and scripting news of interest, Yarn has created a patch to be able to scale HUD head ani's (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88439.0). This will fix an issue with WoD + Stranded where the WoD main campaign head ani's would not fill the larger HUD gauge used in Stranded. Another use would be to let modders create larger headz for large resolutions (1080p+). Anyway, it just needs a review and it can be commited to the codebase.
Karajorma has coded up something cool (& very meta), SEXP collections (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88328.0). Or in other words, lists and (in future) maps which can be used in SEXPs, similar to how these data structures are used in other programming languages. This is very cool for the advanced FREDders out there, I'm keen to see what can cooked up using this feature. Only drawback at the moment is that there's no FRED support, so you'll need to dust of your text editor to test it out.
Swifty has continued to work soft shadows & deferred rendering (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=87121.msg1764985#msg1764985) and has released a couple of new builds. A bunch of bugs have been fixed, and the performance improvements have been confirmed. It looks like it's getting fairly close to being ready, so head on over to give a test and report any outstanding issues you find.
ngld, Hellzed and m!m have been making steady progress on their new installer/launcher (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=86364.msg1765180#msg1765180). It's even got a new name, Nebula. Screenshots are always good, see these (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=86364.msg1762704#msg1762704) posts (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=86364.msg1764295#msg1764295), and I'll link one here as well:
(http://pix.toile-libre.org/upload/original/1410196675.png)
I'm keen to give this a go when it's ready for beta testing :)
X3N0-Life-Form has been working on a new LUA script to manage ship variants (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88392.0). The idea is to let LUA handle creating subtle ships variants rather than creating separate variant in the tables. Sounds very cool, so head over a give it some testing.
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Newcomer Gee1337 can't model, texture or FRED (*yet*), but he still got a certainly rare talent around these parts. Sound making! Check out his cool sound thread (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88330.0) for some wicked beam sounds for your new weapons of mass destruction. It's hard to get a picture of sound so… here's a spectrogram of one!
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014Octgeebeam.jpg)
UndyingNephalim is still going strong with their Star Fox Event Horizon mod! (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=87880.msg1761930#msg1761930) There's a bunch of new preview videos for you to drool at. Have you tried the demo yet? If not, you should!
Starbug made quick work of this new large battlecruiser, the Tython. (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88321.0) Modelled, mapped and partially textured in under a month! It also follows the general design style of Steve-O's Vexor, so if you've got other Steve-O ships in your mod, be sure to keep an eye on this one!
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014OctStarbugTython.jpg)
I think I missed this one from last month! Col. Hornet has started work on a new cruiser, the GTC Naxos. (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88186.0) If you were a fan of Aesaar's Erebus design, you will surely be a fan of this cruiser. It's like a little brother to that big destroyer. I'm sure it'll still have a large bite though!
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014OctHornetNaxos.jpg)
Rhettro is going strong with his gunboat, all those fine details are done and he's into the most enjoyable phase of modelling! UVMapping! (Ok, I lied.) Let's hope to see it fully textured and operational next month!
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014OctFotgGunboat.jpg)
DahBlount is cutting through the space ether with a redesign of the Kaze (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88360.0) from Wings of Dawn. I don't think you even need weapons on that thing, just fly into your enemies and you'll just cut them in half without any trouble.
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014OctDBKaze.jpg)
And finally Scooby's got us a live one here that is sure to leave its enemies grounded. The Thunderbolt! (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=87765.msg1762081#msg1762081). In true new-generation Scooby style, it's got landing gear and a lot of other fine details. A perfect addition to his fleet!
(http://i.imgur.com/9A7juA9.jpg)
Also Bearcat.
(http://lazymodders.fsmods.net/hlpnewsletter/2014/10Oct/2014OctScoobyThunder.jpg)
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This month starts a multi-part tutorial adventure concerning Lua and FreeSpace Open. This won't teach you how to Lua, its more about how to use Lua with FreeSpace. Part 1 doesn't require any real Lua knowledge at all, (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tutorial_-_FSOpen_and_LUA) it's all about making a SEXP library that will let you run a whole pile of SEXPs with a single Lua command.
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by mjn.mixael
Last month's theme was Relief.
This was a unique screen drawing on an old cliche... using a dark foreground in contrast with sunlight to give a sense of 'things are better now'. I subtracted MjnPoints for using the cliche, but gave extra points for getting out of the 'show space ships from afar' box.
(http://hard-light.net/wiki/images/RScreen0134.jpg)
Screencap Scoreboard:
Ckid - 2
Mpez - 3
AndrewofDoom - 1
tnathan475 - 1
The Hound - 1
Betrayal - 1
Runner up was Ckid because these are also very, very pretty! (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88324.msg1763192#msg1763192)
As a reminder, we're going to do things slightly differently this year. Our many campaigns are filled with emotional ups, downs, and/or lackthereof. So we'll highlight that with a whole year's worth of emotional themes. I don't care what's in the image as long as it portrays the particular feeling for the month.
The new theme for October is Fear.
Watch those HUD gauges (especially that sneaky FPS gauge) and check out the Screencam Script (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=82173.0) to help you win a badge and bragging rights. You can see the rules and the previous winners here on the Wiki (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Screencap_Contest).