Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => FS2 Open Coding - The Source Code Project (SCP) => Topic started by: Age on May 02, 2005, 01:34:46 am
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Hello all...
I'm new to this whole Open Source Project thing.. And I'm quite confused on a few things:
1. What exactly IS OSP?
2. I'm noticing quite a few DLs here and there... which one should I get and how do I use it?
3. You people need to speak English :)
Anyway, any help for the noob appreciated...
--Age
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http://scp.indiegames.us/content.php?content.4
:welcome:
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1) I'm assuming you mean the SCP (Source Code Project), which is a community-driven effort to bring Freespace 2 from the quality game that it was in 1999 into the current generation of games through improvements to the source. You still technically need FS2 to play, though the dependence on the original install decreases by the day.
2) To be safe, I'd recommend finding the official link to 3.6.5. There are other more stable builds in some regards, but that one has the most of the more recent features and bugfixes, and there's a good bit of community knowledge on its faults. It's also the easiest to install from the ground up.
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Gunnery control, target Age and open firel!
:welcome:
Emergency exits are to the left and rear. Open them at your own risk, as there is a giant vaccuum outside this vessel. In case of insurgency or mutany, there are liquid nitrogen guns under your seats, but they're better used as melee weapons because the chambers are filled with napalm. If you encounter a Shivan, don't worry. His name is Carl. Just give him your lunch and slowly back off. Also, do not speak or look directly at a [V] God, because he will most likely send you to Pepsi Prison! You have been warned, enjoy your stay.
Anyway, Source Code Project is exactly what it sounds like. In 2001, Volition released the source to the public in order to keep the community alive. The people in this forums have done some outstanding work to bring up-to-date technology to a seven year old engine. Improvements include DirectX 8, OpenGL, massive gameplay improvements, and continuous evolution of the engine. It's not uncommon to see a new feature every week, and something big is often introduced every month. I don't have the linkage to any particular threads, but it would be good to read the stickies.
And again, welcome :).
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It's freaky to think of how long the SCP has been going on.
I still remember when glowpoints were a new thing. ;)
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they still are, no one uses them :doubt:
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Hey, I use them all the time!
All the FS2 terran fighters use them!
YOUR ORION USES THEM!!!:p
though admittedly they'd be easier to use if Styxx's plugin didn't set the normal equal to the location vector. Do you really want to know how obnoxious it is to manually change a vector value on 248 glowpoints...
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Originally posted by Bobboau
they still are, no one uses them :doubt:
If POFCS made them show up, I'd use them. :p
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I'd actually agree on that point. Glowpoints have seen severely limited usage because there isn't good tool support for them. Between the max converter and PCS, they aren't too hard to get in, but they take a lot of time and inherently can't be done on a model until it's finalized (since importing them crashes every time). If the glow chunk wasn't contiguously at the end of the POF file, I admittedly probably wouldn't hastle with them myself.
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indeed, id use alot more glowpoints if i didnt have to manually re-enter them every time i convert a model. i have extensive plans to use them on ssj dante. all im waiting for is a version of pcs that has a more stable glowpoint editor, or better yet full glowpoint autogen.
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Originally posted by StratComm
though admittedly they'd be easier to use if Styxx's plugin didn't set the normal equal to the location vector. Do you really want to know how obnoxious it is to manually change a vector value on 248 glowpoints...
What is the normal for glowpoints good for anyway ?
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I think it's used to scale the type... um, the 'light-beam' type glowpoints out from the origin, for one thing.
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Originally posted by Age
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3. You people need to speak English :)
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In a forum, we need not SPEAK English. We have to be able to WRITE down things in English. Be precise! :D
Seriously: If this is a comment on foreigners' language knowledge on this board, you have just now given a very bad first impression for foreigner speakers. :ick:
Originally posted by WMCoolmon
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I still remember when glowpoints were a new thing. ;)
Was is so long ago?
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it was like the first thing implemented.
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Oh, I was thinking about the glowmaps, which are not that old.
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Originally posted by TopAce
Seriously: If this is a comment on foreigners' language knowledge on this board, you have just now given a very bad first impression for foreigner speakers. :ick:
I think he was refering to the fact that we tend to talk in technical terms which a newbie wouldn't understand.
That is true but what with it being so long since the experts were new to the SCP it is hard to tell what parts are understandable and which are too hard.
@Age : You'll find lots of good info in my FAQ. If you don't understand anything pipe up cause it means I need to give it a more detailed explaination.
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they're still prety old, shine maps are still somewhat newish, but getting old, environment mapping is still quite new, though not brand new.
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Originally posted by Col. Fishguts
What is the normal for glowpoints good for anyway ?
They do determine vectors for beam-type glows, but they also determine, IIRC, the direction from which normal (type-0) glows are visible. (0,0,0) means always visible, but any other value makes them fade out like engines when not viewing from that angle. At least I think that's what it does; I always just change it back so I'm not 100% sure.
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What I meant by number 3 was, that you people speak of "Glowpoints", "shinemaps", "sexp's", and such.
But I'm willing to learn all that :D
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To avoid confusion: SEXPs has no concern with copulation. It's the abbreviation for S-expression, a term used by mission designers, also known as FREDers. Consult the Wikipedia and go to the FreeSpace Lingo section to learn all the important terms we use.
Link:
http://dynamic4.gamespy.com/~freespace/fsdoc/index.php?pagename=Freespace%20Lingo
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Originally posted by Age
What I meant by number 3 was, that you people speak of "Glowpoints", "shinemaps", "sexp's", and such.
But I'm willing to learn all that :D
It becomes very easy to grasp quite quickly :D
I should be adding these to my glossary anyway so you get a nice explaination for free :D
- Glowpoint - Basically the glowing engine thrusters that FS2 capships used to have have now been extended so that you can use them anywhere on the ship (for instance in order to have blinking runway lights etc)
- Glowmap - A second texture (denoted by _glow following the name) that is applied to a ship after the main one. Unlike glowpoints glowmaps do not actually give out light. They simply show particular parts of the texture as if they were fully lit.
- Shinemap - A third texture (denoted by _shine following the texture name) that tells FS2 which parts of a ship should be made to look shiny.
Anything else I should add?
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- Shinemap - A third texture(denothed by _shine following the texture name) that tells FS2 what color should the reflected light be from the ship.
(As a result white parts will be fully reflective, shiny; black matte, red parts will only reflect red light and so on...of course this means the shiny parts will be red if the lightsource is red.)
[/list]
Hmm...bob's superdetail boxes, the particle system, environment maps, overexposure are a few things that aren't known when they should be or asked way too many times when it was already experimented with.
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/me makes his "feature of the whatever" suggestion for the SCP once more. ;)
Glowpoints have been around since before the SCP, as well. Overexposure isn't actually in the EXEs, unfortunately.
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Can I get a FS2 specific shinemap tutorial? I figured out glowmaps on my own (obviously) :D IDK still if I want to impliment them for everything but I want to try some experiments....
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Alpha controls how much env mapping applies to the surface, think of it as reflectivity.
The rest of the texture measures the shininess of the texture - pure black won't shine at all, pure white will shine readily (as will pure red, pure green, pure blue, or any combination of them). If one section of the texture is purple, when that section shines, it'll have a purple shine.
For a sort of poor-man's bumpmapping, you can set parts of the texture that should be indented to have lower shine-color values.
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The reason I brought it up is every once in a while the same story has to be told.
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Bob's original fighter beam code doesn't seem to have happened all that time ago - you know, the one where the source code was first out, the one where daveb commented that Bob was doing something problematic or something.
Eh Age - I'd go here and get the following: (http://scp.indiegames.us/download.php?list.8) :
1. Launcher 5
2. fs2_open 3.6.5 Installer
3. 3.6.6 Media VP (http://scp.indiegames.us/download.php?view.57) Use the Zpack - it complies everything.
1 and 2 are the program files. 3 is the art that takes full advantage of the new programming.
Glowpoints, shinemaps etc... are just for individual terms for programming improvements to the game - big major shocking ones, sure, but you'd see it as soon as you jump into FS2 anyways.
We speak English.
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Have we really been doing this since 2001....
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actually it was 2002, since the vbb had just died.
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2. fs2_open 3.6.5 Installer
If you crash on the third mission of retail, you'll need to also pick up an updated build of the EXE. Then using the Launcher, select the new executable. I had a strange bug that would totally crash to desktop (CTD) right as soon as the two cruisers Glorious and Impervious jumped in. Using a new build fixed that.
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Thanks for the help on getting me set up with FSO... Looks awesome, but I have a small problem:
(http://img160.echo.cx/img160/3788/off3sj.jpg)
Note in this image that my radar is off to the right. This is happening not only with the radar, but the briefing diagrams and speech-text as well. Any ideas? :D
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I've never seen 640x480 art used at the "standard" high-res size before. Missing sparky_hi_fs2.vp, are we?
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!!!Almost forgot!!!
Another deviously abandoned/unknown feature:
What happened to decals?
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I've never seen 640x480 art used at the "standard" high-res size before. Missing sparky_hi_fs2.vp, are we?
Link please? :D
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The decals are in the code, you just have to implement them in the weapons tables.
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Originally posted by Age
I've never seen 640x480 art used at the "standard" high-res size before. Missing sparky_hi_fs2.vp, are we?
Link please? :D
Check the Freespace FTP thread in General FS or simply look at the HotU section of my FAQ.