[Jeff Vader]

Once more: if you want to use the 3.6.10 MediaVPs, you must have at least Core, Assets and Effects. Otherwise you'll get problems. The rest, mainly Music and AdvancedEffects, are optional.

[jkalltheway]

I redownloaded the files, and got rid of the other ones. Now i should be running on 3.6.10 and with 3.6.10 mediavps. I ran the debug, the attached came up. Also, the problem with the planet is still there. I apologize if i'm being a little hardheaded, but this is something i really want to deal with. Also,  this might or might not be related but it appears the engines for the escher dont show up. I still take the engine wash damage, but i don't see it. This isn't a new problem, its been there but i just never noticed it. Might be related? If theres anything i can provide a screenshot of that might help, please say so.

[attachment deleted by necromancer]

[blowfish]

It doesn't even look like the mediavps are running there...

[Jeff Vader]

If you ran a debug build, could you (again) post fs2_open.log from \freespace2\data?

[jkalltheway]

Here you go

[attachment deleted by necromancer]

[Jeff Vader]

Code: [Select]

Passed cmdline options:
  -spec_exp 11-spec_point .6-spec_static .8-spec_tube .4-ogl_spec 80
  -ogl_spec 80
  -spec_static .8-spec_tube .4-ogl_spec 80
  -spec_point .6-spec_static .8-spec_tube .4-ogl_spec 80
  -spec_tube .4-ogl_spec 80
  -ambient_factor 0-no_emissive_light-spec_exp 11-spec_point .6-spec_static .8-spec_tube .4-ogl_spec 80
This looks rather messy. The last line would suffice, except that you probably should have spaces between flags. Like -ambient_factor 0 -no_emissive_light and so on. Also, it most certainly wouldn't hurt to add the zeros in front of some of the numbers, as in -spec_tube 0.4.

Code: [Select]

Searching root 'C:\games\freespace2\Media_VPs\' ... 0 files
Curious. The game engine searches the \Media_VPs\ folder as it should, but there are no files there. Where did you place the MediaVPs you downloaded? They should be in \Media_VPs\.

[jkalltheway]

oh i see, i named the folder "mediavps" not media_vps. tried it again, the planet looks better now, but is still an oval. Also, black stripes appeared on the hercules model, i guess that this may be because my graphics may not be able to handle it? I think the mediavps are working now, because everything looks much better.

[attachment deleted by necromancer]

[Jeff Vader]

Also, black stripes appeared on the hercules model, i guess that this may be because my graphics may not be able to handle it?

Actually an Nvidia driver issue. 8600M GT is a laptop graphics card, correct? Try to find and install the latest graphics drivers from your laptop manufacturer's site.

I think the mediavps are working now, because everything looks much better.

That is often the case.

[Herra Tohtori]

Quoted for repetition and in bold so that you might actually read it this time.

Actually there's a bug that causes round background objects to become ellipses on widescreen resolutions. And no, it's not that the planet is squeezed flat horizontally in regards to monitor frame, but it actually is distorted on the background...




Bizarrely, changing the background parametres in the mission to

ScaleX=100% (ie. 2.00000)
ScaleY=110% (ie. 2.20000)

makes the planets very close to round, at least on this particular resolution (1680x1050), but fixing a code issue by deforming the media is something Microsoft would do rather than what should be done.

On another topic that planet looks like the retail PlanetA1 rather than any MediaVP variant of it, so question arises whether you have any mediaVP's actually working after all...

It's an SCP bug with widescreen resolutions. Nothing you can do about it before it gets fixed in the codebase, except:

-Play at 4:3 resolution (1024x768, 1280x960 or 1600x1200)
-dick around with mission parametres and set each planet so that ScaleY=1.1xScaleX (this works on 1680x1050 resolution, I'm quite certain that different screen aspect ratios would require different ScaleY/ScaleX ratio than 1.1, and you should remember that generally it's not a good idea to use double negative to get a positive, it'll likely come to bite you in the ass at some point (like forgetting the edited missions somewhere and having them distort the planets after the bug is fixed...)
-Tolerate it.

[jkalltheway]

Quoted for repetition and in bold so that you might actually read it this time.

Actually, i did read your post. However, if you look at my next post, i asked how i would go about changing the background parameters. Seeing as how at the time, you did not respond, i didn't think of it anymore. Also seeing as how i was attempting to deal with my other problems, it simply slipped my mind. There is no need for general assholery here. I apologize for my lack of a proper brain, but i work with what i got. As for the rest of your post, i will take your suggestions into consideration and attempt to fix these problems. Thanks to everyone who helped, or tried to help. Lobo in particular for taking so much time to assist me in this matter. Hopefully, there won't be any more problems.

[Herra Tohtori]

Yeah, I missed that. No assholier than thou attitude was intended. No newbies were hurt in the making of this post.

In addition, I'm a bit wary of walking you through the mission parameter changing procedure, since like I said, it's not in general a good idea to fix things with double negative (just look at Internet Exploder and how it's innate broken-ness caused a lot of web pages to be coded incorrectly so they would display "correctly" on IE..)...

Anyway, if you decide to counter-fix the aspect ratio on the missions, you need to:

0. Aquire tools necessary to open a VP container file (look for Maja VP editor, Descent Manager Tools, VPView32, VPMage)
1. Extract them from MV_Effects.vp, save them as individual files on ..\FreeSpace2\mediavps\data\missions\
2. Open them in a text editor such as Notepad++ (or even basic notapad, if you really wish to use that) or FRED2_Open, if you want to do it the hardest way
3. Find every background entry with Planet on it, and change the ScaleY/ScaleX ratio so that the planet is displayed as round in the game itself
4. Save and run the game to check if the ratio is correct (or close enough for comfort).

Like I said, on my particular resolution, 1.1 ratio proved to be so close to correct that I used that. Example:

Code: [Select]

$Starbitmap: PlanetF
+Angles: 0.000000 1.448622 0.000000
+ScaleX: 4.000000
+ScaleY: 4.400000
+DivX: 2
+DivY: 2

In short, it's a bit of a hassle unless you already have the necessary tools and understanding to do it, and you'll end up with a temporary fix of questionable quality (I would go so far as to call it a crude hack), and when the issue gets fixed, it'll become unnecessary altogether.

[jkalltheway]

lol i see i see, well either way i'm probably just going to use a different resolution. should be ok i guess?