[natty_dread78]

 Hi guys,
I've installed the 3.6.8 zeta media VPs, with the 710 patches, and I use one of WMC scripting build (to use Nuke's mouse control).
It works fine at first, but then it seems that big ships crash the game, with all sorts of errors (malloc failed, or some turret not found in the table...). It's not a memory issue, as I have 1g of RAM with an x700 (and memory usage shows 24Meg, so there's plenty left).
If I use the 3.6.7 media VPs with 710 patches, everything works well, except the shockwave which makes a big black square (looks like the black bloxes around the subach 7 bug).
 Any ideas ?
Thxs,
N_D

[Flipside]

The Black boxes from the old VP are because the way transparency was done changed between the two, so the old files aren't compatible with the newer version.

As for the crashes, I'm not really sure, from the messages you're getting it sounds like your .vp files are corrupted, but they're a bit big for re-downloading unless you absolutely have to.

Anyone else had problems like this?

[Trivial Psychic]

I'd recommend using the 3.6.9 build rather than that scripting build... unless you are doing anything with that scripting.  Furthermore, I would highly recommend not using anything but the 3.6.8 Zeta VPs with the 710 patches, and a 3.6.9 build.

[natty_dread78]

@ TrivialPsychic
 Yeah, but I really need WMC scripting build, because I use Nuke's mouse control, and there's no way I can play without it.

@Flipside
 I fixed the "black boxes around the subach 7 bug" by disabling the -jpgtga flag. But that didn't solve the black box around the shockwave.
  As for the 3.6.8 media VPs, they don't look corrupted. I downloaded zpack.zip, so if the file was corrupted, I would have been unable to unzip it, right ?

[Flipside]

Yeah, it does seem unlikely that they are corrupted, it has happened before though, admittedly, I don't think they were in zipped format then.

Yup, the old .pcx files that came with the original Freespace used pure Green to denote transparency, they still work, but things like shockwave used to be additive textures, which meant that their colour value was 'added' to whatever was there, so bloack was transparent, that's changed now to using the Alpha map of the texture, so turning off jpgtga will make Freespace revert to the old .pcx files for the weapons, which work, but the shockwave, I suspect, is still using the .dds file without an alpha map, which is why you get those big black areas.

[natty_dread78]

Nice explanation Flipside. But: any idea on how to solve the problem ?
Does using an older build solve it ?

[Flipside]

Damn, I thought if I could dazzle you with lots of technospeak you wouldn't realise I didn't actually know what you could do about it

Seriously though, an older build might work, but you'd open yourself up to other problems from those builds. My main concern is why these ones don't work with your current build I guess.

I would suspect your best bet, at least until the Scripting code gets included in the main branch, is to revert to an older version, or basically, find a setup that works for now, you could, for example, take the mv_effects folder from the newer .vp and replace the older one, since the effects aren't causing errors, that should fix the shockwave problem.

It's a bit of a cobble-together suggestion I'm afraid, but I can understand the appeal of Nukes mouse code and why you'd want to keep it.

[natty_dread78]

Damn, I thought if I could dazzle you with lots of technospeak you wouldn't realise I didn't actually know what you could do about it

lol. But it IS usefull. Knowing the cause of the problem is the 1st step in finding a solution!

Seriously though, an older build might work, but you'd open yourself up to other problems from those builds. My main concern is why these ones don't work with your current build I guess.

I would suspect your best bet, at least until the Scripting code gets included in the main branch, is to revert to an older version,

I'm going to try that (downloaded 5 versions!)

or basically, find a setup that works for now, you could, for example, take the mv_effects folder from the newer .vp and replace the older one, since the effects aren't causing errors, that should fix the shockwave problem.

I tried that but it seems to work in a strange manner (it removed the beautifull FSOpen sky, with lots of stars). I haven't checked if it solved the shockwave problem, though...

It's a bit of a cobble-together suggestion I'm afraid, but I can understand the appeal of Nukes mouse code and why you'd want to keep it.

Yeah, without Nuke's code, I think I would have stopped playing. I have a joystick, but I suck with it, I don't know why...
Anyways, thxs for your help, mate!

[Huggybaby]

You can try replacing mv_adveffects with This File, which is the same but without the shockwave animations.

[Turey]

I play with normal mouse just fine.

I just wish the sensitivity was a bit higher. I can make much sharper turns with the keyboard than with the mouse.

[Wired]

You can try replacing mv_adveffects with This File, which is the same but without the shockwave animations.

I'm going to do a slight highjack here and ask something,

Is the only difference between mv_adveffects & mv_adveffects2 the removed animations, I'm asking because the first are around 250 megs and the other 165 megs. That's a hell of a lot of animation

Just to mention, with the old adveffects I dip down to around 10 fps when there's a shockwave, with the second one I stay at around 90 fps... which is nice.

[Huggybaby]

Yes it is a big size difference, and the shockwave is the only thing removed (at least, I hope *crosses fingers*)

I removed 159 shockwave3d-glow dds files at 513KB each, and the 3,073KB shockwave3d.tga file, and the 1KB shockwave3d-glow.eff file.

[Flipside]

Yeah, that really is an insane amount of texture memory for one animation, basically around 80 Megs.

[natty_dread78]

Just to let you know, I solved my problem (black box around shockwaves) by using adveffects.vp  The shocksave looks very nice. And I have no slowdowns.
 And, for u guys that play with normal mouse, you should really try Nuke's mouse control. It's really much better. Of course, that's relative...