Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat

I think Bloodstone Prison was scarier than *Cathedral

Why is it so hard to code a ragdoll getting up?

I though this was too minor to start a new thread over, and as it relates to game visuals i'll post here. Yesterday night, (Victoria day, 11pm) I was strolling through the richer part of our neighbourhood. In Canada very many people launch fireworks on Victoria day. The neighbourhood is of the type without any streetlights or sidewalks, and has about 100 meters of front lawn between the road and the houses. This makes it look a lot like a nighttime atmospheric FM from T1. The houses are up to 3 stories high with stone sidings, staircases and turrets. The trees casting long shadows and bushes and occasional gas-lights provide a dark eerie thiefy nighttime park atmosphere, but the warm yellow lights on the houses balance it out. Some of the arched windows are glowing in various dull colours through the lacework and curtains. The lawn is impeccable - moist, short and dark green. (Ombrenuit might like this). As I was turning a corner I hear the familiar pops of fireworks and see some flashes of light as expected. As I continue walking one bright light doesn't stop glowing. As I approach and take a closer look I see it's a spherical-trimmed bush having some orange particle effects on the bottom of it, and a column of dromed fireplace fire crackling through the middle of it, leaving the peripheral branches unaffected. As I continue walking and staring 3 teenagers run up to it shrieking with a water bottle, douse the flame, and say that's all the fun for tonight. Then they get in their customized sports cars and drive off. If I had assembled a bush with a flame in dromed people would say a burning bush doesn't look like that in real life. But then you never know until you try it.

It's an honour to have Dom, Isht, and spar actively engaging in this thread. By the way, to humour you, I'm reading darkmod forums in Links after getting tired from learning bash scripting (I don't have X installed, nor do I really want to into my 32M of mem.) and it's nice to be able to quick reply and see that these forums are Links friendly.

When in the 1970's word spread out about the mouse-window computer interface as opposed to entering text some people were excited. I am no longer excited about using a mouse and a monitor to play thief-like things. When time permits, (in a few years) I'm going to buy some equipment like 5DT Data Glove Ultra Wireless Kit and hi-Res800™ (2D/3D) and try to make darkmod into what I wish it to be. The movements of hands will correspond generally to various forces applied around you in the environment (eg. climbing an overhead branch or beam, something that's not possible in traditional engines), deft maneuvering (eg. to snatch a purse or slide by in a door half-ajar) and gesticulations to control variables such as movement vectors and positions (crouching, holding breath, etc). It's nice to see that already people are having success viewing their favourite games in 3d (since all computers games are "3d rendered" now people call them stereovision to be clear), eg: medal of honour allied assault, system shock 2, (thief doesn't work), soul reaver 2, .. these guys got doom 3 working with 3d. http://forums.stereovision.net/viewtopic.p...1760&forum=5&10 site about drivers and computer game stereovision benchmarks: http://www.stereovision.net/toxicx/1050info.htm

@"with one of those backing things on it": Only one of my lamps is a fully enclosed modular 1910 carriage lantern. ...Which i'm going to model and texture etc into darkmod eventually (in a few years)

As I previously mentioned I have a collection of around 20 kerosene lamps at home. On some occasions I did exactly that. If you hold the lamp ahead and to the side a bit, and don't move your eyes, look straight ahead, then the peripheral eye cells get saturated with light while the central ones can see well ahead.

I love the movies with ghost trains, and bystanders who turn around when you ask them for directions and turn out to be demons from another dimension (or some other such nonsense). In a regression it surfaced clearly how I was killed in "gladiatorial" combat in a dark cramped room filled to the brim with shouting spectators. It's not pretty.

oy. the room is aflame!.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_azide I was just doing my routine synthesis when I happened upon this much used compound. Would that constitute a trap or a gas-filled room (with hydrogen azide)? To lose some hitpoints: throw it in water, throw it in the fireplace, hold it with a bare hand, lick it, crush some and drop in soup, or touch a copper, silver, or lead table or candelabrum. Many women in my city have arsenic to improve the complexion. Quick Edit(Add): I feel the invisible gas(etc) falls into the 3rd category.

There's only two buttons to hold: W for swim forward and V for hold breath. Wait a minute, it doesn't apply while swimming - gas only. Exactly. lucidity and deduction. Arrows flying into your back you don't see. you only hear them. Are we going to continue to be limited to two senses of sight and ear or are we going to experiment into gameplay with more senses? (like the smellometer) In half life 2 the hydrogen extracting facility is explosive while the mechanism is lowered but not while raised. I don't know about other FMers but I at least plan to include a lot of urban scenery including factories, chemical plants, forges, refineries, and sewage plants. Lots of gases there. Chemical labs too. Good idea. Previous ideas: rat, rat with camera, cat, noisemaker mouse.

I see this train of thought circling around the discussion without anyone bashing it so I'll just quickly bash it here and now. If you take a breath of poisonous gas and then hold your breath, the gas is not reacting away anywhere and it's not being replaced in your lungs. If it does damage then it will continue to do damage. If, on the other hand, the unpleasantness of the gas is guaged, just like our normal biological noses do, the player will know when to hold his breath. Without knowing the circumstances, the player won't know if this stinky gas is poisonous enough or not. All he knows from previous experiences is if the guage becomes too stinky (and he has the given gas in his lungs) he starts taking damage at a fast exponential rate until he can ventilate his lungs with fresh air or dies. In real life none of us have died yet, but we have ran away to fresh air instinctively to ventilate our lungs and prevent death. Therefore I propose a guage for smelliness, a button/automatic to hold breath, possibility of odourless, colourless death gas in lower chambers evident by circumstantial evidence, and a button which toggles and you don't have to hold. (sense of smell only possible while breathing). Regarding toggling: Thief is pretty much the only first person game I played for years. I played doom 3 and half life 2 recently. not having two separate buttons for running and walking, and having to hold shift for either one and not having toggl'able crouch really makes playing uncomfortable. I wanted to propose finite element gradation of the room into concentrations of the gas, and certain concertrations of odorous gas being smell'able while higher ones being lethal and the different concentrations of odourless colourless gases taking different time to kill the player (no healthbar indicator here because there is none when you die from CO). but then I thought the community would think of it as too complicated.

Pictures and explanations of audio devices of the past: http://www.videointerchange.com/audio_history.htm

Don't take the previous post seriously. I was grumpy. I'll start shooting after the exams, etc.

When I offer to take some pictures nobody notices but when this guy offers some French pictures everybody wants them. Just because I'm colonial doesn't mean my textures are not moody.

Crashes less often than Dromed? If so, I'm happy.

I probably will.

A tiny joking post showcasing a new army gadget managed to ignite so many emotions. I think T1 set the stage, and T2's robots, cameras, and especially the orb were too much. T3 I haven't seen yet. Unlike Oddity, I don't play it for the hardcore stealth, but for the immersion, atmosphere, romantic setting, and the buildings, objects that recreate some things from the past. Even the magic arrows in T1 were too much for me. I prefer broadheads, arrows with sacks of water, arrows with an explosive mixture and oiled cloth, arrows with pouches of sawdust, etc. What's a Mexican wave? Exactly.

The military now has a scouting orb which is an arrow. check this out. http://www.defensetech.org/archives/002232.html This puts more pressure on Garrett The Main Character in TDM to have one too.

Ombrenuit, I loved your avatar since I first saw it. When I found out it's from Gankutsuou I downloaded the series and watched all 24 episodes in a short time. Haydee. As for an FM, aside from the huge city I have in the works, I was thinking of recreating some Sherlock Holmes episodes as FMs. They are short, focused, have a good atmosphere and a driving plot. The Copper Beeches are first on my list. Of the possible themes in TDM, I particularly love the Victorian era theme, but the medieval era theme is discordant with me.

In some FMs there was something connecting zombie-killing abilities to the new sword, and the FM authors gave the player the new ability.

I've thought about such problems for a while before, and I was wondering why not let the renderer take care of the problem of too many polys and build the cityscape with abandonment? Whenever in the player's FOV there are too many polys, the engine would in any direction with a long distance and many polys create a picture instead which has the image of the scenery behind it. Because of the large distance involved, and it updates quite often, there shouldn't be a problem with perspective when the player moves? I have no idea how stupid what I just said sounds.

If the working extra satisfies my perfectionist or obsessive side I'm willing to do it.

No more "haunt stadium" eh?

Remember the original triangular T1 box? many different shots. That's what enticed me to buy it. The screenshots look like the game is a pre-rendered adventure game and I just couldn't believe it's live action. I still have the box on my bookshelf.

Muhahahahaaa! I shall spend 5 years recreating the entire downtown core of my city in TDM with 50 loadzones!!@