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sure - I would only ask that you follow the thread to make sure you don't report stuff that has already been mentioned: https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/21822-beta-testing-high-expectations/

well i do have a copy of the thief 1 darkengine source code (the dos version), sadly it is not buildable unless you have a very very old msvc compiler (msvc 4.0) or proficient with porting it to a newer version which i am not since the compiler needs support for dos and i think the last one that had some support was .NET 2003 but you need to hop through a few loops to get it working on win10 64 because of permission problems etc. darkengine 2 source was quite different and a bit of a mess to handle i seem to remember. still trying to get hold of a copy of it but im not hopefull.

heh i was thinking the same though it might just have been a glitch when writing the names are pretty similar. But for correctness it is called the dark engine and the newer version that allows us to run these beauties on win10/11 is called newdark. newdark is kinda interresting as it just suddenly popped up on a french forum some time ago by an anonymous developer with the alias le corbeau who allegedly got his hands on the original source code and started updating it for modern OS. this was the original thread i believe -> https://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=140085 bikerdude was on that forum to when the patch hit i noticed hehe.

Okay, I had no idea, I have googled it up now and you are right, to my own surprise. Done, I´ve put some paragraphs which were previously not in spoiler tags into spoilers.

Thebigh is right. The pronunciation tripped me up too, but that is apparently how Leicester is pronounced. Also @TarhielI'm glad you are loving the FM but do you mind putting spoiler tags on your post please

Operating System Windows 11 Pro - CPU Intel 11900k - System RAM 32 GB - Video Card Asus 3090 - Video Drivers 531.29 Nvida - Experienced Performance, No problems with Dark Mod graphics settings on full everything on max @ 40-50 fps

I'd like to install the game using the tdm_installer. It doesn't do anything. The moment it would start the download it stops immediately with an error saying "Missing end chunk .. ." There doesn't seem to be any info abut this error on the forum. Could anybody help me with this pls? Also I tried direct downloading the files with the links provided in the installation log. It worked I got 4MB of the game installed now, 4072MB to go.

We will look at some of this stuff, but SPOILER tags, please!!!

This may make sense in that the performance impact of the volumetric effect can scale with how much of the effect is filling the screen. We shipped with a “performance mode” but had to setup the entities by hand to do it (so it’s not perfect). If you change the LOD detail settings to “Low” or “Lowest” this will disable certain lights, particles and such that can be very heavy to render. You can try these settings and see if you notice an improvement. If not sending us some pictures of heavy areas (with spoiler tags please) will be helpful with tuning these “performance modes” in subsequent patches. Thanks for playing!

I'm all for giving the players more options, but you wrote that you edited most of these into the GUI already. So could you please fix the stupid GUI bug that has been annoying me for years too? It's the one when after downloading all available missions, the names of the very same missions are still visible in the download window overlayed with the text "No new missions to download" afterwards.

Interesting, although I'm not sure what to make of that. One of my favorite games (The Chronicles of Riddick Assault on Dark Athena) was published by Atari, and, they don't even seem to care to keep the activation servers running much. Or remove/change the copy protection, which doesn't work at all on Windows 11. I really hope that Nightdive delivers at the end of May... I'm not one of the shit storm crowd (it's absolutely horrible on the Steam forums...), but, 7 years of development is a long time, and delaying the release obviously has become a bit of a habit, to say the least.

(I apologize for the odd poll question layout. I wasn't able to add five yes-no questions, because polls are limited to three questions.) Hi everyone, I've recently been working on some patches for issues that I've read about from players on the TDM and TTLG forums — and Discord. My goal is to make it as easy as possible for players, especially new players and those who need usability/accessibility options, to find what they need in order to have a better TDM experience. I've already written the GUI and game engine code for these settings, which I've been using in my personal build. The reason for this poll and discussion is to both guide the finalization of my work and collect data to help inform the dev team. Which patches I submit depend on the outcome of this poll, discussion, and what the dev team agrees to accept. Once decided, I can coordinate with the dev team. I've attached screenshots of what the new settings menu would look like if all of the settings are accepted. Below, I have detailed each menu setting, so you can have an easier time understanding each one. Very important to keep in mind: None of these settings change TDM default behavior. They are all opt-in. If you are already happy with the behavior of 2.10, 2.11, etc. and these menu settings are accepted, nothing will change for you. Rename "Always Run" to "Run Mode" with options "None, Always, Toggle" After 2.11 was released, @i30817 requested that "toggle run" be added to the settings menu. Its cvar is already in TDM as "in_toggleRun" (same as Doom 3). I propose renaming the "Always Run" setting to "Run Mode" with options: "None", "Always", and "Toggle". None = in_alwaysRun 0; in_toggleRun 0 Always = in_alwaysRun 1; in_toggleRun 0 Toggle = in_alwaysRun 0; in_toggleRun 1 Show Blackjack Helper @Wellingtoncrab suggested that the new blackjack helper be added to the settings menu. Its cvar was added to 2.11 as "tdm_blackjack_indicate". More info: It's the new blackjack helper added to 2.11. When the game detects that the blackjack can be used for a successful hit or KO, the blackjack will rise slightly. I propose a "Yes/No" setting for this. Slider for "View: Head Bob" @ChronA requested a way to disable head bobbing, because a viewer watching him play was having severe motion sickness. Also, there was a bug in TDM that made setting the head bob in the console not stick after loading a saved game. (Even with 2.11, if a mission overrides the "tdm_player_thief.def" file and sets "pm_bobroll", "pm_bobpitch", "pm_bobup", and other cvars, it will override player preferences.) As far back as 2008, players have had trouble setting head bob. Another one from 2018. At the end of 2022, @Shadowex3 registered just to voice the need for a way to control head bob. I propose that a slider be added to adjust the amount of head bob. This would use a new "pm_headbob_mod" cvar with a value between 0.0 and 1.0 (default 1.0, no change). The "pm_headbob_mod" would be a multiplier for "pm_bobroll", "pm_bobpitch", and "pm_bobup". The advantage to this approach is that missions like Volta 2 and Hazard Pay would not need to adjust their "tdm_player_thief.def" files for head bob to work properly. And, the player can still adjust "pm_bobroll", "pm_bobpitch", and "pm_bobup" as they like. Slider for "View: Mantle Roll" This is similar to head bob for those who are sensitive to motion. Its cvar was added to 2.11 as "pm_mantle_roll_mod". A Thief player on Discord said, "2.11 will have a cvar to tune down the mantling animation at last." I propose that a slider be added for "pm_mantle_roll_mod". Auto-Search Bodies @Zaratul requested the "auto-search bodies" feature from Thief 1 & 2. Its cvar was added to 2.12 dev16783-10307 as "tdm_autosearch_bodies". I did a poll on the a Thief Discord server and roughly 20% of players there use the Thief auto-search bodies feature. I propose a menu setting for this, so that players coming from Thief 1 & 2 can easily find it.

I'd like to follow up on an earlier post, that keeps with the simple approach of retaining a fixed subtitle fieldwidth. Regarding about how one might test that a subtitle fieldwidth is "just right" for a given subtitle-line character limit (e.g., 42/line), font, and font scale, here's what I would suggest. Using dummy sound files, create a set of about 100 "worst likely case" subtitles that are exactly the length of the character limit. These are directly derived from the corpus of existing "story" and "speech" subtitles. Turn this set into 100 sound shaders for another version of my testSubtitles... program (with the desired fieldwidth, font, and font scale under test), and step through them. What you are looking to achieve is NO auto-wrap from the first to second line. If you get auto-wrap, then adjust the font scale and/or fieldwidth and iterate until good. This gives assurance about "worst likely cases", not "worst possible case", e.g, 42 W's in a row. Details: Suppose you have a function that takes a subtitle string and a font, and returns the "draw length" of that string in internal scale-independent font units, that is, pre-scaling/rendering. It's just a summation of lookups into the appropriate static character-width table (assuming kerning is not an issue). Because we will be using the calculated value just to rank the strings for "worse-ness", the "font unit" is arbitrary. [ @stgatilov, maybe you could provide me with such a function in C++? Then I could do what follows. ] OK, so that is embedded into a program that is turned loose on the existing subtitles, to: look for 2-line subtitles (in inline or srt form) where the lines together exceed the character limit convert those to a single string by replacing the linebreak with a space truncate them to the character limit calculate the "draw length" of each export the strings and their draw lengths into a csv (along with a field indicating the source) Do that for each available subtitle source (FM or stock barks), and import all the .csv files as sets of rows in a spreadsheet. Then sort the rows by draw length and deduplicate (ignoring source). Take the 100 "worst likely case" rows, export them, and turn them (using techniques already developed) into sound shaders for the testSubtitles... program. So, a bit of work, but you get assurance that you've optimized things to minimize future problems.

I'm still using a Brother black & white laserprinter from 2004. Almost never had problems with it. I think Laser/led printers usually have less problems than inktjet.

Has there ever been a printer, regardless of the manufacturer, that worked right? Seriously, I can't remember a time in my life where I didn't have printer problems.

TDM Modpack v2.8 released in the opening post Please note this new version is only compatible with TDM 2.11 (or higher). It won't work in previous versions of the game. What's new? ~ SMART CONTAINERS MOD v1.0 Our friend @Obsttorte added new functionality to TDM 2.11 that allow us to tackle a long standing problem: difficult to frob objects inside containers. Newer maps come with improved chests and a number of older maps and prefabs were at some point revisited but still, many containers out there remain a constant source of frustration for players. The "Smart Containers Mod" will make the bottom of containers (chests, jewelry boxes...) non-frobable right at the beginning of the mission. I tested this implementation extensively and I didn't find any usability problems nor I detected any issues that might break a mission and I think it is safe to share the mod with the community. Let me know if you find any oddities in your looting adventures! ----------------------------------------------- ~ CLASSIC BLACKJACK MOD v1.2 The "Classic Blackjack" also gets a little update to include some code from TDM 2.11. Thanks, once again, to @Obsttorte blackjacking has been GREATLY improved in 2.11 and the Classic Blackjack Mod isn't as relevant as before, but since the mod comes with its own rule-set it still has a place within the TDM Modpack. ----------------------------------------------- You can find the download link in the first post on this topic. Changelog: ============================== v2.8 - New release ------------------------------ • Compatible with TDM 2.11 (or higher) • SMART CONTAINERS MOD v1.0: Initial release. • PLAYER SKILLS MOD - ORIENTATION v1.2 - Fixed card highlighting issue when r_newFrob was set to 0. • PLAYER SKILLS MOD - COMBINATION v1.1 - Fixed arrow effect not showing up properly in some circumstances. • (Internal) Major and minor adjustments here and there. Cheers!

I wouldn't call them "hardcore stealth", they're rather fast stealth, but, yeah, great games I only can recommend if you didn't play them yet. Arx Fatalis is great too, but, it has some serious balancing problems. Some quests and parts of the games are very easy, while others are way too hard. And, the magic where you have to hand draw the runes is also pretty questionable. In hectic situations, you just aren't able to draw the runes. It's already difficult when there's no hectic. Yes, you have 3 auto spells, but, that's not nearly enough. From Arkane Studios, I also can recommend Dark Messiah of Might & Magic. It's really good.

dont see a problem with it either should be fine as nbohr1 said it does support opengl 4.6. intels built in gfx can be a bit finnicky at times though but i only had problems with a few select games using them. for my own part i ended up using the older pc components for gaming while my threadripper now chugs along building msys2 packages and other general development projects, gfx is a 970 gtx. The 1080 ti i paired with the asrock z97 extreme6 which runs really well when not overclocking, my old asus x79 deluxe is used as a second gaming computer for when my friends come to visit, and used as a media pc when im alone. I paired that one with my old msi R9 290X gfx card.

I'm aware this might have been thought about before and there's probably a reason why it hasn't been improved. Since many good changes are happening including lifting of legacy limitations, I felt this is worth thinking about granted it's not too breaking. There are two technically independent yet related subjects I wanted to address here, both with the same goal of better unifying weapons with other inventory items: The internal weapon definition system, then how GUI and inventory could be improved so weapons are treated more closely to everything else. Technical limitations: TDM still uses an old and limited method built into the engine to define weapons, something idTech has done since its early days. This comes with a few problems: You can only have up to 16 weapons registered, weapons need be listed in the global definition of the player entity, and it's simply redundant. I was wondering if as a target for 2.12 or later, it would be possible to remove the legacy weapon slots from the engine and store weapons like other items; This would allow a FM to define any number of custom arrows / guns and do so without having to override the player def, just define your arrow like you would a custom lockpick as a derivative from its base class. It doesn't feel right to for the engine to designate two types of items ("weapon" and "literally anything else") with the former going through a special hardcoded registry while inventory items already do the same thing more simply. Only ability I know is unique to weapons is drawing the first person hands and animating them: Items would need a generic ability to define a md5mesh / md5anim set for hands when selected and operated, which would be awesome since other objects could use this as well. Everything else seems like it should fit into place: The arrows are just a projectile spawned at a given position angle and velocity, technically you could already create an inventory item that spawns a flying arrow when used (I think)... the ammo and projectile are already defined as standard items too, it's only the "shooter" that uses the legacy engine registration as an extra dependency. Inventory wise weapons presently have a special status, in that they can be selected and operated independently from items: I'm aware changing this may disrupt what players are used to so changes are questionable. I support having a single selector for cycling weapons and items together, even merging the "use item" and "fire weapon" keys to operate whichever is selected: If we did that we could technically implement a first-person hand displaying whatever you have selected... some things like the lockpicks may need a custom animation but imagine how good that would look when picking doors, heck you could even see the bag in your hand when "loot" is focused! Only real complaint I see is some players want to keep an item handy without having to deselect it when switching to a weapon, like being able to quickly use a health potion while drawing the sword to attack: We can solve this by having hotkeys for more essential items similar to the lantern and spyglass, like a "use health potion" button so if you have a potion you may instantly heal... we'd be freeing up three key-binds with an unified inventory anyway (prev item, next item, use item) which is also an advantage. Do share your thoughts and if you can think of a better way.

Above 3 items are released now, on the "Barks" thread: https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/21740-english-subtitles-for-ai-barks/&do=findComment&comment=483331

Instead of that, you could, in that time period, start learning your own missions and in doing so become more active on the forums, learning from others. It's also great to understand how things work in the engine, when you play. It might spoil some immersion though.. Or learn to build games with other engines, like Godot for example.

Keep in mind also that mission size, and complexity have increased dramatically since the beginning. For a lot of veteran mappers, it can take over a year to get a map made and released. The last dozen missions have for the most part been pretty massive, with new textures, sounds, scripts, models etc. We seem to be long past the point of people loading up the tools, and banging out a mission in a few weeks that's very barebones. We still do see some of those, but I noticed in the beta mapper forums and on Discord, that mappers seem to make these maps, but don't release them, and instead use the knowledge gained to make something even better. Could just be bias on my part scrolling through the forums and discord server though.

CD Project ditching their in-house engine I kinda understand though. It definitely looks nice in Cyberpunk 2077 when bumped up to max settings, but it sounds like they had a ton of issues during development and the release was full of technical problems that took many patches to buff out (though it still has the occasional T-pose among other glitches.) I think in CDPR's case, the choice to move to Unreal made practical sense. The talent pool for people familiar with Unreal is far higher than REDengine and that in itself would speed things up considerably as opposed to getting new people familiar with an in-house engine. I know Remedy still use their in-house engine (Northlight) so good for them, but who knows, maybe they'll switch eventually too.

There is no SS3, how can they do a remake? And thank god they got rid of unity, that engine is total trash garbage on anything over 60 fps. Just spend 5 minutes on steam forums for Unity project games, and there's just thousands of people complaining about poor performance, stuttering etc.