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Yeah something's been wrong with these for a while: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showt...78&hl=torch

Further to this topic: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=6991&st=0 is anyone else using Vista? If so what setup do you have and what version of DarkRadiant? I'm using this setup and DarkRadiant v0.9.4 crashes on me, but v0.9.1 works: Vista Home Premium Intel Core 2 Duo 6600 2 Gb RAM nVidia GTS 8800 320MB with latest nVidia drivers

Doom 3 uses a special compression technique for DDS textures, so you don't get the artifacts. I never had any problems running doom 3 on my old card. If I wanted to play the game at a faster frame rate, I always dropped it down to low settings...this would scale all the textures down to very low res dds files. I didn't see any nasty artifacts that usually appear from compressing them...like you do with JPEG. TDS normal maps were all dds as well and they didn't have any weird banding...they were blocky, but that's just because they were low res. Doom 3 uses them all the time, speculars too. I'm not saying we should reduce our textures to 256 x 256 like TDS...I'm just saying we should use dds to keep our textures at higher res. It will definitely save on some processing power. I think the issues with some of the compressed normal maps may have been that they weren't compressed properly with the compressonator. I'll run some tests on my system, and post a dds_testmap.pk4 for people to try out, using nothing but DDS. We'll see what issues cause it to break. I would like to get down to the bottom of what is causing issues for some people, as the dds files should work right across the board. I think it might just be stray settings somewhere.

Does anyone have Motionbuilder running in XP with an 8800 GTS type of card? I've got myself a new rig with an 8800 GTS but the current nvidia drivers screw up the realtime playback It skips a few frames ahead when playing in 24 fps (or whatever speed). When playing animations with the show "ALL FRAMES" option it does like it says play all frames but that's of course too fast. i read on some cg forums that it's a general problem with the current 7XXX en 8XXX series and autodesk is apparently working on this issue. So be warned

That's ignorant flamethrowing, and you know it. I had many friends in my teens and early twenties when I was a 'lad' and never really thought about anything, but I have deliberately distanced myself from them, because I simply have nothing in common with them these days, and their company irritates me, as does the company of my family members. The irony is that the sort of people I do have things in common with tend to be people who aren't bothered about being socially 'normal' or friendly, so they're not the sort of people who hang around together. What you mean by 'grumpy', is that I actually question things, things which have become so normal to you that you don't question them, you just do them. I don't just accept social norms and traditional responses and actions as being correct for that reason alone. I don't go through life on autopilot. The fact is that ignorant, thoughtless people are the happiest in the world, and 'grumpy' people tend to be people who think about things, because when you actually think about things, and see things for real, and don't just float though life ignoring everything you don't want to see, you realise it's all a big heap of shit. And don't talk to me about ZylonBane, he's just someone who pretends to be grumpy and sarcastic in front of noobs. Whenever a mod warns him, he rolls over and bleats like a sheep. I've been banned from many forums because I don't give a shit, and do not hide my views to become more acceptable to people.

What fucking use is empathy to someone with Alzheimer's. Some new cure I haven't heard of? IF you really cared, you'd volunteer to actually help people who have it, rather than making posts on forums saying how terrible it is. There isn't a town in the country where you couldn't go and volunteer right now to help someone. The truth is, you don't give a shit, at least not in any way that might impinge on your life or cause you the slightest inconvenience. SO don't give me this crap about how caring and empathetic you are. Selfish AND hypocrites, and you wonder why it irritates me so much.

I'm pretty sure all of the VFS methods deal only with stuff underneath the Doom 3 directory and in .pk4 files. It might be necessary to load the image yourself, and extend the TexturesCache module interface with another method to insert a new image into the cache, e.g. virtual void insertImage(const std::string& name, const Image* img) It looks like an Image object is just an interface which defines, amongst other things, methods to return the height and width of the image and a pointer to an array of bytes, which you can presumably get through GDK's image loading functionality. Inserting it into the textures cache might be dirtier, because there is some stuff about LoadImageCallbacks that you would have to deal with but I think there is a default you can use for this. Oh, and there is that horrible HashedCache again. If you were feeling particularly energetic, you might find that splitting out the TexturesCache into a separate module would make things easier, and it might even be possible to get rid of the image callback stuff altogether, depending on whether anything is actually using it.

Now that I think about it, things like this should probably be uploaded as pk4 files. Otherwise I have to figure out what has been changed in HUD.gui and change it back before merging my version.

Is the Radiant editor that DR is based on the problem? Maybe some other people have got it working properly on Vista and have some answers on some other Radiant forums.

There is a hardcore set of ghosters that typically hangs out at the eidos forums. their rules are simple. Don't be seen leave no evidence (other than missing loot) don't be heard above suspicioun (Is that a rat, did I hear something) basically level one alerts is the max. If an ai hears or sees you for sure (I saw you, come on out) level 2 alert than the ghost is busted. They even go so far as to complain about friendly ai in missions, because even though they are friendly, if they saw you they saw you. Personally I like to play what I call appartition mode Much like Fidcal, I'd rather not ever be seen or heard and I try not to use too many tools. But if they are alerted above level 1 I will hide and wait, not reload/retry. So at the end of the night they just think they were seeing things (must've been a ghost - the house must be haunted)

And yet you frequent forums every day to read the opinions of other people. Imagine that. I, on the other hand, want to know what other people like in their missions, being a beta mapper who plans on building a few. Which is why I started the thread. P.S. Are you guys always this grouchy? Or did you all get out the wrong side of the bed this morning?

That's excellent work, especially considering you did it in two days while still learning the editor. New Horizon is the guy to contact about applying for beta mapper status (or anything else). Email recruiting@thedarkmod.com or send a PM to New Horizon via these forums. Include a link to this thread so he has some context, and in case he hasn't seen those screenshots yet.

I searched the forum on loot values but didn't really come up with much. Probably not a huge deal at this point but probably needs looked into by the team before release. I'm adding loot defs so I thought I'd post my thoughts. Obviously the main thing we are aiming for in loot is the ability to easily recognize it. Values : seems to be the one factor that is most important. I've added alot of skins to the loot.def file. I did this so we get consistant loot values. Other wise the author would create a gold ring and have to choose a skin and change the value for a silver ring. Of course we can't stop an author from choosing any value they want, but most likely will stick to convention if it's easy. Probably the most important reason to have standard loot values is for the players. Often times at TTLG someone would be looking for that last 75 gold. It was easy for someone to say: gold goblets are 75, look here and there, a coin stack and a plate would be 75, ect... Anyone can double check my values and give input. Basically on things like rings and coins silver = 1/2 gold. Also I tried to make diamonds the most expensive with emeralds second, opals, down to less precious gems like amethyst. I didn't change any existing values, just tried to base ne values off of the existing items. Moveable/Static Loot : In my forums search I came across a thread or two talking about this. I think this is old news but would like to hear what you all currently think about it. I think at one point the team wasn't sure if it should move or not, due to explosions blowing it out of reach, whether or not the mover would work with loot, ect... All these issues seem to have passed so I suggest we get rid of static loot, is there a reason to still have these entities? (other than it already being used in maps?) With the exception of the scepter, statue loot, religious symbol and the diamond all of the loot models have collision models. I can add collision for the scepter and the statue as they are ase. The diamond needs retex so I can do that and add collision, although it will then be an ase. Someone else will need to add collision to the religious obj. I think bonehoard has some static loot which would be better as moveable anyway. I couldn't reach so I shot 10 arrows and it never budged. It was a gold vase which doesn't appear in the loot list but should. I suppose angua just added loot props for that map. Also, I'd like to get more opinions on the gem textures. I want to replace the diamond and ruby textures of old with these. I've got one thumbs up so far (from PinkDot?) the big blue thing is my diamond, the little white thing is the old one. of course there are several sizes... The tex on far right is meant to replace the ruby (small red next to large red) The red on left turns out to be a bonehoard specific shader. --EDIT--forgot to mention, the small red gem with my tex needs remapped, it would look more like the large one.

Do you think I have time during work hours to post essay-long rebuttals on internet forums? Some of us have jobs to do, you know! I'll outline some quick thoughts, seeing as its lunchtime over here. We seem to be mostly in agreement, it's just the wording that's causing problems. I'll ignore all that you do agree with me on. Regarding the story - as I said somewhere on the last page it doesn't have to be a complex story about an imporobable affair or whatever. Just little stories to make the characters feel more alive. Everyday, humdrum things. Perhaps someone could mention that they visited a dentist and had a tooth pulled out by some new steampunk contraption and it hurt like hell. Just little tales to add a bit of life to the mission. A sense of discovery - As I said they don't all have to be 'finding the lost city' style moments. Chopping down a banner to find an alcove, or something. I'd be suprised to find an old house without anything to find it it. Anticipation - Why should this kill the suprise? What the player finds where he's going doesn't have to be what he thought was going to be there. A twist - We'll just haveto agree to disagree on this one. But as I said before twists don't have to be big. Personally I enjoy 'em. Originality - Team members don't want me to discuss this. Keep it human - Agree to disagree. I don't like zombies and bug beasts. It's not much of a sneaking game if they just walk after you when you're caught. Haunts are fine because at least they involve some sneaking. Each to his own I guess. Rewarding Loot - As I said before realistic placement of loot and loot as a reward aren't mutually exclusive. Loot would be in hard to get areas - whoever owns the house doesn't want thieves and servants getting them after all. The loot would be where the guards are. Anyway, I think this disagreement is best resolved through the medium of level building!

Thought it would be good to move this to the public forums.

I tested them in an empty room. The goal was to test the effect of a number of meshes, so I wanted to eliminate any other considerations. The test showed quite clearly that multiple meshes had *no effect whatsoever* on framerate--at least on static meshes. It's possible it added to the overall load time for the map however, I didn't really pay much attention to that. Here's the original thread: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showt...&hl=submesh edit: the original test, using 5000 poly objects, showed only a drop of 2 fps when going from 1 mesh to 4, even with *135* models on screen. So while there does seem to be a marginal decrease, the effect is so low as to be not worth considering, IMO.

http://www.iddevnet.com/quake4/LevelEditor_Performance This link is not new on this forums (Gildoran posted it some time ago). You can find there some info on Draw calls and Batch sizes. Basically draw is a batch of polygons of the same shader and for one light only sent to graphics card. So 10 AI with 10 shaders each lit by 3 lights mean 300 draw calls. It's plenty, because 1000 is recomended maximum number of draw calls per frame. And where's the rest of rendered map? Springheel - I believe 10 meshes AI are a performance killers. Did you check them in empty room or in full map, with plenty other models and geometry with various textures? If anybody has time to do some test (sorry, I can't for a while) just check how many draw calls each AI adds to scene. There's a commnad r_showprimitive which shows draw calls number.

@Baddcog: the thread where discussion started: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?s=&am...st&p=135335 I'm not on my TDM system at the moment, but I do have one performance thing I can mention. When I was doing the recent AI tests, I noted the difference between D3 AI and TDM AI. The setup used 40 D3 imps, and later, 40 TDM city watch (same map, same environment). After trying all of those AI performance testing cvars (several of which shut the AI down completely, so we can figure any TDM AI complexities are not factoring in), I found that the room full of imps gave me, ~20-40 FPS. That's a lot of polys running quite well on my slower system. The 40 citywatch (not animating, not aware) brought the framerate to the low teens (12-14). I believe the citywatch and typical TDM AI have close to 5K polys. The D3 AI have half that. They're quite blocky actually, but it's hidden well by really incredible materials. So anyway, that at least would indicate that yes, while Doom3 can render a truckload of polygons really well, it does add up. In this case, double the polys nearly halved the framerate. I believe 125k polys is a pretty packed scene. It can definitely be done, but it's pushing it, especially with all of our advanced systems in place.

Got some new info for you guys from official Eidos forums. Deus Ex 3 is going to use the Tomb Raider Revival engine from Crystal Dynamics. http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=176735 Here's a Q &A. http://www.developmag.com/interviews/104/Q...-Eidos-Montreal Just started reading but it looks like this time they chose something that has already been established and won't waste time like Ionstorm Austin did with Invisible War. I have high hopes for this game.

I don't know why I bother, you are the wost debater on these forums, no better than a child at times. This isn't about any grand anthropological conclusion, I'm simply backing up my initial statement, whch was challenged, that the urge to have kids is not instinctual, does not occur in animals, and therefore cannot be instinctual in humans. The conclusion is that it's an intellectual process, caused by a mix societal brainwashing and tradition, the realisation that new generations are a necessity, and as an inevitable consequence of the the fact that sex is so desirable. Yes, nature makes sex desirable to make us do it so evolution can happen, but it does not give us an innate desire TO HAVE KIDS, only TO HAVE SEX. A desire to have kids, and weighing up all the pros and cons that go with it, is too complex a thoght process to have evolved, it's something that only human brains can think of.

The new T2X footsteps have been uploaded to CVS, along with a new sound shader. The agreement with the T2X gang is that we do not let anyone outside the mod know that we are using their footstep sounds. Internal knowledge only. Upon release, the step sounds may only be used by FM authors for Dark Mod FM's. The tweaked settings won't become default until the new build of the pk4, so you'll have to add the tweaked settings in your Doomconfig.cfg file. Here are the relevant settings. seta pm_stepvol_crouch_creep "-7" seta pm_stepvol_crouch_run "4" seta pm_stepvol_crouch_walk "-2" seta pm_stepvol_creep "-5" seta pm_stepvol_run "8"

The mitten hands are separate meshes so it's not that hard to rerig: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?s=&am...st&p=102537 Not that I don't mind someone else redoing my work

Texture forum, not thread. It's here: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showforum=4 I guess Contributors don't have access to the start-up thread... or SVN in general. Perhaps there's some confusion over which group you were supposed to be added to?

Don't know about Opera, but you can block it quite effectively in Firefox using Adblock with the URL http://forums.thedarkmod.com/uploads/av-254.jpg Maybe there is an equivalent plugin for Opera which allows more specific URL filtering.

SubVersioN. We mostly use TortoiseSVN around here (Linux users use something different). Once NH gets you set up, you'll be able to see what we're talking about and how to get it set up. For repetition's sake, the link you will need to get started on TDM: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=6694