Search the Community

Well put, New Horizon. Always a voice of reason. One thing I was just thinking is, since we all disagree about whether or not mines would be realistic, wouldn't it be cool if when you tossed a mine it then faded to invisible, or at least nearly tranparent, over a couple seconds? (If it turned completely invisible, maybe just leave a very faintly glowing LED on it or something.) At first I wasn't thinking this wouldn't be something I'd want to see in a Thief game... but then I remembered there was an Invisibility Potion in T2. And I liked using it on Garrett. Soooo, isn't it realistic to think the same sort of technology/magic could be applied to a mine? Sure, one application is on a biological level (Garrett) whereas the other is on a mechanical level (mine), but still. Technological/mechanical advances could put this in the realm of possibility within the Thief world, imo. And I'd like it. It seems more thief-like than having a big mine plopped in the middle of the floor. Regarding the loud sound it made when you tossed them in T2, which I also didn't like (not secretive enough), I was thinking we should coat our mines with a sound-absorbing polymer or something Or perhaps they should have cushiony bottoms and edges?

The reason is we needed a new one...the others are not right, don't work etc.

I can't help noticing that LGS made a very good job with their choice of tools, so I don't really see a reason why we not should include them. It's about fun. Not "because LGS did so".

I suppose everyone is perfectly aware that mines are just about the single item in the entire universe that a thief would be least likely to use, other than a flashing neon hood? Oh, yeah, I forgot, LGS had them in Thief, so...etc...I'd hate to think we were sticking them into our game for that reason alone

Just an update: I've got the GUI editor working once again. For a few days after my upgrade I couldn't use it, and didn't know why. Then I found out that putting Anti-aliasing on in D3 does a number on the editors for some reason. Anyway, I'm back working on the book, but I'm continuing to have one annoying problem. The page curls in the left and right corners have a transparent background, but when I set the alpha map for the tga file, it always comes out with a thin, light-coloured border around it, which looks like crap. I haven't yet found a way to get rid of this border. My next attempt is going to be trying to save an alpha map that overlaps the original image by a couple pixels and see if that will help.

Well, my brother showed me how to partition the new drive, and once I uninstalled the old graphics drivers and reinstalled, the stuttering problem was gone. Over at D3W, zeh told me that the reason my GUI editor wasn't working anymore was because I'd put anti-aliasing on in Doom. Apparently that's a no-no when you're editing. So as of this moment, the only thing I can't explain is why my Photoshop image of the open book suddenly has a weird barcode spashed across it. edit: I have another question though...I have winxp home on my secondary computer, and would like to upgrade it to xp Pro. Can I just install right over top? It's giving me the 'having two operating systems is not recommended' spash screen.

Yeah, I suggested earlier that a guard's acuity (visual, auditory, etc) should increase with each state of alertness. So a shadow may be dark enough to hide you from the sight of relaxed guards, but if they start getting alerted, they'll be more likely to spot you. That way, even if he puts his sword away and returns to his route, it isn't business as usual. He will be harder to get past. This gives even non-ghosters a reason not to be spotted.

I think the issue with the bow aim is not that easy. I can understand that most players may want to have a target indicator. On a real bow this is different. Even if you have a aim help it may not be really of a help. The reason is simple. There is some Zen in shooting a bow. Normally when lerning to shoot a bow is all about body control. You don;t learn to aim with your bow, you learn to aim with your body. You need to learn how to place your body in the exact same position that you need to acquire every time when you target something. If you don't learn that you never learn to shot a bow properly because there is to much error margin. And that is exactly the problem with our bow in game. We don't have that body and it would be quite hard for a player to learn it. Of course you can always play around with it, and still learn it, but the question is, will our audience accept this?

THe reason it looks like a T-rex, is becasue it is a T-rex) I'm modelling it for someone else, and he actually make a joke that I could always just it as a burrick for TDM - I thought that's not a bad idea actually, may as well kill two birds with one modeling session. I tend to agree though, I should tweak it a little. I think I'll make it look a little more like GIMG's concept.

dear TEAM! oDDity i still didnt get the Fprime..I mean I really do not wanna use any unregistered software..because of my business i m all the time buying hardware... but actually im waiting for the next version, after they covered every stuff in lightwave i ll get it.. Actually when i was checking it in my friends LW machines, i have noticed some subtle differences than lightwave's own renderer. I m very fanatic about lightwave and its renderer especially. Although everyone is going beserk with the Fprime..I really still sense differences. And while im waiting im working on the other pcs on other stuff. So ... you know... But in next version i ll be a member Fprime guild.. Sparhawk actually there are couple of different ways to that. Sometimes a little plugin helping you sometimes even so much easier with other techincs. The thing is Lightwave is a great program and modeller.. When i saw first time LW and 3d MAX i mean . Lightwave's menu and layer system made me instantly amazed..I fell in love with the LW. Still there are so much problem in LW animation system but that modeller is an amazing stuff. I m telling everytime, if im making animations only reason is LW. IF something happens and LW dissappeares from the face of earth i would never ever touch another 3d application. I would be sewing that Black Jack for you from cotton So your answer is lightwave... at least 3 ways of making the same thing in same time...Talking about lightwave is making me emotional ... im about to cry... best...

dear oDDity:) I ll try to fix the face.. Of course i was more like architectural and mechanical modeller for years... I think i should stick with making just furniture and stuff like that for this mod and keep my time trying to fix things.....I mean of course i can change, add so many other props to your base model but really it doesnt do anything good for my skills which im really trying to improve. I was making cartoon 3d characters for TVs but not that much humanoid characters. And for some time (springheel knows the reason) i may have some anatomical problems.. I think it s better for me not to try anymore on character models... Because really this team has the best.... so the best must create the final characters...I mean we should not give away the quality... So i think .I m not gonna try to make character for this mod again... and I even do not put any kind of picture on LW modellers background. Not even a logo. I mean i force myself to not copy the actual stuff..So for me it s not even an option to put a model and change it...I mean it may take months for me to make a good proportional model or a face but it s ok really i dont have rush After many occupations in this visual art fields i started to focus on modelling mmm couple of months ago.. So i think im still so amateur... i was focusing on so many other things when i was making that woman. i mean my mind was divided in three things as i was making it....It was really so hard for me to work in 3 different PCs on 3 different stuff.... but this is not an excuse... of a bad modelling ... And i admire your work...It s not a good thing for me to mess with it best (with us)

Hmm, yes, but the reason they're simple s becasue you're knocking them out in 10 minutess and not modeling any detail in. I know you're probably used to relying on textures for detail, but with normal maps you have to model the detail in a high res object. There's no deadline to get all the furniture finished by this evening you know, so, pace yourself)

would be quite nice, I know what you're talking about, Oddity. But I also like SH's movie idea. But there's no reason why it couldn't be ingame (with minimal loading, only one room).

Bosch for some strange reason chose Christianity for his religious subjects, and not a hammer or builder or trickster i sight) Maybe SH could come up with something along the lines of the typical Renaissance religious art, but depicting something a little more appropriate for the THief universe (or whatever it is we're calling ours) I could come up with a dozen of these very quickly, and I'm sure that's all we'll need. Fm authors can easly change the skin.

I really love that pictures and that was another reason why T1/T2 was so atmospheric and T3 sucked. The pcitures looked as if they were really from that epoch, I don't know if they are actual classics or not but at least they look as if the could be. But somehow I doubt that we can use this pictures in our game. It doesn't really matter if we are a commercial project or not because copyright law doesn't really make a difference with that. Thinking that we have such pictures in our Thiefy levels would give a real big boost to the atmosphere of them but I'm not really convinced about copyright.

My major problem with "body awareness" is, that it's plain stupdi from a real world point of view. At least in many cases. Seeing hands when walking around? Why? When I go I never see my hands and I'm not aware of them. Even running I barely are aware of them, so why would I have a constant reminder that I have hands to use? I know that I have hands and so does the character in the game. Pickupanimations are ok, but they tend to slow down an action and look most of the time simply ridiculous. The lockpicking was not so bad in T3 because the hands were in a quite limited position (hence the suck in) and looked more or less ok. But having a pickup animations means that either the character has to be in a proper position or the animation will look wrong. Either because the hands will have to be extended in order to reach the object properly, they will have to be bended in an unrealistic way, or they look realistic but will touch air instead. If we want realistic moving handanimations, then the player has to be in a position where it makes sense. This means, he has either to be sucked in (which I hate) or he has to move in the proper position himself (which could become frustrating). The major problem with body awareness is IMO that you never will have the amount of control over a computer character as you have over your body. Simply because the only things to control the character is the mouse and the keyboard. And this is exactly the reason why you either have to force the model into an animation or the player has to learn complex control mechanisms. A good example is the slight delay when the palyer is looking in another direction then the body is aligned of. The delay is not realistic, simply because in RL you never have this issue. You can move your head independently of your body (to some extent ). So looking in one direction and going in another is never an issue with a real body, but it is with a computer controled character because usually you can either control the body or the head but not both. And these are similar problems for all other body parts to. I can control my hand while simoutlanously moving my head and also my feet in totally different directions. I can even read while walking and I do this all the time when I'm on the street. So to me body awareness is something that is much overhyped and expresses more a lack of phantasy than anything else. I have no problem seeing no body and still knowing that it's ME that is running around in the castle steeling things. Yes. That's also my opinion.

There is no problem with that. I think the reason for putting it in the middle are twofold. 1.) Because of 3rd person view, the have to position the model in such a way that it looks believable from 3rd person view as well as from first person. That's also why you had to be sucked into position. Placing it on the sides would cause unneccessary problems, because it can either be on the left or right and there has to be enough place so that the model doesn't either dissolve into the building or might be collisioned and can't get into the proper position. 2.) Probably handles on the sides could be harder to see because of lighting conditions. Considering the XBox it might be much worse on a TV screen. When the object is placed in the middle the light is probalby better there. Just pure speculation of course.

YEs. I'm sure it ;ooks even better in game, with the real time specularity. Just on the subject of doors - does anyone know what the reason for the central doorhandles/locks in T3 was? Will there be any problems putting door handles and locks on the right/left side of the door like normal?

I was just reading the update on moddb for "A terrible Secret" and I must say I'm quite surprised. First they claim that Doom 3 didn't allow them to create their set because they didn't intend to create so many custom textures. But than he says that HL2 is so much better with it's physics (which is certainly true) and with the proper artistic team they can also create the dark envirnonment that they envisioned. Now I'm a bit surprised because I wonder what that "proper artistic team" is supposed to do. Does have HL2 so many different textures set? And if so why would he need that "proper artistic team". If not (as I understand the text) then they will still have to create their custom textures, which implies to me that this is not the reason why they changed to HL2. Well, it doesn't really matter, just being curious as I liked the story from that mod and it's sad that they switched to HL2 and so I likely can not play it if it comes out.

here's a new door-texture also in Thief2-style. however the normalmap isn't perferct yet and it probably needs a heightmap, which doesn't work for some reason.

I haven't been able to find a place that sets it permanently. I can change it manually every time, but that's a pain. The reason I panicked was that this seems to be a new thing...at least, I can't remember it being set that way previously. So I was worried that whatever created these mysterious borders also deleted some messages. I'm glad that isn't the case.

Bare with me on this. This isn't some idea I just came up with. The illusion WON'T be destroyed when the compass points move (as I thought I illustrated). It's a trick used in many commercial 3D games. No, the 2D gem doesn't move. It doesn't need to, because it's a perfectly round sphere. You can't tell which way its facing. Look at my previous example pic. BECAUSE you can't tell which way a marble is facing, is why you can use a 2D pic for it. You don't need to render new pictures for every angle you see it on, because a perfect sphere never looks different, no matter what angle you view it on. The only way it looks different is if you change the light source, which isn't nessecary for a HUD item. -But you are right, there is no real difference with a true 3D one and the 2D one from a programming perspective, since both are simply changing textures on a mesh in real time. -And the poly count doesn't really matter I suppose, since there is only one of them and not lots of them all over the screen (like in-game objects such as coin stacks). -But the 2D one has the possibility of being pre-rendered much nicer looking, and perfectly round without huge amounts of polys. That is generally the entire reason for employing this trick. If I could find some screen shots, I could show you what I mean. Okay, it's not a decent example, but maybe it gets the gist across. Look at the tyres on the Karts. (They are all the same tire object). Notice how they have managed to get treads on the tires, shading, rims etc. all which would take up lots of polys. The fact is, that they only rendered 1 animation of the tire revolving on the Y axis (ie. rotating as if sitting on a microwave plate while it turns) and stuck this on a 2 poly square. They did not render frames for any other angles (except 2 more for the z axis, so the tire can look like it's spinning) because the fact is, that the tire will ALWAYS look like one of those frames from the animation of the Y axis revolving, no matter what angle you look at it from, high, low, diagonal, side, etc. because of the way the tire is shaped. It is a perfect circle. In the case of a perfect sphere, it looks the same from ALL angles, something they exploited in Mario 64 with the king ba-bomb - his body is a 2D image of a pre-rendered sphere with a highlight on it - that way, he is perfectly round (no polygonal edges), it only takes up 2 polys instead of hundreds, and his eyes, arms and legs rotate around that image as he turns, as if it was a perfect sphere, completing the illusion. Much like what I'm suggesting for the light gem. All I'm saying is that it's possible to exploit this trick to make a much more beautiful, glass-marble type looking gem, like the one that was first posted.

can't see the pictures for some reason - maybe because I'm on a public-pc here ?! edit: now it works...

Problem is, LW doesn't have a version that most people can afford. Hell, only reason I can afford 3DS is because of student pricing. Maya has the PLE, but I'm not sure how that would apply here. And I've tried using Blender and Milkshape, and I absolutely hate the interfaces for them. Edit: Isn't it the same methodology, regardless of format, to get a mesh in-game? Go ahead and post it anyway.

As Finger said, this would be done with a particle engine. And as Spring rightly points out: This is something that can wait until the core features have been implemented. This is also the reason why I don't fix the doors right now. For our purposes it works and we will have to do a lot of polishing later on.