The End Is Nigh

[demagogue]

Yeah I was about to say "fixed a few bugs ... wut?" lol. Look at the sourcecode too and you'll see greebo's work is everywhere. He's done everything for this mod and gone waaay above the call of duty in the time he's tirelessly put into it. His work can't be appreciated enough. Three cheers for greebo!

[Xarg]

For contributions of this magnitude, we may require an entirely separate thread to properly express our gratitude to the guy(girl?) who posts on these forums with the name Greebo. Should such an event not come to pass, I'd like to offer a big thanks and express my appreciation of the work he's done, I've had a lot of fun with TDM so far, and each mission/feature that comes out only adds to this.

[Springheel]

Look at the sourcecode too and you'll see greebo's work is everywhere

 

Not to mention thankless tasks like managing the website, the wiki, the mission download database, the developer SVN database, the release packaging, etc.

[Big Gulp]

Honestly, the biggest problem this game has is a lack of awareness. I bought and played Thief and Thief 2 religiously (played through TDS just once), and although I'm very much up to date on PC gaming I hadn't even heard of this mod until a couple of days ago, after buying all three Thief games on Steam. One thing led to another, and I just happened to hear about the mod while checking for fan missions for T2.

 

Don't be too down, though. Dark Mod is utterly fantastic. Of course I want more development of fan missions, but what's out there right now will keep me busy for a long, long time. I'm extremely thankful for all the hard work you guys have done. I'll at least be spreading the gospel. =)

[Bikerdude]

Don't be too down, though. Dark Mod is utterly fantastic. Of course I want more development of fan missions, but what's out there right now will keep me busy for a long, long time. I'm extremely thankful for all the hard work you guys have done. I'll at least be spreading the gospel. =)

Welcome to the forums mista and yes spread the word :-D

[Bikerdude]

Not to mention thankless tasks like managing the website, the wiki, the mission download database, the developer SVN database, the release packaging, etc.

I have PM'd him and you on this subject.

[Xarg]

Here's one thing I don't get... MWLL suffers from the same lack of publicity (somehow!), despite having been featured in multiple gaming magazines, and winning awards 2-3 years running at Moddb.. where is this magical place to go to advertise this kind of thing? For reference, MWLL forums have been open for something like 4-5 years, they've had concept art and concept videos up something like half a year before release, but after all this time, their forums have only 23,000 or so users (many of which are spam bots which are banned not deleted, same procedure as here from what I observe), yet MechWarrior Online (shortened to MWO from here on) has, in 1 year, gathered 110,000 users on it's forums, and up to 1,000 are active at any time. Is there some medium of advertising that both TDM and MWLL have failed to utilise? I doubt anyone from either dev team has the money to pony up for a TV advertisement, so where is this silver bullet for advertising?

 

Is it big mod/file repositories? (both mods have featured well on Moddb, and MWLL had a big advert on Fileplanet a year ago for its 0.4.0 release). I just don't understand why these 2 mods, despite solid PR efforts from both teams, seem so.... in the dark. There's even frequent mentions of MWLL in the MWO boards, yet the numbers show absolutely no sign of skyrocketing with people who want to play a product that's out now, with people playing, instead of waiting several more months for a shot at a new game that will be going into open beta status. I just don't get it! What are we missing?!

[RPGista]

I was going to say that the public is different from genre to genre (but then I realised that the mods you mentioned are about the same game). TDM, being inside a very specific niche, cant expect to attract the same mass as other games attract not only because of more popular themes, but also because of association with new, more popular games than doom3 was. The question is more if TDM is being able to attract a big portion of the "sneaker" public, which is the only one it will. More important than that still, IMHO, is how invinting TDM really is to the creative people among those users, who would use it to create missions and express their vision through it.

 

Just read about Greebo - he is a true master, hugely appreciate the work he's done with DR, some of which I witnessed.

[7upMan]

Xarg, regarding MWLL, as far as I can see it, the main issue is that the first videos of MWLL were a bit... underwhelming. I mean, they didn't make the most of the Crysis engine, the lighting (and shadowing) was inferior, and the Mech models weren't as detailed as they could have been. Still, I bought a (used) copy of Crysis (a game that I really despise) for the sole purpose of playing MWLL one day, when it has matured to a near-final version. I'm still waiting for this day to come.

 

On the other hand, the first MechWarrior video was pure awesomeness. It rocked as hard as nothing ever before. Back in the day, I have played MW 2 + Mercenaries + Ghost Bear's Legacy as well as MW 3 (and watched my brother play MW 4), but I never got this "awesome awesome awesome!!!!1111" feeling that the new MechWarrior video gave me.

 

I'm not really up to date with MWLL, so I couldn't tell if the maps and models have improved. However, if they have, maybe it's time for a new promotional video with all the best models and maps, making the best use of the Crysis engine. But that's just my two cents.

[Xarg]

was made on 0.5.6 for Crysis Wars, which is the current new version. 0.5.7 is slated for Soon^tm Edited June 1, 2012 by Xarg

[7upMan]

OMG! Awesome! MWLL sure made some progress over the last few... years.

[Xarg]

Glad you enjoyed it . If you've been swayed to give it a try, Crysis will no longer work, as the 0.4.x version line was the last that offered support. 0.5.x and onwards are Crysis Wars only (Crysis Wars is the multiplayer component of Crysis Warhead).

[Bikerdude]

If you love TDM, you love Greebo's work.

 

Amen to that!

[MKG]

The end is far from nigh. You all seem to have forgotten the (mainly silent) people like me. I'd love to run TDM - I really would. I even bought Doom3 purely to run TDM (OK I played Doom3 too, but that's not why I bought it). Unfortunately, I once started TDM wrongly and, ever since then, I can't get the thing to start again. Frustrating! And, despite advice from here, I haven't managed to correct my error. I've just read some good-looking news about a stand-alone version (SURELY, that would solve my problem), but I'd like to see more about that (you see, if there IS any more news about that on here, it's hard to find).

 

So, don't despair - your audience is here. Even some potential contributors (me, for one, but I can't start TDM so I'm stymied - see what I mean?).

 

Keep going. I'm right behind you ... quietly.

Edited June 27, 2012 by MKG

[New Horizon]

Well, it takes more than an audience to keep a project going...it takes volunteers willing to roll up their sleeves and do dirty work like fixing bugs to get the releases out the door, without that the mod is toast.

[MKG]

I appreciate what you say, but I think you maybe miss the point. TDM is, according to its own name, a mod, and mods bring with them attendant problems of compatibility and user knowledge. Considering that the engine is now open-sourced, there is no reason for this project to remain a mod - it should, in my opinion, come out of the closet as a full-blown application in its own right. I assume that the aforementioned stand-alone is what that's all about (and please, someone, tell me if it's not).

 

The people who loved the Thief series are still around, and there are going to be many new people who will love the atmosphere - as long as they don't have to work overtime to even get a working version of a game. It isn't all about the work involved in producing TDM (well, it is that too, and thank goodness such people are around), it's also the amount of struggling and hair-pulling a user has to go through to get a working result. I'm one who couldn't get through that stage - but I still look for developments and, hopefully, a version which works right out of the tin.

 

This mod is not, I believe, toast. It may move slowly, but at least it moves. The audience HAS to be there, otherwise there's no point in the effort, and I know that the audience IS there. But please - make it easier for idiots like me to get it working.

[nbohr1more]

Even though the upcoming 1.08 is not standalone, it will have it's own executable and therefore should

have less problems for installation...

[grayman]

MKG, have you described your installation problems elsewhere on this forum?

[MKG]

Yes, I did, Grayman - and received advice as to how to put it right. Unfortunately, I ended up looking for files to delete which didn't exist in the first place. Nothing wrong with the advice - but I was just at the point of changing over to Ubuntu. I had a Doom3 Linux runner, and I did even get TDM to work - once. But then I tried (in error) to load it directly as a Doom3 mod and, of course, it went wonky. Try as I might, I still haven't found a way to put that right.

[demagogue]

Our adoring fans don't have to just do hardcore things like bugfixes or making textures or models either. One thing they could do is just regular fan stuff... Make some fan art of our world. Write a fan-fic or a comic. Make a fansite. Remix a TDM ambient. Make a fan map of Bridgeport with all the districts & try to place the missions in it. Fun stuff like that would IMO do a lot of good just building buzz and letting people have fun with it, and letting outsiders see that TDM is fun & worth being a diehard fan of.

[MKG]

Even though the upcoming 1.08 is not standalone, it will have it's own executable and therefore should

have less problems for installation...

 

That sounds great - but could you explain it a little more? The last time I coded anything, Status Quo were new.

[lost_soul]

I for one love the "let's play TDM" videos. Even if I've completed a mission, I watch them all. The commentary adds to my enjoyment because you get to hear what someone else thinks of the environment as they play it and sometimes really funny things happen.

[nbohr1more]

That sounds great - but could you explain it a little more? The last time I coded anything, Status Quo were new.

 

Currently TDM is a DLL which hooks into the Doom 3 executable. For missions to install it must create a virtual "Mod Install"

which is very convoluted and path dependent. TDM 1.08 merges the DLL code into an executable compiled from the Doom 3

source. Now there will be no "virtual mod install" nor will there be a "mod install" but instead there will only be mission installs

which do not require any tricking Doom 3 or reloading. It'll all be native.

[MKG]

You have made my day - nay, my year!!

 

Does this mean that I will, at last, be able to use Dark Radiant seriously and see my efforts in the real(ish) world? If so, you've made an ageing hippy extremely happy. Oh - but only if it's done soon ... any ideas as to when?

 

(NOTE: Not being negative, but I've been staring at TDM for ages with my tongue hanging out).

 

Ahhhhh! I've just thought - there WILL be nods in the direction of Linux, won't there?

Edited June 27, 2012 by MKG

[nbohr1more]

To my knowledge, the last "major" TDM 1.08 bug was vanquished by Angua a couple of days ago and

thus it wont be long before the code-freeze then testing.

 

A Linux build is planned, yes...