The Adventures of Thomas: Lucy's Quest

[geegee]

The Adventures of Thomas: Lucy's Quest
Author: gg
2022-06-20
Version: 1.1
Required TDM Version: 2.10 or higher
EFX: Yes

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Cautionary note: 

This FM needs a strong CPU/GPU combination sufficient to play the more demanding TDM FMs. 
Just as for many or most of the new FMs being released with the new gfx possibilities opened up it does a world of good to tweak the advanced video settings for the best combination of settings for your PC.  For example, on my weaker laptop I set shadows as stencil and soft shadows off.  On my desktop I set shadows as maps and soft shadows medium.  Bloom off.  Ambient occlusion off.  Since the FM was built and extensively tested at these settings I believe either should produce a satisfactory experience.

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Sound Credits:
freemusicarchive.org music Aislinn04_-_Aislinn_-_Lovely_Maria
freesound.org klankbeeld_horror_1
freesound.org/people/CarlosCarty/sounds/522687/ om_aum_mantra_male_chant_bb
freesound.org/people/Still%20Frames/sounds/37720/  still_frames
freemusicarchive.org music The_Mind_Orchestra_Bruwynn
tecknic.bandcamp.com/album/the-dark-mod-ambience-and-atmospheres Zack Bower Ancient_2, _3, _5.  Solemn_1
freesound.org/people/Jagadamba/sounds/256006/ group_chanting_om_aum

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Thanks to: 
The TDM/DR developers for producing such a beautiful machine.
The keepers of the wiki pages which are looking very good these days.
Sotha for his invaluable tutorial "The Bakery Job".  This tutorial is a jewel.
Springheel for creating an atmosphere. 
Bikerdude for... ideas how to do things and scale things.  
Playtesters and advisors Dragofer, wesp5, datiswous, shadow.
datiswous pointed out some immersion breaking lighting faults, so I got the idea.
wesp5 gave me some good advice on how to tell the story - so it's more understandable.
Dragofer gave me some early advice on optimizing the mission, which gave me a couple of months work with results that are well worth it.  
Dragofer wrote a script which optimizes CPU calculations of AI interactions.  Shadow helped by testing the script, as well as testing  other attempts at optimization.  With the script in action only the minimal of AI interactions in the player's vicinity are called to be calculated.  The script provides a general benefit but the results vary from computer to computer.  The script targets a CPU task.

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Gameplay:
Notes attached to objectives contain essential information on gameplay, on who the good/bad guys are, on what the player must do, and why.
Mandatory objectives are linear, directing the player along a route to the goal.  Optional objectives can be completed anytime.

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CAUTION: 
spiders, rats, undead, necrophiles, cannibals, 
psychotic thugs, and some generally unsavory characters.
No snakes, though.  The spiders ate them.

==============================================================

 

Edited July 2, 2022 by geegee

[nbohr1more]

Congrats on the release!

[joebarnin]

46 minutes ago, geegee said:

No snakes, though.  The spiders ate them.

[nbohr1more]

The mission is up in the mission database:

https://www.thedarkmod.com/missiondetails/?internalName=at1_lucy

I will need a 2nd screen-shot for the image browser to work there...

Edit: 2nd image added

[Amadeus]

Congrats on the release Geegee, looking forward to this

Edited June 9, 2022 by Amadeus

[Heuli]

Congrats on the release!

I'm already looking forward to it

[esme]

I've got to the belcher & found some weird behaviour, I've checked & I'm definitely on v2.10, anyone else get this ?

JPG of screen

[geegee]

1 hour ago, esme said:

anyone else get this ?

Thanks for the report. 

I've never seen that in my hundreds/thousands/millions of playthroughs of the area.  There's nothing special about those AI or the area.

Do you know the cheats?  Could you start a new game, open the console with ctrl-alt-` and type in noclip (enter) then notarget (enter).  You can then quickly fly through walls to the belcher and check if it happens every time.  noclip and notarget are toggles, so typing them in again will exit from the cheats.

 

[esme]

ok, noclipped to the belcher on a fresh mission & they behaved normally, must be something my end, doesn't seem to affect anything so not a worry

[High John]

I haven't got very far and now I'm stuck.

I've got the stockade key and got into the stockade.  There seem to be 2 ducts.

1. To the right as you go in.  I met a white spider, but couldn't go beyond that.
2. At the back.  Can't get into that one at all.

Help please(!)

[geegee]

39 minutes ago, High John said:

Help please(!)

Look up.  The ducts go in 3 dimensions.

[Zerg Rush]

Very nice mission, but very difficult to play for me, due to a low FPS in my humble laptop ☹

[boissiere]

6 hours ago, esme said:

I've got to the belcher & found some weird behaviour, I've checked & I'm definitely on v2.10, anyone else get this ?

I've just had the same thing though only with 3 AI (not the lord). It doesn't seem to affect gameplay though,

[geegee]

4 hours ago, boissiere said:

I've just had the same thing though only with 3 AI

The .jpg shows AI standing in "skinning" position with arms stretched out. 

This isn't good.  It doesn't effect gameplay in the Belcher because of the way triggers etc. are set up, but if it happens elsewhere it might break the game.  Regardless, it's totally immersion breaking!

This isn't consistent.  In esme's case it happened once but didn't happen again after a fresh restart.  In your case different AI are effected.  

@stgatilov I wonder if this erratic behavior could be produced by the spawnarg neverDormant=0 that's on those AI?  It only happens on some AI with the spawnarg.  There's been no report of the AI in the "yard" area (first area of the FM) behaving like that though the spawnarg is set on all of them.  

[Shadow]

11 hours ago, esme said:

I've got to the belcher & found some weird behaviour, I've checked & I'm definitely on v2.10, anyone else get this ?

JPG of screen

 

I saw this too on all my plays in the Belcher but didn't report it in beta. I just figured that's how they were supposed to be. I had never seen anything like these figures but I assumed it was part of a horror vibe, which I definitely got!

[geegee]

On 6/8/2022 at 4:11 PM, nbohr1more said:

The mission is up in the mission database:

@nbohr1more , a problem has been reported and I wonder if this FM could be taken off the database and I could retract the release until the issue is resolved? 

[Marbrien]

I have just started this on Expert, and seem to have found the same problem. When I got to the Belcher pub, four people in the main bar were standing still in the crucifix pose, three of them had their heads slightly detached. 

[Filizitas]

Ill wait for a first patch and then give it a try :3 nice job.

CAUTION: 
spiders, rats, undead, necrophiles, cannibals, 
psychotic thugs, and some generally unsavory characters.
No snakes, though.  The spiders ate them.

Very horny

[esme]

Quick question

Spoiler

Is Airmids drop box the one where I drop the walking stick ?

 

[pwl]

Yeah I am having the same problem in the Belcher Pub. Great mission until this!!  This problem used to happen in Thief fan missions on occasion.

[datiswous]

On 6/10/2022 at 3:59 PM, esme said:

I've got to the belcher & found some weird behaviour, I've checked & I'm definitely on v2.10, anyone else get this ?

JPG of screen

I had a similar issue during beta testing Iris. Maybe @Wellingtoncrabknows more of this issue. Just guessing.

[pwl]

Also when I was in the Pub I could hear a bottle clinking it was under the foot of the man playing the lute.  When he moved his leg it would stop, and when he moved his leg back it would start again.

Weird!!

pwl

[Wellingtoncrab]

1 hour ago, datiswous said:

I had a similar issue during beta testing Iris. Maybe @Wellingtoncrabknows more of this issue. Just guessing.

Are they supposed to be ragdolls? I had lots of ragdolls in my mission that would not drop correctly at map start and t-pose for testers (though it was never an issue on my local machine).

Running the "saveRagdolls" command fixed it as far as I know:

https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Dead_Bodies

Edited June 11, 2022 by Wellingtoncrab

[geegee]

6 hours ago, esme said:

Is Airmids drop box the one where I drop the walking stick ?

Spoiler

There are 4 similar drop boxes in the FM.

1. You drop the walking stick in the box next to Aeden's hut "decorated by Airmid's sign" (mandatory objective) - the sign being the swirl. This opens the way to the manor. That drop box is now done.

2. The note to Gwyneth that appears after you drop the walking stick needs to be put (mandatory objective) into a drop box in the barn at Gwyneth's farm.  Some other items (optional) go there as well.

3.  After finishing the mandatory objective given by Gwyneth and crew a way opens that soon leads to Airmid's grotto where Airmid's drop box is located.  What goes in that drop box is all optional.  At the grotto you pick up Airmid's herbs to give to alchemist Gray.   

NOTE:  what goes into Gwyneth's drop box is to do with the farm, what goes into Airmid's is info/evidence intended to reach the Crown.

4. In the lab next to Gray is the last drop box where you put the herbs.  That drop box is now done.  Wait a sec and collect the goods from Gray and you're home free to return to start (if you gathered enough loot) or to explore further and finish off optional objectives.

I'm glad to see you're still playing it! 

[geegee]

@esme @boissiere @Shadow @Marbrien @pwl

I don't get this scarecrows-at-the-Belcher glitch on either my PC or my laptop so my hands are tied without help.  This glitch seems new so that narrows my hunches re. what might be causing it.

If anyone who has this glitch wishes to help out - it's asking a lot to be sure - could you send me a PM so I can send a link to a possibly fixed map?