hey somebody view my minimal viable product!
and tell me whatcha think so far?
http://www.thelivingmoon.com/undomiel/frameset2/interface/index.html
i've been working really hard on it, and i feel like i'm out here all by myself digging up a field without tools, seeds for planting, or water to water it.
Greetings Beth:
OUTSTANDING!
Although we are not 'game designers', per se,
we do have a handle on page design, layout, etc. ;)
We created all the original roll-out for IBM's Via Voice,
for example, including the contest posters for vendors, packaging, etc. ;D
May we be of service in any way?
tfw
Undo Nice work so far, I was wondering who's doing the art side of your site/game? Also I did a course in Webdesign so i could give you some pointers if you'd like.
The color pallet is very appealing so far.
I added an altered image of your site and tried to show you some basics ( I have no clue just how much you are familiar with hmtl )
Usually you want to have the most and important content in a 960px 600px ratio. Why? Because studies have shown that at first glance this is the space that either attracts a person or makes him want to leave a site. Call it the goldilock zone zone of you website :)
Also a navigation bar on the left is oldschool let me rephrase that most sites have a main navigation and a secondary navigation.
The secondary navigation will be the one on the left ( this one will differ from page to page )
The main navigation you want to keep in the goldilock zone. preferable horizontal .
Hope this helps you somewhat :)
Cyanhide
Edit: I forgot something also its seems you working with low-rez images across you site. This does lowers the overall quality of the website ( visual speaking ).
Quote from: thorfourwinds on August 21, 2012, 12:42:13 PM
Greetings Beth:
OUTSTANDING!
Although we are not 'game designers', per se,
we do have a handle on page design, layout, etc. ;)
We created all the original roll-out for IBM's Via Voice,
for example, including the contest posters for vendors, packaging, etc. ;D
May we be of service in any way?
tfw
woot. know any programmers? :D
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 12:56:33 PM
Undo Nice work so far, I was wondering who's doing the art side of your site/game? Also I did a course in Webdesign so i could give you some pointers if you'd like.
The color pallet is very appealing so far.
I added an altered image of your site and tried to show you some basics ( I have no clue just how much you are familiar with hmtl )
Usually you want to have the most and important content in a 960px 600px ratio. Why? Because studies have shown that at first glance this is the space that either attracts a person or makes him want to leave a site. Call it the goldilock zone zone of you website :)
Also a navigation bar on the left is oldschool let me rephrase that most sites have a main navigation and a secondary navigation.
The secondary navigation will be the one on the left ( this one will differ from page to page )
The main navigation you want to keep in the goldilock zone. preferable horizontal .
Hope this helps you somewhat :)
Cyanhide
Edit: I forgot something also its seems you working with low-rez images across you site. This does lowers the overall quality of the website ( visual speaking ).
yeah it had a top nav, a right nav, a left nav, i was all nav'ed out. it's not my website design. i'm just adding content and pics and trying to make the data for the pages and interior menus. are you saying you'd like to do some art for it? ?
that'd be awesome. did you read the player character blurbs?
You mean the race descriptions? Yeah i'm reading up on those. I would love to make some stuff but I don't have all day to work on it^^.
If you'd like i'l do a sample on a character and just let me know if u'd like it.
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 01:04:28 PM
You mean the race descriptions? Yeah i'm reading up on those. I would love to make some stuff but I don't have all day to work on it^^.
If you'd like i'l do a sample on a character and just let me know if u'd like it.
Cyanhide
that would be fantastic
hey about the goldilocks zone, should i move the character stuff closer to the top? i don't want people to get bored before they've seen the character stuff.
i'm trying to decide if any of them should have facial hair. the only race with a beard are the martian males and it's a fake pharaoh style decoration. not even a full on pharaoh beard. more like a little decorative thing to protect their chins in combat.
i' m stll arguing with myself about whether to make a seventh race, and have it be the sentient reptilians from earth. the problem with earth as a homeworld planet is, it's so pretty in planetary engines, everyone would want to live there. lol game would be filled with reptilians. lol
not only that, how do you make a pretty female reptilian? ?
I don't think you will want races on a mainpage, maybe just a reference.
But you have your :
Mainpage from there you will want to pick different pages ( the navigation is allowing you to a different page ).
You will want to have have a main page (or directory ) for races then you will want a sub navigation to each race ( different page ).
For the Goldilocks zone I would suggest something like a Jquerry image carousel ( Jquerry allows you to have dynamic things moving like fading in or out ).
And on the reptilian note
This is how you make reptilean females hot.
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 01:43:06 PM
I don't think you will want races on a mainpage, maybe just a reference.
But you have your :
Mainpage from there you will want to pick different pages ( the navigation is allowing you to a different page ).
You will want to have have a main page (or directory ) for races then you will want a sub navigation to each race ( different page ).
For the Goldilocks zone I would suggest something like a Jquerry image carousel ( Jquerry allows you to have dynamic things moving like fading in or out ).
And on the reptilian note
This is how you make reptilean females hot.
oh i have that jquery image carousel on the game theory page, which is not part of that website template. hmm, yeah, could i put the character race thing on the carousel ? also, the title banner at the very top, drives me bonkers. i like it and don't like it at same time. it needs an overhaul.
p.s. that's a human with a snake eye. i'm talking about scaley reptilians lol
sorry for off topic. glad i got some input tho! was starting to feel like NUMBER FIVE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj-qBUWOYfE
Quote from: undo11 on August 21, 2012, 01:53:59 PM
p.s. that's a human with a snake eye. i'm talking about scaley reptilians lol
(http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/fb503391e3.jpg)
I actually knew a woman in Nimbin who had a fairly strong physical resemblance to this pic, believe it or not. ;)
More seriously, though, I had to browse through fchan for a bit, before I could find one that was genuinely reptilian. I like some furry art, but most of it that is reptilian, has all of the hard edges smoothed off, to the point where it still looks almost completely mammalian.
Did a quick WIP, when I read the description I think you wanna go to an Aryan/aboriginal kinda species.
I doing the mercurian, Still figuring out my tablet again( it been ages since i painted lol )
I think the banner is neat but just needs some sharpness and bling!
Cyanhide
Quote from: petrus4 on August 21, 2012, 02:51:38 PM
(http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/fb503391e3.jpg)
I actually knew a woman in Nimbin who had a fairly strong physical resemblance to this pic, believe it or not. ;)
More seriously, though, I had to browse through fchan for a bit, before I could find one that was genuinely reptilian. I like some furry art, but most of it that is reptilian, has all of the hard edges smoothed off, to the point where it still looks almost completely mammalian.
the head on the one on the right is great. wearing garters and a bustier, is WEIRD! lol
okay guys. i said "prettier" not "sexier." hehe. who woulda thunk it. :D
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 02:53:32 PM
Did a quick WIP, when I read the description I think you wanna go to an Aryan/aboriginal kinda species.
I doing the mercurian, Still figuring out my tablet again( it been ages since i painted lol )
I think the banner is neat but just needs some sharpness and bling!
Cyanhide
oh wow, cyan. she's looking great already! she's gonna have clothes, right? :D
the aborigine is the saturnian guys. short little bald dudes and dudettes with neon markings and skull rings. radioactive guys. thor would hate 'em. :D
mercurians are tall native american types but with an other worldly flair.
Yeah she'l be having clothes, but since where talking cloths here, robes? or spandex?
Well i'm not impressed by her YET, I was thinking of googling some more on the aboriginals and maybe add some painting on her arm ? like mixing in some culture :)
Glad you like it so far :)
Cyanhide
EDIT: Aha okay the red sorta skin made me automatically think native indians/aboriginals. I gotta be honest from reading the description from Saturn guys i couldn't tell =/
Quote from: undo11 on August 21, 2012, 02:58:19 PM
the head on the one on the right is great. wearing garters and a bustier, is WEIRD! lol
okay guys. i said "prettier" not "sexier." hehe. who woulda thunk it. :D
Sorry about that. As I said, the pic came from a furry image board. Believe it or not, but that image is
exceptionally tame by furry standards. ;)
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 03:02:56 PM
Yeah she'l be having clothes, but since where talking cloths here, robes? or spandex?
Well i'm not impressed by her YET, I was thinking of googling some more on the aboriginals and maybe add some painting on her arm ? like mixing in some culture :)
Glad you like it so far :)
Cyanhide
EDIT: Aha okay the red sorta skin made me automatically think native indians/aboriginals. I gotta be honest from reading the description from Saturn guys i couldn't tell =/
the mercurians are native american aboriginals but very tall ones with an other worldly flair and a hint of european mythos, tossed in. i was trying to mix together several themes. i was thinking not so much spandex as a suit of body armor made of very fluid shiny white scales so they sorta of ripple when they move, rather than crunch, if you understand what i mean
Quote from: undo11 on August 21, 2012, 03:07:26 PM
the mercurians are native american aboriginals but very tall ones with an other worldly flair and a hint of european mythos, tossed in. i was trying to mix together several themes. i was thinking not so much spandex as a suit of body armor made of very fluid shiny white scales so they sorta of ripple when they move, rather than crunch, if you understand what i mean
Probably not such a hot idea. The NAs are pretty much the one ethnic group in existence, who I would never use as a basis for fiction, or at least not overtly. They tend to be absolutely feral about cultural misappropriation. I do not go near them culturally myself in any way, shape, or form. You just get far too much crap from them if you do, and they find out about it.
If you're going to use them as a source of inspiration, don't make it too obvious. I would definitely keep the skin colour non-human; purples, blues, or greens are ok, but red (at least in their shade) will get people making comparisons. Most especially, if you're going to make any references to shamanism at all, keep them extremely generic. Don't visibly use anything that could be traced back to a particular tribe. You really do not want the grief that could come from it, believe me.
Haha Petrus I disagree, your avatar tells me you play world of warcraft allot of concept art and final designs are directly from the native indians.
Cyanhide
Quote from: petrus4 on August 21, 2012, 03:15:58 PM
Probably not such a hot idea. The NAs are pretty much the one ethnic group in existence, who I would never use as a basis for fiction, or at least not overtly. They tend to be absolutely feral about cultural misappropriation. I do not go near them culturally myself in any way, shape, or form. You just get far too much crap from them if you do, and they find out about it.
If you're going to use them as a source of inspiration, don't make it too obvious. I would definitely keep the skin colour non-human; purples, blues, or greens are ok, but red (at least in their shade) will get people making comparisons. Most especially, if you're going to make any references to shamanism at all, keep them extremely generic. Don't visibly use anything that could be traced back to a particular tribe. You really do not want the grief that could come from it, believe me.
oh the skin color and the feathers are the only linkage. nothing else is similar.... well their personal ship design might look a bit like a teepee, if you were to draw it as a geometric shape. heres the one i mean
(http://thelivingmoon.com/undomiel/frameset2/mercurianshipblack.jpg)
undo that is cool! i don't know out about online games but that is pretty impressive.
wish i could help, but alas i lack the skillz. may have a play though when ya done.
Did some more goofing around undo,
I may went abit to far native american ? Stuff like feet/hands/face well pretty much everything needs allot of work^^
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 03:24:25 PM
Haha Petrus I disagree, your avatar tells me you play world of warcraft allot of concept art and final designs are directly from the native indians.
Cyanhide
The Tauren were modelled on the Native Americans, yes. AFAIK, NAs weren't heard screaming about that; but they have about enough other things, that I tend to feel a bit paranoid. To the extent that I've looked into their culture at all, (very little, truthfully) I've generally tried to be extremely secretive about it, because I haven't wanted to risk antagonising any of them. I've seen a few of them post some stuff online, which has told me that they generally want whites to stay well away from them, culturally speaking; so that tells me that any anthropological interest needs to be kept very low key.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMNMWZM1Jp8
I would often listen to this, when walking or riding into Thunder Bluff, which was the Tauren capital. It's beautiful music.
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 08:03:08 PM
Did some more goofing around undo,
I may went abit to far native american ? Stuff like feet/hands/face well pretty much everything needs allot of work^^
Cyanhide
i like the hair and shoulders. :D
here's a history of art i've done for mercurian female (
and one more
i decided against using long staves / staffs and went for shorter mace type weapons, even the staff is a shorter version of itself, more like a bo staff. this is a list of weapon types
i would say the mercurian is holding a glimmer
so far there are no bladed weapons
side note:
thrall is osiris. aggra is isis.
sylvannas is ma'at.
tauren are hathor followers.
worgen are anubis followers.
that is all. :D
I haven't said a thing but I have been following your other thread. :)
As I haven't read it all I don't really know how a thing about the game, but I like what I have seen so far, I only think that the different species need a more polished look, as it may be one of the ways to attract people to the game.
Cyanhide's work looks great. :)
Uhm Okay so what I will be doing is doing sort of an overlay from one of your screenshots. Thanks for giving me the list of weapons ( it gives me a direction ^^ ).
@Petrus: I hear ya, I play mmorpgs myself to and if I could I would stay adleast 50% of my time in a virtual world also, a real Tabula Rasa. To be what you want to be without boundaries such as race or origin.
@Armap thanks :) I'm not nearly as good as real concept artists but what I make I do with all my heart ;D
Cyanhide
mercurians are also loosely based on "mercury" of european lore.
mercury, messenger of the gods, fast dude, depicted with wings on his feet. instead of putting the wings on their feet, i've put it on their weapons. they wear white because it reflects sunlight, rather than absorb it. they live on mercury, the planet closest to the sun, and one method of adapting to the environment, besides building domed cities with filtrating materials to block out harmful rays and excessive heat, is to wear materials that reflect sunlight, provide constant airflow over the surface, is to wear thin, highly flexible but incredibly resiliant white scaled body suits, neck to toe, that "breathe" when they move.
liquid metal mercury is the basis for their technology, although their architecture and ships are sleek, fast, pointy, mercury colored things.
liquid mercury is the color of silver. so everything reflects light and is shiny
venusians, like everything to be round and smooth, although they are adept at the use of and raising of crystals of various kinds. all their architectural shapes are rounded. their personal ships are rounded.
their clothing is rounded. there are no pointy parts. they derived originally from underground crystalline chambers, thus their fair skin colors. they developed techniques to make the crystals useable as flooring, walls, etc, which required learning to grind and polish crystal. everything became round and smooth.
I'l do my best and try to keep working with light colors, but painting silver is hard :o.
Like Really hard lol.
I most say i'm really impressed with the lore and how well you worked this world out. Really.
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 10:46:39 PM
I'l do my best and try to keep working with light colors, but painting silver is hard :o.
Like Really hard lol.
I most say i'm really impressed with the lore and how well you worked this world out. Really.
Cyanhide
oh only the ships and buildings are silvery. their clothing is white.
the lore is partly the brainchild of history, myth and the rest is made up by amaterasu, ellirium and myself.
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 21, 2012, 09:58:32 PM
@Armap thanks :) I'm not nearly as good as real concept artists but what I make I do with all my heart ;D
And it shows. :)
Quote from: undo11 on August 21, 2012, 10:22:57 AM
hey somebody view my minimal viable product!
and tell me whatcha think so far?
http://thelivingmoon.com/undomiel/cover/index.html
i've been working really hard on it, and i feel like i'm out here all by myself digging up a field without tools, seeds for planting, or water to water it.
That is some very sweet work Undo.
Here are some templates I had made a while back for those that are wanting to create some more content you can see what areas need content.
I designed some frigates (In the other thread) but they need a few design tweaks as the program I used to make them was quite limited.
Has anyone offered a framework for your game, Undo, it seems all the pieces are there, yet theres not a functional game yet.
Ive seen frameworks on the web, with no characters or objects, so maybe theres something you can shoehorn your current crop of things into?
When it does come to fruition though, it will be so complex and interesting, youll sell it like crazy!
Have you thought of contacting a gaming company and selling the product youve created so far?
And, if you remember right, Ellirium, my favorite are the Neptunians! :D
Cheers!
Le
Quote from: Littleenki on August 21, 2012, 11:58:16 PM
Has anyone offered a framework for your game, Undo, it seems all the pieces are there, yet theres not a functional game yet.
Ive seen frameworks on the web, with no characters or objects, so maybe theres something you can shoehorn your current crop of things into?
When it does come to fruition though, it will be so complex and interesting, youll sell it like crazy!
Have you thought of contacting a gaming company and selling the product youve created so far?
And, if you remember right, Ellirium, my favorite are the Neptunians! :D
Cheers!
Le
;D Heh just remember those outside environments aren't very friendly to little fishy type creatures that are so tasty. There will be creatures big enough to attack cities on every planet. We haven't determined what form that will be in an under water environment but needless to say you will feel like prey once you leave the comforts of the cities on any planet. Ship travel might be the exception to this.
Can you make us taste like rotten tomatoes?
At least well have a chance!:D
Le
Quote from: Littleenki on August 22, 2012, 12:15:35 AM
Can you make us taste like rotten tomatoes?
At least well have a chance!:D
Le
Maybe Undo will agree to some glands you might get to squirt them in the eye with some ink and swim away. ;) As for tasting like tomatoes, not a chance. Pickeral is the flavor of the day. :D
Hmmm what would a Mercurian taste like? Lead & Burnt toast?
Quote from: Ellirium113 on August 22, 2012, 12:17:45 AM
Maybe Undo will agree to some glands you might get to squirt them in the eye with some ink and swim away. ;) As for tasting like tomatoes, not a chance. Pickeral is the flavor of the day. :D
Hmmm what would a Mercurian taste like? Lead & Burnt toast?
Argh. pickerel...my least favortie to eat, but to catch?
love it!
Mmmm mercurian marsala..writing it up now!
:D
LE
If the Neptunians mate like other fish, there will be lots little Neptu-frys to help populate the planet. ;D
Quote from: Ellirium113 on August 22, 2012, 01:14:46 AM
If the Neptunians mate like other fish, there will be lots little Neptu-frys to help populate the planet. ;D
Oh, we do;)
Le
Quote from: Littleenki on August 21, 2012, 11:58:16 PM
Has anyone offered a framework for your game, Undo, it seems all the pieces are there, yet theres not a functional game yet.
Ive seen frameworks on the web, with no characters or objects, so maybe theres something you can shoehorn your current crop of things into?
where where?
Quote from: undo11 on August 21, 2012, 10:54:01 PM
the lore is partly the brainchild of history, myth and the rest is made up by amaterasu, ellirium and myself.
That is what I enjoyed about my favorite game of all time - Drowned God - Conspiracy of the Ages
Unlock 4000 years of Lies
(http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb221/Unreal69/Games/Drowned_God-cdcovers_cc-front.jpg)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drowned_God:_Conspiracy_of_the_Ages (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drowned_God:_Conspiracy_of_the_Ages)
As you can see, that is what they did with DG, and sold a BUNCH!
There were many interactive puzzles to be solved in order to move on, interactive machines to be operated, as well as the workshops of Einstien and Da Vinci to be browsed, Morgana makes an appearance, UFO's zip through the sky on occasion, you discover and use stargates to travel various locations and times, all while tracking down the mystery of the Drowned God Alien.
Music was eerie and haunting on most occasions.
Very enjoyable and lots of fun for weeks.
The cover got my attention in the store, I picked it up and read the back cover and was sold on the idea.
The game delivered as advertised and I recommended to my friends.
Here are a few screen shots that don't really do it justice, but were all I could find.
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376887-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chokmah.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376935-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-bequest.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376936-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-bequest.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376938-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-binah.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376940-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-binah.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376943-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-binah.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376944-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chesed.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376946-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chesed.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376948-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chesed.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376949-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chesed.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376950-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-din.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376953-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-din.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376309-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chesed.gif)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376947-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chesed.jpg)
(http://www.magnetmarks.com/pics/soft/images/drowned9T.jpg)
(http://www.planete-aventure.net/shot/dgod_01.jpg)
(http://www.planete-aventure.net/shot/dgod_03.jpg)
(http://www.planete-aventure.net/shot/dgod_04.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376941-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-binah.jpg)
(http://www.gameboomers.com/reviews/Dd/Ddimages/drownedgodss.jpg)
(http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/376885-drowned-god-conspiracy-of-the-ages-windows-screenshot-chokmah.jpg)
when i read the title of it, i thought, "oh it's about osiris."
figured that out, only because of the shabaka stone text, which
held a variation of the story i hadn't seen before but which told more details about what happened at abydos, specifically. he "entered the portals of the lords of eternity" after he was rescued from drowning by isis, it said, "to the north of the land to which he came." the land to which he came was abydos (he was nimrod, enmerkar, narmer). so i was looking for something in the north of abydos, which i figured out was the osirieon, which meant the concept that a portal of the lords of eternity (et.al stargate) was in the osirieon at some point.
long convulted theory behind the portal in question was that it was unearthed from the buried remains of enlil's temple city of nibru (nippur) in sumer and sailed via river barge and ocean going vessel, to egypt, where it made land fall after being tugged across the desert sands to the location that would come to be known as abydos.
then the osirieon was built to house it and a pyramid to osiris was constructed over it, on the spot. that pyramid is what is "dissected" by
"set", in the dismemberment of osiris story, it's pieces strewn around egypt where they are later fashioned into a few noteworthy obelisks by isis, whereever she found a piece of his "body", which i read to be a chunk of the stone that was originally his pyramid. this also doubles for her fashioning of an artificial phallus (obelisk) for him.
oh boy ya got me started lol
Awesome, don't stop now!
I am still slowly digesting that last post! lol
Quote from: A51Watcher on August 22, 2012, 06:35:45 AM
Awesome, don't stop now!
I am still slowly digesting that last post! lol
i added the bit about the artificial phallus isis made for osiris, being an obelisk made from some of the stones of his then dissected abydos pyramid.
big question: if she reconstructed osiris' "body" (pyramid) from his former pyramid stones, where is it? giza maybe? doesn't make sense. i thought giza was older.
hmm.
wait, it does make some sense, since the stones in both the osirieon proper (not the end chambers or tunnel added by seti I) , were undecorated and of the same composition and dressing as the stones for the giza temple.
Quote from: undo11 on August 22, 2012, 06:56:58 AM
wait, it does make some sense, since the stones in both the osirieon proper (not the end chambers or tunnel added by seti I) , were undecorated and of the same composition and dressing as the stones for the giza temple.
:o
8)
it would be fairly easy to make a mist style video game in the browser window, but the problem with that is, that's not the style of game we're conceptualizing here. mmo means many people playing at the same time, in the same game environment, and they can see and interact with each other's "digital characters"
here's an example of a group of players in a dungeon in wow, which is a mmo.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02L1UQzZjj4
Quote from: Ellirium113 on August 22, 2012, 12:12:59 AM
;D Heh just remember those outside environments aren't very friendly to little fishy type creatures that are so tasty. There will be creatures big enough to attack cities on every planet. We haven't determined what form that will be in an under water environment but needless to say you will feel like prey once you leave the comforts of the cities on any planet. Ship travel might be the exception to this.
oh wait. you're confus-ed :D
the RTS portion of the game, doesn't attack the players on the ground, just does armor type damage to the buildings. that decision was made so the people who prefer to play without violence, who are playing the simulation portion, don't have to engage in any violence. so neptunians would still be safe from physical threat on their homeworlds.
the homeworld planets of the inner and outer worlds, have planetary shields that don't allow damage to organic tissues, so living matter is not hurt by the invaders. only types of weapons sold for hurting planets with organic shields, is non organic weaponry that can only hurt non organic things. all they can hope to do is damage non-organic structures such as mining facilities, factories and support structures (like houses and storage facilities) to the point where their competition for planet resources is lowered. homeworlds are giant sanctuaries.
the rts portion also rids the game of the problems Star Wars Galaxies had in their housing simulations, et.al, people building houses and structures and abandoning them, thereby taking up valuable real estate active players could otherwise utilize. so the idea was that the out of system invaders would do damage to facilities not located under the city dome. and if not repaired by the player, would eventually decay and disappear entirely, over the course of like 3 months. give the buildings "armor" stats and have it take damage like player armor does so by the time it reaches 0% armor, it's now no longer useable, and in this case, disappears from the real estate, making that spot available for purchase as well.
so it's a built in system for keeping real estate useable by purging abandoned facilities from the game by just the normal wear and tear of invasion damage on the structures "armor."
city structures don't have that problem because they are under the dome. however, their active payment of maintenance, keeps their buildings from being sold to another player.
the system would be designed to keep a copy of the person's property and its contents on file for a year, so that if they returned to actively playing and caring for property, they would still get back their stuff, but not their chunk of real estate where they originally built it. if the lot(s) were still for sale, they could just retake possession of it, unpack their furnishings and decorations and put them back in their structure(s) and resume their normal play. <-- (this last part is a bit iffy, since it could be abused and that's what we're trying to avoid here). also only the game engine could sell houses already built on real estate, that way avoiding people buying houses already built on property and then reselling them for such exorbitant prices that no one could buy them, resulting in the same problem of a field of empty houses.
this was a huge issue in star wars galaxies because houses were also often shops and stores where people sold their goods. but if they abandoned their property new stores could not be built on the existing abandoned ones, and the buyer could spend literally hours going from abandoned store to abandoned store, never finding what they were looking for. in our game, the longest a property with building(s) would be vacant/abandoned/non-maintenanced, before being removed or put up for sale, would be 3 months and any store, would have access to the same planetary auction house so shop hopping would not be a necessity. even while the 3 month period was transpiring, access to the planetary auction interface would be still be accessible and available, there, thus removing the issue of abandoned merchant shops causing more and more useless travel.
the point of having individual shops was to provide showcases of life size replicas of the goods that merchant creates and puts on the market. so there would be no "preview" of the item you wanted to buy. you'd either have to know what it looked like, or travel to a shop that has it for sale and view their showcase. the ship showcase would be a trip. (<---these showcases would obviously be copied on player websites so you could access them instead of having to travel to the individual shops, so it would be necessary to make travel between merchant shops, easy and faster than normal travel. most likely a special merchant portal that drops you right in the showcase but doesn't allow you to exit into the main part of the shop. that way keeping people from using merchant showcase portals for super fast travel between planets). would be best to have it be decoratable by the shop owner but otherwise be an instance that is generated on demand by the buyer wanting to view the showcase items.
items not created by the simulation people on homeworlds would be sold on the hub auction houses, which provide auction house previews, so no travel to a showcase is necessary but also no life size replicas to see either.
p.s. i was also thinking that once a city was founded and named, that certain structures would auto build by the game engine, at the city's creation and those structures would never vanish, regardless of player population in the city, after that. probably some type of civic buildings not buildable by simulation. a space port would be an useful thing to keep available even in low pop cities but since our players have their own ships and hangars for their craft, it would have to be something else. not sure what though. will have to think on it a bit.
travel back and forth between the hub and a homeworld of your faction, would require using your personal ship. fighter ships would be isolated to the hub hangars and other forms of travel. fighter ships can't pass thru the planetary shields of homeworlds.
accessing any shop on any homeworld, would result in a listing of the items available by homeworld simulation currently listed on the planetary auction house. so having your own shop on your property is actually handy, encouraging pvpers and pvers to do enough simulation to have their own shop and therefore, access to the planetary auction house interface from their own housing lots. this also keeps the economy moving since resources for building simulation will be in demand by more than just people who engage in full time simulation while ingame.
Quote from: undo11 on August 22, 2012, 03:33:42 AM
where where?
The Unreal Engine (http://www.unrealengine.com/).
There's this, for starters, undo. License is free for educational or non-commercial use; and the best part is, they seem to have massively brought the prices down even for some commercial licenses as well. It used to just be a single flat fee of half a million dollars, from memory, but they've apparently introduced a lot of different plans now; they probably noticed that virtually no one could afford it, otherwise.
If you did decide to use this, I could possibly help, as well. I messed around in probably the earliest released version of UnrealED (the one that came with UT99) for around six years, on and off; 1999-2005 or so. I don't know Java, but I did learn how to use the pathnoding system for the AI. Steven Polge developed it from his knowledge of linked state routing protocol; I've had a bit more experience with that again recently, in Minecraft.
Quote from: petrus4 on August 22, 2012, 10:40:29 AM
The Unreal Engine (http://www.unrealengine.com/).
There's this, for starters, undo. License is free for educational or non-commercial use; and the best part is, they seem to have massively brought the prices down even for some commercial licenses as well. It used to just be a single flat fee of half a million dollars, from memory, but they've apparently introduced a lot of different plans now; they probably noticed that virtually no one could afford it, otherwise.
If you did decide to use this, I could possibly help, as well. I messed around in probably the earliest released version of UnrealED (the one that came with UT99) for around six years, on and off; 1999-2005 or so. I don't know Java, but I did learn how to use the pathnoding system for the AI. Steven Polge developed it from his knowledge of linked state routing protocol; I've had a bit more experience with that again recently, in Minecraft.
well i liked their video on browser based first person shooter tech they are coming out with. it was real nice. but i've messed around with browser based 3d games and this is what i found:
1. the browser hates 3d. no matter what browser. it doesn't like generating all those faces and keeping it in browser memory. the result is this really irritating low level flicker rate that hurts my eyes. if it hurts my eyes, it will probably hurt somebody else's eyes as well. and i am really concerned about the effect it might have on epileptics.
2. we need something that people with direct x 9 can play, because this economy has bottlenecked alot of computer upgrades (including my own). sure replacing the computer maybe cheap but there's also the graphics card. i can guarantee you unreal is currently running direct x 10 and higher and probably requires a 200+ dollar graphics card upgrade to build/play games with it. it's pretty though, real pretty.
3. i wanted something low brow, that's still 3d and may not be as pretty graphically, but which will allow large amounts of people to play the game in vicinity of each other. this is particularly necessary with planetary engines, where we're asking the game engine to not only generate players and their ships, pets, houses, armor, weapons, structures, pvp, pve, rts, and dungeoneering, but also doing it together in the same spaces of the game environment, while also rendering planet textures, loading and rendering clods of planets surfaces with their flora and fauna, and etc.
this is one of the reasons that there are currently no planetary game engines in which you can go down to the surface and get out and walk around, build houses and so on, because every nerd wants his planet engine to be so gorgeous that when it comes time to put people on the surface, no one can move.
so i want an old planet engine that has been tweaked. preferably direct x 9 but willing to go with direct x 8, if necessary or something equal in open gl or what have you.
i found a fantastic one, that almost meets every one of my criteria (it needs some tweaking though), but the problem was the guy created it back in 2003 and during the creation of it, employed a GPL algorithim, meaning that it is freely distributed, with its source code, but you can't sell anything you make with it, and you can't make money from the use of it either. for example, even if the game is free, if you maintain a shop to support it from which you generate income or a monthly subscription in order to play it, you are violating the GPL license.
i spoke with him at length about it, and he told me that it was cutting edge for its time and he was annoyed no one had managed to make a usable game out of the technology. one way that would be possible was writing it in another language. it is currently C++, so writing it in java or C# would work and bypass the GPL issue. problem was, he didn't personally have the time to do so because he is not only a professor of computer science at some university overseas, but also teaches a class outside of normal school hours for making games for hand held devices. the planet engine itself he created for his graduating thesis and the university hired him on the spot. it was real cutting edge and still is pretty freakin' amazing. just needs some attention to make a fantastic game with it. all the ground work is already there.
let me tell you about it. it's our solar system. exactly what we need for our game. it keeps accurate time. the planets and moons and sun and stars move in accurate time. clouds move over head on earth. the planets that have obvious atmospheres (earth, venus, mars) have atmospheres in the engine. saturn has a huge set of rings. you can move around in first person or 3d person camera views. you can fly down to the surfaces, but not land on them nor get out and walk around. i think it has simple ogre collision (you can't fly thru the ground). it needs real collision (you can fly thru the buildings and other things. he has procedural cities on various places on earth, programmed in. procedural flora, programmed in. you can fly down under the water surface on earth, although the surface is just a snapshot of water from nasa's blue planet, and doesn't move like water. but the underwater is murky and pretty much what you'd expect under water to look like (not any light refraction, however). it has a simple biosphere map, where cacti grow in high desert, pines on mountains, palm trees in subtropical/tropical locations, etc, on earth (he has tree distribution for big open spaces, laid out in a grid. they need to be randomized. a simple tweak to the algorithm). this biosphere concept can be reused with different parameters and graphics for the other planets.
it's missing quite a few things but also, already has quite a few things. just needs a programmer who is willing and capable of converting it to something like C# or java and give it some tweaks and attention. only problem there is, i'm not sure on java for a mmo, and pretty sure C# has not been around long enough to be as tweakable as C++ but i could be wrong. it has no fauna. no skeletal rigging animation. no editor interface.
if you're interested in seeing it, i can provide the link, you can download it and fly around in it, and see what i mean. the trees are all billboarded and ugly, but those are tweaks that can be made to it. i'm currently trying to convince him to make small changes to it, like one every few months cause the other planet engines are just getting more and more graphically complicated and ignoring each other's failures.
Quote from: undo11 on August 22, 2012, 11:02:07 AM
well i liked their video on browser based first person shooter tech they are coming out with. it was real nice. but i've messed around with browser based 3d games and this is what i found:
I had no idea that Epic had released browser-based games. None of their games that I've played, have been browser-based. I don't like browser-based games myself at all. They tend to be written in Java, or are bad in various other ways. When I mentioned Java in my previous post, Epic used that as a scripting language. The engine itself was written in C++ I think.
Quote3. i wanted something low brow, that's still 3d and may not be as pretty graphically, but which will allow large amounts of people to play the game in vicinity of each other. this is particularly necessary with planetary engines, where we're asking the game engine to not only generate players and their ships, pets, houses, armor, weapons, structures, pvp, pve, rts, and dungeoneering, but also doing it together in the same spaces of the game environment, while also rendering planet textures, loading and rendering clods of planets surfaces and etc.
Are you sure you need to do a full planetary AND space system? From memory, Star Wars Galaxies tried that, and it crashed and burned. Way too many eggs in too many different baskets. It just gets too complex.
I'd also seriously reconsider player housing, to be honest. The only place I've seen that done successfully was Ultima Online, and even there, it really wasn't that great. You had people building houses immediately in front of dungeon entrances, as well as massive lag. Instancing your house neighbourhoods has been a suggestion which might work, but it probably wouldn't remedy the lag issues.
Quoteso i want an old planet engine that has been tweaked. preferably direct x 9 but willing to go with direct x 8, if necessary or something equal in open gl or what have you.
You are right about wanting relatively low resolution. Starting out low graphically, was what enabled both WoW and Minecraft to get as big as they are now. Unfortunately, Minecraft in particular is bloated as hell at this point, and the forum psychopaths scream for WoW to increase its' polygon count on a regular basis, as well.
As one other warning; think very, very long, hard, and carefully about whether or not you want PvP. World of Warcraft was originally a primarily PvE game, and that was another one of the main factors which allowed it to become so successful.
The Arena was to World of Warcraft, as the iceberg was to the Titanic. The reason why, is because it broke the brand. PvE roleplayers and PvP/FPS gamers are two very, very different demographics of people. PvE roleplayers have much longer attention spans, are more intelligent, less aggressive, have much greater social cohesion, and are willing to accept delayed gratification. In short, they're just more desirable and civilised people in pretty much every respect.
The Arena, on the other hand, caused WoW to become flooded by the Halo/CounterStrike demographic. These were very different people, as mentioned, and they began demanding that Blizzard change WoW to meet their preferences, which Blizzard did. As a result, the game's original demographic started leaving during The Burning Crusade; the exodus only really ended with the release of Cataclysm, with the end result being a loss of at least 2 million players, and probably closer to 6 million in real numbers.
The irony is that the FPS demographic who took over are also still not happy, because WoW was not able to turn itself into a full FPS. At this point it is an extremely awkward, ungraceful FPS/MMORPG hybrid, which nobody is happy with and is still leaking players like a seive.
World of Warcraft: An Autopsy (http://mirshwow.blogspot.com.au/2010/02/world-of-warcraft-autopsy.html).
I wrote the above linked article at the beginning of 2010. I'd strongly encourage you to read it, if you are willing. It outlines a number of mistakes which Blizzard ultimately made, which in my opinion, future MMORPGs need to avoid.
i've been thinking about this kind of thing for awhile. :D
there are no dungeons on homeworlds, where all the housing simulation would take place so entrances can't be clogged up.
the interiors of houses are instanced but there's a limited amount of items that can be stored or placed inside the home. this will help with lag. you won't be able to go in your house and drop 50 of the same item in the corner.
keeping the real estate lots separated from each other by so many in-game feet will lower lag as well. like you couldn't build your home next to someone else's home because your starter plot is meant to contain your house, a guest house, a garage and a storage facility. and there's an easement around it to keep people from blocking each other. the warehouse storage facility on your housing lot is where you put those 50 items of the same kind lol instead of the corner of your house. and the decorations for the interior of your house are mostly related to textures. such as wallpapers and furniture textures. decorative items would be limited. that was the big probem in SWG -- people crammed their houses full of things either to decorate with or to store. the storage faciliity will handle storage.
if you still don't have enough room, your personal inventory is gigantic. see the graphic for it, attached. the bag with the 1 on it, in the upper right hand corner is a drop downable box (scrollable), and ends up being bigger than an entire wow guild bank.. you can add bags (up to eight) to that drop down. so you initially have an inventory of 12x7 (84 slots) with the ability to add up to 8 more bags to the drop down, at 84 slots each. that's alot of inventory room and the warehouse storage facility on just one housing lot has 84 slots too.
got whole planet surfaces to play with . we can have nice sized easements around these housing plots
Small update, I have been really trying to keep as close to your description as possible, but its really hard.
Hope you like
( I feel i'm nearing a final concept ) Please feel free to add things you really think needs to be changed or has to have.
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 22, 2012, 12:49:10 PM
Small update, I have been really trying to keep as close to your description as possible, but its really hard.
Hope you like
( I feel i'm nearing a final concept ) Please feel free to add things you really think needs to be changed or has to have.
Cyanhide
that's looking more and more interesting!
not sure you read this in the thread, but hats are just decorations in this game. for head related stat increases, we use various types of goggles or sunglasses, eye gear, eye wear. was just going for something different. a different kind of look.
Aha, Okay so remove the facial thingi ?Since your original picture also has some sort of tiara. I was thinking converting it to a vail kinda thingi ( vail/face mask assasin ).
I'm trying to stay mostly on the surface of what your saying so adjustments can be made more easy. If I where to go to much in detail it would be really hard to find alternative ways.
Basicly what i'm doing is searching for a base character.
How is the skin tone ? To redish or ?
Question about the eyes, I thought I read a while back they would have a glow, as in glowing glowing ( meaning giving off ambient light ) Or more like storm white eyes ?
Cyanhide
petrus4
i'm going to go read your information but i wanted to first talk about what i had already noticed about pvp.
this is a copy and paste from my game theory page:
My first hand experience while in a battleground in WoW, playing my mage, ties synergy to combat balance.
At the time, you could put points in 3 different talent trees, starting at level 10. Now you can only put points in 1 talent tree, till it's full, and then you can put points in others.
Anyway, mages in World of Warcraft have 3 trees to pick from: frost mage, fire mage or arcane mage. I chose arcane mage because i was developing a synergistic skill set for battlegrounds. At the time, most mages would only go frost because it had alot of pvp friendly defenses for the mage. However, that meant the enemy team had developed counter strategies for those defenses.
I learned that if they were accustomed to one type of mage pvp, choose a different one and make it work by thinking about how to do so effectively and synergistically. That character was so good, she was unstoppable. Blizzard (company that created wow) ended up downgrading several mage abilities in those areas, to keep it from happening again: it was THAT good and as a result, that unfair to the other players.
Which leads to the next part.
For all the synergy, there also has to be balance. The number one complaint in mmos, particularly in pvp or when choosing what classes will be able to attend raids is class imbalance. if some skill sets make some players too good at pvp or pve or rts, it ruins it for everyone who isn't playing that class. Probably the biggest cause of loss of players willing to support your game is not balancing the classes.
Of course, there's also the difference between somebody who is well geared and someone who is not. Or someone who is much more experienced and someone who is less so, but if you put 2 people of similar experience, with similar quality gear into a pvp scenario and one completely owns the other, there's gonna be problems. As a result, mmos have rather long beta trials of their games to be sure the game is balanced. even then, things can and do, go wrong.
For example, some melee classes require what is called "gap closers," so they can get close enough to a ranged melee or ranged spellcaster, to actually be able to defend or attack. If they don't have that, they will be dead way before they get close enough to engage the enemy and that's not pvp, that's just slaughter.
As a result, game designs often include not just gap closers but interrupts or what is called "crowd control". There is no easy solution for crowd control, because once you start adding it into the game, pretty soon every class has some form of it, and people end up not being able to use their other abilities. pvp goes from being about who has the best skill, to has the best crowd control, and since everyone has crowd control it's no longer pvp, but rather something that looks like it might be pvp...someday . lol
---
the end of that section.
now i want to discuss why each race has only ONE option for class and it is inherent to that race, and that is because, combat balance will be infinitely easier and more satisfying for the player's experience. when we add new races (in future expansions, hopefully) we can add either new class types or simply allow the new race to have access to one of the other already existing classes, which should already been balanced by then.
i also don't want to make the mistake of making the healers carry the bulk of the game on their shoulders by having survival be so intrinsically contingent on healer mana that it can all be blamed on the healer if anyone dies or the group/raid wipes.
now i'm off to read your article.
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 22, 2012, 12:59:28 PM
Aha, Okay so remove the facial thingi ?Since your original picture also has some sort of tiara. I was thinking converting it to a vail kinda thingi ( vail/face mask assasin ).
I'm trying to stay mostly on the surface of what your saying so adjustments can be made more easy. If I where to go to much in detail it would be really hard to find alternative ways.
Basicly what i'm doing is searching for a base character.
How is the skin tone ? To redish or ?
Question about the eyes, I thought I read a while back they would have a glow, as in glowing glowing ( meaning giving off ambient light ) Or more like storm white eyes ?
Cyanhide
go for the glasses, no veil. trying to give it a sort of spacey look, with a tonge in cheek set of cultural references. the mercurians eyewear looks like retro art deco, like the tail fins on a 50-60's automobile. the venusians look like steam punk. the martians look like soemthing picasso would've come up with, simple geometric shape oddly placed, the jupiterians look like elvis, the saturnians look like something james bond would wear or those guys in the matrix movies (agents?), and the neptunians look like something out of old captain nemo art, a submarine hatch. :D
the skin color is great. might even be nice if it were even deeper red. but i like it the way it is so maybe just keep going with it the way it is. it seems to compliment the white feathers nicely
Quote from: undo11 on August 22, 2012, 11:29:34 AM
i found a fantastic one, that almost meets every one of my criteria (it
needs some tweaking though), but the problem was the guy created it back in
2003 and during the creation of it, employed a GPL algorithim, meaning that
it is freely distributed, with its source code, but you can't sell anything
you make with it, and you can't make money from the use of it either. for
example, even if the game is free, if you maintain a shop to support it from
which you generate income or a monthly subscription in order to play it, you
are violating the GPL license.
I lost my first reply to this, due to Firefox reloading the page from a
typo; so I'm writing it in Vim first now, hence the weird formatting.
*Orcish growling*
The GPL does not make any stipulation, about whether or not you can make
money from software that is licensed with it. I will quote from Stallman
himself, here.
Many people believe that the spirit of the GNU Project is that you should
not charge money for distributing copies of software, or that you should
charge as little as possible just enough to cover the cost. This is a
misunderstanding.
Actually, we encourage people who redistribute free software to charge as
much as they wish or can. If this seems surprising to you, please read on.
The word "free" has two legitimate general meanings; it can refer either to
freedom or to price. When we speak of "free software", we're talking about
freedom, not price. (Think of "free speech", not "free beer".) Specifically,
it means that a user is free to run the program, change the program, and
redistribute the program with or without changes.-- Selling Free
Software (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html).
The GPL 3 is murkier, but the only thing that the GPL 2 requires you to do,
is provide source if you provide binaries, and also to provide the source
code of any derivative works you make. In other words:-
a} If you change something, and release the changed program, you must
provide the program in both source and binary form.
b} If you want to charge money to sell unmodified copies of something that
someone else has licensed under the GPL, go for it, but you must provide
said program in both source and binary form.
The other thing to understand about the GPL, is that the Free Software
Foundation is essentially a cult, and the GPL can be considered its'
manifesto. Virtually nobody uses the GPL (3 at least; 2 is a decent
license, if still restrictive) because they have invested conscious,
rational thought into doing so; they use it because they have been either
brainwashed or otherwise pressured to, by either Richard Stallman, or other
people in the Linux/Free Software community.
Generally speaking, anyone who wants to make their software open source, and
has actually thought about it, will normally use either the BSD or MIT/X
licenses, which truthfully are not that far removed from public domain,
given what they allow in practical terms; although the BSD license does
still include a copyright statement, and requires attribution.
Richard Stallman is UNIX and open source software's answer to Paul of
Tarsus, with everything that that analogy implies. The unencumbered trading
of source code existed before him, in a number of different venues, (IBM's
early SHARE program among its' customer base being one example) but while
claiming exclusive credit for the concept, he has also attempted to bury it
in a semantic quagmire, which has led to exactly the type of confusion that
you demonstrate here.
This is another topic I'm fairly passionate about, as you can possibly tell,
but I will shut up about it at this point.
Quotei spoke with him at length about it, and he told me that it was cutting edge
for its time and he was annoyed no one had managed to make a usable game out
of the technology. one way that would be possible was writing it in another
language. it is currently C++, so writing it in java or C# would work and
bypass the GPL issue.
That is refactoring, and it probably would not hold up in court, if you were
challenged on it. If the code does exactly the same thing, functionality
wise, and has exactly the same name, then if the FSF's lawyers tried to
claim that it should still be under the same license, they would probably
win.
Unless the license is GPL
3, then I would just use it. GPL 2
is not a problem. You can still charge money for use of the engine; all you
have to do is provide the source code for it. The GPL also does not place
any restriction on artwork at all, for the record; so you don't need to
provide masters for that, or give anyone permission to create derivs from
it, if you don't want to. You can copyright that completely. That is what
Red Hat did, with their Linux distro; the code is GPL, but their logo/art is
completely their own.
Quotei'm not sure on java for a mmo
Java is slow, but the advantage of it is, that it is generally easier to
port things to different platforms. When Notch wrote Minecraft for example,
he didn't need to rewrite the entire game to make it work with both Linux
and Windows; he wrote a support library for Linux with a few
platform-specific bits and pieces, and that was basically it. The bulk of
the code ran as-is.
Before you ask, however, no, I do not know Java. I certainly don't know
enough of it to refactor a major program. Truthfully, I wouldn't write an
editor in it even if I did; you want a higher level scripting language like
Python (which is also slow, but could also work multi-platform, if you did
your GUI stuff for GTK) for that.
A program ideally has four different layers, or exists as one of three
different types.
a} Stuff which controls bare hardware. This is written purely for the
computer/hardware's benefit, and is not written with the intention of being
understood by humans at all, for the most part. This is where you have your
binary, and stack based languages like Assembly or FORTH.
b} The Application Programming Interface (API) layer. This is an interface
level between machine language, and stuff which humans can partially
understand. Basically an API is a set of aliases, which associate single
commands in machine-only languages, with function names that humans can
understand.
c} The scripting layer. This is where a more basic level programmer can
take the function names from the previous layer, and start applying logic to
them, with an appropriately basic scripting language; Lua is a good example
of this. This is where you can write loops, branches, elseifs etc; basic
decision making code, although if you're intelligent, you never tell a
computer to perform more than rote tasks, for the most part.
d} The human interface layer. Generally speaking, anything I write for
myself, will not normally have this layer at all; but this is the GUI layer
for complete non-programmers. This is the layer people interact with when
they normally use, say, Firefox.
The reason why I'm pointing that out, is to also emphasise that different languages
are meant to be used with different layers in that group. So it's not a good idea to
use a layer a} language like Assembly, as one example, for layer c} tasks.
That is not to say that you
can't do it; it's just that it will likely be a lot
more difficult, and you won't enjoy the experience. It's directly analogous to using a
one wood golf club, for a shot where you'd normally only need a putter. Breaking
things up makes your life easier.
QuoteC# has not been around long enough to be as tweakable as C++ but i could be
wrong.
C# is pure Microsoft, AFAIK. Hence, probably Windows only; although I don't
know, because I've never used it or really looked at it at all. C++ is also
a mess, for the most part; although people generally use it for graphical
stuff, because object orientation makes it easier to create new
windows/classes, rather than having to write out an entirely new template
every time, if you're only doing something incrementally different.
When I go this far off topic, I normally get accused of seeking attention;
people who do so, generally don't seem to be able to grasp the idea, that
maybe I just like talking about things from a reasonably free-association
basis. So accept or reject the above as you will.
petrus4,
no worries, i thought it was interesting and informative.
the planet engine is Open Source (GPL 2)
here's the information on it and the download link. if you try it, please let me know what you think. the following are the bits to control it:
1-9 controls speed, with 1 being slowest and 9 fastest with 0 being lightspeed and not very useful to look at a solar system. i mean you end up like wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy yyyyyyy wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy yyy past what you were just looking at.
Shift + z allows you to slow down the passage of time. default time is 100 times faster than normal time.
Z allows you to increase the passage of time
P changes FPS by changing quality. low quality is normalized at 60 FPS.
I removes/shows the data on the screen so you can see the whole scene without/with the data
M shows/hides the ship (which i think is a naboo cruiser from star wars)
R realigns the camera so the ship is directly in front of you in case you end up losing the camera
C allows you to freely move the camera around/away from the ship. R helps go back to the ship's position.
One of the keys allows you to adjust View Distance by adding/removing fog
http://vterrain.org/Packages/IUE/
i read your article and i'll just say, that the LFG tool has helped me out immensely but i think they implemented it too late, when player pop was already waning, resulting in having to form groups from multiple servers. had they done it back when the game had peak membership and only from the server you were currently on, woulda been all good.
as far as sex change/race change,etc, negatively impacting the game, and all that, i dunno, i never really thought about that. i mean it might help a player escape a stalker or might help a stalker keep stalking their victim. so it's 6 of one, half dozen of the other. i suppose having the personal responsibility thing for behavior is easily avoided by just not playing the character who has been behaving badly and playing a different or new character. not sure there's a way to avoid that problem when you have 8 potential character slots available on each server and there are 40 servers lol
race eyewear concepts so far
see attached, click to enlarge
(correction jupiterian sunglasses sorta look like a cross between a butterfly and elvis sunglasses lol )
jupiterian sunglasses from the front
lol
i think there will be a toggle so you don't have to show the sunglasses/eyewear, while still retaining the stat boosts
also think it would be fun if you had an option to turn on an animation for sunglasses/eyewear, such as a right click function. like the jupiterian glasses, would flap like a butterfly. the neptunian ones would open and close like a submarine hatch. the mercurian ones might have light dash from one side to the other side (would kinda make them look like the original battlestar galactica cylons tho, which i don't want to do, so maybe glow at each end like tail lights on a car). the venusian ones could fog up and refog. they aren't fogged up anyway. they are magnified (useful for jewelers). the martian ones would glow at the bottom corner, like headlights for driving in fog on a car (useful in martian sandstorms). not sure yet what the saturnian ones would do. perhaps have a little neon decorative bit on them that pulsed.
Quote2. we need something that people with direct x 9 can play, because this economy has bottlenecked alot of computer upgrades (including my own). sure replacing the computer maybe cheap but there's also the graphics card. i can guarantee you unreal is currently running direct x 10 and higher and probably requires a 200+ dollar graphics card upgrade to build/play games with it. it's pretty though, real pretty.
The editor for the origional UNREAL TOURNAMENT I believe is long before Direct-X 9...this was origionally designed to run on OPEN-GL, GLIDE, & Direct X. This was right around the time 3d-FX cards were dominant. Your current laptop should be able to to run MULTIPLE instances of this. If you are working off a laptop with Intel based graphics this will be the issue as it does not perform well. Even still running this in direct-x should take next to no load on todays PC's as the poly counts are low and the video cards are generations newer. I can't speak for the programming side as I am mostly familiar with software and hardware and not a lot of programming.
and these were the hero machine conceptualizations, when we first started this project. we don't want to copy these verbatim, for the obvious reason that they belong to hero machine and are not entirely how the final characters should look
looking at this i realize that the tallest race for the outer worlds faction are the healers (neptunians) and the shortest race for the outer worlds faction are the tanks/warriors (jupiterians). since they will be matched against martians in pvp, and martians are average height, jupiterians should have a racial talent/skill called "big guy" or something, that they can activate every 3 minutes, where they grow in strength and size. so it doesn't look like they are always chopping the martians in the knee caps.
there's also the problem that the martians in these examples are not in their metal armor. martians wear metal armor. jupiterians have natural armor.
Quote from: Ellirium113 on August 22, 2012, 06:17:56 PM
The editor for the origional UNREAL TOURNAMENT I believe is long before Direct-X 9...this was origionally designed to run on OPEN-GL, GLIDE, & Direct X. This was right around the time 3d-FX cards were dominant. Your current laptop should be able to to run MULTIPLE instances of this. If you are working off a laptop with Intel based graphics this will be the issue as it does not perform well. Even still running this in direct-x should take next to no load on todays PC's as the poly counts are low and the video cards are generations newer. I can't speak for the programming side as I am mostly familiar with software and hardware and not a lot of programming.
errrm, the unreal dev kit is direct x10 tho. can we even use/buy the original unreal tournament editor and wouldn't there be some problems trying to get it to render planets?
since we have new people reading/responding to the game concept, might as well give an over view of two more functions.
"Give Me the Options" concept, for new players.
the first one is for using skills/talents/imagines
and the second one is for learning how to compare armor pieces and choosing upgraded versions from inventory.
next was an idea we tinkered around with, in relation to questing.
quests begin at the hub associated with your faction. when embarking on quests, you are directed to a hub portal. at the portal is what is referred to as the GARB DEVICE. the garb device determines what appearance and mode of transport will be necessary for the quest you are about to embark on, and then allows you to enter the portal with your new appearance. the mode of transport would materialize on other side of the portal, on the actual questing world.
when going on quests that require the garb device, we considered having the player UI change appearance as well, to fit the mood and atmosphere, timeframe, etc, of the questing planet you are on. the big argument against this idea is that people tend to want to customize their UI, and having the game engine changing that customization everytime they embarked on a new garb device quest, would be a problem just waiting to happen.
see attached an example of a questing world UI (deliberately made to look older, even less tech saavy) for a fantasy based questing world . now the idea i thought would still allow this to work is to have an UI customization for questing world types, that save to your character's data pad, just like their garb rooms. so initially, you would have to create your ui customization for each questing world type (category, such as fantasy based, futuristic, dystopian, etc).
the next thing i considered was having a couple add-on designers, who did nothing but create add-ons for the game and have them provide these add-ons from the hub libraries/databases. players could peruse the add-on database, pick the ones they wanted, and fine tune their game play which would include a UI customization section that could be created and saved in advance of ever embarking on a garb device questing world.
this would mean that third party add-ons would have to be a no-no, and that might be hard to impossible, to enforce.
Update
I used the face from your screenshot as baseline.
So i'm trying to figure out the glasses but i'm running low on resolution :o
So the ornaments/glasses where gold first but then I tried using a metal'ish blue which suits the mercurians better i think.
Cyanhide
Edit: Thanks for loading the here machine pictures, those are really perfect for baseline, It each shows distinct features and trades.
compare the above ui , to this one for homeworld parts of the game. this is the normal space ui (see attached)
the chat box and action bar are resizable, dismissable and movable to any place on the screen. so alot of customization is possible. however, add-on ui designers would probably have a field day with something like this
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 22, 2012, 09:21:05 PM
Update
I used the face from your screenshot as baseline.
So i'm trying to figure out the glasses but i'm running low on resolution :o
So the ornaments/glasses where gold first but then I tried using a metal'ish blue which suits the mercurians better i think.
Cyanhide
Edit: Thanks for loading the here machine pictures, those are really perfect for baseline, It each shows distinct features and trades.
wow she looks awesome!
You like? I'm glad, its nice to do some painting again, for some reason I can never get the same amount of quality for myself then I produce for others.
Shame really ^^
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 22, 2012, 09:25:14 PM
You like? I'm glad, its nice to do some painting again, for some reason I can never get the same amount of quality for myself then I produce for others.
Shame really ^^
Cyanhide
you should be proud of that! it's a splendid work of art. the movement in it, is fantastic.
you know the one i'd like to see you paint....
jupiterians. they're actually not stocky. the hero machine just didn't have an option for short, adult, thin. only, short adult stocky.
they are lithe, not emaciated or skinny, just trim and slender but also quite short.
the concept regarding height was related to planet size. the bigger the planet, the shorter. the smaller the planet, the taller. so since they are biggest planet in the game, they are shortest. the more mass, the thinner the bones. the less mass, the thicker the bones.
Well I'l finnish her, then i was thinking of doing the male versions ( males are easy )
And then I'l paint a jupiterian. So like elvish kinda posture but short and no pointy ears? :p.
But i'l read up on them before i'l paint one.
Well i'm really glad you like it so far. Now off to bed the misses awaits.
NN
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 22, 2012, 09:44:35 PM
Well I'l finnish her, then i was thinking of doing the male versions ( males are easy )
And then I'l paint a jupiterian. So like elvish kinda posture but short and no pointy ears? :p.
But i'l read up on them before i'l paint one.
Well i'm really glad you like it so far. Now off to bed the misses awaits.
NN
Cyanhide
great :D anything you're willing to contribute is all good.
Quote from: undo11 on August 22, 2012, 11:02:07 AM
1. the browser hates 3d. no matter what browser. it doesn't like generating all those faces and keeping it in browser memory. the result is this really irritating low level flicker rate that hurts my eyes. if it hurts my eyes, it will probably hurt somebody else's eyes as well. and i am really concerned about the effect it might have on epileptics.
I have a program that analyses any on-screen action and makes a report about it, so that can be tested, once you have something visible. :)
Quote2. we need something that people with direct x 9 can play, because this economy has bottlenecked alot of computer upgrades (including my own). sure replacing the computer maybe cheap but there's also the graphics card. i can guarantee you unreal is currently running direct x 10 and higher and probably requires a 200+ dollar graphics card upgrade to build/play games with it. it's pretty though, real pretty.
As far as I know DirectX doesn't work in browsers, but I have not been following that area for a long time.
Quote from: petrus4 on August 22, 2012, 01:25:21 PM
C# is pure Microsoft, AFAIK. Hence, probably Windows only; although I don't
know, because I've never used it or really looked at it at all.
C# (and all .Net languages) can run on Linux by installing Mono, a conversion of the .Net framework for Linux, the result of the Mono Project, sponsored by Novell and made with support from Microsoft.
I tested it some months ago, by installing a site made with C# on a Linux machine with an Apache web server, and it worked. :)
more graphical things from the game.
this is a hub schematic, overhead view
haircolors
hairstyles
markings
lip colors
lip designs
game flow chart
game world flow chart
icons
an example of a skill data pad which would pop up on mouseover describing the skill's usage and effects and displaying the icon for it, in the upper left hand corner.. in this case, the mercurian skill,
"Liquid Cloak"
professions list based on race
personal ship schematics
these are suppose to be more of a cultural statement than aerodynamic or utilitarian. they are only meant for travel in planetary atmospheres and between a homeworld and the hub.
i used a free copy of fraps, a software to make videos while playing video games. then i converted it to an animated .gif using an unregistered .gif converter, which i really like. here's an example of a video converted to .gif while using the engine i've been talking about.
(http://thelivingmoon.com/undomiel/frameset2/iue15.gif)
that software is really inexpensive too. i could buy it for like 25 dollars i think. fraps is a bit more. and i think we would need something like the pro version of fraps, to make cutscenes and etc.
Quote from: ArMaP on August 22, 2012, 11:59:19 PM
I have a program that analyses any on-screen action and makes a report about it, so that can be tested, once you have something visible. :)
As far as I know DirectX doesn't work in browsers, but I have not been following that area for a long time.
that's what i'm trying to say. i don't want to make a browser game. i will if i have to, but i would rather have it be a downloadable game using video game making software that's established, so we're not always swimming against the current
Quote from: undo11 on August 23, 2012, 04:23:01 AM
that's what i'm trying to say. i don't want to make a browser game.
OK, I understand it now.
My reading comprehension hasn't been that good in these last few days. ;D
How to slow down model related lag in our game
we discussed this topic as well, in the prior thread on the subject. so this is for new readers.
one of the problems with new 3d mmos, is the trend to give new players entirely too many options for their character's appearance. and although having lots of options sounds great, it tends not to be when you get alot of players, all with different models, in high traffic areas like raids, battlegrounds, cities or similar congregating points. (this is even starting to happen with world of warcraft as they add more and more flying mount textures to the game, resulting in these mammoth textures floating/flying around in high traffic areas, many of them completely different from each other).
so to satisfy the player's interest in variation, i thought it would be better to let them make changes over time, that required something similar to a daily quest concept, where you accumulate special points you can spend to adjust or modify your character's appearance in the hub's cosmetic facility, as you level up. the higher your level, the more options you have.
even then, we wouldn't be starting out with 20 different hairstyles for each race, for example, nor ending with 20 different hairstyles. we're going to start with a very basic 4 options for each modifiable physical trait and up it to 8 by end game, so we don't end up with the same problem when more and more people have reached max level and have enough cosmetic points to make as many changes as they want.
just to give you an idea of a mmo that had a fantastic set of characeter model options, that ended up losing a third of their players to the inability to move in major cities, i present, AION, a graphically gorgeous game with entirely too many model options
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1UHTXA8CK0
this accumulation of cosmetic points would be achieved via a non violent daily quest (so people who just play the non violent parts of the game, can also accumulate cosmetic points and we don't have to have 2 different cosmetic quest lines). light hearted and silly quests would be best for this, as it would also help to remind players that it is just a game afterall and not a commentary on your worth as a human being.
anyway, as a result, i've been exploring various hairstyles in addition to the first set of options. the first group are 4 standard hairstyles/markings, which generally fit the race they were designed for, however, later in the game, as the player accumulates cosmetic points, they can make additional or new changes to various aspects of their character's appearance, up to 8 for each modifiable attribute.
PVP Balance
One thing that turns people off from pvp battlegrounds and arenas, is how fast their character may get killed or how easily it is to make their character useless. One of the reasons these fast kills are in mmo games is because the accumulation of honor points requires fast kills and so the idea was to give the player reduced survivability, vs. their survival in non-elite/non-raid pve scenarios.
to solve this, i've been toying with the following concepts:
1. no fast kills in pvp.
2. you get oodles of honor points per kill, because it takes quite a while to kill any class. this means INCREASING survivability for pvp battlegrounds. it also means that....
3. a person wearing cloth isn't going to die just because you hit them once or twice . a ranged melee isn't going to die fast simply because they have ranged melee abilities to compensate and therefore should automatically have less survivabilty. no, if you want to take out that ranged melee, you gotta work at it, same as any other class. this also means, however, that ranged melee can't range you a few times and take you out of the game either. it's gonna take work and strategy.
4. no reason to add crowd control to pvp battlegrounds, and therefore, the players can actually use their other abilities.
5. you will have to strategize, with your battleground team, as if you were fighting a whole group of raid bosses, and the opposing team will have to do the same because you will be just as hard to kill as they are.
6. both factions will have equal social appeal, so that there's not one side that's always low population and therefore, the underdog, and also to alleviate the issue of having the more socially appealing side, with the most newbies, which can be incredibly frustrating in pvp battlegrounds. if this means adding a couple more races, so be it, but this area has to be done correctly. i'll show you why in a minute.
7. as part of the increased survivability and increased honor point collection, all gear stats will be removed when you enter the battleground. therefore you won't be able to go in a pvp battleground and die 2 seconds later just because you don't have special gear vs. your opponent who does have special gear. this will be about skill and teamwork not about stats and gear.
now for the why:
watch this video, made by a fellow who quit the new star wars game, STAR WARS THE OLD REPUBLIC, because newer mmos are all following wow's template, which is one of the big problem areas of wow in the first place. why copy the parts that are malfunctioning?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnKYF_ZZQDE
i'm thinking making healers immune to damage and incapable of dealing out damage. this means they have to manage their "imagine" energy efficiently cause once they run out, they'll be useless to their team until they have more, same as any raid. they only get honor points if their team does. this will also alleviate the issue where the entire opposing team tunnels/targets your team's healer(s) and they never manage to heal anybody. this would make it necessary to have only one healer per team.
stuns are a form of crowd control, so are dizzy, knockback, silence, mind control, blast, fear, stomp, frozen, frost, clap, charge, ambush, etc, none of those types of abilities would be available for use in pvp battlegrounds, to solve the issue of spending most of your time doing nothing because you're under some form of crowd control
One thing I liked in an old Star Wars game was that we had a finite amount of power in our ships, so we had to balance it between the engines, the weapons and the shields.
Would something like that made sense in a game like this?
Quote from: ArMaP on August 24, 2012, 01:32:36 AM
One thing I liked in an old Star Wars game was that we had a finite amount of power in our ships, so we had to balance it between the engines, the weapons and the shields.
Would something like that made sense in a game like this?
is this thread in private mode? cause you're the only one responding now, and that would be because only mods can see private threads. can you find out for me please?
Quote from: undo11 on August 24, 2012, 01:38:52 AM
is this thread in private mode?
I don't know, I only know that's visible to everyone.
Quote from: ArMaP on August 24, 2012, 01:32:36 AM
One thing I liked in an old Star Wars game was that we had a finite amount of power in our ships, so we had to balance it between the engines, the weapons and the shields.
Would something like that made sense in a game like this?
ships are different story. :)
Quote from: undo11 on August 24, 2012, 02:06:40 AM
ships are different story. :)
One of my all time favorite space battle games was Klingon Academy. IMO this game was way ahead of it's time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxV-CCEpJrw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lf2BHSLItfM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZT3pycEw6Q
Ah sweet memories of Federation canon fodder. :D
Quote from: undo11 on August 24, 2012, 02:16:14 AM
something strange going on here. why is it everytime someone joins the team or shows an interest in working on the game or helping with it, they suddenly go poof? am i being left out of the loop on this ? are you guys using me like a cheap dish rag?
While I can't speak for anyone else, undo, I can tell you why I probably (although I won't say definitely) won't be getting involved in this project.
The problem with MMORPGs, is the difference between what they are meant for, and what they actually get used for, by a vocal minority of the population, at least.
An MMORPG's purpose, is what I myself, and several other people I observed, used World of Warcraft for; self-discovery. It's to allow and facilitate the usually quiet, retiring, reclusive individual (who normally remains introverted because of how terrifying and generally fascist, contemporary society usually is) to vicariously experience the archetypical Hero's Journey.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYwdzYC3uUc
Virtual Worlds: Why People Play (http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/VWWPP.pdf).
That is not, however, what very many people use it for. A lot of the people who I saw, primarily used WoW simply as a means of deriving the source of narcissistic supply, which they were unable to obtain in offline life. They treated the game as a treadmill, or as a loot vending machine, because all they wanted was to be able to sit on their mount within the cities, decked out in epics, and have everyone else stare at them in awe. They saw the weaponry and equipment that their characters were able to get in-game, as ends in themselves. When it is used in that manner, it ceases to be a means of potentially greater empowerment and development for a person, and becomes a trap.
I pinned her again, and when her eyes cleared, spoke in a furious whisper, my eyes level with hers. The basilisk I'd had earlier was not good eating, and I knew it would smell as foul on my breath as it had tasted. Sure enough, she flinched.
"This is what I can teach you. I know of the people you speak of. They at times go to dangerous places, yes; but with healers and mages beside them, warriors in thick plate in front of them, and enough others in general to hold their hand and make sure it's *safe*."
My lower lip curled.
"They also eat three square, even meals a day, with wine, cream, and gravy, and every night they sleep in the same soft, clean, perfumed beds that they will die in, behind thick stone walls, that yet more of those men in plate stand on top of."
My next words to her were a snarl.
"I live out here."-- Mirshalak (http://mirshwow.blogspot.com.au/2008/09/some-more-fiction.html).
That is not the same as the Hero's Journey. It can look the same perhaps, in many ways; but the great error lies in seeking only the outer appearance of attainment, rather than the culmination of the real internal process. People have called me a hypocrite where Mirshalak is concerned, and truthfully, they're right. I haven't allowed what Mirsh has taught me, to cause me to really live fearlessly. I've only allowed it to go far enough that I have conscious awareness of what a contemptible, mediocre coward I am, while still continuing to be one anyway.
The point is, however, that that is what people potentially
can obtain from an MMORPG; they can take that out of the game, and back into offline life, and they can ultimately become a much more powerful and confident person because of it. The thing which makes an MMORPG such an incredibly effective and unique means of a person obtaining that, is that they don't even know that they're doing it. As far as the player is concerned, he or she is just playing a game.
Bruce Wayne: You're vigilantes.
Henri Ducard: No, no, no. A vigilante is just a man lost in the scramble for his own gratification. He can be destroyed, or locked up. But if you make yourself more than just a man, if you devote yourself to an ideal, and if they can't stop you, then you become something else entirely.
Bruce Wayne: Which is?
Henri Ducard: A legend, Mr. Wayne.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qmK3lpkgVo
i hear ya.
and just allow me to add to that sentiment, that the frustration i'm experiencing as an old female trying to make headway in something like this, is equivalent to pulling my hair out, with my teeth, one hair at a time, while balancing on one toe that's missing a toenail.
p.s. so while everyone is trying to be a legend in their own time, i'm just looking at the timer for normal human life span and thinking, crap, i'm gonna be a senior citizen soon. ye olde brain aint gonna work in its current state, forever, so if i don't get something working on this thing soon, i'm gonna be too old. in fact, i may already be too old but i would like to be able to make that decision for myself, not have other people make it for me.
Quote from: undo11 on August 24, 2012, 05:21:13 AM
p.s. so while everyone is trying to be a legend in their own time, i'm just looking at the timer for normal human life span and thinking, crap, i'm gonna be a senior citizen soon. ye olde brain aint gonna work in its current state, forever, so if i don't get something working on this thing soon, i'm gonna be too old.
Screw old age. I'm paranoid enough about that myself, for the both of us. In reality though, not long ago I heard about a woman who took up marathon running when she was past 80. I've heard of people who go surfing in their 70s, as well. Life expectancy is continually getting longer, as well.
Even if it wasn't, as long as your mind is working to a basic degree, you can keep going. Hell, your mind is going to work for
longer if you keep doing this stuff, even when you are elderly. My great grandmother lived to 93 in her own place, and then when they put her in a nursing home, she was dead within a year. She had nothing to do, and lost the will to live.
Just keep going, and don't focus on anyone else's preconceptions about whether you're too old to do anything. From everything I've ever read, most scientists supposedly do their best work in their mid to late 20s. If I believed that rubbish, I wouldn't even be doing what I am in Minecraft now, let alone anything more serious.
Common sense is for common people. ;)
Update male Mercurian.
If you want anything changed please feel free to say so :). Still Work In Progress.
(http://i610.photobucket.com/albums/tt186/Cyanhide/mercmal.jpg)
Cyanhide
OUTSTANDING !
Gosh! Thankyou :) Hope it'l eventually lure people to the game haha^^.
Cyanhide
that's pretty.
here's my observations:
nice pose.
he's too muscular for a mercurian.
his biceps and thigh muscles are more like what you would see on a venusian or martian, particularly venusians who are fitness freaks and tall, whereas the martians are more compact athletes . same for the family jewels. abs are good but could probably be toned down a bit. he looks cool though.
i like the rest of it. :D those feathers are so nice. too bad it would be impossible to make them that beautiful on a 3d model. also like the wing design. that's cool looking. thumbs up on that. got the whole retro vibe going on. are you still having problems with the lower half of the mercurian female?
do you think it's better to have them be so brawny? i mean all three races of the inner worlds faction will be these fairly large, muscular people if we do that, vs. the outer worlds faction who have 2 short races and one average height with an average build.
may have to add 2 more races, and give the inner worlds a shorty and the outer worlds another tall.
k, here's the race legend on these guys
mercurians: native americans, extra-terrestrial with greek mythos in there too
venusians: scandanavians, extra-terrestrial with some norse mythos
martians: african, semites, extra-terrestrials with some egyptian mythos
jupiterians: chinese/japanese, extra terrestrials with chinese/japanese cultural styles, a bit of buddhist lore in there.
saturnians: australian aborigines, extra terrestrials with aborigine art motifs (gotta be careful on this cause some motifs are new creations and not public domain/. i created my own for their markings. you can see them on prior page of the thread)
neptunians: sumerians or atlanteans, extra terrestrials, with mermaid/merman thrown in.
k think i figured it out:
2 new races will be:
earthians (hehe): tall reptilians - outer worlds
moonians (as in earth's moon): greys, short - inner worlds.
woot.
the lore for the greys will include that they were genetically designed by the reptilians to mine the moon and became disatisfied with their servitude, and joined the inner worlds faction.
the reptilians will be a challenging race to do lore and art for.
The female lower torso is literally killing me :D I'l adjust the hair then to be more 3D friendly then.
What do you mean by brawny ? ( uhm like super torso ? ).
I'l slender him down then ;D.
Cyanhide
Quote from: Cyanhide on August 25, 2012, 06:28:52 PM
The female lower torso is literally killing me :D I'l adjust the hair then to be more 3D friendly then.
What do you mean by brawny ? ( uhm like super torso ? ).
I'l slender him down then ;D.
Cyanhide
on the female, you could paint one leg, then mirror / reflect it / clone it, on the other side.
yeah brawny means muscular. you can leave the feathers as they are. it's a concept art so that gives you room for flair and creativity you can't ordinarily get in a 3d model. just as long as it approximates the final 3d model. if you think it can be modelled in 3d and not be too far from the concept, it'll work. . :) also keep in mind that the 3d model will have to be low res to keep it mmo friendly, so quite a bit of your pretty detail will be lost.
every race has different reasons for their level of fitness:
mercurians use fitness as utility*
venusians use fitness as beauty
moonians use fitness as utility*
martians use fitness as advantage
earthians use fitness as utility*
jupiterians use fitness as advantage
saturnians use fitness as utility*
neptunian use fitness as entertainment
*utility is defined, in this case, as anything that is secondary to primary skill sets. dps benefit from fitness but it is not the basis of their function in the mmo environment. whereas tanks/warriors gain the most use out of fitness/athletics because it's their primary skill set. because neptunians and venusians don't use fitness as a primary skillset or secondary utility skillset, they can use it any way we want in order to fit their race with their lore and the game world's lore
our 2 new races, will both be dps
so now each faction has
one healer class
one tank class
and 2 utility (dps) classes
oh and i used this free 3d modeling software to create the 3d examples: Make Human http://www.makehuman.org/
maybe it will help you arrive at fast answers for how something you're designing would look in 3d.
gonna have a problem figuring out the earth racial equivalent of reptilians. because they have such negative connotations, i am leery to assign them to any particular racial traits other than dinosaurs lol
we either have to make them extremely savage and scary or fun and interesting. not sure which to choose because on the one hand, i want to keep both factions equally attractive to new players so there's not a shortage of people interested in a faction due to social norms, and on the other hand, since the outer worlds faction have no large, intimidating race, the reptilians might serve the purpose well by adding intimidating features to their appearance, not just tall but tall and scary. they can't be too musclebound though, or we end up with a dps that's musclebound, and that wouldn't make any sense, particularly since the outer worlds faction has a short tank class. the reptilians would seem like the more natural choice for tank then and that's not gonna work. our little jupiterians are martial artists of a sort.
i think the greys have the same problem. probably have to make these 2 races solely dependent on non-race based information. in other words, we'll have to make it up as we go along and just add bits and pieces of common ufology type information and dinosaur info (have to be careful of copyright here as well) where applicable.
the next issue is, what kind of dps to make them.
the inner worlds has a rogue dps already but no hunter dps. we could give the hunter type to the grey, who uses ranged weapons and some kind of pet. would have to be a biological pet, because its from inner worlds and they are all about natural stuff for the most part.
in outer worlds, make the reptilian a rogue type class.
now these have to be separated from each other somehow.
remember the mercurians were masters of disguise, which they achieve by the use of imagines and potions. but the outer world factions rely more heavily on artificial means to achieve the same or similar effects as inner worlds abilities.
yeah that'll do it. make the reptilians masters of disguise, rogue type, too, just via a different process, involving technology. the animation would have to be either sillier or scarier, than mercurians, depending on which approach we want to take on this.
guess we need to have a set of nice art examples of what all these guys/gals look like, then blurbs on their lore/classes, then ask people which race they find the most appealing, think they would play and why, then determine which side needs a tweak to keep the factions evenly distributed with player populations.
the mercurians, jupiterians and neptunians are our equivalents to furries. with the addition of reptilians we now have 3 furry types on the outer worlds side. vs. only 1 on the inner worlds side. hmm... perhaps make the grey's pet, the grey himself/herself, controlling via a mind link or something, a furry racial pet. but what is the question. in other words, the grey is there via mind link but not physically present other than the furry pet who's eyes he sees out of and extremities he uses but that means the grey would no longer be a ranged dps, more like a wow druid in boomkin form.
would work if we depicted the grey translucent and dimensionally shifted when in combat, so he's interfacing with 3d reality via the furry. any suggestions for the furry type? has to be something you might consider for a moon based critter. also, it's ranged dps, so maybe an imagine user. our first mage type, perhaps. i'm resisting the urge to say "fairies."
maybe we could have them create their pets on the spot, like a mage does when they summon elementals. elementals as furries? not sure on that. too many elemental pets in mmos. thinking....oh oh, i have an idea. they use moon "dust" to form something like this
http://mrdoob.github.com/three.js/examples/webgl_particles_dynamic.html and it can take various shapes of their choosing. like give them 4 choices, something unique tho.
maybe they can form little light based replicas, like the images in the link, of the opposing team members racial features but are purely ranged dps. and the saturnians, form little robots that act like normal pets where lack of fine tuned control that the greys have over their pets, is replaced by the fact the saturnian can use ranged weapons as well as the damage their pet does.
maybe. i can't decide. having those pretty glowy lighted characters really is an opportunity to have a cool, unique looking pet form for the greys. i just can't think of anything that i really like atm. hrm, maybe angels, beings with wings but just drawn in light. and then they have a choice of making it male or female and in one of the 4 colors we choose for it. that would allow us to include an angelic type race, without some of the complications related to the animation of flying. they won't fly as they are just light projections of moon dust that the grey is using for combat.
i'd like to clarify something about the appearance of the male characters in the game. i don't mind if they are more masculine looking, if by chance some of them look too feminine, i don't mind if they are buffed up a bit, within the framework of their skills and lore, of course. just keep in mind that more than half of the female characters in a mmo, are played by men. not because they are gay necessarily or cross dressers, but because they claim to like watching a female character move more than a male character. they can dress them in slinky armor and so forth.
personally, gender is just not that big of an issue to me. if i like the character animations and sounds, i will be more likely to pick that race/gender. cause you spend so much time doing things that require running the animations and sounds the character does, that they are just as important after playing them for several levels as their appearance.
here are some wow examples of casting animations. you can see a big difference and probably tell as well how some could get really irritating if they were awkward or paired with irritating sound fx.
Blood Elves
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuPLLqjgBQw
Draenei
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U867mTu_pME
Worgen
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sR0Q4l01nvc
All horde priest casting animations other than goblins
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vztCzQBuI2E
Night Elf Male
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC8UK-qKnlI
Night Elf Female
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGgAAhD-ZlY
Goblin Female
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unMCykSumtU
etc. there's a bunch more. some of them are quite fun and decent or tolerable. some of them are irritating. at least to me. so it isn't just how big the muscles are or the capacity for breast size modification, but also if the model is pleasant to work with for multiple levels.
i think wow's decision to not let the muscle size, breast size, height or weight of the character models be changed, was a good call. when i played star wars galaxies, they had a profession called image designer. you could modify other players appearances, including height, weight, hair color, eye color, markings, markings color, horns, horn colors, skin color, muscle size, breast size, even booty size, etc. the most popular mod by far was breast size, followed by muscle size. what were once female models with trim physiques, turned to vast armies of laser gun wielding playboy bunnies. it was crazy.
can ruin the lore of a game in a hurry that way.
new idea for the world pvp planet.
initially we had the idea of making a separate pvp planet, where rare resources spawned. we realized that these resources would have to be specific to pvp, so if non pvpers wanted them, they would have to want them out of some kind of business decision and fight pvpers to get them, rather than as result of them being useful to the rest of the player community, other than pvpers. this planet would also have a level restriction.
we also discussed making the world spawn a raid level boss as a planet mechanism, et.al, the planet has its own defenses, and once enough people start harvesting its resources, eventually a raid level boss spawns. this boss immediately adds anyone currently on the planet, to its aggro list, then teleports them to its location, no matter where they are on the planet, nor what they were doing. a battle ensues. anyone that takes part in the battle by attacking the boss at least once, or healing anyone currently engaged in combat with the boss, is added to a second list to receive a token, if the battle is succesful and the raid level boss is defeated. a dungeon specific to that planet, and only enterable if you take part in dispensing of the raid boss, is activated and if you have the token, you can enter. even rarer pvp based resources are inside this dungeon. technically it isn't a dungeon. it's more like another part of the same planet, perhaps the lair of the defeated raid boss which contains very specific, rare resources that are not otherwise available on that planet.
this lair is only accessible for 1 hour. then the whole thing starts over again if there are enough people harvesting resources. there would be a few different raid bosses.
p.s. you wouldn't be able to go outside the raid boss' range and start harvesting again, as long as it was still alive, as the area where everyone on the planet was teleported to would be covered by an inescapsible boundary till the boss was dead
Yesterday I went looking for game frameworks, and I found some here (http://sourceforge.net/directory/games/gameframeworks/os:windows/freshness:recently-updated/).
I hope it helps. :)
Quote from: ArMaP on August 28, 2012, 11:15:35 PM
Yesterday I went looking for game frameworks, and I found some here (http://sourceforge.net/directory/games/gameframeworks/os:windows/freshness:recently-updated/).
I hope it helps. :)
thanks armap. i've been to that site many times before, but i forgot about it recently. need to bookmark it i guess.
still plugging away at this.
working on the front end (supporting website)
some cute little graphical effects generator, i was tinkering around with, that lets you put an image on a 3d box and on a folded, card like graphic
see attached
more
blurbs on the two new races
Moonians - Masters of Dimension
Moonians are short, frail, with slender limbs and long, spindly fingers. They have large heads and eyes, no body hair and smooth greyish skin tones. They create beautiful sculptures and protective domes from high-impact moon glass, extracted from the dusty soil of the Moon. They also excel at the manipulation of dimensional space, by which they create armored doppleganger pets. The pets share a dimensional bond with them, allowing the Moonian to enter a phase shift during battle. As a result, Moonians are the hunter-type class of the Inner Worlds faction.
Earthians - Masters of Illusion
Earthians are extremely tall reptilians, with tough, scaley hide. They are skilled at wood working and gardening. They have somewhat slender bodies with heavily slanted eyes of various colors. Instead of hair, they grow manes composed of strands of shedded scales. They excel at the art of illusion and camoflage. As a result, Earthians are the rogue-type class of the Outer Worlds faction.
update to the official site for the game
any criticisms, compliments and comments, gratefully accepted.
http://www.thelivingmoon.com/undomiel/frameset2/interface/
Looks good. :)
I like the card effect.
Besides looking nice, it gives an effect of making you want to open it up and get it closer to the screen so you can see more.
Also, it adds to the slice of life or moment in time effect, making you curious as to what it looks like in moving or animated form that is going on in the game.
Kind of like a newspaper photo making you want to see the video of the event.
Great choice of introductory effect I think.
WOW, Beth!
Im not a gamer usually, but I might have to jump into this one...you have been really at the grindstone...beautiful effort!!
Cheers, and congrats on the excellent progress!
Dave
aww thanks :)
woohoo, got my monk :D that's a jug of herb tea tied to the end of her staff.
(http://thelivingmoon.com/undomiel/monk.jpg)