posted
uh, I've barely touched There, and don't remember seeing you anywhere, havn't been on there in oh I'd say 6 months
[I didn't really think it was you, but now I am worried... did you make a SilentKnight account on there.com? Coz I definitely saw someone as SilentKnight. I assumed they just made the same name, but do I need to be concerned? -s]
posted
I think my there is SKnight579 cause SilentKnight was taken. I could be wrong though, I was wrong once in the past.
Posts: 3361 | From: Midland, TX, USA | Registered: Nov 2001
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There.com is still in beta? wasn't it in beta like 5 years ago when you first started working for them? I know i tried it back then...
Posts: 948 | From: Woodland Hills, CA. USA | Registered: Dec 2000
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A comic book company (Platinum Studios), purchased my website from me and brought me on board, so I'm working for them now.
I got to be in the new york times too Check out the article here (I'm the one with the cross arms, 20 pounds heavier ago )
Posts: 948 | From: Woodland Hills, CA. USA | Registered: Dec 2000
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But can't complain I suppose. Been working on a new website for over a year... ready to launch it in a couple weeks.
Posts: 948 | From: Woodland Hills, CA. USA | Registered: Dec 2000
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posted
All this happy chatting is taking time away from Rocket Club development
-------------------- "Eye of twilight give us sight Take our offer, give us might Make our power tears of night" Posts: 794 | From: Somewhere in Argentina | Registered: Jan 2000
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in honor of this auspicious occasion, I ran three copies of RC at once and had my astronauts all stand on the same beach and watch the waves crash (almost) in unison.
And then immediately wanted about 30 features (mostly to do with knowing where you are and what objects existed in the universe.) I have a bug where sometimes your own Star Server doesn't bother to tell you about your own stuff (coz, I guess, it thinks it already told you)
Also, I realized I am making persistent backups of avatars, so that you have a semi-permanent dummy of everyone who has visited you.
Oh, and I had a shower idea for a certain kind of destructibility, where weapons cause damage to form up to 100% (or hp down to zero, if you prefer) and you get all the joy of destroying stuff, but then a few minutes later they heal. (so the owner isn't POed at your destruction). Still, while dead, they are not defending/shooting/etc. Good for rampaging destruction, without sucking the joy out of creation.
-------------------- He knows when you are sleeping. Posts: 10561 | From: California | Registered: Dec 1998
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posted
Hay guys! I figured I'd stop by the ol' forums for a little rubber-necking on rocket club. I guess I should download the latest version and check it out. This I will do...
Posts: 366 | Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
I was searching old folders for that one file I misplaced and cam across those old ship models I'd done up hoping that I'd see them in RC sometime. Then I looked at the demo again, and it's doing much better than it did before - the laser even fires now. Still kinda funky trying to go from walking to flying but still progress.
Posts: 24 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
Dan, ever since i first found out about RC I've loved it.
But there are a few questions I have about it.
(1) Suppose you and your club are all on your home planet, using the debug list you can alter the planet's shape, texture, water, gravity, etc., will you be able to make these changes with the players on your planet?
[debug changes are just for you, and temporary (I hope), but I hope someday to give you some persistent customization options. Basically a grayscale image you would 'paint' to get the height map you prefer (instead of the fractals) and probably an alternate colormap for the elevation/slope terrain texturing. As well as letting you name your planets. I hope -s]
(2) I know you are probably planning to do somthing about this but what is the point of a ship if you can go infinately fast with no vehicle?
[yeah, I need to allow unlimited PgUp right now, but you can imagine eventually it will be limited. For the next release I added WoW-like mouse button usage, since WoW has trained my fingers to believe how a mouse should work. I need a new button for 'jump' now though (and the normal keys, like space, are still chat-centric for me. That's something I don't like in other games (needing to hit ENTER before you can chat), but I may cave in someday anyway, as WASD are pretty convenient... -s]
(3) There is a glitch where if you accelerate your character an insane amount of times the skeleton and body are deformed and your are unable to play the game in most cases due to being stuck in that area. I despise this glitch...
[I ignore your plight. -s]
(4) In my opinion the surface of planets has far to many sharp hills and mountains, If it would be less like that and with more large flat surfaces. I realize less mountains means that camoflaging your base on an enemy planet might not be so easy.But could you make planet surfaces more bearable while still maintaining suitable cover?
[agreed, in addition to that grayscale I mentioned above, I want to keep working on my algorithm so as to have more places where erosion has filled valleys to create more flat space. WITHOUT losing the cool under sea topography. I think I see this as several randomly placed 'large circles' which hint to the fractalizer that massive erosion has occured in those areas (and which then attenuates negative height changes.) The size and number of these 'circles' would then be another randomly selected aspect of the planet, so you would still have some planets as rocky as before, and some with huge flat areas. -s]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Finally enough with the questions. My first (and only) recemendation.(apologies for the spelling errors)
I was thinking that When you are killed, or disarmed or whatever. You ship spirals out of control and eventually explodes leavig you standed in space or on that planet. Unless you have a spare of course... But what exactly will you lose besides the ship? Possibly skill points or parts of skill points. All your weapons, 5% of your total credits on hand , and maybe even some elements?. Perhaps in this format?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You were disabled by a General Laser: Being used by: Bob:Omega Club:Klingon, You lost:
Beginer's scout ship (1) Plasma rifle(1) Plasma Grenades(3) Chest beam energy weapon(2) 4,000 credits ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As for Bob... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[honestly, I don't know. Death has been problematic for me. In any case, I think it is contextual. At times you are basically playing an RTS, so death might mean Game Over for that instance. At other times, you are just a wandering adventurer and I don't want death to be *too* traumatic. Probably something where you have degraded travel options until you resurrect and/or get repaired. I'm sure there will be a lua callback for it, so it will be extensible to things like the generic skill system, but I probably won't do anything like oout-right loss of possessions. Though I expect most possessions to be fleeting in any case (getting destroyed in battle), there will be core possessions you do not have to worry about losing constantly. waffle waffle.. -s]
posted
Just out of curiosity, how old is the tech demo on the download page? I know it's different from what I've seen before, just don't know how different.
Posts: 24 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
It says when the demos were made on their respective pages.
-------------------- This signature contains a lot of foul languages. Also racism. Posts: 2227 | From: Yokohama, Japan | Registered: Oct 2002
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posted
So, I puttered on Rocket Club a bit over the weekend...
* planets and stars now have names (random ones)
* a lot of random values *will* be overridable by an *optional* ini file. So for YOUR solar system you will be able to craft a file that specifies some aspects which would otherwise be picked at random.
* I changed the fractal terrain generator to use a helper 'crinkliness' array. This is a fairly coarse array (32x32) which breaks the sheet into 1024 cells where each cell can be assigned a roughness variation. Planets have an overall roughness factor, but inside of each cell I add that cell's roughness to the overall planet roughness. Then when doing fractal folds inside that cell, they are adjusted by the local roughness. This allows you to basically pre-seed that array with your 'mountain ranges'.
It's not completely straightforward since fractal folding is done recursively, so, for example, the cell in the center of the sheet has a pretty profound affect on the overall height variations on the planet, whereas a cell near the edge only affects a smaller area.
Anyway, my thought is to ultimately allow that crinkiness array to be loaded from an image file you make for your planet(s) (called out in your special ini file) where black is 'less rough' and white is 'more rough'
But in the meantime, keeping true to the concept of "generate the entire stellar system from a single random seed" I pre-seed that array by doing a 'drunkards walk' to make an initial mountain range (so to speak).
I'm not sure I am completely done yet, but so far the results are promising. I have definite flat areas (well, not completely flat, but pretty flat) and some areas that are mountainous. Still not as wonderful as a beautifully handcrafted artist height map, but slightly nice than before. Except right now maybe it is a bit *too* flat.
* I worked on the terrain texturing a bit, fixed a normal computation that was leading to some ugly artifacts. Re-jiggered the uv coords (u is driven by elevation, v by slope,) and generated a bunch of 'better' terrain image files (which is kinda hard to do, but I found just gluing together bits of photographs of different sorts of terrain actually looked pretty good.)
* It still suffers from a lack of mid-scale interest. Big scale I have the elevation/slope data, and small scale I have a noise pattern. But I need some mid-scale stuff to keep it from looking too repetitive. Ideally what I would like to do is have a nxn image where the RGB values are three separate blend values for 3 different textures. (grass, sand, and cobblestone, for example). But I may just have to depend on ground cover for this.
I have some ideas to beef up my ground cover. More algorithmic trees (instead of a million cruciform of the same tree) made up of a small number of primitives (small number of 'fronds') mixed in random combinations per tree. Ditto for bushes.
* I started the button manager, but that's going to be a big deal. Basically there is a data description for possible things. Then there is your inventory of things you have, with per instance state. Then there is the visualization of the thing from an inventory perspective. Then there is the visualization of the thing from an action (button) perspective. So your ray gun has a plan file to help it get made, the raygun you own is 50% damaged. Your inventory shows a raygun with damage and special attributes. And a button on screen allows you to fire it.
The trick is to keep the inventory/button layers as then as possible and have them JUST be UI wiring to the actual instance in your otherwise-invisible inventory. That way you can do things like rearrange your button bar without it being a big complicated deal.
I will basically have a button bar on the screen to which you will drag the buttons/items you personally find interesting. With keyboard shortcuts and a handful of automatic buttons for, say, the vehicle to which you are currently attached. This solves the problem I had with the fact that you could be attached to something with multiple weapons slots to which you had attached a diversity of weapons, and the left mouse button was not able to determine which weapon you wanted to fire. So now there will be a real trigger for every weapon.
* I added a DNA browser (in rocket club DNA is Distributed Network Architecture and all objects are derived from the DNA base class, which knows how to replicate itself on every PC that needs to know about it. Anyway, the browser is really just a debug window which lets you see what all is being simulated on your server and your client. And on the client I support the very un-game-like ability to instantly teleport to any object. I did this, as I said, for debugging purposes, but it also allows a certain amount of garbage collection. Plus it gives you a way to cheat and peek at what people have dropped in your system.
* /commands
I added support for some debug slash commands, the most interesting of which is /set as in
/set dirt test23
which changes the texture map image to textures/test23.jpg (without modifying the height map). Very useful when crafting terrain texture images.
-------------------- He knows when you are sleeping. Posts: 10561 | From: California | Registered: Dec 1998
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posted
I should point out that by changing the way the terrain engine works, I have guaranteed that all your existing planets will change shape, possibly dramatically.
Stuff you have dropped will re-sink to new ground for the most part, but likely you will find some cities are now either sunk to the bottom of the ocean, or bobbing gently in the waves.
-------------------- He knows when you are sleeping. Posts: 10561 | From: California | Registered: Dec 1998
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We were talking about you on Arc and now you're back on the forums!!
-------------------- This signature contains a lot of foul languages. Also racism. Posts: 2227 | From: Yokohama, Japan | Registered: Oct 2002
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I've been playing eve-onine for near the past two years, so I'd just like to add how it deals with losing a fight: well, you lost. You lose this ship, you lose the mods. Some survive, which can be looted from your wreck by friendlies or by enemies (yarr!). I know Dan's a nice guy at heart, but RC seems to be more kill-others themed than WoS. Just as an example, I can post a killmail from Eve.
Small Nosferatu II Small Energy Neutralizer II Phased Plasma M, Qty: 57 Stasis Webifier II Small Armor Repairer II Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II Fusion M, Qty: 3000 (Cargo) Phased Plasma M, Qty: 2532 (Cargo) Hail M, Qty: 2500 (Cargo)
In Eve, you can insure your ships for a flat rate based on their "base price" (given what parts it takes to build it, and what the devs set those parts to cost way back at the start of the game when npcs sold minerals) for like 12 weeks or something. You also get a clone for if your escape capsule is destroyed. If it's up to date, you lose nothing unless you have anby implants (stat buffing items) plugged in to your brain, which all go poof. Well...splort.
-------------------- Any and all velca will be added to your personal hahta in Angamando. Posts: 711 | From: Chanhassen, Minnesota | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
I downloaded the vaporware and it's got some awesome potential, Dan. I mean... just imagine, a world as huge as these, to build whatever you want, to ride your centaurs freely through the valley... It's totally forseeable for another player to have a small town on your planet and you not even be aware of it.
However, I had some problems with the textures. When I first loaded the game no textures. It was all black. Well... i downloaded DX10 from Microsoft and no help (I have Vista and it comes with 9 anyways). Turns out I had to turn on Ambient Light to even see the textures, and they don't look quite like your screenshots. Any suggestions?
At any rate, this is gonna be great. Well, eventually.=-) When it sees completion I believe this could be one of the greatest of all time (yeah yeah sounds cheezy, but I can't think of another game with this much... scope). Keep up the good work... and let me know something about my texture issues. =-\
Posts: 5 | Registered: Oct 2007
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posted
Yes, you really need the next release to see anything with Vista/DX10 (not sure which of those hates me, but my shaders seem to work, but the raw pipeline code ends up with no 'light' on models, which leads to a very dark world indeed. I'm sure it's my fault, but it only seems to be an issue with Vista/DX10
---
If I can stop being sick for awhile (my stomache issues have me down for the count today), I will push the shader version. I have been hesitating to do so since along with the shaders comes all new everything, so your star system and accounts will all be wiped and you will start from scratch. I don't want to release that, and then a week later do it again. So I am trying to make all the huge infrastructure changes I can, in this next release.
Having said that, you can take a sneak peak at
http://www.synthetic-reality.us/RocketClubA29.exe but be warned that you will need to install the REAL A29 on top of that. I periodically am updating that copy, without changing the version number, so people can have multiple incompatible copies of A29.
But if I can be healthy, and have a weekend where I don't have to do day-job work then I will push the real A29 soon.
-------------------- He knows when you are sleeping. Posts: 10561 | From: California | Registered: Dec 1998
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posted
Oh wow, when I posted that killmail I didn't even notice Vole and Lenny and SK and bandit posting a couple months ago. o/ ya'll. o.o
-------------------- Any and all velca will be added to your personal hahta in Angamando. Posts: 711 | From: Chanhassen, Minnesota | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
It'd be nice to be able to press E (standard FPS "use") and enter a vehicle when you are within a certain distance from it, or its "door". That, and be able to get out of it the same way.
-------------------- Constantinople! We shall never forget your zany barge poles! Posts: 4232 | From: Gresham, OR | Registered: Nov 2003
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posted
Have you heard of the word "patience"? Dan works for there.com, WoS/Arcadia/Rocket Club aren't on the top of his priority hierarchy.
I'm pretty sure you're just posting to complain and aren't really interested in seeing all those updates, but I just thought you wanted to know.
-------------------- This signature contains a lot of foul languages. Also racism. Posts: 2227 | From: Yokohama, Japan | Registered: Oct 2002
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posted
Yes i have heard of the word "patience". and no im not posting here to complain. i just wanted to see how the game was doing.
Posts: 374 | From: Florida, tampa | Registered: Jul 2008
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posted
I suggest you go check threads like this one.
-------------------- This signature contains a lot of foul languages. Also racism. Posts: 2227 | From: Yokohama, Japan | Registered: Oct 2002
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posted
A coordinate system would be useful. Such that you could give instructions to places and other players could enter the coordinates and have their ships understand them.
Planets: p#, n#, w# (planet, north/south, west/east) Orbits: p#, r#, i#, Θ# (planet, radius, inclination, theta (angle)) Arbitrary points in space: x#, y#, z# (x (east/west), y (north/south), z (zero is in the orbital plane))
Planetary coordinates are basically latitude/longitude with an additional argument for planet, where 0 is the sun, 1 is the closest to the sun, etc.
Orbits specify a circle by three points, the center of mass of the planet, the "highest" point the object reaches in its orbit (the point farthest from the orbital plane where z is positive), and a point in the orbital plane which has the same radius, is at 0 inclination and 90 degrees from the specified point.
Arbitrary points in space are given in a standard x/y/z, where origin is the center of mass of the sun, the z=0 plane is the orbital plane. x and y can basically be arbitrarily assigned.
-------------------- Constantinople! We shall never forget your zany barge poles! Posts: 4232 | From: Gresham, OR | Registered: Nov 2003
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posted
Hmm.. I've encountered a small problem. Rocket Club has always worked previously, but now when I try to run it it says that the side-by-side configuration is incorrect, and that I should see the application event log for more detail. I have no idea what any of that means Does anyone experience this problem, or better yet, does anyone know how to fix it? I'm running Vista if that's important at all.
Posts: 4 | Registered: Apr 2009
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note the link on that page called "Microsoft VC2005 DLLs"
Gone are the days where you can just 'include the DLLs with your game' and unless you buy into the microsoft installer maker (which doesn't support patching), it is a vague hassle making it more automatic.
Why they don't include the 2005 DLLs in Vista is anyone's guess. It's not like they change. They should send them out with Windows Update IMHO.
-------------------- He knows when you are sleeping. Posts: 10561 | From: California | Registered: Dec 1998
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posted
Ah, thank you, I never would have thought to do that..I usually just assume I have everything.
Edit: I figured I would ask a few questions and make a suggestion without adding a post
-If there are to be 2billion star systems, how will you really be able to search for them. I mean if there are 1billion NPC systems, that would make them (and thus their wormholes), open all the time , right?
-You'll eventually make visual acknowledgment of scripts optional, right? I mean...When I fly down to my city, all of the scripts from the guards practically blind me.
-Will you change the free camera controls in chase plane? I would prefer Ctrl+Mouse drag... Pwetty Pwease? Or you could always add custom controls....
- I think that, if you only put the "necessary" elements ( Needed for BASIC things that you need to start off) in every solar system, and a random assortment of more valuable/rare elements in the solar systems, that it would encourage commerce. All you would need to do is make sure that every system got around the same quantity of rarer elements. Ex: Player 1's system has a total gold extraction rate of 100, Player 2's system has a total Platinum extraction rate of 100.
posted
I am thinking of the NPC systems as mainly being temporary. Like I choose to host some tournament in 'randomly picked at that moment' NPC system, it then becomes the system I am serving (my own home star wormhole is closed), so you still only see one wormhole per active player.
And I suppose I would have a directory somewhere of systems you have personally visited, so you could get back to them, but you would only be in one at a time.
My point being that the total open wormhole list only grows with the number of simultaneous players on that hub, so it's pretty unlikely to become unmanageable :-)
And your local star book would be an excellent candidate for use of the SQLite database I added a year or two ago, for no apparent reason at the time other than 'i could!'
---
UI control sets are much more complicated than I expected. Something that feels 'simple and natural' turns out to really have a zillion special cases.
I would like to be able to say something like "the control key and the left mouse button are identical in function" (since that sort of pronouncement makes my life easier), but they really aren't, shouldn't, and maybe can't be.
My main crisis right now is that I love the current mouse navigation/view control, but it offers no chance of a mouse button for weapons trigger.
So being able to flip into 'weapons mode' where ctrl becomes the left mouse button for camera/movement, and left mouse button becomes primary instant weapon trigger is.. well.. mandatory for the FPS mode of the game. But then conflicts with the super desirable 'both mouse buttons down to move forward' which I love as much, if not more.
I *tried* to establish a sort of internal model of 'meta buttons' and then coded all the actual behaviour based on these meta buttons, and then a separate layer binds 'actual buttons' (which could be changed by the user) to the 'meta buttons' which are cast in stone and cannot be change and you never see them directly.
but I wasn't really successfull (because of all these hidden special cases). I think I may get there eventually, but I'm already into like the 30th generation of UI tweaking :-)
posted
You could always just specify ctrl + click to be fire. Or use the insert key!
-------------------- SoV: Exalted Devout Oracle | World Developer | The Black Guard Outside is just a prank older kids tell younger kids at Internet Camp Posts: 9479 | From: NY | Registered: Apr 2003
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