Will a walker without animation still work in the game?

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Cool N1 tanks. Ironically, I can do X animations with Truespace, but then I'd need to ask someone to convert them to XSI for me. Any volunteers? LOL, just kidding as I still struggle when trying to get animation stuff right. BNG.

[mrtwosheds]

I would of thought that the actual data in an .x animation would be very similar to that in an xsi, you could probably cutnpaste it across in notepad and adjust any small format differences.

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

I've tried it with the 2 versions produced by X2XSI and Threed. All I had to do to get them moving in 3DEX was to add SI_ to the XSI AnimationKey headings. BZII, can read the first object of an X file, but nothing after that as I've gotten them into the map editor minus any texture using an ODF file. It's a great big hassle though, and not really worth doing things that way.

I don't really have the time or resources to make animations where they're needed on models like walkers. I have managed to get several normally animated models like a service truck, turret, and scout working in the game, but they all function nicely without any animation; apparent BZII ignores and anim count entries in the ODF as I fully expected the game to crash upon loading my models in the map editor, but it didn't to my total surprise.

I have a good feeling that at least 90 % of the game units can be produced minus any animation that will work adequately in the game. Perhaps even more efficiently as animation must put some extra strain on the game engine to manipulate the moving parts on a typical animated model. Sorry to be so long winded, but this is a forum for modelers to discuss BZII related model making issues. BNG.   

[Avatar]

You know...

If you name the parts the same in YOUR walker as they are in one of the STOCK walkers...

You can use the stock animation files for YOUR walker.

All an animation version of an XSI does is tell the MSH maker what parts rotate X amount, or move X amount, at each frame.  With a little care you can use the same animation file for multiple models and it works fine.

-Av-

[BNG Da BZ Fool]

Yes, I seem to remember you mentioned that some time back AV. Which of the XSI files should I use for my walker? The skel_file? I'd like to try something relatively simple, but don't really know where to begin. Tanks, BNG.

[VSMIT]

All except the skel file.  Take a look at the walker ODF.  The files listed under "Animations" are the ones you use.

VSMIT.