Messages

As long as Gamespy never gives up on the old girl (BZ1 OR 2) it's a great setup, having a powerful, neutral server for everyone.  Still, if someone's going to go to the trouble of coding in Gamespy support (or something like it) as a replacement for ANET it would be good to have a backup...  or at least keep such a thing in mind for the future.

I mean really, it's a great idea and Ken is up for sainthood for even thinking of fixing BZ1 to work in a more modern setting but given the size of the community would Gamespy even want to add support for BZ1?

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I have to inject here that MY version of the Destructor would be more akin to that guy in Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life" who got to choose his own method of execution...   



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And, as for most any new idea it'd be best if the AI could actually make use of it... 

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I assume you're talking about Sgt Hulka, who used to have a few boxes of TRO in his garage.  I just asked Toni if he still has any contact with Hulka and he said no, that the only way he'd know of to get in touch with him would be the TeamEvolve web site.

If anyone could get ahold of him AND he does still have some copies we could set up sales here in the US for him.

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The 'wick effect'...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wick_effect

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I had no idea you made it! well done. 

Thanks, but it's a total hack, literally just splicing text files together at certain points.  Still, it did let me get the first object into BZ2 before Pandemic released their Max plugin. (It was a simple white cube with no collision, so not really useful, but at least it worked...) 

When I see that people still use x2xsi it strikes me that I'd rather they worked on testing OM's converter for him, to get a decent converter that supports animation.

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FE had a very nice blinking light on top of the EDF Armory.  Slightly modified it makes excellent red or green blinking strobes for conventional aircraft...

The only times you'd need to animate a texture instead of a model would be for something like a display, a color changing ship, or a very trick alien ship like a Vorlon or something...  Most other uses I can see for it would be better done by animating a model.

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I was an Apple guy, so Choplifter comes to mind...   There were a few good side-scrollers back in the day of 16 colors or less...  Commander Midnite was also a great side-scroller, with missiles and such.

Funny that only Duke recognized the side scroller for the genius that it is...     We don't need these 3D worlds!  We can get by on only 2 directions!  lol...

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Of course I'm keeping a P3-500 with Win98SE just to run BZ1.   Seriously, I am. 

The black screen in XP might be what I keep running into, which is you have to back out to menu and then go back into the game to get your view back after shelling out.  Much easier just to keep the old hardware around...   

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And the major disadvantage of requiring Gamespy support for it's existence, since you CAN set up your own Anet server but not your own Gamespy server.

Or has someone found a way around this?   

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I tried this equation on my PC, looked what happened
<image removed in case it gives any of you bad ideas...  >

OMG that was TOO funny...  I love it...

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That assumes one server...

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Software mode for BZ1 was amazing, as it allowed you to see what that new-fangled 3D video card was really doing.  The difference was stunning, and you'd never know that without being able to compare the two modes.

Once everyone had a 3D card you couldn't find a game that even had a software renderer.

As stated earlier BZ1 software mode is a major advantage to modders using the Shift-F9 screen.  It gave you a slightly messier display in return for actually showing objects, dialog windows, etc..

I also used software mode to run BZ1 windowed when walking around inside the objects in the editor and recreating them in Max.  Seems to me that BZ wouldn't run in a window in hardware mode, although maybe this was probably more of a driver issue?  It's been awhile...

So, dump the software renderer and if any major issues show up with Shift-F9 I'm sure it'll be easier to fix those, or live with them...

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Awesome...  and I like the  progression towards "modern" units it shows.  I'd love to see more mods that mix the two technology types more...

Guess I'll have to buckle down and get BZC done...   a little snow will help with that. 

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I'm not going to say what company I'll be working for quite yet; I want to see what their policy on side projects (read: BZ2) is. I'll just say that it's listed on http://www.gamedevmap.com/index.php?tool=location&query=Austin .

-- GSH

Blizzard Austin!  Coming soon, "World of Battlezone", the MMRPFPSRTSG to end all MMRPFPSRTSG's!!!   (Massively Multiplayer Role Playing First Person Shooting Real Time Strategy Game)     

Humour aside when a game company closes it's always blamed on mismanagement...  I mean, it's not usually the coders and artists that determine the course of a game, it's the Project Designers and Managers, right?  It's all happened before and will probably happen again...

The whole world is cutting back, closing down, pruning the branches.  It's been a long time coming and it's mostly due to the continuing evolution of the Industrial Revolution.   Mankind needs to come up with new ways for people to earn livings if they're going to continue to depend so much on robots, and push productivity over all else.  What happens on that final day when one person working can produce everything humanity needs?  Old George will push the button and it'll all roll out assembly lines, but nobody will be able to buy it because only George has a job.  (working for Spacely Sprockets, if you don't get who George is by now...)

On a personal note it sounds like both Ken and Nathan have hit the ground running...  I hope everyone here expresses hope for their future, and thanks for the work they've done.  Even if GSH's new job (or any other reason) shuts him down from working on BZ2 any further he's already given us an amazing gift in 1.3 just the way it is now.

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