[Risu2112]

Yeah, I don't want the UI to shake, or become uncentered. I already have all of the envronmental effects coded in, they just need to be modified to work with the rewrite, in most cases this means I need to change a few counters.

[Risu2112]

Will be taking a short break from development in order to compete in the DoZ.

[Superfunk]

So are you working on Starflight MZX again? I'm dying to play it!

[GetDizzy]

As is everyone, funkbrat. I imagine hes working on it, yes.

[Risu2112]

Almost level 60..

Then work will resume.

[asgromo]

Okay...

[Revvy]

I think Ken's still hooked on WoW. =\

[Zagooky]

Wow. It is the only word I can use to describe this wonder of a game. Very much good luck to you! Can't wait to play it!

[Risu2112]

Worked on the game today

Well, actualy all I did was dig through my 50+ copys of the game trying to find the most current one, and then ran some tests to figure out what I was doing. That all took about 2 hours though so it counts.

Now that the initial release of WoW has finaly started to die down for me, and since I finaly got my DM mask epic mount and necropile set, I should begin to regularly work on the game again. Thanks for every one's patience. I should point out that while I am still prepared to finish this thing up my self, I would still be interested in making the project a co-op with some one else =). This game still doesn't have an actual story, just a whole lot of temporary peices of stories.

Edit: I should point out that my previous post indicating that I was starting up again because WoW was cooling off, was in fact a lie. sorry.

This post has been edited by KenOhki2112: 28 March 2005 - 09:00 PM

[Xombie]

I've been watching this project since shortly after I joined. This has got to be the active project with the longest time in the works. it was around even before the era of the ! I still love that icon. and I'm sure I'd love this game if I ever see it released.

[Superfunk]

KenOhKi2112: Jusy how long have you been working on this game again?

[Xombie]

because its so difficult to look at the first page and sift through the scrambledness

EDIT: even easier: mouse over the topic title. august 13 2001, in case you don't feel like doing it yourself

This post has been edited by Xombie: 29 March 2005 - 12:05 AM

[Micah]

I think he's been working on it far longer than that though...like 7 years I thought =/

[Risu2112]

If you mean when did I start working on the project, took it's first form in Megazeux2.51 (I'm pretty sure this was the version) in february of 1997. I might be a month or two off. The game crashed into the brick wall of reality in only 2 weeks after I ran out of counters. When MZXs3+ came out 6-12 months later (or at least when I obtained it, might have been released well before I obtained it) I was able to seriously work on the project again.

However since then the game has faced revision after revision after revision, and very little of that early game still remain. I should however point out that the original world file was never deleted, while it has been copied and re copied I never completely started over, and the current version is a direct linear descendant of the original

As for how much time I have invested in this project, I feel it is no exaggeration to say it is measured in the thousands of hours, and has been for some time.

[Koji]

And you guys thought chronostodian is in the works for too long...

[Risu2112]

Actualy took care of this yesterday, but I felt it was probably best not to update on april 1st..

Finished that landing animation for the planet screen, I'm not sure if I discribed it before, but it's really simple. Basicly you see your ship fly over a few sectors and then land in the one you selected to land at. I had something similar a long time ago, however since they predated the sector blending it looked pretty bad. This however looks pretty good, almost good enough to make an animated .gif out of.

Once I convert the lander code to actualy work with the new engine, SFmzx will finaly, for the first time, be fully compatible with MZX2.8+

[Revvy]

Hell yes. ANIMATED GIF. ANIMATED GIF!

[Risu2112]

Seems a few thing have not been standardized on the new planet board.. hopefuly I will have them all straitend out tonight, I'm eager to have this aspect of the game working again, as I can't very easly test the rest of the game if I can't land on planets to mine =(

Most of the issues are with regard to placing the players ship on the ground, and correctly removing it. I'm not entirely sure how this will be handled yet, I'm once again thankful for all this board space we get now as it will greatly simplfy the actual coding.

This post has been edited by KenOhki2112: 07 April 2005 - 06:26 AM

[Risu2112]

This took like 4 takes, and then was butchered by animation shop any way.

This is pretty much what it looks like to land your ship now, as you can all see, the new blended terrain zones look FAR better than the big fat squares they were before.

You may also note that the mineral generator is not functioning as intended, and I still haven't gotten around to fixing the minimap in the top right of the screen.

Enjoy

Edit: disregard the darker/lighter frames, this is the result of a malfunctioning weather system that hasn't quite been removed yet.

Attached image(s)

• 

This post has been edited by KenOhki2112: 09 April 2005 - 11:34 PM

[Revvy]

That's awesome. The zones are great.

[Bramble]

Cooooool. Man that's pretty nice. I like the shadow beneath the ship.

[Risu2112]

Here's a look at what the new earthquakes look like, damage turned off, keep in mind it looks smoother in game, my timing on F12 was a little out of sync with the framerate.

each quake puts out 2 shockwaves, a thin black one and a thick white/grey one.

the black one moves twice as fast, as a small head start, and expands 50% further, but does no damage, it's something of a warning. Also note a few seconds before a quake starts, a small white wave comes out only a few characters, after it goes away the quake hits.

The second wave hits for damage.

Magnitude is determined by the techtonics rating of the planet 0-6 (0 is no quakes) all others follow the rule radius = random 12 through 12+6*techonicsrating. Tech rating also greatly affects the number of quakes, the planet below was set to 5, which is really high. not many planets will actualy be THIS active.

Note that your lander is not really fast and will rarely be able to escape one of the shockwaves unless it's pointed in the right direction and is already really close to where the waves disapear.

Attached image(s)

• 

[Zagooky]

Nice screens. I like the earthquake

[Koji]

WHEE CIRCLES!!!

<3

This is fantastic! I love how much faster mzx is now at doing these kind of things. <3 Exo.

[Risu2112]

hitting a snag on hotspots, a bit discouraging considering how fast I got those shockwaves in the game, which by the way are totaly kicking ass.

Also I have some grinding to do for the mini map.. shouldn't be a problem.

As for the shockwaves, I'm not quite done with them, I am going to add in terrain resistances to them, varibles for each map that determine where quakes are more likely to happen, More activity in high elevations for example, this will be similar to how resource placement is controlled . A similar solution will be provided to hotspots, assuming I ever get them to work correctly, to contrast this. Lower elevation = more frequent hotspots. This is just a general rule of thumb by the way.

Weather effects are still up for grabs, At this point, bad weather just reduces the rate your lander recovers energy (energy is needed to move). So in effect it makes the lander slower, and more vulnerable to other planet hazards. I intend to at the least rework how this happens as the current system isn't that great. I've removed the pallet fade thing associated with weather because it was largely retarded, maybe I'll slap together some rain effects now or something.

The resource generator is not currently functional with the new engine, while only small changes are needed to make it mostly functional, I am at this time greatly concerned about how it will function near the boarders of the planet due to the continuous wrap around effect.

At this time landing on the planet is a one way trip, the exit code is in place, but the destination board is not. I am considering merging the boards, however this is not too likely as it may very well become a huge mess.

I sure hope all these changes will be worth it, I can't wait to be _Finished_ with the surface board.

[Risu2112]

Here is something of a teaser for the game.

A sample of the combat board with a quick fight you can try out. It's a bit complicated at first to play, but read through the notes and give it a try. Keep in mind I am anticipating some changes, and a few bug fixes.

The zip file contains a saved game, in order to play you must load the saved game.
Playing the world will just get you auto killed. The save game has an initialized state ready, the code for which is very large and confusing and spread out over many many robots, and was not included. the .MZX is there for reference incase you want to take a look at some of my most embarassing code.

PLEASE READ THE NOTES, YOU WILL NOT UNDERSTAND ANYTHING THAT IS GOING ON IF YOU DO NOT READ THE NOTES =D

ALSO: M AND P ARE INCORRECTLY LISTED ON THE DIRECTIONS. IT SHOULD READ
P = TOGGLE MISSILE LAUNCHER ON/OFF
M = FIRE MISSILE
DAMINT
ALSO
X turns on shields NOT S
Press X to toggle shield generators, reeaaaallyy sorry guys ;_;



Known Issues: (I'll edit as needed)

It's F4 = load, not F3 as stated in the notes ;_;

Display flickers, some times a display will rapidly flash on and off, this is almost certainly due to the timing on the robot going out of sync (40 commands per cycle at the moment), it's not too common so it's not a big deal, I will most likely be raising the commands on this board.

Sensor critical hits: I have completely revised the sensor critical hits, they are broken in this version, if some of your displays go solid red, or mostly red, sorry. The new fixed staticy version (which is not perminent as these are sometimes) has not been implimented on this board yet.


Also note, the center of the right displays shows the distance of the enemy ship, if you do not start next to him and he's off screen, go the directon the white ship icon is pointing, directly above this icon also displays the direction of the enemy as N/S/E/W/NE/NW/SE/SW

Old attachment removed.

[Lachesis]

Sounds cexy, man. I'll play it when I get the chance.

[Risu2112]

Here's a newer version of it with working sensor criticals. Also fixed my mistypes on the instruction. If you have the other one replace it with this.

Note that I replaced the enemy's NPG with a plasma beam yeouch. =o

Okay, new attachment, if you downloaded this one do it again.

Sensor Save roll doubled, and removed the double crit bug... Redownload now ^^

Old attachment removed.

[Risu2112]

Bug fix, keep em comming. ^^

If one of the mods would do me the favor of removing the old download links, as I can no longer edit those posts ^^

Don't want any one getting the wrong version..

Old attachment removed.

[Risu2112]

Seems I made more problems in each version than I fixed.
At this time I would like to call your attention to a version that I actualy tested.

Fixes:

Raised commands, cleaned up the mess that made, this should solve just about every visual flicker in the demo.

Mini shield display, disabled in the last version, now working correctly again

Linking boards, you get teleported off the board correctly now after the battle

Double crit solved for real this time

several other small details.

Again, if any one has any bugs please let me know so I can take a look at them, enjoy!

Old attachment removed - download from the link further down instead.