TCs: All at once or in Plug-Stages?

Raemon

I've almost finished Act one of my TC, Exodus. It contains roughly 35 storyline missions, a small area of inhabited "systems" (around 10 planetary systems. My game takes place entirely in the Sol system so far). Each segment of the whole TC, when completed, will take place in relatively confined spaces. (The second Act of the game begins when you reconstruct the hypergate to the Inner Solar System, so you can't get there before you complete Act 1.)

Therefore, it would be pretty easy to release the game in chunks. I could do Act 1 now, and when its finished, make Acts 2 and 3 add on files that you can download later. Or I could just wait until the whole thing's done.

So, now I ask: would people rather I finish the whole thing before I ask for Beta Testing/Normal Download? Or are there people out there who would like to start Beta Test it now and perhaps influence ideas/plot development for later segments?

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Andcarne

I would say that it would probably be good to start beta testing as soon as the first act is done, and the second is close to completion. This way, when the beta testers are done the first act the second should be done. I would also think that releasing it in chunks would be a good idea. As long as the next parts are in progress/nearly done. If you get people playing it then don't release the next part it will seriously annoy everyone playing it.

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Martin Turner

Release it to your beta testers in chunks, but release the whole game in one go - you never know, you may want to change some of the decisions you made early on once you've done the final missions, and you may also want to upgrade your earlier quality after you've finished your final stuff.

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Raemon

Okay then.

It still needs a bit of tweaking before it is ready for Beta Testers, but if anyone is interested in helping out with them, drop me a note hear. (I'd like at least 1 Windows user if possible, in case there are any problems that arise from the transition between Mac and Windows)

Also, although I do not consider new graphics too important, if anyone who is beta testing also can do good graphics and sees something that they would particularly like to add or redo, feel free to let me know about that too.

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mrxak

There's a whole bunch of (potentially) willing beta testers in a list. See the link in my sig...

Chuckles

Quote

Originally posted by mrxak:
**There's a whole bunch of (potentially) willing beta testers in a list. See the link in my sig...

**

Speaking of which, I need to edit that.

Raemon, check your inbox, I sent you an e-mail expressing interest in beta-testing your plug(s).

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Starbridge42

I am expressing interst in Beta Testing
My E-mail adress is Starbridge42@hotmail.com
oh, and I'm on Mac.

-Starbridge42

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Raemon

I will be uploading Act One: In the Arms of Jove, to the Exodus website as soon as I have enough time to do it all at once. I'm not sure how long this will be. (I'm using dial up, so I'll need an hour or two to do it, and I'm suddenly finding myself with a rather busy schedule)

If all goes well, it'll be up on Tuesday. Whenever I get it done, I'll reply to this thread again with the web address and the announcement that it's up.

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Bomb

Quote

Originally posted by Martin Turner:
**Release it to your beta testers in chunks, but release the whole game in one go - you never know, you may want to change some of the decisions you made early on once you've done the final missions, and you may also want to upgrade your earlier quality after you've finished your final stuff.

**

I've always been a supporter of the system where you sort of get a rough finished piece done then send it out and smooth out the edges and bugs during the beta period. Of course, I have run some of the worst betas in the history of plug-in making, so what do I know?

_bomb

Raemon

In theory, I should be done by now, and the first Act should be up for download. Yesterday, all I had to do was change the descriptions of some outfits.

Unfortunately, I've ran into a bug of some sort that is screwing around with all my missions. Ones that are supposed to auto abort do not. Some of them are invisible and shouldn't be. A bunch of weapon outfits suddenly stopped working. I have know idea what happened. So I have no idea how long it will be before it's ready for Beta.

If anyone has any idea what's causing this, and how to stop it, please help me out.

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Guest_UE_Research & Development_*

Which plug-in editor are you using? Some of them are more stable than others, and some of them are notorious for instability and corruption of files being edited :).

EDIT: It may be a good idea to break up your plug-in into several plugs, one for each type of resource (missions, ships, outfits, etc). That should make troubleshooting easier. As well, you may want to write in 'null resources' to override any resources that are used by the default scenario but not by your plug-in (e.g. if the regular data files contained missions 128-600 and you only used 128-400, make 'null resources' for 401-600 containing no real mission information). Someone else may be able to help you to a better capacity than me.

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(This message has been edited by UE_Research & Development (edited 10-21-2003).)

Dimpfinator

Quote

Originally posted by UE_Research & Development:
**Which plug-in editor are you using? Some of them are more stable than others, and some of them are notorious for instability and corruption of files being edited:).
**

Yeah, I've been having problems with MissionComputer (the latest version) not being able to save Dëscs, and then corrupting the resource associated with the dësc. Nasty little bug, so I've been doing my stuff in ResEdit until I work out what's going wrong. It's always possible that I have a corrupted version, but it was working fine for quite a while, no bugs at all.
Of course there was the infamous EV-Edit, which gave me endless hours of trouble until I found ResEdit was what most people used. That was back in the day when I knew next to nothing about resouces etc. :bang head:

Anyways, It would make sense to break it into chunks, especially since that way you could upload it piece by piece because you're on 56K.

~Dimpfinator

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David Arthur

Quote

Originally posted by Dimpfinator:
Yeah, I've been having problems with MissionComputer (the latest version) not being able to save Dëscs, and then corrupting the resource associated with the dësc.

Could you give me an example of the resource corruption you're experiencing?

Also, could you check whether the problem occurs when you use Save As? There's an issue with the standard Save command in version 3.0.0; I've uploaded an update that fixes it, but it's taking so long for the add-ons page to be updated that I may have to re-upload it to my own site.

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kauthor

At this rate, MacDevil told me he uploaded Heart of Darkness TWO WEEKS AGO. I will suggest re-uploading to your site. Remind me to strangle EVula.

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Dimpfinator

Quote

Originally posted by David Arthur:
**Could you give me an example of the resource corruption you're experiencing?
**

Sure. I'm running 3.0.0, and when I click the outf editor, then double click the resource I want to edit (lets make it 128 just for the sake of simplicity). I then click "edit description".
When I'm done there, I click OK, and it then comes up with a dialog saying that it cannot save that resource, and when I click OK, ID 128 appears completely blank, although it still exists (no fields with anything in them if I go back in.)
There seems to be no problem saving(cmd-S). I just tried to re-create the error, and it wouldn't do it. This may have to do with me having just upgraded to EVN 1.06 since the error (slow internet connection--had to get it from a friend. I had been running 1.02) This is on OSX 10.2.4 also.

I hope this helps you out,

~Dimpfinator

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Dimpfinator

I found the problem:
It's usually a problem when pasting resources. It won't paste new resources at first, and I have to hit Try Again and Replace before it appears. Not a big problem at all, and I'm back using it. Being to select multiple resources for copying & pasting would be usefull though. Future addition?

Heh. Still haven't had a problem with saving, or Save As.

~Dimpfinator

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Raemon

I'm using ResEdit in OS X. I'm also not using plug-ins, because my initial attempts to do that didn't work whereas my initial attempts to just hack the Data files did. I think I could probably translate everything to plug format now if I wanted to, but I don't really feel like it, unless it becomes clear that the fact that I am using hacked Data files is the reason it isn't working.

It was all working fine until I added the one invisible mission, which made the other mission not work.

I did, however, fix the outfits and the "Yay! You made landfall!" mission. Those were all resource editing errors I just happened to make at the same time, which made the whole thing look like one huge conspiracy to destroy the TC.

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