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Well, I've decided to keep a progress log, so you'll know how far away it is to completion. All dates prior to now I don't remember.
Description:
Well, when I first came up with the plug, I was going to call it Terran Wars. I've recently decided that War In The Void has a nicer ring to it, so that's the name. It will be rather huge. My current plans include 160 ships per "race", with 8 "races". I'll also be having 30 missions for each "race." I'm not planning on any branching of the missions. As far is difficulty goes: yes, it will be difficult. However, I'll include a few training missions for each side to update you on the new concepts and get you in shape to play it. There will be loads of new styles of weapons and ships, and I'll try to keep them as realistic as possible (for instance, cruisers are big, destroyers are small, etc.). Many new concepts and skills will need to be learned.
Progress Log Entries:
A long time ago: Decided to make a really big plug. Really big.
Still a while ago: Began brainstorming new ship classes, and did a few graphics.
A while yet: I got tired of working on it, and quit for a while.
Not as long ago: Started working on it, but completely scrapped all but a few graphics, which were renamed.
Recently: Began working a lot on graphics for it. I've also been brainstorming all sorts of new things which will be very nice for it.
1/25/01: Made a progress log. I also have most of the graphics done, and should be ready to start working with Hera in about 2 days.
------------------ "I think I have discovered the problem with humans. It is not entirely stupidity, as I once thought. It is their pigheaded and baseless philosophy: "If it isn't me, then it's opinions, feelings, and life do not matter, and it was meant to serve me." They also have this ability for creating excuses that are pointless, but they get others to believe it. A few examples: "It's only some savages. It's only five acres of rain forest. It's only one semi-truck. It's only fifty gallons of toxic waste..." After this realization, I marvelled at how humans, and the rest of the planet, have survived for so very long." - Me
1/27/01: Just finished with the graphics. I'll probably make some more while I think of new ideas for levels, but this is it for now. I'll begin with the plug tomorrow. I also organized the graphics into various folders, because Strata was complaining the the main folder with all of the graphics in it had too many files. It's gonna be painful to make the spins for all of these...
Perhaps you can use a (registered) version of Graphics Converter. There's a function where you can assign a set of transformations to a script, and apply those transformations to a group of graphics. That way, you can have those 160+ graphics all converted to spins in one or two quick keystrokes.
------------------ Ne Cede Malis Sed Contra Audientor Ito
I don't have it, and don't know where I could get it. I'd appreciate it if you could tell me where, though.
Quote
Originally posted by Mag Steelglass: **I don't have it, and don't know where I could get it. I'd appreciate it if you could tell me where, though.
**
you can get it at : (url="http://"http://www.lemkesoft.de/")http://www.lemkesoft.de/(/url)
------------------
Thanks.
1/28/01: Began working with Hera, and got some basics done. I got my first corrupted copy within 10 minutes of creating it. :rolleyes: I started again, though, and everything's okay. I might work on it more today, but I don't know. I don't think I'll post more stuff for a while, as there probably isn't going to be much to report on.
2/1/01: I've selected my testers. I've decided that this will take forever if I only have other people testing at beta time, so I will be having testers throughout the development of it. I've already emailed the testers, so if you didn't get an email, you're not a tester.
As far as progress on the plug goes, I have 1.5 levels done. Making new graphics is slowing me down, but I'll be done with most of them by the time the Confederacy's missions are done. I wont need to make any more graphics after that, so it'll speed up from there.
I really need you to reply to that e-mail I sent you yesterday.
------------------ No-one here is exactly as they appear.
You sent me an email? I never got any emails from you. Try sending it again, I guess.
2/5/01: I have the first two training missions pretty much done. I think I'll do one minor tweak to the second one and test it to make sure it works (a total of about five minutes), and then start working on the third one.
(This message has been edited by Mag Steelglass (edited 02-06-2001).)
2/10/01: Have the third training mission nearly done. The thing that's causing all of this to go so slow is making the ship sprites, and not wanting to, as each one takes about half an hour. I've also implemented the destruction sequences, which are very different from the ones in standard Ares. I've also planned out some other things, but I don't think I should tell you about them. That's about all, for now.
------------------ "I am the supreme dictator of the universe, it's just that nobody knows about it yet." "Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow."
2/18/01: Well, I have the Confederate training missions done, and I think I have the first actual Confederate mission all nice and done. I don't think I'll give any new versions of the plug to my testers until tuesday, though. That way, they'll have a lot to look forward to. The weapons and ships are progressing nicely, and a good balance exists. And, so you know, you can worry about the missions being as difficult as the ones in The Rogue.
dont send mine till wendsday, well i already emailed you about it...
------------------ just take my post, and imagine everything is speeled right. nickel count: 9
Originally posted by Mag Steelglass: **2/18/01: And, so you know, you can worry about the missions being as difficult as the ones in The Rogue.;)
You can say that again Yipes.
Heh.
You know you are screwed when you can't beat the first mission. Maybe when my brain recovers from this cold...
------------------ Formerly-Rampant Human-Coded AI
2/25/01: I added a feature which lets a ship know if it's capable of orbital bombardment and acts accordingly. I've also redone the skill to be out of 100 instead of 21. My testers have also brought up another point to my attention: it's too hard. So, I'm going through it to make it a bit less difficult, and I think I'm (so far) managing to keep it decently difficult, yet not difficult to the point where it can't be beaten.
3/1/01: Well, I just recently got level 5 pretty much done, which puts me at 33% of the Confederate mission string complete (there are also five training levels that I've already done). This puts me at a total of 3.7 percent done, which means about two more years until the whole thing is done. As you can see, this is a very BAD thing. I think that things should pick up after I'm done with the Confederate mission string, as I'll hopefully have all of the sprites done, and I won't need to make any more. Also, I'll then have a nice large chunk of the objects that I'll be needing all done, so I won't have to make a bunch things every single time I start making a new level.
I'm still getting bugs found and features suggested by the testers, I think I'll use this part of the post just to let them know that they're doing a good job. (This isn't just nice bs, guys, I really am grateful. Thanks.)
how many of the other testers can actually beat these levels without cheats besides me? just wondering...
posted by mag steelglass This puts me at a total of 3.7 percent done, which means about two more years until the whole thing is done. As you can see, this is a very BAD thing.
(sarcastic)oh goody i get to test this until im in college(/sarcastic)
posted by mag steelglass **(This isn't just nice bs, guys, I really am grateful. Thanks.) **
sure....
------------------ just take my post, and imagine everything is speeled right. nickel count: 10
Originally posted by Pyro: **how many of the other testers can actually beat these levels without cheats besides me? just wondering... **
To my knowledge, zero. I probably could beat them if I could play Ares for 3 or 4 solid hours, but that's not happening.