Marathon 1 Redux

[CluckyInventor]

I'm still running the 0.0.5 alpha version, but time doesn't pause when you read terminals. Does setting that flag change this as well? While you might want to drop the time-pause "feature", it might make levels like Arrival different in that the new player sees the terminal, starts reading it, but doesn't notice the alien buggers that are coming to smack him up while he is reading.

[ravenshining]

There is a separate flag for allowing time to stop while reading terminals. I don't plan on using it as I find it ruins the suspension of disbelief. There is, however a

Code: Select all

   $0010 | handles glue like marathon 1

flag I will make use of and possibly also

Code: Select all

   $0020 | the floor is lava

.

I notice there are some unused environment flags, $0800 and $8000. Perhaps I shall experiment with them, or a dev can use them to provide GJing. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure the engine looks at the physics file to determine GJing, so perhaps there's something in there that can be set, if I can find documentation.

[Pfhorrest]

You might be interested in looking at how Eternal handles weapon pickups adding to ammo if you want that behavior in arbitrary ways and not just on TC like in M1.

[treellama]

You're looking for

Code: Select all

_environment_m1_weapons = 0x0400

. I forget why it's a map flag and not a physics flag

[ravenshining]

You might be interested in looking at how Eternal handles weapon pickups adding to ammo if you want that behavior in arbitrary ways and not just on TC like in M1.

I noticed that behaviour, I will take a look.

You're looking for

Code: Select all

_environment_m1_weapons = 0x0400

. I forget why it's a map flag and not a physics flag

That's the flag I set to get the weapon pickup to work, but grenades still blow me backward instead of upward.

Attached is Never Burn Money extracted from the old M1A1, with the 0x0400 environment flag set via hex editor. If you cheat in an AR, fire a bit, and pick up the one on the map, it replenishes as you would expect, but try and GJ out of the Deprivation Chamber and it sends you flying away from the wall.

[treellama]

OK, try this one then:

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_monster_can_grenade_climb = 0x80000000

In the physics model, for the player.

[ravenshining]

Ah! Can you point me to a reference that breaks down the file structure? Last October I had found one for the shapes file and was using it to hex-edit the one I'm currently using, but I can't seem to to find it again.

[ravenshining]

Finally got all the latest stuff up on Simplici7y! Bumped up the version because the release on Github has, much to my embarrassment, a broken HD weapons plugin. Also, you should now see Radix's new term art on G4!

Sorry for the oversight and delay. I'm having some difficulties IRL, and Eternal has been distracting me from this.

http://simplici7y.com/items/marathon-1-redux

...and now the git is fixed as well.

[ravenshining]

Progress on shapes and physics today- some BoBs have been granted a concealed carry permit. They've already got the pockets for it, after all. 25 new bitmaps, 54 frames, 3 sequences and a lot of physics editing later, I've got them shooting up Pfhor - and still running away at the same time. I threw in a few extra CLUTs while I was at it, too, for use on the colony.

They can either whip out a .25 ACP (no ammo harvesting!), a small fusion pistol, or a can of pepper spray. They're not as quick on the draw or as good a shot as the cybernetically enhanced slaves of Durandal from M2, but I think a few of them sprinkled in enhances the combat.

Pepper spray isn't working properly. I set it to energy drain, but unfortunately monsters die to energy drain, so unless Pfhor are deathly allergic to capsaicin I'll probably drop it, it was a silly idea anyway.

[CluckyInventor]

My favorite feature of the latest release of redux is the thing where you go back to the beginning and find the save/charger disabled, but if you are desperate enough you can spam your action key and use them anyways. This makes me wonder: are there any other "disabled" items that can still be used in other scenarios?

The marathon manual states that the pistol is the standard sidearm of security officers but the fusion pistol is very rare. I wonder if this applies to the miniature versions of the weapons as well.

[ravenshining]

Hm, that wasn't intentional...

Using the same pistol as the player is rather inconvenient. Having BoB stuffing a .25 ACP in their pocket and firing from the hip is one thing, but a .45 magnum? I think I'd need a lot more sprites. Also, since actually saving the BoBs is necessary to get to the colony missions, I don't want to give people incentive to loot BoB's corpse.

I think what I'll do is write two new terminal pages about these unobtainable weapons. The smaller pistol could be explained as also being standard issue, but for off-duty self-defense, undercover work, or as a fallback, rather than being strictly for "active duty field personnell." Maybe not a .25 ACP, but another small round that can be given an explanation of being more effective against the Pfhor and Drinnol- maybe the .45 is a hollowpoint, but the smaller pistols fire a steel-core FMJ that is able to punch through the Pfhor's armour and Drinnol's musculature? So Leela allocates the more vulnerable BoBs armour-piercing ammo while sticking you with the .45.

Then the BoB's fusion pistol isn't a Tech.50, but say a Tech.10, a cheaper, mass-produced, low-capacity, non-overchargeable, civilian cousin of the military-grade Tech.50.

[HelviusRufus]

but for off-duty self-defense, undercover work, or as a fallback, rather than being strictly for "active duty field personnell."

Possible more realistic would be the .25 is just the standard issue and everybody gets one. If the person has an MOS that requires more firepower, such as a security officer who would be actively engaging nefarious miscreants, then an appropriate weapon is issued.
That's why I gotta shotgun and you don't.

[CluckyInventor]

It's possible I didn't communicate my second paragraph well. I just wanted to point out that the manual makes clear that the Tech.50 is extremely expensive to produce, and it would seem logical that the Tech.10 or whatever is similarly more expensive than a traditional pistol. For this reason, you should encounter more BoBs wielding .25 ACPs than Tech.10s. Say, a 3:1 ratio. Throw in a few BoBs who spent the extra buck for a fancy weapon for some extra spice but leave most armed BoBs with more standard .25 ACPs.

I'd be more than happy to read a terminal explaining the mechanics of the BoB weapons.

[PerseusSpartacus]

I like how this project is coming along - I think I'll start toying around with some ideas of how to help out; maybe some artwork?

I noticed you were curious about the M1 Tour of Duty we did. In case you needed help finding them, there's a list with links to the posts we did for each level in M1 at the bottom of this page.

As for the discussion of what music to use, Craig Hardgrove actually kindly linked to some other remakes on his website - you can find them here, down near the bottom. I'm particularly fond of the work done by Tobacco and Chibi-usa; largely faithful to the originals, but with a nicer, more modern sound. In my opinion, Tobacco has some particularly nice remakes of Fat Man, Leela and Rushing, while Chibi-usa does a good job updating Aliens Again and New Pacific Reprise.

I strongly approve of arming some of the BoBs - it's rather demoralizing to run around protecting a bunch of useless whiners who scream the same thing over and over again. They really should learn to help themselves!

I also rather like the idea of making the platforms on Colony Ship telescopic - I can totally picture that, and in my mind's eye at least, it looks amazing!

[Alex]

You could say the bobs are armed with makeshift weapons - nailguns or some sort of converted welding device or something. That would explain why the player cant take their weapons, and also if the colours denote different jobs it would explain them all having the same weapon, as presumably they have access to the same tools.

[General-RADIX]

Trying to start a new game (either by just clicking "New Game" or ctrl+shifting) gets me the following error:

Spoiler:

Assertion error!

Program: ...
File: shapes.cpp
Line: 2043

Expession: bitmap

For information on how your program can cause an assertion failure, see the Visual C++ documentation on asserts

(Press Retry to debug the application - JIT must be enabled)

Clicking "Retry" just crashed A1. I hit "Ignore" two times (replace "bitmap" with "primary_colors" and I think "secondary_colors") to no results; going back and disabling the weapons plugin did nothing, either.

I have a bad feeling that this is an easy fix and I'm just not error-literate...

[ravenshining]

Trying to start a new game (either by just clicking "New Game" or ctrl+shifting) gets me the following error:

Spoiler:

Assertion error!

Program: ...
File: shapes.cpp
Line: 2043

Expession: bitmap

For information on how your program can cause an assertion failure, see the Visual C++ documentation on asserts

(Press Retry to debug the application - JIT must be enabled)

Clicking "Retry" just crashed A1. I hit "Ignore" two times (replace "bitmap" with "primary_colors" and I think "secondary_colors") to no results; going back and disabling the weapons plugin did nothing, either.

I have little idea what any of this is about, but the context of line 2043 of shapes.cpp in stable is:

Spoiler:

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static void update_color_environment(
   bool is_opengl)
{
   short color_count;
   short collection_index;
   short bitmap_index;
   
   pixel8 remapping_table[PIXEL8_MAXIMUM_COLORS];
   struct rgb_color_value colors[PIXEL8_MAXIMUM_COLORS];

   memset(remapping_table, 0, PIXEL8_MAXIMUM_COLORS*sizeof(pixel8));

   // dummy color to hold the first index (zero) for transparent pixels
   colors[0].red= colors[0].green= colors[0].blue= 65535;
   colors[0].flags= colors[0].value= 0;
   color_count= 1;

   /* loop through all collections, only paying attention to the loaded ones.  weÕre
      depending on finding the gray run (white to black) first; so itÕs the responsibility
      of the lowest numbered loaded collection to give us this */
   for (collection_index=0;collection_index<MAXIMUM_COLLECTIONS;++collection_index)
   {
      struct collection_definition *collection= get_collection_definition(collection_index);

//      dprintf("collection #%d", collection_index);
      
      if (collection && collection->bitmap_count)
      {
         struct rgb_color_value *primary_colors= get_collection_colors(collection_index, 0)+NUMBER_OF_PRIVATE_COLORS;
         assert(primary_colors);
         short color_index, clut_index;

//         if (collection_index==15) dprintf("primary clut %p", primary_colors);
//         dprintf("primary clut %d entries;dm #%d #%d", collection->color_count, primary_colors, collection->color_count*sizeof(ColorSpec));

         /* add the colors from this collectionÕs primary color table to the aggregate color
            table and build the remapping table */
         for (color_index=0;color_index<collection->color_count-NUMBER_OF_PRIVATE_COLORS;++color_index)
         {
            primary_colors[color_index].value= remapping_table[primary_colors[color_index].value]=
               find_or_add_color(&primary_colors[color_index], colors, &color_count);
         }
         
         /* then remap the collection and recalculate the base addresses of each bitmap */
         for (bitmap_index= 0; bitmap_index<collection->bitmap_count; ++bitmap_index)
         {
            struct bitmap_definition *bitmap= get_bitmap_definition(collection_index, bitmap_index);
            assert(bitmap);



Maybe I have too many "unsafe" colours?

My apologies for forgetting to put you in the credits on the latest Simplici7y dl. Last night I fixed that on GitHub. I will be putting people's aliases unless they tell me they want their real name.

I like how this project is coming along - I think I'll start toying around with some ideas of how to help out; maybe some artwork?

Glad to hear it! I welcome any assistance. What sort of art do you do?

I'm particularly fond of the work done by Tobacco and Chibi-usa; largely faithful to the originals, but with a nicer, more modern sound. In my opinion, Tobacco has some particularly nice remakes of Fat Man, Leela and Rushing, while Chibi-usa does a good job updating Aliens Again and New Pacific Reprise.

I strongly prefer the originals to any remakes I've heard besides Craig's, but I'll give Chibi's a second listen. Can't say I like Tobacco's.

I strongly approve of arming some of the BoBs - it's rather demoralizing to run around protecting a bunch of useless whiners who scream the same thing over and over again. They really should learn to help themselves!

Yes, especially since I want people to save them, not kill them! They now shout "nooo!" as well as "they're everywhere," not to mention the trash talk, apologies, etc. from M2, and even the airlock technicians will kick and punch if cornered. I tried giving the ATs pepper spray, but it makes them too easy to tell apart from the simulacrums and was rather too comical.

I also rather like the idea of making the platforms on Colony Ship telescopic - I can totally picture that, and in my mind's eye at least, it looks amazing!

I'm not 100% sure I can pull that off, but I'll do my best :-) I might instead restructure that whole room as a reactor, with you jumping across control rods.

this reason, you should encounter more BoBs wielding .25 ACPs than Tech.10s. Say, a 3:1 ratio. Throw in a few BoBs who spent the extra buck for a fancy weapon for some extra spice but leave most armed BoBs with more standard .25 ACPs.

Oh, definitely. So far it's even less than that.

Possible more realistic would be the .25 is just the standard issue and everybody gets one. If the person has an MOS that requires more firepower, such as a security officer who would be actively engaging nefarious miscreants, then an appropriate weapon is issued.

That's basically what I intend to say.

[PerseusSpartacus]

Glad to hear it! I welcome any assistance. What sort of art do you do?

Well, I can't say I'm terribly qualified - I'm a novice hobbyist who mostly focuses on portraits (you can find my work here). I was thinking about experimenting with recreating the Hound that was cut out of the original game. It would take me quite a while to put that together, but I think I could get it done. Of course we would need to figure out what the Hound is supposed to do, or if they're even worth the effort of putting in.

For reference, the Marathon Scrapbook describes Hounds thusly:

The Hound moved quite fast but could not climb stairs and only had a melee attack. Hounds acted a lot like piranhas, guarding low spots on a map and wandering off when they couldn’t attack the player any longer.

Also, there are only a few images of what Hounds are supposed to look like:

Concept art for the Hound, from the Marathon Scrapbook

hunter&hound.jpg (15.91 KiB) Viewed 1601 times

Hound sprites, also from the Marathon Scrapbook

Screen shot 2018-03-19 at 2.29.55 PM.png (106.29 KiB) Viewed 1601 times

A screenshot from an early version of Marathon

From these I should be able to make some concept art, which I can then use to create the BMPs for use in the Shapes file. If you plan on using Flippant Sol's xBR Monsters, we can use his methods to create high-res versions of my Hound sprites that will fit in naturally with the rest of the monsters.

[ravenshining]

Nice portraits! Later on, there will be Pfhor terminals to create. Might be fun to have a portrait of a Pfhor for one, maybe praising some Pfhor commander, although the player would have no intelligible text to tell them what it's about.

If making the hounds come to life is your desire, I'll make use of them. I can think of plenty of low, empty areas that could do with some piranhas. Otherwise, plenty of the original sprites could do with a touch-up.

[philtron]

I finally got around to giving Redux a solid playthrough to give some feedback.

I skimmed the thread so I don't think I'm retreading too much ground.

Bigger Guns:

1) I love that staggered lift that's a platform with a border that rises and falls. I am here for that shit.

2) The beginning area is a little architecturally confusing. All the extended windows and ledges actually made it hard for me to figure out where I was going. I think this area could use just some solid, floor-to-ceiling walls.

3) I love the reinterpretation of the BioCore Vents with the liquids. That was really great. This is exactly the kind of alterations I'd hope for from something like Redux.

4) I didn't like how some of the BioCore pits cause damage when you touch their floor. Felt like punishment for exploring (thought there'd be ammo at the bottom), which was especially harsh since there's no shield chargers between then and the "ambush" at the end of the level.

5) Some of the sprite placement seems sloppy. Melee Fighters have trouble dropping off ledges when they're blocked by a "fence" of sprites, so they just pace back and forth and I shoot them from afar. I wouldn't use spirtes in combat areas because its hell on the monster pathfinding.

6) Really liked the exterior views onto the surface of the Marathon.

G4 Sunbathing:

1) I think the sound needs some work. I didn't hear any gun sounds at all, except for the Fusion Pistol overcharged beeping. I'd prefer to at least hear muffled sounds. I think also total ambient silence was a bit grating. I think some ambient "astronaut breathing" would be good along with some "Jjaro creaking" ambience.

There was an unfinished mod that did Vacuum sounds really, really well. I forget what it was called, but you could actually float through space from one ship to another, and the Marathon was old and dilapidated and falling apart; it did some neat tricks like having "vacuum" actually be a clear liquid so you could actually use airlocks to enter and exit ships and the gravity would "change".

Anyone remember what that mod was called?

2) Can't think of much else to say. If you were interested in making architectural changes, those identical, long straight, empty hallways could probably use some pillars, changes in floor/ceilling elevation, shelves, or something.

Alien Guns:

I know there was some discussion about this and I think there was a poll, but here are my thoughts nevertheless. As is usual with my thoughts, this ends up being a bit long so I'm hiding it in a spoiler.

Spoiler:

One thing Bungie was really good at back in the day was making sure that each unit/weapon occupied a unique gameplay niche. If you want to use a particular play style then there was a specific weapon you'd want to use.

The problem with every Marathon mod that included the Pfhor staff is that it shares the same exact gameplay niche as the fists, and because the staff is usually faster, it makes the fists redundant and obsolete. The player ends up using the staff exclusively and this completely changes the feel and atmosphere of the game.

For other mods I don't think this is a problem, but for this mod, which is to a degree trying to recreate the experience of the original Marathon, it is a problem that as a player I'm falling back on using the Pfhor staff in exclusion of other weapons.

This was actually a bit of a problem. Because of the excess of Pfhor ammo, I ended up primarily using Pfhor weapons to conserve my human ammo, which really changed the nature and the feel of the gameplay. (Maybe there's excess ammo just for testing right now, idk.)

If you also feel like this is a problem then these are my suggested solutions:

1) Make alien weapons disappear when used up, just like the Enforcer gun. It makes the weapons feel different and special. It also adds to the feeling of using the enemy's weapon as a scramble for survival, which I liked.

2) Make ammo/weapons drop only from special monsters that are placed in unique locations or in secret areas. (You can also do this by creating monsters that look and are identical to regular monsters except that they drop items and the regular monsters don't; mix the item-monsters with the regular monsters during level placement.)

I know this was already briefly discussed and there was a vote, but there's my thoughts. Each of those suggestions basically just makes the alien weapons more rare, thus preserving the core gameplay by encouraging players to rely on the main human weapons, and it makes the alien weapons feel more special and unique.

I'll also make a couple suggestions for making the alien weapons a little more unique; as I mentioned, Marathon's weapons all occupy unique gameplay niche's. The Pfhor weapons right now are just redundant.

Trooper gun: I get that it fires grenades faster, and maybe the bullets faster (?),but it's just a faster AR. My suggestion to actually make it feel different would be this: since Troopers tend to fire two grenades in quick succession, give the player's Trooper gun a burst of 1 on the secondary fire. This will fire two grenades simultaneously (I don't think there is a way to get them to fire in succession automatically); I'd give the Trooper secondary fire some Theta error (fires inaccurately) but check the "No verticle error" for whatever projectile you use for the grenade, which will cause the grenades to fire in different horizontal directions but will be accurate vertically. Also, I'd give the primary fire less verticle error, so that it's spread is halfway between an AR's spread and the horizontal spread of the Enforcer gun. I think this would make it feel more unique.

Staff: I like the idea of adding recoil to the staff, but the backwards-recoil of the melee and the forwards-recoil of the ranged seems counter-intuitive and a little off. I think it'd work better if it was reversed and you have forward-recoil for the melee, backwards for ranged (or maybe backwards recoil for both?). Also with the ranged attack, as with my suggestion for Trooper grenades, I'd give an inaccurate (6-10 theta error) burst of 2 (which becomes 3 projectiles) to mimic the double fire of some Fighters and to underscore how the Officer doesn't really know how to use the weapon properly. I think this would help make it feel more unique and fun to use; you throw three random projectiles like it's a panic weapon. For the melee attack, instead of making it fast, I'd make it do a lot of damage, but it's recovery period is much longer; almost like you're smacking it down like a heavy hammer. I think this would really help the melee attack feel different from fists.

Anyway that's my feedback, hope it's helpful.

[ravenshining]

Thank you, Philtron! These kinds of posts are wicked helpful.

4) I didn't like how some of the BioCore pits cause damage when you touch their floor. Felt like punishment for exploring (thought there'd be ammo at the bottom), which was especially harsh since there's no shield chargers between then and the "ambush" at the end of the level.

I'm sorry to hear that. Did you skim through the terminal and miss Leela telling you that The BioVent core's macerators are still running, so stay off the bottom if you must venture through them.? The tunnels between them are 2 WU high, and should be easy to swim through without ever touching the bottom.

5) Some of the sprite placement seems sloppy. Melee Fighters have trouble dropping off ledges when they're blocked by a "fence" of sprites, so they just pace back and forth and I shoot them from afar. I wouldn't use spirtes in combat areas because its hell on the monster pathfinding.

That's what feedback is all about- I did not experience this issue in my own tests and will have another look at the final room. Thank you!

G4 Sunbathing:

1) I think the sound needs some work. I didn't hear any gun sounds at all, except for the Fusion Pistol overcharged beeping. I'd prefer to at least hear muffled sounds. I think also total ambient silence was a bit grating. I think some ambient "astronaut breathing" would be good along with some "Jjaro creaking" ambience.

That should not happen. There are muffled gun and explosion noises, and an electric hum for the fusion pistol. That's all set in shapes and physics, not Lua or MML, and should be rock solid. What version are you running, did you get it from GitHub or Simplici7y? Have you double-checked your environment settings? Are you sure your volume isn't just too low?

The breathing sound is a good idea - that's what "unused 1" slot in M2/∞ sound files is for. I think I heard one in Eternal, not to mention a few other sounds I'd like to use from there...

There was an unfinished mod that did Vacuum sounds really, really well. I forget what it was called, but you could actually float through space from one ship to another, and the Marathon was old and dilapidated and falling apart; it did some neat tricks like having "vacuum" actually be a clear liquid so you could actually use airlocks to enter and exit ships and the gravity would "change".

Anyone remember what that mod was called?

Return to Marathon, perhaps? I'll have to check it out.

2) Can't think of much else to say. If you were interested in making architectural changes, those identical, long straight, empty hallways could probably use some pillars, changes in floor/ceilling elevation, shelves, or something.

That was already on the to-do list!

The problem with every Marathon mod that included the Pfhor staff is that it shares the same exact gameplay niche as the fists, and because the staff is usually faster, it makes the fists redundant and obsolete.

I think you are right. In the first couple versions, you had two shots per staff. People complained, I upped it to four shots, people still wanted more, and now it's 13 melee / four ranged. It does actually dissappear if you use up all the ammo, but that doesn't happen since there's so much lying around.

And, your suspicions are correct that the way it is set up now is only for testing purposes. I was planning on having the weapon's functionality increase slowly over the course of the game. When you first get one, it would be melee-only, slower firing, and non-reloadable. As the Leela learns more about the Pfhor from rescued crew, or as Durandal and Tycho communicate with them directly, you'd learn how to fire projectiles, reload it, and fire it faster. Pfhor don't start dropping spare batteries until you learn what they are and how to install them, so you won't have huge stockpile when that time comes.

That said, I'm more than willing to nerf it's final form!

Trooper gun: I get that it fires grenades faster, and maybe the bullets faster (?),but it's just a faster AR.

...that fires in vacuum and under liquids.

I don't like burst fire for either weapon - if the Pfhor don't get it, neither should you - and the no vertical error idea too similar to the scatter rifle, but to carry that same idea in another direction... Here's a breakdown of the stats at present:

Spoiler:

Code: Select all

               MA.75  TSMG
Bullet ROF      10/s   7.5/s
Bullet Error     10      9
Bullet Damage  10-15   16-19
Bullet Rounds   52      18
Grenade ROF    1.4/s    3/s
Grenade Error    0       4
Grenade Damage 81-100  41-60
Grenade Rounds   7       4

If I reduce the SMG error from 9 to 8 or 4, it will result in a strange, = shaped pattern that will never hit exactly where it is aimed, but have a tighter grouping. The grenades, maybe I'll up the error to 5 but have no horizontal error, which will feel very strange and alien in the hands of the player, but still behave similarly to how it's handled by green and purple troopers. Alternatively, I could set the error low, and give it vertical wander. I'll play with both and see how it feels.

Then there's always the homing grenade option which the purple and blue troopers will use if included, but for the player that will require Lua and probably not multiplayer.

EDIT: After fiddling with various settings, I settled on an error of 4 for primary fire (very tight grouping, but strange pattern that never hits exactly) and 9 for secondary with no horizontal error. Like this, grenades make good suppressing fire if you empty the whole clip in one go. The Eternal firing sound would go great here if I can get permission.

Staff: I like the idea of adding recoil to the staff, but the backwards-recoil of the melee and the forwards-recoil of the ranged seems counter-intuitive and a little off.

That's intentional Try to melee with the staff, and it forces you out of melee range, try to fire projectiles, and it brings you closer to the enemy...

Now that Treelama has pointed out there's a physics flag to enable grenade climbing (although I still need documentation of the offesets to actually implement it), I may rework the staff recoil entirely.

[ravenshining]

Remember Science Officer 2nd Class St'ngr and his/her unauthorised experiments in comparitive physiology? S/he was only ever to gather the tiniest of scraps from dead S'pht exoskeletons, and even then only when using minimal force. So, I thought, why not have the same happen for the player?

I took the images of scraps from the term, applied perspective. made a sequence for them at scale 1, and set them to only appear if the compiler suffers a soft death - they will not appear if you are wise and kill them with the fusion pistol, shock staff, or grenades. What do you think? Here's 15 dead S'pht all lured into one killing zone on G4:

In other progress news, I've finished adding all the Marine bitmaps. Now to fix the sequences...

[philtron]

Thank you, Philtron! These kinds of posts are wicked helpful.

Excellent.

I'm sorry to hear that. Did you skim through the terminal and miss Leela telling you that The BioVent core's macerators are still running, so stay off the bottom if you must venture through them.? The tunnels between them are 2 WU high, and should be easy to swim through without ever touching the bottom.

I'm not talking about the tunnels, which weren't too bad. I'm talking about the isolated pits of liquid. I starting going down them thinking there might be secret ammo at the bottom. Sorely mistaken.

Are you sure your volume isn't just too low?

Possibly. I was playing with just my computer speakers. I'll try again with some headphones later.

Return to Marathon, perhaps? I'll have to check it out.

That's the one! It did some really interesting tricks. Return to Marathon and Marathon Apotheosis are two of my favorite mods even though neither of them is completely finished.

I think you are right. In the first couple versions, you had two shots per staff. People complained, I upped it to four shots, people still wanted more, and now it's 13 melee / four ranged.

That said, I'm more than willing to nerf it's final form!

I don't think nerfing it is the issue. The issue is "does it have unique behavior that is fun to play. differentiates it from other weapons, and encourages an interesting play style from the player".

Trooper gun: I get that it fires grenades faster, and maybe the bullets faster (?),but it's just a faster AR.

...that fires in vacuum and under liquids.

Yes, but what I'm talking about is how the weapon feels. How does it feel to play with this gun. The fact that it fires under liquids and in vacuum is pretty superficial when it behaves/plays almost identically to the AR. At that point you might as well just let the AR be vacuum ready for all the difference it makes.

The original point of making only duel and fusion pistols vacuum enabled was that it changed the nature of the game for players. They had to rely on a different weapon set and a different playstyle while in vacuum levels. If you have a vacuum capable Trooper Rifle that behaves exactly like an AR it just further negates the entire point of having vacuum levels at all.

I don't like burst fire for either weapon - if the Pfhor don't get it, neither should you

Well the Pfhor don't get to fire while strafing nor do they get to fire bullets simultaneously with grenades. They also don't get to switch weapons, either. Ultimately, I think the primary thing to focus on is to make the alien weapons interesting and unique to play somehow. Any difference between how the player uses the weapon versus how the monsters use the weapon can be explained away with some terminal attributing the difference to human physiology, lack of understanding of the alien tech, or Pfhor bureaucracy outlawing the use of weapons in the way the player uses them.

Example: Let's say, hypothetically, you make the Trooper fire all its primary rounds in one shotgun-like volley (to make it more unique, and as a homage to the old AR glitch that people used to use in multiplayer). Then you have a terminal explaining that the Pfhor Troopers are totally capable of firing their guns this way, but Pfhor bureaucracy tells them they're only allowed to fire in a series of single shots with the help of a tertiary trigger that the Officer's fingers can't reach. Just an example.

EDIT: deleted some stuff about pfhor staff

If I reduce the SMG error from 9 to 8 or 4, it will result in a strange, = shaped pattern that will never hit exactly where it is aimed, but have a tighter grouping.

Ah, that's right, I forgot that Theta Error doesn't actually change the accuracy of the fire but changes the fire to a preset pattern. There's a page somewhere on the internet that has a chart of each pattern for each theta error, but I can't find it right now. I thought it might be in BattleCat's Anvil Tips but it looks like that page doesn't exist anymore.

[philtron]

I replayed the mod to get a better idea on things.

Sound in vacuum is okay. Some sounds are just a lot quiter than others so I didn't hear them without headphones.

I played around some more with the alien weapons to get a feel for them. I didn't notice before that the ranged attack on the Staff is actually a charge up attack. I was playing around with this and I noticed there's actually a nice dynamic you could build off of with the staff: lunging forward with the charge up attack and then backing up with the attack that does recoil is kind of fun. It has an interesting rhythmic quality. I'd recommend expanding on this dynamic with the staff. Maybe have a longer lunge and a longer backwards recoil so the player can lunge at enemies and then push themselves backwards really quick in this kind of dance-like rhythm. I think that might make the staff more fun and unique to play.

The room where you pick up the assault rifle on "Bigger Guns":

It always seemed pointless that the switch in there turns on and off the light. Why would it be set up like that? What is it lighting up? I always thought it would be cool if the switch opened up a curved window which then let light in from outside, thus explaining why the room gets brighter and darker. That's my suggestion; have the switch in there open a window onto Tau Ceti or what have you.

I actually did this on a map I made many years ago but never released because it was garbage. I've attached it so you can see the effect I'm talking about, if you're interested. I've nuked all the objects so there's no monsters and I've put the starting position in the assault rifle room. There's actually some neat areas (including a warehouse with crates and palettes) so if anyone would like to play the actual combat version of the map let me know and I can upload it.

[ravenshining]

The problem with increasing recoil, is it makes it way too easy for the player to fly about. At 85, with four shots you can climb up to 2 WU ledges. So, if I knock the number of melee rounds per charge back down to 4, I can increase the recoil from 60 to 80 without too much issue. I can raise it more if I slow the rate of fire, but I ought to get to bed.

It always seemed pointless that the switch in there turns on and off the light. Why would it be set up like that? What is it lighting up?

It is a light switch. It turns on the lights that are all over the alcove.

I've made a breathing sound for the vacuum similar to Eternal's, although mine is slightly longer, higher, and in 16 bit; and I'm working on improving some other sounds as well as attending to the physics ideas.

I'm drastically increasing the recoil on the trooper gun (it's firing better ammo than your AR, and designed to be comfortable for alien physiology), and have changed about damage resistances. For both the BoB's pistol and the SMG, I'm using the "shotgun" damage type. Armoured and large enemies will be more vulernable to shotgun damage. Changed the trooper grenade contrail to a yellow sparkle for visual contrast.

EDIT nvm projectile speed diatribe, it messes with multiplayer.

Changes are up on GitHub for the base shape, sounds, and physics. Not in the scenario folder or map yet.
https://github.com/ravenshining/M1R.