Times of War Development Team

As long as it's a direct link - if it slows the game down even a titch it'll have to go (the keyboard & mouse -> console). Sound reasonable? ;)

I think I can keep the speeds up. This is what halflife does, If im not mistaken =).

Z.

Ive got DirectInput running both mouse and keyboard in the UI system.

Z.

Oh, Sas. I wanted to ask you this =).

I am getting a wireless modem for my Palm V*. I wanted to ask you if you could have two versions of the CR fora, one regular, and one straight text and hyperlinks for me =).

Z.

* I got a great deal on eBay. The modem is normally $369.00. I got mine for $20.50 =).

These new things all sound pretty cool.

Zaei, i agree with Sas, if putting all the stuff through the console slows it down scrap it. If not, run with it.

Now i have the networking running i will start sorting out some applications to test it. Im also thinking of putting the Protocol class back into it because this allows for a much quicker/easier implementation of new parts to the server and client. probably only for when its LOBBY and GAME state so the actual connecting code will never be seen in the engine.

Not sure how much work i will get done this weekend coz im going out Saturday.

Sas - On the planning it sound s abit weird, im not really a game player so im not sure if the "gaming world" would like that so i leave it open to the others.

The AI should stop the units from jamming or getting stuck, tis a must !!!

View wise, something like AoE i think would be best.

Since ToW is introducing all of these new concepts, we had decided at the beginning to allow a "Classic" mode of play. This is where houses give "food", units are "built", and all the rest of this unrealism.

And I'm still thinking about the planning phase, so is there any way I could make it better?

For the planning and strategy, I was planning to give players access to a sector map, where they could plan attacks, and such. basically, the idea is that when a unit is trained, it is automatically assigned to a unit (either a unit of all the same unit type, or mixed, the player decides). You will alos be able to give these units a creative name =). Then, there would be two selection modes, unit and individual. When in individual mode, you select individuals. In unit selection mode, you select the entire unit, and control it as one group. Many games limit the number of groups you can have at one time, so they lose out on this. In the planning phase, you will be able to set paths for units. For instance, a flanking attack would have both units circle around the enemy forces (this is where recon comes in, the AI will automatically adjust to go to the last enemy sighting). At a prearranged signal, both units attack.

Oh, and I doubt that the console thing will do anything to slow the game down. I thought that my stack tracing might have been slowing the game down, by adding an n length string to a buffer and removing it for every single function called, but there was no significant frame rate change. Also, I have my control system ideas (it uses abstract classes, so that I can have PlayerControl, and AIControl classes, and use them transparently), which limit the number of actions that can be performed each frame to 1 (so the AI doesnt have a huge advantage).

I like the idea about backup plans.

I would prefer a full radius viewpoint, because it is easiest. I dont know if we are going to be doing FOW, but I dont think that it would be very realistic if an entire enemy unit could walk up behind an individual without them noticing =). Perhaps we could have a half radius in front to the full vision range, and a halfradius behind with full vision range - 1 to simulate hearing.

Z.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Zaei
Not full access, but the same amount that they would get from keyboard/mouse access, and then some.

The current implementation of the console CAN actually carry out this style of commands, with a wrapper to add the object code in.

Z.

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That looks bitching!

I want one.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Arbiter
That looks bitching!

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:p


[IGNORE] lol - playing with the quote thing [/IGNORE]

=).

Z.

I've got DInput up and running, and taking input =). Now I just need to integrate the system in with the Engine, and set up the callback system.

Z.

Input callbacks are working =). They look like VB calls:

Code:

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void TimesOfWar_Mod::TOW_MouseButtonDown(int button)
{

}

---

I have callbacks for key down and up, mouse button down and up, mouse move, and mouse wheel scroll.

Z.

Hum.
About the viewpoint, how about this deal?

http://www.vbforums.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=948169

The faintest red is the range of hearing, the middle red is the behind viewpoint, and the brightest red is the front viewing range.

Is that what you meant, or have I gone off on a totally different way?

Actually you know what, let's have a full radius ;)

Full radius is fine =).

I got fonts and text display up and running tonight, from scratch =). Its not perfect yet, but it works =).

Z.

I'm just dropping by to see how things are. I hope your game is going right. i can't rejoin yet, I'm just borrowing my dad's internet connection. :)

Too bad. Nice to hear from you again though! ;)

Funny thing I found is that my email is still listed in the Crystal Rain TOW developers list!:D Do you still use that site?

If you want to be there in the new version, you're there, as long as you're going to contribute at one point in time to the end development. However, if all you can give is advice and the odd idea, I can list you under "Creative Consultant", if you'd like. By the way, that site hasn't been updated. The new (and not-yet-finished-but-soon-to-be-that-way) site is at http://www.crystal-rain.com/preview/.

I'll try to help, if I can ever get internet. I've even forgotten who I worked with! One question though. What happened to the part of the story I wrote? You probably had to change it for something else, right?

Good to hear from you KamiKazeKiwi :D

Nice going Zaei !

YAY, i finally found why it wasnt working. I was used sizeof instead of strlen, u use one for sending and one for receiving and i used da wrong one for this certain place.

All working KICK ASS perfect :D

i have now got the workings of messaging users working (the bones, of whispering though this is not complete yet). I now have implementation in the way of an invalid username/password/game/version being passed results in an error.

Once a game has been played through fully, ie a winner has been decided. what screen is going to show ?? will there be one with results on it ?? (have u played red alert ??)

Yes, Psy (you'll notice EVERY RTS has this ;)), so I'm sure we won't leave it out. It should have stats, awards, a cool timeline, and the option to save the game's log, so you can replay it ;). Maybe this is asking for too much, but for training you could maybe have a "ghost" civ that was your civ in a previous game. You can load up one of this demo files and add the civs as ghost civs ;)

LOL - I dont play many games, im more of a creator than player.

I will add a results screen to the end, well not the actual screen, but the implenetation i nnetworking, so the server can tell the clients to go to it.

I have added an OnReady callback to the networking.

This is so the client can tell the engine when to send the name of the game it wants to join. This will probably be used for other parts too.

By the end of this week i should have a demo of the networking out. It will be similar to last time - a chat program - featuring:

- Current Talkers (Current Players)
- Single Chat Room (Lobby)
- Passworded Server (Locked Games)
- Whispering

hehe, oh that was short, but hey, all of the error handling will be set up perfectly so every error that can occur is handled. Everything will be coded exactly so it can almost be re-used as is for the actual game implementations.

I can now load textures using the TOW .texture format =). its actually a simple RAW format, using a converter i wrote in VB. I am still having a little trouble with the thing (For some reason, it keeps telling me the file is 2 bytes long), so I have hardcoded 256 as the texture height and width for the moment.

Z.

Ok, figured out the problem on that one =). Texture loading works =).

Z.

Kool =)

May i suggest Sastraxi and Zaei download a demo of Dungeon Seige (Microsoft), just been watching my bro play it and it is very nice. lots of inspiration there and a very good camera system. 32 rotation like ours by moving mouse to edge of screen. Zoom in and out with mouse wheel.

I got messgaing/whispering all working ship shape =)

Heres a little simple log from current runnings of the server.

Code:

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Divinity Networking
--------------------------
Divnity Networking Initialized
Divnity Network Selected: DN_NETWORK_IP
Divnity Networking Server Started
Connection From 127.0.0.1:2532
OnHello
OnVersion
OnUsername
OnPassword
OnJoin
Richard Whispers: HELLO
Richard Says: hello
Disconnection From 0
Divnity Networking Server Stopped
Divnity Networking Terminated

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I added transparency masking to the texture converter =).

Z.

The texture loading is nearly finished. I had a little problem with the colors (blue and red were switched), but that is fixed. I didnt notice the problem earlier because I was converting greyscale images (the font), but now its fixed. I need to implement the loading in the LoadTextureEx() method, adn then it will be finsihed =).

Z.

Is the '.texture' format compressed in any way? If not I suggest gzip, you know, the free zipping dll ;)

I dont really want to add any complexity to the format, since there isnt really a reason. The final downloadable will be compressed, so download size wont be a problem, and at that point, it doesnt really matter =).

Z.

I now have the plug-in dll supporting ip blocking :D

Excellent. Now, I think that a copy of ToW should be assigned an ID, and that ID is tied to your email address. It would leave that ID on the computer even after installed, pointing to a known program (ex. Internet Explorer), therefore making it so the only way to get a new ID is to reinstall windows and get a new email address.

That way dynamic IPs can be blocked as well if you know what I mean ;)

This is the most security we can get, seeing as retail games such as Half-Life have the code burned into the CD. Without this key, you cannot play over the network.

Yea, that should be best. lemme know when you have some kind of system built into the game / windows and i can probably stick this into the networking, im currently working on letting the other players know when a user joins the lobby.