Times of War Development Team

You arent allowed to be pissed off at VBF =). It is a costly enterprise for Karl, and he is providing it to us for absolutly nothing. Its kinda like people being pissed off at Battle.net when it lags. Its free, and the owners dont have to provide the server, so be glad of what you get =).

I did a nifty thing earlier today, with the console. If you look in the picture above, you can see that the console prompt is a simple "> " string. This morning, I changed that so that it can be anything that you like. You can also change it in-game, using the console function "set_prompt("<some prompt>");". Its pretty nifty.

Psy, for the installer GUI... I posted a link before VBF went down, did you get it? I implmented the Bitmap Region making function in VB, and here is my results:

http://www.vbforums.com/attachment.p...postid=1148918

I sent the app to Sas, but we both agree that it looks pretty bad with that much transparency, but I think that we could do something with it, to make our installer a bit more creative. Tell me what you think =).

Z.

The blobs are the tower model that I created. They ARE lit, but only with ambient light, so you cant see the inside edges. I HAVE changed that model since, now it is a textured tree =).

I THINK that if you add a semi-colon to the end of your Print #1, ... statement, it wont add the line feed.

Z.

It still added the line feed.

I got the link. can you send me the vb code you did so that it can save me some time. I think its probably better if its not as transparent as that.

For this are you meaning as some kind of graphic or do u want a funky skinned installer ? coz if the installer is skinned then you want it more like shown in the tutorial.

Whatever youd like to do with the installer, its up to you... I am personally not a fan of full screen installers, but it isnt a big deal =).

Here are the files for the project. You will need to set your own picture on the Form's Picture Property. The region maker function will build a region using the top left pixel as the transparent color.

Z.

Cheers for the code. The only problem is that it is too slow for what i want so im gonna stick the function into the dll i already have and use C++ power.

Zaei, the current GUI i have is what was there before but without the blue/black backing. Do you think this is good ? i was also thinking of making it that without the background and the forms having round corners but im not so sure.

I can do that quickly without the C++ code.

That would be great, Psy. I loved the last layout =).

With the region thing, Its going to be slow in VB or C++. The article had an external utility to write the region data to a file, that could then be loaded at runtime, or embedded as a resource. I personally think that would be easier in C++ (pointers).

Z.

okay everyone, please vote for which you think should be done:

1) No Background - Rounded
2) No Background - Square

Or 1 or 2 but with a Blue/Black background.

2)

(P.s, Zaei, cud i see a shot of the demo with the textured model ?)

LOL i added : at the end of the Print thing and looking back at the posts now i noticed SEMI- LOL so i added a ; and it works perfect.

no need for me DLL now, cheers!!!!

I'd say go with the square :)

Have to agree with Sas... Though perhaps we could customize that top border part =).

Ill post a shot in a little while =).

Z.

I agree with Sastraxi and Zaei.

Ok, here is the requested screen shot =). I am thinking of going to a different projection matrix (perspective seems to stretch meshes near the edge of the screen, which looks bad...).

http://www.vbforums.com/attachment.p...postid=1152067

Z.

The trees look excellent. I suppose though that they are yet to inherit their shading from the ground?

Nope, no shading on the trees. I may or may not implement it, but it will require a little modification to the loading code... I will probably just shade them with ambient lighting... easier.

Z.

I don't think they'd look good, when all's said and done, if they weren't shaded.

The problem is, to get the nice shading, I basically have to raytrace from the light source to the tree vertices. The problem THERE is that each mesh object has a scaling matrix that set's it's dimensions properly. When the modles come out of 3DSMax, They could be any size at all, so when I load them, I simply find the dimensions, and then create a scaling matrix to scale the whole mesh down to 1x1x1. Then I can set the dimensions I want, and have it display correctly. Great. Now, I would do the raytracing at load time, but if the scaling matrix was changed, the results would be wrong. The picture you see there has the trees at max brightness. On the other hand, the maximum ground brightness is RGB(0.8, 0.8, 0.8), so it looks funky. If you like, I CAN set a directional light source, which would shade the trees on one side, the side facing the light, since all of the models do have normals.

Z.

If not too hard to implement, I'd like to take a look at that before deciding :)

I need to clean up my light implementation. At the moment, it is pretty shoddy, as I implemented it originally as a quick hack. I will work on that tomorrow. Im tired tonight (The start of a freaking 3 day weekend, and I am tired ::bash on head:: =).

I also want to try to get the terrain rendering finished up, etc, at some point soon.

Z.

I'm tired myself, for an odd reason. Oh well. I fixed some more errors in the forum but it's still a mess.

Meh, from chaos, order =).

Z.

I just fixed up my windows, so now I can resize them, with the usual border dragging =).

Z.

Ah, the wonders of usual border drags :)

I have implemented console object function call to real object function call mapping =). For instance, those trees you saw int he screen shot... I can now command them to hide and show themselves =). Essentially, when you create a console object, you can specify a code object to map the console object to. Then the function is called, I parse out teh parameters and such, just like when calling a virtaul console object function, but I simply pass it along to the real object's Dispatch() function, which takes care of the actual function =). It works well =).

Z.

You're getting addicted Zaei, 4 =)'s in one post! You should cut back :D

I was pretty pleased with myself =). I am actually now implementing Units =).

Z.

The Times of War project jsut grew by almost a dozen files... I am trying to do this the right way, and separate data from output. For instance, a TOW_GameUnit only holds a mesh's moniker, while a TOW_GameUnitOutput will hold a TOW_GameUnit, and will grab the moniker, and draw the mesh =).

Z.

hey, seems everything is going good good good.

I dont mean to be a dick, but. is it just me or in some strange way do those tress seem a little... out of place?

I think, perhaps theyre too bright or too green, to me they seem a little odd.

Its still very good work and that console thing sure does sound cool.

The installer is effectivly finished and ready to use. All i need to do is add in a little bit of extra code for installing a mod or patch.

That is what Sas and I were talking about above =). I have changed the greenness to a much darker greenness, so they fit a bit better. Still need a bit of work to fit better, but it will be ok =).

Taking a look at the installer now =).

Z.

Looks good, but I dont have a script to run it with =). When I put something in(like "tow://install:www.crystal-rain.com/install.tws"), it get Run-Time Error 13, Type Mismatch.

Z.

looking at that now, what u can do is tho is run the exe as normal and it will give you a menu ;)

hmm, i dont get that error, it could be coz you need to replace the old hub exe with this. on ur PC you should have the hub (added here) and the installer (above) in the same directory. to set it up run the hub exe, then u can run the installer.

Found n Fixed.

I can run from IE now, but I get Run-Time Error 53, File Not Found.

Z.

Ok, no error =), when simply running the thing, though I think the link is invalid. Same error (53) when running from IE.

Z.

Code:

---


[Script]
Type=1
Version=1.0

[Server]
Address=www.crystal-rain.com
Port=80

[Install]
Directory=${ProgramFiles}\${Company}\${Name}\
License=http://127.0.0.1:8080/Install/License.txt
Method=Internet

[Group]
Name=${Name}

[Application]
Company=Crystal Rain Entertainment
Name=Times of War
System=Windows98
Version=2.0
Size=3.60MB

[Files]
Count=2
/files/towhub-script.tws;${Application}\install\towhub-script.txt;1
/files/image.bmp;${Application}\install\image.bmp;2

[Registry]

---

Save that to a .tws file and use that for a script (dbl click the exe, click install, then enter in the path to it).

not sure about the error in IE, btw there is no working script on the crystal rain server.

rename the installer file (the 128kb one) to modInst and it'll work.

Psy... Damn =). Pretty slick =).

Z.