Messages

1

Tools / Re: UnitSprite Studio

« on: September 21, 2023, 01:26:28 pm »

I'm sure it can be automated somehow, I'll give it a try.

2

Help / Re: Colors from palette turning invisible

« on: February 22, 2023, 01:37:00 am »

That file is not entirely reliable, the RGB values are slightly offset from the palette used in most of the community tools.
You can simply use the actual palette in the file you get back from the spritepalette tool.

Alternatively, I've attached a BMP file that contains the UFO Battlescape palette. Try using that one. The image is actually only a single transparent pixel, just use the palette information.

3

Tools / Re: UnitSprite Studio

« on: December 29, 2022, 02:34:45 am »

Well it does currently support drawing routines 2 (XCom HWP) and 5 (Sectopod, Reaper), so you can edit those 2x2 units as you would have any other unit. I will add other drawing routines if you need them.
Granted, editing these units is not exactly intuitive and requires some knowledge of how they work. I will add a description on how to work with them on the wiki.

If that's not what you're after, then give me a description of what you want and let me see if I can do that.

4

Help / Re: How to turn an image of HWP into spritesheet for HWP?

« on: November 12, 2022, 01:10:50 am »

You can use UnitSprite studio for this. It's not ideal, but it can be done with some effort.
I've written a guide: https://github.com/bohemond-of-antioch/OpenXcom-UnitSpriteStudio/wiki/Use-Smart-merge-to-create-2x2-units

After you have the UFO Spritesheet split up correctly, you can just use UnitSprite studio to edit it and you don't have to repeat the process again.

5

Brutal AI / Re: For AI-"improvements", should I add a new option or use the existing "sneakyAI"?

« on: October 25, 2022, 08:47:21 pm »

I'd rather split off my decision-making right at the beginning from a clean slate. That will obviously take longer but I'll feel a lot more in control of what happens.

I can confirm that splitting the code off completely is probably the best way to do it. What I've done is sidestep the game AI in BattlescapeGame.cpp like this:
In BattlescapeGame::think, instead of

Code: [Select]

if (!handlePanickingUnit(_save->getSelectedUnit()))
handleAI(_save->getSelectedUnit());
I have my AI module return a BattleAction and let that be handled by the Battlescape:

Code: [Select]

BattleAction unitAction = sideAI[_save->getSide()]->HandleTurn();
if (unitAction.type != BA_NONE)
{
handleUnitAction(unitAction);
}

That way, your AI can also handle order of selecting units, which is sometimes important.
Some other code is necessary to connect the modules together, but I've had best results with this kind of idea.

6

Tools / Of Tanks and Chryssalids

« on: October 23, 2022, 01:03:13 am »

New version is released and on github.

Support for Drawing routines:
2 - XCom HWP
7 - Chryssalid
8 - Celatid
9 - Silacoid

New features:
You can edit the Item sprite directly in the studio
Pixel operations preset for fixing the common problem of left <-> right arm switch
More shortcuts for selecting layer (numbers 1 through 9)
New Single frame sprite can be created with custom size and palette

Bugfixes:
Color shift now works properly for complicated Drawing routines
Loading of non 8 byte aligned images
Item layers are handled with better performance

Notes:
The new drawing routines are not tested in game, please report if you spot any problem.
Only Soldier(0) and Floater(1) drawing routines support display of items, so you have to load up one of those to use item editing.

7

Tools / New minor version

« on: August 30, 2022, 05:37:01 pm »

I've released a new version with some improvements to the Advanced Options and also a bugfix for FloorOb generation.
Release and documentation of new features is on github.

8

Open Feedback / Re: wrong position for personal armor arms?

« on: August 30, 2022, 01:36:44 am »

This error is more common than you think. I have noticed it multiple times already on many types of armor/enemies. It's almost imposible to spot in-game because it's in an animation.

It can be easily seen in UnitSpriteStudio, it can also be easily fixed in UnitSpriteStudio, detailed here.

9

Tools / Re: HandOb maker

« on: April 25, 2022, 12:02:42 am »

That's got to be a false alarm.
You can build it yourself if you want to be extra careful. The project is in Visual Studio 2019.

10

Tools / Re: UnitSprite Studio

« on: April 21, 2022, 11:12:29 pm »

I've identified the problem. The xcom.png image has a palette with only 67 colors, because it's saved with optimized palette. The function that tries to identify the palette expects there to be 255 colors, hence the index out of range error. I did not account for this feature of PNG.

I'm not sure if there is a point in fixing this, as the optimized palette sprite will not work in-game anyway. I'll fix it if I see a simple way to do it.

In the meantime, I've attached your spritesheet saved with UFO Battlescape not-optimized palette.

11

Tools / Re: UnitSprite Studio

« on: March 22, 2022, 10:42:12 am »

Yes, you can. A sprite sheet for a single item will be 256x40. You might also want to take a look at HandOb maker (https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,8160.0.html), which easies creation of these sprite sheets.

But I'm hardly qualified to help with modding and especially the graphical side of things. If you ask about creating item sprites in the Help section, I'm sure you will get much better advice than I can give.

12

Tools / Re: UnitSprite Studio

« on: March 21, 2022, 04:04:34 pm »

That is a good point, that's actually not supported, I completely forgot about that possibility. I'll add it to my to-do list.
At this time, if you want to preview a different item, you will have to cut it out of the complete sprite sheet and make one where the desired item is alone (or at the very top of the image).

13

Tools / Release: Integration with HandOb maker

« on: March 12, 2022, 10:36:22 am »

New version released (on github):
Integration with HandOb maker
Possibility to load item from file and preview it on the unit
Support for additional rule values (standHeight, deathFrames)
Quick reload from source file

Integration with HandOb maker & Item preview:
You can now view an item as it would show up in-game on the unit. For now works only on select few drawing routines: 0 Soldier and 1 Floater.
You can either load in a file in the 8 frame format or you can load it from live HandOb maker application.
Short description is in HandOb maker wiki (https://github.com/bohemond-of-antioch/HandObMaker/wiki/Integration-with-UnitSprite-Studio)
If you click the HandObMaker button, it will start up a monitor and will refresh automatically with every update sent from HandOb maker. Likewise on the HandOb maker side, you can either send updates automatically or on demand with a button.
Beware: I did the integration via clipboard, because it was just the simplest. This means that your clipboard contents might be cleared unexpectedly when you have the integration running on full auto.

Support for additional rule values:
Here the most important is deathFrames. Most of the drawing routines support it, even though it seems to make sense only for a few of them. The UI is a little clunky, but it does its job. Don't forget to move the control focus to somewhere else once you are done entering the value. You'll see what I mean once you try using it.

Quick reload from source file:
You can reload from the source via File->Reload from disk or by pressing F5.

14

Tools / Release: Integration with UnitSprite Studio

« on: March 12, 2022, 10:19:20 am »

New version released (on github):
Integration with UnitSprite Studio
Significant performance improvement
Stability improvement
UFO and TFTD palette support

Releases moved to GitHub: https://github.com/bohemond-of-antioch/HandObMaker/releases

Integration with UnitSprite Studio:
More on that at https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,9524.0.html

Palettes:
Exports only in UFO Battlescape and TFTD Battlescape 0. I do not really see the point of having more options. Matching indexes is done with simple closest RGB.

Documentation:
Finally got around to describing the Advanced Options: https://github.com/bohemond-of-antioch/HandObMaker/wiki

15

Tools / Release: Floater

« on: January 29, 2022, 01:46:02 pm »

New version released (on github):
Drawing routine 1 - Floater
Support for Palettes
Single frame Drawing routine can edit any image size

Palettes:
There is a new combobox beside the palette that allows you to change the loaded sprite sheet's image.
When you switch palette you will be prompted with "Match colors to the selected palette?"
Yes - Will attempt to find the nearest color in the new palette and re-index
No - Will leave the indexes be, simply using the new palette.
Cancel - Will not change the palette

Single frame:
You can load images of any size, but don't expect great performance. The pixel operations work fine though.