Messages

346

Work In Progress / Re: i created a new alien --- WIP - called ant man

« on: March 08, 2015, 05:47:57 am »

thanks guys.

it still has issues in sprite mostly arm stuff but im slowly fixing it.  but question is! what is the terror unit ? i wanna add 2 simple terror units

I feel like your thread has been hijacked:) 

Your question is tricky, but if I was thinking along the lines of the "ant" theme, I'm reminded of those bugs ants use as "cows" to milk.  Maybe those caterpillars (I think aphids too) could be more omnious of course.  Some kind of symbiotic relationship between the terror units and the ant critters.

347

Work In Progress / Re: i created a new alien --- WIP - called ant man

« on: March 07, 2015, 08:25:06 pm »

mrrshan in master of orion   yea that would be cool. probably modify muton as well? just add the lion head on top of muton body

That's what I was thinking.  Make the colors with more orange, red, and yellows.

348

Work In Progress / Re: i created a new alien --- WIP - called ant man

« on: March 07, 2015, 07:56:37 pm »

Looks interesting!  Good job so far.  Now it has me thinking that it would be cool to make a Kilrathi alien race from Wing Commander Series...hrrmmm.  Muton looks like a good one to start and add some really good bare handed melee.  I may have to dust off my poor graphic skills now....

349

Suggestions / Re: ModPack Installer

« on: March 07, 2015, 03:42:02 am »

would be cool if mods override but not overwrite data files. so make like 1 more folder called MODS and each mod gets a  directory with same name as the ruleset which acts as a fake data folder for that mod alone. any resources or STR in the mod that have same name as the ones in data folder get overriden by the mod. latest mod being the one that overrides the last. you can probably choose mod load order too.

for ex

data/Rulesets/badalien_mod.rul

data/MODS/badadlien_mod/Resources/badalien sprites/badalien.png  <=>  data/Resources/badalien sprites/badalien.png

<=> means interchangeable, equivalent, same as

data/MODS/modname/ takes precedence . if nothing in MODS then is pulled from data/ instead.

essentially making mods nondestructive

and you could use a zip file with the right folder structure/files as the modpack then have some little program that just takes zip files and unpacks them in data/  so you get data/MOD/modname/*stuff* and data/Rulesets/modname.rul so you can easily uninstall later without corrupting the data folder. The folder structure completely created by the modder . All the modpack installer does is unpack it in data. EZ

and this app would read current rul files and display a list..if you choose to delete a mod then it deletes rule file and it's corresponding folder in MODS...

you can still do it the old way by putting it in data if you want

I do like the sound of what you're proposing.  It would be a lot easier to deploy into the data folder.  The advantage of having a "mod" manifest would be to give the mod developers possibly more control over how the mod is deployed if need be.  I guess I need to check into how the new system is being developed first though.

350

Suggestions / Re: ModPack Installer

« on: March 07, 2015, 03:39:40 am »

Possibly, but I'd wait until after the mod engine overhaul.

So is there documentation about what the mod engine overhaul will be? Or do I just need to grok the source code?

I'm okay with waiting.  It would give me some time to get familiar with new system and test.

351

Fan-Stuff / Re: Haiku

« on: March 06, 2015, 10:36:41 pm »

City at nightfall
A Chryssalid steals a kiss
Here abounds terror

352

Playthroughs / Re: Let's Play OpenXcom: Up Close and Personal!

« on: March 06, 2015, 04:05:04 am »

That's good news that there's plans to make it a standard feature of the main game.

I may play around with the code too.  Do you know if his git repo fork has everything in it?

353

Playthroughs / Re: Let's Play OpenXcom: Up Close and Personal!

« on: March 06, 2015, 02:14:27 am »

One day...I'll be caught up!  Thoroughly enjoying it, Ivan.  I'm past episode 40.  LOVED the first base defense where you got caught with your proverbial pants down.  Awesome job squeaking out a victory too.


I do have a question.  You've been making modifications to the Commendations.  Are those available for the 1.0 release of OpenXcom?

354

Playthroughs / Re: XCOM THE BOARD GAME

« on: March 06, 2015, 02:10:53 am »

I've heard about it.  One of my lunch time boardgame group attendees has been planning to bring it the last two times, but most of us have been stuck at home due to bad weather the past two Thursdays.   I don't know if he came in today with it or not, but I sure would like to play it.  I saw Tom Vasel's "The Dicetower" review  of it and thought it looked great.  Both reviewers in the video are big fans of the video game and gave a decent critique. Don't expect it to reflect the "tactical squad" combat of the video game.  It's more like a Geoscape implementation version of the game with abstracted squad missions and base defense.  Does require an tablet or smartphone to play it too.

Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6stnvss1co

355

Fan-Stuff / Re: Haiku

« on: March 04, 2015, 07:58:23 pm »

UFO aground
The breach a rookie charges
Sacrifice worthy

356

Suggestions / ModPack Installer

« on: March 03, 2015, 05:55:08 pm »

So, one of my bad habits is I tend think.  While on a relapse, I thought about what would be a nice feature to OpenXcom that would make it even more accessible.  I thought that it's kind of hoky how mods are installed, so what does everyone think about a "mod" installer for OpenXcom?

I could possibly pull this off externally from OpenXcom in fairly short amount of time.  I'm quite handy with Python.  I was thinking that we could come up with a descriptor file inside the mod(yaml, json, ini... don't care), that the installer can use to know where to put stuff into OpenXcom.  Maybe also keep track of mods installed with another file located in OpenXcom.

Later on, it could be built into the executable and made into  a menu on one of the "Options" screens.

Useful?

357

Offtopic / Re: Introduce yourself

« on: March 03, 2015, 02:04:25 am »

Also Welcome from me Jay!

You could give my Mod a try -> Research Alive Aliens

I'll be sure to check it out, but I may wait until I can beat the game with what I got.  A little overwhelmed at the amount of mods:-)

358

Offtopic / Re: Introduce yourself

« on: March 02, 2015, 11:13:00 pm »

Hi, I'm Jay.   I just started playing X-COM a few weeks ago (bought it on Steam), and soon found OpenXcom which is AWESOME!.  I am design engineer for a telecom company.  MSEE degree by schooling, but more software engineer by experience (over 18 years).

I'm old enough to have played the original.  I was a sophomore in college around the time it came out and was about the time I bought my own PC (486 DX2 100Mhz baby! - Pentiums just came out).  However, I was more into Wing Commander/Flight Sims, Civilization, and RTS games at the time (although I enjoyed the tactical battles of Gold Box series on C64).

I don't play videogames as much as I used to back in high school and college, but I recently took a trip down memory lane with my kids with some old games.  I had heard of X-COM as one of those classics, and I can certainly see why.  Very well done game even with the few warts it has.  OpenXcom has done a wonderful job of taking some more of those warts away, and the team and community should be commended.  The mods are awesome too.

Ivan, your video series is great.  I've learned a lot even with your mods, and my son and I enjoy watching them.  I think we're on episode 20.  I've downloaded the mod, but not ready to play the Up close and personal challenge yet.

Shoes, your medal/stat tracking mod is awesome is well.  It adds a lot of flavor to the game.

Those are the only mods I've installed so far, and looking forward to exploring more.  I haven't even beat the game yet..sheesh:-)

I'm very tempted to get into the modding community, but we'll see how things go with the limited time I have and too many ideas for too many things that I don't know what's good for me;-)  I think an "Avengers" or an "X-men" mod would be awesome where you take a team of superheroes against the alien horde.  Unbalanced I'm sure, but a blast to play through a couple of times.  Probably would take years to do with all the new rules, stats, and artwork (yes, I've seen the Iron-man suit mod and awesome).

Look forward to more mods and TFTD (got to go buy it after I beat this one).

EDIT: From the US, 41 yrs old, living in Alabama (cue Forrest Gump jokes now).

Cheers!
J