Author Topic: Ufopedia while in battlescape  (Read 7356 times)

Offline doctor medic

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Ufopedia while in battlescape
« on: July 31, 2015, 10:48:24 pm »
Is it possible to have the ufopedia with the current research of the save?

Offline Arthanor

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #1 on: July 31, 2015, 11:13:13 pm »
Quick access to the Ufopaedia while in battlescape would be incredibly useful, indeed. Especially for the total conversion mods out there!

Offline doctor medic

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #2 on: August 01, 2015, 03:54:51 pm »
The problem is thought how can it tract the current research you've found?Would the code force it to appear and then go back to the menu of the battlescape?Is it possible to return back to battlescape and not in geospace?

Offline yrizoud

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #3 on: August 01, 2015, 05:10:48 pm »
Openxcom does't have the limitation of the original game being two separate executables.
The engine already has the information about what is researched (unresearched items are labelled 'alien artifact' and can't be shot/used)
I don't think there is any technical challenge, it's rather a matter of choosing a smooth ergonomy (right-click on item ? A "question mark" icon that you click then point at an item ?)

Offline Arthanor

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #4 on: August 01, 2015, 09:24:02 pm »
The easiest would probably be to add an option to straight up open the root menu of the UFOPaedia. The user can then select what they want to look at. An easy place for that would be an "Open UFOPaedia" button in the options menu (the one that opens from the "?" button, which is rather fitting) when in battlescape.

Having it tied to items is a bit clunky. What if I want to know about sectoids? I have to stun/kill one and stand on its body to open the proper UFOPaedia article?

Offline doctor medic

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #5 on: August 02, 2015, 06:08:15 pm »
The easiest would probably be to add an option to straight up open the root menu of the UFOPaedia. The user can then select what they want to look at. An easy place for that would be an "Open UFOPaedia" button in the options menu (the one that opens from the "?" button, which is rather fitting) when in battlescape.

Having it tied to items is a bit clunky. What if I want to know about sectoids? I have to stun/kill one and stand on its body to open the proper UFOPaedia article?
That is exacly what i had in mind and with the game being open coded it should be possible.

Offline nadir-1648

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #6 on: August 02, 2015, 09:04:57 pm »
Is it bad that I fail to see the utility of this?

I mean, all information on weapons (except damage) is already right there and the UFOpaedia doesn't really say anything useful about the aliens.

Offline DracoGriffin

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #7 on: August 02, 2015, 09:18:00 pm »
Is it bad that I fail to see the utility of this?

I mean, all information on weapons (except damage) is already right there and the UFOpaedia doesn't really say anything useful about the aliens.

It would much more useful for mods, but could be useful for new players or those who haven't memorized everything yet.

Offline doctor medic

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #8 on: August 02, 2015, 09:58:50 pm »
And because some mods like x-piratez have weapons with important details like some weapons doing %stun damage or have calculations like strenght 0.1*accuracy 0.2

Offline Arthanor

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #9 on: August 02, 2015, 10:52:49 pm »
Is it bad that I fail to see the utility of this?

I mean, all information on weapons (except damage) is already right there and the UFOpaedia doesn't really say anything useful about the aliens.

Bad? No.. but it suggests to me that you haven't taken full advantage of all that OpenXCom offers ;)

It it not really important for a vanilla game, but as soon as you used it with some mods, it becomes interesting. What's the autoshot range of an autocannon in the FMP? What about in XPiratez? Or UFORedux? Do you really want to count the tiles? Or the snapshot range of a sniper rifle in all 3 of the aboves? What about the damage of their alien alloy ammunitions?

They use the same graphics, but they most likely don't share the stats. At some point, it's just too much and I would rather spend hours playing the game than studying the UFOPaedia.

This is especially relevant in mods like Piratez where there is a LOT of weapons and you can use weapons from your enemies, for which you may already have a UFOPaedia entry but never really paid attention since it is the first time you see it.

Offline Dioxine

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #10 on: August 03, 2015, 12:10:16 am »
There is no problem per se with separate executables, but with the thing that battlescape uses different palettes than Geoscape (where Ufopedia resides). AFAIK messing with that would be a big problem.

Offline clownagent

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #11 on: August 03, 2015, 12:18:26 am »
Quick access to the Ufopaedia while in battlescape would be incredibly useful, indeed. Especially for the total conversion mods out there!

Yes would be really useful. In X-COM Apocalypse this was possible by right-mouse-button and you could parse through whole ufopedia during battlescape, if I remember correctly.

Offline yrizoud

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #12 on: August 03, 2015, 12:52:04 am »
but with the thing that battlescape uses different palettes than Geoscape (where Ufopedia resides). AFAIK messing with that would be a big problem.
It's no issue because Ufopedia is full-screen. It can switch to ufopedia palette when you enter it, and switch back to battlescape palette when you exit it.

Offline Arthanor

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #13 on: August 03, 2015, 03:48:08 am »
That's what I was hoping for :)

Now we just have to find a nice coder who can make us a patch!

Offline Qpoter

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Re: Ufopedia while in battlescape
« Reply #14 on: August 03, 2015, 07:39:58 am »
Would be useful, even if only for mods. I won't be memorizing all the weapon stats in Piratez anytime soon...  :P