Just joined the forum, Q's about NS2
Jenkins
Join Date: 2009-07-02 Member: 68003Members
Join Date: 2009-07-02 Member: 68003Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Helloes & Engine related questions</div>Hello to all @ UWE and forum-goers :)
I've recently been Peer pressured (didn't take much) into pre-ordering NS2 (will make the transaction when i have some spare mooleh)
I wanted to first say NS1 is THE best mod I've ever seen for the GoldSrc engine and i don't think the word "MOD" does it justice. Valve could never dream of making such detailed content as you guys and my hat is off to you all for such a fine job. Unfortunately I don't play the MOD as often as i should, but i'm actually a developer myself and have been working with the Hell-stricken Source Engine for over 12 months now, and i've just about had enough of all the bull$*** that comes with it.
For example i did a little test the other day, recently i've upgraded to a much better computer (i7 920 | GTX260 | 6GB RAM | 64bit Vista) and before i copied all my mod tools, assets and media across i went ahead and loaded Source SDK, created a new Single Player mod for HL2:Ep2 just to see how long it took to clone the pistol (easiest weapon to clone, no dependencies).
I was surprised that even when i deleted all the comments (i don't like doing that but the pistol is one exception) i was still left with over 285 lines of C++ code for something that i find relatively brainless to implement.
Not only that, the time it took to get this weapon working was around 20-35mins (because of other things such as scripts) and that made me say "Wow this really does suck"
I guess where i'm going with this is, will i need to spend that amount of time to clone such an easy weapon (if that's possible) with NS2?
I am currently developing a "MOD" with a friend of mine from the UK, and i feel the Source Engine is holding us back from our true creative capabilities. I don't have the sort of qualifications or experience that you guys have at UWE but i'm an early adapter and can pick-up nearly any software and use it without being scared by it or put off by the alien-ness of the tools.
That said, Hammer and the Source SDK are possibly the worst (free) SDK tools out there and yet 9 months ago i would of defended them if someone said that to me.
I once described VHE (Hammer) as being the "Lego" to Unreal's Editor being "Mechano" where Hammer is built around mostly straight edges and prefers (in compiling and ingame) Symmetrical geometry.
I am getting really sick and tired (and sad) of my team mate telling me then asking "Hey i've got this great idea for a weapon/enemy/whatever, is that possible?" and me telling him that i would need to go to college for 5 years to learn advanced C++ for his idea to be implemented.. :(
We really want to see our ideas and conceptual designs and thoughts put into place, even though some of them have been stolen/used before in other games we would really like to make it happen in it's entirety.
Another thing that i get annoyed at with trying to use the Source Engine is when i finally after weeks of troubleshooting and getting the codes to work, it ends up breaking something else and therefore the whole game collapses infront of me, i get frustrated, pissed off and frankly i lose most of my enthusiasm when something like that happens because i've spent weeks trying to get it to work, then it finally works then it breaks something else and i'm basically back to square 1 (just with a different problem).
What i want to see from NS2;
~~~
Simple Scripting such as XML type values, where for example is has something like
Firerate=0.4
Vectorcone=3.5
TracerRGB=255,200,200
etc etc
Something like what i've put above would require tens if not hundreds of line of C++ code for the Source Engine, and while Valve say "because the end result is more flexible" people like myself with no real qualifications or experience in the programming industry wouldn't know where to start let alone actually implement something as (simple?) as what i've said above.
~~~
HLSL type "on-the-fly" Shader editing, preferably inside the editor (Like WorldBuilder for Command & Conquer 3)
Where i can add bloom, HSL or any type of shaders with sliders and save them straight into the map and/or save them as files to use later (also a big + is being able to see the source codes for the shaders as you edit them with GUI tools - for example Torque Game Engine has something similar, would be great to see that)
~~~
From the videos i've seen of NS2 editor looks like you already have my next suggestion in place but its worth a "Thumbs up" from me anyway, which is Real-time lighting in the editor.
I am sooo sick of trying to tweak lighting values in Hammer only to find the Brightness or RGB values are slightly off, which requires compiling of the map which in some cases can take a long time (even with the cordon tools areas like big outside maps for example can be very taxing on compile times)
~~~
Cut scene/player overridden camera tools <u>in the editor</u> instead of learning a whole new way of creating such things (Source Demo UI), once again the only way to do this with Source is with Alot of knowledge of the "Path" tools and while they are fairly simple, can have a bad effect ingame which again requires compiling and testing which i don't have time for when i only want to test a few meters (game meters) of Camera paths
~~~
I suppose this fits in with the above, but things like Faceposer for ingame cut scene sequences are nonsense tools to me because of the way it's totally setout differently to the editor. I prefer all those types of tools to be accessbile from the one editor, not 50 different editors to achieve the one thing
(placing scripted entities in hammer, the loading a different editor to actually make the animations [3dsmax/XSI] then loading a different editor *again* [Faceposer] to put those together)
To me all these things while Valve might prefer them as a company, is way too much work for just a small team like yourselves to do to achieve yet another what i would think to be a simple effect ingame and something that is highly overlooked and understated.
~~~
A simpler type of FMOD sound designer within the editor would be great, i see that you guys have added the FMOD libs in NS1 which made me go "wow these guys really did spend alot of time on this so called MOD" (should be a game because i see no resemblance to a MOD anywhere)
~~~
Basic material editing (i don't mean Textures i mean the configurable files [like vmt's]) once again in the main editor would be fantastic
Perfect example is when creating a alpha-blended, scrolling, Self Illuminating texture for Source, requires at least 3 different editors where i feel this could be done with plain Photoshop then the configurable file for the material be edited real-time so i can see my mistakes as i make them lol
~~~
Basic model editing would be great aswell, not the actual mesh creation but UV projection and what valve call "QC" file editing would also be very very handy in the editor, once again the learning curb for such things in Source engine is a bit of a joke, not knocking their way it's just most other companies and games don't actually require such an extensive knowledge of both scripting and programming just for the creation of models, i would love to see that in the NS2 editor
I guess i might stop now because i don't want to write the next Tom Clancy novel as my first post, i'll leave it up to you guys to add your thoughts about what i've said, i know that some of these things may or may not have already been implemented which is awesome :D
It's just what i would personally like to see from an editor, especially since i know this can be done but Valve are too set in their ways to change it for this small fry.
Once again well done on a great job with NS1, the attention to detail is something you guys should be winning awards for on the highest level, good luck with the next release :)
Yours truly,
Jenkins
I've recently been Peer pressured (didn't take much) into pre-ordering NS2 (will make the transaction when i have some spare mooleh)
I wanted to first say NS1 is THE best mod I've ever seen for the GoldSrc engine and i don't think the word "MOD" does it justice. Valve could never dream of making such detailed content as you guys and my hat is off to you all for such a fine job. Unfortunately I don't play the MOD as often as i should, but i'm actually a developer myself and have been working with the Hell-stricken Source Engine for over 12 months now, and i've just about had enough of all the bull$*** that comes with it.
For example i did a little test the other day, recently i've upgraded to a much better computer (i7 920 | GTX260 | 6GB RAM | 64bit Vista) and before i copied all my mod tools, assets and media across i went ahead and loaded Source SDK, created a new Single Player mod for HL2:Ep2 just to see how long it took to clone the pistol (easiest weapon to clone, no dependencies).
I was surprised that even when i deleted all the comments (i don't like doing that but the pistol is one exception) i was still left with over 285 lines of C++ code for something that i find relatively brainless to implement.
Not only that, the time it took to get this weapon working was around 20-35mins (because of other things such as scripts) and that made me say "Wow this really does suck"
I guess where i'm going with this is, will i need to spend that amount of time to clone such an easy weapon (if that's possible) with NS2?
I am currently developing a "MOD" with a friend of mine from the UK, and i feel the Source Engine is holding us back from our true creative capabilities. I don't have the sort of qualifications or experience that you guys have at UWE but i'm an early adapter and can pick-up nearly any software and use it without being scared by it or put off by the alien-ness of the tools.
That said, Hammer and the Source SDK are possibly the worst (free) SDK tools out there and yet 9 months ago i would of defended them if someone said that to me.
I once described VHE (Hammer) as being the "Lego" to Unreal's Editor being "Mechano" where Hammer is built around mostly straight edges and prefers (in compiling and ingame) Symmetrical geometry.
I am getting really sick and tired (and sad) of my team mate telling me then asking "Hey i've got this great idea for a weapon/enemy/whatever, is that possible?" and me telling him that i would need to go to college for 5 years to learn advanced C++ for his idea to be implemented.. :(
We really want to see our ideas and conceptual designs and thoughts put into place, even though some of them have been stolen/used before in other games we would really like to make it happen in it's entirety.
Another thing that i get annoyed at with trying to use the Source Engine is when i finally after weeks of troubleshooting and getting the codes to work, it ends up breaking something else and therefore the whole game collapses infront of me, i get frustrated, pissed off and frankly i lose most of my enthusiasm when something like that happens because i've spent weeks trying to get it to work, then it finally works then it breaks something else and i'm basically back to square 1 (just with a different problem).
What i want to see from NS2;
~~~
Simple Scripting such as XML type values, where for example is has something like
Firerate=0.4
Vectorcone=3.5
TracerRGB=255,200,200
etc etc
Something like what i've put above would require tens if not hundreds of line of C++ code for the Source Engine, and while Valve say "because the end result is more flexible" people like myself with no real qualifications or experience in the programming industry wouldn't know where to start let alone actually implement something as (simple?) as what i've said above.
~~~
HLSL type "on-the-fly" Shader editing, preferably inside the editor (Like WorldBuilder for Command & Conquer 3)
Where i can add bloom, HSL or any type of shaders with sliders and save them straight into the map and/or save them as files to use later (also a big + is being able to see the source codes for the shaders as you edit them with GUI tools - for example Torque Game Engine has something similar, would be great to see that)
~~~
From the videos i've seen of NS2 editor looks like you already have my next suggestion in place but its worth a "Thumbs up" from me anyway, which is Real-time lighting in the editor.
I am sooo sick of trying to tweak lighting values in Hammer only to find the Brightness or RGB values are slightly off, which requires compiling of the map which in some cases can take a long time (even with the cordon tools areas like big outside maps for example can be very taxing on compile times)
~~~
Cut scene/player overridden camera tools <u>in the editor</u> instead of learning a whole new way of creating such things (Source Demo UI), once again the only way to do this with Source is with Alot of knowledge of the "Path" tools and while they are fairly simple, can have a bad effect ingame which again requires compiling and testing which i don't have time for when i only want to test a few meters (game meters) of Camera paths
~~~
I suppose this fits in with the above, but things like Faceposer for ingame cut scene sequences are nonsense tools to me because of the way it's totally setout differently to the editor. I prefer all those types of tools to be accessbile from the one editor, not 50 different editors to achieve the one thing
(placing scripted entities in hammer, the loading a different editor to actually make the animations [3dsmax/XSI] then loading a different editor *again* [Faceposer] to put those together)
To me all these things while Valve might prefer them as a company, is way too much work for just a small team like yourselves to do to achieve yet another what i would think to be a simple effect ingame and something that is highly overlooked and understated.
~~~
A simpler type of FMOD sound designer within the editor would be great, i see that you guys have added the FMOD libs in NS1 which made me go "wow these guys really did spend alot of time on this so called MOD" (should be a game because i see no resemblance to a MOD anywhere)
~~~
Basic material editing (i don't mean Textures i mean the configurable files [like vmt's]) once again in the main editor would be fantastic
Perfect example is when creating a alpha-blended, scrolling, Self Illuminating texture for Source, requires at least 3 different editors where i feel this could be done with plain Photoshop then the configurable file for the material be edited real-time so i can see my mistakes as i make them lol
~~~
Basic model editing would be great aswell, not the actual mesh creation but UV projection and what valve call "QC" file editing would also be very very handy in the editor, once again the learning curb for such things in Source engine is a bit of a joke, not knocking their way it's just most other companies and games don't actually require such an extensive knowledge of both scripting and programming just for the creation of models, i would love to see that in the NS2 editor
I guess i might stop now because i don't want to write the next Tom Clancy novel as my first post, i'll leave it up to you guys to add your thoughts about what i've said, i know that some of these things may or may not have already been implemented which is awesome :D
It's just what i would personally like to see from an editor, especially since i know this can be done but Valve are too set in their ways to change it for this small fry.
Once again well done on a great job with NS1, the attention to detail is something you guys should be winning awards for on the highest level, good luck with the next release :)
Yours truly,
Jenkins
Comments
You were right to stop the post, atleast in my case I jumped over the most =P.
Welcome to the world of addicted people by Twitter!
You were right to stop the post, atleast in my case I jumped over the most =P.
Welcome to the world of addicted people by Twitter!<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Lol i think your saying you didn't read all of my post, which is fine because it's not really for you to read as such, i posted this as a general suggestion/inquiry for the developers and i wanted other dev's to share their thoughts about it.
I don't use twitter, i probably never will because i'm not really fussed about hanging on the edge of my seat waiting for a reply...
Thanks for the welcome though :)
-Jenkins
I had your state of mine in the beginning, but now I'm in the UWE grip =).
Obviously none of us can give you really exact info (As none of us have seen the tools), but a number of things the team have said is that one goal is to make it very easily modable. For one everything will be written in LUA (if you are not familiar, I suggest learning about it a bit now). We haven't seen exactly how you would go about doing something like creating a simple gun, but they did say early on that they want you to be able to go in and just tweak a couple of variables and effectively create something new, so it is likely (though not 100%) that you will see things to your liking in terms of those things.
Also, plop down the $40 and get the tools 'soon'.
also, going back through old podcasts is worth it to see all the things they have said.
I am sooo sick of trying to tweak lighting values in Hammer only to find the Brightness or RGB values are slightly off, which requires compiling of the map which in some cases can take a long time (even with the cordon tools areas like big outside maps for example can be very taxing on compile times)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I totally agree with this statement. It was very frustrating to check my couple spotlights as compile time was 2hours (mapped for tf2 for awhile). Real-time lighting in the editor is like heaven for me (well, maybe not but still very heavenly like).
This is what I want to see <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/news/2008/10/unknown_worlds_videocast_5" target="_blank"> Videocast_5</a>
<!--quoteo(post=0:date=:name=Jenkins)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Jenkins)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Simple Scripting such as XML type values, where for example is has something like
Firerate=0.4
Vectorcone=3.5
TracerRGB=255,200,200<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You should check out this old excerpt of LUA code(the pistol code coincidentally enough). I don't know how flexible overall it will be, but it seems like they're working hard to make it readable and accessible.
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/cache/thumbnails/pistolcode_800x824.jpg" target="_blank">
<div align='center'><img src="http://www.unknownworlds.com/cache/thumbnails/pistolcode_195x200.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" /></a>
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/news/2007/6client_side_scripting_and_weapons" target="_blank">
Blog Post.</a>
</div>
It was actually all a clever dig at you Thaldy. Read it closer and you might get it.
Thanks for the kind words. We are indeed hoping to give someone exactly like you the toolkit of their dreams. We will be making our content tools available first to everyone that pre-ordered as well, so we'll be taking feedback from you on how well we've done.
I would suggest you read through some of our engine blog posts, found <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/engine" target="_blank">here</a>. Hope that gets you excited for the (near) future again!
I'm never going to say we are 'one' ever again! The bond is broken! Be gone!
:p
Thanks and no worries mate i understood (sort of :P)
<!--quoteo(post=1715287:date=Jul 3 2009, 12:45 AM:name=Thansal)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thansal @ Jul 3 2009, 12:45 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1715287"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->For one everything will be written in LUA (if you are not familiar, I suggest learning about it a bit now).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Luckily i know a fair bit of LUA, also it's alot easier to read/write LUA than something like C++, and imo can be alot more flexible and easier to debug. (I used to write LUA apps for PSP)
<!--quoteo(post=1715287:date=Jul 3 2009, 12:45 AM:name=Thansal)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thansal @ Jul 3 2009, 12:45 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1715287"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Also, plop down the $40 and get the tools 'soon'.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Next week for sure! :)
<!--quoteo(post=1715287:date=Jul 3 2009, 12:45 AM:name=Thansal)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thansal @ Jul 3 2009, 12:45 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1715287"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->also, going back through old podcasts is worth it to see all the things they have said.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I've seen most of them once but a second look may be in order :)
<!--quoteo(post=0:date=Jul 3 2009, 01:50 AM:name=locallyunscene)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (locallyunscene @ Jul 3 2009, 01:50 AM)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->You should check out this old excerpt of LUA code(the pistol code coincidentally enough). I don't know how flexible overall it will be, but it seems like they're working hard to make it readable and accessible.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This looks very promising thanks for the info! :)
<!--quoteo(post=0:date=Jul 3 2009, 07:23 AM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jul 3 2009, 07:23 AM)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Thanks for the kind words. We are indeed hoping to give someone exactly like you the toolkit of their dreams. We will be making our content tools available first to everyone that pre-ordered as well, so we'll be taking feedback from you on how well we've done.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I am very excited to hear this, can't wait to pre-order, can't wait to play the <u>Game</u> and especially can't wait to try out these tools! Thanks for the reply Flayra :)
Thanks to all and have a wonderful day (or night :P)
-Jenkins
I also modded a lot in Warcraft 3, and i have to say, it is the most user friendly editor i have ever seen, and you can do so much with it.