Author Topic: RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets  (Read 853 times)

Legacy_Tchos

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #30 on: September 28, 2015, 07:58:30 pm »


               


What it looks like is being done here I'm not sure can be done in nwn2 as I dont believe the tiles have the anims to loop through. You could swap out vfx or even models, but you cant affect trees via any script and as far as I know the terrain textures can't be changed either.




 


Tiles can be swapped in NWN2 by script, but as for terrain textures, I don't know.



               
               

               
            

Legacy_OldTimeRadio

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #31 on: September 29, 2015, 04:26:03 am »


               


Does the Bioware compiler handle "selfillumcolourkey" correctly? The compiler I have breaks all animations with self-illumination. I always use it for placeables but never for tiles because of this.




Is this really about "selfillumcolourkey" or the whole "setfillumcolor" vs "selfillumcolor" thing?


               
               

               
            

Legacy_Zwerkules

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #32 on: September 29, 2015, 04:32:07 pm »


               


Is this really about "selfillumcolourkey" or the whole "setfillumcolor" vs "selfillumcolor" thing?




The compiler I use breaks all those animations because it probably looks for the misspelled "setfillum" instead of "selfillum". Changing "selfillum" to "setfillum" will break the uncompiled models and there's no guarantee the models will compile correctly, so I just don't compile tiles any more. Another reason for not compiling tiles any more is that though they might load faster, the compiled models are so much bigger that haks (not counting textures) have between 160 and 200% the size they had before. The disadvantages of compiling the tiles far outweigh any advantages compiled models may have.


Placeables however, though they too grow in size when compiled, don't have any problems with animations and they load noticeably faster, so I compile those.



               
               

               
            

Legacy_OldTimeRadio

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #33 on: September 29, 2015, 09:17:17 pm »


               

The compiler I use breaks all those animations because it probably looks for the misspelled "setfillum" instead of "selfillum".




I believe the problem you're dealing with comes from an error in a model compiler/decompiler which is based off some of Torlack's code. Which means it could be Torlack's original compiler or even the model compiler/decompiler which comes with Acaos' NWN Explorer Reborn 1.63. To remedy this, use the DLA compiler in this archive here. This compiler has the correct "selfillumcolor" spelling in the code, along with several other helpful fixes.


The Bioware internal compiler (also in the pack at the link above) also has the correct spelling but can not decompile models. However, for tile/placeable compiling, I have found it to be superior.  It usually does a better job with non-characters than anything.  Torlack's model compiler and any of its derivatives (Acaos', DLA's) all work the same way, which is reverse-engineered from the old Bioware model viewer's behavior, for the most part.


 


The Bioware internal compiler is not a reverse-engineered community tool.  It's basically a standalone version of the bit of code which compiles models in the toolset and game. It's not perfect, but it's my first choice before the DLA compiler.

 



Another reason for not compiling tiles any more is that though they might load faster, the compiled models are so much bigger that haks (not counting textures) have between 160 and 200% the size they had before. The disadvantages of compiling the tiles far outweigh any advantages compiled models may have.



Meh.  I've written about the benefits of compiling models a bazillion times so I won't belabor the point, except to say (again) that no model ever hits the screen uncompiled.  All models are always compiled by the toolset or the game if they're in ASCII format when they're loaded.  Having the same model compiled again and again, on the fly, is only the first of many reasons why pretty much all (finished) models should be distributed in compiled form.  Most of the others can probably be gleaned with a Google search of site:bioware.com "oldtimeradio" AND "compiled".  


 


I understand that in some remote sense where people have tiny, tiny hard drives, the enlarged file sizes could be off-putting.  But when we're talking about 100k vs 200k for a model, is that really more of a burden than making every single player, ever, wait while that model is compiled on the fly, every time it's loaded?  For tilesets, especially, that can be such a timekiller.


 


Speaking more generally, I know this won't change any minds already made up on the point.  It never seems to.  But it's such a funny thing for people to reject for whatever reason, I honestly find it confusing.  


 


Cheers to you, though, and I hope if you experiment with the DLA model compiler that you have better experiences with the process and, maybe, a change of heart on the matter.



               
               

               
            

Legacy_MerricksDad

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #34 on: September 29, 2015, 11:59:16 pm »


               

Really, the issue of space should have been taken care of when we started getting above the 200 MB hard drive size....well as long as the computer owner has funds for today's equipment. I remember having that discussion with my dad years ago, and he was saying how big of a mistake it was to just keeping getting a larger hard drive, so you could have more and more stuff to fill it with, opening a gap for crappy programmers to leave junk in their code, instead of making cleaner code. As a coder at the time, I agreed with him, but it isn't about code now. It is about saving processor time, and game smoothness. Code really accounts for such a fly spec of anything on a drive now, and image resources account for, from what I can see, a great majority of anything on a drive (not counting compressed music).



               
               

               
            

Legacy_Tarot Redhand

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #35 on: September 30, 2015, 12:36:51 am »


               

Depends how much of your hard earned cash has been spent on a nostalgia fest through GOG (guilty as charged - 230+ games and counting "but they're so cheap!!!" and it took years to get there). Otherwise my 2tb data drive has over 1tb to go yet.


 


TR



               
               

               
            

Legacy_henesua

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #36 on: September 30, 2015, 07:51:31 pm »


               

How do you script tile animations? Is that an NWNX thing?



               
               

               
            

Legacy_OldTimeRadio

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RE: Interesting Idea for Seasonal Tilesets
« Reply #37 on: October 01, 2015, 12:19:36 am »


               


How do you script tile animations? Is that an NWNX thing?




I don't think that's possible.  It might be an NWNX thing already but I believe VirusMan commented that if it were ever done, people would only see updates on re-entering the area.  So nothing "dynamic" that I know of.