Ongoing WC project about to break out

D

dreddnott

Spaceman
Nob and Hades (and, a couple months later, I) started the Wing Commander Total Conversion to X-wing Alliance just over a year ago, and have made steady progress since then. We're almost ready to release a preview of the WC1 segment, since we have all 4 Confed and all 6 Kilrathi fighters done, and the Venture and Ralari as well.

We made most of the models ourselves (Nalkri, Rogue_62095, Hawkeye, JC, and Hades) but some we got off the Homeworld conversion, others from wcmods.com (all textures were home-brewed/modified by me and/or Hawkeye).

You can see pics of almost all of our current ship designs at http://www.xwlegacy.net/wctc/pics but here are some in particular:

sartha1.jpg

Model by Rogue_62095, his best yet!
vaktoth3.jpg

The Vaktoth came with its own textures in a skin-like format, I had to mince it up to fit into XWA's texture-per-face setup. I also added a bit of detail. It works especially well against those pesky Broadswords (Nalkri's model, my textures). Note that this is not an A-17D Broadsword, but rather an A-17A (we will probably have a G model as well).

You'll notice that the WC3 ships' textures are pretty much stylized to resemble the colour scheme used on WC1-2 ships: more bright, and a little different in the detailing. This is especially obvious with the Kilrathi ships.

We are going to have cloaking Strakhas, and our conversion only extends as far as WC3 ships, and ships considered old in WC4. WC Privateer and Armada will be included to some degree.
We'll have our own storyline, courtesy of Nob, of course.

If you have comments, suggestions, etc, please reply...and don't put the reply above my post!! ;-)
 
Gee, they're not -that- good... :-P

Right now, I'm waiting on Nalkri, Rogue_62095, and JC to get their butts moving on the Strakha (with genuine proximity-based Cloaking Action!), Sabre, Stiletto, Crossbow, and eventually the Fralthra and Exeter. Sheldon is slowly working on the Tiger's Claw (so the rumours go).

It's been most enjoyable dredging old 2D craft up and putting them into the world of 3D. Finally being able to fly around and in the capships will be most liberating (you should see the Ralari and Venture! In fact, I'll make you! ahahaha...).

ralari3.jpg

venture1.jpg


Concordia is nearing completion...not sure what else I can do besides tweak the textures and add illumination effects (and the ships in the foreground, respectively, are Dralthi and Krant).
 
Oh, but they are -that- good :). Over at UE, in the interest of saving time (we've used up enough of it already) we're forced to use whatever models have already been converted, and frankly, I'm jealous :). It's actually rather ironic that the best representations of WC ships will appear not in the best WC game, but in the best X-Wing game.
 
Looks like someone will finally be putting his Alliance to work!:) I am especially pleased with the Krant. Keep us informed of any news.

Q, Did you get a look at the swarm of Epees? If those had a single heavy rocket on each ship, that listening post would go down faster than flying boulder on a planetary mission.;)

[Edited by Death's Head on 02-07-2001 at 13:57]
 
Originally posted by Quarto
Oh, but they are -that- good :). Over at UE, in the interest of saving time (we've used up enough of it already) we're forced to use whatever models have already been converted, and frankly, I'm jealous :). It's actually rather ironic that the best representations of WC ships will appear not in the best WC game, but in the best X-Wing game.
Click to expand...

So you mean that all wc converted models looks bad? Remmember that ships from WC1 and WC2 are very simple, thats why they dont look too good when converted, but i think they do look good, and with no disrespect to the xwa mod (your ships do look great), i always think that the textures in SO look much better than the xwa ones...

[Edited by KillerWave on 02-07-2001 at 21:59]
 
So you mean that all wc converted models looks bad? Remmember that ships from WC1 and WC2 are very simple, thats why they dont look too good when converted, but i think they do look good, and with no disrespect to the xwa mod (your ships do look great), i always think that the textures in SO look much better than the xwa ones...
Click to expand...
Not at all... there's a lot of great looking WC converted models. It's just that some of the WC1 conversions aren't that brilliant. Usually, it's a matter of texture.
 
Of course the WC1 textures dont look very good in SO, you must remmember that WC1 is an old game, and the ships where more drawings than 3d models...but the models are good, just the textures have a cartoon look :)
With other textures it could be different, i think in UE, you are using snuzzle textures for the tigers Claw isnt it? that does make a lot of difference doesnt it?
 
Originally posted by KillerWave
Of course the WC1 textures dont look very good in SO, you must remmember that WC1 is an old game, and the ships where more drawings than 3d models...but the models are good, just the textures have a cartoon look :)
With other textures it could be different, i think in UE, you are using snuzzle textures for the tigers Claw isnt it? that does make a lot of difference doesnt it?
Click to expand...

Hurmf... WC1, WC2, WC Academy and Privateer ships weren't 3D, they were BITMAPS. Hence they didn't have any textures nor could be converted to a 3D game engine. The model and textures UE uses have all been made from scratch.

The problem with UE ships isn't just about textures, but also about flat shapes (ie wings) of some ships like the Gratha and the Scimitar. Unfortunatly, since these are flat, they tend to disapear when saw from the side (like a sheet of paper).
 
All those textures were handmade by me (with the exception of the WC3 ships, where I heavily altered and enhanced the defaults).

All the models we made were drawn by extracting the 2D image files from WC1 and WC2 and doing eye comparisons.

I'd therefore like you to refrain from calling these ships specifically conversions of the original WC1 and WC2 ships - maybe reinterpretation is a better word. :)

It's a damn shame that I don't have any pictures of our Scimitar to show you. It looks freakin' incredible (Hawkeye's work, also Hornet).

The textures, for the most part, don't resemble the originals too much, I tried to keep them consistent, and a little darker and more detailed. It keeps the Gratha from standing out against the Sorthak too much.

The most annoying part was the matter of length. Almost none of the WC1-3 (and Privateer) ships have the length correct in the manuals. Often the tonnage and the length are switched, or length is doubled (or both). Some WC2 Confed ships and all WC2 Kilrathi fighters are the only ones with correct lengths so far. I wish they could get things straight.
 
I didnt know that, i thought it was converted to 3d in some way, now that i think of it, its stupid of me :(
But the WC1 and WC2 ships do look great on SO, its just that, at least to me, they dont have that "metalic" look, i mean, the WC3 and above textures appear to be made from metal in the game, but not the WC1 and WC2 ones (again, to me at least)
And being those ships are made from scratch, its a bigger credit for its creators!:)

[Edited by KillerWave on 02-08-2001 at 22:35]
 
Originally posted by dreddnott
All those textures were handmade by me (with the exception of the WC3 ships, where I heavily altered and enhanced the defaults).

[...]

It's a damn shame that I don't have any pictures of our Scimitar to show you. It looks freakin' incredible (Hawkeye's work, also Hornet).

The textures, for the most part, don't resemble the originals too much, I tried to keep them consistent, and a little darker and more detailed. It keeps the Gratha from standing out against the Sorthak too much.
Click to expand...

Would you like to contribute your Scim and Gratha models for UE ? :)
 
Heh, why don't you just post a requests list?

Once we release at least one chapter of this TC, I'm free to give out the components of our models (textures, wireframe, etc). That'll take a while, at least if we don't get the capships done ASAP!

I'd really like to have a model of the Dorkathi, Dorkir, or Kamekh right now. Just the wireframe, I can do the textures. hehe.
 
I'm going to sue you for using my name! TC IS TRADEMARKED!



YOU'LL PAY FOR THIS INSULT, FOOLS!!!!!!!!!

(tee hee)

TC
 
Well, it was one-of-a-kind, so it might be a bit pointless. At the same time, the fact that one was modified in such a haphasard manner implies that there's bound to be others out there with various freaky modifications. If you've got the time, you could even make several versions.
 
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