The Beto Sector... a Strike Commander reference! (Armada Maps are full of crazy Origin references).
Here's part three!
Remember that old fighter pilot game called Wing Commander for the C64 that we mentioned a while back? Here's a very blurry picture of the box... which looks eerily familiar!
Here's part two!
Destroy them all if you can.
HellcatV here: I have finally implemented a system to control a starship using realistic physics in space (no air resistance). Note that many people have previously decried "realistic physics" as evil or uncontrollable. I tried them in vegastrike classic, and agreed with the masses. However, upon reading a manual, I was struck with a rather interesting idea...the whole idea behind afterburner slides made me realize: "Wing Commander Physics" == "Real Physics": it's just that in Wing Commander Universe, the computer is smart enough to correct for the lack of oxygen by applying counteractive forces in such a manner that the pilot won't know he's flying in space. With this in mind, I constructed a system I called "fly by wire" after the AI computer in the F16 Falcon that turns that unflyable craft into a pilotable craft (it would tumble out of the sky) I designed a method in "real physics" to make it feel like wing commander physics...that brought along with it afterburner slides, missile collision bouncing (like in WC1 and 2) and all sorts of wonderful Wing Commander realisms :-).So let me pronounce with conviction (and 10 seconds of successful testing) that Realistic Physics are a GOOD thing...because it lets the player have the flexibility of turning off the computer (wow what if the nav computer gets shot) and flying where forces don't get compensated and doing terribly cool maneuvers, and then switching it back on again and seriously having fun fighting just like WC1! Here are the details also available at my page (http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net):
- Major AI code modifications have been accomplished. Navigation orders have been slightly fixed so a starship doesn't going off careening in some random direction tryin to get where it's going and never getting there and hence never stopping. (note the exploding midway demo on the web)
- A "Fly By Wire" interface has been completed conceptually. It is as of yet almost untested except for a very brief 10 second test by myself...seems to work.
- This "fly-by-wire" is what was mentioned in the manual in regards to 'afterburner slide'. In space (and hence in vega strike) no forces exist to compensate the thrust of your ship or the sliding of your craft--or even the turning of your ship. The manual states that the computer cannot properly compensate for hitting the afterburner then turning. This gave me the idea that unlike in prophecy where a magic water exists to slow your ship down and make sure you don't go too fast, your ship computer compensates every control on your joystick to attempt to boost you straight forward even though your inertia is pushing you to the side. Falling naturally from that, your natural maximum speed is that which your computer can compensate for and keep you moving more or less straight ahead at the instant after a turn. Punching the afterburners will give it a few seconds of trouble, but no problem.
- The computer is completed... its never-ending job being to attempt to get the ship you're piloting to travel at the "SET-SPEED" in the cockpit, no matter where you're flying after a missile blast or a collision--or a tight turn.
- A system for interacting with the computer is also underway...where you can tell it 'stop compensating...I really do want to fly backwards because that's the way I'm heading' This will allow both players and AI to do seemingly impossible maneuvers...though mostly letting the computer control is the only way to seriously fight.
- A system for humans interacting with the control computer via keyboard has been completed. Mouse support will follow closely behind if necessary; however, joystick control is pending a decent API choice. (recommendations?)
- What does this mean? You keyboard jockeys can FINALLY control a ship instead of just a lame camera--a ship with pitch,yaw, roll limits, etc etc etc.... it's--wonderful! When can you expect a demo? In a matter of days/weeks depending on how done it really is (this computer doesn't have the hardware to conduct a thorough test of the movement)
Here's the first of the Wing Commander Armada sector maps in an updated format... one each day, for 11 days!
Well...
Welcome to Game Three, Week Thirty-Five Trivia. We play each week. Every Monday two main questions and one bonus question are posted to alt.games.wing-commander and listed at the CIC. Please email answers to CReid1701@aol.com or ChrisReid@wcnews.com. Be sure to include a name you would like to be known under for the Scoreboard that will be up soon. Have your answers in before this coming Sunday (July 1, 2001) to ensure your answers are recorded. Answers submitted early may be returned and you may be able to fix incorrect answers, time permitting. Main questions answered correctly are good for 5 points, bonuses good for 3.-------
Answers to Questions for Week 33 (starting June 18, 2001):Question 67: What was a Confederation base or outpost destroyed in the mid 2630's?
Most Popular Answer: Alexandria BaseQuestion 68: What was a Confederation base or outpost destroyed in the mid 2650's?
Most Popular Answer: Pegasus BaseBonus 34: What was a Confederation base or outpost destroyed in the early 2680's?
Answer: Confed Astronomical Station K-105 or Surveillance Outposts Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta------
New Questions for Week 35 (starting June 25, 2001):Question 69: What is the primary role of the Pelican Class craft?
Question 70: What is the primary role of the Zartoth Class craft?
Bonus 35: What is the primary role of either the Odysseus Class craft or the Copernicus Class craft?
Submissions are due by July 1, 2001.
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Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com and do not post directly to the Newsgroup. Thanks.
Q: Your brother works for what label?
A: owns lazySOB records, and texasmusicroundup.comQ: Will this be a "big" release or an "In-house" release?
A: small out-house. Very texas, dontcha know. Doesn't make any difference--a record is a record.Q: Estimated number to be made?
A: I dunno. A thousand to start.Q: Any thought toward the inserts on the CD?
A: It'll be pretty slim in that regard, I imagine.Q: And how much of the score will be on the CD?
A: Every stinkin' bit.
I recently saw a commercial for the Men In Black cartoon. Apparently, Earth gets invaded...by the Kilrathi?! The fighters used in the episode look strangely like ones from the cover of WC1 (Forgot the class...brain fart!), all the way down to the lasers pointing out of the half circle wings! Anyone else notice this? MIB has done good spoofs of the genre several times (Predator, Alien, Fantastic 4 and the Marvel Universe) and I think this is another tip of the hat...
I apologize for the lack of updates, but due to some oddities in sourceforge along with me having moved physical location, I have been unable to edit the webpage.Progress has been moving forward! Beams have been completed, with a standardized weapon format being written into the unit.xml files. The names of weapons reference a master weapon list which contains the properties of all weapons a starship could have.
In addition, major effort has been spent on making a fast collision detection system. One might argue that collisions are rare as starships do not often crash...however each laser beam or mass driver cannon needs to collide in order to do damage, so a breathtakingly fast collision system is important!
I store all starships and beams in a 3d collision table that has divided space into sectors. starships are only compared with others in their sector. If their farthest out points are somewhat touching then more difficult and accurate tests are used. BSP's are not fully functional yet, so the collision system right now utilizes only bounding spheres and boxes (2 levels)
Lots of debugging effort has been put in to remove some very stupid bugs in the collision system...it now appears to be working:
***MESH midway.xunit - Unit DELIVERS DAMAGE TO Planet - sun.bmp
Killing velocity: (0.28409,-1.81515,-2.15836), 1.23215
***MESH midway.xunit - Unit DELIVERS DAMAGE TO Planet - moon.bmpAnd lastly extremely preliminary code has been put into place for a slow port of the graphics libraries to C (as opposed to C++). AI and the collisions will remain C++.
So all is looking bright for vegastrike. We're still looking for AI programmers or programmers willing to port large quantities of C++ code to C. Please let me know at Hellcatv@hotmail.com
Welcome to Game Three, Week Thirty-Four Trivia. We play each week. Every Monday two main questions and one bonus question are posted to alt.games.wing-commander and listed at the CIC. Please email answers to CReid1701@aol.com or ChrisReid@wcnews.com. Be sure to include a name you would like to be known under for the Scoreboard that will be up soon. Have your answers in before this coming Sunday (June 10, 2001) to ensure your answers are recorded. Answers submitted early may be returned and you may be able to fix incorrect answers, time permitting. Main questions answered correctly are good for 5 points, bonuses good for 3.-------
Answers to Questions for Week 33 (starting June 11, 2001):Question 65: What were the details surrounding a destruction of Jeannette Devereaux's fighter during a mission?
Most Popular Answer: Angel's Rapier was knocked out as she destroyed an incoming Skipper Missile during a sneak attack attempted on Sol System in '54.Question 66: What were the details surrounding a destruction of Todd Marshall's fighter during a mission?
Most Popular Answer: Maniac sacrificed his craft to cover Blair during the Kilrah Temblor Run in '69. Some sharp trivia players came up with some good answers from his academy days as well.Bonus 33: What were the details surrounding a destruction of Troy Carter's fighter during a mission?
Most Popular Answer: Catscratch got cocky during a milk run to retrieve a satellite and wound up leeched. His craft was destroyed to prevent Confed from retrieving the item.------
New Questions for Week 33 (starting June 18, 2001):Question 67: What was a Confederation base or outpost destroyed in the mid 2630's?
Question 68: What was a Confederation base or outpost destroyed in the mid 2650's?
Bonus 34: What was a Confederation base or outpost destroyed in the early 2680's?
Submissions are due by June 24, 2001.
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Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com and do not post directly to the Newsgroup. Thanks.
There are currently around 20 missions in the story line, and they are all quite multi-part. When you look at a game like Wing Commander, you jump from one point to the next, and each place is an action-bubble, where something happens. You do not get the sense of place and dimension in a game like that, but only see some disconnected places. In Freelancer, everybody you meet has a "mission" or a plan, and they do come from somewhere, so they do have a "home".
To: ML Mercenary; ML Ace Pilots
Please help me! I was told that the pilots on these mailing lists were usually reliable, and at the very least would do anything for a buck. I need someone to save me from a rogue band of Papogod terrorists that I may have pissed off.
I need to leave Crius and I fear they may be preparing to ambush me.
You've seen the amount I'm offering. That will be paid to whoever goes to all four NAV points around Crius and kills any Papogod warships present. Please help, I'm desperate.
We have ourselves a major problem.
The crew of the CIS Kaitlin have mutinied and jumped ship. Although the mutineers have not yet been located (believe me, they will be) the Kaitlin has. She is now stranded at Nav point 120.
Two CIS Cruisers have been posted to oversee the recovery operation. However, no CIS fighter units are available at this time to help. We require a mercenary to help defend the carrier while the recovery units make their way to the Kaitlin. Let us stress that the Kaitlin is a very valuable piece of military hardware which must not fall into enemy hands.
Welcome to Game Three, Week Thirty-Three Trivia. We play each week. Every Monday two main questions and one bonus question are posted to alt.games.wing-commander and listed at the CIC. Please email answers to CReid1701@aol.com or ChrisReid@wcnews.com. Be sure to include a name you would like to be known under for the Scoreboard that will be up soon. Have your answers in before this coming Sunday (June 10, 2001) to ensure your answers are recorded. Answers submitted early may be returned and you may be able to fix incorrect answers, time permitting. Main questions answered correctly are good for 5 points, bonuses good for 3.-------
Answers to Questions for Week 32 (starting June 4, 2001):Question 63: What was an incident that caused Christopher Blair to be investigated or court martialed?
Most Popular Answer: The destruction of the TCS Tiger's ClawQuestion 64: What was an incident that caused Jason Bondarevesky to be investigated or court martialed?
Most Popular Answer: The mutiny aboard the TCS GettysburgBonus 32: What was an incident that caused Geoffrey Tolwyn to be investigated or court martialed?
Most Popular Answer: The Black Lance Affair------New Questions for Week 33 (starting June 11, 2001):
Question 65: What were the details surrounding a destruction of Jeannette Devereaux's fighter during a mission?
Question 66: What were the details surrounding a destruction of Todd Marshall's fighter during a mission?
Bonus 33: What were the details surrounding a destruction of Troy Carter's fighter during a mission?
Submissions are due by June 17, 2001.
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Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com and do not post directly to the Newsgroup. Thanks.
K, got the WCM DVD, Region 2 - German today. Pretty much a disappontment at the first glance (compared to the US release).DVD-case is the same as the English version. A bit different size of images and different text. They rather concentrate on advertising it as extension of the game as as a crossover of StarshipTrooper and Top Gun. BTW: German version is FSK-12... So we can see it one year earlier then you :P
Opening the box I noticed the lack of a a booklet. Also immediately a writing error jumped into my eye: "Chapter 5 - The Tigerk Claw" Ah, yeah - well...
The case of the DVD again lies (The english version said that there is French language which isn't) about the content - or I am just to dumb to find them? In case of the R2 DVD they say English and German 5.1 sound. That one is correct. However Subtitles are only in German while they claim English ones. Ditto for the menu. I could only see a German menu, no switch for it. The claimed Widescreen 16:9 also doesn't seem to be present. Only 2,35:1.
But as I said I did only have a first look.
The menu on the DVD is even worse then the English ones. They skipped any animations when switching through the (very few subpages). Also there are no trailers on the German version.
Mmmm, that is pretty much it. Oh, yes. As expected the dubbing is kinda odd. Especially Paladin sounded awful to my eyes. Actually all actors I did hear in a quick glance got too much of mickey mouse voices for me.
Ghost reports that Cinecanal in Argentina will be airing the Wing Commander Movie twice this month. Locally, the movie is titled "Escuadron Espacial" -- Space Squadron. Times as follows...
Wednesday, June 20th - 20:15
Sunday, June 30th - 18:40
Then, Origin Systems was looking for a programmer to work on Wing Commander Armada, the first multiplayer game that Origin had done in that product line. The experience I had in computer communication landed me that job. I worked on a wide variety of systems in that game and became familiar with 3d computer graphics. I stayed at Origin and worked on Kilrathi Saga, and eventually wrote the 3d graphics engine for Wing Commander Prophecy.
Welcome to Game Three, Week Thirty-Two Trivia. We play each week. Every Monday two main questions and one bonus question are posted to alt.games.wing-commander and listed at the CIC. Please email answers to CReid1701@aol.com or ChrisReid@wcnews.com. Be sure to include a name you would like to be known under for the Scoreboard that will be up soon. Have your answers in before this coming Sunday (June 10, 2001) to ensure your answers are recorded. Answers submitted early may be returned and you may be able to fix incorrect answers, time permitting. Main questions answered correctly are good for 5 points, bonuses good for 3.-------
Answers to Questions for Week 31 (starting May 28, 2001):Question 61: What are three fighters that carry exactly three main guns?
Most Popular Answers: Broadsword, Morningstar, Piranha and Drakhri.Question 62: What is a fighter that carries exactly three regular missiles?
Most Popular Answer: HornetBonus 31: What are the distinctions of three different Excalibur variants?
Most Popular Answers: Reaper Cannons on the 103A, Ion Cannons on the 103B, Increased Shields on the 103D and a Stealth Loadout on the Recon Excal------
New Questions for Week 32 (starting June 4, 2001):Question 63: What was an incident that caused Christopher Blair to be investigated or court martialed?
Question 64: What was an incident that caused Jason Bondarevesky to be investigated or court martialed?
Bonus 32: What was an incident that caused Geoffrey Tolwyn to be nvestigated or court martialed?
Submissions are due by June 10, 2001.
------
Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com and do not post directly to the Newsgroup. Thanks.
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