Armada

Hello there...
Is it just me or is the armada engine the most impressive of all the WC series? Maybe I'm just old fashioned, and maybe it's just the strange beverage that I hold in my hand talking... but in my opinion it is unparallelled as of yet. The newer WC games are lost on me, and I find myself stuck back in the good old days. I am hoping to make a game with the flight engine based in Armada... here's the thing; I am not a programmer nor a graphic artist LOL, just a lowly writer with an impressive WC story to tell. If this peaks anyone's interest or anybody has advice on this topic, a reply would be greatly appreciated.
 
Similar idea to the hi-res versions of SO. That would be a nice thing to have. I wonder how HCl did it. There may be some difficulty with cockpits etc though.
 
Doesn't armada have that feature where you can get rid of the cockpit and see only the instruments, like the WCP HUD? Because I believe what HCl did with the cockpits in the SO patches was simply change the absolute position of each display on-screen... so theoretically, the same could be done to Armada if a hi-res patch was made... but the cockpit graphics themselves might have to be re-scaled or done away with, perhaps.

--Eder
 
I love cockpits too. I think that the WCP/SO HUDs, and, especially, the WC4 HUD, hurt the atmosphere of the games and the overall experience of feeling like "you're there".

--Eder
 
I'm sure there would be some way to save the cockpits, hell, if we could get H.E day to do them they'll end up looking better than the originals! i reckon an upgrade would be a great idea.
 
Originally posted by Eder
Doesn't armada have that feature where you can get rid of the cockpit and see only the instruments, like the WCP HUD? Because I believe what HCl did with the cockpits in the SO patches was simply change the absolute position of each display on-screen... so theoretically, the same could be done to Armada if a hi-res patch was made... but the cockpit graphics themselves might have to be re-scaled or done away with, perhaps.
Good guess, bright eyes!
...No, I'm not coming onto you, it's just that WC-quoting is a difficult habit to break :).
Yes, that's exactly what was done with the cockpits in the SO patches. Their absolute positions were changed without rescaling them. In fact, this even meant that we had to remove those blue cockpit strut thingies that only appear with 3Dfx, because there was no way to make them look right without being able to rescale them.
The problem with Armada (though as far as I know, HCl has never considered such a project, so maybe if he did, he could find a solution to this too) is that we don't really know much about how the positions of the cockpit instruments are stored. Furthermore, Armada itself would probably not make for very happy patching - most of HCl's patches these days are in DLL format, which would be rather difficult to use with a game that doesn't run under any form of Windows ;).
 
Speaking of which, Q... (Here comes! :))

How do I change the position, size, and graphics of the CIC room? And can I, like, add the Object Viewer and Flight Sim into SO without replacing any of the older CIC room "buttons"?

--Eder
 
In the case of the former, I'll have to consult my notes to give you all the details, which are on the other computer (must hook them up in a network one of these days). But the good news is that it is very easy :).
In the case of the latter, yes you can do it. We've done it ;). This is mostly a matter of editing the series file however, rather than the room file. Basically, every time you add something like that in the room file, you need to provide a reference to the name of the function in the series file which will serve this item. Naturally, if you refer to a function which doesn't exist, the game will crash. More details will follow eventually.
 
Okay, I've got some questions.
I have never gotten the excalibur patch to work in Armada... don't even know if it can myself lol, but how does it respond in multi-player? And also the Positron AMG Armedit program... how does that respond in multiplayer?
 
I forgot to mention...

Oh yeah, and this might reflect how a hi-res patch for armada might behave in a multi-player scenario... ??? just babbling
 
Originally posted by Quarto
More details will follow eventually.

Great... I shouldn't need to mess with that stuff for a while, but it's simpler than making missions... so I just thought I'd get the questions I had about it out of the way :)

--Eder
 
Well Eder, it's good that you're not in any great hurry because I still haven't gotten around to checking it ;). I will, though.

I don't think anybody's ever tried any sort of editing with multiplayer, Corsair. My guess would be that it would depend on whether both (or, in the case of PG, all) players have the patch. If only one player has the patch, this would create a very peculiar anomaly, or it would simply crash. I mean, imagine if your computer is convinced that you're flying an Excal with a top speed of 520, while the enemy's computer thinks you're flying a Banshee with a top speed of 350... how would Armada react? However, if all the involved players use the same patch, then there should be no problem at all. As for the non-existent hi-res patch on the other hand, this patch would not influence gameplay in any way, and therefore it would not affect multi-player at all.
 
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