Wing Commander Prophecy: Secret Ops Model Update Pack

[DefianceIndustries]

I'd absolutely prefer glow/self-illumination map.

I actually spoke with the Open/GL team about this. It could be done without a major overhaul, we discussed using any pure white areas on the spec map as the key to making objects emit.

 

[Dark Sentinel]

Well, hum, a proper glow or just an imitation you told me about earlier?
Also I guess you're almost done with WCP/SO Confed figters and interceptors - what left is Shrike and Devastator + four supporting ships - SAR and refueling shuttles, Marine LC and SWACS. Am I right?
I guess I need to speed up to get more bug fighters done.

 

[DefianceIndustries]

No it would be a proper glow IIRC. Not sure if it would glow white or the color of the diffuse map.

You are right. I have a Herc and an SWACs modeled, the rest are on my list of to-do's. But we're almost done doing Confed fighters!

 

[DefianceIndustries]

Quick status report: For the last month I've been dealing with a bug that caused WCP:SO in all its forms to die on my PC. The silly part was that it was only me nobody else on the planet seemed to have the same issue (as it related to 17 year old software). So I had to pull an old desktop out of mothballs and use it for model conversion and testing. It really screwed up my workflow. Happily, with windows latest patch, whatever it was is gone and the game runs fine again. So, I'm in the process of extracting a fresh copy and re-applying all my updates to get me back in shape. Pretty quick I'll have new shots of Dark Sentinel's awesome Moray and Wasp in the game.

We're creeping up on a major milestone for the project as well, getting all the Confed fighters modeled and updated. So stay tuned...

 

[Vidmaster]

sounds great

 

[DefianceIndustries]

Here's the F-110, now with the SRB attached. I'll be working on doing conversions this weekend, so there will be more screen shots incoming.

 

[Quarto]

Very nice! Sadly, the more I look at this high-detail Wasp, the less I appreciate the original design, which seems to ultimately be a cockpit with weapon pods. I suppose it makes sense considering the Wasp has one job only, but looking at it now, I just don't think I like it. But that doesn't take anything away from the high-detail model!

 

[DefianceIndustries]

What's oddly fascinating about the Wasp to me is that in SO it's one of the best fighters in the game. Highly maneuverable, with one of the best gun and missile load outs to be found on Cerberus' flight deck. The Mosquito pods alone make it formidable, but couple that with some dust cannons and descent shielding, and it gives the Vampire a run for its money. But I agree its kind of an odd-ship-out as far as aesthetics goes. It seems like a hold-over from a previous iteration of fighters from the art department.

 

[Dark Sentinel]

Heeeeey, you even kept the huge open nozzle of the SRB pod.

 

[Quarto]

What's oddly fascinating about the Wasp to me is that in SO it's one of the best fighters in the game. Highly maneuverable, with one of the best gun and missile load outs to be found on Cerberus' flight deck. The Mosquito pods alone make it formidable, but couple that with some dust cannons and descent shielding, and it gives the Vampire a run for its money. But I agree its kind of an odd-ship-out as far as aesthetics goes. It seems like a hold-over from a previous iteration of fighters from the art department.

Not necessarily. Think about the Wasp, using the Squid as a point of reference. Both are very, very simple designs, hardly anything more than an engine, weapons, and a cockpit. Their only role is interception, so they're very no-frills. The Wasp is the only ship in the Midway's contingent that does not appear to have a jump drive built in, for instance. We can almost certainly assume, too, that while other ships are capable of atmospheric flight, the Wasp lacks this capability. And of course, both the Vampire and the Panther have special features that give them ultra-high manoeuvrability on one axis, requiring a special adjustment from the pilot. The Wasp has pretty good manoeuvrability all round, but cannot rival either the Panther or the Vampire if they are well used. And finally, the Wasp presumably would have a much lower range than other fighters. You don't get to fly a long-range mission with the Wasp, because it can't fly such a mission. So, yeah, the Wasp appears at first glance to be overpowered compared to those other ships, but when you think about its limitations, you realise that it's really not. And this is very well reflected in the ship's visual qualities... and sadly, this is exactly what makes it such an ugly beast .

 

[DefianceIndustries]

The MUP is officially back in business! Conversions are complete for @Quarto 's least favorite Confed fighter , as well as the Moray. I want to call out @Dark Sentinel's excellent Moray model, now that I've gotten a close look at it I can say that as far as the MUP goes, this is clearly his best work to date! Bravo sir!

****Updated the post with some in-games shots of the moray.

 

[PopsiclePete]

Beauties !

 

[Quarto]

Best refuelling shuttle ever!

 

[DefianceIndustries]

Here are a few shots of the Wasp in game.

 

[DefianceIndustries]

I found a bug while testing unrelated to the Wasp, for some reason the upgraded Excalibur breaks the intro movie, no idea why as the game doesn't throw an error, it just crashes. It's not the unlimited patch as near as I can tell since the upgraded Panthers render just fine. I thought it might be related to the model's scale, since the Excal in the game is only 11 meters as opposed to the 31 or so it is in WC3/4 but after rescaling it, the game still crashes...which is silly since it works just fine in later missions at full scale. I may have to look at the intro mission code to see if its in there somewhere...item #5 on the bug list...

 

[Quarto]

Hmm. Looking at those in-game shots with the Panther's cockpit, I am rather strongly reminded that apart from overhauling the ship meshes, you may also want to look into the cockpit meshes .

I don't know what the issue with your Excalibur bug might be... but are you sure it's related to the Excalibur at all? I don't recall the Excalibur in the Secret Ops intro (though I might simply not recall it).

 

[DefianceIndustries]

I don't know what the issue with your Excalibur bug might be... but are you sure it's related to the Excalibur at all? I don't recall the Excalibur in the Secret Ops intro (though I might simply not recall it).

Yes it appears briefly right as the camera pans past the listening post and escorts a tanker toward the Cerberus.



I know its related to the Excalibur because there are only two upgraded models in the scene (currently) the Panther and Excalibur. When the game started crashing I replaced the models with their originals and it worked fine, by process of elimination I discovered it to be the Excalibur that was causing the crash, darned if I know why though.



As for the cockpit meshes, funny you should mention that. @Dark Sentinel wants to look into tinkering on an upgraded Panther cockpit for the mod.

 

[DefianceIndustries]

@Quarto, @PopsiclePete: I had an idea and I wonder if it's possible: animated controls inside a cockpit model (ie a flight stick that moves). I'm not sure if it can be done in a cockpit, but theoretically couldn't you use an EPOD chunk to create an animated flight stick? You could create rotation on the X and Z axes (you'd have to play with the hard point pivot location to create a stick that moves rather than rotates) but is such an animal possible?

 

[Triple-B]

@Quarto, @PopsiclePete: I had an idea and I wonder if it's possible: animated controls inside a cockpit model (ie a flight stick that moves). I'm not sure if it can be done in a cockpit, but theoretically couldn't you use an EPOD chunk to create an animated flight stick? You could create rotation on the X and Z axes (you'd have to play with the hard point pivot location to create a stick that moves rather than rotates) but is such an animal possible?

To be honest with you: I really hate the flightstick in wc 1-3. Always played with clean Cockpit( Kilrathi Saga). It was sort of irritating to me

 

[Quarto]

@Quarto, @PopsiclePete: I had an idea and I wonder if it's possible: animated controls inside a cockpit model (ie a flight stick that moves). I'm not sure if it can be done in a cockpit, but theoretically couldn't you use an EPOD chunk to create an animated flight stick? You could create rotation on the X and Z axes (you'd have to play with the hard point pivot location to create a stick that moves rather than rotates) but is such an animal possible?

Uhhhh... I absolutely have no idea whatsoever. It seems very doubtful, at least it would require some significant patching. The one thing I am sure of, is that you can't use an EPOD chunk, because the cockpit file does not support such structures.