Sat Jul 23, 2005 1:47 am
Stupid Hovis Tricks
So... it's like this, folks. I've been working on 1.3 of the XML Toolkit Mod (I never thought I'd be spending this much time with this, lol) and while I've completed the major things I wanted to accomplish, such as adding custom ShipDealers to every valid Base in the FL universe, making custom Thrusters with custom flames, working on new ALE TXMs (that's a whole topic in and of itself) and other things... I have this little challenge that I'd like to hear some practical feedback on (and, uh, maybe even get some help with on the coding end).
Basically, I've decided, after much thought, to raise the Cruise speed. This works just fine, with no additional lag in MP (due, in large part, to the fact that the AI runs soooo much more efficiently in Toolkit than in the original game) and the SP campaign is still functional (after adding a very long delay before Cruise kicks in, with custom sound FX) but... there is an issue: the Hovis race.
Lots of people have enough trouble with the Hovis race when they're Cruising at 300, let alone 800 (which is where the speed's at now, after much testing) and I don't think that most people will be able to handle the Race in SP at these new Cruise velocities. So, I've been kind've thinking that I should make the track have a much kinder, gentler layout- say, a gently-curving circle or S-curve. My problem here is simple: how do I go about this, from a coding perspective?
Just moving the track-rings does not produce the desired effect. So this seems to be mainly Mission code. Anybody feel kind enough to explain how the Race's states are set, declared, and satisfied, so that I can alter this area of the SP Campaign? If I could get some help here, I'd appreciate it, and I'm sure that whatever we learn could be applied to ... say ... a totally new SP campaign at some point. So, much like my work with THN scripts, I'd like to see if anybody with prior experience would be willing to help- I'll provide the community with any relevant info/code chunks I can come up with as I work on it
Also, while I'm at it... could somebody explain why FLScan thinks that there are numerous errors in the SDK's Mission code? I would have to assume that these are, in fact, real errors, and maybe I could fix them up at some point.
Last but not least... I am of the slowly-growing opinion that there may be THN reference errors in the SDK that are causing some buggy output at various places. Among other things, I've seen at least one entry for a Female model with a Male hand-set. I'll comment more on that when I have taken a lengthier look at the code...
Basically, I've decided, after much thought, to raise the Cruise speed. This works just fine, with no additional lag in MP (due, in large part, to the fact that the AI runs soooo much more efficiently in Toolkit than in the original game) and the SP campaign is still functional (after adding a very long delay before Cruise kicks in, with custom sound FX) but... there is an issue: the Hovis race.
Lots of people have enough trouble with the Hovis race when they're Cruising at 300, let alone 800 (which is where the speed's at now, after much testing) and I don't think that most people will be able to handle the Race in SP at these new Cruise velocities. So, I've been kind've thinking that I should make the track have a much kinder, gentler layout- say, a gently-curving circle or S-curve. My problem here is simple: how do I go about this, from a coding perspective?
Just moving the track-rings does not produce the desired effect. So this seems to be mainly Mission code. Anybody feel kind enough to explain how the Race's states are set, declared, and satisfied, so that I can alter this area of the SP Campaign? If I could get some help here, I'd appreciate it, and I'm sure that whatever we learn could be applied to ... say ... a totally new SP campaign at some point. So, much like my work with THN scripts, I'd like to see if anybody with prior experience would be willing to help- I'll provide the community with any relevant info/code chunks I can come up with as I work on it
Also, while I'm at it... could somebody explain why FLScan thinks that there are numerous errors in the SDK's Mission code? I would have to assume that these are, in fact, real errors, and maybe I could fix them up at some point.
Last but not least... I am of the slowly-growing opinion that there may be THN reference errors in the SDK that are causing some buggy output at various places. Among other things, I've seen at least one entry for a Female model with a Male hand-set. I'll comment more on that when I have taken a lengthier look at the code...
