This topic is for discussion of map #1719: Hovership Commander Mission 0
(https://knucklecracker.com/creeperworld4/queryMaps.php?query=thumbnailid&id=1719)
Author: Argonwolf
Size: 120x180
FYI the people tagging it broken are because the UI doesn't load correctly if you're not on the current beta version (due perhaps to a bug that I reported and is only patched in the beta version right now). So you may want to avoid releasing more maps until the patch comes out.
Here's a picture of what it looks like in the older version. When it redraws an area it seems to work right, but there is the possibility of errors due the aforementioned bug.
For those wanting to try anyway, press n, and the top half of the log will update, but I didn't test it further beyond that before switching back to the beta version.
worked fine for me, a liitle bit too much info at once, but if the missions add things slowly it would be ok :}
All I got was a screen with the hover ship there, with no ability to do anything. Mouse, keys, all zero effect. I couldn't even exit the level until I realized "Esc" worked enough to bring up that menu, at which point I finally had a mouse to click exit.
Quote from: CyberDyneSystems on June 08, 2021, 06:57:30 PM
All I got was a screen with the hover ship there, with no ability to do anything. Mouse, keys, all zero effect. I couldn't even exit the level until I realized "Esc" worked enough to bring up that menu, at which point I finally had a mouse to click exit.
Are you in the mverse beta version? When I released the map I knew there were some issues with rasters but I didn't think it was that severe. It should work alright in the current beta (and hopefully the soon-to-come stable release of mverse). Sorry about the brokenness, the project got a wee bit out of control and bugs started slipping past me!
I didn't test thoroughly, but I think the main issue is because the raster is blank, people don't realize they need to press n to start working through the messages before the game allows input. (Even with it displayed, I didn't realize that at first, either)
Quote from: Durikkan on June 08, 2021, 07:17:19 PM
I didn't test thoroughly, but I think the main issue is because the raster is blank, people don't realize they need to press n to start working through the messages before the game allows input. (Even with it displayed, I didn't realize that at first, either)
The raster definitely starts out rendered for me, I played it a lot of times to work out all the bugs. If it doesn't initially render for somebody who has the beta installed, I couldn't say why. The first slide of the tutorial has the n - next prompt. The only bug I encountered was the energy, anti-creeper and arg meters rendering through, but it doesn't affect anything except the visual and I didn't figure it was worth the time of writing an exception into the code to mask it.
That being said I'll go play it from the colony menu and see if it behaves right for me. All bug reports are certainly appreciated.
Quote from: alche on June 08, 2021, 06:53:20 PM
worked fine for me, a liitle bit too much info at once, but if the missions add things slowly it would be ok :}
The missions will have everything available, with the first mission being slow and easy with lots of room to play with it all. Subsequent missions will still have all weapons and tools available, but be more difficult with more enemies and scarcer resources, encouraging more complex gameplay. Of course some of the challenge will always come from the piloting itself, as was intended from the beginning.
Yay, one more thing i can't do since i'm not on steam :'(
This concept seems to be great and I will be happy to try and play it when it works properly in a CW4 release version since you seem to have worked hard on it and the idea is great.
However, releasing a map containing a script that only works in an unreleased beta version of CW4... well. That's a big no no of design in my opinion. You should be proud of this work, but like Cyberpunk, maybe release it when it's actually ready?
Quote from: Durikkan on June 08, 2021, 07:17:19 PM
I didn't test thoroughly, but I think the main issue is because the raster is blank, people don't realize they need to press n to start working through the messages before the game allows input. (Even with it displayed, I didn't realize that at first, either)
Um yeah, this was me :) Thanks for the heads up, felling a little daft.
buuuut, Wow, this is AMAZING! I just can't believe the things that are being done with these maps! FPS, PAC and now I get to fly an Orca :)
I'm not using the beta. I un-paused and nothing was showing, so I hit <Enter> and the display came up.
Really amazing stuff. The feel of the controls is pretty good for the most part. Lot of keys to have to remember, but might not be too bad. Looks like this has an amazing amount of potential.
Quote from: Redneck on June 08, 2021, 09:31:29 PM
Yay, one more thing i can't do since i'm not on steam :'(
Why can't you? Doesn't the GOG version let you play community maps or something? It's not a multiplayer map, it just requires the beta because the previous version has a bug in the 4rpl used to render the UI.
Quote from: Shatterstep on June 08, 2021, 11:16:03 PM
I'm not using the beta. I un-paused and nothing was showing, so I hit <Enter> and the display came up.
Really amazing stuff. The feel of the controls is pretty good for the most part. Lot of keys to have to remember, but might not be too bad. Looks like this has an amazing amount of potential.
Great minds think alike, perhaps? Good guess hitting enter anyway, since that's the key that starts the mission, and is prompted to be pressed on the last of the "Intro" text panes. I'm glad you got to have fun in spite of the bugs, and you can pause at any time which displays a small control reference sheet above the HUD. I'll certainly agree that I put quite a few controls in though. :o
Quote from: CyberDyneSystems on June 08, 2021, 10:50:43 PM
Quote from: Durikkan on June 08, 2021, 07:17:19 PM
I didn't test thoroughly, but I think the main issue is because the raster is blank, people don't realize they need to press n to start working through the messages before the game allows input. (Even with it displayed, I didn't realize that at first, either)
Um yeah, this was me :) Thanks for the heads up, felling a little daft.
buuuut, Wow, this is AMAZING! I just can't believe the things that are being done with these maps! FPS, PAC and now I get to fly an Orca :)
I mean we already have Tiberium in CW4, not to mention the obelisks of light in the final mission. I just wanted to keep that ball rolling, y'know?
But yeah if you're not in the beta that's why the UI didn't render, otherwise there's a prompt that says "N - Next".
Wow this is really something! So much potential!
My only gripes are that building feels kinda bad and inacurate, which goes double for terraforming, any reason why it can't be at the cursor? having to use the bomb cam adds unecessary complexity imo.
I'm also bummed that you are using spacebar for ascent since I have that set to pause normally. I would have prefered the altitude to be set at Z X, but this ofcourse is just my preferences, though any chance you could set the ship controls to the "custom keys" ?
This concept and the execution is amazing! I'm curious how you made those raster textures, is there an external program that can create these?
Quote from: Up-Level on June 09, 2021, 04:30:14 PM
This concept and the execution is amazing! I'm curious how you made those raster textures, is there an external program that can create these?
There IS an external program that can create them. It's a script I created in Unity engine that takes a Texture2D and reconstitutes it as an uncompressed base-64 18-bit color string. If you (or anyone) wants the script or some textures converted, just ask. I'll help you set up the raster script to render them too.
Quote from: CyberDyneSystems on June 08, 2021, 06:57:30 PM
All I got was a screen with the hover ship there, with no ability to do anything. Mouse, keys, all zero effect. I couldn't even exit the level until I realized "Esc" worked enough to bring up that menu, at which point I finally had a mouse to click exit.
i couldn't even get escape to work
Quote from: SteveCarlo on June 09, 2021, 05:56:50 PM
Quote from: CyberDyneSystems on June 08, 2021, 06:57:30 PM
All I got was a screen with the hover ship there, with no ability to do anything. Mouse, keys, all zero effect. I couldn't even exit the level until I realized "Esc" worked enough to bring up that menu, at which point I finally had a mouse to click exit.
i couldn't even get escape to work
You'll need the Mverse beta to play this mission and future ones properly due to bugs with the UI. I've since updated the maps' tags to reflect this.
I was able to play this mission without issue on non-beta, regular ol' 1.4.8. There is an initial rendering issue but pressing 'n' a couple of times to step forward a few frames to get to the initial dialog seems to clear that all up.
"WIER" - I am winner.
I think a LOT of mapmakers would love to add custom overlay meshes/textures to their maps for the posted screenshot portion even if that is all they ever use CPACKs for. If it were made relatively easy to do, more maps would use it.
Having made a number of custom maps myself with 4RPL, this obviously took a ton of time to make. Custom units for pretty much all aspects of the hovercraft (the unit itself, weapons fire, floating cursor, etc) and custom textures both in CPACKs and embedded into the 4RPL itself. Not to mention, debugging 4RPL once it is inside a CPACK is a nightmare. I wish there was a 4RPL Console for CPACK scripts.
That box in the corner though is nuts. It looks like you are drawing every single pixel with BlitRaster() - a 4RPL function I'm not particularly familiar with. Including the tutorial text. There are a lot of really interesting bits of code in both Tutorial.4rpl and RasterCheck.4rpl to look at. I would love to see more core game functionality for custom menuing rather than having to do stuff like what you did, which is basically making your own 2D texture drawing engine inside a video game scripting language...
One thing to note is that clicking on the raster box apparently zooms it in to 2x size. Clicking again results in zooming into something like 4x size (and a bunch of the box is no longer visible on the screen). Clicking again restores it to 1x size. I assume the zooming behavior is baked into the core game itself. Maybe that box was originally intended as some sort of debugging facility for sprites, hence the zooming bit?
Quote from: CS Z on June 09, 2021, 09:26:11 PMOne thing to note is that clicking on the raster box apparently zooms it in to 2x size. Clicking again results in zooming into something like 4x size (and a bunch of the box is no longer visible on the screen). Clicking again restores it to 1x size. I assume the zooming behavior is baked into the core game itself. Maybe that box was originally intended as some sort of debugging facility for sprites, hence the zooming bit?
Yeah, that's baked in to the base functionality of the raster. As for speculation on its purpose, the raster actually defaults to the size of the current map (and the crash bug for non-beta is because part of having it bigger than the map size was overlooked). So perhaps it was to be used as an informational display of some sort, with every map tile represented and changing color based on.. something. So clicking on it would effectively be zooming on that map display.
Pretty intriguing mode. Normally I'm not too excited for new modes since that seems to be overly popular compared to the regular style of play I prefer, but this one's very interesting - reminds me a lot of Battlezone Combat Commander. The idea of doing RTS stuff while also being part of the action is a fun, albeit difficult, idea to play with.
I was able to play it in non-beta, after a couple retries to figure out how to start it due to the already well mentioned bug.
My only gripe is the way terraforming is handled. It's so clunky and unintuitive that I feel I won't be using it at all unless absolutely necessary, so I hope your future maps of this mode don't make it a core necessity to progress.
Quote from: Durikkan on June 09, 2021, 10:44:20 PM
Quote from: CS Z on June 09, 2021, 09:26:11 PMOne thing to note is that clicking on the raster box apparently zooms it in to 2x size. Clicking again results in zooming into something like 4x size (and a bunch of the box is no longer visible on the screen). Clicking again restores it to 1x size. I assume the zooming behavior is baked into the core game itself. Maybe that box was originally intended as some sort of debugging facility for sprites, hence the zooming bit?
Yeah, that's baked in to the base functionality of the raster. As for speculation on its purpose, the raster actually defaults to the size of the current map (and the crash bug for non-beta is because part of having it bigger than the map size was overlooked). So perhaps it was to be used as an informational display of some sort, with every map tile represented and changing color based on.. something. So clicking on it would effectively be zooming on that map display.
The raster scales with the UI when the setting is changed in the pause menu. I just assumed being able to resize it was a way to further customize it since the smaller UI might make it difficult to read.
Quote from: CS Z on June 09, 2021, 09:26:11 PM
I was able to play this mission without issue on non-beta, regular ol' 1.4.8. There is an initial rendering issue but pressing 'n' a couple of times to step forward a few frames to get to the initial dialog seems to clear that all up.
"WIER" - I am winner.
I think a LOT of mapmakers would love to add custom overlay meshes/textures to their maps for the posted screenshot portion even if that is all they ever use CPACKs for. If it were made relatively easy to do, more maps would use it.
Having made a number of custom maps myself with 4RPL, this obviously took a ton of time to make. Custom units for pretty much all aspects of the hovercraft (the unit itself, weapons fire, floating cursor, etc) and custom textures both in CPACKs and embedded into the 4RPL itself. Not to mention, debugging 4RPL once it is inside a CPACK is a nightmare. I wish there was a 4RPL Console for CPACK scripts.
That box in the corner though is nuts. It looks like you are drawing every single pixel with BlitRaster() - a 4RPL function I'm not particularly familiar with. Including the tutorial text. There are a lot of really interesting bits of code in both Tutorial.4rpl and RasterCheck.4rpl to look at. I would love to see more core game functionality for custom menuing rather than having to do stuff like what you did, which is basically making your own 2D texture drawing engine inside a video game scripting language...
One thing to note is that clicking on the raster box apparently zooms it in to 2x size. Clicking again results in zooming into something like 4x size (and a bunch of the box is no longer visible on the screen). Clicking again restores it to 1x size. I assume the zooming behavior is baked into the core game itself. Maybe that box was originally intended as some sort of debugging facility for sprites, hence the zooming bit?
Thank you for your kind words! Debugging is a bit of a nightmare (I only recently discovered the "go to line" function in Windows Notepad, before that it was totally insane, hah) but that's par for the course. I'd love it if Virgil added the ability to just feed a string into the 4rpl compiler, then I could make my own in-game code editor in the raster with auto-complete on method names (it would be equally as cool if he put a code editor in himself, but that's asking a fair bit more lol).
The texture thing wasn't hard, I have a script in Unity that turns a Texture2D into the 18-bit color string the script contains, and all the code that turns it back to a bitmap is in said script for all to see. Same Unity script can spit out a pipe-delimited string of character sprites for use in the 4rpl script as a raster font for printing text. That one was slightly more complicated but luckily I already had both the sprite drawer and text printer already made from a still-unfinished earlier CPACK for drawing character images and text a la Creeper World 3 as a sort of continuation of its storyline.
Click-to-zoom is indeed built-in functionality and I figured it was so you can shrink the normal UI while still having a big raster display, but that's just my best guess since the zoom level can't be controlled from script.
Quote from: Argonwolf on June 10, 2021, 08:39:55 PM
I only recently discovered the "go to line" function in Windows Notepad, before that it was totally insane, hah
:o
That's even more nuts. Notepad++ has 4RPL syntax highlighters for it...and all the other useful things code editors have such as what line number and character the keyboard caret is at and code autocompletion. Notepad works in a pinch but I wouldn't want to write too much code in it.
I'd really appreciate it if someone could walk me through opting into the the "mverse beta" as Google, Steam, and Knucklecracker forums all seem to come up empty on that search. Thanks in advance.
Quote from: CyberDyneSystems on June 12, 2021, 04:01:28 PM
I'd really appreciate it if someone could walk me through opting into the the "mverse beta" as Google, Steam, and Knucklecracker forums all seem to come up empty on that search. Thanks in advance.
1. Open Steam library.
2. Right click on Creeper World 4 in the large vertical list at the left side of the screen
3. Click Properties
4. Click Betas
5. Change the drop-down box from None to mverse - mverse
6. Play CW4 and it will auto-update
Quote from: Argonwolf on June 10, 2021, 08:39:55 PM
Debugging is a bit of a nightmare (I only recently discovered the "go to line" function in Windows Notepad, before that it was totally insane, hah)
By the way, there is a powershell command that can monitor the print output file and display any changes, effectively working like a console output. Detailed here: https://knucklecracker.com/wiki/doku.php?id=4rpl:commands:print
Quote from: Argonwolf on June 12, 2021, 05:14:39 PM
Quote from: CyberDyneSystems on June 12, 2021, 04:01:28 PM
I'd really appreciate it if someone could walk me through opting into the the "mverse beta" as Google, Steam, and Knucklecracker forums all seem to come up empty on that search. Thanks in advance.
1. Open Steam library.
2. Right click on Creeper World 4 in the large vertical list at the left side of the screen
3. Click Properties
4. Click Betas
5. Change the drop-down box from None to mverse - mverse
6. Play CW4 and it will auto-update
Bless you Sir! I was messing around on those pages for some time, I never would have thought to right click to find that menu! Thank you!
Quote from: Up-Level on June 12, 2021, 06:33:28 PM
Quote from: Argonwolf on June 10, 2021, 08:39:55 PM
Debugging is a bit of a nightmare (I only recently discovered the "go to line" function in Windows Notepad, before that it was totally insane, hah)
By the way, there is a powershell command that can monitor the print output file and display any changes, effectively working like a console output. Detailed here: https://knucklecracker.com/wiki/doku.php?id=4rpl:commands:print
I'll have to keep that in mind for large projects in the future, it may be more efficient than I currently do. Right now I've done alright printing relevant information to the unit debug text, in this case the hovership unit, and also I have the text renderer for my raster scripts that I can repurpose easily enough, but they only go so far, so if I need to dump a ton of information I know what to do now. Thank you!
For me the UI works but i can't for the life of me see or find the yellow and pink ammo bars. Is this a known bug?