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Sajt Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 1026 |

Posted: Mon Feb 15, 2010 8:40 pm Post subject: |

I should reiterate how much I enjoy the non-linearity. This is both the map's design, and the fact that monsters occasionally drop weapons, so you might get the shotgun in the very first room or you might never get it. So it was pretty entertaining for me to replay the map a dozen times as I did. It would definitely be a benefit to reduce the amount of weapons/ammo the player acquires, so he is forced to make decisions like "if I use this gun now I might not have any ammo for a while afterwards", thereby increasing replayability (since he will try other strategies next time).
I didn't notice any problems with coop, except we ran out of edicts halfway through so I didn't get to "test" the latter half of the level (we only tried the one time). The only odd thing I noticed was the print "No SP...", which showed up a lot for some reason.
I just tried the shotgun jump, and it was pretty funny. Brings back memories of FinalQuake: Real (one of the first mods I remember playing). Now I finally know how you are supposed to get to two certain areas.
As for "computer updated", the sound itself isn't so annoying, it's just that in the first area it keeps repeating until you check the AIDA.
Also, I should mention that I thought that all the weapon models, animations, sounds, and effects were perfect. They are a lot of fun to use.
One problem with the machinegun's balance is that rooms clear way too fast when you spray them with machinegun fire. One way you could take a little off its lethality without making it weaker would be to do what Unreal Tournament (and probably some cheesy movies too) did with the minigun: when you kill someone with it, their corpse will remain suspended in the air, twitching, as long as you are riddling it with bullets. This means that you will have to let the corpse fall before you can get at anyone behind it, either by ceasing firing, or by shooting somewhere else for a moment.
As it is I find very little reason to use the TNT. It is really fun to stick to guys (who for some reason don't notice it), but you usually have to take some hits to do it, and there really is no point in not using a quicker weapon to take them out (since if a guy is facing the other way, pretty much any weapon can kill him before he has a chance to turn around). Or if you have played the map before, you can bounce some TNT around a corner to blow up some guys (for example the guys near the ring near the start), but that only favours people who already know the map. Maybe if the monsters made more idle sounds you could guess that they were around a corner and try throwing TNT. And of course Duke3D had those cracked walls which could only be blown up with explosives, leading to secret areas or methods of reconnecting the level (nice places but not mandatory, since you might have no TNT at that point).
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F. A. Špork, an enlightened nobleman and a great patron of art, had a stately Baroque spa complex built on the banks of the River Labe.

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xaGe Joined: 01 Mar 2006 Posts: 329 Location: Upstate, New York |

Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2010 12:50 am Post subject: |

..I've been running qsrbeta3 on Windows 7 32bit with DirectQ v1.8.1 as well as Darkplaces release 20090709 with no apparent issues. I'll give qsrbeta3a a go.

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Downsider Joined: 16 Sep 2008 Posts: 478 |

Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2010 1:38 am Post subject: |

Wow, this is really nice. It's like a modern, as far as gameplay goes, Quake.

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Dr. Shadowborg Inside3D Staff Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 726 |

Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2010 3:47 pm Post subject: |

Sajt wrote:
I should reiterate how much I enjoy the non-linearity.

Limiting the amount of ammo pickups should mostly do the trick. (note, the stakegun doesn' t exist anywhere on this map) I'm gonna go ahead and scrap the "not here on skill x" for monsters and add some code to make them tougher on higher skill levels.
The rest of the episode I'm designing for hellsmash should largely be non-linear with the occasional exception of boss maps, etc.

Sajt wrote:
I didn't notice any problems with coop, except we ran out of edicts halfway through so I didn't get to "test" the latter half of the level (we only tried the one time). The only odd thing I noticed was the print "No SP...", which showed up a lot for some reason.
I just tried the shotgun jump, and it was pretty funny. Brings back memories of FinalQuake: Real (one of the first mods I remember playing). Now I finally know how you are supposed to get to two certain areas.
As for "computer updated", the sound itself isn't so annoying, it's just that in the first area it keeps repeating until you check the AIDA.

Coop might seem like it works okay, but there aren't any info_player_coop spawnpoints in the map right now. I'm toying with the idea of adding "rally points" that only appear in coop, that can be activated by players as the progress, to help players who die get back to their buddies faster. (these rally points would also give a weapon or two, so no getting stuck having to go back to get a pickup or two)
"No SP..." is associated with the blast jump. I'll probably take it out later.
Shotgun Jump was added to deal with the issue of broken rocket / grenade jumps and the limited nature of the blast jump. (Plus it's funny )
"Computer Updated" repeats three times before it goes away on it's own. I'll reduce this just one.

Sajt wrote:
One problem with the machinegun's balance is that rooms clear way too fast when you spray them with machinegun fire. One way you could take a little off its lethality without making it weaker would be to do what Unreal Tournament (and probably some cheesy movies too) did with the minigun: when you kill someone with it, their corpse will remain suspended in the air, twitching, as long as you are riddling it with bullets. This means that you will have to let the corpse fall before you can get at anyone behind it, either by ceasing firing, or by shooting somewhere else for a moment.

I'll try doing this, it sounds cool enough to be worth doing anyway.

Sajt wrote:
As it is I find very little reason to use the TNT. It is really fun to stick to guys (who for some reason don't notice it), but you usually have to take some hits to do it, and there really is no point in not using a quicker weapon to take them out (since if a guy is facing the other way, pretty much any weapon can kill him before he has a chance to turn around). Or if you have played the map before, you can bounce some TNT around a corner to blow up some guys (for example the guys near the ring near the start), but that only favours people who already know the map. Maybe if the monsters made more idle sounds you could guess that they were around a corner and try throwing TNT. And of course Duke3D had those cracked walls which could only be blown up with explosives, leading to secret areas or methods of reconnecting the level (nice places but not mandatory, since you might have no TNT at that point).

Have no fear, while the Dynamite / TNT might SEEM useless right now, remember that it's a demolition tool first, weapon second, and really loud third. (yes this is a hint about what's to come) There will also be a monster or two that will be made easier to deal with using it later. (infact, maybe even as soon as the next map!)
I'm currently working on the issues in hse1m1.bsp, and have already started designing hse1m2.bsp.
Once again, thanks for the feedback!
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"Roboto suggests Plasma Bazooka."

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frag.machine Joined: 25 Nov 2006 Posts: 728 |

Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2010 6:04 pm Post subject: |

Just played your map... I second Sajt, is a top quality map you have here. And the AIDA is cool, too. I am doing something in the same line (HQ radio messages to give mission objectives and hints), although much less sophisticated. Also I just coded some homing missiles too, wished I had saw yours before, could spared me a lot of job
I suggest you to add some time between AIDA nags instead removing it entirely. I am using a 10 second interval in my radio stuff that makes it less annoying.
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http://fragmachine.quakedev.com/

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Dr. Shadowborg Inside3D Staff Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 726 |

Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2010 7:50 pm Post subject: |

frag.machine wrote:
Just played your map... I second Sajt, is a top quality map you have here. And the AIDA is cool, too. I am doing something in the same line (HQ radio messages to give mission objectives and hints), although much less sophisticated. Also I just coded some homing missiles too, wished I had saw yours before, could spared me a lot of job
I suggest you to add some time between AIDA nags instead removing it entirely. I am using a 10 second interval in my radio stuff that makes it less annoying.

Thanks!
That reminds me, I need to release the source code for the current version. (You've probably already got your homing missiles where you want them, but just incase...)
http://tlb.quakedev.com/files/qsrbeta3a_src.zip
Just beware any who dare tread the haunted halls of this source code. Insanity awaits just around the corner, embarrassing and messy parts too. Probably more than a few fat and unused parts too. That said, there's probably a great deal of QC Treasure to be had in there as well.
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"Roboto suggests Plasma Bazooka."

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xaGe Joined: 01 Mar 2006 Posts: 329 Location: Upstate, New York |

Posted: Wed Feb 17, 2010 4:42 am Post subject: |

..Everyone knows how the classic red diamond buttons look like in Quake. [opinion] It was a nice change to see how you created them and no more difficult to find then if I where playing Quake2. I've been conditioned to run and touch anything that looks like a computer screen or console. [/opinion]
..I've yet to have any issues with your latest patch.

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Wazat Joined: 15 Oct 2004 Posts: 732 Location: Middle 'o the desert, USA |

Posted: Wed Feb 17, 2010 6:57 am Post subject: |

I'm kicking myself for not having tried this mod yet. I will do so. BTW, just wanted to pop in and say (despite not playing this yet) that one way to make enemies more potent is to increase their frame rate. This has the effect of speeding up both their movement and attack speed (i.e. light knights in Conquest). If the skill variable affected both the enemies' speed by, say, 0-20%, and damage by maybe 0-50%, that could be a very potent powerup for enemies.
You don't want to stim speed too much because some enemies won't look good when they move too fast.
Alternately, just increase damage & HP, and give enemies a couple of extra attacks and perks as skill increases (ala grunts firing twice in nightmare).
meh. I need to play this mod. Must... pull... away... from... biological... need... for... sleep...
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When my computer inevitably explodes and kills me, my cat inherits everything I own. He may be the only one capable of continuing my work.

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Sajt Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 1026 |

Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2010 12:27 am Post subject: |

Hmm... I hope the machinegun idea actually works. It might look stupid if a handheld machinegun could keep a body suspended in the air. It looked okay in UT because that was a gigantic six-barrelled minigun... But we'll see, I guess! _________________
F. A. Špork, an enlightened nobleman and a great patron of art, had a stately Baroque spa complex built on the banks of the River Labe.

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xaGe Joined: 01 Mar 2006 Posts: 329 Location: Upstate, New York |

Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2010 1:52 am Post subject: |

..You have a good idea Sajt, but instead of having the body hang, twitching & shedding blood in the air as UT just have it maybe twitch, shed blood on the ground as it falls normally until the player stops shooting it. You could even have a a few second timer set for a certain amount of time(3-5seconds) after its not be fired on until it truly is dead & if the player starts shooting at it again before that time period it still sheds bloods(and maybe twitch). You could even make the dead body gibbable after its dead, dead?
..Hell that might be a mod of its own right there itself! lol! That would be satisfying (to me at least) against monsters and against players in DM.
..and when I say shed i mean SPRAY!

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Sajt Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 1026 |

Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2010 4:52 am Post subject: |

Hmm, yes, that's another option. And you could have the monster's bbox lower bit by bit as it falls to the ground, so it still blocks shots for a few tenths of a second, unless you shoot up high above its falling head. But having a corpse be shootable requires SOLID_CORPSE. (You could probably hack it so that all SOLID_NOT corpses become SOLID_BBOX while a weapon traceline is going, but that is probably slow and it doesn't handle the case of projectile weapons anyway.)
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F. A. Špork, an enlightened nobleman and a great patron of art, had a stately Baroque spa complex built on the banks of the River Labe.

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goldenboy Joined: 05 Sep 2008 Posts: 310 Location: Kiel |

Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2010 4:30 pm Post subject: |

Well, I properly played all the way through now. I'll get it out of the way now: Congrats Doc, Hellsmash is one of the craziest mods for Quake and incredibly well pulled off. The map? In addition to others' praise, I have some criticism. The amount of damage output by enemies has been reduced since the beta, I think. Turrets were obviously weaker. This is a wise change. The game rarely gets too hard now (it's still tough, but doable). I say rarely because there was one spot where I had to godmode to get through. It was when I returned to the room before the gold key door - there's a turret and several monsters respawned. I had only 8 health and there was simply no way I would get past that without godmode. Every time I turned the corner, I'd get owned. Maybe consider spawning some health kits with every group of enemies you re-spawn, or have respawning health or restocking health dispensers in areas with heavy combat.
The progression can be a little confusing; the map isn't complicated, but at first I had no idea where "generator room door X" was, or where the "maintenance closet" was at the end, when I got the message. I had to guess at the maintenance closet, and I had to run around pretty aimlessly and look for something that resembled a generator room door. I eventually found it, but it should have been marked by a message like "Generator room door X locked". Similar to the doors in e3m1rq.
I only ever found one of these generator room doors, the first one.
The introduction to dynamite was really good. At the same time, this serves as an introduction to auxfire. Well done here. Dynamite should be used more, or required to progress more. It's fun blowing up hatches etc.
I thought ammo was plenty, which is nice, and health was OK. I only found the cliche secret (you shouldn't assume that the player finds all secrets when balancing the map though).
The mod,
AIDA: It could be a little de-crufted. When I pick up a PDA, it's a little too many keypresses and menu usage before I can read the message, for my taste. The text is also rather small. Maybe with CSQC, there could be a graphical AIDA with bigger text.
As you probably remember, there are similar things in my RMQ maps, albeit done differently (rather like cutscenes than menu usage). I think the audio log/cutscene method has the advantage of being quicker to access (and you can keep playing while the audio runs). But that's just preference... have you tried converting those PDA texts to spoken WAV files that play when selected, ala DOOM 3?
Some enemies are still pretty crass, like the red enforcers and those rockets and fireballs. But I guess that's just Hellsmash!
I like that the shotgun gibs zombies. All mods should do that.
Er, yeah. What else can I say. There's still so much to discover in this mod... did you get rid of the cards btw?
Good job, Doc!
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ReMakeQuake
The Realm of Blog Magic

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Sajt Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 1026 |

Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2010 3:56 am Post subject: |

goldenboy wrote:
The amount of damage output by enemies has been reduced since the beta, I think. Turrets were obviously weaker. This is a wise change. The game rarely gets too hard now (it's still tough, but doable). I say rarely because there was one spot where I had to godmode to get through. It was when I returned to the room before the gold key door - there's a turret and several monsters respawned. I had only 8 health and there was simply no way I would get past that without godmode. Every time I turned the corner, I'd get owned. Maybe consider spawning some health kits with every group of enemies you re-spawn, or have respawning health or restocking health dispensers in areas with heavy combat.

Difficulty is an important thing. I initially played on hard and won twice out of my first maybe ten playthroughs, which sounds about right. But since then I play on nightmare and wish for a greater challenge! I think the turrets could use some more health on nightmare, and the non-machinegun guards could be pumped up somehow. The plasma/slow-railgun, dynamite, homing missile, and even shotgun guards aren't really dangerous. The machinegun guys and turrets are nice and dangerous, but maybe the guards' reaction time could be boosted (the turrets' reaction time is good though - perhaps you could even add a beep before they start firing, to warn the player).

goldenboy wrote:
I only ever found one of these generator room doors, the first one.

Actually, there are three doors, one after each other. If the frontmost door is the last one you open (as happens when you take one of two main routes), you don't really notice it. I didn't notice that all three doors were in the same hallway until my fifth or so playthrough.

goldenboy wrote:
Er, yeah. What else can I say. There's still so much to discover in this mod... did you get rid of the cards btw?

I admit that Hellsmash was not really enjoyable until this release. It was way too many features and rules to memorize from the readme, that you don't really notice in the game (since you just shoot guys until they die anyway). The ranks are another thing like this, but fortunately they didn't seem to do anything in qsrbeta3 so I didn't have to worry about figuring it out too. But this release seems to have the perfect balance of features (although with so much ammo you never have to use the bonus items).
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Dr. Shadowborg Inside3D Staff Joined: 16 Oct 2004 Posts: 726 |

Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2010 4:19 am Post subject: |

Okay, a lot to cover, so... First: Machinegun idea failed as Sajt feared it would. Not so much because of the machinegun model, as much as the quake monsters not really having proper twitch / flinch animations. What I did instead, after that failed is I extended the time that monsters remain solid when going through their death animations (usually 7-8 frames) and can take damage during this period, coupled with reducing the damage the machinegun does. (14x2, one hitscan and one projectile. This ultimately means you can gib them if you do enough damage.) I think this was enough to do the trick, without messing up the powerful feel of the machinegun... (blocks longer, reduced power) We'll see once I finish and release the second patch.
Second:
I've finished stripping out the "not here on skill x" flag on all the monsters, now it's time to impliment the skill settings on the monsters themselves. (yes, I was actually planning on going the Sajt / Wazat suggested route of increasing the reaction times of monsters, possibly damage and health too depending on the monster...)
Third:
Nightmare has always been broken in Quake. Now that I've decided to abandon the cruft that is "not here on skill X" in any maps I do in favor of beefing up monsters, I can afford to pay attention to this rather important problem.
Moving along:

goldenboy wrote:
The amount of damage output by enemies has been reduced since the beta, I think. Turrets were obviously weaker. This is a wise change. The game rarely gets too hard now (it's still tough, but doable). I say rarely because there was one spot where I had to godmode to get through. It was when I returned to the room before the gold key door - there's a turret and several monsters respawned. I had only 8 health and there was simply no way I would get past that without godmode. Every time I turned the corner, I'd get owned. Maybe consider spawning some health kits with every group of enemies you re-spawn, or have respawning health or restocking health dispensers in areas with heavy combat.

Hmm, thought I'd nailed down enough health there. I'll investigate some sort of wall mounted medicine cabinet that spawns health occasionally or something. (note health works a little differently in this release, Aidkits boost you to 50% of your maximum health, Zealkits can boost you above that to 100% of your max health, healthrot removed.)

Quote:
The progression can be a little confusing; the map isn't complicated, but at first I had no idea where "generator room door X" was, or where the "maintenance closet" was at the end, when I got the message. I had to guess at the maintenance closet, and I had to run around pretty aimlessly and look for something that resembled a generator room door. I eventually found it, but it should have been marked by a message like "Generator room door X locked". Similar to the doors in e3m1rq.
I only ever found one of these generator room doors, the first one.

Noted, I'll see if I can make things a little less cryptic.

Quote:
The introduction to dynamite was really good. At the same time, this serves as an introduction to auxfire. Well done here. Dynamite should be used more, or required to progress more. It's fun blowing up hatches etc. I thought ammo was plenty, which is nice, and health was OK. I only found the cliche secret (you shouldn't assume that the player finds all secrets when balancing the map though).

As I said earlier, Dynamite is a demolition tool first, weapon second, and really loud third. (I will speak no more of it, for more is spoiler! ) I'll include a few demos in the upcoming patch, just to demonstrate a few things about gameplay.
I've made ammo a little scarcer, but not unbearably so. Health has remained the same. (I'll look into some health at the chokepoints like I mentioned earlier.)

Quote:
The mod, AIDA: It could be a little de-crufted. When I pick up a PDA, it's a little too many keypresses and menu usage before I can read the message, for my taste. The text is also rather small. Maybe with CSQC, there could be a graphical AIDA with bigger text.
As you probably remember, there are similar things in my RMQ maps, albeit done differently (rather like cutscenes than menu usage). I think the audio log/cutscene method has the advantage of being quicker to access (and you can keep playing while the audio runs). But that's just preference... have you tried converting those PDA texts to spoken WAV files that play when selected, ala DOOM 3?

AIDA is one thing I intend to do something about, come CSQC enabled release of GoldQuake.
Spoken WAV files are an interesting idea, Strife did something similar for Blackbird, though it kept a text version for reference.
One rather big problem with adding Spoken WAVfiles though is the problem of voiceacting. (No, I do not want players to go "lol, your CO is Steven Hawking, LOL STEVEN HAWKING LOL", and I don't know how well I'd sound trying to do "Invincible Particle Cannon"-man and the "GAME OVER MAN! GAME OVER!" guy you find down in the reactor core...)

Quote:
Some enemies are still pretty crass, like the red enforcers and those rockets and fireballs. But I guess that's just Hellsmash! I like that the shotgun gibs zombies. All mods should do that. Er, yeah. What else can I say. There's still so much to discover in this mod... did you get rid of the cards btw?
Good job, Doc!

Some enemies are BORN to be crass. It wouldn't be Hellsmash without them!
Boomstick. Who Wants Some? =D
Cards are gone, the catchphrase for this release is "simple, easy to use, with a reduced learning curve". It's worked well, and has served to make the game fun again, rather than top heavy with needless features.
That doesn't however mean that I'm getting rid of their models however... (* starts scheming a scenario where the player blows up a hatch or door and busts in on some enforcers playing cards. And then the player kills them. Messily. But also with style. Because the player does stuff like that. For Breakfast. )
Anyway, thanks for the feedback!
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goldenboy Joined: 05 Sep 2008 Posts: 310 Location: Kiel |

Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2010 12:43 pm Post subject: |

I could voiceact the soldiers' logs for you, this is only a small effort since I have the stuff set up already. I'm sure others have a microphone on their computers as well, which is really all that's needed. If you can Skype, you can voice act.
I could contribute at least a small thing, after failing to deliver maps
This type of thing is a lot easier to do than voice acting monsters, which is one of the more difficult parts of RMQ and one part we got a lot of flak for. But reading a short log entry into the microphone isn't difficult at all. More sounds make the game a bit deeper, especially on the story front. I really liked the log entries.
As for the Steven Hawking problem, there are ways to make spoken stuff more deeper and fuller IF the source recording is reasonably well spoken.
For comparison, the grunts, enforcers and ogres in RMQ are completely voice acted by the team. Of course that can always be done better, but - people who get worked up over voice acting in Quake mods should be a little more realistic. It's all done for the love of it.
About difficulty, yes, that's a hot topic. Just wait till Lardarse shows up (aka "Are you guys insane?!"). I agree that skill dependant monster behaviour is the right way to go. Sounds like you're on a distinguished road
Petty criticism aside, Hellsmash is outstanding.
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