[VERSION 1.01] Prime Directive (aka Space Station Omega 2)

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GooberMan
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by GooberMan »

I'm using the 1960's cars from that pack because there are no 1930's cars. The art deco look I'm going for in the hotel needs work, but you find out pretty much in the next scene that it's all black and white because it's a dream sequence. And there's no reason to use futuristic cars in a dream sequence.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by GooberMan »

Development Diary #22

Have YOU seen VENTY?

Image

After Enjay's suggestion that I plunder Paranoia's model riches, it has spurred me back in to motion a little bit. All the stuff that I was dreading putting in suddenly became a lot easier. Such as this little alteration to the labs lobby. Now it has a real monitor, and a base-wide notice about Venty.

Image

I've gone through the models in paranoia and have basically cut out the weapons and all the Half-Life specific stuff like the scientists and guards and Xen items etc. I'm left with generic stuff like the computer monitors, which I'm now putting to good use (as well as a few other items as you've no doubt seen). It's making the detailing part far more bearable. There's a section in the labs that's basically 3D floor nightmare. I've had to be careful with the placement of these models as the sector division I've got going in a few rooms means they are easilly culled even though they should be in view (combination of BSP culling and the fact that ye olde simple square-radius collision isn't enough to make the objects overlap the multiple sectors required). It would have been much more of a nightmare had I tried constructing all that out of level geometry.

It has allowed me to put in enough detail to put the map progression back in order. It's now possible to run through from start to finish again. It's still not at an alpha stage, but it's one step in the right track again.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by Gez »

I 70.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

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Development Diary #23

I've been working on a little bit of completely optional side story for the last few days. As its all flashbacks, it has given me a good diversion away from the rest of the project. The end result is another upgrade for your demon powers.

I'm on the hunt for more MD3s. What I have isn't enough. Especially if it keeps at 60 on my Core 2 laptop. I have a collection of public domain models that I'm going to convert in to MD3s. I might release it as a separate pack before the full release of Prime Directive, as extracting the MD3s from Paranoid that I wanted was a bit painful so I'd like to make it easier for the next person to come along.

I just realised that if I lay my iPad mini out flat, I can touch type on it reasonably well. It's a pity the text entry is nowhere near as good as the stock android keyboard though. Although, I've moved over to a swipe input on my phone so its not like I type on one keyboards anyway.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

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Development Diary #24

It's a good thing GZDoom doesn't backface cull MD3s.

Image

A quick negating of one of the scale values, and a corresponding ZOffset, in MODELDEF and I don't have to screw around with scripts to set the pitch of something to 180 degrees. And it has the added benefit of being perfectly visible in GZDB.

I did a run through of all the content earlier today, as I realised I hadn't done so in a while. It took over an hour to hit everything according to the timer on the automap. It's shaping up to have an hour and a half to two hours of gameplay. It's also taking far longer than I wanted to in regards to polishing it up. I'm going to have to aim for 90% done if I want to release the thing at all. Which is exactly the approach I took for Doom: The Arcade Game and Space Station Omega.

I also finally put shadowing code in to the outdoor lighting code. But by shadowing, I mean generic multiplication of the current light values. This also allows the possibility of some areas being brighter than the default calculations. Nifty.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by GooberMan »

Development diary #25

Number 25? And still no release? I must like the sound of my own voice or something.

Work is progressing on the map I've dubbed "Hotel Hellifornia." Part of it can be seen in the intro to the open alpha. I'm taking the time to make some fun hell traps in the area to break up the "base invasion" flow some more. The map previously existed purely for exposition. But why waste an entire map for that?

I've been saying for a while now that if I want to contribute to ZDoom, I'll need to get my work contract clarified in regards to open source software. Work has been busy, but to be quite honest I think I'll end up holding off on clarification until Prime Directive is done. It's taking long enough to get done without having to worry about making new ZDoom features or fixing bugs or overhauling cvars/the gl renderer/etc. With Prime Directive done, I'll start up a new play-around mod that I won't expect to ever release but will help in testing ZDoom features.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

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Development Diary #26

Hellifornia work took longer than anticipated. Not because there was a lot of mapping to be done, but because I realised that I was making a big storytelling mistake in it.

The Gateway Experiments have always been all about choice. There's a story to be told, but how you get to the key plot points is up to you for the most part. Prime Directive has a longer "linear" start than Space Station Omega did, but once you get past the intro how you approach things is entirely up to you. Except for a key plot point. During the Hellifornia map, the idea (without giving too much away) was that you fight your way to an important meeting, and then after that meeting you get sent back to the Eureka Base and continue on your way. The meeting, as such, served to be exposition. I realised when writing the dialogue that it wasn't good enough. It had no choice.

I've been trying to make the conversation choices more meaningful than they were in Space Station Omega, at least on a character level. One of those choices is at the end of the public alpha - you have a choice about what you tell Elaine. That's a pretty important one for the characters. The choice I've now got in the Hellifornia level entirely changes how you play the rest of Prime Directive.

I did have to go back through the other maps and alter them slightly in places as a result. But that was a small price to pay. I'm also going to have to rethink the final battle to some degree. One of the choices you make turns it in to a grindy grindfest.

Speaking of grindfest, that's exactly what mapping the marine barracks feels like. I had zero inspiration for it a couple of months ago, and now that I'm looking at it again I still have zero inspiration for it. I need to finish it and move on to polishing up the sewers (I spent some time on one part of them before getting on to Hellifornia, so I'm trying to pace myself a bit there). But I don't know how to make it interesting enough. I might play a few base maps for inspiration, so if anyone has recommendations for "realistic" (ie Space Station Omega-esque functional aesthetic) maps I'll give them a play.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

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Development Diary #27

Updating ye olde Eureka Base screenshot. MD3s, and the sector-based shadowing to go with the outdoor lighting system on display.

Image

I also found a way to make the barracks work. By giving the player choice. The barracks is basically meant to be a bit of a hard slog as you're directly going up against a barracks full of marines. There's now a few ways to approach the battle. I might throw in a few more. Once I've got the battle sorted, there's a couple of other things to do to it and then I'll move back to the sewers.

It's been four months since I started working on this thing. I didn't expect it to take this long. Then again, I haven't been giving it my full attention.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by CorSair »

I haven't read thread thoroughly, but this is starting to look pretty polished.

I did some day, just out of curiosity, download the alpha, but never took any look. Is it still same version you provide?
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

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I haven't updated that pre-alpha. So yes, it's still the same version.

Now that I've put more marines in there, if there's enough interest I can upload a new pre-alpha. My main concern, as always, is marine balance. There's always backlash against hitscanner enemies if they're overused, and as it turns out the marines are pretty much all hitscanners except for a select few cases.

I'm also expecting backlash against the way I'm handling cutscenes - which, thanks to the choices I'm giving this time around, are just about as important as killing everything. I might start up a thread in off-topic (and probably Doomworld as well) to guage what people think is the ideal cutscene type these days.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by CorSair »

Against the marines... Have you though about making every hitscan weapon into projectile? With that, player has some chance to avoid incoming hail of bucks and bullets, instead getting mowed down afar from chaingun or from shotgun sniper other side of the area with instant hit projectile. Players are affected too, so they should reconsider their tactics. Main problem is, the extra (annoying) work with the code.
But I think you're not looking this kind of solution?

Against hitscan enemies, only viable solution against them is decent cover. Any way to minimize your exposure for instant hit projectile is my solution for most hitscan enemies, especially if it contains lot of them. (Not really new idea?) And in my opinion, poking your head out, shoot, get immediately behind cover, rinse and repeat, is not the most exciting thing.

I haven't put more thought on this. It's just thoughts I've put together after I played it through about like hour ago. Probably playing more in this week if time permits it.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

Post by GooberMan »

Yeah, I'm not particularly inclined to go through and change the hitscan weapons to launch actual projectiles. The way I see it, if they're faster than the plasma rifle then they're just about hitscan weapons anyway. If they're as fast as the plasma, then they're easily avoidable. Rather than changing those fundamentals, I've been balancing the marines battles out. Which I guess I should rant about in a development blog.



Development Diary #28

So. Marines. There are a few Doomers out there that have knee-jerk reactions to hitscanners. They can't stand them. Sometimes, they have a point - some WAD authors cheese their way to a difficult map by placing a bunch of hitscanners together. I've wanted to avoid this with Prime Directive, but the inescapable fact is that marines are (excepting a few rare cases) a bunch of hitscanners placed together.

The stock ZDoom marines are far too powerful. Maybe they use the same damage values as the player - but those damage values don't work well in large mobs. Doom deathmatch only ever had four players on a map back in the day, and the weapons worked well in that context. Run in to ten ZDoom marines, and guess what time it is on the rape clock. So I got to work fixing that.

First up, the marines are too slow. I've increased their movement speeds to almost double. This makes them a far more mobile threat. Not the smartest idea with their overpowered weapons. The solution? Change their weapons.

The pistol guy was just a glorified zombie man originally. This is rubbish. Why wouldn't a marine keep on firing his pistol just like you do? He now keeps on firing once he's got a lock on you. The first shot is accurate, while the others can veer off target. One of these guys by themselves aren't too bad. Run in to four of them? You're in trouble.

The shotgun guy wasn't changed too much. Damage values were altered, as was the spread.

The super shotgun guy was game breaking. It could instakill you with 100 health and armor from across a room. Flat out bullshit. Damage was substantially reduced. It still hurts to meet someone carrying a super shotgun, but you're likely to at least escape the encounter and rethink your approach.

Chaingunners? Yep. Imagine the pistol guy, but four times worse.

I don't think I touched the rocket guy's code at all.

I altered the plasma guy to match how the player's plasma gun works. This was before exactly that was done to the marines in plain old ZDoom.

I'm not using the BFG guy, so I've paid him no mind.

In a couple of select locations, I have melee marines. Normal fisty marine punches about as fast as you do. Berserk marines move significantly faster, have twice the health, and have berserk punches. They hurt.

Even like this, marines were still overpowered. As a part of the balancing act, I decided to let them drop stimpacks. But not all the time. The value is higher than 1 in 4, but that's only because ZDoom's random number generator doesn't give a 1 in 4 chance based on that number alone. Bell curves and all. This is proving to be a wise choice - it allows a bit of chance in to proceedings, it allows the players to self-medicate as a reward, and it means I don't have to illogically place medkits all over my trying-to-be-functional base.

So, the marines feel better all round. But they're still just a bunch of hitscanners. Simply putting them somewhere and expecting them to work is amateurish. Rather, I've designed marine battles to their strengths.

Towards the end of the public alpha, after you've returned from hell you drop down in front of the Eureka Base main entrance. In between you and a wall you need to traverse is about twelve marines. Because they're hitscanners, you're not going to escape that fight without cover. I designed the arena with this in mind - there are plenty of opportunities for cover, both as a natural part of the arena (trees, the Eureka Base sign) and with some crates. Why crates? Because the marines were trying to use them to trap anyone coming through the other side of the wall. The crates tactically were being used to create choke points, but because you're coming from the complete opposite side they serve as cover.

More importantly though, is that you can't rely on one spot for cover. Thanks to the marine's upgraded speed, they will outflank you. The only way to survive the battle is to constantly be on the move. And, to excel at it, you need to change your play style. Ducking is a vitally important mechanic in the battles I've designed. Again, the trees are good for ducking behind. But so are the 32-high crates.

Finally, I've made the marine combat areas somewhat open. There's never one way to approach a marine battle. When I was playtesting that entry area, I focused on killing the marines in front of me the second I dropped in to the arena. It took a week or two for me to realise that I could sneak to the opposite side of the arena and take on the other marines first. I've found this to be an easier task for my play style. There's at least one other way you can tackle the battle, but I won't go in to that right now.

The barracks started getting good to map for when I sat down and thought about how I was building the marine battles. I viewed the map as a grind when I started making it, but eventually realised this would break the flow and fun factor too much. There's several ways to approach the battle now, and lots of opportunity for different tactics to take out the marines.

The best part? I haven't figured out the best way to clear that zone out yet. But it doesn't feel unfair. I think the barracks is going to achieve the "Dark Souls Style" thing I mentioned previously. I want Prime Directive to take Doomers out of their comfort zone, but I don't want it to feel unfair. This is my main concern with the marines. It's a balancing act to make them fair at all times, but simply removing the hitscan elements from their weapons isn't a solve-all. If any of the marine fights feel like a cheese fest, then I've failed. If they feel tough but beatable, then that's Dark Souls Style and it's precisely what I'm going for.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA!

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Development Diary #29

So I've finally taken that break from working on Prime Directive that I've been talking about. Although, it basically came about because the 1st of May in Finland is a special day. It's official name is Vappu, but colloquially it's known as Hangover Day. And I sure as shit won at that. I got smashed the night before, forgot to have drunk food, and forgot to buy Gatorade to replenish the salts the next morning. I didn't leave the house until 3pm for the Vappu picnic, I was supposed to be in Helsinki by 11am. Took my sweet time meeting up with everyone too, I was still feeling horribly seedy so stopped at a fried chicken place to get hangover food - which immediately made me feel better.

Needless to say, it's resulted in me just chilling out more than anything lately. Well, there's other reasons, but I won't go in to them. Suffice to say, I did Vappu right and am just taking it easy for a bit.

I opened up GIMP last night to try and sort some textures out as I was going through my phone and remembered I took the pictures. Seemed like a good way to spend 20 minutes. Wrong. I know the gamma thing isn't really something people come up against In fact, there's texture settings in Direct3D and OpenGL you can set to tell the hardware what gamma profile the incoming texture data is authored with - Photoshop and GIMP might occasionally bug you about different colour profiles but that's about all most people see of it. The textures I uploaded look completely different on my monitor as they do my iPad. I'll have to get to the bottom of that sometime, but right now I can't really be stuffed.

I have been thinking a lot more about the story as a result (considering the gameplay is basically there). I really want to dial up the Cronenberg plotline. I've done a bit to dial up the demon plotline, and I need to give the Elaine plotline a bit more attention. But the Cronenberg plotline is at the heart of the questions you're forced to answer throughout Prime Directive and the ones that have the most significant impact on gameplay.

I might throw up another pre-alpha just to bide the time (and hopefully get some solid feedback on how it's panning out).
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - SECOND public Pre-Alpha RELEASED

Post by GooberMan »

SECOND PUBLIC PRE-ALPHA BUILD RELEASED

And it's obtainable from this location.

THIS REQUIRES A CURRENT SVN BUILD OF GZDOOM (obtainable from here if you've not done it before)



It's been a while since the last pre-alpha release. What's different this time?
  • Everything's open. Incomplete, but open. Still, it's possible to "complete" the gameplay part in this build.
  • This is the first public build in which the new demon weapon is available (obtainable from the Hell level in the video).
  • There's a decent bit of polish in some previously-accessible areas.
  • VENTY!
  • MD3 grabbag.
  • Voxels! In GZDoom! You maniac!
  • Gameplay examples of my moving 3D floor trick.
  • Well-hidden impse.
  • More unbalanced marines than you can poke a BFG at. Because there is no BFG in this mod.
As the entire mod is now open, you may find the need to noclip out of one or two areas.

General feedback would be good, but as always I'm mainly trying to get the marine balance right. If they seem unfair at any point, tell me. There's probably quite a bit of balancing required for the demon weapon too, so feedback on that (and the "trials" you need to go through to increase its power) is also appreciated.
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Re: [WIP] Prime Directive - SECOND public Pre-Alpha RELEASED

Post by DoomNukem »

this is awesome stuff, having fun playing around in it, i'm a bit of noob as I seem to die alot haha, the storyline's really well done you've given personality to the characters. Do you plan on having voice acting?
If your looking for actors this site http://fiverr.com/ has a lot of talented actors who work for cheap i've used some in projects before.
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