[v0.10.0] ZetaBot: The ZScript Bot

[Gustavo6046]

I just had a new idea.

What if we held a contest, where a WAD (or single map from a WAD) was chosen, and people had a deadline to make ZetaBot nodes for this WAD? Then, for each player's nods setup, four ZetaBots would be spawned (with coop respawn enabled) in the four player starts, and the nodes that led the bots to exit the level in the least amount of time would win.

This could encourage people to learn about bot pathing, as well as foster the ZetaBots themselves.

I will resume development on the ZetaBots. Just had to take a break. Sorry about that.

[Gustavo6046]

It is in grief that I announce that the ZetaBot project is now unfortunately discontinued; while it was a good ZScript learning experience, it is clear that this is still only a child's sandbox compared to projects that concern the native C++ code of GZDoom. Therefore, even with ZScript's new capabilities, attempting to develop a bot in it is mostly a moot point, at least when it comes to the essence of the project itself. It was very nice to work with you, fellow ZDoom forum members. Thank you.

[Gustavo6046]

v0.10.0 is out; after a long hiatus and a very long time thinking about it, I feel like this still deserves to be at the very least ironed out and polished for you beautiful people to play with. It was not a pointless project after all, as it clearly had a bit of a legacy, inspiring at least one other bot mod to rise out of the starry abyssal crib. After all, this actually does work, unlike, you know ... thing. Nonetheless, I am ecstatic to announce that the ZetaBots are maintained once more! Awh yeah, baby, long term support, bet y'all love some too!

Just a word of caveat emptor. There have arose some strange performance bugs in the project lately. So, unlike the (outdated) screenshots suggest, spamming a bunch of ZetaBots might be kind of a bad idea.......for now! This project is now being maintained! Things will be fixed! Hooray!

[Gustavo6046]

Screw this "preview" column in the subforum thing. I can''t post my logo because it needs transparency, which Imgur links can't have, and attachments apparently are skipped and can't be used as preview thumbnails either. I honestly don't know what to put there. This is just a bot! Maybe I should have made screenshots of the path network instead -- when the paths are shown they can be truly beautiful, especially in newer versions where I adjusted that.