WC4 Mod For Homeworld 2 In The Works (June 5, 2006)

AD said:
Could it be possible to decide what Kind of action would be taken allong with a variable for success? For example, firing a few MIPs would hardly be effective in taking over a Concordia class ship though it could certainly be effective for sabotage.
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Ehh, I don't know how that could be implemented with HW2. The Marine Frigates simply attach to a ship - and then a countdown bar starts. Once it's finished, the ship is commandeered. I've never used these ships myself - so I don't remember if you can send more than one Marine Frigate to a ship to speed up the countdown. I do remember that in the first HW game, a commandeered ship needed to be returned to the mothership to be "refurbished" into a ship you control.

By the way - is this mod going to change the capital ship subsystems?
 
LeHah said:
Ehh, I don't know how that could be implemented with HW2. The Marine Frigates simply attach to a ship - and then a countdown bar starts. Once it's finished, the ship is commandeered. I've never used these ships myself - so I don't remember if you can send more than one Marine Frigate to a ship to speed up the countdown. I do remember that in the first HW game, a commandeered ship needed to be returned to the mothership to be "refurbished" into a ship you control.

By the way - is this mod going to change the capital ship subsystems?
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You can latch more than 1 Marine Frigate in HW2.
 
I don't think it speeds it along though. It just acts as a redundancy. So if one gets blown off, the timer keeps going with the second or third.
 
In the latest testing update I have, only the UBW Assault Shuttle is operational in terms of capturing another unit. The assault shuttle is pretty cool in that it has two mounted single-barrel laser turrets (although they only do very minimal damage) and their movement appears to be superior to the standard shuttle.

At the moment, the assault shuttle can only appear to board and capture enemy destroyers and cruisers with one shuttle at a time per target by latching on to the rear of the capship. Concordia class carriers can also be captured with up to four assault shuttles at a time (two on either end of the flightdeck). I'll have to get back to you on whether or not additional shuttles increase the capture speed in the mod.

Aaron mentioned in the UBW design brief a few months back that enemy jump buoys could be captured, although I still need to test this. Hopefully most of the smaller capships will be able to be captured in future updates and perhaps some facilities as well (although probably with much slower boarding times). Sneaking in a few shuttles to takeover an enemy mining operation while they're engaged elsewhere would be fun!

I'm not sure if this is standard HW2 AI taking over or if the new target priorities have been implemented, but the enemy ai currently targets any incoming assault shuttles before everything else, which makes successful boarding in the current build quite difficult. Once a shuttle has latched on, it's generally quite protected from nearby capship turret fire (although this could be a targeting bug), but is vulnerable to fighters, so at the moment you need to have almost total fighter superiority over the target area before sending the marines in. :D

Cheers,


Bryn
 
BrynS said:
Once a shuttle has latched on, it's generally quite protected from nearby capship turret fire (although this could be a targeting bug), but is vulnerable to fighters, so at the moment you need to have almost total fighter superiority over the target area before sending the marines in.
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I played some HW2 tonight with WildWeasel and WildFire, keeping this mod in mind. I believe that the AI wouldn't normally target a ship like the marine transport in that the AI also very rarely targets capship sub-systems (engines, building facilities, etc). Obviously human players are totally different than that.

You mentioned capturing jump buoys. Does this mean that a Confed point can't jump to a UBW point? Also - are jump buoys stationary or single movement, like probes or gun platforms? (Perhaps I missed somthing in this thread...)
 
today i have sad news to report. something that will probably set back the momentum of the mod. BrynS is sadly leaving the team. He will soon be shipping off to university and onto bigger and better things, and much against his will he will not be able to devote as much time and energy to the mod project as he has uptill now. i truely wish him all the very best, and really feel his presence here wil be sorely missed. at the same time this now brings the mod team back to just me. i have contacted ton_viper earlier today and am expecting a mail back on how tight or free his schedule is to help with the mod again. however if ppl see these pages grow a little less chatty over the next week, then please bear with me as i try to gettings back up to speed. thanks.

now for the questions:

as for targeting shuttles go - i made them top priority. but ppl are forgetting that you can disable a ship before boarding. kill the bridge and engine housing and its just like a floating brick. space superiority is important though. MIPS are out of the question for now. there is something similar to MIPs in HW2 already - the vagyr boarding pods. so it can be done. also bw repairing faster sounds good, ill implement it. right now no jump points are captureable - this will change. they are single one shot moves. leech cannon/missile effect can be achieved by an emp equivalent in hw2 but a tactical purpose is yet to be found. if its just to disable a ship then sub-systems are present, as for fighters it doest make sense - just blow them apart. repair is by harvesters and auto-repair only. drydocks are just metal scaffolding and frameworks so they arent tough on hp. they go down with a couple of torps - easy.

on another note just another kind request: can someone please mail me gap, and a quick tute or how-to on how to get it to play the audio from the tre files. my email is justice.gundam@gmail.com

thanks in advance,
- aaron
 
Thanks guys. :)

It's been a real blast working on the mod and as I mentioned to Aaron, I was very much looking forward to going "all the way to Kilrah" with the mod, as it were.

I've been continually amazed over the past few months with Aaron's incredibly detailed and professional models for the mod, not to mention the significant programming and script changes he's already made to turn another much-loved franchise in Homeworld, more and more into the universe we all know and respect as Wing Commander.

I'm really glad that the project has someone of Aaron's calibre at the helm and I'm sure you will all enjoy playing it as much as I've enjoyed helping in a small way to make it a memorable and compelling Wing Commander experience. :)

I'll be following the development as best I can and will pop into the forums when I'm able -- I can't wait to play the final release against other Wingnuts!


Final Additions
Before I head off on Friday, I will be releasing few more bits and pieces including the oft-delayed CIC 8th Birthday tribute. :o I'll also release a single zip archive of all the reference images captured for the mod which anyyone is free to use for any other WC pursuit. I've extracted all of the unique WC4 music tracks from the WC4 DVD via Game Audio Player and upsampled them to 16-bit Stereo, 44.1Hz uncompressed WAV files from the original 8-bit Mono, 22.05Hz encodings (Uncompressed the audio comes to about 220MB and runs at about ~45-minutes, but I'll upload a ~80MB RAR -- Zip is 160MB :( ).

Obviously, upsampling an already lossy and downconverted source yields negligible fidelity improvements, but the resulting tracks should be more suitable for mixing and editing in other projects. I'm just tracking down all the music credits from the WC4 DVD to add to the pack readme and will then send the download link to Aaron. If it's ok with the CIC, then I would be happy for them to archive the pack for other fan projects if they want -- Aaron will be able to pass on the download link when it's online.

Aaron, I've e-mailed you a copy of GAP 1.32 and will update the audio extraction thread re: WC3/WC4 in this forum shortly with a mirrored download link, usage instructions and screenshots for extracting the WC4 audio.

Cheers,


Bryn
 
Wait, Bryn, you can't leave. Don't you rememver the CIC forum's Fan Project contract? You cannot leave until it's done. Just joking. I hope you're switch to college life goes well.
 
Thanks again, guys. :)

I've uploaded a combined WC4 HW2 Mod Reference Pack (61.78MB Zip Archive) of all the reference materials I captured for the mod from June to September 2006. It's mostly comprised of WC4 cinematic stills and in-game screenshots, but also includes some images from WC3, WCP and the movie, as well as one or two sound effects, the HQ mod screenshot pack, the mod video contact sheets (summary thumbnails) and some XviD versions of the Quicktime Border Worlds and Black Lance animated logos. Feel free to use any of the reference images for other WC projects or pursuits.

The tribute will be online later today and maybe another gameplay video if I can edit it in time.

Cheers,


Bryn
 
Okay, the CIC-08 Tribute is up and only just a little bit later than planned. :p

Download here.

Ideally, it was going to be much more expansive and span a more significant portion of the WC4 introduction sequence. HW2 maps and backdrops better suited to the FMV content were to be sourced and more dynamic shots captured. A few weeks ago I wanted to restart the compilation with higher resolution FRAPs captures (1024x768 cropped to 16:9 and then upconverted to 1280x720 / 720p) after I realised it was actually viable on my haggard Athlon XP, but with other demands looming, it's been on the backburner for ages.

Still it was a labour of love and like the rest of the mod testing, a thoroughly enjoyable experience. I hope this basic template gives a glimpse of the cinematic potential that the mod will present when released, especially to those interested in recreating lost scenes and events only previously described, expanding on exisiting Wing Commander FMV or creating original movie compilations complete with voice-overs. :cool:

Anyway, I'm just about to ship out and will pop-in again when I can. As much as I'm going to really miss testing the mod, it will be neat to check up on the development and discover new features and images for the first time as they're posted. All the best, Aaron! :)

Cheers,


Bryn
 
hello all, did a bit of dabbling with gap and had some fun with putting wc4 voices in hw2. the process is far from over and im starting to agree with an earlier post about the wc4 audio content not being enough to use for all the hw2 speech directories. however i might have some more audio to work with if gap could open all the files in the tre. i cant find hawk's comm chatter audio along with catscratch, panther and a few more, also dialog from pirates, pirate capships the ubw cruisers that appear early in the game and many more are missing. has anyone successfully found or extracted any more audio from the wc4 tres?
thanks in advance
- aaron
 
Thanks. I'm still adjusting, but it's all good. :)

Yeah, it's unfortunate that GAP isn't able to open every file within the TREs. I recall there being quite a few different pilot voices from Confed, UBW and Black Lance, although some repitition may be required there to equip every fighter from each faction, but the support and capital ship audio was sparse.

Failing any improvements with GAP, it should be possibile to capture audio within WC4 using FRAPs or the audio capture utility in DOSBox, but both of these methods are quite time-consuming and will likely require further extraction/demuxing (if using FRAPs) and trimming/editing in an audio editor (if using either FRAPs or DOSBox).

The Tech Support section is great for getting WC up and running in DOSBox. I was using the D-Fend GUI for DOSBox, which I found very accessible and would recommend if you're looking for a front-end.

Anyway, keep up the great work!

Cheers,


Bryn
 
BrynS said:
Failing any improvements with GAP, it should be possibile to capture audio within WC4 using FRAPs or the audio capture utility in DOSBox, but both of these methods are quite time-consuming and will likely require further extraction/demuxing (if using FRAPs) and trimming/editing in an audio editor (if using either FRAPs or DOSBox).
Bryn
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Or Just run wav studio in the background. I see no reason not to use the win95 patch with WC4. Start the game. get to just before a mission, alt-tab to an audio recording program like creatives WaveStudio that comes with almost any Soundblaster card, alt-tab back and start the mission. Don't forget to turn of everything but speech in the audio portion of the options menu before hand (alt-o) and to save the settings. When you your done, just alt tab back to the recording program and hit stop. This method will be time consuming if you want every possible line of dialogue.

As far as variety goes. I see no reason why you coulndn't also use some of the pilot and capship banter from wc2, 3, Prophecy, and secret ops where they don't specifically talk about the kilrathi. I could see the WC2 ones not fitting enough because of the style but its certainly worth considering.
 
Yeah, the method you described sounds good AD, especially as DOSBox places more of a resource strain on most PC's. It shouldn't be a problem for a very recent system, but on my single core Athlon XP, I couldn't play WC4 smoothly in DOSBox, although I was able to extract images and audio where required and for grabbing the odd sound it was fine. Unfortunately, there's a certain level of monotony with either method, but the end result will likely offset it.

Using audio and comm chatter from the other games (where appropriate) should broaden the sound pallette quite a bit, although it would be neat to get some of the significant WC4 characters in the mod if that's what Aaron intends to do. Anyway, there's a fair number of options available to Aaron and I'm sure the community would be willing to help out with additional voice talent, if required. :)

Cheers,


Bryn
 
Very nice job on the video BrynS, thanks for the extra work you've put in! Czacen, you're a genius. Excellent job with the BW base, as well as all the other models you've made, it's amazing to me how you can make such an awesome looking mod! Can't wait to see those BW units in action and hope to play the mod when it's out.
 
BrynS said:
Okay, the CIC-08 Tribute is up and only just a little bit later than planned. :p
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That's neat, thanks.

BrynS said:
Still it was a labour of love and like the rest of the mod testing, a thoroughly enjoyable experience.

Anyway, I'm just about to ship out and will pop-in again when I can. As much as I'm going to really miss testing the mod, it will be neat to check up on the development and discover new features and images for the first time as they're posted. All the best, Aaron! :)
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So what's going on now? Aaron mentioned you were starting school. What's the reason for no longer being part of the mod team?
 
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