What does Privateer 1.0 need?

Thanks JKeefe, that's exactly what I'm after. Will update shortly.

Note: unless these have been changed, the following are from the config file as is:

One of the memory settings is for 640MB of RAM. Who has 640MB of RAM? While it is possible (512+128, 256+256+128, etc.), it is rare. Perhaps the setting in-game (and thus the manual description) should be for 768MB of RAM.

The descriptions for "Hard Game Play", "Insane Game Play", and "Impossible Game Play" are all identical.
Click to expand...

Play settings for those three ARE the same, so I left descriptions the same. Will update when changed.

As to the technical stuff and descriptions, I personally have no idea. What's there is a result of trawling the VS forums and hassling hellcatv. Any corrections are welcome.

Lastly, places where info is missing, feel free to post information to fill in.

Many Thanks
Silverain
 
also: the mouse cursor stuff is gone now that we corrected the problems.

to replace it we allow a user to choose between Ariel and Times fonts
 
More:

Section 6.3.1
Under "Mission types", change "Bounty Missions ask you to hunt down and frequently kill a target" to "Bounty Missions ask you to hunt down and kill a target". You always have to kill the target, right?

It says "Accepted Missions are not saved within a Saved Game." Campaign missions are saved, right? Maybe there should be a note about that (or maybe you want to almost entirely hide the campaign from discussion, like the original manual did).

In the "Missions Screen" section, it is not the "Mission BBS" button - the button only says "Mission".


Section 6.4.2
Change "The Cargo Screen will have the following across the upper viewing area. In the top left will be three button marked..." to "The Cargo Screen will have the following across the upper viewing area: three buttons marked...".


Section 6.5
You don't need to double click anything i the ship dealer; Change all instructions to single click.


Section 6.5.1
Change "Note that the view-screens have slider bars where information is greater than can be viewed in one view-screen" to "Note that the view-screens have scrollbars where information is greater than can be viewed in one view-screen"

Change "This will either be due to your ship already having a similar ugrade installed, your ship cannot mount that sized model upgrade, or you do not have the funds available" to "This will either be because your ship already has a similar ugrade installed, your ship cannot mount that sized model upgrade, or you do not have the funds available".


General
The spiel about "On arrival at a base, station, or planet..." doesn't really need to be repeated at the beginnig of each section describing menus. It's perfectly understandable to have a brief intro sentence on each module and then hop right into the description.


That's it for now - I'm through the top of p.31
 
Thanks JKeefe

for 1.0 we let you select the font used in most of the game and the font used in the base computer interface separately....
THat way you can have big mission descriptions yet small inflight text

We call the options
Arial HUD
for (inflight arial)
Times HUD (for inflight times, Arial on the base)
Helvetica (for arial in the whole game)
Times (for times in the whole game)
 
And still more:

Section 6.6.3
double-clicking again - you only need to single click to access guilds.


Section 6.7
"A greater hive a villainy, danger and iniquity you will never find than the local" - is that supposed to say "A greater hive a villainy, danger and iniquity you will never find than the local bar"?

"In Privateer Remake the Bar, located at most bases in the known universe represents such establishments." - I don't know what this is suppossed to say, but something's not right.

Change "While stepping in here to have a drink, you can chat to the bar attendant..." to "While stepping in here to have a drink, you can chat with the bar attendant..."


Section 6.7.1
Same as above - "chat with the local bar attendant..." instead of "chat to the local bar attendant..." (this happens twice in this section).


Section 6.7.2
"Fixers are representatives of the various Privateer Remake factions with whom it may be possible to converse with" - remove the second "with".


Section 7.2.2
"How to target a base or planet, and flying there normal drive and autopilot are discussed elsewhere" - I can't quite figure out what this is supposed to say. Maybe "How to target a base or planet, and how to fly there using normal navigation or autopilot are discussed elsewhere"?

Figure 18 refers to crashing into the base. AFAIK, you can't do this; you just fly "inside" the 3D model and it dissapears.


Section 7.2.3
Change "Autopilot shortens the transition time between two areas of interest where there are no identifiable hazards nearby..." to "Autopilot shortens the transition time between two areas of interest when there are no identifiable hazards nearby..."

It says the autopilot light will be off if "a) the player is within 15,000 meters of a destination". This is not true; the autopilot light stays on.


Section 7.2.4
"Note that you are vulnerable to attack while jumping, as your shields are disabled to power the jump drive." My shields stay up when I jump...


Section 7.3.1
"View Reverse - F4 - As a pilot cannot look back through the ship, this view represents a camera mounted and looking to the rear of the ship." Not so - F4 is still the original Privateer rear view (from inside your ship).


Section 7.4
In the "Communications" section, it says "As conversations appear, read from left to right." Is this really necessary? :)

In the "Missions" section, it says "The objective recorded under missions will change color as well." It would be nice to include a description of what the different colors mean.

In the "Targetting Reticule" section, it says "During combat, you will usually attempt to have your opponent appear in this crosshair when firing." That's not really true, as a lot of times you need to lead your target considerably (I actually find that some shots require such extreme leading that the target is out of the Tarsus' limited filed of view - damn crappy ship).

Change "Where you have a targetted objective in your front viewscreen..." to "When you have a targetted objective in your front viewscreen..."

In the "Directional Pointer" section, change "Where you have locked onto a target..." to "When you have locked onto a target..." Also, change "This pointer provides an indication of the direction and location of your current target" to "This pointer provides and indication of the direction you must turn to face your current target" (it is a 2-D vector only, not 3-D).


Section 7.7
"Being able to say hello, engage in psychological battle..." - I like the humor, but this is an incomplete sentence (there is no main verb),


Section 8.1
Somewhere in here there needs to be a description of how your target's shields are displayed on the targetting MFD. Since the remake uses a 3D model in the targetting screen, the depictions of shield levels in the MFD no longer correspond to their location on the targetted ship. The manual needs to explain that, regardless of the target's orientation in the targetting MFD, the shield levels at the top of the MFD are the front of your target.

Section 8.1.1
Change "Firing a weapon will either reduce the surplus energy available" to "Firing a weapon will reduce the surplus energy available"

Section 8.1.2
The missile targetting description refers to a "lock tone". I get no tone, just the diamond. Is that a function of my crap radar, or is there never any tone?


Done for now - through p. 56
 
I would leave it out. Anyway, I'm just pointing out discrepancies between the manual and 009b gameplay, not making gameplay suggestions.
 
Section 8.1.6
Change "Once close enough, and the object is sufficiently small..." To "Once close enough, and if the object is sufficiently small..."

Next paragraph, change "Where" to "when" and change the first "you" to "your".

Change "A tractor beam is commonly used to capture loose cargo pods and miscellaneous debris - typically being employed after a battle" to "A tractor beam is commonly used to capture loose cargo pods and miscellaneous debris; thus, it is typically employed after a battle".

Change "An interesting usage of the tractor beam is where a sifficiently large ship (such as the Ox) employs a tractor beam to capture whole ships..." to "An interesting usage of the tractor beam is when a sifficiently large ship (such as the Ox) employs a tractor beam to capture whole ships...". And what's an Ox?

Change "A derivation of the above, is the use of prepurchased cargo ships as wingmen" to "A derivation of the above is the use of prepurchased cargo ships as wingmen" (no comma).


Section 8.2.3
Change "It is the nature of the Privateer Remake universe that any travel a pilot makes, is made at their own risk" to "It is the nature of the Privateer Remake universe that any travel a pilot makes is done so at their own risk" (note the deletion of the comma).


Section 8.3.3
Change "Both music and sound are an integral feature of Privateer Remake, providing the right mood and atmosphere; whether on a base, in the middle of space, or a major battle" to "Both music and sound are an integral feature of Privateer Remake, providing the right mood and atmosphere, whether on a base, in the middle of space, or in a major battle" (note the comma instead of a semicolon; you have to use a complete sentence after a semicolon).


Section 9
I'm assuming this entire section is fine since it is verbatim from the original manual.


Section 10
In "Display Lists" it says "This setting takes vertex commands and stores them for later execution - that is, define your drawing for multiple execution later." Change to ""This setting takes vertex commands and stores them for later execution; it defines a drawing for multiple execution later." Also, the sentence "this setting will download a starship to the video card when the starship is drawn" doesn't make much sense; the card itself draws the startship, so it originates on the video card. Only the command to draw something originates off of the video card.

Also in "Display Lists" change "Recommend do not use this setting if you do not have a high powered graphics hardware card" to "This setting is not recommended if you do not have graphics card that XXX". "XXX" can either be something like "is higher than Radeon 9000 or Ge Force 4 Ti 4200" (I'm just guessing) or "supports [this feature]".

Total rewrite of "Per Pixel Lighting" follows:
"Per-pixel lighting effers the ability to calculate lighting effects at the pixel level, greatly increasing precision and realism in a scene. This setting makes the lighting effect sharper and more defined. Per-pixel specular lighting is designed for a graphics card that supports pixel shaders - a DirectX 8 compliant card. Cards that meet these criteria are GeForce 3, 4, FX, and 6000-series cards on the nVidia side and 9000-series and X-series cards on the ATI side. Selecting per-pixel lighting with an older card will result in subpar performance as the pixel shading is done with software rendering (i.e. by using your CPU).[/i]"

In "Reflection", change "is an environment map (picture of background)" to "Selecting reflections calculates an environment map based on the background surrounding a ship."


Section 16.1.13
You can probably get rid of this section.


And that's it, I'm done. Let me know if you have any questions.
 
Thanks JKeefe, I'm slowly going through and changing as per recommendations. Note: some I may not change, mainly because I don't know an answer e.g. "This setting is not recommended if you do not have graphics card that XXX". "XXX" can either be something like "is higher than Radeon 9000 or Ge Force 4 Ti 4200" (I'm just guessing) or "supports [this feature]".

Unless someone can answer these?
 
Display lists should be used unless they cause a crash on any hardware... currently no cards are known to crash with display lists.
VBO[Experimental] is for users who want every ounce of performance--- the stability of VBO is largely dependant on the driver of the week... generally ATI has been more stable with Vertex Buffer Objects than nVidia...but both have been known to release revs of drivers with problems...
Compiled Vertex Arrays are only to be used in the event that both VBO and Display lists give intermittant crashes.
 
To summarize... Vertex Buffer Objects (VBO) give the best performance bar none. They are unstable on some revs of nVidia drivers on certain boards.
Display lists give reasonable performance on all known hardware with few stability problems with drivers released after 2001.
Compiled Vertex Arrays are rock solid and should be used in the event that both of the other two methods of drawing fail occasionally.
 
In the "Missions" section, it says "The objective recorded under missions will change color as well." It would be nice to include a description of what the different colors mean.

Can someone note the different colors and meanings please?
 
Sure...
red is less complete or impossible to complete
yellow is somewhat complete...
and green is complete.

For defend a target that is red = not dead yet... yellow = damaged enough that if he runs he's considered dead... green = dead
for the instructions to go somewhere...an objective is yellow until it's reached.
for defend missions an objective to be defended is yellow unless it is destroyed (then it turns red) or green if the defend is completed (both red and green probably cause the mission to be terminated a few seconds later)

There's a new thing for the 1.0 release that lets you abort missions in the mission screen (where you accept missions...there's a category called Active missions--if you click it you see the objectives and the option to abort that mission)
There's also the ability to look at objectives in the nav computer inflight by clicking nav/info then going to missions I believe :-)

Good luck with the manual--I just committed a binary that does this to cvs
 
Silverain said:
Thanks JKeefe, I'm slowly going through and changing as per recommendations. Note: some I may not change, mainly because I don't know an answer e.g.
Click to expand...
After you are done with your edits, post back everything you do not know the answer to. I can either think harder at that point (I was reading thoroughly but quickly the first time) or I can do some research. Seems like hellcat has some answers already, and I can help with getting the wording right so it is technically accurate.
 
Have uploaded a replacement manual with JKeefe & hellcatv's changes. See link below.

Did not update 5.3.4 RAM and gameplay as they are as per config file.
7.2.3 autopilot light a) didn't change as I'm not sure if the devels will be changing this? If auto light is to stay on, will correct for final 1.0
8.1 put reference to shield locations in the HUD section
16.1.13 these are actual controls just not bound. Will leave in just in case they are used in the future.

If I've missed something, please repost it for corrections before final 1.0

Silverain

P.S. many thanks, and please keep nit-picking.
 
I have a few things that could be changed (don't know if they allready are listed, so sorry if I repeat some points)

1. if I jump and hit the key more than once, for every key-hit 1 jumpfuel is used, even if the jump already begins.
Happens to me when I'm on the run for example. I just head for the jumppiont with full aferburners und as soon as I'm getting close enough I start hitting "J".

2. It would be usefull to have indicationlights for running systems, like ECM or turret-AI, at least in the VR-Mode.

3. Graphicproblems with the turrets in the Galaxy:
3.1. In the lowest position I can see parcialy THROUGH the ship (I don't know is can be corrected).
3.2. The lower turret should be orientated like it is realy under the ship. Right now the ship is allway "under you". This is a little bit confusing.
3.3. Maybe you can add an function to switch between the turrets (wile you're in the turrets). Right now I'll switch with the 1st SHIFT-F1 -> upper turret, 2nd SHIFT-F1 -> cocpit, 3rd SHIFT-F1 -> lower turret, 4th SHIFT-F1 -> cocpit and so on. Critical in Combat.

4. Shipdealer: on the original game he told you how much your ship is worth an offert you automaticly to accept it as payment (is that correct written? ).
Maybe you can add a feauter wher I can decide to:
4.1. trade the old one in for the new on.
4.2. sell the old ship but keap all the systems for the new one
4.3. keep the old ship but transfer chosen systems to the new one, so I still have an functional ship in reserve but have the important systems in the new one. To sell the systems I need form the old ship und by them again for the new one would be a losing deal.

EDIT:
and here some changes that would be nice to have but ar not necessary
1. the missioncomputer should also tell you if the mission leads you outside the quadrant
2. Starbases outside geminiquadrant should have other namens.
3. where is Terra? I once traffeld (fust for fun) to Sol-system, but no Terra :-(
4. I miss the jumpoint from the Junction-system to the Gemini-system. I can jump from Sol-qaudrant to the Gemini-system and from there to the Junction-system but not back.


P.S.: sorry again for my poor english
P.S.2: and keep up the good work (I played almost 7h yesterday, just like old times: WOW)
 
TIRex said:
1. if I jump and hit the key more than once, for every key-hit 1 jumpfuel is used, even if the jump already begins.
Click to expand...
a problem indeed. Until it's fixed,b e careful with that j key ;)
2. It would be usefull to have indicationlights for running systems, like ECM or turret-AI, at least in the VR-Mode.
Click to expand...
Hopefully we can add a config var to have ECM always on. No reason for it ever not to be. A turret AI indicator would be nice. It would be easy in VR mode, somewhat harder when in "real" mode. Perhaps changing the turrets' target indicator depending on their status.

3. Graphicproblems with the turrets in the Galaxy:
3.1. In the lowest position I can see parcialy THROUGH the ship (I don't know is can be corrected).
Click to expand...
Moving the turret (or the position of the viewpoint) slightly up could help. Having cockpit graphics for it should help too.
3.2. The lower turret should be orientated like it is realy under the ship. Right now the ship is allway "under you". This is a little bit confusing.
Click to expand...
Not much that can be done with this. Functionally there is no difference between a top turreet and a bottom turret. Unfortunately this also means we can't have different graphics for the two of them as in the original.
1. the missioncomputer should also tell you if the mission leads you outside the quadrant
2. Starbases outside geminiquadrant should have other namens.
3. where is Terra? I once traffeld (fust for fun) to Sol-system, but no Terra :-(
4. I miss the jumpoint from the Junction-system to the Gemini-system. I can jump from Sol-qaudrant to the Gemini-system and from there to the Junction-system but not back.
Click to expand...
The rest of the WCU is in the game as a source of news, and as a source of NPC ships. It is necessary to maintain balance. We wanted to focus on Gemini, so most of the links out of Gemini were removed, but players are finding the remaining ones anyway ;) This is a problem since the rest of the universe is not modelled accurately at all. While Gemini is hand tooled, the other systems are randomly generated when you visit them, with the effects you have noticed (no earth, Perry Naval Bases everywhere etc. Also, jumpgates that are too small etc). The current plan is to sever the remaining links, to keep things focused on Gemini. To keep the balance from dying, the links will still work one way, ships outside of gemini can come in but not the other way around. That way we don't have to worry about how the other systems look, or warning the player if a mission will take him out of gemini.

For WCU, the links (including Junction->Gemini) will be added back, and we will work at adding Blackmane base, Earth or whatever.

I know what you mean about playing for many hours :) I still do, even after all this time with it. Glad you like it!

yay: 200 posts
 
selling and buying back my tachyon gun gives easy money

Not sure if this has been mentioned, but I found an exploit in the ship upgrade that lets me make money too easily.

I'm at a confed refinery base in the HeavensGate system of the Enigma Sector. I am on really good terms with the confeds. I just got enough money to buy a centurion, so I decided to sell all my upgrades,buy the centurion, and then buy back the upgrades so they could be on my new ship. I accidently put the gun in the wrong slot, I like my guns to be balanced, so I decided to sell the tachyon gun and buy it back to put it in a different slot.

I noticed that when I sold my tachyon gun, and bought it back, I actually made money on the trade, about 10,000 or so. This doesn't seem right. I think I should be loosing money, since the sell price should be less than the buy price. That is the base should think its selling new and I am selling used, right?

On another note, I got to this base by repeatedly taking the highest paying cargo missions, and now I'm lost. The Nav map looks like a tangled mess when I try to look at the sector view. I can't figure out how to get back to the Gemini Sector...Can anyone tell me the path to get back?

Thank you,

--Brandon
 
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