Some thoughts about modding

(SCDS_reyalP) #21

Then why did they do 3 patches, and release the mapping tools and game source ? If you assume they wanted to cripple ET to move people on to their other games, that doesn’t add up.

I think ikanatto has a very good point. Compared to the work required to make a total conversion, hacking up some modeling tools isn’t huge big deal. How do you think SD got their modeling tools ? They sat down and wrote them.

There is another thing that works against ET total conversions, which is a lack of publicity. The game is free, but the people who hear about an ET mod are most likely to be ET players. Even a really cool TK isn’t likely to get more than a small mention on non-ET sites. Most of the people who are still playing ET are doing so because they like the ET gameplay style, so it would take a very engaging total conversion to get them to switch. For example, I know a lot of ET players liked ETF, but very few of them liked it so much more that they dedicated their gaming time to ETF instead of ET. Same for TC:E. For a total conversion mod to really take off, you need a certain critical mass of players so anyone who picks it up can find a populated server in there area, any time of day.

As long as mods are only known to the existing ET community, they will have to cannibalize the ET player base. The people who have stuck with et (shrub/etpro/etpub) this whole time are unlikely to switch in large enough numbers, unless the mod is truely amazing.

BTW, I would consider the csports player numbers to be very suspect. Every other indicator says that cs:s has a MUCH larger active player base than ET.

(kamikazee) #22

Good point, and this problem is what FalckonET is suffering from. Allmost no publicity, and players allways miss each other on the servers so nobody’s on.
We’re probably just too late too release a mod so close to ET:QW now, but giving it all up would be a waste of previously spent time as well.

(squadjot) #23

i think a ET:RTCW mod would be quite popular…make it just as it was (osp-like)…rip out the XP system, add new antilag code, then u got a great comp game again, available for all.

(Jaquboss) #24

etpub become popular because second biggest mod ( shrub ) died,
TC:E was very succesful in my environment when i tell about it my to friends ( who don’t like ET )
so there is a lot of thruth that non-ET players are great source for ET mods

(carnage) #25

i think a ET:RTCW mod would be quite popular…make it just as it was (osp-like)…rip out the XP system, add new antilag code, then u got a great comp game again, available for all

maby but a comp mod isnt realy the sorta game u can just bring up and play a few rounds i made for the hardcore comp gamers. i think any TC has to be public primerialy with posibly comp settings or realse some patches to allow for better comp play after initial puplic sucess of the game

so there is a lot of thruth that non-ET players are great source for ET mods

TC:E was good but similar to games like CSS and i expect most players who liked TC:E would rather and already play CSS

There is another thing that works against ET total conversions, which is a lack of publicity. The game is free, but the people who hear about an ET mod are most likely to be ET players

a very good point. so i gess if a TC mod is to take of we need to get a presance outside of the ET SD comunity. but fisrt you need some sorta project idea and ppl to advertise it to so a lotta work still. and still prob need a good number of ppl from the ET comunity to give the mod a good background in ET modding and get an inital number of ppl working on the project so others outside the comunity see it as just someones dream that will never happen

(SCDS_reyalP) #26

There is one, and it isn’t very popular. (started out as RTCWMod, now llamapro)

(nUllSkillZ) #27

A little summation of ET modding problems:

[ol]
[li]missing playermodel tools (subsequently no animators)
[/li][li]the “uber”-mod Pro (and Pub)
[/li][li]ET gameplay / ET itself
[/li][li]lack of publicity
[/li][li]similarity of ET mods to other games / mods (example: TC:E / CS(:S))
[/li][/ol]

Hopefully I haven’t overread a problem.

(carnage) #28

missing playermodel tools (subsequently no animators)

the “uber”-mod Pro (and Pub)

ET gameplay / ET itself

lack of publicity

similarity of ET mods to other games / mods (example: TC:E / CS(:S))

ill just try to add a bit more detail to these points

the “uber”-mod Pro (and Pub)

ET gameplay / ET itself

these are pretty much the same that ET already has such good gameplay and the pro + pub mod only make it better so for any mod its gona be hard to beat

missing playermodel tools (subsequently no animators)

the lack of animators is a problem but there are sufficent tool to make very good player models without real a lot of work and because of the mdx animation similar humanoid players can use the ET animations as a lil work around for lack ofanimators

similarity of ET mods to other games / mods (example: TC:E / CS(:S))

Many mods for ET are still WWII theme so maby not quite getting the interest from modder they need to get more staff in. also the mods that arnt ww2 seem to be in the style of other games like TCE for example

lack of publicity

i think this is becasue of the failure of the ET modding scene in general over the last few years many are not paying any attention to it anymore. Asmentioned above when someone starts a new mod say POP another WW2 mod so thge modder outside looking in are prob sick on ww2 mods and have no interest

It would be nice to see someone with a fresh idea for mod, new theme and new gameplay

As long as mods are only known to the existing ET community, they will have to cannibalize the ET player base. The people who have stuck with et (shrub/etpro/etpub) this whole time are unlikely to switch in large enough numbers, unless the mod is truely amazing.

it posible to offer an instaler and game shortcut that with install the mod files and launch the game without ever having to mention ET so offering a good TC mod as a standalone game could be a good way to get some new players from outside the ET playerbase

(Lanz) #29

Yes that’s true when it comes to pro but with pub you have two options

  1. The source is available so you can help mod it with things you would like to see in it and send them a patch, or 2) If they don’t like it you can derive your work from it and make your own mod with the same functionallity.

Still your pretty fucked if you try to make a competitive mod, not because pub is bad but because no true pro player would ever consider playing a match on it.

the lack of animators is a problem but there are sufficent tool to make very good player models without real a lot of work and because of the mdx animation similar humanoid players can use the ET animations as a lil work around for lack ofanimators

Yeah you can make use of those tools perhaps, but how many modelers would? It’s just a pain in the ass for the average modeller.

I don’t think lack of publicity is a problem tbh, if someone did a great inovative mod, people would play it and people would tell their friends to play it.

(kamikazee) #30

Who has ever heard of Jaquboss’ fantasy mod mention in nullskillz mods-list?
He’s only got a few levels, and the idea looks promissing.

(nUllSkillZ) #31

Ok, playermodel tools are available but hard to handle.

Publicity within the ET community is existent.
(Are the players part of the community / visit community pages regularly?)
But the ET players like to play more ET or other mods (pro / pub) or are not interested in non WWII games / mods.

Publicity outside of the ET community is nearly not existent (I guess).
Therefore the potential target player group does not know anything about these mods.
Or the players are not interested and like to play more other games / mods (for example TC:E versus CS(:S)).

(carnage) #32

I don’t think lack of publicity is a problem tbh, if someone did a great inovative mod, people would play it and people would tell their friends to play it.

i think this is directed to the publicity to the general modding comunity to get more modder back to ET not to the actauly players of the game

it been proved in other topics that ET still has a very large player base compared to many popular fully paid games

Ok, playermodel tools are available but hard to handle.

??? what, all you need is a mdc exporter that is avaidable then the converter tool. it will take about 20seconds more to exprt your model since you have to run the mdc though the converter after it been exported to mdc format… there is not extra significant work

look in the mod project list for the screenshot of jaquboss you see there hes used a rtcw mdc model and put it though the exporter. the option are use a sceleton from a rtcw model as a base and re use ET animation (also posible to add extra mdx animations if needed). or build a new sceleton made new mdm and mdx are a bit of re coding

(P4nth3r) #33

I think people are talking about the mds/mdm/mdx importers/exporters carnage

(kamikazee) #34

True, no mdc’s, only mds.

Problem is: MDS importers/exporters are hard to find nowadays, especially for more exotic 3D editors like Lightwave.
What I’m now trying is to make a convertor which converts between mds, mdm or mdx to a custom format. I’ll then need to make importers/exporter for this custom format. Once I’ve got those I only need to implement a new format in my convertor tool to reach all editors which have a plugin for the custom format, no seperate plugins needed.

The question is: When will I have/take the time to actually finish this thing?

(Jaquboss) #35

MDS imported by cookson’s import script looks far more diffirent than in tutorials ( bones instead bip figure mainly )
i have no idea how to work with it , experenced user should however have no problems :nag:

(Mr.Mxyzptlk) #36

Free FBX toolkits are available for Windows 2000/XP, Mac OS X and Linux which
can be used to create FBX files. FBX files can then be imported by many 3D apps,
some of which already provide FBX native support, or by using Alias’ supplied plugins
for various version of the following apps:

Maya 5.0, 6.0, 6.5, 7 (win, mac, linux)
3dsmax 6.0, 7.0, 8.0 (win)
Lightwave3D 7.5, 8.0, 8.2 (win, mac)
Softimage XSI 3.5, 4.0, 4.2 (win)

(kamikazee) #37

Ah! That’s actually what I needed but didn’t find last time I looked for it! (Probably because it’s hosted on Autodesk’s site)

I’ll look into it, because yhis might just solve my problems. Thank you!

(tjw) #38

In regard to the modeling problem, it seems what is missing most of all is a MDM/MDX import/export python script for blender.

I started playing ET because it was free (and available on Linux), started modding because the tools to do so were free (and available on Linux), but I don’t know jack about it’s animations or modelling because I would have to buy thousands of dollars worth of software (that doesn’t run on Linux) to open the damn files that contain these precious bits. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was also some of the thinking responsible for the low number of total conversion mods. Well, not the Linux part of course :slight_smile:

There are import/export scripts for blender now that can handle MDS (RtCW) and MD5 (Doom3), so I assume that a MDM/MDX(ET) script is quite possible. Of course I’m only speculating about this since I know jack about blender or models, but it makes sense in my limited view.

(nUllSkillZ) #39

Quote from “My mod: Beta1 release!”

(Jaquboss) #40

mds has native support in ET, try this

	SUBWINDOW( 128, 128, 128, 256, "PLAYER" )
	itemDef {
		name		"playermodel"
		group		GROUP_NAME
		rect		128 128 128 256
		//style		WINDOW_STYLE_FILLED
		ownerdraw	UI_PLAYERMODEL
		//backcolor	0 0 0 .5
		//border		WINDOW_BORDER_FULL
		//bordercolor	.1 .1 .1 .2
		visible		1
		//decoration
	}

and copy multi_axis from RTCW demo/fullgame to model directory…
you should have nice model view :slight_smile: