Got a couple hours testing in on a new FNV game this morning.
Was initially pleased -- as we were finishing up the "tutorial" with Sunny (which I always play through to get the extra ammo) the girls stopped me, each in turn notifying me that she was thirsty, but had a drink on hand.
The code fired.
Once.
Never happened again. Nor did the hunger state ever appear at all.
I know the code is valid... but I have no idea why it's failed this time.
Slack-ass pieces of shit actually drew a salary for coding this engine...
Anyway. Now I get the fun of running up diagnostic scripts, to figure out whether the counter isn't running, or the variable checks are stuck, or what.
From as long as it took to get the one successful appearance, I can tell you that their object scripts are not running every frame like they're supposed to -- the girls' timer started running before mine did, and it was still five solid minutes after I got the first dehydration notice before they did.
Once, just once, I would like this game to obey it's own goddamned rules.
So, bets are off for the inclusion of a working HC mode for NCCS in the near future, until I figure out what in the unholy fucking shit is going on this time.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Friday, February 10, 2012
Too Much?
Finished off the HC dialogue this morning.
Contained in its own quest for the sake of my sanity, it was easy to check the counter and see how many lines of dialogue were involved in this rather basic endeavor.
The answer? 201. For three personalities.
I had figured on six for NCCS general; plus seven new personalities; plus four or five extras here and there. Assuming the number of lines needed track into NCCS, that will make for 1206 lines of dialogue.
...I may not have thought this project through well enough.
On the up side, I further modified the code so that when you give a companion a Sunset Sarsaparilla, there's a 10% chance of them getting a Star cap instead of a standard bottlecap. Either way, they also keep the empty bottle, as well.
Edit: remembered to add Nuka Cola, as well (and have them keep cap and empty bottle).
After updating the companion scripts to make use of the new hunger and thirst code, the plugin now weighs in at 485kb; up from 352kb. Assuming the same ~38% increase in size, this alone will put NCCS up over the megabyte milestone.
Contained in its own quest for the sake of my sanity, it was easy to check the counter and see how many lines of dialogue were involved in this rather basic endeavor.
The answer? 201. For three personalities.
I had figured on six for NCCS general; plus seven new personalities; plus four or five extras here and there. Assuming the number of lines needed track into NCCS, that will make for 1206 lines of dialogue.
...I may not have thought this project through well enough.
On the up side, I further modified the code so that when you give a companion a Sunset Sarsaparilla, there's a 10% chance of them getting a Star cap instead of a standard bottlecap. Either way, they also keep the empty bottle, as well.
Edit: remembered to add Nuka Cola, as well (and have them keep cap and empty bottle).
After updating the companion scripts to make use of the new hunger and thirst code, the plugin now weighs in at 485kb; up from 352kb. Assuming the same ~38% increase in size, this alone will put NCCS up over the megabyte milestone.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
So. Much. Work.
Bored enough this morning that I'm working on the preliminary version of NCCS' Hardcore Mode again.
Three lines of dialogue per companion (one response for each 'tier' of survival skill); times nineteen possible options, equals a metric fucktonne of dialogue (the metric, or "long" fucktonne, of course being more than the Imperial, or "short" fuckton).
I have to say, this right here is what keeps me from doing more with the companion system. Dialogue.
I hate it. The editor is clumsy and slow, has a shitty excuse for a spell-checker that can't be turned off; and all-round takes forever. It isn't even hard -- it's just the sheer, mindless, monotony of the endless copying and editing.
It's comparably simple, no less -- my personal companions plugin has three companions in it. Each one gets her own dedicated set of responses.
NCCS will be... more complicated. I figure an odd half dozen randomized responses based on gender, alignment, and so on; plus extra responses for each of the seven new personality types -- and a few extras for alignments and genders within said personalities -- all times three for the tiers of survival skill and scripting aside, this is going to end up a not insubstantial amount of work.
It's times like this I wish I really was head of a multinational evil corporation. I'd type up a couple of templates, and have a couple of slaves whittle away their life on the remainder. I'd make a joke here about the market rate for a pair of third world children, but someone would probably think I was being serious and take great offense.
...Like I could afford to buy human beings these days anyway...
Three lines of dialogue per companion (one response for each 'tier' of survival skill); times nineteen possible options, equals a metric fucktonne of dialogue (the metric, or "long" fucktonne, of course being more than the Imperial, or "short" fuckton).
I have to say, this right here is what keeps me from doing more with the companion system. Dialogue.
I hate it. The editor is clumsy and slow, has a shitty excuse for a spell-checker that can't be turned off; and all-round takes forever. It isn't even hard -- it's just the sheer, mindless, monotony of the endless copying and editing.
It's comparably simple, no less -- my personal companions plugin has three companions in it. Each one gets her own dedicated set of responses.
NCCS will be... more complicated. I figure an odd half dozen randomized responses based on gender, alignment, and so on; plus extra responses for each of the seven new personality types -- and a few extras for alignments and genders within said personalities -- all times three for the tiers of survival skill and scripting aside, this is going to end up a not insubstantial amount of work.
It's times like this I wish I really was head of a multinational evil corporation. I'd type up a couple of templates, and have a couple of slaves whittle away their life on the remainder. I'd make a joke here about the market rate for a pair of third world children, but someone would probably think I was being serious and take great offense.
...Like I could afford to buy human beings these days anyway...
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Yep, It SuCKs...
So, got the SuCK last night; alas, had a sinus headache from Hell and wasn't in the mood to play with it. You know, one of those where you've already had your Soccermom-allowed dose of antihistamine for the day and it still hurts and you're down to hoping a convenient terrorist will pop by and shoot you in the head as some kind of political statement?
Feeling somewhat less death-seeking this morning, I decided to play with it a bit.
What was I greeted with? ERRORS!
Oh, look: an invalid navmesh -- I seem to remember someone resembling me complaining earlier the game played like there was at least one...
That's right, nine errors before it would even finish loading. And that's just Skyrim.esm -- none of my third-party-tool-created plugins.
Apparently, whoever worked on Skyrim? They were not good at doing doors. And why would they be? It's not like those are an important part of the game or anything...
As expected, the SuCK took forever to load; and ate so much memory in the process that it locked my system. Fortunately, said lock was not fatal; and it did come out of it... but this is one where I'll definitely have to go get a drink or something while it loads in the future.
Once into the SuCK; it's pretty familiar. The interface is all but identical to the GECK; save that there are a couple new options in the drop-down menus here.
First thing's first, I took at look at the combat styles. I'm not sure how much I'll be able to accomplish, here. They've been dumbed down pretty heavily, and now run on sliders rather than proper number fields -- as well as there being half or fewer as many options as their used to be. The 'ranged' tab consists of a lone option that controls strafing.
Imagine a sad Nos here. There will be no Operator style in this engine, apparently.
Melee is more a mixed bag. Options seem to revolve around multipliers rather than hard numbers -- I haven't read the wiki yet, but it appears that all NPCs have the same basic behavior; all you get to control is how likely they are to choose to do this or that. No choice of engagement ranges; range they'll switch from melee to ranged...
The 'close range' tab has a pair of options for behavior: "dueling" and "flanking" -- NPCs cannot be set to do both. There is at least an option to allow dual-wield, though; if you're into that sort of thing.
At this point, I can't make any assertions about being able to get the NPCs heads out of their asses where combat is concerned -- which sucks, as I was looking forward to doing for Iona what I did for my girls in Oblivion.
Looking over the follow package, I can see why they've been giving me so much trouble. Follow distance is no longer a set variable; it's now a radius; no closer than 128, no further than 256. For whatever reason, it seems to take the engine anywhere from several seconds to a few minutes to notice the NPC is outside the radius.
Further downside: they didn't reinstitute the 'armor removed' flag on packages from Oblivion. Slack bastards. Instead, we get "wear sleep outfit"; which is at least an alternative I suppose. Of course, since NPCs can only be flagged as having one sleep outfit, that limits choices rather severely...
We lost the 'always run' flag, as well; it being replaced with a 'preferred speed' setting.
On NPCs: there seem to be an abundance of "Nya nya you can't kill them!" options. Essential, of course; but also 'invulnerable' and 'doesn't bleed'. There's also one that appears to give them unlimited carry capacity.
NPCs also now have a potentially quite complex set of "relationships" that cover family, friends, allies, and even business partners.
Interestingly, the last update to the game seems to have modified several NPCs. I haven't played it since updating, but I've looked over Aela, Ingun, and Iona's settings, and there are definite changes from what I saw in the third-party NPC editor. Aela now allows no crime, Ingun has been removed from the potential marriage faction (possibly only until you complete her quest?) and Iona no longer reports any crimes at all.
I can also tell you why NPCs get more useless as you level: both Aela and Iona top out at level fifty; despite the player not topping out until what was it? 85 and a half or something stupidly specific?
Scripting I can't make much of. Result scripts in quests certainly look like a different language; but it won't let me actually edit a script from the "papyrus manager" -- it tries to load the script into an external editor. Microsoft Digital Image Suite; for some reason that's beyond me. Which naturally won't open since my free trial of said pile of shit has long since expired.
Ugh, my headache is coming back...
Two weeks late, error laden, and the very antithesis of intuitive -- all I can say is this whole mess is very Bethsoft.
I'm sure there's some convoluted and needlessly arcane way to make it work; but don't be expecting any sort of NosCo companions for this game in the near future.
Feeling somewhat less death-seeking this morning, I decided to play with it a bit.
What was I greeted with? ERRORS!
Oh, look: an invalid navmesh -- I seem to remember someone resembling me complaining earlier the game played like there was at least one...
That's right, nine errors before it would even finish loading. And that's just Skyrim.esm -- none of my third-party-tool-created plugins.
Apparently, whoever worked on Skyrim? They were not good at doing doors. And why would they be? It's not like those are an important part of the game or anything...
As expected, the SuCK took forever to load; and ate so much memory in the process that it locked my system. Fortunately, said lock was not fatal; and it did come out of it... but this is one where I'll definitely have to go get a drink or something while it loads in the future.
Once into the SuCK; it's pretty familiar. The interface is all but identical to the GECK; save that there are a couple new options in the drop-down menus here.
First thing's first, I took at look at the combat styles. I'm not sure how much I'll be able to accomplish, here. They've been dumbed down pretty heavily, and now run on sliders rather than proper number fields -- as well as there being half or fewer as many options as their used to be. The 'ranged' tab consists of a lone option that controls strafing.
Imagine a sad Nos here. There will be no Operator style in this engine, apparently.
Melee is more a mixed bag. Options seem to revolve around multipliers rather than hard numbers -- I haven't read the wiki yet, but it appears that all NPCs have the same basic behavior; all you get to control is how likely they are to choose to do this or that. No choice of engagement ranges; range they'll switch from melee to ranged...
The 'close range' tab has a pair of options for behavior: "dueling" and "flanking" -- NPCs cannot be set to do both. There is at least an option to allow dual-wield, though; if you're into that sort of thing.
At this point, I can't make any assertions about being able to get the NPCs heads out of their asses where combat is concerned -- which sucks, as I was looking forward to doing for Iona what I did for my girls in Oblivion.
Looking over the follow package, I can see why they've been giving me so much trouble. Follow distance is no longer a set variable; it's now a radius; no closer than 128, no further than 256. For whatever reason, it seems to take the engine anywhere from several seconds to a few minutes to notice the NPC is outside the radius.
Further downside: they didn't reinstitute the 'armor removed' flag on packages from Oblivion. Slack bastards. Instead, we get "wear sleep outfit"; which is at least an alternative I suppose. Of course, since NPCs can only be flagged as having one sleep outfit, that limits choices rather severely...
We lost the 'always run' flag, as well; it being replaced with a 'preferred speed' setting.
On NPCs: there seem to be an abundance of "Nya nya you can't kill them!" options. Essential, of course; but also 'invulnerable' and 'doesn't bleed'. There's also one that appears to give them unlimited carry capacity.
NPCs also now have a potentially quite complex set of "relationships" that cover family, friends, allies, and even business partners.
Interestingly, the last update to the game seems to have modified several NPCs. I haven't played it since updating, but I've looked over Aela, Ingun, and Iona's settings, and there are definite changes from what I saw in the third-party NPC editor. Aela now allows no crime, Ingun has been removed from the potential marriage faction (possibly only until you complete her quest?) and Iona no longer reports any crimes at all.
I can also tell you why NPCs get more useless as you level: both Aela and Iona top out at level fifty; despite the player not topping out until what was it? 85 and a half or something stupidly specific?
Scripting I can't make much of. Result scripts in quests certainly look like a different language; but it won't let me actually edit a script from the "papyrus manager" -- it tries to load the script into an external editor. Microsoft Digital Image Suite; for some reason that's beyond me. Which naturally won't open since my free trial of said pile of shit has long since expired.
Ugh, my headache is coming back...
Two weeks late, error laden, and the very antithesis of intuitive -- all I can say is this whole mess is very Bethsoft.
I'm sure there's some convoluted and needlessly arcane way to make it work; but don't be expecting any sort of NosCo companions for this game in the near future.
Friday, February 3, 2012
Another One Bites the Dust
...or will in the near future, anyway.
Over the two years and change I've been running this blog, I've linked numerous times to screenshots or occasionally even files hosted on non-English sites; image boards, forums, blogs, and so on.
Sadly, these are dropping like whores during an outbreak of the Black Death.
One of the better ones that hosted a great many of the original Lovers series mods for Oblivion -- as well as body and armor mods, and a shit-ton of cool screenshots -- bought it at the first of this year.
I was cruising the other morning through Loda's FNV section -- a place where I've found a great many astoundingly cool armor and body mods over the years (there is also an FO3 section) -- and was dismayed to see a large block of moonrunes with the date of 3/31 prominently displayed.
I ran the block through a translator, and sure enough: Loda is going under at the end of March.
I used to peruse a Russian forum for some interesting mods; but it went down back in 2010.
The internet being what it is, free services appear and disappear regularly enough; but it's always annoying with mods. A modder or two always decides not to bother moving their work when an established venue dies; deciding instead to simply throw in the towel. Even the ones who do go to the trouble of moving and re-establishing themselves can take months to track down.
I've got my mod archives built up pretty solidly... but I have to confess not seeing any new armors or outfits from some of my favorite sources is a more bleak looking future, as far as my adventures in the nuclear wastelands go.
Over the two years and change I've been running this blog, I've linked numerous times to screenshots or occasionally even files hosted on non-English sites; image boards, forums, blogs, and so on.
Sadly, these are dropping like whores during an outbreak of the Black Death.
One of the better ones that hosted a great many of the original Lovers series mods for Oblivion -- as well as body and armor mods, and a shit-ton of cool screenshots -- bought it at the first of this year.
I was cruising the other morning through Loda's FNV section -- a place where I've found a great many astoundingly cool armor and body mods over the years (there is also an FO3 section) -- and was dismayed to see a large block of moonrunes with the date of 3/31 prominently displayed.
I ran the block through a translator, and sure enough: Loda is going under at the end of March.
I used to peruse a Russian forum for some interesting mods; but it went down back in 2010.
The internet being what it is, free services appear and disappear regularly enough; but it's always annoying with mods. A modder or two always decides not to bother moving their work when an established venue dies; deciding instead to simply throw in the towel. Even the ones who do go to the trouble of moving and re-establishing themselves can take months to track down.
I've got my mod archives built up pretty solidly... but I have to confess not seeing any new armors or outfits from some of my favorite sources is a more bleak looking future, as far as my adventures in the nuclear wastelands go.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Reqiuem: MU
Well, looks like Megaupload is no more.
I suppose those of us who used it for legally uploading files can just go fuck ourselves.
For the time being, all the mods I've released here on the blog are apparently un-released, until I find another decent file-sharing service to upload them to. Once I have found such, I will update the relevant posts with corrected links.
Edit: and a thought just occurred, it is apparently the entire Mega* network, and not just Upload -- I just checked Druuler's comics (images hosted on Megapix) and they're inaccessible, too.
I have to wonder how many legitimate files this axed.
I suppose those of us who used it for legally uploading files can just go fuck ourselves.
For the time being, all the mods I've released here on the blog are apparently un-released, until I find another decent file-sharing service to upload them to. Once I have found such, I will update the relevant posts with corrected links.
Edit: and a thought just occurred, it is apparently the entire Mega* network, and not just Upload -- I just checked Druuler's comics (images hosted on Megapix) and they're inaccessible, too.
I have to wonder how many legitimate files this axed.
Saturday, January 7, 2012
Hitman: Absolution
For many years I've been a considerable fan of the Hitman series of stealth assassination games. While the series has been saddled with poor controls that effectively make it impossible to play it like an FPS; the games are nonetheless glorious -- perfect "hits" often end up as orchestras of planning, timing, and a little luck.
It's been some years since the last title (Blood Money) was released, and with its ending there was no doubt in anyone's mind that the saga of everyone's favorite genetically engineered assassin wasn't over.
I was reading around this internet this morning, and came across some info on the upcoming title.
David Bateson will not be voicing Agent 47.
Vivienne McKee, who has always voiced 47′s handler, Diana, has been replaced by Marsha Thomason.
The original soundtrack for the game is composed by Peter Kyed and Peter Peter, replacing the game's previous composer, Jesper Kyd.
The new title will feature an online or possibly multiplayer option unlike previous titles.
Different 47. Different Diana. Different composer. Multifuckingplayer mode.
Multi-motherfucking-player. In a Hitman game.
If anyone needs me, I'll be quietly sobbing in front of my altar to Silent Assassin.
It's been some years since the last title (Blood Money) was released, and with its ending there was no doubt in anyone's mind that the saga of everyone's favorite genetically engineered assassin wasn't over.
I was reading around this internet this morning, and came across some info on the upcoming title.
David Bateson will not be voicing Agent 47.
Vivienne McKee, who has always voiced 47′s handler, Diana, has been replaced by Marsha Thomason.
The original soundtrack for the game is composed by Peter Kyed and Peter Peter, replacing the game's previous composer, Jesper Kyd.
The new title will feature an online or possibly multiplayer option unlike previous titles.
Different 47. Different Diana. Different composer. Multifuckingplayer mode.
Multi-motherfucking-player. In a Hitman game.
If anyone needs me, I'll be quietly sobbing in front of my altar to Silent Assassin.
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