Llantern

[Wamduskasapa]

On the currents - could somebody give me the name of an age which uses currents? I can implement them if I know what Plasma calls them, because then I can make guesses at what they're called in Max.

you might want to look at AhnySphere01_District_Sphere01.prp specifcally Swim Circular Current Region, Swim Detector, Swim Region Interface and Swim Straight Current Region areas within this PRP, these just might give you an idea of how you may wish to proceed. You might also want to check Tosholek_District_mainRoom.prp ..

[Jevasi]

Well I just checked this out and I'm proud to say that it looks great. I only have one suggestion that dosen't seem to have been brought up yet which is that Llantern really could use some ambient sounds, i.e. waves crashing on the shore, wind, seabirds...etc, it just seems too quiet. I also noticed a bug in that some of the footstep sounds seem to be off. Aside from that though it's a wonderful age, great job Sigismund!

[diafero]

Most fan-ages use D'Lanor's linking book template for the linking - which can be easily patched to not break anything online. The only tutorial I could find is for Blender, however: http://www.guildofmaintainers.org/Forum ... 152&t=1087

[D'Lanor]

The 3DS Max tutorial is here: http://www.guildofmaintainers.org/Forum ... 154&t=1762

[N. Sigismund]

Well I just checked this out and I'm proud to say that it looks great. I only have one suggestion that dosen't seem to have been brought up yet which is that Llantern really could use some ambient sounds, i.e. waves crashing on the shore, wind, seabirds...etc, it just seems too quiet. I also noticed a bug in that some of the footstep sounds seem to be off. Aside from that though it's a wonderful age, great job Sigismund!

Thanks!

Better sounds and a complete journal are next up, pretty much. I was basically applying what I call the "Hit it with a hammer until it works" approach to the footstep regions. At least on my end, this resulted in getting a footstep sound everywhere, but the wrong one in certain places. In the past I've had problems with sounds in general. I know enough know to know what's wrong, so I'll get on it when I get back and finish my exam week. (Mid January)

By the way, I got a message from somebody saying that on DI, the journal cannot be read. I know why the linking book does not work, but the journal? I seem to have screwed up a bit with the interactions for this release... I'll definitely switch to D'lanor's linking book code, because that is the standard and all. Hmm.

I've largely finished the journal text, which is really the only thing I can do while at home. This would be where Network Access would come in handy.

Finally, would anybody be interested if I was to do an event on Llantern around Christmas, maybe on the DI server? I'd love to flesh out some backstory to those interested, probably in both OOC and IC terms, and take the chance to visit some stuff on DI (although I would have to use three characters!)

[tangara]

Finally, would anybody be interested if I was to do an event on Llantern around Christmas, maybe on the DI server?

I would be interested but all depends on the hour which you will choose !

[N. Sigismund]

Hey folks!

I'm back with my Llantern development PC at university now, but also facing a great deal of work and examinations before the end of the month. As I said before, don't expect an update until early Feb, probably.

However, I have already done a little bit of aethetic work on the age. Visitors may have noticed that there was only one generic book that was copied numerous times inside the small stone building. I have fixed this, and by applying different textures and resizing the book (and also fixing the model, which was pretty poor work on my behalf!) I've now got five different books to work with, which should hopefully sell that little bit of the area better. I've also removed the walking footstep regions for the time being. There appears to be a large problem with my implementation there, which will need repair.

My next job is going to be furnishing, and a little bit of Python work based on Andy's pop-up images tutorial. This will be applied to the hut as well. I'm resolving to only release bits of the seafront which I consider "done" from now on. No more finding out after release that most if not all my Python work is horrifically broken due to my own newbishness!

I'll also attempt to get out the .max file and textures, although the latter will be, er, tricky due to the varied licences I have the textures under. For example, a great deal of my textures are from the excellent CGtextures.org, which should be a staple for every single age creator (HUGE resource, full of excellent images. If you can afford the premium version they also have some nice high-res tiling textures too, and you can get the 640x640 tiling textures free) which do specify that you're not supposed to distribute their images yourself. I can see the wisdom in this, but for development purposes, especially if I decide to start something like an SVN for this age, it may be unavoidable... :\ It's pretty funny when you're playing a professional computer game like Grand Ages: Rome like I was over the holidays and recognising the textures they used, because they pulled them from CGtextures too!

Happy New Year, belatedly!
- Nye

[tangara]

Very good news, Nye. Happy new year to you too ! Waiting impatiently February !

[N. Sigismund]

Mmkay, spent today trying to get my LlanternBookGui to show up in the Plasma File drop down. I checked using NeolbahBookGui to see how Andy did it and I can't see any differences besides the obvious. But my file doesn't show up and his does...

Grrrr. Looks like I'm sticking to UAMVars for the time being unless I figure out the problem.

[andylegate]

Make sure you are placing all THREE python files into your Python folder for max:

BookGUI
PagesDefs
Journals

Both the compiled and uncompiled versions ( .py and .pyc).

The reason the GUI file is not showing up is because all 3 files reference each other (BookGUI references the PageDef file, PageDef file references the Journal file).

If you don't: The BookGUI file will never appear in the drop down box.

I could have sworn I put that in the tutorial, but I'll go check right now and make sure. If it's not, I'll add that.