153 replies to this topic

[Maurice1976]

I am just curious why you are doing this? If you put it all on a train in one mission, then... it will be a very long train, and I can't really imagine it looking that good in effect.

 

The main reason I guess is flexibility. To have it available. Ever since I saw that train in mission 6, I felt that itch, wondering what it would look like when it was actually moving. And the game has a number of train carriages that are actually used ingame, whereas others (like the armored train from the Bonn mission in BCoD) are basically just scenery. I guess I am weird that way to have them available as a real train carriage too . Besides, maybe someone else might use it in a mission they're designing. Isn't it also the reason why you put so much effort into your locomotive?

 

And perhaps it's true that it will look kinda weird if you make a long train, but I am planning on a mission on a relatively large map where a railway basically cuts the map in two, without giving the player access to that railway. Trains will move in both directions (double track) and I plan to make a few that alternate. The player will be able to move between the two parts of the map, because I plan the railway to cross over a few bridges that the player can move below. While the player is playing the mission, he'll be seeing the trains pass by, of course. I haven't fully decided yet how the map is going to look exactly, let alone the composition of the trains.

 

Edit: By the way, I do admit that it's a lot more work than I initially expected. I'm using Paint.net to edit the graphics, as it's freeware and has a lot of options and plugins that make it a good alternative to Photoshop. So even if it's a lot more work, it's also a good way to get to better grips with that paint program.

Edited by Maurice1976, 11 October 2017 - 09:47 PM.

[herbert3000]

Hello everybody!

This is my first post in this forum. I didn't find any topic for newcomers to introduce themselves, so I decided to post here.

 

First of all a big thanks to everyone for your efforts (also to the Chinese community ofc ) to keep this game alive until today! This is very big so Congraz!

 

I feel a bit guilty for not having posted before, but here I am! I have played the original commandos series a lot in my childhood, and since then I've been coming back and forth. But if it wasn't for the Destination Paris mod this wouldn't have happened.

I have finished Destination Paris 1.37 IIRC (on normal) and it was amazing experience. Once I saw v1.44(?) and that missions from all the series are included (let alone the great number of community missions) I decided I have to come back for good this time. But I had to do it the right way this time so I went for the hardest mode. I thought I wouldn't make it and I would quit the game, but I ended up progressing and having so much fun! I have finished all BEL missions and decided to continue with BTCOD. I just finished "Thor's Hammer" mission and getting ready for the next one after this post! You never know, maybe I will join multiplayer if these still take place!

 

Btw I checked the mission order and wondering if there is any reason behind it. Seems a bit weird, but ofc this is minor.

 

Sorry for the long post and big thanks again!

 

MiRagE

 

Hello MiRagE!

 

I almost missed your post, it's always nice to meet other fans of the game. Welcome to the forums!

 

Actually there is a reason behind the mission order, if you open the file 'Mission List.pdf' you'll see that the missions are grouped by campaigns and updates. But I assume that the order will change in one of the next updates. For instance, it would make sense if the missions from 'Strike in Narrow Path' would be in order too.

 

Speaking of updates, extrano1955 is finishing his work on v1.45, so stay tuned for the next release
 

[Zakxaev68]

Hello everybody!

This is my first post in this forum. I didn't find any topic for newcomers to introduce themselves, so I decided to post here.

 

[...]

 

Ahoy comrade. Oh, we gotta take part in multiplayer together, all of us forum lurkers. I'm thinking beat Comm BEL/BCD/MOC funniest way possible, you do too? To save the moments, someone can capture it on video! Who's up for Commandos Weekender?

[A_MiRagE_A]

Thanks for info and the warm welcome guys!

Sorry for the late post, I 've been quite busy this month. However I finished BCD (on hard ofc, only hard from now on! )!

It was quite a nice experience since I haven't played BCD before!

Playing multiplayer sounds great...if only I can keep up with you veterans . There are many maps that I haven't played before, but this will not stop me if called to action!

At the moment I 'm wondering which campaign I should start...I watch some you-tube videos (also to see the pros' techniques) and they all seem pretty tempting!

[Jeroen]

This is from previous page:

 

What I want to do, is to just add objects (no shadows, no polygon points) to a map and then run the resulting VOL file through the macro code I am designing. I intend the macro code to then add the shadows and all the required polygon points for me, without any manual actions from my side, other than to tell the macro to start running. That should save truckloads of time when building maps.

 

 

Can you/anyone give me names of specific tree and shadow bmps? And which files they are from? Im testing my png program and want to combine "shadow + image" as a pair or as one image combining them.

[Maurice1976]

This is from previous page:

 

What I want to do, is to just add objects (no shadows, no polygon points) to a map and then run the resulting VOL file through the macro code I am designing. I intend the macro code to then add the shadows and all the required polygon points for me, without any manual actions from my side, other than to tell the macro to start running. That should save truckloads of time when building maps.

 

 

Can you/anyone give me names of specific tree and shadow bmps? And which files they are from? Im testing my png program and want to combine "shadow + image" as a pair or as one image combining them.

 

Well, that's a bit of the challenge, to be honest. They didn't systematically name their shadow files, unlike the mask files.

 

For your information, the first map of BEL has the following individual tree files:

ARB20000.RLE (occurs 15 times in the MAPA0000.VOL file, occurs 9 times in the CHOQ0000.VOL file ... note that the the CHOQ0000.VOL file has 5 references to ARB20001.RLE, a graphics file that's not included in the WAD file for the first mission!)

ARBO0001.RLE (occurs 18 times in the MAPA0000.VOL file, occurs 17 times in the CHOQ0000.VOL file)

 

I suspect that the tree graphics references are super-imposed on one another in the actual mission, with the references in the CHOQ0000.VOL file marking the tree trunk as unpassable. For instance, the MAPA0000.VOL file has the following entry:

    POLY "ARBOL26",1400,3053,0,159,0,2            ;Nombre,CentroX,CentroY,CentroZ,Altura,#vertices,#Tiles
    RADIO        38                ;Radio
    EXTRAINFO        0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0                 ;Extra Info Bytes
    TILE        1360,1818,  78, 156,   0,   0, 0,"ARBO0001.RLE","   "
    TILE        1365,1820,  69, 150,   0,   0, 0,"-RUINA07.RLE","   "

where the CHOQ0000.VOL file has an entry for the same location:

    POLY "NONAME",1400,3053,0,159,0,1            ;Nombre,CentroX,CentroY,CentroZ,Altura,#vertices,#Tiles
    RADIO        5                ;Radio
    TILE        1360,1818,  78, 156,   0,   0, 0,"ARBO0001.RLE","   "

Note the difference in the "radio" section.

 

The corresponding shadow files are respectively

SARB0000.RLE (occurs 9 times in the MAPA0000.VOL file)

SARB0001.RLE (occurs 5 times in the MAPA0000.VOL file)

both for the ARB2000.RLE file (note that the SARB0001.RLE entry is actually for a different tree! You can actually see a mismatch ingame between the tree and its shadow) and

PISO0000.RLE (occurs 16 times in the MAPA0000.VOL file)

for the ARBO0001.RLE file.

 

Note that there are 3 trees on the map that have no shadow file attached to it: their root base is hidden behind rocks or a cluster of trees.

 

As you can see, the name for the second tree and its shadow doesn't match up. It appears they took the character part of the name, shifted that by 1 position to the right and added an S in front of the file name. However, I am not sure you can always reverse engineer it that way.

[Jeroen]

Can you name some trees and shadow from e.g The Asphalt Jungle? I don't have decoded CHOQ files a.t.m.

Edited by Imp, 05 November 2017 - 10:01 PM.

[Maurice1976]

Are there still shadow files in BCD? I don't see "SARB0000.RLE" in CHOQ files.

 

Yes, there are. Mission 5, the Villa where you need to capture the enemy General, has SOMB0000 as base for all individual trees.

 

As far as I can tell, the CHOQ files don't contain shadows, just an overlay for already existing trees. My guess is that the CHOQ files are only intended to define impassable objects like trees and flagpoles and by definition, shadows by themselves are always passable .

[Jeroen]

Sorry but I always forget where to find stuff. So MAPA0001.VOL has references to SOMB0000.

 

Somehow I managed to get a Fase0003 directory long ago that has Eagle's Nest files in it. E.g. planes and trees but no shadows.

 

Are shadows in WADs in the ELEM dir maybe? Where are they?

[Maurice1976]

If you are confusing yourself, it might be a good idea to start clean sheet somewhere . Just make a directory somewhere and extract the contents of each WAD file into its own subfolder. Use that as reference material (i.e., don't mess around with its contents - if you feel the need to, make a copy of that directory first, so you can always quickly refer to what the original WAD file contains). The tricky part here, I guess, is that the FASE numbering and the ingame mission numbering don't coincide for the most part, both in BEL and BCOD. It seems they shifted missions around after creating them or something.

 

The WAD files can be found in the "recursos/elem/" subdirectory.

 

I am at work now, so I can't check my own PC for this information, but from the top of my head FASE0001 from BCOD is the mission of the villa where you need to capture the enemy general (which is mission 5 in the actual game). As such, indeed, MAPA0001.VOL should contains references to the SOMB0000 file. If you've extracted the FASE0001 WAD file from BCOD, you should be able to find both a SOMB0000.BMP and SOMB0000.MASK.BMP file there.

Edited by Maurice1976, 07 November 2017 - 09:29 AM.

[herbert3000]

As far as I can tell, the CHOQ files don't contain shadows, just an overlay for already existing trees. My guess is that the CHOQ files are only intended to define impassable objects like trees and flagpoles and by definition, shadows by themselves are always passable .

You're right!

 

The CHOQ files gave the map designers the possibility to make some small changes (moving the trees and poles around) without the need to change the navigation mesh (SEC).

The tiles in the CHOQ files are irrelevant.

Instead of this:

POLY "NONAME",1170,3573,0,131,0,1
RADIO 5
TILE 1119,2173, 112, 131, 0, 0, 0,"ARB20000.RLE"," "

you could also write:

POLY "NONAME",1170,3573,0,131,0,0
RADIO 5

The effect is the same.

[Maurice1976]

The tiles in the CHOQ files are irrelevant.

 

Just out of curiousity (and I know it's something I can easily test myself ... but I'm not at home right now ), but are the graphics tiles in the CHOQ file even shown at all?

[Lexx2k]

Problem with CHOQ stuff is, that characters can get stuck on them. So they should be used in specific places only.

[herbert3000]

... are the graphics tiles in the CHOQ file even shown at all?

Nope

[Jeroen]

If you are confusing yourself, it might be a good idea to start clean sheet somewhere .

 

I had just found the dir with the FASE000* wads when you posted that (and I was supposed to be working too). But you're right about cleaning up old stuff and restart. Mission files are just a mess in BEL/BCD.

 

Look guys this is what I do

convert SOMB0000.BMP SOMB0000.MASK.BMP -compose CopyOpacity -composite SOMB0000.png

The opacity of the mask is used in the result. Black becomes transparent and grey makes shadow.

[Maurice1976]

Just out of curiousity, what do you want to do with the resulting png files?

[herbert3000]

If you want to extract a WAD file to PNGs (and also repack PNGs as WAD) you can use this application:

https://sites.google...WadPngTools.jar

 

It really bothers me that I'm so unorganized. I should stop posting links to tools inside of unrelated threads, nobody will find it in the future. In a perfect world there would be one single place where people (especially newcomers) can get information about all available tools and what they can be used for. An extended FAQ maybe.

[Jeroen]

Just out of curiousity, what do you want to do with the resulting png files?

 

I load them simply in a test program, that is supposed to become a game some day. You won't believe how much time I wasted on SFML and SDL before settling for Allegro in the last 4 years.

 

If you want to extract a WAD file to PNGs (and also repack PNGs as WAD) you can use this application:

https://sites.google...WadPngTools.jar

 

It really bothers me that I'm so unorganized. I should stop posting links to tools inside of unrelated threads, nobody will find it in the future. In a perfect world there would be one single place where people (especially newcomers) can get information about all available tools and what they can be used for. An extended FAQ maybe.

 

I've always hated having the images mirrored programmatically like this

FRAME 8
SPRITE "SAND0000.RLE",-12,-39,0
SPRITE "SAND0008.RLE",-10,-34,0
SPRITE "SAND0016.RLE",-10,-34,0
SPRITE "SAND0008.RLE",-16,-34,1
SPRITE "SAND0000.RLE",-11,-39,1
SPRITE "SAND0032.RLE",-10,-38,1
SPRITE "SAND0024.RLE",-13,-36,0
SPRITE "SAND0032.RLE",-9,-39,0

so I want to use mirrored images. Luckily i can do

convert SOMB0000.BMP SOMB0000.MASK.BMP -compose CopyOpacity -composite -flop SOMB0000.png

where flop is mirror vertically (flip is mirror horizontally). Can your bean do that?

 

The very best thing for a game would be one big sprite sheet for each figure. So each image is e.g 40 by 40 pixels and, like a checkers board, I can place the side by side. Each image now has an offset to the top left (0,0)

One problem is that a figure standing will have much empty space horizontally and a crouching figure standing will have much empty space vertically, making all images larger than they need be.

[Jeroen]

Maurice and Herbert are busy programming?

[Maurice1976]

Not me . I am just busy with my job during the daytime and kicking back a bit during the evening. Truth be said, I have had too little time to invest in setting up my modding BEL / BCOD environment lately, too much of reallife is interfering with that.

 

Anything in particular you would want to ask me, though?

Edited by Maurice1976, 09 November 2017 - 06:39 PM.