WorldSpawn official WIP thread

[MadGypsy]

I still need to plug light in for this but, I finally got point_particles to work. I'd like to say that I can't believe I got fire to look even this good (I know this isn't that good). I seriously have no clue what I'm doing. I wrapped the particle API with a JSON interface..no problem BUT actually using this requires particle knowledge that I have no clue about. Until today I didn't have any idea what sine and cosine actually do and I guessed heavily on my math expressions to get this to work.

However, to show off just a little tiny bit I used a blue particle.

[MadGypsy]

This was a royal mother fucker. 10 kabillion trillion million zillion hornets! And all because apparently you can't add lights to a lightpicker after it has been applied to a texture. I mean you can add them but they won't do anything. I had to COMPLETELY reconsider a fuck load of code. I know my torch flame looks bananas. It's the best I can do until I learn what the hell I am even doing. However, the light flicker that accompanies that flame actually looks pretty damn good.

That room has 1 light at 150 with a delay of 3 (no attenuation...basically minlight) so, anything that seems brighter than the darkest stuff is the torch flame light.

Tomorrow, I intend to start from the very bottom of my engine working my way up and seriously considering how the future is going to effect each part. When I started this I had no thoughts of RTLs and particles and all that. I'm starting to feel like I'm cramming this shit in my engine. I'm gonna fix that and I'm gonna fix it for good.

[Mugwump]

@FTE Dunno, really, it's just what I've gathered from people mentioning it in the forums.

@community I view all these sites, Func_, InsideQC, Quaddicted, QuakeOne et al as part of the same community: the Quake community. I have accounts at Func_ (for mapping), Quad (for custom maps) and here (for replacement content, mods and more general stuff). I don't see the problem with doing so. At any rate, it could bring more interest in your engine(s).

@popularization Thanks! This also could bring more people here.

@flame Seven has a great looking particle flame in his SMC. Maybe studying it would show you how to do it? I know Baker took a lot of inspiration from the SMC to make his example effects for Quakespasm-Spiked.

[Mugwump]

Also, having more programmers looking at your stuff could lead to emulation and exchange of ideas. Give you clues as to how to approach certain problems.

[MadGypsy]

@Also, having more programmers looking at your stuff could lead to emulation and exchange of ideas.

I would agree if I was programming in a language that any of the quake community knew.

@community I view all these sites, Func_, InsideQC, Quaddicted, ...

Me too, but, I already spend too much time here. Adding 5 other sites would be a terrible idea.

@Give you clues as to how to approach certain problems.

I don't want that at all. You may notice that since I switched from "Real Flash Quake" to this thread I haven't asked any questions. I actually did ask Spike a question in PM but, the answer was to point me to a completed script and explain none of it to me. And that's perfect. I'm really good at things because I am very independent and I'm not afraid to be miserable trying to figure something out. When I very first started this I knew trying to go it completely alone was fantasy-land thinking BUT, once I got off the ground I cut the umbilical cord. Like my very first post here says, "I'm not trying by any means to claim I have it all figured out but, I feel very capable" and that's the truth. I can do this. I'm not saying I will NEVER have a question but, I will never be dependent on other people for this again.

I'm not trying to poo-poo all your suggestions you just managed to suggest everything that I decided long ago has no appeal to me. Also, whereas all of these sites are the same community they are not the same environment. I've managed to maintain a membership here for 6 years and in that time I have slowly but surely figured out how to not make it a complete disaster. I'm not saying a bunch of this hasn't been a disaster. I'm saying it's progressively less of a disaster. I made a couple posts on func in regards to helping someone and was met with a shitty attitude from a couple people. I KNOW it would be a disaster if I was a member there. I'm not very good at ignoring shitty jerky people. It was straight up hard to ignore Focalor and I was only about 80% successful (re: progressively less of a disaster).

[Mugwump]

Heh, OK then, suit yourself. I get it, you prefer to figure things out on your own. I can respect that.

[MadGypsy]

The only exception being if Dutch or someone like that wanted to get in on my project. Someone that isn't lightyears ahead of me in engine development. In a situation like that I would change my stark independence a bit. But then again, even in that situation we would be working on different aspects of the engine so, I would still be going-it-alone from whatever part I'm working on. I actually regret that he doesn't have the time or maybe interest to be a part of this project. I am very confident I could get him on track pretty quick and set him up in a way where the direction he would be injecting into my engine wouldn't affect the overall engine. I mean of course it would affect it, I just mean he wouldn't have to fuck with my script to accomplish whatever his part was.

I work hard to keep dependencies to a minimum. And in that, my engine is more like a bunch of small packages that meet in the middle to achieve the overall result. All someone else would have to do is continue that concept. Like a HUD for instance. Using my method the HUD would be basically a "plug-in".

[MadGypsy]

Good enough for now. On to other things. The base is just a couple of brushes with whatever texture was currently selected. This is all just temporary example stuff. I'll worry about making this stuff better when I can finally make a game in this engine. This one is not using the blue particle. My rocket/fireball always looked pretty decent as fire so, I just reused that particle. I had to change a bunch of the JSON script (from here on out known as "the descriptor") to get the size and stuff to work with the base but, this is pretty much the same formula I was using for the other fire. You may notice in the top image that the wall texture is being colored by the light in a "wash out" way. I need to work on a better expression for specular. It's not as noticeable while the engine is running but I still don't like it. Basically I just got "lucky" and hit screenshot at just the right moment. The bottom image doesn't have the same washout and it's the exact same flame. It just depends on whatever the values ended up being for that frame.

less than 24 hours ago

[Mugwump]

It already looks much better than your earlier attempt. And the pictures are not even moving! Perhaps a little too red on the outside but it's pretty cool. I've already noticed it before but I'm quite baffled at how fast you work.

[MadGypsy]

Just like how I turned a blue particle reddish-orange and relied on additive blending to create the yellow core, I could force my current particles to back off the red by changing 2 numbers (^green, ^blue = less red)...woops no, If I did that I would lose black edges on the particle (transparent). I could just drop the initial red value

startTrans [1,1,1] to startTrans[0.6,1,1] or summin.

[MadGypsy]

I think I'm gonna figure out how to make particle masks. I think that's what it's called...I forget. Basically it's a sprite sheet of black and white blobs that define a range of particle shapes.

If I had to guess, I would say it's probably nothing more than a sprite sheet of alpha masks applied to a ?cube texture?...IDK. I'm brain farting right now on what all this stuff is called. I know the terms I'm just mentally preoccupied. Anyway, I'm going to figure out how to do it.

[Mugwump]

I think you mean particlefont. Not sure how it works exactly but yeah, it's basically a TGA. There's one inside the SMC if you want to look at an example. Actually, I'm not certain but there's probably one in vanilla Quake as well.

[MadGypsy]

THAT!

yes that's what I was brain farting on.

[MadGypsy]

Man, I've been working on reconsidering my script with the future in mind, off and on, all day. I didn't realize how much code I have already written. This is a lot of work. I hope I'm making the right decisions.

I also can't find anything online regarding particlefonts in a tutorial/explanation sense. I guess when I finish refiguring my code I can try my alphamask spritesheet - cubemap way but, I bet that's all wrong. I'm really just taking what I do know and trying to slam together whatever parts make some kind of sense (in theory) to invent a solution. Generally when I do that I get something to work but it's terrible.

I wonder how literally I should take the term "font". Maybe all the answers are right there in that word. A character font is a collection of characters with a definitive style. So, is a particle font a collection of particles with a definitive style? All the particle fonts I have seen are white and black...is this really actually something I am already doing but with a colored font? I was considering the font as a mask to restrict the shapes an effect can make but, the more I think about this I think I am already using particle fonts.

IDFK...back to refiguring my code. I'll worry about particle fonts later.

[Mugwump]

@particlefont Ask Seven. He knows his stuff and is always willing to explain things.