Leaderboard

I just wanted to share my progress on creating custom bricks for LDD. As you can see by the following images, I've succeeded at what many thought impossible: importing custom models into LDD. I have cracked the structure of the .g file format but I still have problems with a section that has to do with the outlines/borders of the bricks. I am now working on an editor to create the xml that goes with the model which specifies the collision and connection information.

Well, that's one Light spaceship built and a lot of polygons deleted. Currently, it's at about 14k, down from 22 or so. Which...is still probably way too high for a multiplayer game. But it's low enough I can say "Close enough for the moment," and move on to the next step - modeling the first playing map. You can't see it in either of these photos, but the cockpit computer is lit. A "night" version, showing engines/running lights(and a tiny bit of glow from the cockpit computer screen). I'll probably need to add some glow to the guns, but I'll leave worrying about that until I'm actually programming the shooting function. EDIT: ...And I've just know realized the silliness of thinking I could use a 14k model for testing functions. :facepalm: I guess I'll just make #885 Space Scooter and use that. I imagine that'll be...still probably a good two or three hundred polygons more than desirable, even if I shave off all visible studs, but it should work at least a little better...

[4:23:28 PM] Will Kirkby: yknow [4:23:47 PM] Will Kirkby: I'm glad there's a mature lego fanbase that I can consider as friends [4:24:00 PM] Will Kirkby: seriously [4:24:02 PM] Will Kirkby: with friends like these [4:24:04 PM] Will Kirkby: who needs elembies

[02:30:13] Terrev: I did a google images search of "raymanly" hoping to find a funny image of a really MANLY rayman or something [02:30:20] Terrev: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CJf2b6TWcAAnB8l.jpg [02:30:22] Terrev: got this instead [02:30:35] Pereki: rayman did 911 [02:31:21] Pereki: jet fuel can't melt limbs that ARENT THERE

Well, it's not exactly the most visually exciting of videos. But, thanks to the awesome work Stopsecret did in his Rocket Script, Crash's helpful answering of questions, and a little search-fu, I successfully imported the Galactic Peacekeeper into Unity - apparently it doesn't have too many polygons - and can spin it around using keyboard controls! (Apologies for video quality, I'm still mastering FRAPS...) If you imagine there's a dark starry sky racing past in this first one, it gets a lot more engaging. This one has a lot more spin - and reveals a lot more issues with missing overlapping* faces. (Don't worry, it can do more than turn in a barrel roll. I had FRAPS issues, and the only video I got of it from a different angle was awkward enough that I didn't upload it.) Well, it's definitely got issues that need fixing. But as far as it goes, it also works - in its own way - which is a heck of a lot more than what I had when I started a few days ago. Not sure what the best next step would be - try to get flying a bit better, model a good test map, etc... *Thanks go to le for pointing that out.

News update: I got got a new fan and it works, so everything is in perfect working order now. Thank you all for your help!

60's batcave? 60's Batcave!

I was poking around in the Alpha Team files tonight, and found several things I wasn't expecting. CATEGORYIMAGES.TXT: 0 lego 41 group1 42 group2 43 group3 44 group4 45 group5 46 group6 35 ogel 1 global 19 trop 36 sub 37 sea 38 polar 39 mtn 40 moon Notice the last six entries there? They're the zones in the game, in the order they're played through... Except the final game only has the first four listed there. This file lists two zones that didn't make the final cut: Mountain and Moon. Seeing as the other four zones are listed in the order they're played through, I think it's safe to say that the Mountain zone would have come after the Polar (Arctic) zone, and the Moon zone would have been the final set of levels in the game. But wait, there's more. CATEGORYUNITS.TXT "Cyberia"? What the heck is that? Perhaps a leftover from LEGO Logic? There does seem to be some sort of portal in the TILT HQ, so perhaps that's what Cyberia is? And there's a listing for a "Neandert" enemy, which is just a few letters away from "Neanderthal"... Who wants to bet it's the big blue primitive looking creature from LEGO Logic? There's also sections for the scrapped Mountain and Moon zones... Which are completely empty. Also, notice that the section listing all the Alpha Team members is titled "T.I.L.T.". There's an asteroid of all things listed in the "LEGO UNITS" section, and a texture named "ASTEROID 2.TGA": At first I thought that perhaps the asteroids appear in the training... space place... But I just checked, and there are none. Perhaps they were for the Moon zone or something? Another odd thing, Dash and Radia's texture names are pretty weird. Dash's textures are LASERBODY.TGA, LASERHEAD.TGA, etc, while Radia's textures are PIPBODY.TGA, PIPHEAD.TGA, etc. All the other team members are identified by specialty rather than name, so why are Dash's textures identifying him as the lasers expert, and what the heck does PIP mean? Finally, there's a bunch of textures that appear to be for a debug GUI or something - buttons for each listing in CATEGORYIMAGES.txt, more finalized looking buttons for each zone (including the Moon zone, but not the Mountain zone, oddly), etc. There's quite a few so I won't be uploading them, if you want to see them for yourself they're in Etc.pac. I'll keep digging around and will post anything else I find.

Just got an email back from Tom Mott, the lead designer for Alpha Team, and he sent a ton of info on LEGO Logic and T.I.L.T. and all that - and he's gonna contact some other developers and see if they can dig up concept art and the like, too. It's nearly 2:00 AM right now so I'm a bit too tired to really post much, but I do want to say one thing: The neanderthals are actually "neanderthaws", and they were found in a world called Mt. Fridgy. Other worlds in LEGO Logic included Aromazona and Poodle Dreamland. This game was nuts, people.

For those who haven't seen Alpha Team's menu. Dash's face as been changed to the Awesome Face (with eyebrows). That is all.