FreeGameDev

BLOCKER / TOP PRIORITY
- Release new version
-- Cross compile windows binaries for release
-- Compile Linux binaries
-- Release on SF

HIGH PRIORITY TASKS
- Tile set implementation Delayed
- include Skorpio's latest models Done
-- Adventurer Done
-- Orc Done

MEDIUM PRIORITY TASKS
- AI improvement to allow basic gameplay for a minimalistic tower defense/rush or dota mode
- Editor improvements - Adding and deleting creatures, traps, rooms and
other props is not possible yet (only in the level file). Modifying the
map layout is not possible in editor. With these features people could
already design maps and load their own creatures and props.
- Creatures' health points don't work (and probably damage, too). They
seem to die instantly, but I'm not sure if it's not implemented yet or
if it's a bug.
- Lighting has to be improved and we have no shadows yet
- The music stutters and we need to find more music (have to search on OGA and elsewhere)
- Shaders and particles for water, fire and lava
- Sounds need to be improved.
- Options menu (graphics, audio, gameplay, etc.)
- Kobold workers should be able to claim walls

OTHER TASKS
- Assess SumWars assets for inclusion
-- models
-- music
- Assess merger with SumWars
-- Assess SumWars requirements for editor
- Assess using the Lips of Suna engine (complete rewrite in Lua)

Hello, charlie!

Thank you for the list!

I have a couple of little questions:

• I'm little confused with "include Skorpio's latest models". Models are in svn already. Are they meant to be added into the test level?
• Also I'm not quiet understand "tile set implementation" task. What should be done exactly? As I understand current implementation already has support for tiles. What features should be added?

For now I'll try to create a DEB package for Ubuntu. And later this or next week I'll try to prepare a dev. environment on Windows and create a build for it.

Heh, an artist speaking to an programmer I think what Skorpio ment when he said tile-set implementation was to get his cool model tileset actually into the game. It seems like just replacing model-files isn't sufficient or such, e.g. a programmer has to hard-code them in or so. Same goes for the orc and thrull etc. monster models he did. I hope that made more sense as I am mostly an 3D artist myself

I would say these things:

- AI improvement to allow basic gameplay for a minimalistic tower defense/rush or dota mode
- Editor improvements - Adding and deleting creatures, traps, rooms and
other props is not possible yet (only in the level file). Modifying the
map layout is not possible in editor. With these features people could
already design maps and load their own creatures and props.
- Creatures' health points don't work (and probably damage, too). They
seem to die instantly, but I'm not sure if it's not implemented yet or
if it's a bug.

Are much more important tasks than the graphical enhancements you mentioned as "High priority". Though adding the orc and adventurer should be as simple as editing the level file. Adding the tile set shouldn't be too complicated either, but I don't know for sure.

Also, there is an annoying bug in the latest git versions that make the game crash when moving "outside" the map, somewhere in the culling stuff paul424 was doing.

The code is a bit of a cluster**** right now though, if I were to get better suddenly I would either look at potential other engines, or do some major cleanup after clearing the most pressing issues. I don't really feel that I can order people too much around when I am not able to work on it myself though. Also, I would urge you to attempt start using unit tests if you are not already, as that should be helpful in reducing issues in the engine.

I've already included the new creatures in my test.level file, since that's really easy, and I had to test them anyway. The file just needs to be cleaned up and uploaded.

Regarding the implemenation of the new tile set, this should be delayed, because we should check out first if this solution is more appropriate: viewtopic.php?f=38&t=3913
Or alternatively a switch to the Lips of Suna engine.

Oln, can you tell me which animations in this list are already supported? http://opendungeons.sourceforge.net/w/i ... animations
More animations would be another low priority task.
I'll also add wall claiming for the kobold workers and an options menu to the list.

oln {l Wrote}:I would say [these] Are much more important tasks than the graphical enhancements you mentioned as "High priority".

You miss the point. Priority is not just about importance, but what can be done quickest too.

The intention was to list some low hanging fruit first. AI coding? That requires somebody really to know what they are doing, to understand the inner workings of OD. It is not something a new contributor can pick up easily.

Let's be honest, there is nothing complicated in AI of OD creatures : we have a variable X of normal distribution on some interval say I = [0,1] , than we have some partition of that I , each of subpartition ( or how it;s called ) having action assigned , and according to the actual value of X we can pick an appropriate action . ( Well there are some corrections for example the non-Drone units cannot do the action Dig, but that's how it works in the big picture.

paul424 {l Wrote}:Let's be honest, there is nothing complicated in AI of OD creatures : we have a variable X of normal distribution on some interval say I = [0,1] , than we have some partition of that I , each of subpartition ( or how it;s called ) having action assigned , and according to the actual value of X we can pick an appropriate action . ( Well there are some corrections for example the non-Drone units cannot do the action Dig, but that's how it works in the big picture.

No it's not.
OD creature AI works on an in/out task list with weighted actions based on factors like LoS, distance, requirement, priority etc. (Unless I missed a rejig while I was absent)

Creature AI will only ever grow more complex, especially when we start wanting to have "competitive" human vs AI skirmishes

This makes me want to ask this, when will be possible for you guys to properly code the creatures behavior? it will be great if you could achieve something like what Flipflop has already achieved in agentkeeper.
But i guess there are still too many areas to focus on developing rather than this one.

Danimal {l Wrote}:This makes me want to ask this, when will be possible for you guys to properly code the creatures behavior? it will be great if you could achieve something like what Flipflop has already achieved in agentkeeper.
But i guess there are still too many areas to focus on developing rather than this one.

Unfortunately I'd have to agree. The creatures will currently perform basic tasks, but having a decent AI for them will take time and isn't currently a showstopper for the project.

Hi guys,

My turn to add on the TODO list while on this:

The OD Windows binaries and installer are, rough edges apart, done. Once I'll be able to sync my work with Paul agreement, I'll create an installer
and we'll be able to move on with this. See: viewtopic.php?p=54236#p54236

Now, there are two/three things I'd like us all to work on, with approval of everyone, of course:
- Fix the tileset display in the Win32 binary. I must have done something wrong.
I asked Paul to review this patch, which might be the cause of the problem: viewtopic.php?p=54237#p54237

- Fix the new tileset handling in the simplest way possible so users don't have to add postfixes, even if it means doing compromise about features.
(Please, no engine or technology switch. :3)

- Fix the white creatures display. Is it an artistic problem, or a dev one?
There is a script here that can convert cg scripts into glsl, would that suffice?
https://github.com/libretro/RetroArch/wiki/GLSL-shaders

Best regards,

- Fix the tileset display in the Win32 binary. I must have done something wrong.
I asked Paul to review this patch, which might be the cause of the problem: viewtopic.php?p=54237#p54237

--> Fixed with the help of paul424's models/ files.

- Fix the new tileset handling in the simplest way possible so users don't have to add postfixes, even if it means doing compromise about features.
(Please, no engine or technology switch. :3)

--> I fixed this on my own by adding the models files in this commit to my own repo:
https://github.com/Bertram25/OpenDungeo ... 5c848d0bb9

- Fix the white creatures display. Is it an artistic problem, or a dev one?

--> Since I'm a complete noob about those things, can someone hint me how I can open/save the cg scripts to be replaced?
Thanks!

Found other little problems that might be already known:
- Quitting the game using the Quit Button makes it crash. I believe it is known but IMHO we should take care of this one early as it might be a symptom of something worse.
(Note that quitting using the window red cross is quitting fine. (?)).

- Pushing "New Game", pushing Esc, and pushing "New game" again makes the game crash because it is reloading the same resources according to Ogre. Might be the same with the editor button.

- Pushing "New Game", pushing Esc, and Esc again, makes the player go back to the game he left as if it was running in background or left untouched in memory. Is that a desired thing?

- Can someone give the current level format? And how to load/save levels in the editor? (I guess we'll need a dedicated wiki page for those two things.)

For later on, I wondered about those things:
- Would you consider adding a "Custom game" button permitting to select a level among a selection (even if only one level is existing atm)?
This would be a good start point to permit players and debugger to try and test different test cases/scenario, IMHO.

Thus, can someone give me the necessary info needed to load a level? (or is a simple level filename enough for the game to be able to load it?)

Thanks in advance for all those info.

- Pushing "New Game", pushing Esc, and pushing "New game" again makes the game crash because it is reloading the same resources according to Ogre. Might be the same with the editor button.

- Pushing "New Game", pushing Esc, and Esc again, makes the player go back to the game he left as if it was running in background or left untouched in memory. Is that a desired thing?

I tell you most of the recent bugs come from porting CEGUI to 0 8 3 which is not complete , but I left it in favour of doing something more entertaining , everyone could fix it ...
If you would put your foot a little longer with OD I could guide you a little , especially if you have time to hang on IRC ...

Hi paul424,

I tell you most of the recent bugs come from porting CEGUI to 0 8 3 which is not complete

I'm just pointing bugs out just so we can discuss about them, right?

but I left it in favour of doing something more entertaining

Cool, what are you working on, atm?
As for me, my current TODO list is:
- Check whether it's feasible to make OD work with XP using msvc 2012, along with the current SDK used.
- Create a standalone OD SDK + a How-to.
- Create an installer once the team is considering the engine state releasable. Just tell me.

everyone could fix it ...

Unfortunately, for now, it seems you are the only one capable to do it, plus, it would make the next release more appealing to users.
The fact that the rotation/tilting seems to be broken as well is in the same trend, to me.
I'm still a noob when it comes in understanding OD core mechanisms, so I fear I wouldn't be able to fix this that soon.

If you would put your foot a little longer with OD I could guide you a little , especially if you have time to hang on IRC ...

Well, I'm from the project next to yours, so I'll stay around.
But I'd rather have a guiding notes here on the forums or in the wiki, so I can check them whatever the time of the day it is, for you or for me.

Btw, I checked the .level file(s) and their format seems rather simple in fact, which is a good thing.
I still think there is no way to save/load from the editor, though. The ability to save the default level would already be a good thing, IMHO,
so that we can rename the level files after editing to create new levels.

Ah, and can you tell me why there is a levels/ and a levels_git/ folder? Can we get rid of one of them?

Best regards,

@Paul424:

Returning on old subjects:

- The engine is using the levels_git/ folder to load the map.
Can you tell me whether I can get rid of the this folder and have only 'levels/'?
This would be less confusing.

- I've looked at all the branches in git else than development.
And from what I've seen, the 'development' branch is the most up to date one,
and nothing seems left behind in the other branches.
Could we thus delete the obsolete branches? And move the 'development' one to 'master'?
This would make much sense for potential new devs.

Best regards,

Yes remove the level dir ,

As for the branches .. .well I was new as well and noticing that I have to jump to proper branch was easiest of all things to grasp ...
I can delete them , but do you promise to re-write the features which are lost there , if we would need than in the future ?

Hi,

Ok, I'll do that change about the levels/ folder whenever I get the time to. Note that again, having the media data in the same repository would make
things much easier.

As for the branches .. .well I was new as well and noticing that I have to jump to proper branch was easiest of all things to grasp ...
I can delete them , but do you promise to re-write the features which are lost there , if we would need than in the future ?

Well, this is putting us to my first questions:
Can you tell me which features have been developped in each branch and their overall states of maturity? And why you weren't using master, just out of curiosity?

Best regards,

Hi everyone

Here is what has been done so far lately:
- New Main menu GUI with cool buttons.
- Main menu buttons stays on screen center, the logo doesn't get stretched anymore.
- The green text isn't shown anymore while playing and can be toggled with F11. Before that, It tells the player the game is still loading.
- You don't have to hold CTRL to zoom/unzoom when using the mouse wheel.
- Not visible, but: The code when using gcc doesn't trigger any warnings anymore, except for one, which is linked to a dependency.
- The camera height bounds are saner.

So far, the game is playable for I was able to beat to the red ones (you play as green)!

The "Bug" about the creatures being killed instantly isn't a bug but happens when you put lvl 1 creatures in front of big ones.
Try to wait a bit for them to train, and build wider training ground, and bed grounds

The code is being reviewed by myself to follow the code convention, initialize every class members, ...
Paul is digging deep into a XML parser for the next map format...

We're both begging now for someone to fix most creatures and building textures.
If someone could have a look at the mesh sources and help us how to fix it, it would be great!!

If the textures could be fixed, I do think the next release could be considered close to be ready!!

Best regards,

Hi again,

I'm posting here to try and grab people's opinion about the following short-term roadmap for the game :
- Fix the camera movement about rotation to the left and the right (looking down or up could be done as well.)
I'd like to make the (US-Keyboard relative) Q and E key used to rotate. You guys ok with that?

- Add support to save the current game map in the current format.
--> Paul is digging deep on the next format atm, but in between, it would be soooo cool if one could bring new levels.
I do think adding save support through a console command should be relatively easy to do.
Plus, a rather easily other command could be made afterward to save in the new format. ok with this?

Speaking of which, charlie told there is no support to put creatures in the level editor. I'd like to add support to that
using a very naive but straightforward way: Put a creature on the level (if possible) when you push a number key on the keyboard (1-9).
I didn't test it, but I do think it's already possible to remove a creature from the map in the map editor, but if not, I'd like to remove them using RMB.
What do you think about it?

Note that I'm working mainly on another project also, and that I do make things on OD for refreshment only, so any help on this is welcome, of course!

Best regards,

> charlie told

If you mean me, then you are mistaken. I have no knowledge of ODs capabilities.

@charlie: See first post of this topic:

- Editor improvements - Adding and deleting creatures, traps, rooms and
other props is not possible yet (only in the level file). Modifying the
map layout is not possible in editor. With these features people could
already design maps and load their own creatures and props.

Q and E for rotate are OK; the improvements on map editor would be good, i could try to make a map or two, but rigth now its very difficult without deep knowledge, i will wait for that (or someone puts up a tutorial "OD mapmaking for dummies").

Also, i tried to contact Skorpio a few days ago, sadly no answer yet. Ill help you if its within my capabilities, whats exactly the reason of the white dudes?

Hi Danimal,

Thanks for your answers.

Q and E for rotate are OK; the improvements on map editor would be good, i could try to make a map or two, but rigth now its very difficult without deep knowledge, i will wait for that (or someone puts up a tutorial "OD mapmaking for dummies").

As for rotating and other things, I'll start digging once the code is a bit more readable. (cleaning it is helping me knowing it, btw. :]) So give a week or two. (The cleaning work is rather easy but as for everything: it takes time.)
If you're willing to create maps, I'll focus on adding/removing entities, and save maps first, then.

Also, i tried to contact Skorpio a few days ago, sadly no answer yet. Ill help you if its within my capabilities, whats exactly the reason of the white dudes?

According to Paul (from main website news), it's because of obsolete shader scripts, Nvidia CG mostly:

website {l Wrote}:1) The Tiles corruption( empty holes in the walls :\ ) — comes from the wrong Scorpio description from his Tile set ( the postfix, like ‘00011001’, codes the expected neighborhood )
2) Creatures’ material ( >>Actors<< as I call them ) corruption ( the white paint on their bodies :\ ) — comes from the obsolate shader’s language version they are coded in ( mostly Nvidia’s CG script ) .

If someone could tell me the right way to open a model source file and locate those scripts, I could try to translate them and/or ask someone to do it. But then, someone should also tell me how to re-export the models correctly. My turn to ask for a tutorial for dummies.

Also, maybe Skorpio could help us about how to fix those "empty holes in the walls."? Or at least tell us where the problem is?

While we're on the subject, were there other tiles, objects, creatures, or any models left that needed to be imported/fixed?

Best regards,

Sorry... i have no idea of how to fix that, we need Skorpio input at least for some pointers. As for new models Skorpio had some on the oven like the blood-fly and lizardman; but that depends on him as well.

Hey guys, I'm still working only on my own projects and am not up-to-date with OD. Regarding the materials, I changed them all, when oln introduced normal mapping, to this format:

{l Code}: {l Select All Code}

import base_material from "general.material"
material Troll2 : base_material
{
    set_texture_alias diffuseMap Troll2_col3.png
    set_texture_alias specMap Troll2_spec2.png
    set_texture_alias normalMap Troll2_nor3.png
}

This also worked for the models without normal maps.

The old, default material scripts looked like that (if anyone wants to change them back):

{l Code}: {l Select All Code}

material Knight
{
   receive_shadows on
   technique
   {
      pass
      {
         ambient 0.00000 0.00000 0.00000 1.000000
         diffuse 0.708792 0.708792 0.708792 1.000000
         specular 0.024482 0.035958 0.044421 1.000000 12.500000
         emissive 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 1.000000
         texture_unit
         {
            texture Knight.png
            tex_address_mode wrap
            filtering trilinear
            colour_op alpha_blend
         }
      }
   }
}

Danimal {l Wrote}:As for new models Skorpio had some on the oven like the blood-fly and lizardman; but that depends on him as well.

The lizardman has already been in the repository for a long time. The "cave hornet" is almost done, but the animations still need some work and I don't know how or if transparency works with the normal map material scripts.