Descent 1 1/2

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon May 21, 2018 4:23 am

Ok then, I'll fix it later today.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Sun Jun 17, 2018 12:23 am

Took the liberty of putting gear and gears into Ceres.
The updated 5-level demo

It comes at the end of the original 4 levels. All 5 levels have been modified to support full 4/8 multiplayer (I did avoid structure changes, though IMO level 4 could use a post-Parallax D2 mechanic to better facilitate anarchy).

Don't panic about extreme difficulty - if anything, I made the level a bit too easy, but hey, we're 1/11 through the mission.

I do believe that the level 3 RL2 is somewhat corrupt however (both the original demo and my version). When I try coop in Rebirth, the joinee gets an error saying that object 0 is an invalid control center and every subsequent playthrough reports a version mismatch even though the mission was directly copied from one missions folder to the other.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Jun 18, 2018 1:22 pm

LightWolf wrote: ↑Sun Jun 17, 2018 12:23 am Took the liberty of putting gear and gears into Ceres.
The updated 5-level demo

I'd have done it myself you know... But thank you, I guess? The power-up placement is not that bad. I had started putting those in on my hard drive anyway, though - and obviously some of my choices were different than yours. Most importantly - no quads until after this boss - spreadfire and homers are all you'll have against this mofukre. And the difficulty is ridiculous here - you're spamming missile hulks like there was no tomorrow, even throwing in two super hulks in a place where you actually won't be able to snipe them from a distance (even though it at first looks like you might be able to), because lasers knock them around too much. This would have been feasible only if you had plasma, which you don't. Also yeah, there's no way those plasma drillers are appearing this early. Overall you really should have consulted me, because the liberties you took were, well... way too liberal.

It comes at the end of the original 4 levels. All 5 levels have been modified to support full 4/8 multiplayer (I did avoid structure changes, though IMO level 4 could use a post-Parallax D2 mechanic to better facilitate anarchy).

First off, optimization of the levels for multiplayer so basically making 8 starting positions) was something that would have been done in due time anyway. We have a checklist here, we haven't forgotten about it. First phase is clearly getting all the geometry, other things come next. It's been repeatedly said on these boards. Also, why would you add something post-parallax to a single player level just so it's better for anarchy? No one would play anarchy in that level anyway, it's not made for that. There are levels people play consistently in multiplayer, and early missions from single-player focused campaigns don't fit the bill. That's like trying to force a sprinter to run a marathon.. or something.

Don't panic about extreme difficulty - if anything, I made the level a bit too easy, but hey, we're 1/11 through the mission.

Yeah, it's way too hard. Just leave the population to Alter-Fox and me, would ya?

I do believe that the level 3 RL2 is somewhat corrupt however (both the original demo and my version). When I try coop in Rebirth, the joinee gets an error saying that object 0 is an invalid control center and every subsequent playthrough reports a version mismatch even though the mission was directly copied from one missions folder to the other.

We might look into this in the future, I was sure diagnostics would filter any such errors. Oh well, not high on the priority list anyway

Sirius · Post by **Sirius** » Mon Jun 18, 2018 9:07 pm

I've seen people play anarchy games in single-player levels. They're usually people who don't really play anarchy games.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Wed Aug 08, 2018 9:34 am

I made some updates to the ogg track listing on Google Drive after I received a couple of new songs and mixes from Pumo for the DCA2 album which opened up a new avenue... I'm not putting any level tracks up on there that are also going to be on the album until the album is out, just adjusting the ones that aren't from the album to match my own list. Replaced the "Frosted Minerals Abyss" track with something new that I think will work better and be more memorable. I'm also planning to revisit one of the songs (Red Moons Rising) that is on there, since I am playing some guitar myself now I think I could make those parts sound a little better than they do -- and being likely the final boss track it needs to sound as good as it can.

I don't know when or if I'm going to have a chance to start on level 39 -- if somebody else wants to take it in the meantime that's fine with me. I don't particularly enjoy doing bosses and I don't really think my stealth idea would have been fun.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Wed Aug 08, 2018 10:33 am

I actually had an idea for that level. Currently working on attaching the main room to the main feature...

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Aug 09, 2018 1:48 pm

LightWolf wrote: ↑Wed Aug 08, 2018 10:33 am I actually had an idea for that level. Currently working on attaching the main room to the main feature...

You're not even keeping up any pretenses of caring about permissions or requests from us, now are you

I know people have been playing Overload, and I was actually about to ask if there has been some progress on the levels in progress! (not you LW)

Sirius · Post by **Sirius** » Thu Aug 09, 2018 5:31 pm

Not recently. Been juggling Overload stuff, trying to set up CMake to build Descent 2 in VS 2017, and working with Naphtha to finish up the Plutonian Shores story. Come September a good chunk of that should be done though.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Aug 09, 2018 11:52 pm

Sirius wrote: ↑Thu Aug 09, 2018 5:31 pm Not recently. Been juggling Overload stuff, trying to set up CMake to build Descent 2 in VS 2017, and working with Naphtha to finish up the Plutonian Shores story. Come September a good chunk of that should be done though.

Plutonian Shores is going to be a great release, can't wait! Once it's released Naphtha will be freed up again too, which is a great thing as well

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Fri Aug 31, 2018 11:55 am

Now that dca2 is coming to a close and I have a good deal of what I need for this mission's faux-redbook ost I had a few thoughts on that and the midi soundtrack.

First of all, if I remember correctly D1's endgame debriefing track isn't used anywhere in the mission... There might be a way to get it to play when the player quits out of or finishes the game if we're interested.

Second thing is since the ogg soundtrack will have songs from musicians all over this community it would be n8ce to get them into the mission credits somehow.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Fri Aug 31, 2018 5:55 pm

On the topic of credits, I was thinking (since there are so many people involved) that rather than the newer "Here's all 60 levels/28 tracks/whatever and their individual authors", we should use a traditional "The level designers are X, Y, and Z; the musicians are A, B, and C; the whateverers are Q, W, and E".

Think the original credits vs. Obsidian credits.

Also should have a song coming momentarily.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Fri Aug 31, 2018 9:53 pm

I don't think long credits would be too much of a problem, it is a long mission. And it's a better catharsis for those who did put long, valuable hours of their time into it. We'll deserve a little bit of accolade when this is done, don't you think?
It's not like they can't be skipped.
And we could try to spice them up with something entertaining.

Sirius · Post by **Sirius** » Sun Sep 02, 2018 2:38 pm

I think one of the reasons we did that with Obsidian is we needed the credits to be a certain length to let the music play through. We weren't trying to start a trend.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 9:02 am

Yeah, I think the author of every level should be credited. I could live with crediting secondary and tertiary mapping in a single clump though, otherwise it may indeed get a bit long-ish. We'll see though, it's way to early to be thinking about that now

Yeah, the composers will definitely be credited, because why wouldn't they be?

As for the Descent debriefing track - did I really miss that one? Wow, I had no idea. It could indeed be used for some level. If I recall correctly it's a rather tension-building track.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 9:25 am

Could be used for a level, but it would make a really good "mission complete" song because, well, that's what it is.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 9:35 am

We also need to remember the briefing and credits. D1 briefing works quite well for the briefing, but both credits songs look like they'd fit in a level somewhere.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 3:02 pm

LightWolf wrote: ↑Mon Sep 03, 2018 9:35 am We also need to remember the briefing and credits. D1 briefing works quite well for the briefing, but both credits songs look like they'd fit in a level somewhere.

The D1 briefing song will be used for the briefings, while the D2 song will be used in a level.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 3:15 pm

But what about the credits?

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 3:30 pm

One of the credits songs, obviously! Not sure which yet, prolly D1's as well, as D2's song is too nice to not use in a level.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Sep 03, 2018 5:43 pm

Yeah D2's credits song is one of those short but sweet tracks.
Should probably go into a smaller vertigo map like Reactor Ohm or Zandura II.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Tue Sep 04, 2018 8:41 am

Alter-Fox wrote: ↑Mon Sep 03, 2018 5:43 pm Yeah D2's credits song is one of those short but sweet tracks.
Should probably go into a smaller vertigo map like Reactor Ohm or Zandura II.

I think I thought of using it for some Ice level. In fact, it would be a great fit for Counterstrike's actual level "Galacia Caverns" IMO, so I'd fancy it being in something similar in this mission.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Sat Sep 08, 2018 7:52 pm

Dynamo maybe?

Then again, I was kind of thinking D1 13 for that level.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Sun Sep 09, 2018 10:45 pm

Ok, I tried to find that post where I listed out all the MIDI assets in the game, but I couldn't really find it, so I'll type it out again, because why not

There are 60 levels, 6 of which are secret and will therefore just play the first six tracks from the regular level (wish there's something we could do about it) - we also need one briefing track, one intermission/ending track and one credits track. This makes 54 + 3 = 57 separate track instances we need. Remove the briefing song and the endgame song and we're left with a pool of 31 songs to use for the 54 levels, necessitating some repetition.

Descent 1 supplies 22 level tracks (one of which is a remix), 1 title screen track, 1 briefing track, 1 debriefing and 1 credits track.
Descent 2 supplies 4 level tracks, 1 title screen track, 1 briefing track and 1 credits track.

That gives us 33 different midis we can use in whatever capacity we want. Of course I wouldn't put a track that'll be heard in every briefing in one of the levels, so the Descent 2 briefing song will be used for a level. Likewise, one of the credits songs (the one we don't use) can be used as a level track. To be fair though, we can probably use both the credits tracks, since it's not like they'll be heard more than twice throughout the entire experience, and you can't say the same for the briefing track, which needs to be exlusive to the briefings, obviously.

Is there really no way to give D2's secret levels particular choices of music, or did Parallax just neglect to do it for the game?

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 8:53 am

There really is no way outside of XL.

Lightwolf, with a name like Dynamo and the design to go along with it I kinda thought you'd want something more intense for that map. I had been thinking of D1 level 11 for it, myself, it would be interesting to hear that one outside of a lava-themed map.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 7:02 pm

Also just wanted to point out that secret level tracks start from level 2 and not level 1. On a related note, the secret levels should also be kept in mind when choosing tracks for levels 2-7.

I don't see something like D1L11 working in Dynamo. Maybe that faster-paced song from D2 (either level 2 or 3, can't remember which)?

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Tue Sep 11, 2018 3:36 am

Dynamo reminds me of D1L4, 5 and 23 if anything. Maybe a little bit of S1.

It would be very hard to account for the secret levels, as the first levels of the game need to have fitting tracks, while the secret levels could use something like D2 Briefing or something. I'd really love for Shroudeye's secret level to have some unsettling track in it, but guess classic and iconic early D1 levels aren't something you can ever go wrong with.

The problem is that people are wired to associate D1's songs with those levels in particular, and therefore are going to judge whether a song fits these new levels or not by how similar they are to the original levels

so we're kinda trapped here in this regard.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Tue Sep 11, 2018 7:30 pm

You could say that's why we have the option of a different soundtrack for those close-minded people.

I'm personally all for finding new associations for each of the D1 songs and figuring out new ways for them to work.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Sep 13, 2018 3:21 am

Alter-Fox wrote: ↑Tue Sep 11, 2018 7:30 pm You could say that's why we have the option of a different soundtrack for those close-minded people.
I'm personally all for finding new associations for each of the D1 songs and figuring out new ways for them to work.

I'm on board with that!

BTW, I really feel like I should stop slacking off and populate the Ceres level finally. That way we could test the first 5-level demo wholesale and make necessary adjustments. I might make that my priority over the next few days. Playing Descent 2 has been hard (got level 21 to do - failing miserably thus far), so I might as well channel my Descent cravings in a different way

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Thu Sep 13, 2018 9:06 am

Sounds good to me. I won't be as busy at work over the next few weeks as I've been lately, either, so I'll be free-ish for some critique and adjustment.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Tue Sep 18, 2018 10:53 am

Ok, I've done part of it, but there's still work to be done, maybe I'll get a moment tomorrow. It's tempting to put only green robots in this level, but this would horribly stifle the diversity as if you don't count green platformers, hornets and other super strong ones, you're left with only like 3 types of green robots

Guess I'll have to supplement with some neutrally-colored (brown) ones too.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Sat Sep 29, 2018 6:23 pm

How's the demo coming?

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Sun Sep 30, 2018 3:34 pm

I've found focusing on populating the level quite hard to do as of late, this weekend too. I keep in mind that this has to be done soonish, though

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Oct 11, 2018 2:00 am

Made signigicant progress in populating the level. I also imported it to the main HOG. Sorry about being so lazy with this, but the updated HOG should be up in a few days, I suppose.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 12:17 pm

I've been rejiggering the OST a bit now that DCA ][ is all but complete. Uploading a few new songs to the google drive folder, and I'll have a whole bunch more to upload after the album actually releases.
I also finally managed to dig up Texace's super-extended mix of Ratzez.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 5:53 pm

Sort of as a challenge a while back when I figured out Zeta Aquilae's texturing formula (the real reason behind Coolyard's complete palette switch), I tried to create a texture scheme that captured the ZA spirit while not using one of the two themes the original system presented. The result was a green-and-orange palette, though it admittedly requires some effort to make it truly look full-on ZA.

One of the better attempts looks something like this. (You may see this as part of a level in the very, very far future

)

A few minutes ago, I noticed that two ZA levels have been submitted, each using one of the original themes in CS. That leaves one level (ZA Military Hub) . I was wondering if that texture theme is suitable enough for me to do the last ZA level.

And yes, I did just remember to ask permission.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Oct 18, 2018 2:18 pm

This level looks more like a hybrid ZA and Quartzon level. The all-water tunnels are kinda ugly and the greens don't look very good. Overall the texturing is ok I guess, but not that remarkable. Since you already have one ZA level (and a bigger one than this), I'd rather give someone else a chance with the last one in this system.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Fri Oct 19, 2018 6:42 pm

I wasn't submitting the particular level... Just the texture scheme...
Either way, any advice on how to make the scheme fit better into ZA, if only for personal ventures?

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Sat Oct 20, 2018 7:28 am

Check out Maximum and go off the texture schemes you find there, combined with those from Counterstrike. That should give you a good feel for what feels appropriately ZA.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Wed Oct 31, 2018 11:58 am

Now that DCA2 is out there I'm adding a bunch more music tracks to the soundtrack folder on the GooDrive... mostly for Xfing's, Naptha's, Superbobby's, homeyduh's and my own levels. Take a look if you wanna judge their fittingness.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Sat Nov 03, 2018 12:37 pm

I'll leave that entirely up to you to figure out the placement of the hi-fi songs. I've already got enough trouble deciding which midis go where, to be honest

Also, sorry for being lazy with the demo. I've been needing to wake up quite early every day for a while now, which makes me utterly uncreative in the evenings and afternoons :< I'll definitely get this thing finished sometime, just not sure when I'll get around to it.