Topic: D2 Workshop development

[Scyphi]

I'm guessing those specs are very flawed/incomplete, then.

[SaladBadger]

It's pretty much that. Honestly, I don't understand how tool development happened back then. Anyone implementing a reader for any format based on Descent2.com's specs was bound to run into some trouble. What didn't help either is that source releases were rare back then, so until the Descent source code was released (Jan 12th, 1998 -- three years after release which is pretty impressive actually, however, most Descent II specific tools were developed before the release of D2's source or any source entirely actually), you had to rely on these people and their documentation of the specs. And yet, somehow proper tools did get written. I'm wondering if Parallax put out their own specs at any point, but I can't find anything that hints at this.

[SaladBadger]

Been a bit since my last update here, but rest assured progress is still being made. The only big problem so far is the modeling stuff, though, and I am still not certain how everything will work, but I hope to make it all work out in the end.

[CrazyEnzo03]

You probably already know this but Blaggert-I-Mean-Blarget wants you to hurry up because Blaggert-I-Mean-Blarget is impatient.

Meanwhile I bask in the glory of discovering how to get around what GXEdit supposedly does to the player ship in multiplayer.

[SaladBadger]

Ah, where have I been? Why have I not done any work on this?

Blame college for my absence. And some minor lifestyle changes. I just haven't had the time or motivation for these things lately, sadly. Been busy trying to get good grades in classes, and improving my artistic abilities in particular. I haven't written any code in a while, and honestly after thinking about it I really don't want to write code for Descent .HAM tools as it exists as-is. (I'm sorry for this, but I'm picky)

I'm starting to come to the conclusion that binary files like what Descent uses for storing object info are horrible and really need to be avoided at all costs. A project I want to take up sometime in the future is a modification of DXX-Rebirth which completely kills off the .PIG files (aside from storing graphics and models) and make it revive the old BITMAPS.TBL file, where you can define your new robots and whatnot using text. Modifications will be able to load new files in addition to the main one (rather than having to specify a completely new .HAM file), and there's the possibility of an "extended spec" where you can have new features like D1 bosses in D2 without interfering with any current mission sets.

The work for something like this would be halfway done if I was to take it up, honestly. This is because the Bitmaps.tbl parser is still in DXX-Rebirth and it still works at least somewhat to the best of my knowledge, but it would still take a fair amount of work to get running, including the creation of a new spec for adding new elements and whatnot. A "decompiler" would also be required, to pull apart the current .HAM files to spit out text scripts that could be used to run the game. In the end though, the result is a fully extensible spec -- I could add new properties at will without having to jump through hoops to expose them to modders. This is just a dream though, and I just don't have the motivation right now to do such a major coding project. I'm really lost in the drive to extend my abilities of putting marks onto a canvas of some sort.