In my earlier post,I had mentioned that I would be able to get the level I submitted for the contest tweaked and ready by the weekend. Well, that didn't happen. In spite of the long list of ideas I had on Friday, the weekend for the most part was a complete bust. I had to work on a production-critical demand issue and after spending almost an entire day on it, I was drained. I did open the toolset but I couldn't even get myself to write a simple trigger script - completely blanked out! Towards the of the weekend, I finally wrung out some energy to fix some of the glaring omissions in the level - floating buildings. I also went through the level in-game, both in tactical camera mode and third-person view to find anything else that was amiss and I recalled Mike's comments about the carts balancing on wheels and went about fixing those.

Where are those invisible oxen?!

I did manage to have a long conversation with Daeltaja on Sunday evening and have a list of things I need to complete for Craggy Island - minor scripting stuff for the most part. The one important thing I'm overdue on is getting a play-through done so I can get a feel for the current state of things. I plan to get that done with today so I can finish the work required from my side - after all, I volunteered for this so I definitely don't want to be the one holding things up!

On the Shadow Magic front, two of my first round games were won successfully and the last one is in progress. I want to win this too so I can be assured of a second round slot - with the modified swiss sytem we are using, two wins might not cut it if the opponents don't get many points. I would probably need to spend some time preparing for the second round once the map is announced and that will likely happen toward end of this month.

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One of the good things with the level building contest was getting feedback from the judges. Mike and Semper have given some valuable feedback, including a tip about ambient animations that will go a long way toward polishing my level-building skills. So, that's what I've started doing now - fixing up the contest entry to remove some of the obvious mistakes - there were two floating buildings a small distance off the ground that I am really ashamed of as I went through the level specifically looking for that! I will also start addressing some of the things I wrote down in my earlier post and hopefully, get the level finished this weekend.

In the meantime, I've started dabbling in 3ds max when I get time so I can do some basic stuff. One of the first things I wanted to do was to get the fence prop with a relatively straighter upper post so it would look better when placed in a chain. I was able to do it though the end result wasn't that good - I just pulled all the vertices up and exported it, which I guess is not the way to do it :)

There is also a scripting contest coming up and I've already got ideas for 3 possible mini-games. All of those would fit in nicely with BaL though the 2 mini-games/puzzles I had planned for BaL won't be entered in the contest - I need to keep some original stuff for my module as well! I also have a cool idea for the setup for one of the games that would involve some new models but after going through some video tutorials yesterday night on 3ds max, I think it should be pretty simple (the available options to create models are staggering!)

Now that the contest is over, I'm also spending more time working on Craggy Island to get the scripts written as and when Daeltaja finishes writing a particular sequence and so far, there haven't been any real hurdles there. I might have to write a custom placeable script to strip out some of the features in placeable_core but again, the core functionality isn't being changed so that should be relatively simple.

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I know...you think it's not really that big of a deal since a lot of people managed to submit some exceptional work for the contest. For me, however, the contest set a couple of important milestones with respect to level building.

A bird's eye view of Evermist

1. This is the biggest level I've created till date. To be honest, this dwarfs the other 3 exterior levels I created. The size of this level is 224 x 288 and the playable area is 160 x 224 (or 5 x 7 using the default chunk size)
2. This is also the quickest I've created any exterior level - it took a little over 10 days to complete this monster (well, it's still got a few tweaks that have to go into it but it is playable right now!)

Again, the above might not seem like major things but keeping in mind that every exterior level I have right now requires additional work (floating trees, night version to be created, more props), it was a very good effort, even if I do say so myself. The contest provided an end date to the work that I really didn't have before - I could create the other resources required for BaL and still be working on the module. Not so here.

Evermist - a view from the Chantry balcony

As I said above, there are still a few tweaks that have to go into the level -

• I need to put in more fencing around a couple of raised up areas
• More props need to be added to the houses
• Some texture rework is required (I was not even sure whether I had utilized one particular texture in more than one area and some areas are still a little bland)
• I need to cut down on the grass in the fields  - I think I have nearly 2000 trees in the level and about a quarter of them have High draw distance. Not a good one for lower-end machines
• Some custom props have to be designed to replace tons of replicated props
• Put in the mist that gives the village it's name :)

Given how I've handled these things before, they'll likely be pushed out till I get the level building bug again - and I'm praying it's not for some time yet. I literally haven't done anything else except level building over the past 10 days and man, do I need a break from that!!

To give you an idea, I was building the final toolset export today morning and I hit an error with the SpeedTree capture for a particular tree (condsn_a, I think). So, I deleted the files in the trees folder, did a post trees alone and it was successful. Just to make sure, I load the area layout in a test area and damn, all the trees except the 'wall' trees were missing their leaves!! I was in panic mode! I did a full post again, same error with the same tree, removed the textures from the SpeedTree temporary folder and another full post, which was finally successful. I go back in and same issue!!
Thankfully, I noticed that the trees closer to the camera were fading in and out as I went near...and then realized Fade Cutaway was selected!!!

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I've been really busy with the Settlement Level contest and pretty much devoting all my time to it. One good thing is, as I'm molding the terrain and putting in props, ideas keep coming up. Not all of these are game-play related ideas though. Many are logical ones - lot of fields and a bakery in the market, maybe add a windmill to grind grain into flour? or a prominent fish-selling meat market gave the idea for a stream through the village, etc.
Also, lots of ambient conversations just write themselves in my head when I am doing prop work. I must admit, most are just explanations for why things are in a particular way but I think even these complete the area as a whole.

Anyway, enough rambling...here is a screenie for your consumption and I'm off to spend more time with the level editor - need to finish prop placement, texturing, more fields/orchard planting, vistas and getting the water to look right.

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Yep, in plural!

I had been toying with the idea of submitting the Leeward level to the Community Contest. However, it is not *technically* a finished level since the village is not complete. The incomplete areas are not accessible in Blood and Lyrium but that wouldn't be enough reason to make that entry a valid one according to the contest rules.
I had started design work on the next big area in BaL, a village called Evermist. This would be a crucial area in BaL so I had spent some considerable time to make sure that all I needed could be presented properly.

Design on Paper

Given that I had the design work complete around middle of last week, I decided to take the plunge to try and finish it before the contest deadline. It is a fairly large level (192 x 288) and I've decided to use a lot of elevations and custom-built houses which makes it even more time-consuming.
At this point, the initial prototyping is done and it is looking pretty good - by my own low standards :)
The contest deadline is just 6 days away so I will be slaving away at it whenever I get some free time. I would love to hear any suggestions or feedback on the posted images either here or at DANexus or in my project feedback thread so feel free to share your thoughts on the level.

The view from the Chantry

The other contest, rather competition, that I am participating in is the Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic PBEM 1vs1 Tourney. Historically, though I've been a Singles Champion, I've never been able to see a 1vs1 competition through to the end. These tourneys typically go on for about 5-6 months and in both competitions held in the past, I've been forced to forfeit due to RL delays. Hopefully, this time, I can play till the end.
Of course, I haven't had much practice since I haven't been playing PBEM for nearly 9 months now but as luck would have it, my first round is relatively easy and I hope to go through to the final 16 without any major hiccups. Here's hoping!
Being on the forum staff, I'll also be helping out with the organization (setting up threads, resolving any disputes, etc) a bit so that is going to cut into the time I can spend on DA.

Too many things going on!
Till later...

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I finished the area (Leeward) I was working on for Blood and Lyrium a couple of days back - finished as in, the required NPCs for the various quests are in place and their dialogue is written and plots and associated scripts are done. Technically, that means I can play through till this area and the story will progress accordingly. Of course, there is some additional play-testing to do to make sure everything is alright. I can't speak for other module-makers but for me, it is very difficult to do more than one or two runthroughs of an area if I haven't added something new to test. I know there are alternate options to choose and different approaches to the same goals (well, most of the time at least) but I just can't seem to muster the willpower to do it. I don't know - is it that the content is not interesting enough or is it just my psyche?

Anyway, the good news is, as I was play-testing, I got a very good idea for a quest at the beginning of the game. Now, some players might not like having to answer lore questions to progress through a main quest line. I even thought of adding in an alternative way to do it but then, ditched the idea. After all, Blood and Lyrium is about a Dalish protagonist and I didn't want to dilute the experience right at the start. I just made sure that the player can find the required answers either through conversations or codex entries before starting the quest.

New Quest - The camera needs a bit of adjustment still

A few posts back, I was talking about Craggy Island and how the island itself was looking beautiful. As it turns out, Daeltaja was looking for some help with scripting and I've decided to set aside some time to do just that. This last week, we went through a few hurdles getting B2B to work right but after the initial hiccups, managed to complete the initial plot and associated scripting. The module is not planned to be very lengthy so I expect, if we keep up the kind of communication we had going last week, to be done with the scripting front by end of this month. I hate to put an end date on things still in development (I've already revised BaL's release date twice!) but I reckon I will take a chance with this; especially as the main developer (Daeltaja) will have a couple of weeks vacation this month.

Till later...

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During my weekly visit to Gamespot, I came across this video article talking about DLCs as the future of gaming. DLC, as most gamers are aware, refers to DownLoadable Content and this is a topic I (and many others, it would seem) have strong opinions on.
When I started playing games - which was pretty late, in my late teens - the additional stuff was always free; primarily because almost all of them were community content done by fans. Map packs, custom clothing/armor, total conversions, unofficial patches, new creatures, etc. All free.

Quake TC for Doom 3 - FREE!

I guess it was just a matter of time before someone in Corporate noticed the demand for these extras and decided that this was a good money-making opportunity. That's a perfectly good capitalist thought and it was a win-win scenario for both parties - more content, polished and with the official seal of compatibility for players and more revenue for the studios. The fallout of this model, at least in my eyes, is the death of the expansion pack. Games hardly have expansion packs nowadays - it's just more DLC to bridge the gap between sequels.

Civilization 4 - Fall from Heaven 2 - Better than most DLCs and free!

In the past couple of years though, the DLC scene has come to signify corporate greed and an utter lack of principles on the part of the publishers/studios. That's not to say all DLCs are bad - some rare ones are good but many of them don't justify the price tag. For example, the Bioshock 2 MP DLC - Sinclair Solutions - was already on the disk and the $5 price for the DLC was to get an unlock code. The reason behind the decision - players need to have exactly the same content to play online (btw, when has this ever been different?) and the DLC potentially is tied to engine updates and such that it had to be included in the disc. Then, there was the infamous Versus Mode DLC for RE5, a fiasco if ever there was one - a 1MB download for playing online, which made it so obvious the content was already there.

...and now, Dragon Age.
Admittedly, we know that the teams that do DLCs are separate from the 'main' development team. However, with the core development team concentrating on DA2 for quite some time now and the game and the toolset in desperate need of some patchwork, does it make sense to keep churning out additional DLCs? I swear the Feastday Gifts/Pranks was one of the worst ideas EVER - when players were still experiencing game-breaking glitches. And what do we get in the patch? Compatibility files for Awakening for the most part.
Why can't this DLC team work on fixing the bugs in the game? Most of these bugs are in the same category as content creation - they can be fixed with a toolset. Why can't some of these guys move over to DA2 development and free up one or two resources in the 'core' dev team to patch the toolset/engine? What's even more frustrating is that these bugs are acknowledged by Bioware. A couple of these (that I know of; maybe more), related to the chargen process, have even been fixed but apparently, there is no time to test and include the fixes in a build. Isn't that sad?

As I said, not all DLCs are bad. I am looking forward to The Witch Hunt for I know it will be good! Why? One word - Morrigan. Bioware knows that if they screwed up her story, it will be their worst debacle yet, bar none. I mean, they can't create a character such as Morrigan, give her the great build-up as in Origins and just let her fade away in a quick adventure, can they? I hope not.

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