Idle Chatter

Well I finally let my EVE-Online account go. Honestly, the only reason I logged on these days was to queue up a new skill. I don’t think I’ll miss it.

For a game with so much potential and attention to detail in areas I often think are lacking in other games, it turned out to be very one dimensional for me. Since I wasn’t interested in the PvP facet of the game that really only leaves the option of mining and exploiting the market. This was kinda fun for a while but frankly mining gets far more boring as you get better at it.

The lack of a true avatar, which is a common complaint about the game, is legitimate to me. Maybe it’s silly but, in an MMO where I tend to want to become immersed in the content, I find it hard to do so when the only entity in the game for me to relate to is a headshot image that doesn’t even move or a ship hull.

I understand that future enhancements to the game include allowing players to get out of their ships and walk around in space stations and possibly even planets one day. This has promise.

Star Wars Galaxies got this part right. It’s a shame the broke the entire game with the combat revamp. I loaded up SWG about 3 or 4 months ago and couldn’t even get my newb character out of the starting area. What a shame.

Thanks to my friends over at TenTonHammer, I’ve gotten an invite to the Age of Conan - Hyborian Adventures (AoC) beta.

Unfortunately, I’m still beholden to a non disclosure so I can’t say much other than it looks promising.

More to come when they untie my hands!

So apparently I’m not the only person to have a bear of a time getting textures compiled for use in the Source engine. Thankfully a much more talented person than I has taken it upon them self to write a tool to do just that very task.

The VTF Tool is actually written for tearing open compiled .VTF files and making them editable but also is handy for putting them back together. I see no reason why you couldn’t use to to compile new textures as well. I’ll be giving it a test this evening if all goes well but until then you can try it for yourself!

VTF Tool

Here is a screenshot of the VTF Tool User Interface.

EDIT:
As it turns out there is an even better tool for this task. Written by the same fellow.

VTFLib is a programming library, but it comes with a much more robust tool with more functionality than the VTFTool. Not to mention that the VTFTool is no longer supported. You can get VTFLib here.

Download VTFLib

I want to break this post into two sections because there really are two parts to the process of creating custom models for Half-life 2. First you must create the model using a modeling tool. Fortunately SoftImage has worked with Valve to produce a free tool that has everything you need to create, texture and animate everything from props to custom character models. The XSI Modtool is available for download here. Secondly you must compile your model and texture for use in the game. This proved to be the most difficult task so far.

XSI Mode Tool

After getting this installed I was immediately able to begin creating custom content. I started off simple by creating a can of spam physics prop using this a great tutorial over at Gamedesign.net. You can find the tutorial here.

Physics Prop Tutorial

Following this tutorial I was able to create a model and texture it in about 30 minutes. Since I have no frame of reference I think that is pretty fast. Using the addon for XSI specifically written to export models for use in the Half-Life 2 Source engine I was able to export the model with no problems at all.

That is where the exciting ease of use and forward progress ends however.

To get your shiny new model into the game engine you have to compile both the model and the texture. While this might seem like a simple process I found it to be quite daunting. The tools for doing this are all command shell based so there is really no useful UI to work with. Being a software developer by trade this isn’t really all that new to me however. What is new is the very strict folder structure setup that is required to make this work.

I banged my head against this for a couple hours last night before I discovered that I didn’t have the proper folder structure setup. At that point it was too late to try and get it setup properly so I left it be for now. It was frustrating to be sure but looking at all the successful mods out there it mustn’t be as hard as I was making it.

I’ll give it another try soon.

Hammer, the map editor that comes with the the Source SDK is, in a word, fantastic.

When you are first getting started creating levels (maps) you should subscribe to the KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) method for certain. As your map becomes larger, it becomes increasingly hard to maintain design concepts as well as a consistent look and feel. After checking out a few tutorials on how to get started I was able to make a few test maps that were very simple but also showed signs of potential.

The most complex element of the Hammer is the large list of entities that you have to chose from at the get go. These entities which represent everything from visible objects such as a furniture and props to interactive objects that the user can pick up or bump around to invisible objects that manage the AI, NPCs and events within your map. Knowing them well and how to use them will save you loads of design time.

The GUI should seem very familiar if you have used a 3D modeling software before. The familiar four-port window greets you when you load it up. The upper left is a 3D camera window that can be configured to show you your map in a basic rendered view. This is handy for getting an idea how things are panning out. The remaining ports are mesh views that show you your map from three different directions.

Not surprisingly, the tools supplied by Valve continue to impress. I like the GUI and think that I can fall into basic level design without to much effort. That is of course if I don’t suck at it.

Here are some links to some good tutorials I found to get started on using the Hammer editor.
Your First Map - Valve Developer Community
Introduction to Hammer - EditLife.net

These wiki entries are absolutely essential as well.
Dimensions - Valve Developer Community
Single-Player Mapping Tips - Valve Developer Community

Good luck!

I should preface this post with the statement that I’ve only given this about 3 hours of effort to this point. A good deal of this time was spent setting up the environment and Visual Studio 2005 so actual time playing with code and project(s) was probably less than an hour but my initial impressions are very positive.

The Source engine appears to be a great environment for developing mods as well as new games not only because it’s well written and organized but also because Valve has taken the time and effort to ensure that the proper tools are available. Between the SDK that is available to anyone who has a full version of any Source based game, and the XSI mod tool for producing new entities/models/prefabs, you really have all the tools necessary for building any FPS game you want.

More experienced Source developers might know better than I but the Source engine seems to be flexible enough to build virtually any type of game. The only limitation I’ve found is the size of the maps. I personally haven’t hit this wall but its really the only complaint that I’ve seen about the Source engine. This explains the frequent loading screens in Half-Life 2 and its episodic content.

All in all it looks like a great way to get started in game development. The code is c++ which is a pretty common language in the game development world. It is however a more advanced language and those interested in getting to know the Source Engine should devote a fair amount of time familiarizing themselves with c++ syntax and practices.

Tonight I hope to dig even deeper into the engine and see what I can do by creating a very simple map and implementing it.

More to come…

Well first off, I’d like to officially announce the birth of my son Aiden Patrick. He’s perfect and healthy and I couldn’t be happier. I suppose that is a ‘new development’, but not what this post is about.

I’m going to begin focusing my free time on game development and design. This is an area of software design that I’ve always wanted to do but have never had the opportunity to do professionally. It’s time to stop waiting around and start doing.

I have a number of ideas and I don’t know if any actual game will result from my efforts but my goals aren’t as lofty as that anyhow. I’m much more interested in learning the ins and outs of game design and development than actually putting together a commercially viable product. Its a good thing too because, with no experience and no real direction, that is about all I can really hope for.

I’m going to begin by exploring the Source Engine. This is the engine used for the wildly successful title Half-life 2 and Portal. Valve has produced a comprehensive suite of tools and documentation to help in developing and designing games and mods for their Source engine.

It seems like a great place to start. Lets see what I can do.

Looks for some changes around here real soon.

Things are starting to quiet down a bit after the birth of my new baby boy so I’m going to get going on a new project I’ve been playing with and need to get serious about. With that dominating my free time I suspect that this place will become equally dominated with the subject of video game development both technical and theoretical.

I’m looking for a more appropriate domain name and will forward this site to the new one when its completed.

Sorry for the LONG delay in posts. More to come I promise!

Lord of the Rings: Online released a patch recently that added in game housing to the its growing list of features. They added it in a way I hadn’t really thought about. Everquest 2 included in game housing either immediately or very shortly after release. These instanced apartments were cool but their relationship with their surroundings was mediocre at best. You didn’t have neighbors and furniture placement was very structured which made customization pretty lame.

With LotR:O the housing is broken out into instanced neighborhoods where you actually have houses and neighbors. From what I’ve read it still has lots of work before it becomes the beast that housing is in Star Wars Galaxies. In SWG you can place an item literally ANYWHERE inside your home allowing for some very creative decorating.

All this talk about housing got me thinking about how it might be implemented in the game I play, World of Warcraft. Certain aspects of housing in other games simply wouldn’t apply. In SWG you could make your home a shop by place a droid and loading him up with goods to sell. WoW already has the Auction Houses for this and since an AH is really no more than a few minutes away at any given time there is no need for this type of feature.

SWG also allowed for placing houses where you liked. Entire towns can sprout up in the middle of nowhere. This wouldn’t work in WoW either simply because of space. In comparison, WoW isn’t nearly as large as SWG and doesn’t include the vast open spaces that would be required for this to work.

What WoW could bring however is instances guild and player housing. This would be awesome. I think it could also alleviate some of the load that is currently in major cities. I think it would have to be implemented similar to how LotR:O has done. WoW simply doesn’t have the room to do otherwise. But instanced ‘neighborhoods’ where play housing and guild halls could exist sounds very cool. Here are some feature ideas that I think would be essential.

Guild Hall
- Guild Hall would have guards and permissions both for controlling entry to the hall as well as rooms inside.
- Guild Bank interface would be moved to the Guild Hall.
- Players could hearth to either their home, an Inn or their Guild Hall
- Players could access the Trade channel from their Guild Hall
- Guild Master could decorate the Guild Hall using preconceived decorations with tapestries showing the guild tabard.

Player Housing
- Different levels of housing could be purchased from a hovel up to a manor. Each having more storage that the previous.
- Players could hearth to either their home, an Inn or their Guild Hall
- Players could set entry permissions for their home to public or private.
- Players could purchase storage Chests with additional storage slots to place in their home.
- Players could decorate their home with purchasable and/or lootable items.

I think this is something that Blizzard will ultimately implement just to keep up with the Jones’ but I’d love to see this sooner than later, I’m running out of bank space!

What features have I left out?

This is part of a series of posts about guild management and related topics.

The G in MMORPG stands for game; and games are played to be won. Historically most video games are intended to be played by 1 player. This is a concept that many of us grew up on. We all want to be the best and will do what we must to achieve that goal.

With MMORPGs however the idea of who is best is muddy at the very least. You can have the best gear but still get destroyed by a player with more skill in PvP. You can be the best at your class while having substandard gear. Those who measure their quality by progression and gear have to assimilate a new mentality about how one becomes the best. You cannot achieve the very best gear in most MMORPGs without joining a guild and participating in raid content.

From a guild management perspective I liken this to the pursuit of the ‘American Dream’. Everyone wants a nice job that meets their individual needs as well as perhaps a small family. They want a house with a two and a half car garage, a dog named Sparky and a second mortgage. Well… maybe not the second mortgage.

In MMO games there are basically three types of players with respect to their goals and time commitment. First there are players who only have the time to level characters but can’t fathom the idea of committing to more than 2 hours of game play. These people for the most part aren’t part of this conversation. The other two types are called casual or hard core raiders. These players recognize that they cannot progress further without the help of others and eventually join a guild and begin raiding.

The challenge to a Guild Master is how to establish the ‘we, not me’ mentality in those new members. With the rare exception, players join guilds for their own personal gain. They join guilds that are on content that they feel that they can immediately participate in and they do so with the desire to reap rewards. there is nothing wrong with this necesarily. It is this mentality that drives the very existence of guilds however this mentality is also part of the downfall of nearly every guild that has ever failed.

So how does a Guild Master take the selfish little devils and turn them into valuable, contributing members of their little society? There are a number of ways that they can try. The most successful ways are to take the focus off of loot all together. Place the focus on the ‘brotherhood’ of the guild and how that brotherhood will provide progression which will, as a side effect, get people the gear they so desperately want.

In this post, I wrote about a couple different ways to manage a guild. One of two I highlighted was the ‘Focus on the people’ mentality. This style of leadership supports the idea of a brotherhood, or close knit guild. Mature players who see a guild is investing in them will feel not just obligated but a desire to do what they must for the sake of the many. This breeds stability and will result, in most cases, in progression and ultimately, more loot.

Rules and policies that promote fairness to all but reward those that make commitments to the guild are also essential to maintaining this ‘we, not me’ idea. If players see that others are rewarded when they make commitments and sacrifices for the guild they will be more inclined to do so as well, even if the core reason is self-serving.