Dune Legacy Update (and request :)

[_Gumby]

Hey,

I got a bit carried away with the whole Dune Legacy thing, here is a list of things fixed:

NEW Features:

-Mentat

Animations:

-Radar animates now

-Repair Bay animates when there is something being repaired

-Starport Animates when a Frigate is incoming

-Refinery Animates when a harvester is incoming

-Infantry Animation slowed down

AI:

-CarryAlls now pickup badly damaged units and return them to a repair bay

Sounds:

-Added 'Radar Activated'

-Added 'Harvester Deployed'

-Added 'Frigate has Arrived'

-probably added some others as well, but cant remember them right now :)

Actions:

-Tank Turrets face direction the tank is moving in

-Rocket/Gun Turrets face direction they are shooting

Tech Tree:

-Only Atreides and Ordos can get Ornithopters

-Atreides cant build WOR

-Atreides can build barracks

-Harkonnen cant build barracks

-Ordos can build Barracks and WOR

GUI:

-Up/Down buttons for Builder Structures

-Added bar across the top for 'options' button

-Added a progress bar for superweapons

Misc:

-Starport has varying prices, anywhere between 65% and 125%. Havent done 'out of stock' yet

-Added Ordos Raider

-Fixed Trooper Icon

-Added speed penalty for travelling over dunes

-Fixed flag colour for windtraps

-Fixed damage craters persisting after structures built over them

Still Broken/TODO:

-Carryalls dont patrol skies

-Units dont have icon in sidebar, makes it hard to differentiate between deviator/rocket tank ;)

-Dead infantry decay

-Tracks in sand

-Fast animation of sand from harvester and smoke on damaged structure/vehicle

-Mentat texts not complete

The mentat feature is mostly complete, all i need is the actual text that the different mentats say, i cant find a data file descriptor for the .eng files that are found in English.pak, so i need those strings. Also i need the power output and other stuff that it lists :)

But other than that the mentat is working, the guy speaks when you get info on something. Its not split into subjects, and the list of subjects is a little crude, but other than that its fine :)

So if anyone has a list of the mentat strings and can get them to me, that would be great, i dont really want to play through dune 2, writing out all the mentat entries as i go ;)

Also, if anyone wants to help clean up the gui, that would be great, i just need button images for all those large white buttons everywhere, so if anyone is up for that, it would be great to fix that up :)

I'll do some more testing, make sure its not horridly bug ridden, then post it here :)

_Gumby

[stefanhendriks]

sounds wicked! Anyway, you can get all strings by mentats from the general.pak (or scenario.pak, what was its name?). Did you try dune.pak too? I thought the file was called simply as mentat.ini or something. (it takes 10 mins to find it though, use XCC utils)

[_Gumby]

Here is a download link:

http://ii.net/~colyton/Dune%20Legacy.rar

Dont turn on double buffering. for some reason it slows right down atm :/

Enjoy :)

sounds wicked! Anyway, you can get all strings by mentats from the general.pak (or scenario.pak, what was its name?). Did you try dune.pak too? I thought the file was called simply as mentat.ini or something. (it takes 10 mins to find it though, use XCC utils)

Yeah, im pretty sure its in the ENGLISH.PAK file, there are a few strings that are easily readable, but they are for when the user first clicks on a new structure, not the actual mentat stuff :/

[Andrew]

It doesn't work for me.

When I open it I get an unexpected end of archive.

And when I unzip it I get this:

The only thing that unzips right is the changelog.

I have WinRAR.

EDIT - this problem solved.

[_Gumby]

I've uploaded a new version, so it shouldnt be corrupt. It is available at:

http://ii.net/~colyton/Dune_Legacy.rar

Here is the list of changes:

-Carryalls patrol skies

-Added Sardaukar Trooper

-Added Fremen Trooper

-Fixed Walls

-Fixed Double Buffering Slowdown

-Made the gamebar a bit better

-Selecting a unit displays its icon in the game bar

-Fixed scrolling so top bar does not hide very top of map

-Fixed voice over sounds for Sardaukar, Fremen and Mercenary

-Fixed some tech issues

-Fremen house can now build WOR and build Fremen troopers there

-Sardaukar house can now build Sardaukar Troopers at WOR

_Gumby

[_Gumby]

BTW, if you get an error about some missing dll files, all the ones you should need are in this archive:

http://ii.net/~colyton/vcdll.rar

just put the dll's into the same folder as Dune Legacy.exe and it should work fine :)

_Gumby

[Andrew]

I put the dll files into the folder, but it still does not load. Do you think I need VDMSound to get it to work? (is it a dos game?)

[_Gumby]

It doesnt need VDMSound,

You need to follow the instructions in INSTALL.txt though

If it complains about not having a dll file, which one cant it find?

_Gumby

[Andrew]

There is no dune.pak file at all... so how am I supposed to move it to the data directory?

Or does it come with the original Dune 2 game? (Sorry if I have not read all posts clearly.)

[_Gumby]

DUNE.PAK comes with the original Dune 2 game

heres a link for it

http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/dunelegacy/dunelegacy/data/DUNE.PAK

[Cyborg]

I still think the rocket troopers are too good for their cost. You can rush a base with relatively few.

And btw, the games works fine for me, and I didn't download anything else than the ordinary rar file with the game files.

[MrFlibble]

Wow! The new version of Legacy is quite great! ;D ;D ;D _Gumby, if you're interested, I've been working on a DL menu design instead of those ugly white buttons. There are some samples in the attachment. The bad thing is I have laughable programming skillz and won't add these things into the game by myself. I'll send you all the files via e-mail if you agree to add them into DL.

And also, isn't it better to convert all the mentat unit-house-and-so-on animations into single GIF files, so that they take much less space?

To Cyborg: If everything goes well with _Gumby, I won't bother you with this anymore. Still thank you for your helpfulness ;)[attachment archived by Gobalopper]

[Andrew]

Wow! Another great Dune 2 game.

But what is with the white spot at bottom right?

[attachment archived by Gobalopper]

[Cyborg]

It seems to be an area of the screen not redrawn.

[_Gumby]

Wow! Another great Dune 2 game.

But what is with the white spot at bottom right?

This is a problem i am aware of, the gamebar is only 480 pixels high, so when you set a resolution higher than 640x480, it doesnt draw the bottom-right of the screen. i'll probably just make a larger gamebar for those resolutions, or make the area black.

Wow! The new version of Legacy is quite great! ;D ;D ;D _Gumby, if you're interested, I've been working on a DL menu design instead of those ugly white buttons. There are some samples in the attachment. The bad thing is I have laughable programming skillz and won't add these things into the game by myself. I'll send you all the files via e-mail if you agree to add them into DL.

And also, isn't it better to convert all the mentat unit-house-and-so-on animations into single GIF files, so that they take much less space?

Those samples are great :)

I have redone the gui a bit, but mainly instead of being white, its red :)

I'd like each button separated from the whole, in bmp format, and it has to use the same palette of 256 colours that all the other files use (tough, i know :). This isnt absolutely necessary, since i can chop everything up to suit my needs, it just means more work for me ;). Each button needs a 'pressed' version of it too (for when the button is pressed).

if you want the same palette, you can just start by editing a copy of an existing picture, like the gamebar, and then alter it to your new design and it should preserve the palette.

and if you have a big screen, like Sample_MainMenu.bmp, they would have to be in 3 resolutions, 640x480, 800x600 and 1024x768

Yes, i am aware that the size of the package is getting quite high :)

im thinking of trying to use a compressed zip format to store the files, and extract it on the fly. since most of the stuff is pre-loaded anyway, it should impact speed too much, but i have to work out how to do that atm :)

i would use png or something, but im not too sure if the colour changes will still work, i might look into that too.

I have also done some new changes since ive last posted:

New Features:

-Cutscenes - Intro, Finale (just have to write the 'meanwhile' scripts)

-Briefings

-Games finish when you complete the mission, they dont jsut hang around

-You can now play the campaign through to the end of the game, for each house

-You get the house info briefing when you start a campaign, just like in original (Do you wish to join house x?)

Cheers,

_Gumby

[MrFlibble]

I've made a probable Mentat screen sample, and also a top game bar with space for messages like 'Spice lost, build more silos' or 'Unit deployed'. Otherwise these messages cover the 'Options' button.

Ah, in the version I've downloaded (which's 0.92b2) I couldn't start a custom game :( And still, vehicles don't leave tracks and infantry doesn't decay.

Yes, I have both normal and pushed animations for buttons, and try to follow the palette (by making new files from the original ones coming with DL, copying and pasting). The only problem's that if I compress all the ready files with ZIP, they will take much time to load, and I'm unable to post RAR files in here, so: either you tell me an e-mail address where I'll send you RAR package as an attachment to the mail, or I'll divide the package into several smaller ZIP ones and post them here.[attachment archived by Gobalopper]

[Ravoner]

Yes, i am aware that the size of the package is getting quite high :)

im thinking of trying to use a compressed zip format to store the files, and extract it on the fly. since most of the stuff is pre-loaded anyway, it should impact speed too much, but i have to work out how to do that atm :)

i would use png or something, but im not too sure if the colour changes will still work, i might look into that too.

Why don't you just use original .pak and .wsa format for graphics in mentat, intro, cutscenes, etc.?

[_Gumby]

Why don't you just use original .pak and .wsa format for graphics in mentat, intro, cutscenes, etc.?

I havent found a format descriptor for the dune 2 .pak/.shp/.wsa files

Also, its alot easier to use bitmaps rather than a custom format since using a custom format would mean i'd have to write a custom SDL Surface loader.

If i can find a format description for the files, then i might alter it to use that.

Today I added zip compression to it, which cut the size down a bit, but its still probably too large, oh well...

_Gumby

[Ravoner]

XCC Mixer at Sourceforge has support for Dune 2 .pak/.wsa/.shp files, so you could probably use those as they are both Sourceforge projects?

[_Gumby]

Yeah, ive just been looking through the CVS repository of XCC Mixer.

I might look into doing it, but like i said, i'll still need to write something to load the wsa files into SDL, and im not sure how to do that just yet :)

I'd also have to write scaling routines and other misc crap, so i think i'll put this feature on the backburner for a bit :)

[MrFlibble]

As for now DL contains six sides, I thought it's quite good to make Fremen, Sardaukar and Mercenary different from their Great House counterparts. So, here are some ideas for these sides' special weapons.

MERCENARY

---------

Mercenary Spy (palace weapon): this insidous agent serves for espionage and stealing technologies. The Mercenary don't have their House of IX (their Palace requires HighTech Factory and Starport), but, if lucky enough, they can build all the other Houses' special tanks.

Mercenary Spy works like the Spy in RA/RA2. He can infiltrate the following structures:

House of IX: allows the player to build special tanks of the infiltrated side.

Refinery/Silo: steals 1000 credits.

Radar Outpost: reveals the current position of all enemy units and structures.

Starport: a frigate arrives at the enemy starport and drops a team of Mercenary units, which can vary from time to time (e.g., the team has two 'slots', each one can contain 1 Siege Tank OR 2 Combat Tanks OR 2 Missile Tanks OR 4 Quads, and the 'slots' can't have the same input at a time)

Windtrap: causes a 40-second blackout.

The Mercenary Spy is invisible (or, perhaps, every player will see him as this player's own infantry unit, like it was with the RA spy?), like the Saboteur, but can't be detected at all, so the only way to avoid infiltration is building walls around critical structures. There can't be more than one Spy at a time.

FREMEN

------

Fremen are best with the Sonic Tank and a controllable sandworm as a palace weapon (appears at a random point of the map and consumes 3 targets and then disappears)

SARDAUKAR

---------

Sardaukar Demolisher tank is a cousin to Harkonnen Devastator, only it can attack air targets with rockets and also is sonic-proof. Sardaukar palace weapon is Invulnerability (read: Iron Curtain from RA1).

[_Gumby]

Ive posted a new version at

http://ii.net/~colyton/DuneLegacy93b2.zip

Its a bit big (12mb), but hopefully i'll be able to shrink that down later.

Here's a list of changes:

version 0.93b2

-Started integrating MrFibble's new GUI

-Fixed some game load bugs

-Fixed some game exit bugs

-Added repair button to buildings

-Added support for upgrading buildings

-Can load a game without having to start a single player game first

-Skirmish now works properly

-Infantry can take over a building when its in 'red' health.

-Made carryalls a bit faster

-Made trikes/raiders a bit faster

-Added intro scene and finale scenes for all houses.

-Added cutscenes

-Added level briefings

-Added partial campaign support. The entire campaign is playable. No 'choose next conquest'

-Fixed save game loading - previous versions of save games will be corrupt

-Fixed gamebar colours not changing when you change houses

-Added support for zip archives.

-Added 'Skirmish' play mode

_Gumby

[Andrew]

At this rate will the project be done in 4 minutes? ;)

I must say, lots of improvements to mention. Will have to play it sometime soon. (downloading it now).

Will make a great desktop game if nothing else!

[neonext]

ya, keep up the good work, i'll definitally have to give it a try too

[stefanhendriks]

Nice list of features; though some where already in the game? (Ie skirmish game...)