ManGodAi4x / AquaCoop, Comic, Cinematic…Terminal Dark.

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Rman Virgil
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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

Post by Rman Virgil »

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macuser wrote:wow those look good ;) did you model them?
The character portrait stills are from my cinematic short WIP Triumph In The Balance where in I do everything, including the voice acting. :) I mainly work in True Space, Grome and Art Rage in digital art (but mostly I work with traditional analog media outside cinema projects - I like the smells and getting my hands and clothes dirty. Old school, no doubt.).

The Cliff Landscape is Grim's art and he works mainly in Maya and Grome & has been a professional artist in the game industry going on 20 years. He is also a masterful designer of game GPMs.

As long as I am here...

An Update on the dual project here: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP and SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X....

I have 2 lists of suggested changes provided by my RL gamer pals. I will have the mental space away from my current projects to work on 'em about mid-December. I'll release those final 2 iterations in time for X-Mas - the season of giving seems fitting for a couple of totally out-of-the-box efforts. :3

- Synergistically, Rman. 8)

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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

Post by theArmourer »

It'll be nice to see these come out. Nice work
~theArmourer
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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

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theArmourer wrote:It'll be nice to see these come out. Nice work
Thank you. :) And they will. :3

Right now I am only holding them back because of the implementation of the recent Super Transport in MP.wz - which has yet to be finalized in it's balance. I'm hoping that at least the "Speed" issue will be done fairly soon so that I may make some necessary balance adjustments on my end and can release around X-mas. That's the plan.

I'd like to complete this project, out the door, this month so that beginning of '11 I can be ready to contribute to Dylan Dog's New WZ Campaign (if it goes forward as last forecasted). At that time I'd also like to jump-in whole hog on an other project I have already begun that is being built on Member Milo's very recent seminal work in Fast Play Mode.

This later project is a Mini-CAM tentatively titled "Scav-Borg Wars" where YOU will play the role of slightly modified Scavs that have rudimentary Air Power (courtesy of Black Project's "Scav Chopper") needing to wage asymmetric, velocity-based, guerrilla style battle to defend your homeland against a first wave invasion by mostly enemy Borg units. There are other unique Mission Game Play Mechanic twists (as in, these do not exist in the original campaign) that I will be keeping under wraps for the duration - unlike how I approached this project were in I explained in detail and provided a plethora of screen caps of all my innovations. :wink:

- Regards, Rman. :hmm:

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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

Post by Rman Virgil »

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...Right now I am only holding them back because of the implementation of the recent Super Transport in MP.wz - which has yet to be finalized in it's balance. I'm hoping that at least the "Speed" issue will be done fairly soon so that I may make some necessary balance adjustments on my end and can release around X-mas. That's the plan.
As this didn't happen I should speak to it before signing out for another spell - just personal credo not because I think there is any vast interest or import in this neck of the woods (in fact, I know much of my specific interests in WZ's evolution are out of scope here and are far better matched to cutting edge game design trending known as VRGs which is were my active interests in gaming & game design have shifted whole hog these days.)

From the get go this dual project had a multi-faceted mission of which one of the major goals was to promote Airlift Supply Logistics Gameplay.

When Buggy said he was gonna implement the Campaign Transport for MP gaming I was simply delighted because this fit in so beautifully with what I was trying to achieve in a roundabout way with only the Borg Transport available. Now with the Campaign Transport implemented in MP there would be the advantage of going to the GPM re-design directly with Armor Airlift.... & direct was defintely far better in my judgement.

The initial v.3.x implementation was not optimal which in it self was no big deal. We got good input from the MP gamers in the community on how to improve the implementation and proceeded to work on the follow through. Unfortunately, I reached an impasse within my know-how and couldn't go any further without help in understanding the source implementation.

The following thread details all of it and how it progressed from Nov. 16, 2010 till I reached that impasse on Dec. 15th 2010.

Experiencing the Super Transport - Ways to Improve ?

Well that's the way things go with FOSS dev. Nature of the beast. Not complaining but still wanting to get out of this impasse so I can modify & test the Campaign Transport in MP as a vehicle to advance the aforementioned Airlift Supply Logistics Gameplay.

So what I've decided to do a few days ago is go back to v.1.10 and a modified version of that source whose binary will support a Campaign Transport MP Mod were I can further make changes to the variable velocity parameters which donot defy my comprehension like they have in the v.3.x source implementation.

Of course this project's maps will not work to that end so I will be using an old map I made in 2000 which fits the bill perfectly. It's called Firefight and it's 250 x 250 - which I believe the optimal size for evolving Airlift Supply Logistics Gameplay as the Central Battle Theater is expansive enough (a 4-player map as is Aqua-Coop) to warrant a viable Airlift alternative to ground armor columns or duplicating manufacturing & defensive resources in theater.

This seems the only way I can move forward and test this hypothesis (which is of crux interest to me here) as there is no telling when the v.3.x implemetation will continue its progression in this area - let alone any possibility of back-porting the results to the v.2.3.x series.

I'll report my results as they coalesce.

- Mado Mitaguyasin, RV :hmm:

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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

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1 of 4 Resource Caches mentioned early on but which I never provided screen shots of......

They come in 2 very different variations and the sets were dubbed as follows: Crimson Mane & Red Beard being one config and Jian's Hilt & Jian's Tang being the other unique config. The screens below are of the later set. The Crimson Mane & Red Beard resource caches have NO ground access - strictly aerial and are also set-up to provide a potential forward base build with unusual supply staging characteristics on the periphery of the main theater - Jian's Hilt & Jian's Tang being designed more as potent centers-of-gravity IN theater.


If you do a ground assault to harvest the resource features of Jian's Hilt or Jian's Tang you risk destroying the depot as collateral damage. (Crimson Mane & Red Beard are configured for different capture tacs and usage potential.)

The best way to claim is to build a Transport as soon as possible and simply fly over the depot - you immediately register a huge chunk of change in your coffer of $$. ;)

The Resource Depot also makes for a quite formidable forward base once captured.

Just a couple of freshly minted, non-Rush, asymmetric, precision velocity, tactical opportunities - out of more than a dozen made possible via 4G/C41 informed imagination & sheer creative map crafting.

Image


Image


Yebo, sanibonani, RV :hmm:

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Resource Cache 008.jpg
Resource Cache 007.jpg
Resource Cache 005.jpg
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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

Post by Rman Virgil »

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So what I've decided to do a few days ago is go back to v.1.10 and a modified version of that source whose binary will support a Campaign Transport MP Mod were I can further make changes to the variable velocity parameters which donot defy my comprehension like they have in the v.3.x source implementation.
Laser-focused, I've gotten results quicker than anticipated. :D

4c-AquaCoop Peep MP is designed for strictly MP and its Airlift Supply Logistics Gameplay component will work beautifully if and when the v.3.x implementation of the CAM / Super Transport is revisited and tweaked along lines spoken to in Experiencing the Super Transport - Ways to Improve ? . Till that happens 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP will NOT be released. It's a shame because my experiments with modified v.1.10 source on my 2000 Firefight Ops map all point to this being an expansive command decision-making experience, exhilirating fun and a fresh, new, viable tactic for MP.

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In my head I have always seen 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP and SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X as a simultaneous release. The former for those who favor MP and the later for those who mostly enjoy SP.

With this recent wave of experiments I am seeing that while 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP release is untenable at this time the release of SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X is viable with some managable modifications - mainly because the use of the CAM / Super Transport can be made non-pivotal and, indeed, the Cyborg Transport alone made plenty good enough for the new set of GP opportunities & tactical possibilities to shine as conjured.

SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X is strictly for Skirmish Mode. Through various techniques the Skirmish A.I. is influenced, without scripting changes, to emergent, dynamic, behavior. "Emergence" is one of 2 concepts I've made use of from Complexity Theory - the other is called the "Adjacent Possible" and this one applies to the human player. Both concepts manifest in way more interesting game play than stock or standard SP Mode efforts.

In both these efforts the dominant asymmetry is obvious in 3 dimensions with an aesthetic style that favors naturalism based on a landscape aesthetic informed by the latest insights of Neo-Darwinism and the Cognitive Sciences. Because of the WZ maximum map size limits I've also crafted a geographic compression inspired by the literary tradition known as Magical Realism. Paramount as well for me in crafting were the challenges of asymmetry in a game world always invoking the issue of a non-level or unfair playing field and how I have redressed these apparent imbalaces of asymmetry in 3 dimensions is by creating boon counter-balancing in the 4th dimension for those with command werewithall. O_o

I don't doubt that the forgoing concision is achieved by evoking a sense of the cryptic, if not sounding deliberately obtuse, and at the expense of a transparent clarity. But I don't want to write a mini-treatise (& I'm sure most don't want to read one in a BB post) so take these merely as clues and a conceptial lexicon that will become clearer once you experience first hand the new set of GP opportunities & tactical possibilities - as well the A.I. behavior. Experiencing first hand will ultimately be the best explanation (supplemented by Googling the conceptual lexicon provided above). 8)

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Re-Cap of some principal inspirations for 8c-ManGodAi4X game play - something of a design mash-up:

1.) The last set of culminating Missions against Nexus in the original Campaign - thought they had some good elements but the end result fell far short of the promise and was indeed, anti-climactic when it should have been EPIC.

2.) August 1993, Somalia, known as Black Hawk Down (book & movie) - a joint Army Rangers & Delta Force operation that lasted a total of 18 hours.

3.) BOSS stages from "Brawler" genre games.

4.) Taninsu Gake Akido training.

5.) 4G / C41, asymmetric, velocity, warfare doctrine.

6.) Archetypal Story weaving techniques from the Adventure & Thriller genres applied to interactive game world narrative constructs.

7.) Complexity Theory concepts of "emergent behavior" and the "adjacent possible".

8.) Cognitive Traps and hard-wired Heuristics revealed by Cognitive Science research of the last decade.

9.) The "Flow" psychological state of optimal performance.

10.) VRG game design & philosophy.

11.) The Art Instinct & Evolutionary Science

12.) D.A.R.P.A. directed and funded R & D.

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As I work on the final modifications SP 8c-ManGodAi4X (to account for the unfinished state of the CAM Transport implementation in v.3.x) I will take this opportunity to explain the new NON-intuitive game play opportunities & tactics that I have created as well some of the above inspirations from which they are derived - ones I have yet to speak to, that is, & only in brief, natch. :lecture:

I will start in the next post by illustrating the possibilities of the Resource Caches called Crimson Mane & Red Beard..... then I will explain the mechanics of Velocity, Multi-Vector Deployment Sand Bars followed by an explanation of the Stealth Airlift Cyborg Transport Deployment LZs (all with clear screen caps) and concluding with a recap of the opening BOSS stage design and what to expect with the rest of the BOSS stages. After that I should be finished with SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X modifications-testing and proceed with its first time release accompanied by graphic set-up instructions to play. :3

Yebo, sanibonani, RV :hmm:
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Re: 4c-AquaCoop Peep MP & SP SKI 8c-ManGodAi4X

Post by Rman Virgil »

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Red Beard & Crimson Mane Resource Caches & Airlift Zones:

The sequence of screen caps speaks to the game play opportunities and fresh tactical potential in the main.
What is missing, and will be addressed in the next sequence of screens, is the value of Velocity, Multi-Vector Deployment Sand Bars which also come into play here (but do NOT at all in the Jian's Hilt or Jian's Tang Resource Caches of my earlier post.)


Image


Image


Image

Yebo, sanibonani, RV :hmm:
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Red Beard Resource Cache 004.jpg
Red Beard Resource Cache 005.jpg
Red Beard Resource Cache 006.jpg
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Re: SP 8c-ManGodAi4x A Go & 4c-AquaCoop MP On Hold

Post by Rman Virgil »

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Stealth Airlift Cyborg Transport Deployment LZs: Fully loaded Borg Transport lands within the safe LZ and from within its full Borg complement are multi-vector deployed in less than 5 seconds ! Enemy force cannot concentrate firepower as they would vs. a single vector deployment (which would also include the Transport itself !). :3


Next Post: Velocity, Multi-Vector Deployment Sand Bars
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Re: SP 8c-ManGodAi4x A Go & 4c-AquaCoop MP On Hold

Post by Rman Virgil »

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Velocity, Multi-Vector Deployment Sand Bars: Just a couple examples of this type map construct making for varied tacs.

Stage Transport: Example A - sea level to sea level.

Image


5 Sec Deployment of all Cyborgs:


Image


Stage Transport: Example B - sea level to elevation & a several tile horizontal split.


Image


5 Sec Deployment of all Cyborgs:


Image

BTW: Example "B" was the gambit part of a 2 pronged assault on the Last Redoubt. While enemy fire was drawn to this deployment in the south, the main combat groups came bearing down from the NE & NW. Fun. :D


Yebo, sanibonani, RV :wink: :hmm:
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Re: SP 8c-ManGodAi4x A Go & 4c-AquaCoop MP On Hold

Post by Rman Virgil »

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Dagnabit ! O_o In my exuberance (for the game, the play, the crafting, the articulation, the sharing, the totality's visionary, & entwined, evolution) I done again plum lost sight of the prevailing singularity's event horizon. Such faux pas can suck big time. (Pun intended.) :shock:

Inequity aversion is such a drag, ham-stringing the very exuberance that spurs us on to just do it, to dare explore the unknown, to make worthwhile stuff out of the journey. To thus be greeted with a commonplace attrition is doggone perverse. :hmm:

Course corrected. TANSTAAFL :3 The bird, & 2 thumbs-up, presented. :lol2:

- Yebo, sanibonani, RV 8)
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Re: ManGodAi4x / AquaCoop In Machinima / FMV Project

Post by Rman Virgil »

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I'm reviving this thread because I began re-using all the assets a couple weeks ago (why waste anything) for a hybrid FMV comprised of Machinima shot in the v. 3.x game world intercut with 3D FP PoV animation created based on an original WZ story and will soon begin posting progress snap shots of this current project here (because I prefer the continuity & appropriateness of using this thread rather than creating a new one and making backward refrences to this one). Think of it as an open diary of this new WIP, like thinking aloud about what you are engaged in doing.

All the images heretofore in this thread were from running in the v. 2.x series and it looks way different in the current v. 3.x. I may also make use of new feature assets that have recently been created that are inspiring along with mingling tertile sets.
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Re: ManGodAi4x / AquaCoop In Machinima / FMV Project

Post by Lord Apocalypse »

Post a 3.1 screenshot when you can, the 2.3.9 version looked pretty good as it was.
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Re: ManGodAi4x / AquaCoop In Machinima / FMV Project

Post by Goth Zagog-Thou »

Can't wait to see it, Rman. :D

I'll be getting back to work on things very shortly. One more busy week and it'll be smooth sailing afterwards (and then 3.1 Cam 4 can start to become reality!).
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Re: ManGodAi4x / AquaCoop In Machinima / FMV Project

Post by Rman Virgil »

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Thanks for the interest guys. Truly, I value it wholeheartedly. :)

I mentioned some of what I've been doing in the "Dr. Reed Fictions" thread in the Lounge bb, so I'll not repeat any of that here.

I will give a quick summary of some the other stuff involved that is preceeding my posting screens.

Doing two things basically.

1.) Remaking the aesthetics to take advantage of the ability to mix and match tertile / feature sets in one map. This is because these are my Machinima shooting stage sets that I will integrate with my 3D CGI, 1st person POV, animation elements to make up the cinematic dubbed "Triumph in the Balance: The Mission R.A.C.E.". To that end I am also intergrating elements from my "Trinity" & "WarSchool" map/mods as well from my collaboration with Laws215 on the "Citadel" & "Cidatel Elite" projects.

2.) Experimenting with what I dubbed a few years ago (when working on the "WZ 2200" Project) Gameplay Map Deconstruction and using the technique to make for increased replay value because the "how" of deconstruction would be, in essence, a wild card in emergent MP gameplay - from one game to the next on the "same" map.
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Re: ManGodAi4x / AquaCoop In Machinima / FMV Project

Post by Rman Virgil »

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"Triumph In The Balance" - What's It About‥?


......... Continued Next Page....

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Last edited by Rman Virgil on 18 Jun 2012, 16:54, edited 1 time in total.
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