create a new freedom force with a freeware game engine like ogre 3d?

[Podmark]

I seem to say this after every post you and Alex make, but this is very impressive. Having all models being able to use the same animations is really interesting, I didn't think something like that would be possible. The facial expressions look really good. Those are a great addition to your game.

[lugaru]

So facial animations on actual in game meshes?



That is a big wow, it would make great screenshots too to see a character flinching as they fly through the air after being blasted with a laser beam. You guys are doing a spectacular job, keep up the great work!

... btw do a youtube search for a game called Underbrush, it is the sequel to Lugaru. They get into some interesting things about foliage using some software to clone trees and branches and stuff to make things look lush without being system intensive.

Also have you dudes done any knockback tests? For me Knockback is part of the soul of Freedom Force (love watching characters get knocked into buildings and across the map). Just curious.

[panoramac]

Facial animations?! That's amazing! I was thinking it would cool to have more of that kind of thing in FF through animated skins that I was playing with on a few customs I did. It's a lot of work just doing that, but what you're doing is even better! Those trees are looking good too and the compatibility with male and female basic. Pure awesomeness!

[randyripoff]

Very impressive.  I look forward to seeing this come out.

[Cyber Burn]

Soooo....busy busy busy.
Firstly I've been getting the models set up so that they are all compatible with the male_basic anims. Yep, no more stretching or compressing if you give a female character male keyframes, or want those male_basic keys to work with a male_heavy based character..heres a couple of hulks duking it out with the male_basic keyframes

[abenavides]

Yep, Tommy's whipped up a ton of new art/model improvements lately. I've been doing less fun but still necessary stuff to optimize code, add a new object editor tool, and pave the way for ranged combat.

My biggest pain-in-the-butt right now is getting flying chars to land on rooftops properly. (got them to stop running through walls - but the rooftops - not quite )

Did meet up with Tommy in person recently which was fantastic. We definitely see eye-to-eye on a lot of what we want the game to be. His Sgt Shield also inspired me to dust off some personal creations to add as well.

So it's all good. Hopefully a new Dev Diary soon.

[tommyboy]

Pod, yeah, getting keyframe compatibility between different sized meshes has been a bit of a bear to do, but should be worthwhile for the freedom it will give.
I'm still hoping an animation conversion tool is possible, so even if a model is not set up correctly to be compatible, you should be able to convert animations to work with it. Fingers crossed on that one.
I should stress that, like facial expressions, meshes don't have to be set up as animation-compatible, they can be made as "ordinary" FF type meshes (exported for Panda) and will still work in-game as long as you provide your own compatible animations. We always try to let people have as much choice as possible, whilst trying to maintain the most compatibility. I can convert my basic FF max files in about half an hour if they aren't set up for animation-compatibility and facial expressions, so I'd hope others will be able to do the same. I'll very probably release a library of my Max files to help other meshers get started, so they can see how things are set up. I'm confident nothing I've done will be beyond anyone else's abilities.

Lugaru, I'm hoping we can get a system to blend in facial expressions during gameplay. It may, or may not make the final cut. I'm already adding expressions to various combat anims, pain anims etc., but it's kind of hard to see unless you are zoomed right in, and in slo-mo. It's definitely something I wanted, mainly for cut-scene goodness, but also for the possibilities in-game.
Knockback is on Alex's Big List Of Stuff To Do. Both of us want that in there, without a doubt. He's already got the basics of it figured out, and I'm very much looking forward to seeing what he comes up with as it is always better than what I hope for, or imagine.

Everyone else, thanks for the kind words and encouragement. We would probably do this anyway, but it's nice to know other people will be able to appreciate it.


Now, a little treat. A video I recorded in watch mode, of two chaps fighting.
Obviously these two wont be in the final game, they are for illustration purposes only.
The system is still not perfect, and some of my animations need work. Bear with us, it's still a work-in-progress.
But if you download and watch it, I think that you'll get an idea of why I spend so much time watching...err.. I meant testing...it
It's a 31.5Mb download, and there is no sound.
It starts in slo-mo but then immediately goes to actual game speed.
If you cannot play it, try googling and downloading GOM media player. That works for me.
I hope you like it:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/x9ae3dlw980hb7f/python%202010-10-17%2023-59-26-67.mp4


EDIT: Oh, and please dont post the video on youtube or similar. This is just a demo for you guys, and we don't own those characters and wont be using them. We could do without any "cease and desist" type actioon brought on by people misunderstanding the nature of the game..

[panoramac]

I like how characters can push each other around. You mentioned knockback physics being an important factor for you guys. I'm glad to hear that and would be great to have a new game that reacts at least as good as the first FF. Just wondering, will there be physics related attributes like heavy-footed, hollow bones etc.. or will the game handle character's mass in a different way? What's the physics engine like?

[Podmark]

Just watched your video Tommy, it's outstanding what you've put together. Really impressed with what you've been able to do.
So who would win in a fight between those two?....

[lugaru]

Very cool news and Yeah, I watched the video. I'm not gonna go so far as to say it looks procedurally generated but the sheer variety and response you guys programmed in makes it seem so... it looks like most sorts of attacks, defenses and responses are represented. The fight looks great, especially the little bits of grappling as mentioned above.

Who would win? Read JLA VS AVENGERS, they kind of decide that it would take days for a winner to emerge BUT they are both smart enough to NOT fight each other.     

[tommyboy]

Thanks.
The video gives a glimpse of how combat will look between ground-based, non-speedster, non-agile, non-martial artist combatants.
Throw in a few other fighting styles, grabs and throws, and you'll get an idea of one on-one melee combat.
Oh, and of course knockback. And, I hope, wielding weapons and anything else you can grab.
Air to air melee combat looks a little different to ground based, and air-ground and ground-air will also have their own look and feel.
I've also briefly discussed water based combat with Alex, we have some ideas for how to accomplish that, but it's a way down the line.

For today, here's a first look at two more of my original characters who may, or may not, appear.
Green Goddess, and Granite Girl:

Granite Girl will probably have different hair, a different face, and may be more bulked up.
Heres their provisional bios:
Green Goddess: powers; plant control. Think moving trees and giant venus flytraps. Although costume is green coloured, no leaves or plant type stuff in it. She's not a "mother nature" stereotype, but a hard-headed scientist using her own plant growth and control chemicals. May share a powerset with poison ivy, eve, et al, but not a mindset. The plants are a means to an end, not her pals, subjects or pets.

Granite Girl: can transform to stone, but in that form is slow, both in speed and in wits. Makes up for it by being strong, and damage resistant, as one might expect. A bigger drawback is that in stone form she cannot breathe, and not being too bright in that form may pass out, unless she changes back within 3 minutes.

[Cyber Burn]

These are just sick Tommy, sick I say...but awesome.

[ow_tiobe_sb]

Green Goddess: [...] She's not a "mother nature" stereotype, but a hard-headed scientist...

...A hard-headed scientist with an acute fondness for PVC. 

And, unless I am much mistaken, Granite Girl's abdomen appears to mark her as something of an (inverted) Sgt. Shield devotee, no?



Spiffy designs, tommyboy!  You and Alex might actually convince me to start playing computer games again (as opposed to simply modding them, creating graphics for or related to them, or composing/recording music for them).

ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

[Cyber Burn]

Green Goddess: [...] She's not a "mother nature" stereotype, but a hard-headed scientist...

...A hard-headed scientist with an acute fondness for PVC. 

And, unless I am much mistaken, Granite Girl's abdomen appears to mark her as something of an (inverted) Sgt. Shield devotee, no?


Spiffy designs, tommyboy!  You and Alex might actually convince me to start playing computer games again (as opposed to simply modding them, creating graphics for or related to them, or composing/recording music for them).

ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

Hadn't noticed that before, good eye.

[tommyboy]

Green Goddess: [...] She's not a "mother nature" stereotype, but a hard-headed scientist...

...A hard-headed scientist with an acute fondness for PVC. 

And, unless I am much mistaken, Granite Girl's abdomen appears to mark her as something of an (inverted) Sgt. Shield devotee, no?



Spiffy designs, tommyboy!  You and Alex might actually convince me to start playing computer games again (as opposed to simply modding them, creating graphics for or related to them, or composing/recording music for them).

ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

Green Goddess is confident to the point of arrogant (using the name "Goddess" after all). She is aware of her physical beauty, and the distracting effect her costume has on men, particularly. She could wear a boiler suit and lab coat, but is pragmatic and will use her appearance to her advantage.

The Granite Girl/ Sarge Shield connection is actually a coincidence. Her skin is derived from a skin of human female musculature sans epidermis. The pic I copied for the abdomen laid out those muscles thus. I wanted her to look really ripped and *ahem* chiseled, hence the very visible musculature, hence the accidental "inverted logo".

[Amazo Version 2.2]

hey tom, will you make the panda based meshes available for download so that we caould get a look at them as far as nifskope or skinning purposes? thanks.

[tommyboy]

hey tom, will you make the panda based meshes available for download so that we caould get a look at them as far as nifskope or skinning purposes? thanks.

Yes, and no.
As far as nifskope is concerned, they simply aren't .nif files, so nifskope is never going to open them.
We are still hoping to be able to release some meshes and a viewer of some sort for people to play with, (or a demo of the game which will effectively be the same thing as there is a character viewer built in).
But since we are still establishing some of the basic building blocks and conventions, it may be a while till that happens.
Worst case scenario, if we cannot get a "character tool" or demo together, I can release some models and skins, and using pview.exe (which is part of the Panda SDK and can be downloaded for free) people can view and skin them to their hearts desire.
But again, I'm still not done with what the basic format will be, so I don't want to release something which will not allow people to make their own stuff for the game. As I've said before, I am using similar enough mapping on my own models that most FF skins would work with very little alteration, albeit needing new "_refl" and "_bump" textures to look their best..

[Amazo Version 2.2]

solid. thanks tom. thanks for putting all this work into such an incredible endeaver. i'm really enjoying watching this progress.

[Deaths Jester]

Did you say "_Bump"?  Ohhhh...I've been so waiting for something with that ability in an FF-based game for such a long time!!!

[nrozich]

Do you plan on adding more attack types like sound for Banshee and Blackbolt?

[tommyboy]

Do you plan on adding more attack types like sound for Banshee and Blackbolt?

Probably, though to my mind, contrary to comic-book-physics, sound is just another form of kinetic energy, (except when resonance is involved). If you are vulnerable to a punch in the face, you are vulnerable to a sonic beam, if not, then not.
Characters who can shift frequencies to create resonant damage (and hey, maybe they all do that, subconsciously, for all I know) get a boost, in my world-view.
So I tend to think it doesn't require any fancy extra coding, though I guess it could be in the "damage type" list even though I would have it as a subset of "impact/concussive/kinetic".
Ultimately, that kind of decision falls to Alex, as he has to code it in. The version I have of the game would probably have sonic as a subset of "physical" damage. That could change.

And lest ye think a lack of posts mean we have given up, we haven't.
I have some pc problems which necessitate replacing a hard drive, and am loathe to model whilst there is risk of losing stuff.
But beyond that I need a particular bit of code written and proven before I can progress, as it will affect the structure of every character mesh, and pretty much every animation too, and I don't want to have to remake everything if I can avoid it.

We've also been playing with stuff like setting up weapons or hair (or anything else) as being defined and added in hero files, or at the character creation screen, and code to "draw/holster/drop/pickup" weapons. To spell out the obvious, weapons will not need to be "baked into" a mesh. Mjolnir or an uzi can be separate model objects which are picked up, dropped, stolen, used, etc. The code we have discussed may have powers assigned to weapons, so if you pick up a gun, the power "shoot bullet" becomes available to you. Pick up a sword, and "stab" or "slice" are added to your powerset.
There are still lots of wrinkles to iron, and decisions to make.
Here's the proof of concept "draw/holster code" screenshot, below.
Neither character model was made with a gun or hammer in it, these are separate "weapon" models assigned in the hero file and called by code, and a key pressed to draw or holster them, with a custom animation played upon doing so.
Obviously Batman wouldn't use a gun, and both weapons need much tweaking on the "holster" positions and rotations. But you can sort of see the idea..
I favour a tag assigned to weapons that will define where a weapon gets holstered, be it hip, back, calf, etc.
It's all still an on-going process.

[Podmark]

That weapons idea is great Tommy. You guys got some amazing stuff going on here.

[nrozich]

Everything is looking great so far.  Keep up the good work.  I can't help but notice the characters look a bit like plastic though.  How do you plan on addressing that?

[tommyboy]

Everything is looking great so far.  Keep up the good work.  I can't help but notice the characters look a bit like plastic though.  How do you plan on addressing that?

I'm not sure what you mean by "plastic".
It's possible that you refer to the level of specularity, (or shinyness, or reflectivity).
This will vary from character to character, depending on their costume and the materials they are made of.
Personally, I prefer what I've been doing, to what seems, to me, to be the dull, flat, matte colours which are the alternative.
But it's an artistic choice. If Alex tells me to tone down the specularity, I will do so.
I've chosen the levels I've chosen because with more specularity you get more visible normal and bump-mapping.
I know some people dont like that look, as it can make the characters look like "action figures", (as was often complained of in marvel Ultimate Alliance).
If other people dislike it, the options for them would be to turn off "per pixel" lighting, or, reflections, or to edit or delete the "_refl" textures.

I'm sure that as other artists make content for the game other styles and looks will become apparent, so if you don't like my particular style, you will have other choices.

[catwhowalksbyhimself]

I think it's the way the new bump mapping or whatever is turning out that leaves that impression.  Since you're using temporary skins with quickly generated maps, it doesn't always work out perfection.  This will be refined later on, I am sure.

[nrozich]

Thanks for the clarification.  Mainly I'm talking about for example, Wonder Woman. She looks kinda bony and indented in the upper body.  Since its a placeholder I'm sure thats just the issue.

[tommyboy]

Thanks for the clarification.  Mainly I'm talking about for example, Wonder Woman. She looks kinda bony and indented in the upper body.  Since its a placeholder I'm sure thats just the issue.

That folded arms pose seen at that angle does look horrible, I'll grant you.
I would hope this little montage will put your mind at rest a little that in other poses, and at other angles, she looks a bit better:


But yes, it's all work in progress stuff, and I've been experimenting with how far you can take the bumpmapping. Perhaps I overdid it on her upper body.

[GoldenGladiator]

Will beam attacks be reflectable in this?

I don't think they were in FF (but it's been a while since I've played around in the danger room so I could be wrong) and that would be pretty awesome if they are. Just a thought that occurred to me today.

[tommyboy]

Will beam attacks be reflectable in this?

I don't think they were in FF (but it's been a while since I've played around in the danger room so I could be wrong) and that would be pretty awesome if they are. Just a thought that occurred to me today.

I hope that they will be reflect-able. At least once, anyway.
But since we have barely begun work on how to represent and implement beams, I don't know for sure.

[catwhowalksbyhimself]

WW's muscles are over emphasized there to the point where she looks emaciated.

Again, I think that's just an issue with the new mapping.