SS2 FM Blind Disposition v1.4.2

[6740d6c444746icemann]

The main thing is to not take it to heart as you have. That's where you went wrong.

The other as previously mentioned is that the amount of FM related content we get now is NOWHERE NEAR the amount we did say 10 years ago. When you are getting a lot of something, you will have less to say about the individual bits. When your getting less you'll have more to say.

[6740d6c444d28chuckles n chestnuts]

The main thing is to not take it to heart as you have. That's where you went wrong.

The other as previously mentioned is that the amount of FM related content we get now is NOWHERE NEAR the amount we did say 10 years ago. When you are getting a lot of something, you will have less to say about the individual bits. When your getting less you'll have more to say.

While I agree with your entire second statement icemann; I don't quite agree with the first one.  I think I was doing more defending for my side of the argument than taking things to heart, not sure if your aware but literally 5 minutes into me posting my FM and my first post ever on this site it was met with very knit-picky and condescending critique, so much that one of the moderators stepped in and deleted about 6 or 7 posts (yeah it got that out of hand), so I don't think you were aware of that.  And you could only imagine how one would react to those kind of post right from the get-go being their first post on a dedicated site to the same franchise they admire as well and contributed fan content to it.

Its only natural to defend ones point of view or argument especially if its over their hard work and effort for something they really have a passion for.  I don't think you would just let someone stomp you into the ground or call you out when you know better and have the proof in front of you to argue against it and just sit there and take it, I would think one would do something about it.  Now, that is not to say I didn't take anything to heart, but I feel alot of how I reacted was just simply me defending my side over some erroneous claims like anyone else would do.  And also if you read some of my posts I actually agree with some of the critique, especially when the poster is coming off sincere about it.  At the end of the day I would like to think a little common courtesy goes a long way. 

In my eyes heres how I see it: everyone is a critic, but the manner in how they critique makes all the difference to the creator, if you come off condescending and snarky, guess what, your gonna be percieved as negative regardless of the validity of your critique.  And if you come off cordial about your critique, your gonna be perceived as someone approaching the issues with sincere objectivity; and with that being stated at the end of the day, its up to the one doing critiquing to choose to approach it negatively or positively.  But again this is only how I see it...

[6740d6c444eeecallum13117]

Here are some thoughts from a guy with very little technical knowledge who just decided to boot up a fan mission...

I really loved it, and I especially love the fact that you made this with pretty much no support over the course of months. That's impressive.

Some highlights:
- The pair of Cyborg Midwives in the main map scared the shit out of me when they shot at me through the glass. I ran all the way back to the hangar at the start of the map. Good times.
- I appreciated the inclusion of already-dead Hybrids; the insanely disproportionate casualty count on the Von Braun always seemed so weird to me. Of course, I gave them a good whack to make sure they were dead
- The hangar full of Hybrids was great fun; I ubermensched and tried clearing it with all sorts of different weapons. I had a grand shootout in its adjoining hangar too.
- The two different endings were really neat.

So, yeah. I get all the negative criticism about technical shortcomings, but for the average player who doesn't make mods or FMs, this was a great pleasure to play.

[6740d6c444febchuckles n chestnuts]

Hey callum13117,

Thank you for your feedback.  A lot of your experience as you mentioned in your post was almost my exact intent for the player to experience, I am glad you liked it!

[6740d6c44549bicemann]

While I agree with your entire second statement icemann; I don't quite agree with the first one.  I think I was doing more defending for my side of the argument than taking things to heart, not sure if your aware but literally 5 minutes into me posting my FM and my first post ever on this site it was met with very knit-picky and condescending critique, so much that one of the moderators stepped in and deleted about 6 or 7 posts (yeah it got that out of hand), so I don't think you were aware of that.  And you could only imagine how one would react to those kind of post right from the get-go being their first post on a dedicated site to the same franchise they admire as well and contributed fan content to it.

From memory there was a question from someone about the FM (which could have been taken about 5 different ways depending on how you read it) and then a whole heap of deletions, but perhaps I missed the posts, if which is the case then fair enough.

And either way I don't want to bring back up old events. Best to all just move on and live long and prosper. And make more FMs :p.

[6740d6c44579dAurora]

I just finished Blind Disposition today. I was not aware there were two endings, but I ended up in the cyberspace one.

I very much enjoyed the challenging difficulty; this FM forced me to learn to play better, making use of all items and every bit of ammunition that was provided. Admittedly I did savescum a bit with turrets and robots, but towards the end of it I found myself needing to do so less and less.

There was a wide range of weapons and playstyles to choose from; you could invest in using one of the big guns, go for psi powers, or to have a balanced loadout of pistol + shotgun + GL. I went with the latter option. Often I found myself running out of inventory space, but this is probably down to hoarding too much stuff, when I should have made a more distinct choice of what to go for.

Something about the level design I ought to mention is how some areas are only accessible through a single hallway. This turns the game's combat into a corridor shooter, turning the same corner time and again to take shots against turrets or slowly approaching robots. I recommend adding two or more paths into the same area; this destroys the bottleneck and lets the player flank the enemy and the enemy to sneak behind the player.

The atmosphere was alright. The visuals were plain in terms of geometric detail, there were many overly stretched objects, and sound could have been used more, especially some background music. All that is somewhat compensated for by the colourfulness of the areas. Unlike for example UNN Nightwalker where the aesthetic is so uniform that you could barely tell any of the dark grey corridors apart, the areas in Blind Disposition were diverse and unique from each other, each with its own theme and set of colours much like the original SS2 campaign. What stood out the most was the cyberspace part, which was very interesting and felt like a really good acid trip.

Unlike some, I didn't see a problem with the walking distances nor the scale of the FM. Sure there were long corridors, but so did the original campaign. Only here the geometry is very simple as mentioned above, so I can see that being a bit boring visually and as such tedious to traverse.

Keep up the good work. 

[6740d6c445afeAurora]

Must also add;

- The pair of Cyborg Midwives in the main map scared the shit out of me when they shot at me through the glass. I ran all the way back to the hangar at the start of the map. Good times.

I was also frightened by this, and by the rumbler you unexpectedly come across. That became somewhat less frightening when I learned how to easily kill the midwives without taking any damage, which is to melee them while crouching in front of them. That is obviously a flaw with SS2 itself however.

[6740d6c446180chuckles n chestnuts]

I just finished Blind Disposition today. I was not aware there were two endings, but I ended up in the cyberspace one.

I very much enjoyed the challenging difficulty; this FM forced me to learn to play better, making use of all items and every bit of ammunition that was provided. Admittedly I did savescum a bit with turrets and robots, but towards the end of it I found myself needing to do so less and less.

There was a wide range of weapons and playstyles to choose from; you could invest in using one of the big guns, go for psi powers, or to have a balanced loadout of pistol + shotgun + GL. I went with the latter option. Often I found myself running out of inventory space, but this is probably down to hoarding too much stuff, when I should have made a more distinct choice of what to go for.

Something about the level design I ought to mention is how some areas are only accessible through a single hallway. This turns the game's combat into a corridor shooter, turning the same corner time and again to take shots against turrets or slowly approaching robots. I recommend adding two or more paths into the same area; this destroys the bottleneck and lets the player flank the enemy and the enemy to sneak behind the player.

The atmosphere was alright. The visuals were plain in terms of geometric detail, there were many overly stretched objects, and sound could have been used more, especially some background music. All that is somewhat compensated for by the colourfulness of the areas. Unlike for example UNN Nightwalker where the aesthetic is so uniform that you could barely tell any of the dark grey corridors apart, the areas in Blind Disposition were diverse and unique from each other, each with its own theme and set of colours much like the original SS2 campaign. What stood out the most was the cyberspace part, which was very interesting and felt like a really good acid trip.

Unlike some, I didn't see a problem with the walking distances nor the scale of the FM. Sure there were long corridors, but so did the original campaign. Only here the geometry is very simple as mentioned above, so I can see that being a bit boring visually and as such tedious to traverse.

Keep up the good work. 

Hey I am glad you liked my FM Aurora and thanks for your feedback!

As far as plain terrain, yeah I can see that being an issue here and I agree (I am kind of a novice with good terrain carving in dromED, but hopefully that will improve over time).

And in regards to corridor shooter, yeah I'll admit it was somewhat linear, but I tried to add alot of rooms for the player to explore, and I tried to make some variety with the two separate endings, but I will also agree that in retrospect some of the level editing choices did make the game feel linear.

And as for your comment on colourfulness, I am glad you admired my choice of chromatics because I spent alot (and I mean ALOT) of time getting the light just right for each area, to add more emphasis and depth to the areas.

And as for the difficulty, I really did try to make it somewhat geared towards dedicated or experienced shock players, but I think the standard/GL or just pure standard route is very much doable on normal mode even for less-seasoned SS2 vets.

But as far as geometrics and less bottlenecking goes, I will definitely take your comment on that into consideration as I agree with you on that very much!

I appreciate your honest critique and welcome your encouragement! 

Edit: and one of these days I plan to do a psi-only speedrun of my FM and post it on the youtube 

[6740d6c4462baicemann]

If you want to go for an ultra challenge, try doing it pacifist style and see if it's do-able. I'm assuming it's not possible with your FM, but a guy managed to make it 3/4 through vanilla SS2 without killing a single enemy himself (he got the enemies to kill each other).

[6740d6c4465fcKolya]

That became somewhat less frightening when I learned how to easily kill the midwives without taking any damage, which is to melee them while crouching in front of them. That is obviously a flaw with SS2 itself however.

This has been fixed in a few other mods. Zygoptera was the first to do it IIRC. Pretty sure the fix ended up in ADaoB and probably in SCP.
There's a single file responsible for NPC motions that should include this fix. Motions.db I think.

[6740d6c44676aZylonBane]

Motiondb.bin.

[6740d6c4469e7callum13117]

If you want to go for an ultra challenge, try doing it pacifist style and see if it's do-able. I'm assuming it's not possible with your FM, but a guy managed to make it 3/4 through vanilla SS2 without killing a single enemy himself (he got the enemies to kill each other).

Yeah, the ShepardReborn playthrough is pretty incredible. Although story-wise, pacifism makes little sense, since most of your enemies are either robots or demented zombies screaming "KILL MEEEEE!!!!"

[6740d6c446d7cvoodoo47]

Blind Disposition v1.2 is currently up as of yesterday.

well then, after a very quick look;

-the earth level has no lighting.
-sound propagation and lighting still broken around the first level toilets (and other places as well, most likely. view -> show/hide - bad rooms in any modern version of Shocked. seeing pink is bad).
-keycards now work as they should, but the second slot on the first level (obj 125) only says "access needed", without saying what kind of access is needed. a custom MISC.STR required, with Access4:"SECURITY2" (or "BANANAS" or whatever you want) line added.
-in the second level, you can frob the broken door (92) and they will disappear, as they have frobinfo/worldaction/delete set. no door (and probably any other sane object) should have this set (unless it's part of some very intentional setup).
-bad texturing on door alcoves (ahh, fixed so many of those when working on original levels).
-a lot of wormgoos float off their surfaces, and are reversed.

attaching a map where I fixed the bad lighting, sound propagation, door location and door alcoves (jump to obj 695 and compare to the original).
[testnextlevel_lightfix.7z expired]

[6740d6c447298chuckles n chestnuts]

well then, after a very quick look;

-the earth level has no lighting.
-sound propagation and lighting still broken around the first level toilets (and other places as well, most likely. view -> show/hide - bad rooms in any modern version of Shocked. seeing pink is bad).
-keycards now work as they should, but the second slot on the first level (obj 125) only says "access needed", without saying what kind of access is needed. a custom MISC.STR required, with Access4:"SECURITY2" (or "BANANAS" or whatever you want) line added.
-in the second level, you can frob the broken door (92) and they will disappear, as they have frobinfo/worldaction/delete set. no door (and probably any other sane object) should have this set (unless it's part of some very intentional setup).
-bad texturing on door alcoves (ahh, fixes so many of those when working on original levels).
-a lot of wormgoos float off their surfaces, and are reversed.

attaching a map where I fixed the bad lighting, sound propagation, door location and door alcoves (jump to obj 695 and compare to the original).

Yeah, I did notice the keycard nuance and just assumed it was normal (wasn't really sure, I am not a dev).  And as for the floating worm goo's I didn't notice much if any of that (perhaps they were very slightly floating).  And as far as sound brushes goes, yes, in the first level I am aware of the no-sound in the bathroom.  I thought it was just that texture and I decided to keep it because I liked the way the tile looked.  And as far as my custom soil texture goes (which you didn't mention but I'll mention it) I tried REALLY hard to get the 'Material Earth' sound for texture archetypes to work but to no avail, but again, I figured I would keep it as pure 'soil' I suppose can get away with little to no sound.

In closing, to the untrained eye, and even trained eye, about 3/4 of what you mentioned or even more, the average player for sure will not notice (this does not mean it should not be fixed).  And a trained eye (depending upon depth of knowledge) may notice (I did notice but I felt it was sufficable and definately playable and not immersion or game breaking).  For example, alot of the fixed room brushes (which I fixed and have in the changelog) no casual player will ever notice that except for a slight strange glitch in radmap but it takes some wierd maneuvering to do (I tested it).  Again doesn't mean it should not be fixed though.  Thanks for your input and fixes though.

Edit: I'll take a look at the fix you did later on tonight after I get off work.  Again thank you Voodoo

[6740d6c447790voodoo47]

sure.

I thought it was just that texture and I decided to keep it because I liked the way the tile looked.  And as far as my custom soil texture goes (which you didn't mention but I'll mention it) I tried REALLY hard to get the 'Material Earth' sound for texture archetypes to work but to no avail, but again, I figured I would keep it as pure 'soil' I suppose can get away with little to no sound.

I've got no idea what you are talking about there. anyway;

-have SHTUP loaded when working with goos, it gives them more depth, making it much easier to see whether they are positioned correctly.
-texture and lighting problems are quite noticeable even for casual players (especially when using hires texture mods), and they really are better off fixed.
-same goes for objects floating off surfaces, it's not a problem if it's just a few pixels, but some are way more off than that.
-the earth level 0,0,0 is in mid air and not in a blue room, but as this is not a playable level, it shouldn't matter too much.
-the no-bulkhead load zones still annoying.

did notice a few basic logs, definitely a step in the right direction, even though they do feel a bit on the rough edge (no portraits, and linguistically imperfect). not sure whether I will have enough time for a serious playthrough, being yanked around between way too many things these days.

also, yes to the reduced spawn rates.

[6740d6c447c76ZylonBane]

And as far as my custom soil texture goes (which you didn't mention but I'll mention it) I tried REALLY hard to get the 'Material Earth' sound for texture archetypes to work but to no avail, but again, I figured I would keep it as pure 'soil' I suppose can get away with little to no sound.

Eh? All you have to do is find the texture name in the texture hierarchy (F5 -> Show Tree: Textures) and drag it under "EarthTex".

And for the love of christ don't use BMP for textures.

EDIT: I see, that texture archetype has ended up under Missing in the gamesys instead of in the Texture tree. You probably saved the mission after adding that texture but didn't save the gamesys. To fix it, go to Edit -> Purge Lost Objects. Go into game mode. Exit back to DromEd. "dirtydirty" will now be listed under the Texture hierarchy and can be dragged under EarthTex. Then save your gamesys. This gamesys will have to be distributed with the mission. You should do this fix for every other terrain texture you added as well.

[6740d6c447f6avoodoo47]

that texture archetype has ended up under Missing in the gamesys

the fm has no gamesys of its own (as mentioned earlier, you actually can grab the SCP gamesys, rename it to shock2.gam, drop it into the fm root folder and get instant cool stuff), so no surprise.

[6740d6c4483b0chuckles n chestnuts]

sure.I've got no idea what you are talking about there. anyway;

-have SHTUP loaded when working with goos, it gives them more depth, making it much easier to see whether they are positioned correctly.
-texture and lighting problems are quite noticeable even for casual players (especially when using hires texture mods), and they really are better off fixed.
-same goes for objects floating off surfaces, it's not a problem if it's just a few pixels, but some are way more off than that.
-the earth level 0,0,0 is in mid air and not in a blue room, but as this is not a playable level, it shouldn't matter too much.
-the no-bulkhead load zones still annoying.

did notice a few basic logs, definitely a step in the right direction, even though they do feel a bit on the rough edge (no portraits, and linguistically imperfect). not sure whether I will have enough time for a serious playthrough, being yanked around between way too many things these days.

also, yes to the reduced spawn rates.

Hey thanks for the info Voodoo, I appreciate it, I'll get to working on it right now and give an update, I'll most likely just use your map for testnextlevel and as for the goo's yeah I'll do that, and Zylonbane thanks for your advice too..but I feel you need this video:

So from Chuckles to ZylonBane here is my video for you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=he_Dtz3X7B4

[6740d6c4484c4Kolya]

I'll rather be in Nice than being nice.


//Thank you. I'll see myself out. 

[6740d6c448739chuckles n chestnuts]

I'll rather be in Nice than being nice.


//Thank you. I'll see myself out. 

lol I don't quite understand the meaning of that Koyla, do you mean be in Nice like in the city Nice, France?  That must be a local term or something , I've never heard that.  I am just big on courtesy when it is due or reciprocated.  I don't know about you but I would rather spread courtesy than contempt you know?

But I don't wanna turn this thread about chicken soup for the soul lol.  I've got some fixes to do!  Either way thanks for you input, even though I don't quite get it.

[6740d6c448853voodoo47]

yeah, I'm pretty sure an annoying video is EXACTLY what will melt everyone's heart.

aanyway, make sure to update to the latest version of the editor if you are about to use the level I posted (SS2tool). also, I find the level name (testnextlevel) strangely irritating.

[6740d6c448affchuckles n chestnuts]

yeah, I'm pretty sure an annoying video is EXACTLY what will melt everyone's heart.

aanyway, make sure to update to the latest version of the editor if you are about to use the level I posted (SS2tool). also, I find the level name (testnextlevel) strangely irritating.

Well, it was supposed to be a joke.  But all sarcasm aside, I have the latest version of dromED and updated it with the SS2tool less than a month ago are there any real changes?  Also, this question might be late but, when I "finalize" that builds EVERYTHING including lights correct?  (The reason I ask this is I plan to change the goo's and maybe a few more things then finalize but I don't want to screw up your work.. oh and sidenote I will give you credit in the .txt release for v1.3 once its out).  Let me know sir.  Thank you in advance.

[6740d6c448c29voodoo47]

yeah, there actually have been udates to Shocked cfgs not long ago, and as I have used that when editing the map, you should do too, to be safe.

if you want to finalize a map, you just fire up the build dialogue, select optimized, set shadow type to terrain+objects and that should be all (well, setting lightmap to 32bit would be nice as well).

[6740d6c448ec5chuckles n chestnuts]

yeah, there actually have been udates to Shocked cfgs no long ago, and as I have used that when editing the map, you should do too, to be safe.

if you want to finalize a map, you just fire up the build dialogue, select optimized, set shadow type to terrain+objects and that should be all (well, setting lightmap to 32bit would be nice as well).

Thank you, I will actually save this comment and add it to my long, long list of 'shockED notes'.  Will do here real soon and possibly repost either within a few hours (if we're lucky), tomorrow, or the day after.