(December 16 to December 22, 2013)
Welcome dear readers to the latest issue of the Weekly Gazette! Here in the Gazette, we give you the news in brief of what occurred in the past week as well as provide any news happening in Save-Point itself
Official Area
Occasions
This week, we've seen a number of birthdays arrive. It started off when inominavel07 and Midnite Reaper shared the same birthday. A couple days later, Flynn Rock, Flying Rock and Rylix had a birthday in common. And lastly, the birthdays of Hatsurugi, ZeroSum, dewanto, Rizzuccio, madd42 and WrinkleMoose had passed.
General Chat
Sometimes you just want to kick back, relax, and just get to know your fellow members. That is one of the good things about the forum is that you can always find out What's on their mind, both during their times of joy or periods of sadness. It was a disheartening moment for Charlie Fleed this week when he discovered that his site, Planet Fleed was deleted for inactivity. Not only had that affiliate forum disappeared, but Steel Beast 6Beets also noticed that gMaker and Legacy Studios are now gone. But DerVVulfman claimed he had spoken to Legacy and he has some ideas in mind. Later on, DerVVulfman described the annoyance he went through being a prosecution witness in a court case, and is apparently not a morning person. In a like manner, JayRay described his own annoyance being the only technical support employee to show at Dell when everyone else decided they couldn't make it to work after a wintery icefall. On a separate note, Ahzoh described with exacting detail, a phonological chart of his constructed language and described the differences in articulated language sounds from vocal to voiceless and beyond.
Games Development
Development Discussion
If you want to play catch up with your fellow game making members, a good way is fo find out What's Up in their RPG GameMaking endeavors. Right now Steel Beast 6Beets ran into a glitch with his game. Once he worked on his game's bestiary, a number of them dies from single-hit attacks regardless of their HP and is very much confused and annoyed. Kain thought that Steel Beast 6Beets could have accidentally attached a 'Death' state to one of the weapons to cause the one-hit kill problem. Along with that, he was curious where he got the avatar. Meanwhile, MechanicalPen wondered if the bestiary could have inaverdantly reset the enemy's HP by accident. Steel Beast 6Beets returned to mention that his avatar came from Metal Slug, an Arcade game from SNK. And as to his one hit problem, he also mentioned that he thankfully had a backup. And he discovered that he indeed had a script that altered the max HP of his enemies, so his problem has been rectified. Meanwhile, Planning ahead is what Kain Nobel is doing as he's set objectives for the first quarter of 2014, filling his time with battlesystem changes, spriting battler sheets, composing music and the study of Java/Ruby. And with his battlers, he is working out the usage of ccoa's dynamic sprite strips per battler to allow more flexibility in the number of frames rather than a static designed sheet.
If you visit the Maps and screenshots thread, you will see a swampland with raised cliff walls, which KasperKalamity said was nearly done.
Have you seen any Animals that should be monsters? If so, then you may wish to see the thread where KasperKalamity invited everyone to post pictures of whatever creature you feel would make for a good enemy. He started off with a black and white shot of a very odd squid. After that, the brightly colored insect that JayRay posted was called the spiny flower mantis. And Pherione posted a shot of the Blue Angel sea snail.
Upcoming Projects
Charlie Fleed is looking for volunteers to test Hartacon Tactics, an XBOX Live Indie Game, before it is publically released. Pherione was enthusiastic and received a PM from Charlie for the download. Not long after that, he put forth a link for a playable demo for others interested. KasperKalamity was curious if a Playstation 3 version was available, but Charlie Fleed made no development for that platform.
Innovation comes in many forms and in many ways. It is then no surprise that a dream led JayRay to imagine a way to keep the filesize, and thus the download, for Roguehaven relatively low. Much in the same way as Dragon Age, he intends to use a world map navigation system that can take the player to various plot points, some only accessible when unlocked. He is still looking for some world creations tools to craft the environments of his games, wishing to avoid a tile-esque lok.
Code Support
DerVVulfman wished to assist Pherione as he asked for help with a Respawn script at Tigereye, but was apparently confused by the system constantly returning to the Game Over screen just as Pherione described. He tried doublechecking various facets such as actor hit points, ailments, and event the routine that flags if the party is dead, and was getting nowhere. Though apparently reluctant, he decided to post a link to a replacement which he created. Pherione thanked DerVVulfman for his assistance and for the use of his script which functions smoothly.
While dealing with BigAce's Warrior engine, firevenge007 ran afoul of a Cannot convert fixnum into string message. He had tried solving the issue himself, but had no luck. He had posted a link to his Scripts.Rxdata file of which MechanicalPen took a look, but couldn't assertain the extent of the issue as he didn't have a working demo to examine. Since then, MechanicalPen accepted a request by Firevenge007 to examine his project to resolve the issue.
Tutorials
JayRay posted a pdf tutorial, Terrains with Cliffs by Stephan Petersson, a 45 page guide for those wishing to render landscapes with cliffs and/or multiple levels.
JayRay also continued his discussion on 3D Rendered Realism in RPGMaker VXAce, discussing in Part II the means to render 3D graphics using tools such as Blender, 3DMax and TurboSquid. He points out various things to consider such as the proper angle for rendered graphics, using a mapshot or screenshot to create a paralla map, and other niceties. After that, he went into Part III which discussed interaction with the map's objects.
Material Development
Event Systems Database
Two weeks ago, urbios released a demo showing off an evented add-on for the FPLE v2 system, though it was placed in the Scripts Database category. This week, he returned with the H-mode7 urbicubs engine, a collection of scripts revolving around MGC's HMode7 system, and another event system which urbios crafted. And like his previous work, this too was moved out of the Scripts Database and into the one specified for Event Systems. DerVVulfman suggested adding more instructions into his event code to make it user friendly. And upon seeing it, the thoughs of Flight Simulators entered JayRay's mind.
Scripts Database
While it wasn't originally posted in the Scripts board, JayRay discovered a 3D Dungeon demo which he said rivaled or exceeded the First Person Labyrinth Engine by MGC. Written by by Sabakan for RPGMaker VXAce, the link which JayRay provided went to a blog documenting it's development while DerVVulfman provided the link which is currently working.
Resources Database
Last week, JayRay unveiled the Da Vinci Sprite Template starting off with Alexander, his basic male characterset. This week, it was Adriana's turn, though JayRay feels that she may still look pixelated. But not only did JayRay upload the sprites, but he released cloth templates which members may use to create custom clothing which JayRay can take and render at will. DerVVulfman wondered whether JayRay could supply another template, something more for robes. In reply, JayRay stated that other clothing templates were already in the works, and told DerVVulfman a PM was in the way to inquire about formatting threads.
Resource Requests
Ahzoh was wondering if anyone could craft a Tileset of buildings in Gothic Architecture, particularly within a darker environment and to include the colors of his game's national flag. A couple of changes he inquired would be that the typical cross or religious symbol normally atop spires be replaced with the symbol in his game's national flag, and that the terrain styling would be akin to a mountaintop region, possibly with snow patches, some snow-affected plants and grassy areas and the like. As the game he is crafting is non-commercial, he will see no income from the game, thus no pay. However, he would give due and proper credit to the artist.
Meanwhile, Grael discovered that ntzrmtthihu777 uploaded the Final Fantasy IX Sprites which have been hidden on the internet. Unfortunately, the dropbox link wend town and Grael wondered if it could be updated.
Creativity Section
Literature Section
While many may know 'Belly of the Beast' as one of Kain Nobel's gaming projects, they may not know that Echoside isn't merely an album that he is composing, but another RPG project. He has been developing the story and overall concept for years, and now would like to present Echoside: The Shorts, a series of short story samples from his game. His first sample is entitled "A Request from the Next Mr. President" and would like opinions and perhaps some predictions how people may think things may turn out. Based on the reception, he hopes to release another piece within a week or so.
Special Projects
ReGaL (RPG Game Lab)
The Talk Box
Just as Kain Nobel described how his other projects helped out Regarding ReGaL's development, so too did DerVVulfman express how his own project helped to make advances in ReGaL's default script set. And as Kain mentioned talk of learning a new programming language, so did DerVVulfman, though he seems to be looking forward to it more than Kain Nobel. But not all has been mere discussion as the default scripts now includes an actual A* (a star) Pathfinding system which functions with the previously applied map looping system. But work continued as an adjustable anti-lag feature was installed and tested with nearly a thousand events. DerVVulfman cited that there didn't seem to be any lag with a map holding 300 events, but the new system can allow roughly 800 events to be available in a map with almost no lag when using new anti-lag system. DerVVulfman also confirmed that the anti-lag system does take looping maps into account.
Well, that's it for this week.
"I've only been doing this fifty-four years. With a little experience, I might get better." - Harry Caray (1914-1998)
PROSPECTIVE GAZETEERS!
If you are the creator of a thread in Save-Point, you have the option of sending/writing your own entry into the Gazette. The Gazette accepts write-in announcements (which will be doublechecked). Likewise, the Gazette would welcome other content such as a comic-strip series, ongoing story arc, or the like.
Just PM DerVVulfman with the submissions. Submissions must be in by 10pm EST.