Nah you're right, I am unable to do many things, but getting rid of people who think they know everything about a subject because they drew some cocks on a white paper concerning the subject is luckily one of my specialties. But I'll retort nicely and give a counter argument: No, the Source engine is not essentially a blank slate for highly experienced coders. There are many hard limits, such as edicts, both local and networked, being limited to 2048. The PVS system also limits or prohibits several optimizations in networking and graphics. The BSP format that Source uses isn't built for large, open areas, although visclusters have helped out in that department. There are many more trivial engine-set limits, such as sound crossfading distances being hardcoded. Ramming in a new renderer or anything similar to that will cause VAC to be activated, something you may recognize as being very, very bad.
I did not mean to insult. I just hate it when people say stuff can't be done. Yes with limited access that modders have it would be difficult.But there is always the option of getting full access to the code. By part time devs I mean unlike normal game developing where you have a full team of people working around the clock. Empires devs basically have lives and do this in their spare time. I do appreciate all the work the devs do. This is the best mod on the source engine.
If you want to pay £50,000+ for full access, and then pay at least £20 to actually buy Empires after that, then be my guest.
Empires is definitely a game I wouldn't mind paying $50 for. As for the $82,000 I am sure with the right business plan Empires team would have no problem getting financed. It would just take growing the population massively. Possibly start by buying some decent advertising.
I appreciate your change of tone, and will follow suit. Unfortunately, even with full access to the engine, some things would still hamper us, like the BSP format. Of course, we could then stick in a completely new map format and assorted tools, but in the end, isn't that why you pay for a game engine license, to not have to write all that stuff? :p It's also worth mentioning that computers and the study of them is hardly a century old, and because progress is made at incredible speeds, a person's knowledge about the subject becomes outdated in mere years, many technologies becoming obsolete. Code written today will probably be considered stone-age stuff in thirty years. Luckily, the Source engine is very modular, and Valve has done a great job at updating it accordingly. Too bad modders are stuck with a version of the engine that is five years old, and when a new version comes out, we'll have to port everything once again Unfortunately, our technical debt probably easily supercedes that figure. If we were aiming for a commercial game, rewriting the game completely and even moving to a new engine would be a far better choice. That Wikipedia page also suggests a link to the very aptly named antipattern Big Ball Of Mud, which really is how a big part of the code looks like. MOOtant refactored (=rewrote) many parts but a lot of stuff was so precariously mashed together that even rewriting pretty simple things was time consuming.
I know how that feels. Im in the process of converting some old VB6 code to C++ OOP and its a frigging headache. Its no where near the size of empires but, every function depends on 7 other functions and all variables are global. Changing one fictions breaks all the other functions. The code was written by teenagers fresh out of programming class. I can attest that recoding another persons/teams code can be a damn headache. Im ready to throw it in and just code it from scratch since I have the VB6 code to know what the program "should" do.
No that's probably us raping the sound system with fifty million identical sounds. Actually, if you play a sound twenty times in a three-second time span you're bound to get this sort of static I think Oh and the effect that the hardcoded value has is that the "far-away" version of a sound plays after like 2500 units already, while we would probably like it to be around 5000 units or something
Yea but usually only from the side. TBH I dont think I have ever killed anyone in a jeep from in front or behind, only from the side because there is no door.
This research tree: http://www.forums.empiresmod.com/showthread.php?t=11435#post265312 EDIT: Actually scratch that, just the awesome weapons in that research tree. SECOND EDIT: No, this: http://forums.empiresmod.com/showthread.php?t=9760
Jeeps with a model of a lvl 3 MG on the back, with two, 3 slot mounts for heavy machineguns. needs moar rape. Dual heavy DU jeeps or dual Bio MG, dual HEMG would be interesting too.
I remember playing Weedy's modded version of Empires with Riot tanks (Meds with APC turrets on top), which just had 2x 2 slot MG. My god.
Yeah, I've wondered what would happen if there was an APC variant with 2x2 machine guns (and no nade slot). Just allowing dual chaingun on anything faster than a heavy would completely murder any hint of balance. Biodiesel would become my favorite engine ever. You know what would be fun? A map like vehicle training, but with only 2-slot DU jeeps. Zooming around spraying each other would be boss.
-Grens have the ability to rocket jump. -Mines go back to being regular pressure activated mines not fucking proxy mines. -Empires community actually getting along? Solution? divide by zero? -Tribes style jet packs and anti friction ski thingamajigs. -Remove the scout class.
