Monday, October 13, 2014

How owning virtual goods can lower your materialism

I need this, I need that. Everybody needs things and wants to own kewl stuff. Most people would luxury their apperance with glamour fashion or enhance their house hold, others would buy sports cars. The world is filled with endless numbers of fancy things. Our egoistic point of view let's us build sand castles and indeed this is pure materialism.


(Well, not really – and that's the point)


Me, me, me. Hmm, or maybe a Me-410? Maybe a Galaxy Class spaceship. Uh wow, a Nimitz Class Carrier. Ah, I allways wanted a Learjet. I need that stuff, I need it!! But wait, I'm no pilot nor a BigShip Captain, dang it.

Now instead of spending money on things you don't really need how about spending money or grind time for things you entirely ain't needing at all? That's right, virtual goods, LadGents. They make you feel happy and they don't stand around when you get bored of them. Some spend millions on ingame items, which is no different to beeing fanatic with something. But heres the point, I think it's not bad to move someones need for material goods into the virtual world. Maybe it's because those people may have understood that you can't allways get what you want, especially in real life. If you ask me if Porsche or Spaceship guess what my answer would be. Real life is limited, your virtual Avatar is pure fantasy and that's exactly what provides endless possibilities to gain access to dreamy stuff.


People that don't have much are happy with less. Theres nothing more to say. Grind on, LadGents.


Saturday, October 4, 2014

Pimping Google Earth's Flightsim

That's a little of a kinda old topic. Did you see the new feature where GoogleMaps look GTA style? Well, maybe only in particular or as some early state dev showcase. I duno but that reminds me that GoogleEarth offers some vehicle driving fun and this keeps this piece of software insteresting for me (while Google might launch a game based on GoogleMaps sooner or later, who knows).


(Ay, flying in space is a different topic)

A GoogleEarth community mod for it's flight sim part
We all know the flight simulator that comes with GoogleEarth but did you know that it's one of the most sophisticated flightsims around? It goes far beyond the basic keyboard setup and grants a very detailed flight model. It's tricky to fly but the only place where the maps are real including heightmaps and 3D buildings and so on. But theres only a HUD, not even a cockpit. And there are only two planes to play with. Guess what, there is a way to mod it and theres a set that may contain your favorite sightseeing aircraft. However, the graphic detail is simple and I have no info on the flight model.

This makes GoogleEarth's Flightsim feel more fun
Now, instead of having a boring flight experience, add-load a plane, activate it's animations and press "H" to get rid of the HUD, niiice! There is a set of aircraft included, e.g. the "Super Connie", the Twincopter "Osprey", a F-Jet, a BF 109 or a 747. Skilled Modders could even add more planes.

The installation could not be made easier 
It's: Download > pick a planes texture size (big or standard) > double click on it (it's a Google Earth *.kmz file type) > have fun!

Heres the link with a instalattion guide

Comments
This is more or less a Reblog with my own words since the original topic from Amir B is quite old now and I guess not many people stumbled upon his outstanding solution. It's free and fun. It's not perfect, it just enhances your GoogleEarth experience. Oh and I found another approach on the web but the website of it was down. I will continue looking around and if I find something I will update this post.


Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Free Head Tracking alternatives

While TrackIR ain't that new to us and Oculus Rift is something relatively new, how about some free head tracking solution that uses the webcam instead of external hardware? Heres a little review of such optical motion tracking applications. 

(Things will be different in the year 3000)


Where was that button again? 
It keeps me strugglin. I'm playing so many different vid games that sometimes I forget my controller and keyboard setup. In general, this whole thing makes me sick, it could be so simple: All I need to do is to take a look around the map, especially when playing in cockpit mode. Are buttons a must? Not at all – thanks to everything we life in middle of the future and here we can find nerdish solutions for a better digital lifestyle. So, let's give it a try.

Test experience
Starting with a headbanging session and yeah it works! The download was easy but the installation needs some attention. It seems lots of games support this type of input methods. I also tried this with War Thunder and it was big fun. However, it could lower your ingame FPS (depends). The decision about the right software is a question of choice since both have a unique set of features. Which software fits best, you might ask.

FreeTrack
This software piece can also be used for a better computer accessibility as a kind of input device. It runs with a standard webcam and FreeTrack states the the majority of webcams work with their solution. It uses markers to track your heads movements. Conclusion: You will need to put something onto your head, so in order to make it work you could wear a Headset or a hat. Those markers could be a infrared source, a LED or some retroflective surface material. Freetrack offers a Single Point mode, a 3 Points Clip mode, a Points Cap or 4 Points Cap mode. On their website theres a so called "LED Assembly Wizard" that will teach you how to do the LED part. For a list of supported video games check this link.

FaceTrackNoIR
This software works without a marker. You don't need anything besides a webcam. Also, it can track multiple objects at the same time. It runs with a lot of so called "Protocols" that grant many type of use. You have to choose one of the Trackers and this also means a bit of cunsumption for your individual setup. Then you can pick Filters as presets for different environments (e.g. dark places). This piece of software is modular so we can expect further improvements. FaceTrackNoIR supports about 400 different video games having a special workaround for non-supported games, too. Heres a huge list of supported titles.

Thoughts
In the past, I did a couple of projects with the MS Kinect system and compared to that those free tracking methods are not that sophisticated but at least a cheap workaround that really can be recommended for a better gameplay. But: This might not work in dark rooms or inside a nerds lightless room where theres no way to find the potatoe chips. I'm not sure about the impression we leave to people watching us play like that – it looks a bit strange I guess. And the biggest question that remains ununanswered: What's next, no more buttons? TrackSteering?

Find out more and download one of both:
FreeTrack 
FaceTrackNoIR


Note: As usual this ain't gonna work with Macs or Linux OS.



Robot Simulator – Domo arigato Mr. Roboto?

This time around I'm gonna review one of those very special Simulators. Yeah, strange things exist but this software could be quite usefull for you. LadsGents, get to know about Robot Simulator.

(I like to move move it, you like to: MOVE IT!)

Why crashtest bots in real life?
I once had RC stuff like helicopters and RC cars but I selled them because I knew if I would try to steer those things, they would crash the hard way. The only thing I was able to fly was a pair of robo-birds and they got attacked by cats and dogs. You guess it, in a video game such problems don't even exist and in my opinion the respawn part is the best thing at it. And yeah, the industry also does it that way, using their highly advanced Simulation environments before testing things in reality.

"It's a game". No, it's not, but it's fun + it's educational
This game comes from the developer of the almost unkown but very good Vehicle Simulator and the Virtual Sailor. It is like a Sandbox for your robotics projects. You can build robots, add code and test the whole thing within a scenery of choice. The physics engine acts like real stuff. The DirectX 9 delivers proper graphics and the integrated voice-speech is fun, too. A good Joystick support is also part of the whole thing.

Two choices: Control the robot or make it run artifical
You will need a basic knowledge of the programming language BASIC but you don't have to know much since there are many sliders and options on screen that allow a simple and fast control over the robots. Every axis can be adjusted by the user. On the other hand you can plot courses and create a semi intelligent bots that do what you want them to.

Robot types
Different types of robots are included along with components and tutorials. Those given robots are big fun. You can play with a desktop size rocket, a car that has laser, a tank like moving bot, a LED board of even a robotic spider.

Many possibilities

  • You could create your own drones and toys.
  • You could create a Tele Presence system like Sheldon from Big Bang Theory.
  • You could create a kitchen service buttler bot.
  • Unfortunately, the creation of FemBots seems to be impossible.

Summary
This game is not for free but you can use the base version with only a little of limitations. The full version can be ordered for 20 bucks. I recommend to download the Demo first. This way you could sneak into it and play around and in best case it wont be boring (depends on you). I still need to learn more about this Sim but one thing is for sure: It's better to test things inside a virtual environment.


Disclaimer: Do not create super intelligent robots, please. Scientists believe that one day robots will be more advanced than humans so let's just avoid the Matrix effect. Speaking of such, it would be wise to not introduce this Simulator to the Cleverbot because his mood is often in a bad condition and he prefers to get mad at people instead of having a good conversation. Hehe, just kidding, at least a bit. ;)


Sunday, September 21, 2014

DC S World - Now this is a real Simulator

Many of you allready heard of it – talking about the DC S World sim. It is called 'The Simulator OS'. So, in fact this will only be a little review compared to what could be said about this upcoming video game. 

(Wow, look at that plane, wow that plane)

Gameplay
Very simple: this feels real! You are inside that plane, you can only leave it with the eject seat and theres nothing you know about that plane except you took a look at the manual. This is for pro sim gamer enthusiasts and what awaits them is no 'casual gaming experience' at all. Getting to the runway takes approx. ten minutes and only in case you learned how to move that plane on the ground. There are a lot video tutorials on YouTube and they should be considered in case you want to take-off at proper safety. You have to manage your flying aswell as that planes onboard systems and Fly-by-Wire only helps in case your plane has that specific feature in real life. The multiplayer mode is a great feature and nothing that could be descibed as mandatory for such a ambitious 'non-game'.

A good reviewer should allways give a minus point, too: The buttons in the cockpit can only be pressed using the keyboard and you can not click on modules directly with the mouse. Maybe this gets improved and this ain't even a minus point since that game offers a variety of input devices.

Vehicles
One word: DLCs. But you can start for free with the Su-25, a nice solution to enter DC S World. I still don't have a clue how to fly that thing, I guess I should RTFM. You can find plenty more air vehicles, also helicopters and tanks. The most fascinating one could be the F-15 but it depends on you. In total, currently 14 vehicles (at the moment) are offered for a price that is exactly below 10 bucks.

Graphics
This game needs good graphic cards (so I can't play it). The model quality of this games vehicles is for real the max. you can get so far. DC S has a Insanely HighRes mesh and texture quality. However, the ground level detail ain't that high.

Game Engine
The developemet is steady going and makes this Simulator better – step by step. This video game, ehm I mean Simulator has great capabilities and we should give it a place in the Hall of Fame of all-virtual Simulators. The all-over aviation physics and the capability to add different input devices along with Multiplayer support speaks for itself.

Summary
This game gets my 4.8 rating out of 5 so we can assume it's a 5 Stars triple-A title worth a thousand words. It has originality and as a standalone Simulator Operating System it's definitely a good thing not needing much more extras and stuff. Since this game has a better broadcasting scala than past or unkown simulators, we can expect to hear more from DC S in the future. See you in there (you can find me parking on the ground, scratching my head on how to close that canopy).

Heres a 'trailer' kind of video from YT:

For more info, go to: digitalcombatsimulator.com

Saturday, September 20, 2014

My main inspiration is knowing a lot of ugly game assets ;]

It's sad but people like me don't have the in-depth gameplay, RPG or storyline experience. All they want to achieve is to fulfill their dreams and so they wait and wait for specific features and the things that they would shout for. Some of them read dev blogs for breakfast. Same here. Others create entire new Sagas but let's not talk about guys like Roddenberry or Lucas or Cameron again.


When I was a child gaming was a lot of fun and felt like watching a great movie. I got to be totally fascinated and the value of entertainment I had was allways good. I don't know what exactly changed but decades ago I believed that Space Invaders had very immersive graphics. Many people felt the same I guess. :] Now when playing vid games, why do I get bored so fast? I still take part as a player / grinder and yeah I still play vid games from time to time.

Today I mod more and more instead of playing. Things inspire me to create new things only because I am aware of further waiting for this and that and that. There was I time when I was thinking that someone will for sure create and publish the same thing I want. Unfortunately, this happened only a couple of times so I have to depend on myself to get what I want. I stopped to play lots of games because of that. Now I only rely on specific game engines that offer further expansion possibilities. However, I guess I should play more with the Cry engine or other engines but first things first I need to have my own wagon to drive around the maps looking for things to improve. This might be the main reason I am developing a all surface vehicle for use in different 'modable' video games.

Beeing a creative person I must have missed a lot of things along the path of entertainment. I can't continue to depend on movie makers and video game studios so I'm just another guy on the internet creating mods. There are others out there that do a kinda similar thing drawing or modeling stuff and I wish they would join us video game modders all around the web. I don't know what they play but I can see clearly that some really impressive game engines need more developers and most of all more great asset designers. If Daniel Simon decides to design ingame assets I could immediately shut down this blog. ;]


Friday, September 19, 2014

MouseKBoarders VS. Gamepads VS. Joysticks

"I ain't got better – I just changed the controller setup".

Crap, I was a X-Box gamepad user and now I play WT casual level style – only for better grinding. It's funny, with standard controller configuration you can achieve way more. This type of gameplay should be featured as 'Fly-by-Wire for retro planes'. I often wondered about the highscores, now I realize that even me can be a super air superiority ace pilot having multiple win streaks in a row. 

This topic has been on my mind since some time. The whole situation can not be changed, we've come too far – so here is a little fact sheet – just in case other players call me a n00b again (those b00ns):


Fact #1
Owners of command chairs know that such types of simulators can do serious stuff.

Fact #2
Joysticks players are on a pro sim level.

Fact #3
Gamepad users have the better comfort and good precision.

Fact #4
Users of mouse and keyboard allways win.

Fact #5
n00bs use preset steering assistance in video games to outmatch us all!!


Wednesday, September 17, 2014

New blog layout

This blogs layout slighty changed. It's looking a little bit better now. The glow effects might be able to lower your browsers FPS (actually, they are not intended to be lens flares). The Special FX is only visible to Chrome browsers atm. Beware slow PCs (like my Laptop). Enjoy and read a bit – new contents have been added, too. While I still need to go back in time to resolve some misspellings you may find some good readings in here. Downloadable stuff will be added in case this blog will not suffer at this nerdy corner of special interest. Oh, the new background image is a long time experiment on JPEG-compression – will it blend? Hint: Check the poll on the right side. And BTW: Bring back SG-1, SG-A and most of all MGM Studios.

McKay to Shepard: Will there be a aftershow?
Shepard: More Online Marketing, McKay, now!

Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Magic Tutorial: How to get your own War Thunder base skin

(the result could be something like this, I prefer to leave some space on the skin to apply ingame decals. A reason for shame is that I choosed the wrong plane for this tutorial. This way my fantastic Do 217 looks a bit strange but that's a different topic).

This is the professional way of quick modding. You can now easily skin every plane with the best result. It also helps a lot when creating your own paints / skins – having a base texture without preset markings and disturbing paint.

Requirements:
- Photoshop CS2 (at least) or Gimp
- A War Thunder installation
- A Plane of your choice

Step 1:
Select a plane and click 'Customization'. Now enable the User skin by pressing the arrow button on the right. It will create a subfolder with the planes skin name inside WT's User skin folder. A dialog screen will appear, click OK. Allright, done?

Step 2: 
Go to the WT folder and enter it's subfolder called '\UserSkins' and enter the newly spawned subsubfolder (you may have to reload the folder with keyboard 'F5').

Open this file by right clicking and selecting the graphic software of choice: Grab the file with the ending *_n.jpg or *_n.tga (wait, you don't have name suffix activated? Uhhh, common hehehe – well, just grab the '_n' file ;)

Example: do_217j_1_u.tjpg 

And now open: _c or _a or whatever else theres a file for. Open it the same way you opened the previous file (don't worry if theres only a _a or only a _c along with a _n).

Step 3:
Gimp or PS is running and you opened both files. Make sure the layer module is visible under 'View > Layers'. Now unlock the layer by doubled clicking on the small locked icon (counts for PS). Do that for both images (wait a second Gimp users. ;)

Make a duplicate of that image (also counts for Gimp's). Okay, now you have two images. Activate the movement instrument and drag-n-drop one image into the other in this order: Drag image _n into image _a or image _c. 


 (image _a)


Position it exactly over the other layer (tip: position it to the top left corner and make sure it has the same position as the layer below).

(image _a with overblended image _n)

Step 4:
Heres the special trick. Simply 'desaturate' the upper layer by changing the layer option dropdown to 'luminace'.
(upper layer set to 'saturation' layer mode)

Now even the national plane markings should be no longer visible, it's just like magic (should work with almost every WT plane skin). All the so called grills and fins are blended into the other image. Sidenote: Those _u files are Bump-Map shaders and those are always handy. Now we will take a look at improving things.

When viewing the details of that image we assume that we could do better, so simply make a copy the upper layer and desature it. Finally change layer mode to 'colour' and flatten the image to be only one layer (click on Menu > Layers > "Flatten layers". That's it, were almost done. Notice that every colored part of the image turned to be a perfect base template? What we now may need is some good contrast, so open the brightness/contrast dialog of your graphic software and play around with the contrast till so have a nicely saturated image (a slight lowering of contrast, e.g. +50 %). And by changing the brigtness to some plus range you can create silver shining iron but it will make dark areas looking grey, e.g. wheels.

 (dark is a start)

Heres where second method is a big help (not mandatory): Once or twice again copy the last remaining layer. Play around with one of the layer options of your choice / choose one that fits best for you. By overblending and overblending many layers with diferrent layers you can also achieve great results.

(Simply played with brightness/contrast, copied the layer and set it to 'hard light'). 

Step 5:
Looking good for a overall base texture, it's done for the first instance right? Ok, now click save as and overwrite the following file in the User skins subfolder of that plane you edited:  *_a.jpg or _c.tga (you could do a backup before but it's not mandatory).

Go back ingame, WT will reload your skin ingame but you need to go to the 'Customization' screen again and press the little reload icon. Make sure to select the User skin in your favorite planes customization setup. Take a look at your new base skin, awesome looking – if you followed all the steps you sure be happy with the result!

 (both you look even good in ultra low quality)

[- Now you know how to handle layers and it needs just a little of practice to get something like this -]

(work in progress, unfinished but allready made of carbon)

Hint: You can even set the output format in the game options to be a lossless TGA file format or a JPEG. It depends on how long it should last looking good (a little insiders jocke). ;)

However, those skins are only visible to the player and can not be viewed by other players ingame multiplayer. But anyway, this skin is now a great template for you and it looks good ingame without further modifications. You could simply apply two decals on it to at least have something to show to the other players. You can play them and maybe a cat near you is looking at your new plane skin. Note: Do not use too much white paint, the render engine of WT only looks half way ok when making some kind of grey paint. Different to that, dark stuff has brilliant detail.

(limited support for white: Details on the planes skin are not visible, almost plain white actually beeing a grey base template to not bloom the overall appearance)

My NextGen Consoles review

I still don't like 'em^^















Just saying.


--- End of message ---

F2P: And what about account selling without bad intentions?

Some of those Free2Play games are really good and I guess a lot of them have that dual gameplay thing where you can pay to win or waste your time like a sinner. 

The problem
I've had it often, I like a specific game, I play it to obsession till that moment where I begin to realize that I should grab a calculator to measure the needed time resources for needed ingame items and gameplay levels. Right besides that theres that point where a game wont offer any of our favorites on the patch-wishlist any soon. So the end of the story is a broken heart player and he has no urge to start the game client any soon. [ Hmm, let me say this helps with keeping it real, going out of the house, real life might be no fun but it is a must. And then I encounter another Free2Play game and I like it, the whole situation restarts, It happended to me with a couple of F2Ps but I will not name any because I think I really like them?? ]

The solution
It's very simple because all I can say is: 'There are players out there and they only play for prestige, they only wanna own every little thing they need for their ingame experience". And it's true, prestige means in my case, I want all fancy vehicles and I don't care on their XP, HP, DP and stats capabilities. I want to 'drive' them like a classic car and while even n00bs can blame my planes or spaceships or what so evers skill points I would still be having a lot of fun if I can manage to collect my favorite ingame items. And heres how it could work: "Allow account selling, this way everyone could buy a entirely up-leveled game account". The only other thing which is needed is granting a nickname and ownership change = a better balencing between player types IMO. There still will be a lot to play / grind for players so nobody can say a good filled game account is only something for n00bs.

The ignorance
There are many great F2Ps and I would like to buy official game account offers. People can find unofficial account selling at online marketplaces. This is no solution. Again, all I can say is: "No level by level, please". Keep the free and keep the pay to win. I just don't understand why taking over a mates account the legal way is such a no go. We can only hope that people start to talk about this topic while video games are getting more and more to be our daily entertainment. Having fun everytime I play a specific game would be great, absolutely.

Not that I have the money to do so^^ ;)
Disclaimer: Do not offer game accounts, it is not allowed. Also, do not buy offered game accounts!


This article has been written by Simulator Miaow. Not really, she typed it, ok ok tbh I have no cat but could a virtual cat be as important as a real cat? Uh, too tricky to comment. Let's say ingame items are as worth a real cats mouse toy. 

WIP: The 'Fruit fly

Some would say that without any doubt, such image compositions should not be done by Art Directors, not in that unprofessional way having a idea for a composition and making fun like a jocke out of it. Yeah, of course they're right. Some would add that also counts for this blogs layout. ;)

So this is what comes out when you try to keep a Orbinauts community updated even with minor progress.

Work in progress – no time to play but wasting time is a must, sometimes
You know how it is, theres a thin line between what could be done by a artist to introduce his virtual for free product and what nerds do for fun. The balance between those aspects is for sure artistic. Anyway folks, heres another preview of the now so called 'Fruit fly a.k.a. DIGNITY CLASS. Oh and one more thing, the misspelled words in my trash interpretation of a data transfer are due to Cervezas. YaY, hope you enjoy + it's only a #WIP...let's call it a Trash-Up.


(I managed to grab some details while hidding crucial bugs of the mesh. Now that's artistic! ;)



Thursday, August 21, 2014

On a fun level – playing War Thunder

While I ain't had that much time recently heres how I describe War Thunder.




Pretty unknown? No, not any more thanks to WT. 
This is a He 112 in the B-1 variant, YAY

The first thing I had to do is buy me 500 Golden Eagles, a good invest in a bird called He 112 B-1. I really needed to have that plane because it was my main airplane while playing Hereos in the Sky (a more or less unkown MMORPG). AFAIK that other game offered the He 112 B-2 type but who cares (seems I do). This He 112 has a charming look and it's the perfect workhorse for leveling up, e.g. climbing the WT tech tree and spending 3 Euros wasn't that hard with the result of a plane with fast turn speed IMO. Too sad that it's only a Tier 1 plane. It is one of my absolute favorites.

While in World of Warplanes in the beginning you can start with Ar 65 and where WT begins with He 51 as the starter plane, in WOWplanes you can choose between Fw 56, Ar 68 and the He 51. Both games WOWarplanes and WT offer a different variaty of planes, you ain't gonna miss a single plane but this only counts when playing both games at a time. Both have great GFX and accurate modeled aircraft. However the real IL-2 player will miss the realness-factor since WOWarplanes and WT are no simulators. Here is where WT gets a plus point since it offers cockpits and major airplane controls like gears, flaps, elevator trim and what so ever. However, theres a possibility to setup lots things and it seems that since WT is from one of the former IL-2 series developer studios that indicates a masterplan of IL-2-ilizing the whole world on a it's multi plattform game. The all over summary would lead to a casual experience but who knew that this would feel like a dream becoming virtual reality. This ain't no simulation = who cares, it might end up beeing one, no doubt! This time things like camera positions and stuff are really made for the moment and lead to a epic ingame experience. What I really call epic is the OculusRift like feeling when playing WT with a gamepad and pressing the target focus button. Yeah, it's quite easy to handle WT, that's why it's the smarter IL-2 but never tell that to a IL-2 fan, please. Let's just not forget that WOWplanes offers other interesting aspects and that I would play it from time to time again if my PC would not suffer from it. Let's say it has great GFX and my PC not ;) My favorite waste of time will be WT because I really like how they push the game to certain directions, digging their Dev blog and reading patch notes are the first proofs of addiction.

What fascinated me most at WT was the following:
- awesome atmosphere, breathtaking action with lots of control
- the combination of air, ground and sea (sea will be adeed I guess, e.g. the WT logo)
- a contemplative implementation of at least a first bunch of dream planes
- steady development, new planes, tanks and maps all the time
- stunning level of model details (the movie GFX option is great for screenshots)
- your own skins and you can even upload meshes (awesome)
- even my badly half-broken cooler handles the FPS with even good looking results

I would say this has future. I expect modern times jet aircraft to come sooner or later but first more of those historic airplanes, please ;) My first impression of WT is really really good. You will miss all the expert skill and hardware leveling stuff. It's very comfortable to play with not much to do (R & D parts of game are boring but anyway usefull). Usually I would say no way I want to select different engines, hull platings and stuff. But I guess I'm not the only 'virtual collector', means the gameplay is built around the research tech tree and this is a great thing since I can have best equipped stuff without all the struggle that it ment when I was playing other tech tree and equip games. It's a race for the highest tech tree plane and the Tier system is very easy to understand (unlike other games). The dev blog shows that there a five more german planes in development. And those are impressive like the Fw 200 or the He 219 'Uhu'. I wonder if they ever can have the amount of a game called Heroes in the Sky or the legendary IL-2 '46 game. A US military historian once said a funny thing about aircraft developings of WWII, especially in terms of germans: 'Instead of building one plane and making it better and better the germans built dozens of planes'. So the biggest question will be (while even Wikipedia ain't got a full list of aircraft yet, neither I). Will there ever be a entire summary of all aircraft of that time? ...I'm not sure ;)

My two cents, actually three. No, I forgot one, uhm
- theres a big difference when playing with mouse-aiming or with a gamepad. Players tend to call gamepad users n00bs but actually they have a way trickier gameplay to handle. Theres also a difference when playing on a console and on a PC and that difference is clearly visible and within gameplay when comparing PC and console version. This is a call for more respect on us gamepad users, you keyboard-mousers, you ;)
- This game could have more features but they might be added some how, some way, who knows.
- uhm? << to be solved

I will definitively create skins for War Thunder, stay tuned. I have to finish a He 162 for IL-2 first. Today I finished the first He 112 test skin, this means I will offer it here for download when the word 'test' can be replaced. :D

And let me finish this post with this kinda saying comment: 'There are too many airplanes that you wanna fly around with but only a few games to jump inside'. Those would be IL-2, Wowplanes, War Thunder and HitS. At least four things less to worry about. It's depends on you to seek for your favorite planes, WOWplanes has lot's of fancy ones, too and remember, WOWplanes has some WT doesn't has and so on. But it could be that WT will get to be the only game needed in future. Now that will never happen since IL-2 stands alone on it's throne and similar to that WT will take it's time to reach almost perfect state and while good things take time I will continue the game switching even WT will be the first instance from now on.


Monday, August 4, 2014

Project Dignity Class

Early WIP Screenshots - still working on the shape a.k.a. working on a dream (any detail could change, under development). Many subjects are to change:



















Monday, April 7, 2014

Learning by tryin' while getting better and better

People like me have awesome opportunities and I'm not speaking of job offers (but just in case "hello there, you're welcome, let me freelance it"). Knowing how to do stuff like me is luck or sometimes it even feels like destiny. I'm talking about the ability, to make dreams come true.

I create Open Source stuff and still have many unfulfilled dreams like the one of working for a triple A title in the game industry or the deeper meaning of getting paid for doing so. People like me don't really need all the financial background, they just do what they want to do (main requirements: food, water, electricity). You need to know about 3 or 4 things in order to mod a existing game >> 3D, Texturing or Scripting / Editing in general. If you have the mainly important artistic skill, you will be able to realize whatever you could dream of (of course only virtual stuff). The only thing keeping you from doing it is the bunch of work that it includes. While doing a copy and paste of a config file with minor adjustments can be done on the fly, other things like modeling can go mad on little details.

Recently I red of a April day jocke and that a blog got payed by Facebook. I also saw that one insanely talented modder posted his newest creation in usual fashion as freeware but also as payware on turbosquid.
Many modders would agree with me: The amount of time needed to create a good Addon exceeds every expectation. Some would start a discussion on the importance of keeping the zerro $ menthality. I'm just saying, my own opinion differs a bit since I had to realize that most things don't even get considered. I mean many Addons lack on quality. Some modders are for example great with import/export jobs which usually is a lot of work. Others are great modelers and some are excellent texturizers and everything in once is pretty hard to get, see me as another example, I lack on something, too – to name it on configs. And then theres the time issue and real world living. Today I stopped further development once again because after a nice modeling session with some basic texturing and data handling I started the engine to test my creation. Yeah it was big fun, using my very own vehicle for floating like a boat, diving like a sub and early flight tests. I'm working on some kind of combo-craft and everything was good untill I had to remind myself that after the test drive I will need to look after:

- Cockpit and instruments
- Moveable parts (e.g. flaps animation)
- Materials (e.g. transparency for windows)
- VFX (e.g. engine glow effects)
- Config Parameters
- Data handling
- Polycount optimization

I did this or that a couple of times, recently by creating my own Sci-fi vehicle prototypes and testing them. It's always the same with me, I'm playing with so many different shapes that after hours of spare time consumation and while I reached milestone after milestone there was always something left on the todo list.
In such a case, work ain't gets finished at all but that's my very own kind of problem. I think that a good Addon shows that someone really took care of making it a brilliant example and such things are always rare goods.

Micro Crowdfunding. That's what I would call a solution for the as seen everywhere lack of ultra HiRes + mega features. That's because only a few modding projects are done by more than one person, especially where ingame items or objects get produced. Guess what I think that we all should support those who realize our dreams (be it just by modding a game). This means I would pay for the triple A ingame content but different to a DLC I would try to support individuals instead of companies since niche gamers have no big publishers or game studios. With a easier way to donate like a handy function for generic forums we could not only support the makers, also we could take care that those hand picked talents can sweeten our life just like we are a aid to them.

Speaking of me, having a blog ain't a good way to monetize my software skills but it still gives me spare time satisfaction. Releasing my own mods for free is a must and still a thing of personal interest. But if I could I would profit with some support. Since modding is fun to me I don't need anything else and so the good things come for free. If I run out of money and end up unseen you can play the guess what happened game. ;)

Conclusion with the formula for triple A mods:
Creators own satisfaction + skills + support = Evolution in modding

Happy virtual live out's folks!

Friday, March 14, 2014

Taskforce Civil Vehicle



Civil vehicles can be boring, especially in video games. But some prefer to play like me, be it as a freaky collector of Mods, messing up the scenery with proper objects or at good days, beeing serious pro sim vehicle riders.

Pro sim gamers know what I'm talking about. I ain't talking about Arcade Games. One needs to know at least the basics about using a specific vehicle since from our viewpoint even that can be something worth mastering. Then theres a possibility to learn the extra features, e.g. some special or uncommon functions. Also one could read a lot of Wiki's to know about things like air manuevers or whatever counts in real life, too. From another viewpoint too much realism ain't a must have compared to the time it would cost. So if one is more about steering all kinds of vehicles, it's not the classic MS FlightSim thing starting from some airport and landing thousands of miles away (with or without time acceleration). Same goes for a space flight, means a Journey from Earth to Saturn ain't like a quick Earth to Moon visit. We don't have the time or we might have no patience. Instead we enjoy the important things like offroad driving, starting, manuevering, landing, sailing, diving and so on. So we don't miss the interesting part but sometimes playing a "realistic" Sim that way feels kinda strange, comparable to a vertical take-off with vertical landing right at the same spot. It's quite important to have something to do while commanding a virtual vehicle. This way it's more fun and keeping guys like me away from creating scenarios with way too many objects in one place. I often see vids on YT with let's players who only do crap while recording it. In one of my recent posts I said it's about one vehicle. But how about having some fun with it, what to do with it? What I miss most is a good 360° view of the vehicle, so why not run around it with the camera instead of doing lazzy master stunt attempts that end up boring?

Just think of a buddy on your side that gives orders to you:

"Ahhh, I'm getting mad by your flying style"
"Land here, please / Drive there / Set course to... / Hold course"
"Circle target / intercept object / "Dock at" / Follow object"
"Faster! / Slower"
"Pickup something from here / deliver to there / transfer of passengers"
"Fill your cargo space with important goods"
"Slot upgrade or over-cheat your craft"
"Stunting like fly under that bridge / do a looping"
"Withstand a heavy storm"
"Find the SGU Destiny Ship around the galaxies"
"Maintain a fleet wisely and don't forget anything while doing so"
"Force and handle onboard system failures by deactivating 'modules'"
"Master and provide yourself with a executive interactive self experience production like a James Cameron"

Different situations are fun and also something for the eye. When it's about realism, all the kewl things like changing the weather conditions to 2012 means that in real life, such things are unlikely to happen. In standard conditions, only helicopters are thrilling tricky to handle, planes or boats make one feel sleepy. Wind gusts can be entertaining but in general it's pretty boring to watch a buddy playing non combat games. FPS games put you into direct action, Sims need more thinking just like a strategy game. There must be a way of beeing a Captain of something could be big fun, if for example a Voyager Intrepid Class ain't floating around without having anywhere to go or a Sail Boat without a destination could be avoided.

Exactly, we need some nice tasks and tasks need driving experience (btw, you don't really need somebody near or spend pesos for a teacher). You can get the raw material, the vehicle of choice. All those Addons help making Sim games more enjoyable since they lack with stories and in most Sims there is only scenery and vehicles. So in case you feel like me, let's hope that a GF is near saying "If you land on that Vulcano expect some hot action". Said very simple it's about "flying" in a way that nobody would scream at you, even you know there might be no one near (anyway you could use a voice chat or whatever to join other nerdy peeps giving orders for fun on teamspeak).

So, heres my order to you: No matter what you steer, drive savely. But don't forget to be relaxed in case of playing Sims. Improve on skills and in the end, you guess it, the classical jocke that never gets old:

"Attention, our Captains did a sky dive, are there any pilots on board?"

- silence -
"We are going to crash against a mountain"

- a drunk voice answers -
"I can fly this thing"

- meanwhile in the cockpit -
"Sure, I have hundreds of flight hours on my PC"

That drunk guy is at least a candidate. But I would judge such a situation by asking which Simulator he played, but that's another geeky topic. If a kid on board can proof on my laptop to have IL-2 skills, he would be the one to land that airplane. Of course, in that case, he or I would need assistance, maybe not ;]

Well, to be honest, I have a fifty-fifty chance to land savely in video games, how about that? :D   Or how about my space skills, I can land on every planet in our Solar System except Earth, no kidding, very useful ain't it?

More skills based on more serious manuevers is what we get when we try, try, try. The good thing about virtual simulations is that they ain't real, only realistic. And those who play with Scenario Editing can do a lot more to enhance the situation by adding different objects to the current map. Flying over forests can be boring. Ever tried to place entiry cities in the middle of nowhere? Trust me, it's big fun! Many people start with modding games by modding their own ingame experience. So better don't waste with your dreams fuel.

Have a good "A to B" OR "Just don't care". I guess it depends on the mood and maybe it's a proper thing to fly under bridges for the sake of skills. :)

Thursday, March 6, 2014

Status Report: My Modding Projects

Right now in real life: Working on the Punt Boat
(Season begins soon)
[Image Source: sxc.hu]


I've been busy recently. There are a lot of things I would have shared with you that I allready forgot. Never mind, let's face the important things at least. Real life goes first and I wouldn't be the first blogger to fail and this would be my number #Iduno construction zone. But I'm still in the game working on some Mods. In general, the things I like to play with are:

– Product Design (means concept drafting)
– Skinning
– Mesh-importing
– Map-editing
– Playing with config files

The Universal Cargo Box is one of it (I missed to do anything for it recently). The MagShield UVW-Textures is another. Meanwhile I do one or two Delta Glider EX and Arrow Freighter skin jobs. Seems Orbiter is my game of choice. But theres some Mod evaluation going on with Vehicle Sim. And I'm still creating a huge Scenario for IL-2 (but I wonder if it will be compatible with the newest Patches). For IL-2 I plan to create another dozen of Skins. And the BSG Diaspora game also awaits my long time ago promised Flight Skills Test map. I don't want to talk about other things since most things never get finished and some are too heavy to do anyway. Big fun could be the scenario creation within the Map Editor of WC Saga (placing cat's in space).

The idea to create my very own vehicle leads me to research good looking shapes since years and I'm now about the enter the dimension of cockpit design / texturings. Let's see, maybe I start from inside-out instead of drawing exterior concepts first. In the end, I'm trying to match polycount, once I have done the all the research and experimenting, aswell as finding the right plattform-game. But oh wait I was dreaming, just saying, the vehicle would be a space, air, deepsea and floating thing with feets, skids and wheels in one. ;)

Little by little I try to do my part. While I crashplay vehicles and things all the time, I always enjoy Open Source Mods and I wish I could do more to provide others with my little creations. This way I want to shout a BIG THANKS to all modders of vehicle Sims, be it by scripting awesome things or just adding mixed vegetation to the games. Every good Mod makes a game more immersive and theres a huge lack of that thing in every detail... when speaking of virtual games.

Oh and by the way, improving this Blogs look and feel is another thing written down on my task list. This Blog is a free time thing, now highly ranked at search engines but still almost without visitors or feedback. I don't have the time for playing games these days and my PC is a waste since I needed to change it's cooler. Anyhow there should be some releases coming up in the matter of sooner or later. And of course, I will write about the one or other topic on my mind as soon as they appear or whenever I have the muse and time for it.

Requests: On the need of finding something of use


Inspiring Submarine designs with a lot of Steampunk


We need more fancy rides, so I seeked for 3D Meshes for futher implementation into some Simulators and what I had to find was that most things don't even exist in the virtual world. While researching I found out my preferences are somehow unseen or let's say if you ask me, I would reflect a very specific nerd-faction. This means I'll take my opinion and I'm asking in the name of all vehicle related sim players that want to be early adopters, too. Here is some opinion leading for all of us. I hope you agree with me in particular. This list is aimed to bored Modders in search of something special. Thanks in advance!

These are some of the 3D-Meshes or Mods me and others would love to see:


Marine
U-Boat Type XXI (kewl design, hot historical specs)
U-Boat Taifun Class (huge and modern)
Seabreacher X Shark, Dolphin or Orca (fun and innovative)
Sailing Boat Dehler Dehlya 25 (tiny and cute)
Deepflight Black Hawk or Deepflight I or Challenger or Super Falcon Mk II

...

Air
The Jet from the movie G.I. Joe 1 (the non AI two-seater variant)
Synergy Aircraft (a crowd funded futuristic plane)
Mi-24 (a russian helicopter)
He Triebflügel (epic WWII concept aircraft)
He 112 (good looking, good manuevering)
Some Horten Glider Planes (one-wing concepts, needs flight skills)
Wingsuits (YAY, needed)
...

Space
Mars Attacks Flying Saucer (kewl design, epic gadget)
The Flight of the Navigator (unique design, for fantasy purposes)
BSG Rising Star (one of the most beautiful ship designs ever)
A super movable Spacesuit (needed for some)
...

Terrain
Some more very freaky Concept Cars (from real manufacturers).
Some hotter Mech Warrios (more sleek, please).
More different Byclicles or how about some virtual Inline-Skating?
...

Notes

All should have cockpits, except the two last ones. Thanks for developing! Ah and thanks for creating any awesome vehicle design that not got mentioned in here. Keep up the good work! :)

This topic is sheduled to be filled from time to time with whatever I end-up researching while looking for hot mobiles. Soon with pictures and more fancy entries.

Between Star X and Star Y – A true Fanboys Dilemma.

Spaceship Orion from the 60's:
Forgotten entry + hard to match + Low-Res only?

About mixing Space Sagas and their Spaceships

Sure, mixing Space Sagas is no good idea but sometimes it can't be avoided. All those fancy Ships known from movies and tv shows can be called real, at least within a games Mod. So, if you played with thousands of Spaceships in dozens of games, you soon start to realize that one thing might not fit coupled with another. This took years for me to understand. It's a technological and design specific fact that you can't combine for example Stargate with Star Trek, without calling it Steam- or Cyberpunk. If you ever had that feeling, it's a Dilemma! Let me give you another example: Just compare a Warp Drive or Subspace with some generic engines and while we are talking – where are the RCS trusters on most Sci-fi ships at (since most missed to include them)? And that's only talking on the surface of a very deep topic, mainly because for the designers theres a lot of goals when bulding a fictional spaceship. It could be the generic look of the time setting, the technology need or just a current design trend OR as in many cases only a fast solution. Imagine us living in a harsh industrial time. We would see angled minimalistic and sure footed non aesthetic designs. In the other example we would live in a super High-Tech century and our ships would be organic and feature whatever we can dream of. Let's make a note: Different Sci-fi Looks and different time frames produce inconsistency. My favorite way to compare such things is by looking a the cockpit or bridge design or by aerodynamical aspects of the hull. While I often find ugly canopies I also discover many non- or semi-aerodynamic shapes or something I would call "Comic-Look". One thing is for sure, all the stories around the Star Sagas are huge and epic, each as it's own. But what about the specific assets like Spaceships in the matter of the look of the Saga, are they even realistic? And when it comes to gaming, how about mixing them all up togheter?

"Creating a virtual mega Hangar full of different Ships – a long time goal".

Back to reality
Sci-fi is just Sci-fi, but not for us gamers. Lot's of famous Spaceships appear from game to game. Many games offer some simple Unit Management, a Map Editor or some scripting access. This way nerdy folks create fun scenarios containing multiple amounts of different Spaceships. It's just like doing what you ever dreamed of. Once you parked all those fancy Spaceships in one place, which I did over a thousand times, you will be creating a mess, just like me. Different Scalings, window sizes, engine types, hull platings, colours, Sci-fi Technologies and in the end even more important things like different Mesh and Texture detail levels. This was just a little set of things which might not fit. Even in a lone role, when not creating virtual empires, taking a simple ride into space depends on having something to fly with. Running different Sci-fi Mods I had to find a solution to such a complicated question and since it differs from day to day, how to choose my current most liked Sci-fi Universe Spaceship to role play with it? And will it satisfy?

"Help, I know hundreds of Spaceships".

So, what kind of Fanboy am I today?
Most of those Sci-Fi Universes are my favorites. It's a constant change. And there are those days where I don't even want to know a thing about Sci-fi. On such days I feel like a realist avoiding everything that's only theory. When not flying hypothetical stuff I enjoy state of the art ingame vehicles like Ships, U-Boats, Airplanes and almost real Spaceships. Back in time, I would have called myself a Trekkie (I've been playing STO a long time but the recent two movies hindered me from login-in again). Nowadays other Merchandisings play a bigger role to me, like Stargate or BSG (SG is fascinating but I don't really like the look, same with BSG). Andromeda is a too strange and ugly but a interessting story setting. I even was once into Babylon 5 when I was a teenager. Oh and Star Wars was something I called fantasy, even the assets part was nice enough to be liked. Firefly had to little spaceships for me to be recognized with proper attention, same as others (forgotten Sagas). Theres a easy way to determine the issue by simply looking at the fact that Star Trek Federation Ships are too futuristic to be placed near every other Sci-fi. It's sad but it differs entirely.

"Having all of my favorite Spaceships in one place was once very important to me".

No doubt, Steampunk!
Sometimes I can't relate to any of my once beloved Fan Sagas. I'm starting to fan-like independant open source Spaceships, since they offer a lot of the, to me very important "realism" and provide space for my own kind of Storylines. The fun fact is, that one could Mod such ships to however he wanna end-up with, be it a Star Drive or A Wormhole Drive, a cap of coffee on that cockpits texture or whatever. In this case we should have a good base, means a good detail quality (to avoid wasting time with Low-Res sources). Anyway, a Rendevouz Manuever of a BSG Ship with a Star Trek Ship is something fun to watch, in case the beam transporter is offline, which we, for fun, try to expect in such a scenario. This should explain why there are even more things that could play a main role in the confusion:

"Colonial One to Delta Glider NX-425. Wheres your docking port?".
"DG NX-425 to Colonial One. Nope, no such thing, uhm, ..."


Details, details, details:
Lot's of Mods have a great level of detail, others not. Mixing HiRes with Low-Res is always a bad thing to do in the name of immersion. Here comes another tricky problem, should one leave a mighty spaceship alone, even when his Star X/Y fleet is almost complete. Or should he add the Comic-Lookalikes, too? That's another question and the reason I stopped creating overfilled Fps-killing full scale scenarios because things did not even fit. I sure would love to have them all in one place, but all from the same source or with at least a min. on details, most importantly on the mesh and / or texture and besides that on the overall compability (see the Docking Port example above).

"It's like comparing apples and oranges".

A matter of taste OR quality
Well, most would say, why play with Low-Res stuff. I wish I could agree but I learned that many old games offer more assets or gameplay features than state of the art releases. A lot of HiRes Mods come from common games like BF3 and for non-commercial creators it's a matter of time consuming work to create HiRes Mods by themselves. Maybe that's the reason why we don't see them everyday.

"Size also matters a lot - choose your favorite vehicle wisely. Too big means no steering fun. Too small means it wont fit your dreams".

Diving for Pearls
I think a good summary on this complex nerd topic is picking the best and leaving out the rest. Some Sci-fi Spaceships are awesome and some Mods feature those Spaceships. But this topic is not only about spaceships. It's about the best Mods around and good things are like the saying hard to find. So I say no matter what it looks, if it's realistic and full of details it's worth a ride. This way we can create virtual parking lots with things that could be real one day or reflect the future instead of playing with the things we used to like when we were kids and which don't fit our adult needs for authenticity anymore.

"In the end, I only need one personal virtual ultra mega awesome super ride, right?
A Stargate should be enough anyway!".




This topic is not done yet. I will write a bit more on it asap. 

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

WIP UNIVERSAL CARGO BOX

WIP WIP WIP UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Features:
– Note: the texture part is just for fun, no real labels so far but I provided "room" for them. Theres also space for a logo and the "funny wrong placed QR-Code". Also misses some serious scratches
– The usual OLED-Screen (will run a texture of "Linux on steroids"). The Xpad2 is gone (maybe a UMMU will hold it in his hands)
– The red LED-backgrounded 'drag-slide-to-open' mechanism
– Input / Output vents
– The retro control module (now with USB-Connector and XY-Hardware-Slot) + even with some lil' LED system status indicators
– Covered modules (8 possible): Coolant, Electronics, Refrigerator, Pressurizer, whatever (could also count as extra cargo space, e.g. just in case)
– Case study as eye-candy: Somebody forgot to put a module cover back again (might be part of a random box out of +200 planned cargos with little individualization gimmicks)
– The usefull 'LED-Sheeter' also likes to be part of it
– Has Handles, oh yeah baby – Fork lift bottom access
– Space Fork connectors (4 for now, maybe more will be added)
– LED light stripes on each side help locate the box
– The body of the box is made to be sturdy to avoid collision with the soft-parts (but so far it's only plastic)
– At the back: Coolant for integrated computation + old fashion coolant vent
– A little solar collector
– A Gesture Detection Sensor (for the Touchpad)
– Invisible but included: Ambient light sensor, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and duno what
– Other things might be added, too