July 2000
July 31
The first part of the first Meridian
level is still not finished, and I don't have much time, so I'll have to
spend more time on this thing. But I'm also spending time preparing
for college, getting my insurance stuff ready, and planning expenses.
College is going to be really expensive, just for books and housing.
This year alone will cost more than all 4 of this page's photo-log trips
combined. But as for now, it's late, and I need to get to bed.
I just learned that Napster wasn't
shut down on Friday because the injunction was challenged in the appeals
court. But the fact that publishers are trying to shut down new media
instead of thinking about ways to adapt to it is still the main point of
what I was saying. But like I said, that's not really important to
me because I have college to worry about, and of course, Meridian.
To adhere to my new policy about finishing the Meridian levels, I've gone
back to the first part of the level and attempted to finish it. There
were some issues, however, with the health crystals. First of all,
they would have to be arranged on their y-axis, unlike potions, so that
makes it more tedious to put them into a level. That wouldn't be
a bad problem, but the small crystals look too much like the big ones.
I thought they wouldn't because the small crystals are red in the multiplayer
level Relic, but it turns out that the red crystals are caused by blue
crystals getting their layer lighting from a red layer, changing the color.
Now I may have to work on some new health crystal models.
The architecture of the first
city area in Meridian is done, but the objects haven't been placed yet.
Unlike Dragonmech, I'm working on each area of the level separately, doing
the layer geometry and object placement all at once. The layer visibility
calculations are taking longer than they did on my other levels, which
means there must be some real graphic conservation going on.
This is a view of a part of the city as it is now, and as you can see, there are plenty of towers, pillars, and worn areas in the walls. This is all done using the Riot Engine layer system, which has its limitations. This style of city seems to work well, and maybe I'll use it for something more than an ancient ruin later on in Meridian.
Napster was shut down today.
It really doesn't matter to me, because I don't download music files except
for public domain game soundtracks from MP3.com. However, I see this
crusade against Napster as kind of pointless - I mean, it was used for
public domain music too, and it served a good purpose for people who wanted
to share their own music that they made with others, with their consent.
But people only see the pirating, the copyright infringements, and the
potential lost money from rock stars who are already rich enough, like
Metallica. It's also pointless because there are lots of other programs
that can be used to share music and other files, as well as the Internet
itself. Some would say that the real culprit here is the MP3 format,
which makes high quality sound at a low file size, but even CD-quality
WAV files would be easy to collect with a fast enough connection and a
big enough hard drive. The real issue here is that music, which used
to be restricted to vinyl records with no method of reproduction outside
of studios, can now be copied and distributed much more easily on the Internet.
It's a natural step in technological evolution, and record companies should
be able to adapt instead of resorting to suing everyone. Maybe they
could start a high-speed Internet site for people who like to download
music, with money paid through advertising like with TV. I don't
know the history, but I wouldn't be surprised if something like this Napster
controversy happened when recordable audio tapes were introduced.
Yesterday, I resumed work on
Meridian, adding some new mountain areas past the force field and into
the area beyond the canyon that you walk through. I started on the
city today, adding cracks and broken areas to the walls to make it not
look so boring and uniform. In the end, it will look like an ancient
city with walls and pillars, but with new, smaller structures made for
the current orc inhabitants. That's another thing - some of the monsters'
names need to be different because the way it is now, it takes too much
from Tolkien. For example, orcs will be called by their alternate
name, "hueges," and I'll have to think of a name that goblins call their
own species and just use that name. Like I said before, the plot
will unfold in the level itself and not just through some text file.
Right now, I'm trying to clear up the subplot with a group known as the
Sorillians, their history, and their ways. There aren't very many
human character models, so most of that particular storyline will have
to be alluded to in the text.
If you use Netscape Communicator
and like to look at game news pages or discussion forums, or basically
anything that has banner ads or CGI scripts, then you should know that
it crashes a lot. On my system, Netscape has crashed while looking
at the Sparrow's Nest, Surreal-News.com, Gamecenter, and even once on ActionXtreme.
It has happened so many times that I figured Netscape must have fixed it
in version 4.74. So, I downloaded it and looked at one of the forums
that had a high crash rate, hoping it would let me load up more than just
a few pages. It was a little better, but soon enough, it gave me
the good old message that said Netscape had performed an illegal operation
and would be shut down. I'm almost tempted to go to the dark side
and use Internet Explorer, but I'm not going to because I use Composer
to write this page.
My college schedule for the fall
semester of 2000 has been established. They recommended 12 to 15
credits, and the classes I was thinking about added up to about 24, so
I had to save a few of them for later. Right now, my schedule consists
of math, environmental science, creative writing, and Japanese. I'm
continuing my studies from high school, but I had to start at a lower level
because they focus on conversation skills and we didn't really cover that
intensively in high school. We had a few 5-minute activities where
we would ask predetermined questions, but that was about it. No wonder
my homestay family didn't understand a lot of what I tried to say to them.
On the plus side, I knew most of the kanji. My math class is for
a computer science major, but I don't know if I'll be able to handle all
the actual computer classes. When I program or do anything like that,
my brain has to go into programming mode or else I don't understand a thing.
Of course, the environmental class is a continuation of my previous education,
and we get to do labs just like the Pond Profile, I would imagine.
It's a lot of work, and I'll have to learn to study, study, study without
going into a trance. I need to learn by August 29, because that's
when college starts. This web site will be put on hold for a while
then, but hopefully I'll be able to set up an Internet connection sometime
during the first few weeks and still have FTP access to the server.
If that doesn't work out, I'll still read and post to the ActionXtreme
Drakan forums from the school computers.
All my stuff is packed for the
college meeting tomorrow, but I still don't know the exact classes I want
to take. I have a pretty good idea, though. There's this environmental
science program sponsored by my residence hall that seems like a good continuation
of my education at the School of Environmental Studies, but maybe computers
and the environment wouldn't really mix too well. Then again, maybe
they might, for things like marine research and population data.
There will be no entry tomorrow because of the meeting.
I don't actually have to pick
out my classes just yet, but I am looking at that book listing them and
I think I have a good idea of what would be good to take. The problem
is choosing one specific area to study. Right now, there's a lot
I want to learn about, but when I get a job, it will probably use only
the skills learned from a few classes. It's better to be a programmer
who has taken a lot of computer classes than a programmer who has taken
a few computer classes plus biology, environmental science, language studies,
and cultural anthropology. The problem is, I don't know if I want
to be a programmer, a biologist, an environmental scientist, or something
else entirely. I guess I could talk it over with the counselor at
the meeting, because I really don't know how important specialization is
right now.
Here is my Question of the Week
that has been up for more than a week, and the answers (yes, there are
more than one this time!) it received.
| Question of the Week: If you were to design a computer game, what would it be like? Would you want to focus more on graphics or gameplay? Also, who would your target audience be? |
| Answers:
As for the game question, I prefer some of the older reincarnations of the original breakout, I sortof tend to think the layout is secondary in a game if the action does not move, then why play????? Thanks for your time, JOn I'm afraid I'd be a poor marketer. I would design something I'd like
with no target audience in mind. The game would focus slightly more on
gameplay than graphics.
Well if I was going to create a computer game what would it be like......hun
|
If I were to design a computer game, it would depend on a few factors. First, if I wanted to build a solid budget, I would design a game that has a lot of "consumer appeal." For example, games like The Sims draw people in because a lot of people feel that the game is for them and they could get into it easily, and even bargain ware like Deer Hunter can bring in a profit that's much higher than production costs of the game. I don't want to be continually ruled by popular opinion, however, so some of my projects might be games that are well done but wouldn't have much consumer recognition, like System Shock 2. For the marketing, I would make sure to market the game plenty if I thought it was good, but only near the release date. If there's lots of marketing before it's even playable, it becomes hype and people get tired of the game before it's released.
There's not much time to work
on projects anymore, now that my college meeting is coming up. I
really have to pick out my classes before the 25th, and time is running
out. Maybe I'll work on Meridian during my free time after that,
but for now, it's college preparation time. I'm really sorry for
my lethargy on everything I've been doing lately, but it's hard just to
get out of bed these days. It's not my illness anymore, because that's
almost completely gone. I just don't have much ambition for anything
anymore, even this site. Have you noticed that my entries have been
getting shorter, and I'm neglecting more stuff? I should really get
my act together and start really working on things, because there will
be no place for procrastination at college, or so I've heard.
Some of you may find it quite
fitting that the Nalenna section of this site has been inactive for some
time now, considering its origins. But the truth is that it's my
lethargy, which I mentioned earlier, which keeps me from updating it.
Now that I think about it, I could write Ethereal Light much better than
it is now, or maybe make another one of those old arcade-style games.
And that's just what I'm going to do, after I'm done with Meridian.
Hopefully, I'll be able to take a computer to college so I can update this
site and work on projects from there. We'll just have to wait and
see.
The Japan
Picture Page is up now. Actually, I've separated it into 4 pages
to save loading time. The first 3 pages are normal-sized pictures,
and the 4th one has panoramics and vertical pictures. Since all the
pictures I got at the exchange are normal-sized, they are on page 3, starting
with the one of the white-shirted kid (that's me) walking through a forest,
with the big tree to my right. The file name is Jpn_093.jpg, and
it and all the ones with a higher number were taken by other people.
I have converted all the Japan
pictures to JPEG format using Paint Shop Pro's handy Batch Conversion feature.
This made it possible to convert all the bitmap files in a few seconds,
with the right quality level and everything. Making the thumbnail
images, however, required that I resize all the images individually, which
took longer, but it was still good to see how all the pictures turned out
after scanning. As soon as I make the picture page tomorrow, I think
I'll tell my host family about it. They have this rule where they
can't have the connection open for more than 10 seconds at a time because
phone bills are so high, so they may not be able to download all the images,
but they can at least know that there's a web site out there with a bunch
of pictures taken by that strange kid from the United States who lived
with them as their pet for a few days.
All of the Japan pictures are
scanned in. Like I said, there were some bad ones that I had to cut
out, so there aren't as many pictures as there are of Utah. For the
Japan trip, I have scanned a total of 108 pictures and will soon be putting
them all on a single image page and integrating them into the journal,
like I did with the Costa Rica report. I didn't keep a detailed journal,
but rather a list of events, so I'm going to have to make up a lot as I
transfer the journal to the web pages. Now there will be more time
to get all my thoughts together about the trip, at least everything I can
remember.
I forgot all about the Question
of the Week last week, and that time I actually got more than one response!
So, I'm calling it the Question of 2 Weeks, not officially but just in
this entry, and I'm giving it until Sunday before I post the responses
and change the question. Sorry about the neglect, I'll try not to
let it happen again. I scanned in the third and fourth sets of Japan
pictures, so the count is now up to 63. There are three more to go,
including the set of pictures I got at the exchange. Some of the
other peoples there said they had pneumonia too.
Today, I downloaded the demo
of KISS: Psycho Circus, partly because I heard it was good and partly out
of curiosity. I had only heard a few KISS songs, and I had never
read the Psycho Circus comic by Todd McFarlane. I did, however, see
the Spawn movie, which was based on a comic by the same person. That's
not much of a background for me. I started up the demo, adjusted
all the control settings, and began playing. The control was smooth
and responded well, and the graphics looked good and had a good frame rate
on my system. I played through all the demo levels and reached the
end. The enemies are tough but can get repetitive, especially ones
created by monster generators. The generators were new to first-person
shooters but really a throwback to Gauntlet. The weapons were well
balanced, but sometimes it felt like that fifth one, the lightning bomb
weapon, was hard to control. I didn't like how the doors on the building
level would crush me to death if they closed on me, but that's only my
opinion, just like everything else I've said here. I still think
it's kind of strange to have a game based on a band, but like I said, I
haven't read the comic. It's still kind of a fun game.
Well, I went to the doctor and
found out that this nagging cough I've had all week is pneumonia.
It's not the really bad kind where you hack up big globs or anything, but
it's still annoying to be coughing all the time. I'm on antibiotics
now, fighting the illness, hoping it goes away before my meeting in Wisconsin
on the 25th. I scanned in 36 of the Japan trip pictures today, but
I wish I could have had the energy to do them all at once.
I worked on Meridian some more,
changing the sky to blue and adding more plants to the first section.
Now it doesn't look as much like a swamp as a flooded valley, but it's
a change for the better. Also, I changed the music to the Succubus
Lair track, like in my multiplayer swamp levels, rather than the Wartok
Canyons music. I'm sorry about my Japan page not being up yet, but
it takes a long stretch of time to get in the groove of scanning those
pictures while making few mistakes. I will really try to start getting
the pictures ready tomorrow.
Our older computer, which is
the only one hooked up to the scanner, was being used by my family for
most of today, so I chose to work on Meridian some more instead of try
to scan in those pictures. The first swamp area is now textured and
most of the plants have been placed, so it looks more impressive and atmospheric
than it used to.
I still don't know whether that green fog and sky is a good idea. On one hand, it lends to the plant-filled landscape theme, but on the other, maybe a good dark blue sky would be more realistic with the world of Drakan.
Finally, after 20 hours, I've
finished System Shock 2! The last two areas were really weird.
I'm not going to reveal any secrets to those who haven't gotten there yet,
but they were totally unlike the rest of the game. The entire game
was filled with eerie voices, such as the corrupt ship computer, the people
in logs you found all over the place, and even the enemies you fought.
Those enemies were really talkative. You know, I didn't really explore
the entire psi aspect of System Shock 2. I only used first tier psi
powers when I played. I want to fire some spells like those monkeys
launched at me on deck 4 and 5! I want to know the feeling of being
dependent on psi hypos instead of medical hypos and auto-regeneration kits!
And I want to have more free inventory space for my GamePig game device!
Now that I think about it, I may have missed a few things. Delacroix
sent me a message saying she was in cargo bay A, and I searched that part
of the Engineering deck but I couldn't find her. I've heard there
are two endings to the game, and maybe if I find Delacroix next time, I'll
see the other ending.
Once again, I'm really sorry
about not having the Japan page up yet, and I could have scanned in all
the pictures already but I've been addicted to a certain game. I'm
kind of a weak person, and sometimes I have other stuff to do like write
letters. Right now, I've been sending off a bunch of thank you letters
to relatives and friends who gave me graduation cards and money.
Also, I've been slacking a little this past week. I guess that's
kind of hypocritical of me to be lazy about putting up the Japan page because
that's not the Japanese way at all. I'll get back in shape and work
at full force on my projects tomorrow.
I spent most of today playing
System Shock 2. Those cyborg assassins they on the upper decks are
really tough. They're especially tough for me because I fight with
mainly melee weapons like the newly acquired Crystal Shard, and the assassins
run away to throw things at me from a distance. It doesn't make it
any better that they randomly spawn in, because you've never really cleared
out an area. With the huge robots, at least they don't keep coming
back. Now I've picked up a few good weapons too, like the grenade
launcher. This game just keeps going on and on - as soon as I'm off
the ship and think the game is over, I go onto another, more hostile ship
to destroy some mutant eggs. So far, I think System Shock 2 is a
really good game, but whoever said you could get by on good hacking skills
and low weapon or psi skills is wrong. You need those weapon skills,
and you need them a lot.
Lately I've become addicted to
System Shock 2. I started playing it and it took hold of me like
it has never done before. It's as if I've become one of the Many...
Silence the discord... The flesh welcomes you... surrender your will to
us, and fight the machine mother! Seriously, it's a game that really
draws you in, but it's hard even on Easy mode. I'm sorry for neglecting
my other projects, but my creative mind has been subdued by this illness
and I really don't think I could stand the repetition of scanning in all
those pictures just yet.
The upper layers of the first
fortress section of Meridian have been created and textured. Before
I do any more, though, I'm going to finish that first section with all
the water by putting in the grass textures, plants, building objects, and
ambient creatures, as well as maybe a few drones for Arokh to fight.
A lot of people don't like the drones, though, so I may just put them in
the canyon between the fortress and the other side of the swamp.
The canyon is an optional area, but there will be some good stuff there.
My throat is still sore, especially when it gets dry, so I've been drinking
a lot of ice water. I didn't work on my Japan page today, but I'll
try to tomorrow.
I took my Drakan level Meridian
out of magic test mode, and now I'm working on the design and architecture.
Today, I filled the starting canyon area with water. Now, because
all water border grid points have to be at equal height, there are a few
spots where plateaus surround the water. These will be used as places
for huge plants to grow. My throat is still really sore, so I 'm
going to get a lot more sleep tonight and hope the pain goes away.
The Japan trip page will be up soon, maybe even tomorrow if I feel better.
The Sine Wave will have been
going for one year in a few weeks, and this day last year is about the
time I came up with the title and graphics, so I've decided to change it
a little and make it more interesting. There's more contrast now,
compared to the old color scheme, and some graphics have been removed to
save loading time, but I think it still retains the atmosphere of the old
Sine Wave. Notice that there are two waves in the title graphic now,
signifying this site's second year. Also, since my Drakan name is
Zeoc
and my name in Heretic II and Unreal Tournament is Salix, both of those
names are listed at the bottom of the page. I hope nobody minds the
new design, but I could switch it back easily.
I'm feeling a little bit better
today. During most of the day, I was resting, so I didn't have much
time to work on Meridian, but tomorrow I'll start building more of the
level. If you've played the magic test, you saw that the layers and
textures weren't complete at all. The finished level will have the
beginning area filled with water and more detail in the city, as well as
darker lighting in the caves. I've just been working on spells for
the past few days, but I think I have enough of them for the first level.
All my Japan pictures are here
now, and I'll start scanning them in soon for my Japan trip page.
I think I'll focus equally on that and Meridian because they're both things
I enjoy working on. It's late now, and I'm still recovering from
this cold, so that will have to be all for today.
I got my pictures of the Japan
trip a few days ago, and today, our group had a picture exchange party.
Some of my pictures weren't very good, especially the ones taken at night
or indoors, because I wasn't really using the best camera technology for
the situation. Fortunately, there was usually a better version of
one of my pictures that someone else took, and I kept a few of those.
I had a few good pictures in my collection, too, and people seemed to like
them, so it was a fair trade. After the party, there was a really
big storm that knocked out the power, so I'm really writing this at the
same time as the July 8 entry. I also have a cold or the flu or something,
so I'm not feeling too well.
I finished those two new spells,
the Meteor Blast and the Force Beam. Originally, there was a problem
with the Meteor Blast, but I turned it into a cool extra. It turns
out that if a bow weapon has no auto-aiming function, homing projectiles
don't work with it. So I turned the spell into a fairly powerful
normal spell, but if you put on the auto-aiming Tracker Gauntlet, the Meteor
Blast would start homing in on enemies. You can still use the spell
with the normal magic gauntlets, but you can only truly unlock its potential
with the Tracker Gauntlet. The Force Beam fires instantly and does
a good amount of damage, but it has limited range. Also, I've discovered
that you can use the Gas Cloud against opponents with anti-magic armor,
and it will still eat away at their health. That's good, because
that spell was one of the least effective in direct combat, especially
when fighting enemies that charge at you. My next spell will be a
good one. It's called the Swarm of Locusts, and it is a cloud of
brown locusts that slowly move forward and eat away at enemies in their
path until they hit a wall.
I worked on two more spells for
Meridian today. The first is the Meteor Blast spell, which is a red
energy blast that homes in on enemies. The second is a fast bolt
of light, called the Force Beam, that can be used as a sniper spell.
I know those don't sound like traditional names for magic spells, but the
Drakan universe isn't really traditional. It combines fantasy elements
with high technology. In the Dragonmech review by Arokh's Twin, he
points out a supposed inconsistency, saying that they wouldn't have the
technology to make a mechanical dragon. I figured they very well
could have, because in Drakan, they had the technology to create force
field gates, motion-sensor spike traps, and tower-mounted lightning crystals
that could be repaired overnight.
My family and I celebrated Independence
Day today by going to a local fireworks show. It was still fun, but
it didn't have the magic that it used to. Maybe the reason for that
is that I'm getting older, or maybe it's that computer game graphics are
becoming more impressive all the time, and the excitement of real fireworks
isn't there for me anymore. We sat close to where they were shooting
them off, and there were pieces of ash coming our way. One of the
embers, which landed behind a tree next to us, was still glowing.
I used to wonder if fires ever broke out, but now it really doesn't matter
to me. I had other things on my mind tonight, I guess...
I've decided that if I'm talking
about Meridian all the time, I might as well show people the result of
my efforts. So, I've slapped together a magic
test for my new level series, Meridian. I don't want to waste
any bandwidth on this page with screenshots, because I really don't think
it's worth it just yet. The walls aren't textured right, the lighting
is off, and most of the level geometry isn't even there. It's just
a test of what the spells will look and function like in the finished level.
Two more spells, the Fireball
and Ice Bomb, are now a part of Meridian. Also, I changed the look
of the spell pickups. They used to be in the powerup class, as invisible
objects with an appearance effect. This system had some problems.
First of all, they couldn't be death objects for monsters without appearing
high up in the air, and there really wasn't any way to create another object
that would spawn the magic. Second, if I were to discard one of the
spells, it would be invisible because only the base model and not the effects
would appear. So, after some consideration, I decided to use crystal
globes, taken from an enlarged Death Crystal model, as the ammo packs for
spells. First I used unshaded models, which just showed up as unsightly
monochrome circles in the game. Then I shaded it using smooth shading
and specular highlights, but that looked too solid and didn't quite fit.
Finally, I slapped an alpha texture on the models to make the spheres transparent,
and now they will do just fine. I just hope the file size can stay
small as more spells are created.
I created the first magic spell,
the Lightspark, which is a basic magic missile attack. It uses a
2D model with a transparency effect, like many of the explosions and sparkles.
All my spells will be made up of this kind of graphic because they take
up less space in the database and I'm not good at editing existing 3D models
with the modeler. I tried out the Lightspark against some test enemies,
such as those improved orcs and even a primitive giant that throws an unlimited
supply of wine jugs at me. Those giants are able to use anything
as a throw object.
Today, I started designing the
weapons and magic system of my latest Drakan single player level, Meridian.
The primary close-range will be a staff with spikes on the end. It
is shaped like the club the orcs use and it has good range. The first
magic spell you get will be a basic magic missile. Of course, I'm
not
going to use the name "magic missile" because it's used by too many other
games, but I haven't been able to think of a better one. As for the
enemies, since you start out with a fairly powerful set of weapons, there
will be stronger orcs and wartoks on the first level, as well as some of
those annoying giant dragonflies in the canyon section. Don't worry
if you hate those dragonflies, though, because I'm making it so you don't
even have to go through that section.