Descent 1 1/2

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Sun Nov 18, 2018 6:36 pm

I had an idea for the Tycho Brahe boss level, built around a variation on Io's key thing (yellow is in no security rather than red) and having lava mixed in with the ice. As for the boss, I had an idea to focus it around having several entry points to the actual arena, making that the strategic aspect rather than being able to time a cloak/invuln.

Naphtha · Post by **Naphtha** » Mon Nov 19, 2018 5:01 am

Finally finished Ganymede Outpost after a very long delay. Marked each hidden door in the editor with either a Class 1 Drone or an energy boost just to indicate if it is meant to be a secret or a trap, but since it's so early in the set and I'm not sure on the intended difficulty, I figure it's up to you to decide whether some trapdoors can be switched out in favor of secrets. It will still need to be converted to D2, though.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Nov 19, 2018 9:53 am

Naphtha wrote: ↑Mon Nov 19, 2018 5:01 am Finally finished Ganymede Outpost after a very long delay. Marked each hidden door in the editor with either a Class 1 Drone or an energy boost just to indicate if it is meant to be a secret or a trap, but since it's so early in the set and I'm not sure on the intended difficulty, I figure it's up to you to decide whether some trapdoors can be switched out in favor of secrets. It will still need to be converted to D2, though.

You're quite tireless man! Barely finished PS and already back on this wagon. Thanks a lot, I'll take a look at it now!

EDIT: Ok, checked it out. Holy ★■◆●, dat geometry!Brilliant level, as always. When seeing the blue key it caught me off guard for a moment there. I was like "hey, we agreed on no disappearing walls and switches in the solar system portion!" But then I found the actual way of getting to the blue key and I was all like "you clever beast!" Oh yeah, and it was played through D1X, which I remembered only at the time of writing this post, lol

One thing: Think you could work in at least a token amount of one of the jail textures into one of the hostage jail cells? I like the texturing there very much, but this one texture is pretty much a staple and it would be nice to see it in the level, if only in minuscule amounts.

Naphtha · Post by **Naphtha** » Mon Nov 26, 2018 6:34 pm

To be honest, the level was half-finished as of 2016 and I ran out of inspiration then. Not to mention most of the last few months of working on Plutonian Shores was for things like the briefings and balance tweaks rather than cubing any of the levels, so yeah... I had more time to recharge than you might think.

Edited the hostage cell textures. The cell behind the yellow door has a bit of a seam on its right-side wall (looking back towards the door once you've entered it), but I left it that way because it kind of left a unique pattern in the texturing. I can still fix that up if you want me to, of course, but I wanted your opinion on how it looks first.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Tue Nov 27, 2018 11:45 am

Super busy week at work with tons of overtime, but I'll check it out ASAP and let you know. I can't imagine not being happy though.

BTW, do you intend to do the conversion yourself, or should I do it?

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Sun Dec 02, 2018 8:02 pm

Here's what came of the idea:

(The last image is an issue I noticed with the D1-GR4 POG)

Shall I send the level?

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Dec 03, 2018 5:14 am

Looks interesting. The issue from the last image should be resolved by making sure you import the proper template file to the proper PIG and not make any changes to the PIG afterwards - in my experience it looked good at least. Texturing here looks like it could use some work, but in some parts it's pretty cool. This level would be a good opportunity to think about combining those bright, whitish Puuma textures with some of the "ice" whites, to create something of a hybrid look - but it would of course need to be done tastefully

Then again, after playing some Plutonian Shores, I'd really like to have some more Naphtha submissions for the Beta Ceti section :/

Naphtha · Post by **Naphtha** » Tue Dec 04, 2018 9:28 pm

I guess on that note, I'll stake my claim on PTMC Remote Tracking Station. It might take me a while to finish with only a very basic concept in mind right now, but I did want to provide more levels to the later sections anyway.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Wed Dec 05, 2018 11:23 am

Naphtha wrote: ↑Tue Dec 04, 2018 9:28 pm I guess on that note, I'll stake my claim on PTMC Remote Tracking Station. It might take me a while to finish with only a very basic concept in mind right now, but I did want to provide more levels to the later sections anyway.

And that is very much fine by me! I made it to level 21 of PS just yesterday, gotta say the D1 texture feel is quite strong with these recent levels. That said, the Baloris-like level that follows is probably the most stunning level of that kind that I've ever played

So the question again is: want me to convert Ganymede to D2 or can you handle it yourself?

Naphtha · Post by **Naphtha** » Wed Dec 05, 2018 1:36 pm

Oh, sorry. I was going to leave the conversion to you just in case it ends up more consistent that way.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Wed Dec 05, 2018 4:16 pm

Naphtha wrote: ↑Wed Dec 05, 2018 1:36 pm Oh, sorry. I was going to leave the conversion to you just in case it ends up more consistent that way.

Ok. I haven't done any of these in a while and it might be a bit tough to get back into the swing of it, but I should manage I guess. The toughest thing to get right are the monitors, the rest of the textures are a trifle.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Wed Dec 05, 2018 4:57 pm

Well, here it is with Puuma Sphere textures in a couple extra spots!

Sa-Matra I
(Bonus Earthshakers if you know where I get the name from)

Also unless I have an outdated version of the POG, that monitor came from D1-GR4 into an ice.pig level without any PIG changes since.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Dec 06, 2018 9:29 am

LightWolf wrote: ↑Wed Dec 05, 2018 4:57 pm Well, here it is with Puuma Sphere textures in a couple extra spots!

Sa-Matra I
(Bonus Earthshakers if you know where I get the name from)

Also unless I have an outdated version of the POG, that monitor came from D1-GR4 into an ice.pig level without any PIG changes since.

IMO not your best level. Lazy layout tendencies are still prevalent here and there, the geometry overall is D1+ tier at best, the texturing is rather unexceptional, there's an over-reliance on the circular gimmick in the level and overall it's a bit below the quality threshold I'm after. Not to mention you completely half-assed the D1 moving textures, only replacing the first frame of each texture rather than all of them. Monitors, doorlights, lava... that's what we have the template POGs for. I think we should be way past the stage of needing to tell you that.

So yeah, it's a no from me, but guys, feel free to check out the level yourselves and maybe outvote me on this

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Thu Dec 06, 2018 5:42 pm

If I have to delete and reimport that POG one more time...

At least I got the time to do another geometry pass taking me up to 898 segments...

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pd4upH ... sp=sharing

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Dec 10, 2018 2:23 pm

I've converted Ganymede. I think it's perfectly accurate, but I might be missing something. Naphtha, if you feel like it, please check out the D2 version and see if you can't recognize something. I skipped importing the textures which are 100% covered by doorlights though, and I replaced one "Alpha" sign with a "Warning" one. Other than that it should be fine though, down to every single decoration. The monitors work too

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Dec 17, 2018 11:51 am

Hey guys,

I've added a tracker Excel file where we can mark all the music choices, along with checksums and other visual representations of what's accounted for and what isn't. It's on Dropbox, right in the "Other Files" directory. Added a link to the OP too. Feel free to make some suggestions for music choice in that file if you'd like - I'll be able to review it later on.

I'm also going to add a tab called "robot representation" which will have all the robot types listed and judge how well they're represented in the game by the number of levels they appear in. I'm not sure if a mathematical approach to this is the right way to go, but I still kinda think 5 appearances should be the bare minimum for every robot type. Given how many levels we have in this mission, that should be rather easily achievable even with limited robot rosters for any single level. Since I'd also like to se an overrepresentation of Class 1 Drillers and Super Hulks in the mission - especially the later levels, I might also introduce calculations such as appearance rate in the "easy", "medium" and "hard" portion of the game etc etc, that should make it easier to fine-tune the difficulty. Of course there's more to difficulty than just that (obviously), but that should still give us some nice statistical data.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Thu Dec 20, 2018 7:43 pm

If one of my levels has a MIDI song that isn't D2L1, then that was what I was thinking of for that level.
Quick thing I should mention: Currently level 4 has D1L8, meaning that secret level 3 (Quartzon Planetary Vault) would use that same song. IMHO D1L8 doesn't sound too watery.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Thu Dec 20, 2018 8:32 pm

I still think level 4 should use D1L10 if it uses one of D1's three Mars songs at all.
D1L8 is the sort of track that could work well for levels with plenty of other colour schemes and I'd like to see that explored.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Thu Dec 20, 2018 8:51 pm

Trying to decide if it would work better with a green or icy level.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Thu Dec 20, 2018 11:14 pm

That's why we have the file xd plenty of time to decide.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Dec 31, 2018 11:40 am

Haha, I just saw your "location" back to back with Lightwolf's.
The world makes slightly less sense now.

I just wanted to give you a heads up on a conversation in the Descent discord channel (#descent-sp) between Sirius and Parabolicus about getting D1-style exit sequences working in D2. I couldn't follow the whole thing but it sounds like they actually got something that worked. I can try and send you an invite to the channel if you want to take a look since I don't believe you're on there -- if you're interested I advise you to go do that before this gets buried under new conversations.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Mon Dec 31, 2018 6:20 pm

Happy to confuse

Looks like what they did is extract the exit sequence info from the D2 demo. I saw a download file (d2exit.zip), still gotta check it out. Looks like the data is only readable by source ports however.

If we go through with this we may have to make sure every exit tunnel works. I know (though I'm not sure if one made it through) that I've submitted some levels with 3-segment exits to free up cubes for other parts of the level.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Dec 31, 2018 8:27 pm

I thought of that too, especially for a few of my own maps where I already had to cut out parts that pushed them over 900 segs.
Still a good option to have. It's always nice to be able to blow somebody's mind wide open.

Happy new year-- only 3 and a half hours of 2018 left here, and good riddance I say!

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Tue Jan 01, 2019 8:50 am

Well that's definitely interesting! I'd sure love to see this work. I think some additional assets would be required, though. Talking about some background objects which we had in Descent, as well as the obvious - the different colors of the planets' crusts. But yeah, I'm not on that discord, so feel free to paste an invite link here or wherever.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Tue Jan 01, 2019 11:42 am

I may need to get ChillyBus to do it 'cause making links to the server myself as a non-admin doesn't seem to work.

LightWolf · Post by **LightWolf** » Tue Jan 01, 2019 5:29 pm

I could create an invite pretty easily?
https://discord.gg/DEGHMf6

Maybe the channel you're linking to makes a difference.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Wed Jan 02, 2019 3:38 pm

Thanks, I'll join that channel

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Sat Jan 05, 2019 3:04 pm

I just took a look at Naptha's Jupiter level -- the layout and structure have the look of a revamped Phobos Encounter, which is really cool. A lot of the structure in that pack had an almost Half-Life-esque ominous feeling that I've never quite seen captured the same way in this game.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Jan 21, 2019 9:04 am

There are a lot of different feelings in different Descent missions. Descent 2 is sadder and darker than D1, but nothing is as sorrowful as Entropy, for example. Guess this feeling is created primarily by dim lighting, though vast, spacious geometry along with dark textures also play a role for sure.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Jan 21, 2019 10:27 am

Music plays a big role too (which is why I'm moving Vision's track to this map), but yes. What you describe is kind of what I'm getting from Ganymede, but with less verticality than Entropy.
Kind of like Phobos level 1 or 3. I seem to recall the second map having a different sorta vibe, but it's been a while.

Speaking of music, I just recieved an old Yamaha keyboard which uses an actual soundblaster chip for its synthesizer. Might be worth a couple of extra songs for here, even though I think I'm near completion for my part of the OST.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Jan 21, 2019 12:36 pm

Nice! Good keyboards or just midi keyboards are an asset for sure. I'll be looking for one too for sure, just to control VSTs on my PC and maybe record something. Creating music is super fun once you've got the tools. And skills :C

As for Ganymede, it just felt like a picture perfect D1 level to me, really. I didn't get any sort of sad vibes from it, nothing like Entropy or D2 at all.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Jan 21, 2019 4:50 pm

Hah, this one's so old it doesn't have midi support. But I have three other keyboards for that.
The point of this one is that it sounds exactly like an OPL2 card (because it is one). It's better than Dosbox's digital emulator because it's the real, analog thing.

Since I moved Vision's track around, I've added two more songs for Makemake and Planetary Life Research -- the two that used his song originally. The PLR track is a new one and it uses that keyboard... liberally...

So if you want to see what I mean, that song's available for hearing.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Sun Jan 27, 2019 1:11 pm

Awright - I somewhat broke my lazy arse streak and uploaded an updated version of the demo containing the fully populated level 5. The HOG is not taking into account Alter-Fox's difficulty modifications (not saying that the final game won't, but let's talk about that later

). Also, the midi track choices might not yet reflect what we currently have in the tracker file, but I don't have the midis handy, so someone else with access feel free and update the midis according to what we have there.

But most importantly, let me know how the first 5 levels feel in consecutive play! I was able to complete it on Insane myself with no serious trouble, even though at this point you're restricted to homers and spreadfire with no quads. The difficulty might require taking down a notch, but then again, maybe not. The link to the download is in the OP, right at the bottom.

My next order of business will be coming up with the robot profile for level 6 and proceeding to populate it. It should introduce the quad laser power-up, so the odds should be evened up a bit.

Enjoy

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Sun Jan 27, 2019 4:06 pm

Yeah that's fair for now. I haven't had much of a chance to go and problem solve my way through all five maps.
It's quicker and easier all around to populate from scratch (even just with a list of what powerups/robots need to be in which mine). If you could get something like that set up, it would be much easier for me to express my ideas in a tangible sorta state.
The purpose of this demo is really just to demonstrate to folks that this is a real project and it's actually going to look and play well, so a little bit of roughness around the edges is probably fine.

I should be able to set up the midis for you. Though I still think the first five maps are using the least creative choices of the set as planned. If I were to set up a DXA for the ogg OST for those first five levels, could you link that in the OP as well?

Oh. Your download in the OP includes the HOG but not the MN2.

EDIT: I've added a zip with the hog including correct midis and an SNG that should work, and the mn2 to the dropbox in the same folder. If you switch the link to that all should be good to go.
I'll have the DXA up momentarily, it should only be a few megabytes. If you still think that's too big for your dropbox take it down when you read this, and tell me where to stuff it (on google drive, hehe).

EDIT TO THE EDIT: I've assembled the DXA but it doesn't work. Rebirth reads the sng in the hog file before looking for it so it always plays midi music regardless of whether any dxa is there or not.
I'm gonna keep looking into this. The only workaround I can think of right now is if both soundtracks are in dxa format and players switch them in and out manually. I think I could set up a folder structure in the zip that would still allow the midi to work "out of the box" at least.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Sun Jan 27, 2019 6:03 pm

Right! I linked just to the file rather than to the entire folder. Fixing now.

What I've noticed thanks to the recently made robot counter mod is that my levels in their initial versions do contain significantly higher numbers of robots than both D1 and D2 equivalents. For example in level 1 it's 57 against D1's 39 and D2's 36. That's significantly larger robot density indeed, but when playing I didn't feel like it was much of a problem. We can think about lowering the number of enemies as per your earlier suggestions in beta testing, that's where I'd look at balancing issues. Though like I said - I insist for all the robot types I put into every one of the levels to stay represented

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Sun Jan 27, 2019 8:00 pm

That's why I think a checklist for each map where you've decided on the enemy representation would be a good idea. Realistically with this many levels there will probably be a bunch of us doing the populations, so ensuring consistency *now* is a good plan anyway.
I wasn't able to read the spreadsheet very well (some sporadic connection issues today) but if that's there and can be transcribed into a format that's easier to read while populating then that's all we'll need.

I want to try tomorrow and see if I can get the midi soundtrack set up as a dxa that'll work exclusively for this mission. If I can make that happen it'll be much easier to compile tracks for the levels than importing them all to the hog, and much, much easier to switch out the two soundtracks for anyone who prefers the heavier sound. I think it'll also mean we're less likely to have problems with the number of lines in the sng document the mission will require (problems I seem to recall TEW having at at least one point). We already have a bunch of files like the descent.pig that'll need to go into Rebirth's data folder separately from the main mission, so I don't see any problem with having one more... unless you see a problem that I don't.
I don't think dosbox compatibility is a big deal (and it wouldn't be entirely compatible with the way we've got it set up now anyway) because I suspect anyone trying to run the mission through there is going to have bigger playability problems than music tracks not playing properly.

Of course what I'd really like to have for a mission this big and in-depth is an installer that will do all of this for the player and allow them to pick between the soundtracks and any other options there end up being. But I've found out the only person I know of who knows how to do that is unavailable indefinitely.

Maybe we can find someone else for it though.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Jan 28, 2019 11:07 am

Well good news, putting the midis in a dxa works (well this part was never really in doubt).
Bad news, it's not possible to get it to function only for one mission pack.

What this probably means is we'll need to have two different versions of the mission hog, one for each soundtrack. Since I'm in charge of the hi-def OST and also now know how to get midi and ogg soundtracks that'll work simultaneously in both Rebirth and XL I request you allow me to handle the implementation for both soundtracks when it's time.
BTW I did find out something cool when I was playing with DXAs -- you can actually use them to replace the Descent 2 Counterstrike campaign and its oh-so-holy spot at the top of the missions menu with any mission pack you want. Not that we'll actually want to do this or anything like that, but it's still cool.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Jan 28, 2019 11:48 am

Alter-Fox wrote: ↑Mon Jan 28, 2019 11:07 am Well good news, putting the midis in a dxa works (well this part was never really in doubt).
Bad news, it's not possible to get it to function only for one mission pack.

Yes, I'm aware. Any DXA will replace all the music coming from the HOGs, unfortunately.

What this probably means is we'll need to have two different versions of the mission hog, one for each soundtrack. Since I'm in charge of the hi-def OST and also now know how to get midi and ogg soundtracks that'll work simultaneously in both Rebirth and XL I request you allow me to handle the implementation for both soundtracks when it's time.

Yeah, no problem at all. File size is not a concern in our times, so such a solution sounds good. Feel free to take care of it when the time comes.

BTW I did find out something cool when I was playing with DXAs -- you can actually use them to replace the Descent 2 Counterstrike campaign and its oh-so-holy spot at the top of the missions menu with any mission pack you want. Not that we'll actually want to do this or anything like that, but it's still cool.

Wow, didn't know that! That might come in handy some day indeed

BTW, I've been thinking of a more proper title for the mission, my current idea is "Descent: Damage Control". It will be contemporaneous with Vertigo and conclude right before Mercenary begins (I suppose), with no major twists to the status quo, but some more exposition on the robots and the FTL communication capabilities of the virus, with an accent on D1-like briefings and overal feel. Too bad it won't be vanilla compatible - though to be fair it should, bar the area in the Cauldron where I put way too many cubes due to my own ineptitude as an architect, where it kinda slows down. Still, it shouldn't be game-breaking due to that chamber's size and places to hide (I could put in some Guideds too to facilitate clearing the... facility out).

I wonder where we left off in regards to D1-like "rotating robot model"-style briefings. Recent discussions about exit sequences have been rather encouraging.

Alter-Fox · Post by **Alter-Fox** » Mon Jan 28, 2019 6:03 pm

Hey, since my plans for today fell through I was going to do a little bit more work on the rebalancing of the first five maps...
I'm very confused about the population on level 4 though. There are three red hornets in an out of the way room, and none anywhere else (and doesn't the introduction of secondary lifter in the same map render them kind of redundant?).
And there's red hulk in the reactor room even though we've previously decided for the mission's sake not to introduce homing missile robots until map 10.

I'm confused over whether those two robot types are actually meant to be in the level or if they're some kind of mistake. At the very least introducing homing missile bots this early is definitely a bad idea. Level 10 was a good, well-thought-out spot for it, and gave me the okay to build an entire map just for that introduction. If it's not a mistake the least you could have done was let me know.
So I would like to hear your explanation for why you put homing missile bots in the mission so early. And it better not be "they're on mars because they're red".

If it's just for the sake of making the demo a little more exciting I can understand that. And apart from that level 4's population isn't quite so bad as the first three, there's mainly just a few too many advanced lifters.

Took a peek at the start of level 5 -- you've really got a thing for making sure the player's under attack the instant they spawn, don't you?

Descent 1 did that six times, true, but I think there's a reason that its sequel only did it once. Players don't always like that. And besides if you do it every other level people are gonna start to catch on.

Xfing · Post by **Xfing** » Mon Jan 28, 2019 11:17 pm

Well, single homing missile launching bots shouldn't be that much trouble, especially ones located in distant areas. That's why I put a few in Ceres too. But if you think they' be too tough for this portion of the mission, then yeah. I had no trouble dispatching them even on Insane, so I'm not really sure if holding off with them until as late as level 10 is that warranted. Especially since if I recall, level 10 is Charon, made by you, which spams them quite extensively already. If not going for a D1-like difficulty curve (strong enemies appear early on, but few in numbers and/or in easily dispatchable positions), we'll have to go for a smoother increase, meaning that other moderate threat robots will need to be brought in, like Foxes, ITDs etc. Which I don't mind, but that should be carefully considered.

As for red hornets - yeah, I should have put more of them in. I suggest adding them to the possible roster of some matcens to make them somewhat more ubiquitous, while also lessening the threat of those matcens (a single hornet is quick to deal with). They're there mostly for flavor, since maps where you could find both red spiderlings and these guys together were very rare or even absent in the official missions.

The player is not immediately under attack in levels 1, 2 and 4. Level 3 is the only notable instance, and 5 only has a single small hulk, which could as well be gone, or replaced with a Supervisor or mine layer to create the impression of business.