Mods that you've had ideas for that failed

[Mr_Cyberpunk]

I wanted to update Deus Ex's UI but gave up because of how annoyingly seperated the entire thing is. Its not fun to work with. I kinda wished that they'd just used static images instead of chopping them up like that because it was messy, but there's probably a good reason for them doing it I guess.

[WildcatPhoenix]

Well, guess this is as good a place as any to relate the sad, all-too-familiar tale of the Man in Black mod:

Some of you may remember the days I used to come around the OTP forums, pitching MIB and searching for modders. The mod was founded in 2006 as a direct sequel to the original Deus Ex, set less than a month after the ending. The player character was going to be a nano-augmented MIB named "Agent Q," the first of the Series Q agents.

Sadly, we pretty much played out the script of "How Not to Run a Mod Team." We bit off more than we could chew. We got distracted with all sorts of things: new weapons, new augs, command menus for NPCs, unarmed melee, dozens of new models for world items, etc. I let certain unruly team members cause disruption, and when personal life (divorce, relocation to a new city) came along, I fell out of touch with the mod group. And it disintegrated, leaving me with hundreds of pages of script/dialogue and a lot of half-assed, disconnected maps.

Fast forward two years...

...we reform, with all new team members and a clearer perspective on "what not to do." We set up a development forum, we partner with the UNATCO Born mod (another sad story), we finalize the writing and script before working on missions. We streamline. We cut unnecessary fat from the development document, we get brutal with all of those "oh man, wouldn't it be cool if....?" moments which drag down mod development.

One of our mappers puts together, I kid you not, the most impressive piece of architecture I've ever seen in the Unreal engine. It was truly spectacular, and I've given him permission to release it as part of a different project just so it might have the slightest chance of being seen by the public. But...

...our server crashed. No big deal, we just migrate servers, right?

Nope. The team just evaporates. It baffles me to this day. I e-mailed, I PM'd, I even looked up team members on bloody facebook to see why they suddenly dropped out of contact. Nothing. It was as if one day we had a team of 12 committed, excited, talented developers, and the next day we didn't even exist.

I still have all the documents. I still have a 400+ page script that isn't even close to what we aimed for. I still love the concept of the mod and wish it could see the light of day. But as for now, it's just another failed mod in a long line of failed mods.

Don't let this happen to you, kids.

[nerdenstein]

It's a shame to see it die.

[bobby 55]

Yeah, it did sound as though it'd be fun. Kudos for sticking with it for so long with all the crap that you had to endure.

[WildcatPhoenix]

It's a shame to see it die.

(sigh) Well, I can't ever fully give up on it. I've poured way too many hours in to the scripting/planning/coordinating of the mod to just abandon it forever.

But the realities of the DX mod scene have to be faced at this point. There just aren't that many of us out there willing to work on an Unreal engine game, especially without any potential for compensation. At least, not to the degree of commitment we're looking for.

It really is a shame, and maybe something will come along (dear god, dare I hope for DX:HR mod tools anymore?) that might infuse some fresh recruits in to the available modder pool. But until that happens, I guess I'll just keep writing and imagining...

Damn it, now I'm seriously bummed.

[Jonas]

Well... dare I say it? There's always the possibility of learning the tools and making it yourself. You may have to give up on having new models in there, or pare down your features if you can't code, but if you can figure out UnrealEd and the basics of UnrealScript, you can go far on your own.

[WildcatPhoenix]

Well... dare I say it? There's always the possibility of learning the tools and making it yourself. You may have to give up on having new models in there, or pare down your features if you can't code, but if you can figure out UnrealEd and the basics of UnrealScript, you can go far on your own.

Oh believe me, in between the first failure of the team and the second failure, I told myself, "Well, if you want something done right, do it yourself."

The problem is the amount of time it will take me, a mapper with skills that could generously be described as "novice," to become an expert with the SDK. I'm willing to invest the time, but is the community willing to wait another 2-3 years for the mod? I mean, what is the mod scene going to look like in 2014? Will there even be anyone willing to play this mod that I'm pouring all this effort into?

[Crowe]

Oh believe me, in between the first failure of the team and the second failure, I told myself, "Well, if you want something done right, do it yourself."

The problem is the amount of time it will take me, a mapper with skills that could generously be described as "novice," to become an expert with the SDK. I'm willing to invest the time, but is the community willing to wait another 2-3 years for the mod? I mean, what is the mod scene going to look like in 2014? Will there even be anyone willing to play this mod that I'm pouring all this effort into?

TNM took seven years to create, and this is seven years after the game became obsolete.

Besides, I recall the MiB mod being advertised on dxediting before the collapse, and the number of people populating the OTP forums are easily double that of DXE. If the mod is worth creating for the small handful of die-hards on DXE, then wouldn't it be doubly worth doing for the number of people on OTP?

[WildcatPhoenix]

TNM took seven years to create, and this is seven years after the game became obsolete.

Besides, I recall the MiB mod being advertised on dxediting before the collapse, and the number of people populating the OTP forums are easily double that of DXE. If the mod is worth creating for the small handful of die-hards on DXE, then wouldn't it be doubly worth doing for the number of people on OTP?

I sure do miss DXE.

Hmmm....alright, I guess there's only one thing left to do, and that's become an expert with Unreal Editor. I can't just let this thing die. So let's consider the mod in "critical condition," on life support, so-to-speak.

[Crowe]

I sure do miss DXE.

Hmmm....alright, I guess there's only one thing left to do, and that's become an expert with Unreal Editor. I can't just let this thing die. So let's consider the mod in "critical condition," on life support, so-to-speak.

There is a difference between becoming an expert with Ued and finishing a mod. If Deus Ex taught us anything, it is that there is never "only one thing left to do".

[WildcatPhoenix]

I sure do miss DXE.

Hmmm....alright, I guess there's only one thing left to do, and that's become an expert with Unreal Editor. I can't just let this thing die. So let's consider the mod in "critical condition," on life support, so-to-speak.

There is a difference between becoming an expert with Ued and finishing a mod. If Deus Ex taught us anything, it is that there is never "only one thing left to do".

Well, as Jonas mentioned, to complete this mod on my own there will need to be a major re-evaluation of priorities. The key elements (which, to my mind, are story, characters, maps, music) will remain in place, but peripherals such as new weapons/augs/items will have to be cut. Yeah, it's a bummer, but I'd rather get something released that falls short of our original "grand vision" than nothing at all.

I've already spent years planning out several maps, often in hilarious diagrams using programs like Microsoft Paint. Yes, you read that correctly. So the level design aspect of things shouldn't be too much of a problem. But learning the real core skills of mapping (proportion, lighting, texture alignment, complex 3D shapes, etc) are simply going to take time to learn.

I'd better go get started...well, get started again...

[Y|yukichigai]

Sorry, I saw some of this and had to comment....

LAMs that stuck to any surface the right way, spawned a laser from the center of them that acted like a trigger so they blew up if anyone triggered that. I only managed with help to get the grenades to stick and arm when lan on any surface, they even land the right way round, but the laser I was not sure how to do. I even made a "LAM Launcher" that launched these LAMs

Laser emitters are actually something I understand fairly well. Creating them is kind of weird but not impossible. The difficult part would be the cleanup operations, i.e. making sure the laser emitter got removed completely.

"Universal Storage" it accessed a map that was a kinda storage area, so player could store items between maps and get them back. You entered the correct user name and password on a special computer and press "Go to storage" and you teleported to the storage area, then with a button in that map, you could "Log out" and teleport back to last map you were on. The problem I had with this was I did not know how to get the storage map to recognise the last map you were on and teleport you back to the exact location you were at before. (At the computer terminal)

That's not that hard: use Deus Ex's flag system to track that information by having the special terminal class set up to automatically log the map and position you're currently occupying before running the standard set of computer activation commands.

"Wood Bomb" these grenades destroyed all furniture in the area they explode in. Never really saw a good use for this one

Yeah, I don't either, unless you want to open EVERY CRATE EVER without wasting precious time hitting things. Still, kind of funny.

I had a few other things that I never finished like MP inventory belt for single Player, having medkits and biocells automatically activate when you lose the right amount of energy or health. Also a zoomable scope so you don't just zoom in the full way, but choose how you zoom in x2, x4, x6 etc...

All of that could be done by making choice modifications to the DeusExPlayer class or the inventory belt class. The scope zoom in particular I can think of how to do, although zoom in and zoom out would essentially be "hard-assigned" to the next weapon and previous weapon buttons.

[dx_blaster]

All of that could be done by making choice modifications to the DeusExPlayer class or the inventory belt class.

Well I tried to "expand" the inventory system of DX but I have some troubles,
1st if you declare a var array in DXplayer greater than 32 the game crashes instantly.
-> var byte testArray[64];

var array >31 than game will crash!

Critical: FMallocWindows::Free
Critical: FMallocWindows::Realloc
Critical: 0000000F 0 FArray
Critical: FArray::Realloc
Critical: 0*2
Critical: FMallocWindows::Free
Critical: DeleteObject
Critical: (33925)
Critical: DeleteGarbage
Critical: (JCDentonMale0)
Critical: UObject::PurgeGarbage
Critical: UObject::CollectGarbage
Critical: Cleanup
Critical: UGameEngine::LoadMap
Critical: LoadURL
Critical: UGameEngine::Browse
Critical: ClientTravel
Critical: UGameEngine::Tick
Critical: XGameEngineExt::Tick
Critical: UpdateWorld
Critical: MainLoop

i only observed this behavior with in deusexplayer.uc, i tested the array config in other .uc's files of deusex.u,
no crash had been occured. i guess some where in deusex is a hardcoded maxium for inventory array items.

1st i though i found it in PlayerPawnExt.uc (part of Extension.u)
-> var private ActorRef actorList[32]; // List of valid actors
but changeing this array had no effect what so ever.
(made it part of deusex.u, maybe this was wrong, but i cant recreate Extension.u without the game going crazy).

If item objects are handled as actors than this could be a lead.
But as my knowledge of unreal or deusex scripting and how they are related to each other is very limited, this is very likely to be a wrong conclusion of mine (as a only searched an array with size 32).

2nd I also thought of an mp like inventory behaviour in sp but as my programming skills are very limited too,
I won’t be able to on my own; I would do it with some help of experienced people just to benefit from the change to become a little bit better in programming my self.

[DDL]

I suspect the inventory "num things" issue is not due to the playerclass determination of total inventory slots per se, but due to the fucktons of other windows and shit that reference that list of inv slots: if those are coded to have an array of 32, but use an <arraycount(playerinvslots); style iterator, then they'll go tits up everytime, coz they're trying to assign inventory slot 33 to a non existent equivalent.

Fixing all that shit would be FUNZ.

And by FUNZ I mean, not funz.

[dx_blaster]

I suspect the inventory "num things" issue is not due to the playerclass determination of total inventory slots per se, but due to the fucktons of other windows and shit that reference that list of inv slots: if those are coded to have an array of 32, but use an <arraycount(playerinvslots); style iterator, then they'll go tits up everytime, coz they're trying to assign inventory slot 33 to a non existent equivalent.

Fixing all that shit would be FUNZ.

And by FUNZ I mean, not funz.

Well there is a "funz" part with inventory array size:
The global var f*** up >32, the local variable does not, meaning:

var travel byte invSlots[30];
-> i guess this is used for keeping track of the inventory list at map changes
-> if this goes higher than 32 - good bye dx

local byte LocalInvSlots[30];
-> I guess this is used for dxplayer to check various inventory behaviour things (pick up allowed, multiple item, room left for item and so on)
-> if this goes higher than 32 - no problem here chef. dx loves it.

I don’t want this post to become a DXEditing replay thing because there is a better board for this -> DXEditing it self
I posted my observation about this specific problem some time ago, if you want to add some ideas on how to track this damn bastard bug/error/inconvenience, please post them here thx:
viewtopic.php?f=36&t=11017