User talk:MvBarracuda

This is my personal talk page, meant to become a place to collect all kind of useful links and notes.

Roadmaps

 * Milestone 1
 * Roadmap
 * http://parpg-trac.cvsdude.com/parpg/roadmap

Animation directory structure

 * action1_0.png
 * action1_1.png
 * etc.
 * animation.xml
 * etc.
 * etc.
 * agent1.xml
 * etc.
 * animation.xml
 * etc.
 * etc.
 * agent1.xml
 * etc.
 * agent1.xml
 * etc.
 * etc.

Asset filename scheme

 * D o n ' t u s e  a n y  s p a c e  c h a r a c t e r s! Don't-use-hyphens-either. Use_underscores_instead!
 * Don't.use.any.additional.dots.in.the.file.or.directory.name
 * All files and directories are lower case only! DON'T USE UPPERCASE CHARACTERS
 * Multiple frames of one action of a set of animations are enumatered starting at 0 without any leading 0's: run_0.png, run_1.png, etc.
 * Angles are enumerated with leading 0's: 000, 045, 090, 135, 180, 225, 270, 315. Polar coordinate system applies (starting East, going counter-clockwise)

Map editor tutorial
Map editor tutorial

Project management department

 * Switching to Trac for all departments

Writing department

 * Drunkard dialog by zenbitz: 

Detailed version
Title: Taylor-made (sic!) strategies

Heya and welcome to yet another PARPG news update. Two weeks have passed since the last regular one and I have to say that they were rather eventful for the development team. Let's jump into the news update right away.

Project management department We've published our first official press release at the blog recently and sent it out to two websites, hoping that they would pick up the story in their news sections. Fortunately the old school Fallout fansite nma-fallout.com covered it and we're quite grateful for their support to help spreading the word about PARPG. Feedback has been generally positive, if you're interested in the details check out the news discussion thread at their forums. We thank NMA admin Brother None for his continued support of the project!

Programming department There are a bunch of potential topics to cover in the programming department but I want to focus on the prolly most important one first: PARPG developer or1andov ported the FIFE map editor for PARPG so it's now possible to create and edit PARPG-specific maps via the editor instead of doing it by hand. The editor has been working since quite some time on Linux but it took us a few days to figure out some specific win32 problems that held us back from using it on this platform. Fortunately kaydeth found the culprit in the end and fixed the issue.

The FIFE map editor is a great tool but it's not the most user friendly one; there is definately room for improvement in this field. We're currently working on a map editor tutorial but there are still a lot of aspects of the tutorial that we will have to flesh out in the course of the next weeks. I'm rather short of time right now but hopefully I can continue to work on it, especially on the weekends.

The last two weeks have been quite productive for the entire programming department. New Python programmer amo-ej1 created a tool to automatize XML animation file generation for agents (=(non-)player character(s)). You can grab a copy of it at our Subversion repository. In the meanwhile Kaydeth continued to clean up the code base to ensure that it's compatible with the PEP 8 Python coding standard proposal.

I can't cover all of the recent developments in the department in detail. So if you would like to know more, please check the full project timeline</a> of the last two weeks at Trac</a>.

Writing department The work on the techdemo is coming along quite nicely in the writing department. Game mechanics designer zenbitz and community member shevegen decided to step up by starting to flesh out the techdemo quests</a> article at the wiki. Feel free to lend them a hand by contributing. Both of them can be often found at the IRC channel</a> of the project so you've got a good chance to get a hold of them there.

Graphics department Despite the small workforce in the graphics department at this point, there is quite some progress to report in this field. Fallout modding veteran Continuum created a junkhouse residing on a fundament of barrels: <img src="http://wiki.parpg.net/images/thumb/3/3b/JUNKHOUSE.png/500px-JUNKHOUSE.png" alt="Junkhouse render by Continuum" /></a>

3d artist Sirren created the first building for the upcoming techdemo - a guard tower: <img src="http://wiki.parpg.net/images/thumb/e/e2/GUARD_TOWER.png/500px-GUARD_TOWER.png" alt="Guard tower render by Sirren" /></a>

You surely remember Sirren's agent animations that have been covered in some of the recent news updates? Russian Flash developer Dragon created a little web application to show the animations in action. In case you haven't checked them out yet as you didn't want to build FIFE from SVN sources, feel free to give his app a test: http://lab.dragonnoid.ru/flash/isometry/</a>

Last but in no way least, concept artist JustinOperable created a first character portrait for the upcoming techdemo. Check out his awesome drawing of the female guard character that will be used as portrait for the dialog interface: <img src="http://wiki.parpg.net/images/thumb/4/4d/Guard-1.png/500px-Guard-1.png" alt="Female guard portrait by JustinOperable" /></a>

That's all for today. Next news update scheduled for Monday, 2nd of November. See you then :-)

HTML English
Heya and welcome to yet another PARPG news update. Two weeks have passed since the last regular one and I have to say that they were rather eventful for the development team. Let's jump into the news update right away.

Our first press release has been a success and the project got featured in the news section of old school Fallout fansite NMA</a>.

Our programmers finally managed to customize the FIFE map editor for our purposes and a first map editor tutorial</a> is in the making. Zenbitz and shevegen stepped up in the meanwhile and have started to flesh out the quests that are planned for our first techdemo release</a>.

A fellow Russian Flash programmer created a web application</a> to test Sirren's rendered characters and Fallout modding veteran Continuum modeled a junkhouse</a> residing on a fundament of barrels. In the meanwhile Sirren created his first building for the upcoming techdemo as well: a guard tower</a>.

Read the full news update at the PARPG development blog</a>.

That's all for today. Next news update scheduled for Monday, 2nd of November. See you then :-)

And here's your visual teaser for today's update. A quite nice looking guard character portrait created by concept artist JustinOperable:

<img src="http://wiki.parpg.net/images/thumb/4/4d/Guard-1.png/500px-Guard-1.png" alt="Female guard portrait by JustinOperable" /></a>

BBcode English
Heya and welcome to yet another PARPG news update. Two weeks have passed since the last regular one and I have to say that they were rather eventful for the development team. Let's jump into the news update right away.

Our first press release has been a success and the project got featured in the news section of old school Fallout fansite [url=http://www.nma-fallout.com/]NMA[/url].

Our programmers finally managed to customize the FIFE map editor for our purposes and a first [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/Map_editor_tutorial]map editor tutorial[/url] is in the making. Zenbitz and shevegen stepped up in the meanwhile and have started to flesh out the quests that are planned for our first [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/Draft:Techdemo_Quests]techdemo release[/url].

A fellow Russian Flash programmer created a [url=http://lab.dragonnoid.ru/flash/isometry/]web application[/url] to test Sirren's rendered characters and Fallout modding veteran Continuum modeled a [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/images/3/3b/JUNKHOUSE.png]junkhouse[/url] residing on a fundament of barrels. In the meanwhile Sirren created his first building for the upcoming techdemo as well: [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/images/e/e2/GUARD_TOWER.png]a guard tower[/url].

Read the full news update at the [url=http://blog.parpg.net]PARPG development blog[/url].

That's all for today. Next news update scheduled for Monday, 2nd of November. See you then :-)

And here's your visual teaser for today's update. A quite nice looking guard character portrait created by concept artist JustinOperable:

[url=http://wiki.parpg.net/images/4/4d/Guard-1.png][img]http://wiki.parpg.net/images/thumb/4/4d/Guard-1.png/500px-Guard-1.png[/img][/url]

BBcode German
Moin und herzlich Willkommen zu einem weiteren PARPG News Update. Zwei Wochen sind seit dem letzten Update vergangen und ich muss sagen, dass dies schon ganz ereignisreiche 14 Tage für uns waren. Deshalb direkt zu den Neuigkeiten.

Wir hatten vor kurzem unseren ersten Press Release veröffentlicht und PARPG wurde daraufhin in der Newsrubrik der bekannten Fallout Fansite [url=http://www.nma-fallout.com/]NMA[/url] vorgestellt.

Unsere Programmierer haben es geschafft den FIFE Map Editor so anzupassen, dass er jetzt auch mit PARPG Maps umgehen kann. Folgerichtig musste jetzt auch ein [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/Map_editor_tutorial]Map Editor Tutorial[/url] her, an welchem zur Zeit arbeiten. Zenbitz und shevegen haben in der Zwischenzeit den ersten Schritt gewagt und sich an die Ausarbeitung der [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/Draft:Techdemo_Quests]Techdemo Quests[/url] gemacht.

Ein Flash Programmierer aus Russland fühlte sich durch Sirrens Charakteranimationen inspiriert und hat daraufhin eine [url=http://lab.dragonnoid.ru/flash/isometry/]Webapplikation[/url] erstellt um diese online bestaunen zu können. Fallout Modding Veteran Continuum hat eine [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/images/3/3b/JUNKHOUSE.png]Bruchbude[/url] erstellt, welche aus einem Fundament aus Tonnen steht. Davon angespornt hat Sirren das erste Gebäude für die Techdemo fertiggestellt: ein ehemaliges Wohnhaus, welches zum [url=http://wiki.parpg.net/images/e/e2/GUARD_TOWER.png]Wachturm[/url] umfunktioniert wurde.

Das war's für heute. Das nächste Update gibt es (voraussichtlich) am Montag, dem 2. November.

Und hier ist der heutige Teaser: eine von Concept Artist JustinOperable erstellte Zeichnung. Gezeigt wird eine weibliche Wache; das Portrait wird aller Voraussicht nach für das Dialoginterface verwendet werden:

[url=http://wiki.parpg.net/images/4/4d/Guard-1.png][img]http://wiki.parpg.net/images/thumb/4/4d/Guard-1.png/500px-Guard-1.png[/img][/url]

Links

 * MinGW snapshots: http://tdragon.net/recentgcc/
 * How to market a product: http://blog.businessofsoftware.org/2009/07/seth-godins-talk-from-business-of-software-2008.html

Workflow

 * Each department can have a specific workflow to not force them to use tools they don't feel comfortable with. This is a rule of thumb as tools might be useful but require initial effort to get used to them.
 * Trac will be used for the following tasks:
 * sending in patches.
 * reporting bugs.

Quotes about PARPG

 * News update: "It's time for a little news update. We've boiled down possible setting and game mechanics aspects in the last week. So far we've agreed on a nuclear winter setting; furthermore the game will take place in Northern Europe / Scandinavia. In case you're interested about the details, feel free to check out the full news update at the PARPG development blog."
 * Reply at the Obsidian forums: "Some poorly thought out choices already. While I certainly hope for the best for your project I am expecting vaporware."

Image resize trick

 * [[Image:Drunkard_dialog.png|500px]]